Ohka rocket-bomb (aka the "BAKA Bomb") sits inside a bunker in Ibaraki Prefecture. Note the cherry blossom emblem on the fuselage.ONE-WAY TRIP: They fell to Earth aboard `cherry blossom' rockets
Aug 7, Asahi Shimbun News
...Come Aug. 15, the nation will again look back to the close of World War II, 59 years ago. Crowds of reporters and curiosity seekers will again gather at controversial Yasukuni Shrine-the nation's central shrine to the war dead-to see which politico will turn up and to snap photographs of the dwindling number of veterans who come every year to march in their old uniforms.
How many of them, however, will visit Ohka (Cherry Blossom) Park, set at the edge of the immense Sumitomo Metals foundry complex near Kashima, Ibaraki Prefecture, and a shrine in its own right?
There, a small granite altar stands in front of a crumbling air raid bunker, inside of which, beyond a wire fence, sits a replica of an MXY7 Ohka 11 rocket-bomb.
Cherry blossoms seem a ready-made symbol of the brief glory of youth, so it's no surprise that such a poetic name was given to this most desperate of weapons.
Looking like a spaceship, but actually little more than a torpedo with wings, the Ohka was meant to be slung under a bomber and dropped near its target. Only then would its pilot, a young man with a few weeks training, switch on its rocket and guide the craft to its end-a blossom of fire, mangled metal and flesh....more...
