Japanese
p. 85 · Read in the full issue
“Shoot The All”
Japanese Commander Said
Lieutenant-Commander Su zuki, the Japanese commander on Ocean Island during the war, claimed at his war crimes trial in Rabaul in April, 1946, that he did not know the war was over until August 24 or 25, 1945, although the Japanese Emperor had unconditionally surrendered on August 16. He said he had first heard of the surrender over Truk Radio, although there had been many rumours of it before that.
Suzuki said that he had given the order to exterminate the 200 Islanders on Ocean Island to four of his company com manders on about August 18.
“It was a very brief order ” he said. “As far as I remember it was: ‘Shoot all the natives on the island.’ ”
Asked why he had given the order, Suzuki said: “We had heard rumours about Japan going down. We had decided to kill them. The most important reason was an order I had re ceived from Rear-Admiral Keiji Shibazaki. . . . This order was to fight to the finish, and, as the natives were likely to cause trouble, to execute them all”.
NOTE: At this time, there were no Ocean Islanders (Banabans) on Ocean Island.
They had all been deported to other islands soon after the Japanese occupation.