page_title: Junichi Sasai
section_title: Papua New Guinea
hierarchical_section_title: Junichi Sasai / World War II / Papua New Guinea
caption_attribution_description: English: Lt (j.g.) Junichi Sasai of the Tainan Air Group. This 1942 photo shows the young combat leader shortly before his death over Guadalcanal.
context_page_description: Lieutenant CommanderJunichi Sasai was a Japanese naval aviator and fighter ace of the Imperial Japanese Navy during World War II. Lieutenant Sasai was killed leading his fighter squadron during an attack on Henderson Field during the Battle of Guadalcanal.
context_section_description: The Tainan Kōkūtai (Air Group) was transferred to Lae on Papua New Guinea in March 1942, reorganizing with new officers. Among his Tainan equals, Sasai was known as "Flying Tiger", a reference to the tiger-head belt buckle he wore always, a gift from his father. In his lodgings, he kept an image of Minamoto no Yoshitsune, the legendary Japanese war hero.
  Already a lieutenant (j.g.), Sasai became Buntaicho (squadron leader), leading the 3rd Chutai (squadron), consisting of six planes, divided in two Shotai's (sections). Each squadron leader's Zero was recognisable by two light blue diagonal stripes across its fuselage, while each section leader's bore one. On each tail, there was a black letter V, the Tainan Group identifier, followed by a three-digit number in the 100s series identifying each aircraft. Sasai was now flying with experienced pilots in his squadron, including Saburō Sakai, Enji Kakimoto and Toshio Ohta.  Saburō Sakai, leading the second section in Sasai’s squadron, was an experienced aviator, having flown aerial combat since early in the Second Sino-Japanese War in 1938 and 1939. Sasai learned the art of aerial combat from the experienced Sakai and the two of them became a great team. Sasai became an ace pilot and owed his life and much of his development as a fighter pilot to Sakai.
  Sasai was considered an exceptional officer by his subordinates, mainly for his compassionate qualities. In private, he ridiculed the inflexibility and austerity of the navy caste system. Such disdain was demonstrated amply by the level of personal interest he took in his NCO subordinates. The Japanese caste system was strict, but Sasai cared more for his fliers. Saburō Sakai, flying as a warrant officer and section leader in Sasai’s squadron, said in an interview:
  The navy had a very rigid hierarchy and caste system; officers never made friends with enlisted men, it was not allowed. But Sasai was a different kind of officer.
  ...
  
  Ohta, Nishizawa and I joined our fighters wingtip to wingtip and did three perfect consecutive loops over the field following a dogfight. After we landed we were very proud of ourselves. Then we had a message that the commander at Moresby had sent a letter to our commander, Sasai, describing our stunt, and inviting us back. Sasai chewed us out and threatened us with grounding if we ever did that again. He was just following procedure, but we knew he was secretly proud of us.
  On April 11, Lieutenant Sasai led nine Zeros scouting over Moresby in three "V" formations. The Japanese had not adopted the finger-four formation that had become common practice in Europe, instead flying in sections of three planes in a staggered formation, the second plane about one hundred yards behind and above the leader and the third on the other side another hundred yards further away, both wingmen weaving as they kept watch for enemy aircraft.
  On May 4, 1942, Sasai became an ace, when he shot down three Bell P-39 Airacobras in only 20 seconds. On May 24, Sasai downed a North American B-25 Mitchell from the 13th US Squadron, 3rd Bomb Group.
  On July 11, 1942, Lieutenant (j.g.) Sasai led 12 Zeros providing fighter escort for 21 bombers from Rabaul heading for Port Moresby. En route, they encountered six Boeing B-17 Flying Fortresses of the 19th Bomb Group. Sasai gave the order to attack the B-17s, so Sakai, Nishizawa, Ohta and two others joined Sasai.  They failed to shoot down any of the B-17s, and lost one of their Zeros in the effort. The dissipation of the close air support  fighters left the bomber attack subject to interdiction by Port Moresby's fighters, and the attack was disrupted. Sasai received a severe reprimand for leaving his bombers. According to Sakai, Sasai's decision was poor, but he and the rest of the pilots sympathized with him because bombers had been hitting their base regularly and that they all wanted to get a piece of the B-17s that had been giving them so much trouble.
  On August 2, Sasai attacked a B-17 using a new head-on tactic, shooting the four-engined bomber down.
caption: Sasai wearing flight gear. This 1942 photo shows Sasai shortly before his death over Guadalcanal on August 26.
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