Miracles and Massacres Read online

  As Cousens sat in the POW’s small common room at Radio Tokyo putting the finishing touches on that evening’s script, he heard a friendly, upbeat voice from the doorway.

  “Hey, boys,” the stranger said. “How ya doin’?”

  The smiling woman at the door appeared to be Japanese, although her accent was definitely American. She was short and wore glasses and looked almost as malnourished as the POWs, yet her voice exhibited an energy that was missing among the Americans. She was looking at them like they were the first friendly faces she’d seen in years.

  “My name’s Iva,” she said, shaking Cousens’s hand, and then the hands of the two show hosts.

  Cousens introduced himself but was careful not to say too much in the presence of a Japanese stranger. His caution, however, did nothing to slow the conversation, because the newcomer was more than happy to do all the talking.

  “I was born in Los Angeles and I only ended up here by accident. See, my mother asked me to go to Tokyo to visit my aunt Shizuko, who was sick. But I hated it here right away. I tried to find a way home to L.A., but the government kept asking me for more and more paperwork and then they took forever to approve it. Once Pearl Harbor happened it was too late—and so here I am.”

  Cousens and his two hosts stared at her blankly. It was as though she’d kept all of this information bottled up inside her and it was now all spilling out. They offered little encouragement, no nonverbal feedback like smiles or nods of the head, but Iva kept talking anyway. She told them about the life she missed in America, the postgraduate classes she’d taken at the University of California, Los Angeles, and how she passed the time watching college football and horse racing at Santa Anita. But now, she explained, her life in Japan was completely different.

  “One time the secret police knocked on my door at three in the morning. Scared me half to death! They told me how I would be so much safer if I dropped my American citizenship. See, my parents were born in Japan, and so I’m entitled to be a citizen here as well. But, honestly, I’d rather be interned as an enemy here than be a subject of the emperor. That’s exactly what I told them.”

  Iva explained that she’d moved into a boardinghouse so that her aunt would not be subjected to the suspicions and harassment that came with sheltering an American citizen. Since she refused to renounce her American citizenship, the Japanese had also taken away her ration card, forcing her to share the meager provisions of other boarders. Needing a job to survive on her own, she’d found work two days ago as an English-language typist at Radio Tokyo.

  Then, as quickly as she’d arrived to spill out her life story, she was walking back out the door.

  “You look hungry,” she said to Cousens. Then she smiled and whispered, “Tomorrow I will bring you some apples.”

  Tokyo

  Three months later: October 25, 1943

  “This week it’s apples, eggs, some flour, and a bushel of vegetables!”

  Every weekend, Iva walked more than ten miles to buy and barter for food and medicine at farms in the countryside. She was particularly proud of the haul she’d just acquired.

  “Any medicine?” asked Cousens. Iva’s pro-American attitude and willingness to smuggle things into Radio Tokyo had eventually won Cousens’s trust. He regularly took some of the provisions back to Camp Bunka, where he lived with twenty-six other POWs, many of them sick and starving.

  “Some quinine and aspirin,” she said. “And a few vitamin pills.”

  “You’re a lifesaver, Iva. And I don’t just mean that as an expression.”

  Cousens had spent the last few months admiring Iva’s willingness to risk her own safety to smuggle food and supplies for others. Over time he had grown to trust her enough to explain to her their ongoing scheme to sabotage the Japanese propaganda.

  “Why not share the plan with her?” he’d said to his skeptical cohosts at the time. “She’s one of us.”

  Tokyo

  November 12, 1943

  “You have to bring in another announcer for a new ‘homesicky’ segment,” George Mitsushio told Charles Cousens.

  Mitsushio was a fat thirty-six-year-old who’d been born in San Francisco but had chafed at the discrimination he’d encountered. In the 1930s he had immigrated to Japan and, after Pearl Harbor, chose his adopted country over the United States. He had officially become a Japanese national seven months earlier.

  Given the circumstances, Mitsushio was, at least according to American law, a traitor for having served the Japanese government in various attempts at propaganda for seventeen months before renouncing his American citizenship. He was also, at least nominally, Charles Cousens’s boss, although he generally let the Aussie do anything he wanted when it came to Zero Hour.

