Yukikaze

THE BOOK YOU hold is a new edition of Yukikaze. I was fortunate enough to be granted the opportunity to revise the original edition and went through it thoroughly, but in the end I did not make any pronounced changes. I revisited some of the wording but was careful not to modify any section too much. The fundamental composition of the book itself remains completely unchanged.

Twenty years have passed since Yukikaze was first published in February of 1984. Rereading the original edition, I realized that the significance of this passage of time was actually much greater than I had first thought. The book definitely felt like something I wrote, but I found myself wanting to know more background detail than what had been provided, to get more under the surface of things. In short, the issues I was interested in writing about back then and what I’m interested in now have changed. If I were to try writing the book all over again today, I imagine it would end up with quite a different tone. It would almost be like rewriting another author’s work.

The creation process of the original edition of the book was informed by my interests, worldview, sensitivities, and mindset at the time. While making the revisions, I believed that it was important, both for the fans of the old edition as well as for the readers picking up the book for the first time, to maintain that original flavor. I considered what had changed in the real world since the old edition first came out, and also what hadn’t changed. Doing so forced me to think about the book on a personal level. I was able to make corrections and revisions according to my current mindset but hopefully without violating the subtle impressions a reader may have formed from the old edition.

I decided that if I wanted to create something that reflected my current interests, it would be better for me to write a new book than to try rewriting an old one. That was what drove me to write the sequel volume, Good Luck, Yukikaze. The parts of this book that were changed include some small amendments intended to link it better with the new story. Setting aside the issue of whether or not I should have done so, the intent was to make the book more consistent with future sequels. With that aim, I gratefully offer up this new, “improved” edition to all the fans of Yukikaze.

Chohei Kambayashi

Matsumoto

March 2002

HUMAN/INHUMAN

THROUGHOUT YUKIKAZE THE terms “human” and “humanlike” are set in opposition to “inhuman” and “mechanical.” First and foremost, the book’s theme is the question of what it means to be human. We are shown again and again how the enigmatic invading aliens known as the JAM are completely unlike humans, how communication with them is impossible, how there is no chance of mutual understanding. Through examining this portrait of the thoroughly inhuman JAM, we are able to discern the reverse image of what it is to be human: if to be inhuman is to have no logical method of communication, then to be human is to possess the gift of communication.

The inhuman nature of the members of the SAF charged with intelligence gathering is also stressed in the story. The main character, Rei Fukai, is assigned to the SAF, and it is through him that the question of what it means to be human is asked again and again. One could make the argument that Rei, too, is an inhuman being. However, although his character is that of a cold man, a loner, I don’t believe that these traits consign him to the realm of inhumanity. The trust he places in his beloved plane, Yukikaze, is highly idiosyncratic, a very “human” trait. On this point, taking the character of Rei into account, I’d like to examine the story’s main theme of what it is to be human.

The book opens with an excerpt from The Invader, the book by Lynn Jackson on the subject of the JAM War that was published five years before the timeline of the main story. Opening the novel with an excerpt from a fictional “non-fiction” history is effective in establishing an air of verisimilitude. Within the excerpt, Jackson talks about the soldiers of the SAF.

The pilots of the SAF evidently take a certain satisfaction in this requirement, and individuals with ‘special’ personalities outside the range of normal human standards are selected for this duty. These men put more faith in their machines than in other people and can fly their planes with perfect skill. In a way, they are yet one more combat computer, but organic in nature, loaded aboard the Sylphids to carry out a heartless duty.

She goes on to describe the pilots as “machines that are, through some accident of fate, in human form.”

So what are these “normal human standards” Lynn Jackson is talking about? With this phrase, she’s referring not to the set of traits common to most humans but rather to the broader concept of “humanity.” Typically this term is used to indicate the capacity to experience emotions, with the ability to love being the crucial element. Conversely “inhumanity,” although it bears the connotations of cruelty or sadism, essentially denotes the inability to experience emotion or sympathy.

According to one line of thought, what makes us human is our capacity for empathy. What this means is, if I see things and feel things a certain way, I can make the cognitive analogy that others also see and feel things a certain way. The theory is that the development of the empathic capacity marked a major step in the evolutionary process of the human brain. In other words, we can say that what makes us human is our ability to understand the sorrow another person feels by drawing on our own experiences.

What fascinates me is that the main elements that differentiate us from the other animals, such as the ability to reason, have little to do with “humanity” when seen from this point of view. To the contrary, logical thought, which is the gift of reason, is often shown in a negative light as being “inhuman.” It is therefore not unreasonable to view machine intelligence, which is based exclusively on logic, as something that is fundamentally inhuman.

Yukikaze frequently depicts this inhuman lack of empathy. In the beginning of Chapter I, the SAF’s mission to bring their data back to base even as they watch their comrades die in battle is criticized as being “inhuman.” The reader soon discovers that the target of this criticism is the book’s hero, Rei Fukai.

In his very first appearance, Rei is depicted announcing in an emotionless voice that his fellow pilots have been shot down. He then decides without any hesitation that a plane, which is by all appearances an allied unit, is an enemy and coolly attacks it. In the following pages, the military doctor who treats him refers to him as a “machine.” In this way, the author appears to be inducing the reader to see Rei as an inhuman character.

However, in the same chapter Rei’s behavior is far different from that of a “machine.” He declares his trust in his plane, grumbles about General Cooley, and talks with Major Booker, his only friend, about a woman he was involved with. And, recognizing his own powerlessness in the face of the unknown JAM, he feels anger, grief, and anxiety. “What am I doing? Why am I here?” he asks. The chapter begins with an epigraph telling us that he’d been betrayed by much of what he had once loved and that his only emotional support now came from his fighter plane. Establishing that he has known both love and hate makes it difficult for a reader to regard Rei as inhuman. Lynn Jackson’s understanding of the SAF pilots as “machines that are, through some accident of fate, in human form,” is incorrect as far as Rei is concerned.

Rei’s affection for Yukikaze also undermines the concept of him as a machinelike individual. It is a uniquely human trait to feel empathy not only for another being like oneself but also for animals or even inanimate objects. That he feels empathy for a machine is, ironically, a powerful confirmation of Rei’s humanity. The irrational trust he places in Yukikaze, the faith he has that she would “never, ever betray him,” and his extreme fear of her becoming independent of him negate any claims that he is inhuman and mechanical. Rei’s callous, inhuman exterior is consistently betrayed by his inner humanity. Furthermore, from the very start of the story, the author continually portrays Rei questioning what it is to be human.

Now let’s look at Chapter V, “Faery – Winter,” wherein Major Booker directly addresses the issue of what it means to be human. Imagining what it’s like for the wounded Lieutenant Amata, Booker judges him to be