Banzai Babe Ruth

By Robert K. Fitts. In November 1934 as the United  States and Japan drifted toward war, a team of American League all-stars  that included Babe Ruth, Lou Gehrig, Jimmie Foxx, future secret agent  Moe Berg, and Connie Mack barnstormed across the Land of the Rising Sun.  Hundreds of thousands of fans, many waving Japanese and American flags, welcomed the team with shouts of “Banzai! Banzai,  Babe Ruth!” The all-stars stayed for a month, playing 18 games, spawning  professional baseball in Japan, and spreading goodwill. Politicians  on both sides of the Pacific hoped that the amity generated by the  tour—and the two nations’ shared love of the game—could help heal their  growing political differences. But the Babe and baseball could not  overcome Japan’s growing nationalism, as a bloody coup d’état by young  army officers and an assassination attempt by the ultranationalist War  Gods Society jeopardized the tour’s success. A tale of international  intrigue, espionage, attempted murder, and, of course, baseball, Banzai Babe Ruth  is the first detailed account of the doomed attempt to reconcile the  United States and Japan through the 1934 All American baseball tour and provides a wonderful story about baseball, nationalism, and American and Japanese cultural history.  Paper: 368 pp.