  “This is an Imperial Order,” Mitsushio persisted. “It has got to be done.” Slicing his hand across his throat, he added, “If not, it is my neck as well as yours.”

  “All right,” said Cousens, who was already formulating a plan. “We’ll see what we can do.”

  As soon as Mitsushio left, Zero Hour announcer Ted Ince turned on Cousens. “What the hell do you mean, ‘we’?” Ince said. “I want no part of this!”

  “Hold your horses,” Cousens calmly assured him. “This is our chance to make a complete joke of Zero Hour.” Cousens knew the Japanese wanted a segment that would make Americans miss all the things they loved most about America. He knew he’d have to come up with something that would sound authentic to the Japanese while making American troops laugh. The idea he was about to let Ince in on had come to him a few nights earlier.

  “How?” Ince asked.

  Cousens smiled. “Sex.” Other radio shows at the time used a sultry woman to make the troops miss their wives and girlfriends back home. Cousens planned to do the same, but with a very different result. “We’ll use a woman.”

  He knew it could not just be any woman; it had to be someone with exactly the right kind of voice. The Japanese would mistake her banter for flirting, but the Americans would clearly recognize it as over-the-top comedy.

  “Who?” asked Ince.

  “The only woman we can trust,” said Cousens, who was enjoying the little resistance effort he’d been waging behind enemy lines. “Iva.”

  Tokyo

  November 13, 1943

  “This is crazy!”

  Iva had just performed the first script Cousens had written for her. She knew there were at least six other women who broadcasted to Allied troops in English over Japanese radio stations, but she didn’t own a radio so she’d never actually heard their shows.

  “I can’t do this! I’m no good at it,” she said.

  “You are exactly what we want,” Cousens promised. “We’re not looking for an experienced announcer and we don’t want a sweet, gentle voice. We want a Yankee voice with a certain personality to it—a little touch of a WAC officer and a lot of cheer.”

  Iva still looked dubious. “I’ll coach you to read the scripts the way I want them,” Cousens said, “so don’t worry.”

  Iva liked the idea of being needed by the handsome, charming Aussie, even if it was only in a professional sense. She may have had serious doubts about her own broadcasting talent, but she had no doubts about the coaching abilities of Major Charles Cousens.

  “How long will you stay with the show?” she asked.

  “Until we’ve defeated Japan,” he told her. He had no desire to leave so long as the show was accomplishing his purposes, but it was kind of a moot point anyway. The Japanese weren’t letting him go anywhere until the war was over.

  That was good enough for Iva. She smiled and nodded.

  “Me too.”

  New York Times Trivia Quiz, December 19, 1943

  Question: Who is Tokyo Rose?

  Answer: Tokyo Rose delivers Japanese propaganda broadcasts—in cultured English accents—directed to American fighting men in the Pacific. The men are amused by Japan’s exaggeration of American losses.

  Tokyo

 
April 21, 1944

  “Greetings, everybody!” Iva said into her radio microphone. “This is Ann back at the microphone and presiding over Radio Tokyo’s special program for listeners in Australia and the South Pacific.”

  Cousens had chosen the name “Ann” as Iva’s radio alter ego because it was an abbreviation for announcer.

  “How’s my orphan family? Have you been good boys?”

  There were other female disc jockeys, Cousens had explained to Iva, who might have asked this question in a sultry, sexy way. But he wanted her to sound jolly, like a happy sister or an old friend. He’d coached her through every word.

  “All right, then, we’ll have some music. A tango to start with. ‘I Kiss Your Hand, Madam.’ ”

  As the record played, Iva sat back in her chair and closed her eyes. She thought of her old life in California—a life full of friends and movies and dancing. She desperately wished she was back there, but she was also happy to have found a way to serve a purpose in the war. The thought that she might be helping the Allies in some small way made her get out of bed each morning with a smile.

