Yesterday evening the train was about two hours late. When we reached Kamata, air-raid warnings were issued and it was completely dark. Groping about, I boarded a train. Even when I reached home there were no lights and I went to bed.

I was awakened by air-raid sirens. There was the noisy sound of artillery. When I went outside, the B-29s were flying at low altitude, and their silver wings were revealed in the searchlights as they flew at a leisurely pace. The anti-aircraft guns were firing vigorously, but they were of little effect. But not even one of our planes was sent up. The B-29s were clearly outlined against the sky and indeed pretty. Immediately the sky in the north became pure red. The wind was blowing very strongly. With such a wind there was probably not any possibility of stopping the fires. There was the smell of burning in the wind, and I grieved over the enormous damage, though I didn't know to which areas. I heard afterward that the 130 planes did not come in formation but attacked one by one. According to a later story, Kaneda said that even though it was the enemy their strategy was splendid. They came pushing in from every direction.

In the morning I went to the center of the city to attend a meeting of the People's Scholarly Arts Society. I was told the train was only going to Shinagawa, but I was able to go to Hamamatsuchō. At Kamata Station there was a couple with reddened eyes and smeared with mud. When I asked them about it, they said that the area of Asakusa was burned and the Kannon statue was incinerated. As one approached Tōkyō, there were many people from Hamamatsuchō wrapped in bedding. The crowds of people walking on the railway tracks were exactly like the time of the previous earthquake. The areas to the right and left near Shimbashi Station were burning.

Particularly, Shiodome Station was furiously erupting in fire. Here is the most important freight station in Tokyo, and it is to be expected commodities were piled up in great heaps for two or three blocks in all directions. These were being reduced to ashes. But what should be surprising was that very precisely only the freightyard had been specifically struck, and one could only be astonished at the precision of the bombing.

From Ginza sanchōme to ichōme, everything is in flames. The fires have even penetrated the Shiroki Department Store of Nihonbashi. The Meijidō used-book store to which I always go was completely burned out. I had bought books on Thursday and expected to pick them up. Only Maruzen is undamaged. Is the fact that everywhere one goes the Mitsubishi branch banks are standing something that explains the confidence in them? What is unbearable to see is large numbers of old ladies and the sick who, while being propped up by others, are going somewhere. People carrying in one hand bedding left from the fire, people carrying buckets that have been scorched. These people hobble aimlessly down Ginza Street. The eyes of each and every one are reddened. It is probably because of the smoke and heat.

When I met with Itabashi he said that the Itabashi house had been completely burned out and his wife had gone to Tōyō keizai. When I went to inquire after her she was in an exhausted state. Yesterday Ishibashi went to Kamakura, and his wife and the maid were the only victims. They were unable to save anything. This person who opposed the war previously lost his son Kazuhiko, and now his house has been burned up. What sacrifices!

I hear that Asakusa, Honjo, and Fukagawa are almost completely burned out. Moreover, because of the violent wind, certain people entered the water and drowned to death, and certain people who entered air-raid shelters were overcome by smoke and their corpses were lying here and there about the road. It was a horrifying sight, truly unbearable to look at. The Yoshiwara also was completely consumed.

On my way home, when I approached the Ginsei, the wife of Kasahara Sadao, my nephew, was holding onto three children; having been burned out by the fire, they were left with nothing. Shfiji was in a quandary as to what was the best thing to do.

I hear that all of Hongo, Shiba sankōchō, and other places are completely burned out, and I learned at the police station that 200,000 houses were burned up. If this is the case, it means that there are one million victims, and is this indeed true or not? One part of Tōkyō Imperial University has been lost to fire. With respect to this, the nation can do nothing at all. In the evening there was an appeal from the neighborhood association to donate clothing, food, and bedding.

My god, is this war? Premier Koiso expressed his confidence in "inevitable victory" and attacked the indiscriminate bombing by the enemy. Toward Koiso's attitude that he is merely humiliated about the burning of the stables of the Imperial Household Ministry, there will probably be a hostile reaction from the people.

In today's morning editorials there was news that two more people were promoted to general. It is a matter of ten thousand bones drying up and turning into two generals. These two are utterly arrogant.

According to a story I heard at Maebashi, a colonel of the same city spit out big talk, saying, "Something like Iwōjima is simply nothing more than an electrical spark, and the war begins now." The ignorance of military men becoming a problem in every area is our harvest.

I learned from a communiqué in effect that because French Indo-China says it will not maintain its military alliance with Japan, the Japanese Army is disarming the Indo-Chinese forces and will defend it independently.

When I was looking out from the train on the way to Maebashi, in the countryside there was still air-raid training with buckets. If one sees the actual conditions in Tōkyō, I suppose that one must understand immediately that this sort of thing is not easy and the diffusion power of knowledge is slow.

If one looks at the fire ruins of Tōkyō, again one understands the enemy is bombing on the basis of mechanical power. Accordingly, in the extreme regulation of lights that has been exercised until now, one should understand the stupidity of, for example, behavior such as going around shouting about the light from one cigarette. After all, the fact that we are led by a crowd completely without intelligence brings about this sort of thing.

The army is making clear more and more that it is in the midst of preparations for war operations within Japan. The single key that will determine problems hereafter is, what are the people thinking about this, and what kind of reaction will they have?

March 11, 1945 (Sunday)

Notwithstanding the fact that the air raids teach the essential necessity of a rational mental attitude and the power of science, the newspapers and radio are full of the official quacking of the ideological Japanists. Is this not the road finally of salvation for the Japanese people?

The miserable state following the B-29 air raid after one o'clock in the morning of the 10th day by day is becoming clear. The Ginsei employees are burned out. It is said that in the Asakusa area the corpses are piled up. They failed to escape injury when a violent wind was stirred up. Probably there, casualties are not less than the time of the great earthquake. I think they will exceed twenty or thirty thousand. (Chūbu Nihon, March 5).

If the dead are 100 million, what will become of the nation afterward? For this is the present ideology of the military and right wing. (Chūbu Nihon, March 6).

The enemy's propaganda. We can see that the people are becoming discriminating toward our propaganda.

The decisive battle of the homeland is being earnestly thought about. Already, even the head of the Information Board, Matsumura, is saying this, the commander of Sendai is saying this, and again the newspapers are propagandizing this. The only problem is, what are the people thinking (Chūbu Nihon, March)?

After all, it may benefit the people in general to learn how lightly those whose occupation is war treat human life. Ah!

One should see that the provision prohibiting Jewish government officials, etc., is the Nazi style. With this, whoever they are, they definitely will not obey. It is the mentality of children.

Grew fans anti Japanese war spirit. Know the strength of Japan. An enemy who will carry on even a generation of war.

Grew clearly overestimated the war power of Japan. I think that it's probably not that he did not know. It was a warning to prevent slackness. Nevertheless, if the Japanese open their mouths, they merely view the enemy disparagingly, or they merely bad-mouth them. This is extremely lower class, and I wonder if the Japanese people understand all this.

The crowd called Kanokogi and Tokutomi Soho, while they are two of the greatest ringleaders who brought on this war, are now saying the same things. In their clamoring for the appearance of the young, they are attacking others with regard to the current state of affairs.

The Japan ruled by these kind of people is in trouble.

A Diary of Darkness: The Wartime Diary of Kiyosawa Kiyoshi. Eds. Eugene Soviak and Kamiyama Tamie. Princeton: Princeton U Press, 1999, 325-328.