Steven Bullard

I purchased this book at the Cowra information Centre. I'd been looking for something that described the Cowra breakout and maybe some of the reasons behind it. I think this little volume does a reasonable job of this. There was an interesting contrast between the Italian POWs and the Japanese POWs. The Italians seemed to be quite happy organising choral groups, growing vegetables and going out to assist with the local fruit picking. In contrast, the Japanese were faced with their field service code ....seemingly handed down from a samurai code where one died for the master. In this case, the master was the emperor and it was dishonourable to be taken captive. There were also implications for the family back home. They would qualify for a pension if "dad" was killed in action but no pension and no honour if the dad or son came home after being a POW. So massive social pressure on the poor Japanese inmates. There were also issues of miscommunication: the lower ranks were to be separated from the officers and moved to Hay. And, although a vote was held, it appears that a lot of those present went with the loudest voices and voted for the breakout. Actually, the general idea seemed to be to die honourably rather than actually escape....after all where could they escape to? There is an interesting anecdote about two of the escapees getting very hungry next day ...knocked on the door of a farm house and were treated to tea and scones until the trucks arrived to take them back to the camp.
Predictably, the book is written from the Australian perspective and I found myself just wondering whether the treatment of the prisoners was quite as good as is being claimed. There is some mention of some escapees being shot in cold blood (apparently some were baring their chests and asking to be shot) which would now be a war crime but seems to have been glossed over in the various enquiries.
One interesting development is how a single act of respect by the local returned soldiers club who were maintaining the war graves of their own soldiers decided to clean up those of the Japanese. When diplomatic relations were resumed, the ambassador visited Cowra and noticed the good condition of the war graves ....and one thing led to another in terms of normalising relations and eventually someone suggested having a Japanese garden ....most unlikely location in the semi arid area of Central Western NSW. But it now looks lovely with eucalypts included among the japonicas etc. and it's turned into quite a tourist attraction. Some 234 Japanese died in the breakout attempt and four Australians. A significant number of prisoners committed suicide or died in the fires set under their barracks. Interestingly the Japanese specifically avoided attacking civilians.
The book is in English and Japanese...have to get my wife to comment on the Japanese version. I give it 3.5 stars… (mehr)