All historic sites
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55 sites · page 2 of 3
Hakata Port Repatriation Memorial
博多港引揚記念碑（那の津往還）
A 15-meter-tall weathering steel monument at Hakata Port in Fukuoka, erected in 1996 to commemorate the 1.39 million Japanese repatriates who returned through this port from mainland Asia and the Korean Peninsula after World War II, as well as the 500,000 Koreans and Chinese who departed from here to return to their homelands. Sculpted by Toyofuku Tomonori, the work titled "Nanotsu Oukan" won the 1996 Fukuoka City Urban Landscape Award.
Hario Radio Transmission Station
旧佐世保無線電信所（針尾送信所）
Three massive reinforced concrete radio towers about 136 meters tall built in 1922 by the Imperial Japanese Navy for long-wave fleet communications. The station is famously — though inconclusively — linked to the transmission of the coded order "Niitakayama Nobore 1208" that launched the Pearl Harbor attack on December 2, 1941. Designated a National Important Cultural Property in 2013 and a Japan Heritage site in 2016.
Izumi Naval Air Base Ruins
出水海軍航空基地跡
Former Imperial Japanese Navy air base in Izumi City, Kagoshima Prefecture, which served as a major kamikaze staging base in the final months of WWII. The site preserves well-maintained aircraft revetments (entaigō), an underground command bunker, and a guard tower with visible bullet damage. Over 200 special attack pilots departed from Izumi between March and April 1945.
Kawatana Naval Arsenal Ruins & Katashima Torpedo Testing Range
川棚海軍工廠跡・片島魚雷発射試験場
The Katashima Torpedo Testing Range was established in 1918 on a peninsula jutting into Omura Bay as a branch facility of the Sasebo Naval Arsenal. It served as the Imperial Japanese Navy's dedicated torpedo launch testing and final inspection site for nearly three decades, handling torpedoes manufactured at the Sasebo Naval Arsenal, Kawatana Naval Arsenal, and Mitsubishi Nagasaki Ordnance Works. Six types of torpedoes were tested here, including the Type 91 aerial torpedo used at Pearl Harbor and the revolutionary Type 93 oxygen-propelled "Long Lance" torpedo. The facility includes a rare artificial island firing platform built approximately 50 meters offshore, an observation post atop the peninsula hill, and machine rooms for torpedo fueling and adjustment. Registered as a national tangible cultural property in 2024, the atmospheric ruins remain freely accessible amid reclaimed forest.
Kumamoto Castle & Former IJA 6th Division Headquarters Site
熊本城・陸軍第六師団司令部跡
Kumamoto Castle, one of Japan's three premier castles, served as the home base of the Imperial Japanese Army 6th Division from 1888 to 1945. The 6th Division, recruited primarily from southern Kyushu, was one of the most combat-experienced formations in the IJA: it fought in the Sino-Japanese War, Russo-Japanese War, and the Siberian Intervention before becoming notorious as one of the principal assault divisions in the Battle of Nanking (December 1937), where it stormed the Zhonghua Gate sector under Lieutenant General Tani Hisao. During the Pacific War, the division fought in the Solomon Islands campaign (Bougainville). The castle grounds housed the division headquarters (a 1917 building on the Honmaru), barracks for the 13th Infantry Regiment, supply depots, an army hospital, and ammunition stores — occupying roughly 270,000 square meters of the city center and transforming Kumamoto into a garrison city (軍都). The castle survived the July 1945 firebombing raids but the original headquarters building was destroyed; its site is now part of the restored Kumamoto Castle Park. The castle's concrete-reconstructed main tower (1960) sustained severe damage in the 2016 Kumamoto earthquakes and was fully restored in 2021.
Kushira Naval Air Base Ruins (Kushira Peace Park)
串良海軍航空基地跡（串良平和公園）
Ruins of one of Japan's major kamikaze sortie bases, now Kushira Peace Park. The former 1,300 m east-west and 1,200 m north-south runways are lined with cherry trees, and a memorial tower honors the 363 special attack aviators and more than 200 conventional attack aviators who perished. An underground telegraph command room used to receive final transmissions from departing pilots is preserved on site.
Kyushu University Vivisection Incident — Faculty of Medicine
九州大学生体解剖事件（九大医学部）
Site of the Kyushu Imperial University vivisection incident (May–June 1945), in which eight captured American B-29 crewmen from the 29th Bombardment Group were subjected to live experimental surgeries — including lung removal, seawater blood injection, and organ excision — at the university's anatomy department. All eight died. In 1948, thirty defendants faced a B/C-class war crimes tribunal in Yokohama; twenty-three were convicted. The Kyushu University Medical History Museum on the Maidashi campus now documents the atrocity as part of its medical ethics and peace education mission.
