The Devil: Japan’s Ace of Aces - July ‘98 Aviation History Feature

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The Devil: Japan's Ace of Aces

Hiroyoshi Nishizawa was gaunt and sickly looking, but in the cockpit of his Zero fighter he became ‘the Devil.’

By Jon Guttman

Many leading fighter pilots of World War II, such as Germany’s Erich Hartmann, Russia’s Ivan Kozhedub and America’s Richard Bong, looked as if they had been born for the honor. Japan’s ace-of-aces, Hiroyoshi Nishizawa, was a striking exception. One of his comrades in arms, Saburo Sakai, wrote that “one felt the man should be in a hospital bed. He was tall and lanky for a Japanese, nearly five feet eight inches in height. He had a gaunt look about him; he weighed only 140 pounds, and his ribs protruded sharply through his skin.” Although Nishizawa was accomplished in both judo and sumo, Sakai noted that his comrade “suffered almost constantly from malaria and tropical skin disease. He was pale most of the time.”

Sakai, who was one of Nishizawa’s few friends, described him as usually being coldly reserved and taciturn, “almost like a pensive outcast instead of a man who was in reality the object of veneration.” To the select few who earned his trust, however, Nishizawa was intensely loyal.

Nishizawa underwent a remarkable metamorphosis in the cockpit of his Mitsubishi A6M Zero fighter. “To all who flew with him,” wrote Sakai, “he became ‘the Devil’….Never have I seen a man with a fighter plane do what Nishizawa would do with his Zero. His aerobatics were all at once breathtaking, brilliant, totally unpredictable, impossible, and heart-stirring to witness.” He also had the hunter’s eye, capable of spotting enemy aircraft before his comrades knew there was anything else in the sky.

Even when a new generation of American aircraft was wresting the Pacific sky from the Japanese, many were convinced that as long as he was at the controls of his Zero, Nishizawa was invincible. And that proved to be the case.

Hiroyoshi Nishizawa was born on January 27, 1920, in a mountain village in the Nagano prefecture, the fifth son of Shuzoji and Miyoshi Nishizawa. Shuzoji was the manager of a sake brewery. After graduating from higher elementary school, Hiroyoshi worked for a time in a textile factory. Then, in June 1936, a poster caught his eye: an appeal for volunteers to join the Yokaren (flight reserve enlistee training program). He applied and qualified as a student pilot in Class Otsu No. 7 of the Japanese Navy Air Force (JNAF). He completed his flight training course in March 1939, graduating 16th out of a class of 71.

After service with the Oita, Omura and Sakura kokutais (air groups) in October 1941, Nishizawa was assigned to the Chitose Kokutai (Ku.). After the December 7, 1941, raid on Pearl Harbor and the outbreak of war with the United States, a chutai (squadron) from the Chitose group, including Petty Officer 1st Class (PO1C) Nishizawa, was detached to Vunakanau airfield on the newly taken island of New Britain, arriving in the last week of January 1942. They were equipped with 13 obsolescent Mitsubishi A5M fighters bequeathed to them by the Tainan and 3rd kokutais (which had re-equipped with the new A6M2 Zeros). The detachment got its first three Zeros on January 25.

Nishizawa was flying an A5M over Rabaul on February 3 when he and eight comrades encountered two Consolidated Catalina I flying boats of the Royal Australian Air Force (RAAF) that were operating from the Allied sea and air base at Port Moresby, New Guinea. One of the Catalinas evaded the Japanese, but Nishizawa attacked the other and disabled one of its engines. The Australian pilot, Flight Lt. G.E. Hemsworth, managed to nurse his crippled plane back to Port Moresby on the remaining engine, while his gunner, Sergeant Douglas Dick, claimed an enemy fighter that was later counted as a probable. Nishizawa, on the other hand, was credited with the Catalina as his first victory.

Rabaul was attacked by small groups of Allied bombers throughout February. The Japanese took Sarumi and Gasmata in western New Britain on February 9 and promptly established staging bases there. On the following day, several detachments, including Nishizawa’s unit from the Chitose Ku., were amalgamated into a new air group, the 4th. As new Zeros became available, Nishizawa was assigned an A6M2 bearing the tail code F-108.

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