Yukikaze

told that he couldn’t portray humanity, meaning that he couldn’t portray the cliched emotions that you find rolling around anywhere in ordinary reality, he would probably take it as a compliment.

In 1999, fifteen years after Rei Fukai muttered “Humans are necessary in battle,” Kambayashi unleashed his carefully prepared sequel, Good Luck, Yukikaze, upon the world. As if his intervening works had meticulously laid the groundwork for a new flight for Yukikaze, the novel was a masterpiece that drew on fifteen years of battle victories. In the first book, humans faced the threat of having their reality collapse under the power of “words” and “machines”; the struggles of the characters left the reader with a strong impression of trauma and confusion. (And because of that, the author earned such comparisons as “the Philip K. Dick of Japan.”) In the sequel, however, humans seemed to be slowly but surely gathering the strength to take back their “world.” We may be beings who are trapped in ignorance, who are manipulated by other beings or things beyond our comprehension, but: we are human and we are here, and people are necessary for battle. Got a problem with that? Or so the characters seem to say. And before long, the inhabitants of Kambayashi’s world, these people who use words and machines as an interface to a natural world from which they are estranged, no longer seem weak but rather resolutely strong as they rise to confront that world. You could say that he’s gone from “If you’re not dancing, you’ll probably be made to dance,” the epigraph of Kitsune to Odore (Dance with a Fox), to “If you’re being made to dance, then dance it your way.” For example, this trend became extremely pronounced in 2001’s Eikyuu Kikan Souchi (Eternal Return Device). The novel’s characters fought with the author in a similarly strange situation, with the thrillingly depicted story of manufactured humans arguing with a superior being that could freely create and edit space.

I hope that those who have picked up this copy of Yukikaze will continue on and read its sequel, Good Luck, Yukikaze. It epitomizes the whole history of the evolution of Kambayashi’s work. (I can’t call it “growth,” because it’s evolution for the purpose of survival.) From that perspective, you can truly call Yukikaze Chohei Kambayashi’s life’s work.

In bringing the JAM threat to her readers’ attention, journalist Lynn Jackson says this: “The digital world seems to run counter to the very essence of our humanity. Our language as well. Our civilization itself. So what, exactly, are we doing turning over more and more of our existence to computers?” It’s true that “our civilization” may run counter to human nature. So is the answer to go back to nature? I have a feeling that’s what the JAM would want. Placing human beings on this grinding battlefield that dehumanizes them, repeating “People are necessary in battle” over and over is what allows us humans to remain human in the face of the JAM. Your weapons are the words and machines you couldn’t otherwise comprehend. When you tire of the battle, you would do well to listen to the words of a soldier from Good Luck, Yukikaze: “It’s not a question of what you should do, but rather what you want to do. That’s the answer.”

The truth is, Yukikaze is a declaration of war against the world, made by Chohei Kambayashi and by you, the reader, as human beings. Engage!

RAY FUYUKI

ABBREVIATIONS AND ACRONYMS

ACS armament control system

ADAG Aerospace Defense Air Group

AAM air-to-air missile

ADC Aerospace Defense Corps

ACLS automatic carrier landing system

A/G-AS anti-ground attack system

AGM air-to-ground missile

AIM air intercept missile

ALS automatic landing system

AWACS airborne early warning and control system

BIT built-in test

CAP combat air patrol

CAS calibrated air speed

CDIP continuously displayed impact point

CIC combat information control

DLC direct lift control

ECM electronic countermeasures

ECCM electronic countercountermeasures

ECS environmental control system

EDF Earth Defense Force

EMI electromagnetic interference

EMP electromagnetic pulse

EWO electronic warfare officer

FAB Faery Air Base

FAF Faery Air Force

FCC fire control computer

FCR fire control radar

FCS fire control system

GHQ General Headquarters

GLOC G-induced loss of consciousness

GTGM ground-to-ground missiles

HAAM high-velocity air-to-air missile

HUD head-up display

HVM high-velocity missile

IFF Identification, Friend or Foe

JFS jet fuel starter

KIA killed in action

MAX maximum power

MFD multi-function display

MIL military power

MTI moving target indicator

RPM revolutions per minute

RPV remotely piloted vehicle

RTB return to base

RWR radar warning receiver

SAF Special Air Force

SAM surface-to-air missile

SOP standard operating procedure

SSL SAF Super Link

TAB tactical air base

TAF Tactical Air Force

TAISP tactical automated information sensor pod

TARPS tactical airborne reconnaissance pod system

TCG Tactical Combat Group

TCU tactical control unit

TD target designator

TDB tactical data bank

TDG Technology Development Center