"Jim Fisher" "Maule Driver"
wrote in message
Related?
The book starts with a sweeping historical look at
Samurai culture and fuedal Japan

I don't see the relationship. Did George Sr. train to be a Samurai or
what?
How 'bout some details?

Well, the book focuses on what happens between US Dive bomber pilots and the
Japanese garrison on Chichi Jima. It specifically focuses on 9 downed
pilots and what happened to the 8 that were captured. The ninth was George
Sr. What happened startles this veteran reader of battle field accounts.
And while the detailed battlefield accounts included previously suppressed
information would have made a book unto themselves, Mr Bradley put the
events in context with a compelling analysis of both Japanese and US
culture. From the book jacket:

"... With no easy moralizing, Bradley presents history in all its savage
complexity, including the Japanese warrior mentality that fostered inhuman
brutality and the US military strategy that justified attacks on millions of
civilians..."

I found the history and analysis of mainly post-Samurai Japanese culture
mostly new to me and fascinating.

This book goes well beyond honoring the combatants and showing how war is
hell and yet, it does both quite well.

And there is plenty of aviation.