How many Americans know that for eight straight years after September 11, Japanese warships stood in 120-degree heat in the Indian Ocean to pump 135 million gallons of free fuel into the U.S. Navy? After the twin towers fell in 2001, American carrier strike groups raced to the Arabian Sea to strike terrorist strongholds in Afghanistan. Why could American warships not simply pull into Middle Eastern ports to refuel? Because just one year earlier, suicide bombers in a small boat had blown a forty-foot hole in the destroyer USS Cole in Yemen. Entering port meant risking ambush and losing days off the front line. Within weeks of 9/11, the Japan Maritime Self-Defense Force dispatched its fleet oilers, including JS Towada, JS Tokiwa, and JS Mashu, ten thousand miles from home. Sailing side by side with U.S. destroyers and cruisers at twelve knots across heavy ocean swells, Japanese sailors shot steel cables across the water and winched thick rubber fuel hoses into American tanks without spilling a single drop. From December 2001 to January 2010, Japanese crews completed 939 underway refueling operations. They delivered 510,000 kiloliters, roughly 135 million gallons of fuel, plus 11,000 tons of fresh water, entirely paid for by the Japanese taxpayer. On the final day of the mission in January 2010, American sailors lined the rails of their warship in the blazing sun, took off their caps, and saluted the Japanese crew as the hoses were uncoupled for the last time. True loyalty does not ask for a camera. It holds the line for eight years in the sun.