American Aces against the Kamikaze

This illustrated history describes the clashes between the US and the hastily created Kamikaze units of the Imperial Japanese Army and Navy Air Forces, which were some of the last large-scale aerial engagements of the Pacific War.

The Japanese High Command realised that the loss of Okinawa would provide the Americans with a base for the invasion of Japan. In a desperate response, they unleashed the full force of the Special Attack Units, known in the West as the Kamikaze ('Divine Wind'). In a series of mass attacks between April and June 1945, more than 900 Kamikaze aeroplanes were shot down.

Conventional fighters and bombers accompanied the Special Attack Units as escorts and added their own weight to the attacks on the US fleet. During the air battles leading up to the invasion of Okinawa, and those that raged over the island in the following three months, the Japanese lost more than 7,000 aircraft both in the air and on the ground. In the course of the fighting, 67 Navy, 21 Marine, and three USAAF pilots became aces.

As Edward M. Young reveals in American Aces against the Kamikaze, the combat was often uneven. On numerous occasions following these uneven contests, American fighter pilots would return from combat having shot down up to six Japanese aeroplanes during a single mission.