Last week the Defense Ministry made public an interim report on the death of a petty officer 3rd class from an acute subarachnoid hemorrhage 16 days after a "training fight" on Sept. 9 at the Maritime Self-Defense Force's First Service School in Etajima, Hiroshima Prefecture. The petty officer, who had joined the training course for members of the MSDF special task force, was forced to fight 15 fellow members, one after another, with each fight lasting one minute.

This training fight can only be characterized as grotesque, especially in view of the fact that the petty officer had lost confidence that he would be able to complete the course and had requested a transfer to a submarine unit to which he once belonged. The fight took place two days before he was scheduled to be transferred. The interim report says there was no need to have the petty officer fight so many opponents. Although the training fight smacks of collective violence against a dropout from a special training course, the report takes the position that the incident was a training accident.

It says a fight between a member who is about to leave the course and other members was a tradition and that the petty officer agreed to take part in the fight. While one member is quoted as saying the fight served as a sendoff "memento" for a departing member, another is quoted as saying the atmosphere was such that the petty officer could not say no. The report's statement that the fight was not the type of training that required the presence of medical officers can only be called bizarre.

The petty officer was surrounded by the 15 other members. He could no longer kick by the time he fought his fourth opponent. He became unstable on his feet when he fought the 10th opponent. Still, no one — not even the two instructors present — stopped the fight, which continued until the victim received a right hook to the jaw from his 14th opponent and collapsed backward. The Defense Ministry is poised to treat the death as an accident in the course of duty. To do so, however, would hamper a thorough investigation, blur the responsibility of the MSDF members involved and reduce the MSDF's credibility.