In November 1941, the Army drafted Kazuo Yamane. He trained in Hawaii at Scofield Barracks, but after December 7th, when Japan bombed Pearl Harbor, the U.S. Army did not know how to treat the Japanese-Hawaiian soldiers. First, they took their guns and ammunition, and later gave them back. Finally, after the Allies lost the Battle of the Midway all soldiers with Japanese blood were shipped off the islands in the middle of the night to Oakland, Calif., for training. These soldiers later became known as the 100th Battalion.

After six months of training at Camp McCoy, Wis., Yamane volunteered for the Military Intelligence Service Language School (MISLS). He figured that since he had learned Japanese while attending Waseda University in Japan, he could use those skills in the Army.

On December 8, 1942, he left for Camp Savage, Minn., and studied for six months. After graduation, he received his first assignment:

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John Aiso, the director of Camp Savage at the time, said, "Hey you guys are going to go to an assignment which is the first, you know, of the Nisei. The very first assignment and you men better give a good showing." He never said where we're going. When we got on the train, Gene Matsumoto opened the orders and it said we're going to Washington, D.C., not saying Pentagon. And that's where we ended up, Pentagon. [Oral History]
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In the hallways, no one believed he could be Japanese, but they still wanted to know where he and the other linguists came from:

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One guy asked me, "Where you from? What nationality are you?" Oh, I'm Indian, American Indian. They look at me kind of puzzled, you know. Then he asked me, "Well, what tribe are you from?" The Osaka tribe. And he didn't know what Osaka was anyway because Japan, huh? They giggled.... But that's how much they knew.... We wouldn't tell them what we're doing. [Uncommon Courage]
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For a year and a half he worked with three other Nisei linguists as War Department staff. They translated a book of almost 50,000 Japanese officer names.

Next he moved to Camp Ritchie, Md., to help set up the Pacific Military Intelligence Research Section (PACMIRS). The Pentagon sent the linguists 15 boxes of documents from Saipan. At first, they thought the boxes held nothing of value, but Yamane's commanding officer assigned him to look through it and make a report. In the second or third box, he discovered a thick book:

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When I look at the title ... I was kind of shocked. It listed all the munitions plants in Japan with address, location, everything. An inventory of the weapons and stock, the spare parts that's available, inventory of the munitions.... How many they have where it's located, stored, everything.... So I call my colonel. Colonel, boy I got a hot document over here. [Oral History]
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He had discovered the Japanese Imperial Army Ordinance. The United States immediately began using the information to bomb munitions factories and warehouses in Japan. After the war, Occupation forces used the inventory information to quickly seize warehouses of ammunition without any conflict. 

After the team finished the translation, Yamane received word that he would be sent on another secret mission. Without knowing where he would go or what he would be doing, he quickly married on Columbus Day, 1944. They had met in Washington, D.C., where she had been working as a civil servant.

Almost immediately after his swift wedding, Yamane boarded a large C-54 plane in New York and flew to France. Once again, he learned of his mission en route. On the plane his commanding officer opened their instructions:

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We were going to be attached to the British commanders and we are to attack Japanese Embassy or any governmental agency that you're going to specify, look for Japanese documents.... I was given a personal order by a lieutenant at the Pentagon, "You watch for Japanese documents on Russian intelligence. "[Oral History]
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After arriving in France they waited to enter Berlin. The Russian Army entered the city first and made U.S. Forces wait before entering. While the three MIS linguists waited, the Army sent two of them to interrogate Japanese prisoners in Austria, and Yamane went south to visit his brother and friends in the 442nd Regimental Combat Team.

The Russian Army never let the Americans in, and one soldier described it as, "the start of the Iron Curtain."

After V-E day, Yamane's Berlin mission was aborted. Around the same time he learned that his father had fallen ill and decided to returned to Hawaii with his. The Army discharged him and he continued his father's work in real estate. Yamane successfully worked as a real estate developer, owning restaurants and building shopping malls and bowling alleys.

