26 May 1945 - Members of 72nd Shinbu Squadron. Three of the five are 17 years old and the other two are 18 and 19 years old. The photo was taken the day before their mission. Left to right: front row Tsutomu Hayakawa, Yukio Araki, Takamasa Senda back row Kaname Takahashi, Mitsuyoshi Takahashi
"The only mystery in life is why the kamikaze pilots wore helmets.” - Al McGuire
Japanese pilots adopted the Kamikaze tactic whereby they made deliberately suicidal crashes into enemy targets, mostly ships. The tactic was most prevalent from October 1944 until the end of the war. The word kamikaze means “divine wind,” a reference to a typhoon that fortuitously dispersed a Mongol invasion fleet threatening Japan from the west in 1281. Most kamikaze planes were ordinary fighter jets which were often loaded with explosives and extra gasoline before being flown deliberately to crash into their targets. The accuracy was much better than conventional attacks.
Before the formation of kamikaze units, pilots had made deliberate crashes as a last resort when their planes had suffered severe damage and they did not want to risk being captured, or wanted to do as much damage to the enemy as possible, since they were crashing anyway. This tactic had huge psychological effects on the Allies as they could not understand the mentality behind it.
Captain Motoharu Okamura was the first officer to officially propose kamikaze tactics and asked 23 student pilots he had trained to volunteer for the special attack force. They put both hands in the air, volunteering to join. "Japan's future is bleak if it is forced to kill one of its best pilots." and "I am not going on this mission for the Emperor or for the Empire... I am going because I was ordered to." - Yukio Seki 24th kamikaze pilot to join.
6 January 1945 - The USS Louisville is struck by a kamikaze Yokosuka D4Y at the Battle of Lingayen Gulf
There were attacks carried out during the invasion of Leyte by Japanese pilots from units other than the Special Attack Force. These have been described as the first kamikaze attack. On the 21st of October, a Japanese aircraft deliberately crashed into the foremast of the HMAS Australia. The attack killed 30 personnel, including the captain Emile Dechaineux and wounded 64 including Australian force commander, Commodore John Collins . The Australian official history of the war claimed that this was the first kamikaze attack on an Allied ship but other sources disagree because it was not a planned attack by a member of the Special Attack Force, but was undertaken on the pilot’s own initiative.
Accounts from this attack include one given by Reg Walker, who was serving on the HMAS Australia, in an interview in 1989:
“And the captain was in a sitting position and - Captain Dechaineux - and he ... we were able to get him down into the rec room - recreation room - which was two ... two flights down from there ... from the bridge, and ... Two decks down. And Admiral Collins had gone by then, he'd been wounded, had a nasty cut under the eye. And Captain Dechaineux had this hole in his stomach, and he was burnt a little, his lips were rather swollen. And ... and it was a tragic sight. Commander Rayment was dead. And there were a lot of badly burnt people around that area. Some were dead, some were still alive. And I was down - by then we'd got the Captain down and others down, they kept coming down into the rec room. Those that were alive. And the sick-bay attendants were there. The commander-surgeon, Flattery, he was there. And very active. A very big man. And I remember Captain Dechaineux saying - he was conscious but ... and he was asking all the time whether there were sufficient ... whether the troops were ... those that were injured were being looked after. You know, you're very conscious of his role as a gentleman, and … as a very much-loved captain. And he kept saying, ‘Look after them,’ Just how serious are the injuries? And that, that’s all he was interested in.”
“Approximately 2,800 Kamikaze attackers sank 34 Navy ships, damaged 368 others, killed 4,900 sailors, and wounded over 4,800. Despite radar detection and cuing, airborne interception, attrition, and massive anti-aircraft barrages, 14 percent of Kamikazes survived to score a hit on a ship; nearly 8.5 percent of all ships hit by Kamikazes sank” This number is according to the US Navy however the exact number of ships that sank is still debated by historians as Australian journalists and Japanese historian Sadao Seno claim that a total of 57 ships were sunk in the kamikaze attacks.