天皇てんのう皇后こうごう両りょう陛下へいか きょう硫黄いおう島とう訪問ほうもんへ 戦後せんご80年ねんで戦没せんぼつ者しゃを慰霊いれい

Their Majesties the Emperor and Empress will visit Iwo Jima in the Ogasawara Islands, a fierce battleground in the final stages of the Pacific War, on the 7th to pay their respects to the war dead on the 80th anniversary of the post-war period.

Iwo Jima was an island where fierce ground battles took place during the Pacific War, along with Okinawa domestically. Approximately 21,900 Japanese soldiers and about 6,800 American soldiers were killed.

<br>And then 80 years

Their Majesties will depart from Haneda Airport on a government plane and will visit Iwo Jima, approximately 1200 kilometers away, for the first time in the afternoon.

<br><br>And in the 6th year of Heisei, just before the 50th anniversary of the end of the war, the Emperor and Empress visited the memorials for the war dead of the former Japanese army and the victims of both the Japanese and American forces. After offering flowers, they poured water to console the spirits of those who suffered from hunger and thirst in the fierce battles on the volcanic island.

<br><br>On Iwo Jima, most of the islands residents were forcibly evacuated during the war, but about 100 men, who were conscripted as military personnel, remained and shared the fate of the garrison. Their Majesties also visit the cemetery park where memorial towers for the islanders who lost their lives in the battle are erected, offering flowers and paying their respects.

<br><br>Furthermore, they will have a conversation with the relatives of the war dead of the former Japanese army and descendants of former island residents at the Self-Defense Forces base, and return to the Imperial Palace at night.

<br><br>This year, there is a prospect of visiting Hiroshima, Nagasaki, and Okinawa for the purpose of memorializing the war dead, and on the 7th, it will be the first visit as part of the tour of symbolic regions of the previous war, marking 80 years after the war.

<br>Grandson of the garrison commander: We must pass it on<br>The bereaved families of the war dead have special feelings about Their Majesties visit this time

One of them, Ms. Kie Kuribayashi 66, who lives in Akishima City, Tokyo, is the granddaughter of Tadamichi Kuribayashi, who fought and met a heroic end as an army lieutenant general leading the garrison on Iwo Jima.

<br><br>General Kuribayashi, as the commander of the garrison, never left the island from June of Showa 19 when he was assigned to Iwo Jima until communication was cut off eight months later, and during this time, he continued to send letters to his family on the mainland.

Of the 41 letters that I have inherited and carefully preserved from my grandmother and father, the first letter begins with a preface stating not to show or speak of it to others, and then describes the harsh life on an island with high temperatures, humidity, and scarce water and food, saying, We are living a cave-dwelling life in a barren wilderness, and depending on how you think about it, it is a hellish life, the first since I was born.

If Iwo Jima is captured by the enemy, the mainland will be bombed, so I and my subordinates will fight to the end without expecting to return alive, and words of concern for the wife and children left behind are written.

<br><br>My grandmother and father rarely spoke about the war or General Kuribayashi during their lifetimes, and I think they deliberately chose not to talk about it because it was painful for both of them, said Kae-san

I clearly remember my grandmother saying, Your grandfather stood by my bedside and said, Im back now, when the Ogasawara Islands were returned, she recalls.

A letter dated about a month before the American troops landed said, The remains will probably not return, but since my grandmother had blotted it out, my father later deciphered it and added it. Kaieda-san said, Death is, of course, a sad thing, but I think the fact that even the remains do not return after death made it doubly or triply painful.

More than 10,000 remains, or half of them, have not been returned to the mainland, so I think there are many difficult issues such as what to do under the runway, but I strongly hope that as many as possible will come back, he said.

<br><br>In addition, regarding the visit of Their Majesties this time, I feel that it will serve as a memorial for those who died in the fierce battle, and I would be grateful if you could sincerely pray for the heroic spirits to rest in peace.

In any case, we must continue to convey that war should not be waged.

I want the generation that doesnt know war, including myself, to feel that war should never be waged, he said.