An unlikely heroine of World War II

"Your parents are traitors!" was the taunt that rang in the ears of a lonely little boy in Tokyo while Allied forces were embroiled in bloody engagements against Emperor Hirohito's Imperial troops in Asia. It was 10 years before 5-year-old Makoto Iwamatsu would begin to learn the true story of the prison ordeals his anti-militarist parents had suffered, their painful decision to immigrate to America leaving Mako behind, and their service to the U.S. government during World War II.

The heroic history of Mako's parents, Taro and Mitsu Yashima, might have remained largely forgotten except for the forthcoming Asian American International Film Festival tribute to Mako and the American Conservatory Theater's production of Philip Kan Gotanda's "After the War." Although Mako died of cancer last year at the age of 72, his heritage lives on in his younger daughter, Sala Iwamatsu, a star in the ACT play that begins previews Thursday. The festival will show Gotanda's 1988 groundbreaking marital drama "The Wash," starring Mako, on Tuesday. It was Gotanda who asked Mitsu Yashima, then an art teacher in Japantown, to show the script to her son. But it is Yashima's story, told to me many years ago, that I want to recall. We became friends in 1975 after she appeared with Mako and her American-born daughter Momo in John Korty's TV drama "Farewell to Manzanar" about the wartime relocation of the Japanese in the United States.

Although soft-spoken with a warm, shy smile Yashima was as forthright about "Farewell to Manzanar" as she must have been when she landed in trouble in Japan. She was pleased that the film pointed out the discrimination inflicted on Japanese Americans, but she didn't think the authors really understood the horrors of Japanese aggression in World War II.

"If they knew," she told me, "then they could compare it with what the Japanese army did to the Chinese people and all the places they conquered. The Japanese Americans don't have so much to complain about. Well, we should complain, I know, but not so much."

The daughter of a shipbuilding company executive, Yashima had begun to express her nonconformist views when she was one of the few Japanese women to attend college in Japan. In the '30s, she joined a young Marxist study group to learn about forbidden topics and there she met her future husband, Taro, also an artist. After she lost their first baby, she became pregnant with Mako and spent nearly the whole nine months in a Japanese jail as a political prisoner. She was never charged or brought before a judge but suffered many beatings in the 6-foot-square cell she shared with from five to 15 other prisoners, who tried to keep her healthy by giving her some of their meager food rations.

Despite the prison hardships, once released, she gave birth to the 10-pound Mako. As Japan's military aggression continued to expand, Yashima's parents were worried that the young couple risked another possible imprisonment and urged them to emigrate. In 1939, Yashima tearfully left 5-year-old Mako behind with her parents, afraid to subject the sickly child to the rigors of the 27-day sea voyage to New York.

On Dec. 7, 1941, the Yashimas were living a precarious existence in Manhattan as art students when they learned that the Japanese had bombed Pearl Harbor.

"I was dismayed and didn't know what to do," Yashima said. "My first thought was when could I see my son again and how could he run away from these troubles. But I was glad I could stay in the United States and be with my husband."

He was sketching and writing "The New Sun," a book about their prison experiences, and was working on "Horizon is Calling," about their decision to emigrate. Strongly opposed to Japan's aggression, Taro Yashima joined the U.S Army, working for the Office of War Information and later for the Office of Strategic Services in India.

"I felt conflict about the war at first," Yashima said, "but I was eventually won over by the American people."

She later wrote that "the people's kindness was like meeting Buddha in hell."

After spending two years with the OSS in Washington, aiming American propaganda at the Japanese, Mitsu Yashima was sent to San Francisco to broadcast to Japanese women. The broadcasts were recorded and shipped to Saipan for beaming to Japan.

"My job was to talk to the women in Japan and urge them to run away from the war effort," she said. "Yes, I knew about Tokyo Rose broadcasting Japanese propaganda to American soldiers. I hated her because I thought, 'How could anybody help the Japanese army?' I talked about the terrible food situation. The Japanese women were prohibited from wearing makeup or pretty clothes and there wasn't even time to comb one's hair. I urged them to run away from the cities because of the danger from bombing. I told them not to save money because money would be like a wastepaper thing."

After the war, the Yashimas were granted permanent-resident status by an act of Congress and they were able to return to Japan and bring Mako back to America. Years later, he would make them proud with his 1967 Oscar nomination as best supporting actor in "The Sand Pebbles" and a 1976 Tony nomination for best leading actor in the musical "Pacific Overtures."

Mako's parents went on to collaborate on a children's book, "Momo's Kitten," but eventually they separated. Yashima's feelings about the necessity for Japan's defeat never softened. When people criticized the U.S. bombing of Hiroshima, she would retort, "After all, who started the war? But the atomic bomb should never be used again. Never!"

Mitsu Yashima died at age 80 on Dec. 7, 1988, the anniversary of the bombing of Pearl Harbor.