Torao Neishi was born in Oakland, California. Having prospered in their business, the Neishi family decided to move back to Japan in 1921. Two of the three brothers, including Neishi, remained in Japan with their grandmother while their mother and the youngest brother returned to the United States. Neishi spent 10 years in Japan--an experience that led him to feel "more Japanese than American" by the time he prepared to go back to California. Having Nisei friends in the area helped him acculturate back into American society, and he later entered the University of California at Berkeley to study horticulture. 
<br><br>Neishi was drafted in January 1942, one month after the attack on Pearl Harbor. Few months later, he received orders to report to Camp Savage, Minnesota, to begin language training at the Military Intelligence Service Language School (MISLS). Because of their extensive knowledge of the Japanese language, he and 13 other Kibei comprised a special class, from which two members became MISLS instructors.
<br><br>Neishi participated in the Buna campaign in New Guinea as a member of the language detachment attached to the 41st Division. He and the others scanned and translated captured documents, including diaries, magazines, and unit documents that described the strengths and strategies of the unit. Later, he was involved in amphibious landings in Hollandia, Biak, and other locations. A couple of times, the unit had close encounters with Japanese planes flying right above them, close enough that Neishi could see the pilots.
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Every time we have K-ration, we heat it up, smoke start coming out, the Japanese start shooting at us. But our line kept going up the hill...they're attacking, but [our] headquarters is in the middle of the airfield. They aim at us during lunchtime so we scatter.
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<br><br>Though language specialists typically were ordered not to go to the frontlines, a G-2 officer demanded that Neishi interrogate a prisoner inside a foxhole, with bombs and artillery fire exploding in the air above them.
<br><br>Neishi later joined the 38th Division, during which time he and two others taught Japanese to the Filipino regiment stationed in Buna. He also interrogated prisoners who were convalescing in the island hospital. In the aftermath of the atomic bomb on Hiroshima, Neishi and other team members were in charge of interrogating prisoners of war who eventually repatriated to Japan. Soon afterward, he returned to the United States and taught at the Defense Language Institute in Monterey, California. In later years, he and his family ran a nursery in his hometown of Oakland.
