I'd read about the sinking of the Indianapolis, but didn't know about this. Article here.
Mochitsura Hashimoto, center, former Japanese sub commander, testifies at the Dec. 13, 1945, session of the Navy court-martial in Washington, trying Capt. Charles B. McVay III. (Byron Rollins/AP/AP)
Mochitsura Hashimoto, center, former Japanese sub commander, testifies at the Dec. 13, 1945, session of the Navy court-martial in Washington, trying Capt. Charles B. McVay III. (Byron Rollins/AP/AP)
"...Initially, Navy prosecutors tried to charge McVay with two counts of negligence: “failure to abandon ship in a timely manner” and “hazarding his ship” by failing to steer her in diagonal lines, a since-abandoned defensive maneuver known as zigzagging.
But the prosecutors soon realized they could not prove the first charge because the ship sank so quickly. So they put all their effort into making the second charge stick. McVay had already admitted that the Indy had not been zigzagging at the time of the attack, citing weather. The Navy insisted on proving that his lack of doing so had been consequential.
Among the list of witnesses the prosecution called to testify against McVay was none other than the submarine commander who had sunk the Indy in the first place: Commander Mochitsura Hashimoto. The decision caused an uproar among members of the press and politicians alike....
...During his testimony, he was asked to confirm that the Indy had not been zigzagging at the time he fired upon her — a point he readily conceded. But he went on to seemingly mock the maneuver by explaining that zigzagging would have made “no change” in the way he fired the torpedoes and that he would have sunk the defenseless ship either way.
Despite the unexpected blow that Hashimoto’s testimony had been to the prosecution, McVay was still convicted of hazarding his ship by failing to zigzag.
“The conviction meant that of the almost 400 U.S. captains whose ships had been sunk during the war, McVay was the only one to have been court-martialed,” Stanton said. Indeed, he was the only captain in the entire history of the Navy to be court-martialed whose ship was sunk by an act of war....
The survivors gathered signatures and lobbied members of Congress in visit after visit to Washington... it was up to Sen. John Warner (R-Va.), the chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee and former Navy secretary, to decide whether to take the exoneration resolution to the Senate floor for a vote.
For several months, Vincent said, Warner had opposed the measure and been “utterly immovable” until he received a letter from the most unlikely of people: Mochitsura Hashimoto.
Once again, 54 years after he’d testified at McVay’s court-martial, the submarine commander was coming to his old enemy’s defense. Hashimoto told Warner that he wanted to join the “brave men who survived the sinking of the Indianapolis ... in urging that your national legislature clear their captain’s name.” He added: “Our peoples have forgiven each other for that terrible war and its consequences. Perhaps it is time your peoples forgave Captain McVay for the humiliation of his unjust conviction.”
His heartfelt words were enough to soften Warner’s resolve. “With the addition of Hashimoto’s voice,” Vincent said, “it was as though the entire matter had reached a kind of cosmic critical mass, and Warner realized it was time to finally lay it to rest.”
With Warner at last allowing the resolution to be considered, Congress voted to exonerate McVay on Oct. 12, 2000. Hashimoto died 13 days later....
But the prosecutors soon realized they could not prove the first charge because the ship sank so quickly. So they put all their effort into making the second charge stick. McVay had already admitted that the Indy had not been zigzagging at the time of the attack, citing weather. The Navy insisted on proving that his lack of doing so had been consequential.
Among the list of witnesses the prosecution called to testify against McVay was none other than the submarine commander who had sunk the Indy in the first place: Commander Mochitsura Hashimoto. The decision caused an uproar among members of the press and politicians alike....
...During his testimony, he was asked to confirm that the Indy had not been zigzagging at the time he fired upon her — a point he readily conceded. But he went on to seemingly mock the maneuver by explaining that zigzagging would have made “no change” in the way he fired the torpedoes and that he would have sunk the defenseless ship either way.
Despite the unexpected blow that Hashimoto’s testimony had been to the prosecution, McVay was still convicted of hazarding his ship by failing to zigzag.
“The conviction meant that of the almost 400 U.S. captains whose ships had been sunk during the war, McVay was the only one to have been court-martialed,” Stanton said. Indeed, he was the only captain in the entire history of the Navy to be court-martialed whose ship was sunk by an act of war....
The survivors gathered signatures and lobbied members of Congress in visit after visit to Washington... it was up to Sen. John Warner (R-Va.), the chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee and former Navy secretary, to decide whether to take the exoneration resolution to the Senate floor for a vote.
For several months, Vincent said, Warner had opposed the measure and been “utterly immovable” until he received a letter from the most unlikely of people: Mochitsura Hashimoto.
Once again, 54 years after he’d testified at McVay’s court-martial, the submarine commander was coming to his old enemy’s defense. Hashimoto told Warner that he wanted to join the “brave men who survived the sinking of the Indianapolis ... in urging that your national legislature clear their captain’s name.” He added: “Our peoples have forgiven each other for that terrible war and its consequences. Perhaps it is time your peoples forgave Captain McVay for the humiliation of his unjust conviction.”
His heartfelt words were enough to soften Warner’s resolve. “With the addition of Hashimoto’s voice,” Vincent said, “it was as though the entire matter had reached a kind of cosmic critical mass, and Warner realized it was time to finally lay it to rest.”
With Warner at last allowing the resolution to be considered, Congress voted to exonerate McVay on Oct. 12, 2000. Hashimoto died 13 days later....
