What was the yokaren (豫科練)?
— the Navy's entrance, open to a boy of fifteen
Meaning
Properly, hikō yoka renshūsei — preparatory flight trainees. It was the course the Navy set up to raise the men who would fly its aircraft. Postwar Japanese usually writes it 予科練.
It began in 1930. A boy who had finished higher elementary school could enter — that is, at fifteen. At the time there were ten ways into a cockpit, five in the Army and five in the Navy, and only two of them were open at fifteen. The yokaren was one.
It came in three kinds
The yokaren was not one thing. There were Ko, Otsu and Hei, and the difference is written in the ordinance.
Article 29. The kinds of preparatory flight trainee, and their terms of training, are fixed as follows.
| Kind | Term | Who was chosen |
|---|---|---|
| Ko (甲) | 1 year 6 months | not stated in this article |
| Otsu (乙) | 2 years 6 months | not stated in this article |
| Hei (丙) | 6 months | chosen from men already serving in the Navy (Article 29-2) |
What this ordinance fixes is the three kinds and the length of each. For Hei, the next article goes further and says who they were drawn from. For Ko and Otsu, the article does not say what schooling was required.
You will often read that Ko took boys who had completed four years of middle school and Otsu took those who had finished higher elementary school. We have not yet found the article that fixes that line. The 1933 recruiting guide and the 1938 applicant's handbook both give a single standard — "higher elementary school level" — and do not yet separate Ko from Otsu. If we find it, we will add it here.
Hei was a different kind of entrance
The article begins like this.
Article 29-2. Hei preparatory flight trainees shall be selected from among naval ratings who fall under the following items.
"From among naval ratings" — that is, from men already in the Navy. So the article sets an upper age for Hei: not more than twenty-three years.
It was not a door from outside, but a door chosen from within. A man who came in through Hei had joined the Navy once, and then volunteered a second time. Hei was created in September 1940.
The term could stretch or shrink
The same article carries one more line.
Provided that the term of training may be lengthened or shortened somewhat according to circumstances.
The term could be stretched or shortened as circumstances required. The law itself says so from the start.
⚠️ What can, and cannot, be said here
The word yokaren is often spoken of together with what happened at the end of the war. But the word itself names an entrance, not a destination.
What can be checked is what the articles laid down. That is as far as this page goes.
Two classes for which numbers survive
After the war, a book was compiled that went through the men who flew fighters, one by one. On its first page it says that the total number of the dead is not accurately recorded, and then gives figures for two classes only.
| Class | Flew fighters | Killed |
|---|---|---|
| 36th Flight Students (graduated June 1942) | 28 | 24 |
| Ko yokaren, 4th class (graduated September 1941) | 21 | 20 |
The same book does not give the corresponding figures for the Army.
Sources
- "Partial Revision of the Naval Training Air Corps Ordinance" — Japan Center for Asian Historical Records, Ref. A02030176300 (Articles 29 and 29-2)
- A Guide for Boy Airmen of the Army and Navy (Japan National Defence Association, 1933) — National Diet Library Digital Collections
- Japanese Naval Fighter Units (Koku-Joho special issue), preface