"This volume is a deeply moving collection of diaries written by young Japanese soldiers who gave their lives in a series of battles going from China, through the Pacific to the skies closer to Japan. Many of them were cultivated young university students, full of life and dreams, reflecting on the beauty of life, the love of their families and the painful duty that was their lot. Most moving, in the latter part of the book, are the thoughts of the kamikaze pilots, especially those drafted into the suicide squadron in its last desperate stages."--BOOK JACKET.