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 As the marines fought for iwo Jima, Nimitz’s staff completed planning for Operation IceBerg, a massive assault on Okinawa, the largest island in the Ryukyus and only 400 miles from Japan proper. (see Map 14.) tenth Army would command the XXiV Corps and iii Amphibious Corps, with four Army divisions and three Marine divisions. the campaign would feature the most extensive use of Nisei linguists to date, many of them in military government for the island’s civilian population.6the Okinawan dialect posed special challenges for American forces. At Fort snelling, MisLs formed a special team of Okinawan Nisei who spoke the Okinawan dialect.69 On Leyte, the 96th infantry Division language team included two brothers, Warren t. Higa and takejiro Higa, born of Okinawan parents in Hawaii. When the boys were ages five and two, respectively, their mother took them to her home village in southern Okinawa, where they grew up and attended school. they returned to Hawaii to avoid conscription into the imperial Japanese Army or forced migration to Manchuria. in 1943 both brothers volunteered and were selected for language training.70 sometime in November 1944 the XXiV Corps g–2 summoned t3g. takejiro Higa: “the minute i entered the tent my heart nearly stopped beating as i saw hung before me a large blown-up map of the southern half of Okinawa. Chills ran up my spine as i realized the next target would be that part of Okinawa where i had lived for fourteen years and left merely six years before.” the photo-interpreter officer showed him an aerial photo of the capital of Naha, but Higa could barely recognize the heavily bombed port. the officer then showed Higa a photograph of the village where Higa’s parents had lived. “My hair stood up! For awhile i couldn’t even open my mouth, i was so choked up.” Higa put his eyes to the viewer and traced his finger over his grandfather’s home and his relatives’ houses (all still intact, he was relieved to see). the officer questioned him about the suspicious concrete structures that dotted the landscape. these were not fortifications, Higa explained, but traditional Okinawan tombs.71 “it was a horrible feeling,” Higa recalled. “ever since the first day i saw the picture, every night i used to dream about my relatives. every night, never miss. . . . i dreamed about my uncle, my cousins, and even my schoolmates.” In January 1945 forty Nisei arrived in Hawaii from Fort snelling, but tenth Army needed more than the school could provide. Consequently, u.s. Army Forces Middle Pacific selected about 165 Nisei with Japanese-language skills who been drafted but had not yet begun basic training. in February about seventy-five were formed into the Commander in Chief, Pacific Fleet (CiNCPAC), 1st Provisional Military government interpreter Detachment, and attached to the assault forces. Once the invasion forces had departed Hawaii for Operation IceBerg, the Army established the Allied Military government Language school at schofield Barracks in March for some 275 Nisei soldiers. in March and April 1945 more Hawaii Nisei were enlisted and rushed through the school. About ninety organized into the 6205th interpreter special Detachment flew to Okinawa between  May and July 1945. A similar unit, the 6201st interpreter special Detachment, went to saipan.72 the battle for Okinawa was marked by the most extensive psychological warfare yet in the Central Pacific. the Office of War information borrowed Nisei from the JiCPOA annex, together with trustworthy Japanese prisoners of war, to prepare propaganda leaflets. the leaflets were “based on twenty-five carefully developed themes....the texts of the leaflets were reworked and reworded scores of times until the ideas and the language itself were intelligible to the average Japanese soldier.” the illustrations “were designed to appeal to the Oriental sense of artistic values.”73 the JiCPOA Psychological Warfare Branch printed and disseminated 5.7 million leaflets, including a weekly newspaper that was disseminated in Japan in the final months of the war. Operation IceBerg began on 26 March on the Kerama islands, fifteen miles west of Okinawa, where the 77th infantry Division with its Nisei team landed on ie shima against light opposition. On the third night of the battle, to the horror of the Americans, over 300 civilians killed themselves rather than surrender to the foreign invaders.74 the 77th infantry Division reloaded onto its transports and sailed away, grateful that its own casualties had been light. the fates were not so kind when ten or more kamikazes attacked the convoy on 2 April. One crashed on the bridge of the uss henrico, an