was an officer and ace

Ace

An ace is a playing card. In the standard French deck, an ace has a single suit symbol located in the middle of the card, sometimes large and decorated, especially in the case of the Ace of Spades...

 fighter

Fighter aircraft

A fighter aircraft is a military aircraft designed primarily for air-to-air combat with other aircraft, as opposed to a bomber, which is designed primarily to attack ground targets...

 pilot in the Imperial Japanese Navy

Imperial Japanese Navy

The Imperial Japanese Navy was the navy of the Empire of Japan from 1869 until 1947, when it was dissolved following Japan's constitutional renunciation of the use of force as a means of settling international disputes...

 during World War II. Participating in many of the Pacific War

Pacific War

The Pacific War, also sometimes called the Asia-Pacific War refers broadly to the parts of World War II that took place in the Pacific Ocean, its islands, and in East Asia, then called the Far East...

 battles and campaigns as a member of several units, including the fighter units of the aircraft carriers Shōkaku

Japanese aircraft carrier Shokaku

Shōkaku was an aircraft carrier of the Imperial Japanese Navy, the lead ship of her class. Along with her sister ship , she took part in several key naval battles during the Pacific War, including the attack on Pearl Harbor, the Battle of the Coral Sea and the Battle of the Santa Cruz Islands...

 and Chiyoda

Japanese aircraft carrier Chiyoda

was an Chitose class aircraft carrier of the Imperial Japanese Navy. She was originally built as a seaplane carrier, before being converted to a light carrier from March to December 1943.She was damaged in the Battle of the Philippine Sea....

, Kodaira was officially credited with destroying 13 enemy aircraft. After the war, he served with the Japan Air Self-Defense Force

Japan Air Self-Defense Force

The , or JASDF, is the aviation branch of the Japan Self-Defense Forces responsible for the defense of Japanese airspace and other aerospace operations. The JASDF carries out combat air patrols around Japan, while also maintaining an extensive network of ground and air early warning radar systems...

. In 2008, Tsubasa-kai, the veteran's organization of JASDF, reported his death on its web.