“One of only a handful of Japanese veterans who survived the battle of Iwo Jima – one of the bloodiest campaigns of the Pacific war – spent a recent memorial service on the island alongside US veterans after being told there was no space for him among the Japanese contingent…

Akikusa, who was an 18-year-old radio operator in 1945, recalled how seeing the US invasion force on the morning of 19 February convinced him that Japan’s defeat was inevitable. “I was overwhelmed,” he told the BBC earlier this month. “How could they have so many ships? There were more than in the entire Japanese navy. It was then I realised we were going to lose the war.”