3-88 [Ops in the islands]: Many types of officers were involved in the operation

I used a ferry to hop the Amami islands. It was a time around the end of the year, hence there were many people on the board to go back to their own islands from the city. At the same time, I saw many officers from the police and Japanese public security intelligence agency, another intelligence organization but the police intelligence.

In each island, there have been enough police officers for their job, but it is not enough for the spy operation, which was why they needed to send their intelligence officer from the headquarter. Adding to this, other types bureaucrats were sent to monitor my behavior, hence there were a pack of officers moving together with me.

I could recognize who the public officer was, though it was basically hard to identify which departments they were working for. If necessary, I listened to their conversation to accumulate more information to tell who they were.

There was always a tension due to this monitoring and new environment which had always changed from an island to island.

In the most of cases, the people out there were quite reluctant to cooperate with the police intelligence operation. The police was also an outsider to these islands hence they cannot compel the people, even if they could not get an enough support for their illegal missions.

Moreover, the local police station was likely not to support the intelligence division, as their cooperation might hurt their relationship with the community. Each island is separated by the sea and the headquarter is located hundreds of miles away, which cannot support a daily local policing, which means they would like to avoid any unnecessary conflict.

In any way, the intelligence mission is not easily conducted in this region and could not buy a support of the local people for granted. It depends on the size of island that they can find a collaborator relatively easily in bigger islands as there were many people living. Having said that, each island still held a strong community which is not totally along with accepting an authority of the police.