  “Thank you, thank you, thank you,” Iva said as the tango faded. “Any latecomers listening? Well, you’re sharing Radio Tokyo’s regular program for Australia and the South Pacific. Dangerous enemy propaganda, so beware! Our next propagandist is Arthur Fiedler with the Boston Pops Orchestra playing Ketèlbey’s ‘In a Persian Market.’ ”

  After a few more songs, interspersed with some brief chatter scripted by Cousens, Iva’s twenty minutes on Zero Hour were up. She turned the microphone over to Ted Ince and headed out the door, singing the UCLA football fight song, Gershwin’s “Strike Up the Band,” in her head. At her request, Cousens had made it a regular on the program, knowing that any homesickness it might induce would be trumped by the song’s timely and inspiring lyrics.

  There is work to be done, to be done.

  There’s a war to be won, to be won.

  Come, you son of a, son of a gun.

  Take your stand. Fall in line. Yea a bow.

  Come along. Let’s go. Hey, leader. Strike up the band!

  Iva Toguri smiled. When the war is won, she thought, maybe I’ll make a career of this radio stuff.

  Time, April 10, 1944

  No one knows for sure who Tokyo Rose really is. [Listeners] are inclined to think she is a Japanese, born on the island of Maui, Hawaii, and educated there. Her voice is cultured, with a touch of Boston.

  Tokyo

  March 19, 1945

  “Will you marry me, Iva?”

  Iva liked Felipe d’Aquino, a bony, kindhearted twenty-five-year-old Portuguese-Japanese pacifist known as “Phil” to his friends. They had bonded at work over their shared opposition to the Japanese war effort. In a city with few American-sympathizers, Iva did not have a lot of people with whom to celebrate her little victories over Radio Tokyo.

  “Yes!” responded Iva, feigning some of the excitement she’d seen from newly engaged girls in movies by wrapping her arms around Phil. He deserved that much at least.

  He is kind and loyal and in love with me, Iva told herself. He will make a very good husband.

  Okinawa, Japan

  August 30, 1945

  Clark Lee was one of the most famous war correspondents in America. Six feet tall, with smooth dark hair and tanned skin, the thirty-eight-year-old had just been through an exciting four years. Trapped on Corregidor with MacArthur, he had escaped on the last submarine off the besieged island, then published a book titled They Call It Pacific, covering the European Theater. Lee returned to the Pacific in time to hear the Japanese emperor’s surrender statement live on Radio Tokyo. Tomorrow morning, he and a small group of reporters were scheduled to fly to the Japanese mainland. Now that combat had ended, General MacArthur was planning to touch down at the Atsugi Naval Air Facility, forty miles from Tokyo. It would be a historic day.

  As Lee relaxed on a stone wall by an ancient Japanese burial tomb, he looked at his old friend and fellow reporter, Harry Brundidge. Short and balding, Brundidge was twenty years past his prime—which had come with a series of stories he’d written about organized crime in St. Louis. Since then, alcohol and aging had taken their toll and Brundidge looked every bit of his forty-eight years. He was still as brash and daring as ever; he just wasn’t as good.

  “Want to make a deal?” Brundidge asked Lee.

  “What kind of deal?” Lee liked Brundidge, but he wasn’t about to follow him blindly.

  “Well, we’ve both lived in Japan,” he replied. “So we know something about the Japanese people that others don’t: when Hirohito told them to quit, they quit. I’m willing to bet that, despite our orders to stay out of Tokyo until the Allied occupation force gets there, it’s perfectly safe. I say we make a break for the capital the minute we land.”

  Lee nodded. The military was concerned about guerrilla attacks so reporters had been ordered to stay out of Tokyo until they were given a green light that it was safe. But Lee loved the big scoop and knew they only came to those willing to take a few risks.

  “Suppose I agree,” Lee said. “What’s our story when we get there? Seems like everyone already knows the war is over.”

  Brundidge smiled. “Tokyo Rose. The whole world wants to know who she is. Our Japanese friends will help us find her.”

  Lee was intrigued. The mystery of Tokyo Rose was one of the hottest stories around. If they found her and got her to talk, then Brundidge and Lee could write the first articles about her—Brundidge for Cosmopolitan and Lee for the International News Service. It was a potentially career-making scoop.

  Lee pictured the large-type, front-page headline and then shook Brundidge’s meaty palm. “I’m in.”