assault transport carrying the 305th infantry headquarters. the regimental commander and executive officer were killed outright. in all, forty-nine soldiers and sailors were dead or missing. Among the dead was a Nisei, t3g. edwin Yukio Fukui. He had been born and raised in tacoma, Washington, and was one of the first Nisei to enlist from tule Lake in November 1942. ie shima was his third campaign with the 77th Division.75 On easter sunday, 1 April 1945, the assault waves came ashore on Okinawa expecting heavy resistance as on iwo Jima. instead they were met with an eerie silence. in Hawaii, the tenth Army kept a forward command post ready to parachute onto the island with a team of airborne-qualified Nisei linguists under sgt. Mits usui. However, because of light opposition, the jump was canceled at H+4.76 On Okinawa, the Nisei, some with CiC bodyguards, set about doing the tasks they had performed during previous campaigns: translating captured documents and interrogating the few prisoners.77 On the third day one Nisei saved 250 Okinawans hiding in tombs in a ravine. According to a war correspondent who witnessed the incident, the unidentified Nisei entered a tomb and encountered an Okinawan woman, who lifted his helmet “to make sure he was of Japanese stock, then gasped and put a hand to her forehead in relief.” Another Nisei told the correspondent: [the civilians] are cooperating very well. this morning we had quite a time inducing a crowd to come out of a cave. they said they had been told they would be tortured with needles. Now they seem happy to be safe—from the way they are chipping in to clean up rubbish, wash clothes and make things livable. they are poor peasants for the most part—a pitiful lot who didn’t expect kind treatment.78 When American soldiers found a detailed topographical map on the body of a dead Japanese artillery forward observer, Nisei worked through the night to translate it. American intelligence agencies had few maps of Okinawa’s rugged terrain; aerial reconnaissance had not been possible until shortly before the invasion. the translated map was rushed to Hawaii, where JiCPOA printed 12,000 copies for issue to every unit on Okinawa.79 On 17 April the tenth Army language team published another important translation, the Japanese 32d army order outlining the basic plan of defense for Okinawa.80 the Nisei also interrogated prisoners of war, but the Americans took an average of only four Japanese prisoners per day during the first ten weeks. One division g–2 told an observer: “the number of interrogators given to the division ishopelessly inadequate. each battalion commanding officer needs one. the g–2 stated that a thousand instances could be cited where lives could have been saved if prisoners could have been interrogated right at battalion.”81 After the initial landings, the XXiV Corps wheeled right to face the main Japanese defenses on the south end of the island. soon the Americans found themselves stalled in brutal World War i–style fighting. Heavy rains turned the soil into a quagmire, and the soldiers faced the most intense Japanese artillery concentrations they had ever seen. On the evening of 18 April the corps language team received a captured Japanese forward observer’s chart that showed all Japanese artillery and heavy mortar positions in their sector. Knowing that an American attack was set for the next morning, Lt. Benjamin Hazard and his Nisei worked straight through the night to translate the chart. they finished two hours before the attack, and Hazard delivered the translation to the corps assistant g–2. However, the attack went on as scheduled with three American divisions—the 7th, 27th, and 96th infantry Divisions—attacking on line. the result was disastrous; at no point did the Americans break through. the corps lost 720 dead, wounded, and missing in a single day. When the corps commander found out about the captured map, he was furious and told Hazard that had he known about the map he would have called off the attack.82 Not all casualties came from enemy fire. One day two Nisei with the 7th infantry Division were cleaning their carbines when one accidentally discharged and grazed toshimi Yamada. When he limped to the aid tent for treatment, he requested a Purple Heart. When the surgeon told him that the wound had to result from Japanese action, Yamada responded, “Well, what the hell do you call the guy?” the surgeon still refused, saying it had to be caused by an enemy Japanese. “Well, he’s sure as heck my enemy now!” Yamada did not have long to wait for his Purple Heart: a few days later he was wounded while flushing Japanese soldiers out of a cave.83 On 16 April the 77th infantry Division seized