The Cannery Boat/Lieutenant Kusama

by Seikichi Fujimori

Lieutenant Kusama
by
Seikichi Fujimori

Lieutenant Kusama

On the first of September Lieutenant Kusama left his regiment in the country and came up to Tokyo. He was to have entered the Toyama Mihtaty Academy, which began on the fifth of the month, but on the first there was a great earthquake. The students were informed that the academy would remain closed until further notice.

Just when he was wondering what on earth to do, he met an Auto-Corps officer whom he knew. “You’ve been called out,” the officer told him. He was attached to the Military Commander of Tokyo after considerable delay, and was given charge of eighteen commandeered automobiles. He worked hard from eight every morning till six at night. His chief job was transporting rice and flour. In the stores, besides rice and flour, great piles of bread and fruit were going to rot, and this at a time when thousands were starving. The reason given for this was that no official instructions for their transportation and distribution had been given. Impatient at such waste and inconsistency, Lieutenant Kusama asked permission to distribute them among the needy. Permission was refused on the ground that enormous complications connected with the settling of accounts would arise and the preservation of the official routine was more vital even than the relief of destitution. The lieutenant was disgusted, but without their consent he was helpless.

Within a short time, however, they turned round completely and ordered him to transport the perishable food. The reason lay in necessity. The supplies began to get so rotten as to be uneatable. The committee’s “conscientiousness” might be regarded as liable to shade over into “negligence.” Suddenly they were in a furore, begging him to take the other things away as quickly as possible, as well as the rice and flour. That meant, of course, to take more than the licensed load, but once a thing began to touch their position, all regulations were brushed aside.

For a second time the honest lieutenant was disgusted, but had to submit. Even then, in spite of the labours of himself and his men, the refugees who received the half-rotten or completely rotten supplies, far from being pleased, were resentful, critical and angry. That was only natural, since the food was more likely to poison them than to nourish the starving refugees. ······ Once, while out walking, he sat down on a bench and some ex-service men came up and sat down beside him. It was just after seven in the evening and they started talking about all sorts of things, as they cooled themselves. The chief topic was the Koreans. Each one was going one better with rumours about Korean atrocities.

The Koreans had poisoned some well; they had thrown bombs into some building where refugees were gathered; and a Korean had been caught carrying a load of bombs; another had murdered some Japanese, but had been caught red-handed and surrounded by a crowd of Japanese, who killed him by inches. …

The honest lieutenant’s sense of justice was aroused by this ignorant, exaggerated talk. To his knowledge all these “plots” and “atrocities” were absolutely without foundation. On the contrary, persecution and slaughtering of Koreans by the Japanese were a horrible fact.

“I don’t know what’s coming over the Japanese people …” began the lieutenant. He went on to explain away and combat the misunderstandings and delusions of the ex-service men. He explained that the story about Koreans poisoning wells had its basis in the fact that certain Japanese put into the wells bleaching-powder to keep the water clean; the Koreans supposed to be carrying bombs were really carrying canned stuff; buildings had gone up in flames, not because Koreans had thrown bombs into them, but because sparks had fallen on inflammable materials. It was the Japanese who had done all the killing; authentic reports of their atrocities had come to headquarters.

As the lieutenant rose to go he heard behind him a voice calling, “Here, you.” He turned and saw two guards; behind them pressed a cloud of ex-service men.

“What do you mean, shouting at a superior officer?” he thundered back at them. The two guards recoiled a little, but the black cloud at the back did not heed him.

“That guy’s a Korean, a Korean dressed up like one of our officers.”

“Sure he is. And he was trying to fool us. If he wasn’t a Korean, what would he side with them like that for?”

“You can tell by his face he’s a Korean.”

Seeing the bloodthirsty mob, waving sticks and yelling, the lieutenant gave a start. If he got into their hands there was no knowing what might happen. For a moment he regretted the lecture he had read them. The mob, watching his every movement, pressed in closer and closer.

At that moment good luck came to his aid. A company of soldiers happened just then to pass by. When he saw them he rushed over and asked one of the officers to identify him. The latter readily agreed to this request from a colleague, and vouched for him before the crowd, and in addition gave him four privates as an escort. The lieutenant thanked him and, glancing contemptuously at the mob, started to climb the slope at Dozaka, accompanied by his escort.

When he thought they had gone far enough to be out of danger, he told the men to go back.

No sooner had he started down the slope at Hakusan, however, than a new mob of seventy or eighty people, just as if it had been waiting until he was alone, suddenly congregated and surrounded him. He felt sick of the whole business, and at the same time afraid. Noticing a police box close by, he went over and asked the policeman for protection, but this guardian of the public would not listen to him. He said that, even if he wanted to, there was nothing he could do. But as the lieutenant was insistent, he agreed at last to go and find two escorts. Guarded by them, the lieutenant set off to claim protection at a guard-house in the neighbourhood.

The sergeant-major in charge was thoroughly scared, because as the mob increased in numbers and daring every minute. They were already hurling showers of stones at the guard-house, which was really only a private house, and with their battle-cries making it tremble as if another earthquake had come. Terrified of getting himself embroiled, the sergeant-major speedily despatched the lieutenant, accompanied by a guard of six men, to the police station.

At the police station, when they learned his rank, they were very regretful and straightway hauled out one of the mob who seemed to be ringleader and brought him before the lieutenant. The lieutenant turned to him and asked what he meant by trying to assault him. The ringleader answered proudly that he was the nephew of a general, and accused Kusama of being a bogus lieutenant. Finally, the proofs of his identity which Kusama produced proved too strong, and the man left the police station somewhat crestfallen. The mob, too, robbed of its sensation, melted away.

Under the protection of two guards, the lieutenant reached home at four o’clock in the morning, just as the forms of trees and houses were coming back to life in the faint light of dawn.

This experience taught our lieutenant many things. First and foremost, he was surprised at the ignorance and gullibility of the Japanese people. Secondly, he realized that it was only his rank had saved his life; but later on, while he was commanding the Auto Corps, a new knowledge came and upset all these ideas. Did it come through witnessing the corruption of the Distribution Committee or the destitution of the population? No, what enlightened him more than all these things was the so-called Higher Politics of the Higher Command.

Close observation of the inner working of the Higher Command led him to see that it was bound hand and foot to the moneyed classes. The army existed not to defend the people of Japan from outside invasion, but to further the predatory imperialism of those whose well-being is rooted in the poverty and destitution of the Japanese people as a whole.

When the deep realization of this truth came to him the lieutenant no longer had any desire to serve in the army. The army, too, for its part had further no use for him.

That accounts for his conversion to Socialism.