Yasuyo Yamasaki

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Colonel Yasuyo Yamasaki commanded the Japanese forces on Attu during the Battle of the Aleutian Islands. He arrived on the island in April 1943 by submarine. His orders were to hold the island without outside help.

The 2650 Japanese defenders under Yamasaki did not contest the landings but rather dug in on high ground away from the shore. This battle produced some of the bloodiest fighting in the Pacific theatre, similar to the battles of Iwo Jima and Okinawa.

On May 29, the last of the Japanese forces suddenly attacked near Massacre Bay in one of the largest banzai charges of the pacific campaign. The charge was led by Yamasaki himself, who was killed later in the day, sword in hand, assaulting Engineer Hill. It penetrated American lines far enough to encounter shocked rear-echelon units of the American force. After furious, brutal, close-quarter, and often hand-to-hand, combat the Japanese force was killed almost to the last man: only 28 prisoners were taken, none of them an officer. American burial teams counted 2,351 Japanese dead, but it was presumed that hundreds more had been buried by bombardments over the course of the battle.