by
nick komiya
As I already warned you early on that Navy Kamikaze flags are mostly bad, I can tell you that I would not have touched that flag, had I been offered it. At best it's a botched enhancement of a wartime flag.
Flags like these follow certain social protocols, like offering a toast at a party after a short speech. If you have a Xmas party with people you work with, you normally ask the boss to offer the toast or at a class reunion, the teacher, etc, normally the most senior person. In the case of this flag, that toast giver was an Army Colonel ( who Guy mistook as navy) named Einosuke Otake. He wrote the main dedication and Iwata, the soldier's name followed by his signature. He would have been the most senior officer in reserve for the neighborhood and was thus given that honor. However, for a colonel of the army he has embarrassingly poor handwriting.
At that time, though, the "navy student" title above Iwata's name was not there, but this was thrown in later to make him look more like a Tokko candidate. And to add insult to Otake's childish scribbling, Iwata's Dad barges in at the beginning, upstaging the colonel in large messy letters as if stoned with "The Sky's where lads belong", not a solemn way to say good bye forever to a son. Iwata's Dad is a total disgrace in how he treated the colonel. Thus, the garish right half of this flag is devoid of social grace as if brought to you by the Beverly Hillbillies.
On the other hand, two inscriptions at 6 o'oclock ring true as Tokko, one being a subtle "Get hewn into shape at Tsuchiura", which was a training airbase for navy pilots in Ibaraki. and next to it is a typical Tokko poem about falling like cherry blossom petals for the Great Lord. These two belong there and are no ad hoc additions.
But the two references I mentioned in the beginning seem like they were added in neon lights for those who don't know which side is up or back, in other words, to attract enough attention on things like Ebay. I think it's been messed with.
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