“The fighting situation is becoming ever more fierce,” warns the Tokyo Shimbun today. “The enemy has landed on Yiojimu, which may be said to be Just in front of the gate of our mainland…. By now it has become evident that the enemy is intending to strike directly against our mainland and his fighting will cannot be splighted.” The paper then goes on to warn the people against “propaganda tricks” tending to divide them from the military or to persuade them that surrender will not mean slavery. These labored arguments are possibly an indication of what the Japanese people are beginning to think. Another is the following story that is going the rounds of the capital. A B-29 is shot down and one of the pilots bails out. He lands in the midst of a crowd. They all stare at him and cry out: “Wonderful, wonderful!”
“What is it?” asks a late-comer. “What’s so wonderful?”
“Look there,” he is told. “What wonderful shoes he has on!”