Kamikaze Submarines
Jennifer Wilding

The Japanese Long Lance torpedo was one of the most effective underwater weapons of the second world war. It was not, however, in use for very long during the war as Japan ran out of warships that were capable of delivering it and the Long Lances were left in storage.

By 1944 it was quite apparent that Japan was, for the first time in her history, losing a war and the Long Lances were again put into service. There were still no ships capable of delivering them but desperate times call for desperate measures and the Long Lances were made capable of delivering themselves. They became kamikaze submarines.

Kamikaze pilots are surely among the most romantic figures to emerge from the Second World War. Before heading out on missions of glorious death they lived like gods, receiving the best and most plentiful of everything, wearing Samurai headbands and ceremonial short swords. The image of a young man willing to sacrifice himself on a suicide mission for his country and Emperor is very poignant. They derived their name from a Japanese legend in which the invading forces of Kublai Kahn were blown away from Japan's shores by a wind generated by the god Tenshi, the Son of Heaven. The divine wind (kamikaze) saved Japan at the last moment. The Kamikaze pilots, who would become gods if their missions succeeded, would also save Japan in the last moments of a war. Kamikaze airplane and submarine pilots shared in the potential for divinity.

The air pilots of the Divine Wind were, in truth, a devastating weapon. Their small, light planes were very fast and difficult to shoot down. Almost four thousand Kamikazes died in their "special attacks" with, to them, enormously satisfactory results. It seemed worthwhile to attempt such attacks from the sea.

At first the idea of kamikaze submarines was rejected but as Japan's navy was decimated, fuel became scarcer and the war came closer to home it started to seem not only feasible but necessary. The first prototype was built in February, 1944. The original design had an escape hatch but the difficulties in turning a torpedo into a submarine and the impossibility of pilot retrieval made this feature unfeasible. What eventually emerged was a one-man craft, oxygen propelled, with a hydrogen peroxide driven engine and a three thousand pound warhead. The pilots area was very small, with a few basic controls, a seat and a periscope that could be cranked up and down by hand. It was so small that training was very hazardous, most of the trainee pilots sported bandages on faces that had been gouged by the periscopes during dives.

The model 93 Long Lances were now known as "kaiten", which means "divine fate". It could achieve 40 knots and was small enough to slip though the antisubmarine netting that protected American anchorages. They would be carried on the deck of I class submarines, generally in groups of four.

The first kaiten assault, consisting of three submarines and twelve kaitens, took place in November, 1944 against the American ships anchored in the Ulithi Atoll. It did not go well, one of the submarines was sunk en route. Of the remaining eight kaiten two failed to launch, one leaked and could not be used, two were sunk, one disappeared (later found wrecked), and one failed to hit anything although it did explode. The remaining kiaten hit a fuel tanker, the Mississinewa, which exploded and sank. The Japanese naval command believed that the mission had been very successful, it was reported to the Emperor that three carriers and two battleships had been sunk.

All in all this was fairly typical of the kaiten battle record. They were unreliable in the extreme and often failed to launch or were found to be unusable because of leakage or mechanical failure. They generally failed to hit any target and frequently exploded for no apparent reason. This last may have been the fault of the oxygen used as a propellant, other navies had experimented with oxygen driven boats and given it up as too dangerous. They were also difficult to transport, the Long Lances had not been designed for prolonged periods of submersion and a kaiten that spent too much time under water became useless. This happened a number of times when a submarine carrying kaitens on its deck had to remain submerged because it was under attack. Even extended periods at sea without submersion would ruin a kaiten.

The efforts to make kaitens a viable weapon continued, however. This was largely due to wishful thinking on the part of the Japanese Navy. Competitive submarine commanders would report successful strikes in a sort of one-upmanship to prove the superiority of their crews. The kill rates that were reported were impressive enough that transport submarines were modified to carry kaitens and a massive (aborted) kamikaze/kaiten assault on Okinawa was planned for August 20, 1945.

There were a few successes. The tanker Mississinawa had been sunk in November 1944 and in July 1945 the destroyer escort Underhill had its bow blown off by a kaiten. The ship did not sink outright but was badly enough damaged that it was later scuttled in the Philippines. The LSD Oak Hill was grazed by a kaiten in August but did not sink. This is in stark contrast to the claims of the Navy. Propaganda releases stated that 32 American ships had been sunk by kaiten attacks, including aircraft carriers, battleships, cruisers and destroyers.

Kaitens were not an effective weapon, but they exacted a terrible toll on their creators. Eighty kaiten pilots died on sorties in addition to the sixteen that died during training (including one of the designers). Delivering the kaitens cost the Japanese eight submarines and over 900 sailors. By the end of the war the Japanese navy had only two submarines that were still seaworthy.

Numerous kaitens were found after the war, mute testimony to desperation.