The Niihau Incident, in which a Japanese pilot on Niihau secured the assistance of Japanese residents of that island to secure his release from captivity, and which saw a conflict develop between native Hawaiians and resident Japanese, came to an end when the pilot Shigenori Nishikaichi (西開地 重徳) was killed and the man aiding him killed himself.
The incident became significant in bringing the US Government to internment of Japanese and Japanese Americans.
Niihau was inhabited primarily by native Hawaiians who spoke the language, and owned by a white family that generally precluded access to it to outsiders. It had three Japanese residents, however, and all three helped 西開地 重徳 in his efforts after he crashed landed on the island.
The incident had seen Hawila Kalehano, a native Hawaiian, disarm the Japanese pilot as he was concerned about the surprising event, but he otherwise treated him well. The Hawaiians sent for Ishimatsu Shintani who was marred to a Hawaiian so he could translate. Shintani didn't want to perform the task and only briefly spoke to the pilot. Thereafter, the Hawaiians sent for Yoshio Harada who had been born in Hawaii. Harada was informed by Nishikaichi of the attack on Pearl Harbor. The Harada's, husband and wife, decided to aid the pilot in recovering his papers and escaping.
That night the Hawaiians learned of the attack on a battery power radio. They then confronted the pilot, and it was decided to hold the pilot and turn him over to the islands' owner, who was due to arrive the next day from Kaua'i. The owner, Aylmer Robinson, did not arrive, however, as the military had stopped boat traffic after the attack. The pilot was therefore put under guard in the Harada's house.
On December 12 Shintani attempted to buy the pilot's papers but failed. On the same day the Harada's and Nishikaichi attacked their guards and armed themselves, taking a hostage. They confronted Kaleohano who ran and was shot at. During the night, the escaped pilot and confederates torched the Japanese airplane.
During the night they took additional hostages but became aware that they were being deceived by the Hawaiians and that it was likely that they were going for help. Ultimately a struggle developed in which the pilot shot one of the Hawaiians three times, but was nonetheless overpowered and had his throat slit. Harada killed himself after the pilot was killed.
Shintani returned to the island after the war, after spending the rest of it in an Internment Camp, and lived there the rest of his life. Irene Harada was held as a prisoner until 1944. She moved to Kaua'i and lived the rest of the war there, stating in a 1992 interview that she felt sorry for the pilot and wanted to help him. In an interesting twist, the Japanese government thanked her in later years for her efforts on behalf of the pilot, in spite of her resistance to their doing so.
Authorities, already distrustful of those of Japanese ancestry in the US, were shocked by how quickly all of the Japanese residents of the small island went over to aid the Japanese pilot which had a role in helping to convince the authority to intern the Japanese and Japanese Americans on the continental United States. They were not interred on the Hawaiian islands where they made up 1/3d of the population, but it was felt that it was not economically possible to do so nor that they constituted a danger because of the islands isolation.
Pacific Aviation Museum: The Ni'ihau Zero Incident
Indeed, the incident remains problematic to the social history of World War Two as it does demonstrate that in at least some instances some Japanese and Japanese Americans retained sufficiently strong loyalties to Japan that it could in fact override loyalty to the United States. That does not excuse internment, but it makes it less irrational that it is sometimes portrayed to be. The US and Canada had a long problematic relationship with their Japanese residents as it was in which they both unfairly constantly suspected them of being hostile aliens and had often thought of them as a potential fifth column. The incident gave a real world example of this actually occurring.
The desperate quality of the pilots actions remain curious. The Japanese Navy had designated the island as one to land on in an emergency, as they believed it to be uninhabited. But how anyone who landed there was to be rescued is a mystery. It would have required either a fellow pilot to land there at the time, which was a possibility, and take the others on, or it would have required rescue by a plane designated to that task, which would have been unlikely to have been dispatched. In this case, the pilot attempted to use the plan3's radio to radio for help, but was unsuccessful.
The Royal Navy sank three Italian cruisers off of Tunisia in the Battle of Cape Bon.
Hungary declared war on the United States.
The United Kingdom, New Zealand and South Africa declared war on Bulgaria.
Honduras declared war on Germany and Italy.
The Today In World War Two blog has some interesting items, including the destruction of American airpower in the Philippines.
Today in World War II History—December 13, 1941
A glacier collapse caused 4,000 to 6,000 deaths in Peru when it fell into a lake and caused a morraine landslide.
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