ie shima, an island near Okinawa. sgt. Vic Nishijima with the division language team saw “an elderly private” walking toward a minefield on the first or second day and “bawled him out.” Only later did he learn that this was the famous war correspondent ernie Pyle. On 18 April Pyle was killed by a Japanese machine gun.84 three days later tenth Army declared ie shima secure and the Nisei stepped up their efforts to persuade isolated groups of Japanese soldiers and civilians to surrender. At one point Nishijima coaxed 150 civilians from a single cave. in the early morning light of 23 April t4g. Mitsuo “Mits” shibata saw another group of civilians approach American lines. He jumped up, waved his arms, and shouted to them. in an instant he fell mortally wounded, probably killed by a fellow American soldier who mistook him for Japanese. shibata, a veteran of the Aleutians and the south Pacific, was the second member of the division’s language team to die in three weeks.85 teammate t.sgt. shigeo ito wrote to his friends in the language school: “After losing two of our buddies, the team almost went to pieces. it certainly was hard to  take. We finally pulled ourselves together and i believe the eight of us did the work of 11 men. Yes, we felt that spiritually the two of the boys are still with us, and so we decided to finish our mission without any additional aid.”86 Most language teams on Okinawa were led by Caucasian Army or Navy lieutenants. One Boulder graduate, Marine 1st Lt. spencer V. silverthorne, earned the silver star on 13 June by persuading fifty-six Japanese to surrender.87 tensions between the Nisei and their Caucasian officers were common. the Army language officers had trained alongside the Nisei, but the Navy officers often had no contact with the Nisei until assigned to a team. the JiCPOA final report later commented, “it frequently happened that the two types of language personnel were in competition, or openly working against each other, largely as a result of misunderstandings which could easily have been avoided.”88 some Navy officers earned the respect of the Nisei. During the fighting Lt. Donald Keene, u.s. Navy Reserve, took over the 96th infantry Division language team. it was, he later admitted, “the first time in my life [i had] a group of men in my command.” Before the war Keene had studied at Columbia university and had a gift for the Japanese and Chinese languages. When he took over the team, “at first i was obliged to demonstrate (as usual) that i really could read and speak Japanese, but it did not take long to become friends.”89 One Nisei on the XXiV Corps team, t.sgt. Warren tsuneishi, had been a student at the university of California before the war and was of a similar scholarly bent. tsuneishi and Keene developed mutual respect and enjoyed long conversations about the nature of loyalty, especially for the Kibei. tsuneishi explained to the Caucasian officer “what it meant to be an American fighting in the Army against the country of my parents.”90 Organized Japanese resistance finally collapsed in June, and the surviving Japanese soldiers began to surrender in large numbers. On 20 June the Americans took a record 977 prisoners. At one point tatsuo elmer Yamamoto went into a cave and persuaded 350 Japanese to surrender. in July 2d Lt. Wallace s. Amioka led a combat patrol into a remote area to locate a Japanese colonel and his staff; when  the colonel was discovered, he tried to escape and was shot by the patrol members. soon more than 7,000 Japanese soldiers were in American hands and tenth Army had to establish large holding compounds for the prisoners alongside camps for the dislocated civilians. On saipan and guam, similar mopping-up efforts continued for many months.91 the rising surrender rate was in part due to tactical psychological warfare developed by the Office of War information with the Nisei and trusted Japanese prisoners. this proved to one observer that “Japanese troops can be reached by propaganda weapons as well as bullets and flamethrowers.” Without such weapons,  he concluded, Americans must “be prepared to continue the Pacific war until the majority of the vast numbers of remaining Japanese troops have been killed.”92 these mopping-up operations could be as dangerous as active combat. t4g. thomas H. ige was wounded by a landmine while attached to an African American antiaircraft battalion on the Kerama islands. the Hawaii-born ige had been a graduate student in economics at the university of Wisconsin before the war. He volunteered for language training and joined the Okinawan-speaking team. While on the Kerama islands, he “made it a point to mingle freely with both sides [African American and