Yasukuni badges

**Nick Komiya** · 10-17-2020, 09:30 AM

We've been talking about different things from the beginning. That is the problem with not supplying photos to illustrate one's question. I thought he was asking about the pink ribbon with number in the photo I supplied.

Yes, Fukuoka is right about the medal style ribbon. Because it was such an expensive event with wining, dining and full range of entertainment, like a multi-night invitation to Las Vegas, they needed a unique ticket, good for that event only, as a color code security system to prevent backdoor entries. These were not meant as keepsakes or badges of honor, so I honestly do not think that much thinking went into what color to use, only that it had to be intricate enough not to be copied by the underground. When they used the same design, that means they devised a different visual security screening process for that round.

In comparison, the next of kin badge in the first photo was a longstanding request from the army, which was finally granted on 3rd August 1931 as Edict 204, which defined the issuing rules and detailed design of the badge. So for this official badge, papers such as discussion minutes from the cabinet meeting are in the archives. Shown below is the announcement in the gazette.

**Nick Komiya** · 10-17-2020, 01:08 PM

I did some checking for you on how much of the invitation listing is in the archives. I did find partial lists used to invite families to the Yasukuni Enshrinement of which the list below is an example. This, however, poses a problem.

For similarly organized events like the Year 2600 Gala, the ID numbers used were the numbers on the invitation cards, so the invitation list showed numbers in clean chronological order.

However, the numbers in the Yasukuni invitation list below is not at all in consecutive order, being "Breaved family ID Numbers" instead. That means to look up on a name for a particular number, you first need to find the listing showing bereaved family ID numbers in chronological order rather than any Yasukuni listing.

**Nick Komiya** · 10-17-2020, 01:36 PM

And this is how the April 1941 Yasukuni Enshrinement list shows up in the late March issue of the government gazette. You can look up a soldier by family name and prefecture, but not through any serial numbers.

**Nagoya10** · 10-18-2020, 03:02 AM

Was it possible for Japanese soldiers or sailors to be enshrined in Yasukuni if they had been captured or surrendered during a war and subsequently died in captivity?

**Nick Komiya** · 10-18-2020, 11:52 AM

To be enshrined at the shrine, "war" had to be the cause and "death" the result, but if death followed after some time from a war wound or sickness, it had to be within 3 years of the event to be a war death.

There are actually former prisoners of the war that survived the war and are enshrined at Yasukuni. A navy Zero fighter ace, who was awarded the Golden Kite 6th Class in the China Incident had to ditch his plane on an island in 1943, where natives offered to guide him to the Japanese post, but actually handed him over to the British and into captivity.

Such cases got recorded as MIA by the Japanese, which eventually got automatically switched to KIA and he was enshrined at Yasukuni, posthumously promoted to Ensign and a Golden Kite 5th Class.

After the war, when he miraculously returned, his family was ecstatic with joy, but when he went to city hall to revive his family register, though his posthumous promotion and award got annulled, he was told that his enshrinement at Yasukuni could not be reversed and he remained enshrined there until his death in 2007.

**Nagoya10** · 10-18-2020, 04:11 PM

by nick komiya

To be enshrined at the shrine, "war" had to be the cause and "death" the result, but if death followed after some time from a war wound or sickness, it had to be within 3 years of the event to be a war death.

There are actually former prisoners of the war that survived the war and are enshrined at Yasukuni. A navy Zero fighter ace, who was awarded the Golden Kite 6th Class in the China Incident had to ditch his plane on an island in 1943, where natives offered to guide him to the Japanese post, but actually handed him over to the British and into captivity.

Such cases got recorded as MIA by the Japanese, which eventually got automatically switched to KIA and he was enshrined at Yasukuni, posthumously promoted to Ensign and a Golden Kite 5th Class.

After the war, when he miraculously returned, his family was ecstatic with joy, but when he went to city hall to revive his family register, though his posthumous promotion and award got annulled, he was told that his enshrinement at Yasukuni could not be reversed and he remained enshrined there until his death in 2007.

Thank you for that great information. I am taking it to be that Yasukuni enshrinement did not distinguish between actual battle or war action/caused related deaths, and any death that occurred while in enemy captivity? The reason I ask is the often perceived attitude of the Japanese of that time that surrender or capture was dishonorable, which seemed to have led to so many instances of war crimes on Allied POW's. Of course in most of the Western world, deaths while under captivity still qualified a serviceman to be recognized as a war related death and generally no stigma attached, at least officially, and I was curious if the same standards were used at Yasukuni, 1945 and earlier. Granted, maybe there were not too many known or recorded deaths of Japanese servicemen in captivity by enemy forces either.

Yasukuni is fascinating to me and if someday I was ever to be able to visit Japan (outside of Narita airport) I want very much to visit it. I especially would like to see the military museums there.

**Nick Komiya** · 10-18-2020, 05:07 PM

Neither do I think he would have been enshrined had the Japanese authorities been aware of his POW status. The point is that being a POW would have brought endless shame to ones family back home, and your kids would have been bullied and harassed at school. So they would not have proactively let their family know of their POW status, preferring to be written off as KIA. Thus many POWs would have been recorded as KIA and unintentionally enshrined.

The Zero pilot above was also so ashamed of his capture that he refused to attend any of the reunions of his former unit for many many years until his comrades could finally put his conscience at ease.