Daniel Martinez, Chief Historian at the Pearl Harbor National Monument, states that, "Mitsuo Fuchida is a remarkable man."

Commander Mitsuo Fuchida plunged Japan into war with the US on December 7, 1941 when he led the attack on Pearl Harbor. His autobiography was "discovered" in 2007 in his son's basement library in New Jersey, nearly 66 years after the event that changed the world. This Imperial Japanese Navy officer was also at the Battle of Midway and the Battle of Leyte Gulf and in Hiroshima the day before and the day after the atomic bomb was dropped. Through a chance encounter in Tokyo, he converted to Christianity, and his first testimony in the US was with Billy Graham. During his travels through the US, he met ex-President Truman, President Eisenhower, and many of his former military foes--Nimitz, Halsey, Doolittle, Spruance.

He tells a fascinating story of his life in war, peace and religious transformation.

Among Pacific War enthusiasts, it is well known that there are a number of "disagreements" and "disputes" surrounding what actually happened at Pearl Harbor and Midway and, in Japan, in the days leading up to the surrender ceremony on the USS Missouri. In his autobiography, Japan's top aviator gives his perspective as an enemy and how, after total defeat and occupation of his country, he embraced America as a friend.

MITSUO FUCHIDA INTERVIEW WITH MERV GRIFFIN (1965)
WATCH@www.youtube.com/watch?v=JMe3r7bM9js

November 2017: As we approach the 76th anniversary of the attack on Pearl Harbor, there is still controversy surrounding Captain Mitsuo Fuchida's post-war conversion to Christianity and to peace evangelist.

Several years ago, I had the wonderful opportunity to translate the autobiography of Captain Mitsuo Fuchida, leader of the attack on Pearl Harbor. In Japan, he went from exulted hero at the beginning of the Pacific War to evil militarist after his country's defeat. He wrote that his introduction to the concept of Christian forgiveness was from a story about Peggy Covell, who looked after Japanese POWs in the US despite the fact that Japanese soldiers brutally killed her parents in the Philippines.

I spent many hours researching his connection to Peggy Covell; and I discussed this matter in detail with Joe Yoshiya Fuchida, his son. There is no evidence that Peggy Covell was ever at a POW camp in the US or interacted with Japanese POWs.

Her sister, Alice Covell Bender, wrote: "Peggy had nothing to do with Japanese POWs."

More important, Peggy Covell Struble wrote: “The late Cpt. Fuchida tried to establish the facts of my U.S. Government job, but I’m afraid he never got the facts straight. The persons of Japanese ancestry were moved from their homes on the West Coast of the U.S.A., as you know, and my “tsumaranai” [humble, insignificant] work was only with individuals and families at the Granada Relocation Center in Colorado.” From Peggy Covell Struble in a letter to Reverend Yoshio Oshima dated August 11, 1976