Masafumi Arima

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Masafumi Arima
25 September 1895 - 15 October 1944 [1]

Vice Admiral Masafumi Arima
Place of birth Hioki, Kagoshima, Japan
Place of death between Taiwan and the Philippines
Allegiance Empire of Japan
Service/branch Naval flag of Empire of Japan Imperial Japanese Navy
Years of service 1915-1945
Rank Rear Admiral
Commands held Kamikawa maru, Shōkaku
26th Air Flotilla
Battles/wars World War II
oGuadalcanal campaign
oBattle of the Eastern Solomons
oBattle of the Santa Cruz Islands
oNaval Battle of Guadalcanal
oAerial Battle of Taiwan-Okinawa
In this Japanese name, the family name is Arima.

Masafumi Arima (有馬正文 Arima Masafumi?, 25 September 1895 - 15 October 1944) was an admiral in the Imperial Japanese Navy in World War II. A naval aviator, he is sometimes credited with being the first to use the kamikaze attack, although official accounts may have been invented for propaganda purposes.

Contents

[edit] Biography

Arima was born in Ijuin village (present day Hioki city), Kagoshima prefecture. He graduated from the 43rd class of the Imperial Japanese Naval Academy in 1915. He was ranked 33rd in a class of 96 cadets. As a midshipman, he was assigned to the cruiser Iwate on its 1915 long distance nagigational training voyage from Sasebo to Chemulpo, Dairen, Chinkai, Maizuru and Toba. He stayed with Iwate on its cruise the following year to Hong Kong, Singapore, Fremantle, Melbourne, Sydney, Wellington, Auckland, Jaluit Atoll, Ponape, and Truk. On his return, he was commissioned as an ensign assigned to the battleship Shikishima.

As a lieutenant, he subsequently served on the destroyer Uzuki, battleship Suwo and Kongō, destroyer Ashi, cruiser Izumo, and battleship Hiei. He returned to school, graduating from the 26th class of Naval War College (Japan) in 1928 and was promoted to lieutenant commander. After serving as chief gunnery officer on the battleship Haruna and the cruiser Asama, Arima received his first command on 1 December 1937, the converted seaplane tender Kamikawa maru. He was also promoted to captain the same day.

Arima oversaw several naval air force bases in Japan between 1938 and 1942, and was then posted as captain of the aircraft carrier Shōkaku on 25 May 1942. While on Shōkaku, he was in the Guadalcanal campaign, the Battle of the Eastern Solomons, the Battle of the Santa Cruz Islands, and the Naval Battle of Guadalcanal.

Arima was promoted to rear admiral on 1 May 1943. He was given a combat command on 9 April 1944, and was assigned the 26th Air Flotilla, based at Clark Air Base, on Luzon, in the Philippines. After the Battle of Leyte Gulf, at some date between 13 October-26 October (accounts vary), Arima personally led an air attack against USN Task Force 38 in the Aerial Battle of Taiwan-Okinawa. Before taking off in a Mitsubishi G4M "Betty" twin-engine bomber, he allegedly removed his rank and other insignia, and declared his intention to not return alive. Although Arima indeed did not return, and some damage was caused to the Essex class aircraft carrier, USS Franklin, it is not clear that the damage was from a planned suicide attack, and some accounts state that none of Arima's formation reached their targets.

(Another source claims that the first kamikaze attack happened a month earlier. On 12 September 1944, a group of Army pilots of the 31st Fighter Squadron located on Negros Island decided to launch a suicide attack the following morning. First Lieutenant Takeshi Kosai and another sergeant were selected. Strapping two 100-kilogram bombs onto two fighters, they took off on 13 September before dawn, determined to crash into aircraft carriers. They never returned, but there is no record of an enemy plane hitting an American ship on that day.[2])

In the aftermath of the battle, however, Arima was officially credited by the Imperial Japanese Navy with introducing the use of the kamikaze attack, and he was publicized as a hero in the government-controlled Japanese press.

Arima was posthumously promoted to vice admiral. His grave is at the temple of Kozai-ji in his home town of Hioki, Kagoshima.

[edit] Notable positions held

[edit] Dates of promotions

[edit] References

[edit] Books

  • Inoguchi, Rikihei; Nakajima, Tadashi; Pineau, Roder (2002). The Divine Wind: Japan's Kamikaze Force in World War II. US Naval Institute Press. ISBN 155750394X. 
  • Morison, Samuel Eliot (2002). History of United States Naval Operations in World War II. Vol. 14: Victory in the Pacific, 1945. Chicago: University of Illinois Press. ISBN 0252070658. 
  • Toland, John (1970). The Rising Sun: The Decline and Fall of the Japanese Empire 1936-1945. Random House. ISBN 0812968581. 

[edit] External links

[edit] Footnotes

  1. ^ Nishida, Imperial Japanese Navy.
  2. ^ John Toland, The Rising Sun: The Decline and Fall of the Japanese Empire 1936-1945 p.568
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