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When did Japan first use kamikaze attacks during World War II?
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Battle of Okinawa
U.S. Marines battling for control of a ridge near Naha, Okinawa, May 1945.
Japan first employed kamikaze suicide tactics during the Battle of Leyte Gulf on October 25, 1944.12
The decision to utilize these tactics was made by Vice Adm. Ōnishi Takijirō, the commander in chief of the 1st Air Fleet, in an effort to counter the Allied invasion of the Philippines. The initial attacks were carried out by bomb-armed Zero fighters against a U.S. escort carrier group. While the practice became most prevalent from that point until the end of the war, it is important to note that these deliberate suicide missions represented a desperate shift in Japanese military strategy as their conventional air strength diminished.123