Caucasian], eating my meals with each group on an alternating basis.”93 On 27 July he accompanied a patrol led by an African American lieutenant to look for more Japanese and was severely wounded when the point man stepped on a landmine. ige’s bodyguard, an African American from  schenectady, New York, wrote ige’s wife in Minneapolis to tell her that her husband had been wounded.94 On Okinawa, the American troops encountered an unprecedented humanitarian crisis. At one point during the fighting on Okinawa, the 96th infantry Division team rounded up 1,500 civilians in a single surrender. (On saipan, by comparison, only a few thousand Japanese civilians had been taken.)95 tenth Army had plans for humanitarian assistance and military government, but these plans were quickly overwhelmed. Many civilians, injured, ill, exhausted, and terrified, fled their homes. Between one-tenth and one-fourth of all civilians died. By the end of the fighting the military government was responsible for the care and feeding of 200,000 civilians. the island Command started with seventy-five Japanese linguists and within weeks received another ninety-five. the Counter intelligence Corps faced an equally severe shortage and in some cases used Okinawans who spoke some english.96 Lieutenant Amioka’s Okinawan-speaking team arrived toward the end of April; Army and Navy authorities in Hawaii continued to search for other Nisei who spoke Japanese, even recruiting from among discharged or convalescing veterans of the 100th infantry Battalion. Among these was Pfc. thomas taro Higa, an original member of the battalion. He had been born in Hawaii to Okinawan parents who sent him to their home village to be raised by his grandparents. He returned, was drafted, and ended up in the 100th infantry Battalion. When MisLs recruiters visited the battalion in 1942, Higa was not among those selected for language training: “i think that most of us did not respond to the recruitment because we felt a certain mental agony in engaging in interpreting activities against Japan, our grandfather’s country, even for the sake of assisting the country of our birth. . . . Many Nisei felt less mental agony in going to the european front and fighting against the germans.”97 Higa fought the germans in italy and was wounded at Cassino in January 1944. He returned to the united states for treatment. upon recovery he toured the united states for the War Relocation Authority to tell the American public about the Nisei fighting in europe.98 When the battle for Okinawa began, he helped organize a relief campaign in Hawaii for the Okinawan civilians. the Hawaiian Department g–2, Col. Kendall J. Fielder, personally asked Higa to go to Okinawa. Higa agreed and arrived on 25 April to join other Nisei in coaxing Okinawan civilians out of hiding. He went into caves twelve different times, he recalled, and was successful all but once. even so, his main effort continued to be organizing civilian relief efforts.99 Okinawan-speaking Nisei became adept at spotting Japanese deserters among the refugees. Recalled one Nisei: the ability of most of our team members to speak the Okinawan dialect proved most helpful in interrogation of Japanese prisoners. this was especially valuable and effective in separating out the Japanese soldiers masquerading as Okinawan civilians. A few basic questions to them in the Okinawan dialect immediately unmasked their disguise. Very few Japanese soldiers could understand, much less speak, the dialect. they would be embarrassed when unmasked and, thereafter, would be in a more cooperative mood.100 in June the Japanese 32d army’s senior operations officer was identified while trying to pass himself off as a civilian refugee. Captured by the 96th infantry Division and questioned by george inagaki, he revealed that the 32d army chief of staff had ordered several key staff officers to infiltrate the refugees and attempt to return to Japan to report on the battle to the imperial general Headquarters.101 the war was bringing the Nisei closer to their parents’ homes: several found family members on Okinawa. t4g. seiyu Higashi had been born in California but raised on Okinawa. upon graduation from middle school in 1937, he had returned to Los Angeles and had not seen his father since. they were reunited in Naha on 21 June, and the cheerful photograph appeared in newspapers across the united states.102 even ernie Pyle reported that he had met a farmer who had lived in Hawaii for a time and whose Nisei son was serving in the u.s. Army.103 takejiro Higa met his 7th/8th grade teacher soon after coming ashore with the 96th infantry Division. “Neither of us could say much in that very emotional encounter,” he