  Tokyo

  August 31, 1945

  Iva was ecstatic.

  Leslie Nakashima, a Japanese newsman, had just called and asked if she’d be willing to tell two American reporters about her experience as Tokyo Rose in exchange for two thousand dollars. Iva replied she’d never heard of “Tokyo Rose,” but Nakashima explained that it was simply the name Allied soldiers had given to English-language radio hosts in the Pacific and Iva certainly qualified.

  Between needing the money and wanting Americans to know how her and Cousens had foiled Japanese propaganda efforts with Zero Hour, her answer came fast.

  “Tell me where and when to meet them.”

  Tokyo

  Morning, September 1, 1945

  Iva Toguri walked into room 312 of the Imperial Hotel with Leslie Nakashima and her husband, Phil d’Aquino, without a care in the world. The war was over, the Allies had won, and now she was about to make seven times more money in a single morning than she’d made during her entire time in Tokyo.

  Casting her eyes on a short man pouring a glass of bourbon, and then on his taller, fitter colleague, Iva was happy to finally have a chance to talk about her small role in helping the American war effort. She knew these men would help bring that part of the story back to the United States.

  “Good morning,” said the taller man. “I’m Clark Lee from the International News Service and this is Harry Brundidge from Cosmopolitan magazine.”

  Iva shook hands with the men and they all sat down. Brundidge got right to the point. “So, you are Tokyo Rose?”

  Iva detected a little hostility in his voice. “Mr. Brundidge,” she replied politely, “there are five or six girls to whom that name should apply. I am just one of them.”

  “You worked at Radio Tokyo,” Brundidge replied. “You announced introductions to records. You were a sort of disc jockey, weren’t you?”

  “Yes,” said Iva.

  Lee turned to Nakashima. “You told us that you went to Radio Tokyo and someone there gave you her name?”

  Nakashima nodded. Iva had no idea Nakashima had been paid $250 by Lee and Brundidge for identifying “Tokyo Rose.”

  “Then she will do!” said Lee, grinning. “Now, let’s get to her story.”

  With that, Cl
ark Lee unpacked his typewriter, and Harry Brundidge, for reasons that Iva did not yet fully understand, locked the hotel room’s door.

  Tokyo

  Afternoon, September 1, 1945

  After everyone had left his hotel room, Clark Lee fed a blank piece of paper into his typewriter and stared at it. The interview that had just concluded had not gone according to plan. For starters, he’d expected someone who looked, or at least sounded, like a femme fatale. This Iva woman didn’t fit the bill. More important, Iva had denied broadcasting any propaganda: Nothing about unfaithful wives, the horrors of warfare, or the fictitious sinking of American ships.

  Nevertheless, and despite her protests that she was just one of many hosts, Iva had eventually agreed to sign a paper saying she was “the one and original Tokyo Rose.” That should have been good enough, but now, as Lee stared at the blank white paper in his typewriter, he was starting to have second thoughts.

  Part of Lee’s hesitation was that he had personally heard a broadcast by a woman whom the troops had called “Tokyo Rose” in 1942—a year before Iva said she’d began working at Radio Tokyo. That got his mind running. How many Tokyo Roses were out there? And which of them had actually broadcast propaganda?

  Clark Lee stared for a while longer. He knew that if Iva hadn’t committed treason against her country, then he had no scoop. On the other hand, she had signed the statement.

  Finally, he made up his mind and his fingers began pecking away at the keys.

  TRAITOR’S PAY: TOKYO ROSE GOT 100 YEN A MONTH . . . $6.60.

  In an exclusive interview with this correspondent . . .

  Tokyo

  October 17, 1945

  As Iva finished washing her hair, she heard a knock on the door. Another reporter, she thought to herself.

  After the publication of Clark Lee’s article—which, to Iva’s shock and horror, had portrayed her as a traitor to her country—the media had gone into a feeding frenzy. Interviews had been followed by a press conference, which was followed by intensive questioning by investigators from the Eighth Army’s Counter Intelligence Corps. Through it all, Iva had answered every question asked of her. She knew that she had nothing to hide and was convinced that no one would believe her to be a traitor once they’d heard the full story about her time on the radio.