Minoru Honda, the Japanese pilot who had a bird’s-eye view of US bombing of Hiroshima
- The veteran airman was the only Japanese fighter in the air above Hiroshima when the B-29 bomber dropped an atomic weapon over the city
- Known as the ‘ace of aces’ for his daring exploits including performing highly dangerous sorties into US territory, Honda died on October 3 at the age of 98
Japan’s last surviving fighter ace of the second world war has died, shortly before the nation marks the 80th anniversary of the air assault on the US fleet anchored at Pearl Harbour on December 8.
In interviews before his death on October 3, Minoru Honda, 98, said he regretted that he had not been able to ram his own fighter into the US B-29 Superfortress that had dropped the atomic bomb on Hiroshima on August 6, 1945. Three days later, another heavy bomber unleashed a second nuclear weapon on Nagasaki.
Honda was 18 when Japanese aircraft crippled the bulk of the US Pacific fleet at Pearl Harbour, including sinking four battleships, destroying 188 aircraft and killing 2,335 military personnel.
But as the war progressed and the US brought its industrial might to bear, Japanese losses began to mount and Honda was given a chance to fight for the emperor.
After joining the Imperial Japanese Navy Air Service as a pilot, he earned a reputation as a skilled and daring pilot in the campaign in the Solomon Islands. In one incident in September 1942, Honda made an emergency landing on the island of Kolombangara, where he used a bag of confectionery and a pistol to cajole local residents to help him escape.