Mitsubishi Arms Sumiyoshi Tunnel Factory Ruins
三菱兵器住吉トンネル工場跡
Remains of an underground torpedo factory built in 1944 by Mitsubishi Arms inside six parallel tunnels in northern Nagasaki. Located 2.3 km from the atomic bomb hypocenter, the tunnels survived the August 9, 1945 bombing largely intact and served as emergency shelters. Two tunnels are now open to the public as a peace memorial site.
Mitsubishi Heavy Industries Kumamoto Aircraft Works
三菱重工業熊本航空機製作所
A major wartime aircraft factory built by Mitsubishi Heavy Industries in Kengun, Kumamoto City, as a dispersed branch of the Nagoya Aircraft Works. Operational from January 1944, the plant assembled 42 Ki-67 Hiryu (Flying Dragon) heavy bombers before war's end. The factory complex, designated the 9th Manufacturing Works (第九製作所), was a government-built, privately-operated (官設民営) facility occupying approximately 1.4 million tsubo in what is now JGSDF Camp Kengun. Subjected to devastating American air raids in March and May 1945, the factory also incorporated underground dispersal facilities at Yoneda. The sole surviving assembly building — a distinctive iron-frame structure with triangular sawtooth roofing — remained within Camp Kengun as a war heritage site until plans for its demolition due to aging were announced.
Moji Port (Former Moji Customs & Mojiko Retro)
門司港（旧門司税関・門司港レトロ）
Imperial Japan's most critical continental gateway port, handling over 2 million troops and vast quantities of military supplies shipped to Manchuria, China, and Korea from the 1930s through 1945. The 1912 Renaissance-style red-brick Former Moji Customs building — designed under the supervision of master architect Tsumaki Yorinaka — survives as the district's iconic landmark. After the war, Moji Port served as a major repatriation port receiving hundreds of thousands of returning soldiers and civilians. Designated a Japan Heritage site as part of the "Nostalgic Kanmon Strait" cultural landscape.
Nagasaki Medical College (Atomic Bomb Ruins)
長崎医科大学（被爆遺構）
Nagasaki Medical College, established in 1923 as the successor to Japan's oldest Western medical school (founded 1857), stood just 600 meters from the hypocenter of the atomic bomb dropped on August 9, 1945. The blast and fires destroyed all campus buildings and killed 892 faculty, students, nurses, and staff. Today, the tilted stone gate pillars of the former campus survive as a nationally designated historic site — part of the Nagasaki Atomic Bomb Ruins — serving as a physical measure of the bomb's blast pressure and a memorial to the devastated medical community.
Oita Air Raid Site
大分空襲跡
Oita, the capital of Oita Prefecture on Kyushu, was subjected to 22 air raids between March and August 1945. The city was targeted because it housed the Imperial Japanese Navy Oita Air Base and the 12th Naval Air Arsenal. The devastating firebombing of July 16–17, 1945, by 127 B-29 Superfortress bombers destroyed the city center, killing 49 and displacing over 10,000 residents. Across all raids, 177 people were killed and 270 wounded.
Omura Naval Air Group (Omura Air Base)
大村海軍航空隊（大村航空基地）
Established in December 1922, the Omura Naval Air Group was one of the Imperial Japanese Navy's principal training bases in western Japan. The adjacent 21st Naval Air Arsenal — a major naval aircraft production and repair facility opened in 1941 — made Omura a prime B-29 target during Operation Matterhorn in 1944. The site continues as JMSDF Omura Air Base, home to Fleet Air Wing 22.
Sannō Shrine One-Legged Torii Gate
山王神社一本柱鳥居
The iconic one-legged torii gate of Sannō Shrine in Nagasaki, located approximately 800 meters southeast of the atomic bomb hypocenter. The blast of August 9, 1945 sheared away one pillar and half the crossbeam, yet the remaining half has stood in precarious balance ever since — an enduring symbol of the Nagasaki atomic bombing. Designated a National Historic Site as part of the Nagasaki Atomic Bomb Ruins in 2016.
Tsushima Fortress
対馬要塞
Massive coastal fortress complex spanning the entire Tsushima Island in the Korea Strait, constructed from 1887 to defend against Russian naval threats. Comprising 31 battery positions armed with weapons ranging from 12cm cannons to the world-class 40cm guns of the Toyo Battery, it formed the frontline of Japan's strait-blocking defense network alongside Iki Fortress and Shimonoseki Fortress. Active through the Russo-Japanese War and WWII, most batteries were dismantled by American forces post-war, with impressive ruins remaining across the island.
Usa Naval Air Base Ruins
宇佐海軍航空基地跡
The best-preserved WWII naval air base ruin complex in Kyushu, with approximately 10 concrete aircraft revetments (entaigo) still standing amid rice paddies. Established in 1939 as a training base for carrier-based attack and dive-bomber crews, it later became a kamikaze staging base whose special attack units sortied in April 1945 — 81 planes and 154 airmen never returned. The devastating April 21, 1945 air raid killed over 320 personnel in just 11 minutes. The Jōi No. 1 Revetment, a city-designated historic site, and the Usa City Peace Memorial Museum now anchor the preservation effort.
