"Tokyo Rose dies"

. . . at least that's what some of the headlines rather misleadingly read. For a more measured obituary of Iva Toguri D’Aquino, see today's New York Times:

Iva Toguri D’Aquino, the Japanese-American convicted of treason in 1949 for broadcasting propaganda from Japan to United States servicemen in World War II as the seductive but sinister Tokyo Rose, died Tuesday in Chicago. Mrs. D’Aquino, who served more than six years in prison but steadfastly denied disloyalty and received a presidential pardon in 1977, was 90. . .

Tokyo Rose was a mythical figure. The persona, its origin murky, had been bestowed by American servicemen collectively on a dozen or so women who, seductive but sinister, broadcast for Radio Tokyo, telling soldiers, sailors and marines in the Pacific that their cause was lost and that their sweethearts back home were betraying them. . .

But the identity of Tokyo Rose became attached to Mrs. D’Aquino, a native of Southern California and the only woman broadcasting for Radio Tokyo known to be an American citizen.

For a much stronger defense of D'Aquino, see the Times of London:

SHE was, they said, the Lord Haw-Haw of the Pacific. Born in Los Angeles of Japanese parents, she renounced America and spent the war years taunting American servicemen on the radio, assuring them that their cause was lost and that their country’s defeat was inevitable.

She became the most notorious traitor produced by America during the Second World War. In the eyes of the world she was the despicable “Tokyo Rose”.

When she was finally tracked down in occupied Japan and brought home to the US to stand trial, the furore was immense. The tabloids and the airwaves were filled with hatred for a young woman who had committed the worst of crimes — that of being publicly and flagrantly anti-American in time of war. . .

That was the legend. The truth, when it emerged, was very different. Indeed, it was so different that if a new trial were to be held today, those in the dock would mostly be journalists, agents and officials of the US Government.

For it was a combination of these three that whipped up the story of Tokyo Rose and then pinned the blame on Iva Toguri. Her story and the one concocted by them were separated by more than culture and language and the need, in the immediate postwar period, for traitors to be seen to pay for their crimes. They were separated by politics and cynicism and, most of all, by the intense desire of an unprincipled group of American reporters to secure the scoop of a lifetime.

Posted by David on September 27, 2006 10:35 PM