Japan's surrender was not a simple on/off switch

[Kptlt. Neuerburg]

Many Japanese soldiers and sailors where in a quandary when the end of war was announced. A majority would commit suicide rather then surrender, others decided to ignore the surrender order and would continue to fight the enemy until they where killed or captured, some did surrender believing that if they killed themselves they would be dying for nothing.

I just finished reading Operation Storm which is about the massive I-400 submarines, their crews, training, possible missions and of course the end of the war. In it, it describes the various possibilities that the subs crew would take. Not surprisingly suicide was mentioned, along with sailing to an isolated part of the eastern coast of Japan and dispersing the crew allowing them to return home as "ghosts", one even made the suggestion that they turn pirate stealing supplies from captured ships as they went (sounds like the plot of a Cussler novel). The biggest argument with deciding what to do happened between Commander Tatsunsuke Ariizumi, the commander of Submarine Squadron 1 (or Daiichi Sensuitai also known as Sen-toku) and the Lt. Commander Nobukiyo Nambu, commander of the I-401. Ariizumi would of preferred that the crew commit mass suicide or go rouge and go out in a final blaze of glory for the emperor. Nambu on the other hand thought that now the war had ended was the get his crew home alive but without being captured or surrendering. In the end Ariizumi killed himself and Nambu almost got his wish, but the I-401 was captured by the USS Segundo (SS 398) about 100 miles off the coast of Honshu some fifteen days after the ceasefire agreement had been signed.