Chapter Five

1.     Japan is made up of 6,852 islands, of which just 430 are inhabited. The four largest and most populous are Honshu, Hokkaido, Shikoku, and Kyushu. The capital city of Tokyo is located on Honshu’s eastern shores.

2.     Prior to this battle, Japan was ruled by daimyo (samurai lords) who established their own small kingdoms. Forces led by Toyotomi Hideyoshi defeated those of the shogun (military dictator), Akechi Mitsuhide, thus beginning the reunification of Japan. Hideyoshi’s brilliant generalship has been compared to that of Napoleon Bonaparte. Daimyo rule remained in effect in some areas of Japan, coming to an end in 1871.

3.     The so-called fire balloons were indeed launched. Most did not reach America, and those that did inflicted little damage. Yet the fire balloons were history’s first intercontinental weapons. Not until 1982 and the Operation Black Buck raids of the Falklands War would they be surpassed as the longest-range attacks ever conducted.

4.     The first Geneva Convention of 1864 was signed by Japan in 1886; subsequent agreements were produced in 1906 and 1929. Japan signed the 1929 treaty and verbally agreed to adhere to the terms of the 1906 treaty. The emperor obviously did not live up to his word.

5.     President Roosevelt had ordered the Pacific Fleet’s headquarters moved from San Pedro, California, to Pearl Harbor in May 1940. This intended show of strength instead became a vulnerability.