The Banzai was Bad
The banzai charge is forever linked to the Japanese victories in World War II, but the truth is much more ironic. The tactic was simply bad strategy. Ironically appalling strategy:
"Don't you guys know banzai charges never work?!"
"Everyone who learned that died in banzai charges."
Horrific Irony
Ronald Reagan appears early on in the earlier timeline as a Lieutenant during the war. He asks a soldier for advice to dole out to other young soldiers—unlike him—who would actually be sent overseas to fight. The veteran’s reply is to kill the ones holding swords first. Reagan nods knowingly and replies, "Smarrrt--you target them because they're the officers, right?" The soldier quite profanely corrects his misapprehension—ironic because Reagan’s incredibly simplistic reasoning skills would one day get him elected to Commander-in-Chief: “No…you kill ‘em because they’ve got…swords. You ever had anyone running at you waving a…sword?”
What is the Cryptonomicon?
The Cryptonomicon is presented as something of extraordinary importance and significance. Certainly not the type of thing that would be placed into a position where it could just all disappear in an instant. This particular misapprehension is a type of irony that has been the backbone of world knowledge throughout civilization:
People speak of it as though it were a book, but it’s not…It is everything that Commander Schoen knows about breaking codes, which amounts to everything that the United States of America knows. At any moment it could have been annihilated if a janitor had stepped into the room for a few minutes and tidied the place up.
The Irony of Honor
Real-life American General Douglas MacArthur is presented as a brilliant tactician not so much because he is a master at maneuvering troops, but because he possesses a certain sick genius at psychological understanding of his opponent. The Japanese—you may have heard somewhere—probably reached the peak of their vaunted allegiance to honor during World War II. And this ironically will cost them the war because MacArthur manipulates the Japanese unwillingness to lose honor before their superiors by admitting to the mistakes that MacArthur is exploiting.
The Phantom of Irony
It is a big book. And there are a lot of characters. Some more important than others, of course, but a lot of them are pretty significant. One of those who really must be considered absolutely essential is Lt. Goto Dengo. Indeed, he enters the action early: he is there on page 40 of what turns out to be an 1150-page book. Ironically, however, this major character without whom the book would collapse manages to disappear entirely for huge chunks not just one, not just twice, but three or four times throughout the book. Shortly after his entrance he is AWOL until around page 260 only to pretty much be absent for almost the entire 300’s. Several times throughout the narrative Goto goes away for more than a hundred pages at a time and yet it is impossible to imagine the book without him. He almost becomes a phantom of ironic plotting.