A-bombed Camphor Trees of Sanno Shrine
山王神社被爆クスノキ
Two ancient camphor trees (kusunoki), variously estimated at 400 to 600 years old, that survived the Nagasaki atomic bombing on August 9, 1945, despite standing only 800 meters from the hypocenter. Stripped of all branches and leaves by the blast, the charred trunks sprouted new buds within two months, becoming enduring symbols of life, resilience, and peace in post-war Nagasaki. Designated as natural monuments by Nagasaki City, their rustling leaves were selected as one of Japan's "100 Soundscapes Worth Preserving."
Akae Airfield Revetments
掩体壕群・赤江飛行場跡
Surviving WWII aircraft revetments from the former Imperial Japanese Navy Akae Airfield in Miyazaki City. Seven concrete shelters remain from the approximately 50 originally built in 1944, making them among the best-preserved examples in Japan. The airfield served as a major staging base for kamikaze operations during the final months of the war.
Ashiya Air Field
芦屋飛行場
An Imperial Japanese Army airfield in Fukuoka Prefecture, built around 1940 and established as an Army air base by 1942, used for fighter interception of B-29 raids and as a staging base for Army kamikaze (Shinbu-tai) special attack sorties during the final months of WWII. Now the JASDF Ashiya Air Base.
Aso Mining Yoshikuma Coal Mine Ruins
麻生鉱業吉隈炭鉱跡
Ruins of the Yoshikuma coal mine in the Chikuho coalfield, operated by Aso Mining (麻生鉱業), the family company of the Aso political dynasty. During WWII, approximately 300 Allied POWs (197 Australian, 101 British, 2 Dutch) were held at Fukuoka POW Branch Camp #26 from May to August 1945 and forced to work underground. Two Australian POWs—John Watson and Leslie Edgar George Wilkie—died at the mine. Between 1939 and 1945, an estimated 10,000 Korean laborers were also mobilized to work in Aso Mining's pits under harsh conditions.
Hotarukan Tomiya Shokudo
ホタル館 富屋食堂
Restored wartime military dining hall in Chiran, Kagoshima, originally run by Tome Torihama (1902–1992) — known as the 'Mother of the Special Attack Corps' (特攻の母). During 1945, the Tomiya Shokudo served as the designated army restaurant for kamikaze pilots departing from Chiran Air Base. Torihama provided emotional support, home-cooked meals, and motherly care to young pilots on the eve of their final missions, often forwarding their last letters to families. The building was faithfully reconstructed and opened as a memorial museum displaying photographs, personal effects, and stories of the pilots and Torihama's lifelong dedication to preserving their memory.
Kyushu Aircraft Zasshonokuma Plant
九州飛行機雑餉隈工場
The main factory of Kyushu Aircraft Company (formerly Watanabe Iron Works) at Zasshonokuma, Fukuoka — birthplace of the J7W1 Shinden, Imperial Japan's radical canard-configuration interceptor designed to counter B-29 raids. The Shinden's forward-swept canard wings and rear-mounted pusher propeller made it one of the most unconventional aircraft of WWII. Only one prototype was completed; it flew three times (August 3, 6, and 8, 1945) from nearby Mushiroda Airfield before Japan's surrender. The 120,000-tsubo factory site was seized by US forces after the war and is now occupied by JGSDF Camp Fukuoka, where wartime factory buildings still serve as military warehouses.
Metabaru Airfield Ruins
目達原飛行場跡
Former Imperial Japanese Army airfield in Yoshinogari Town, Saga Prefecture, established in 1943 as a branch of the Tachiarai Army Flight School. The base trained student pilots and served as a staging point for Army special attack (tokubetsu kōgeki) operations during the final months of WWII, with the 273rd Shinbu Squadron and other kamikaze units departing via Metabaru en route to forward bases in southern Kyushu. The site is now JGSDF Camp Metabaru, with the former main gate pillars and a 1992 memorial monument preserved outside the base perimeter.
Miyakonojo Airfield Ruins (East & West)
都城飛行場跡（都城東・西飛行場）
Site of two Imperial Japanese Army airfields in southern Kyushu from which 79 Shinbu (Army special attack) pilots flew Ki-84 Hayate fighters on 17 kamikaze sorties against the U.S. fleet off Okinawa between April 6 and July 1, 1945. The West Airfield (built 1934, expanded to 1,200 m runway by 1945) launched the first mission on April 6; after devastating air raids on April 27–28 destroyed it, operations shifted to the East Airfield (built 1944 on converted rice paddies by the Navy, later transferred to Army use). Today, stone monuments at both former airfield sites and the Hayate Shinbu Special Attack Corps Memorial in Toshima Park (former Army cemetery) preserve the memory of the young pilots, most aged 18–23, who never returned.