On PBS: The War

[goesh]

What impressed me most about this documentary was the segment on the 442 Bn, all Japanese and the part about that Crow Indian guy. The dominant culture always presents itself in the best light and lesser groups get shuffled to the side and not much is said about them. I knew for instance that Americans of direct Japanese descent had fought in the war, but I had never heard of the 442 Bn until this documentary came out. Blacks started getting their due long before Japanese and Native Americans. Times have changed and for the better. I found very moving in particular the part about a Japanese family in an internment camp getting official notification that their son had been killed in action.

But in getting back to Indians, it was our current President who finally got the ball rolling to honor the Dineh (Navajo) code talkers for their significant contribution. The Oct. issue of the VFW Magazine has a nice piece on Native Americans. 25,000 served overseas during WW2. Before Indians were given US Citizenship in 1924, 4,000 had gone overseas to fight in WW1. On 11/15/03, Sheldon Hawk Eagle, Lakota, was KIA. His bloodlines go back to Crazy Horse. His ancestor would have been proud of him. In 2005, DoD released a report that said Indians compose less than 1% of the population but they make up 1.6% of our armed forces. It is duty and honor and their warrior heritage that brings them to recruting stations, not the pay and benefits and coming from the dire poverty of most reservations, that is saying alot, but it also says alot about America in general.

I had 4 uncles in it - 1 KIA and 1 disabled and the 3 who survived never said a word about their extreme sacrifices but that is not unique to Americans or that particular generation. When the dust finally settles in Iraq, the troops will come home and take their place in front of the long line of Veterans standing behind them. They will be honored no more, no less than those behind them and they will suffer in silence for the most part and take to their graves their nightmares of killed enemies, fallen comrades and dead civilians. So be it, we would have it no other way.

[Tom Odom]

What impressed me most about this documentary was the segment on the 442 Bn, all Japanese and the part about that Crow Indian guy. The dominant culture always presents itself in the best light and lesser groups get shuffled to the side and not much is said about them. I knew for instance that Americans of direct Japanese descent had fought in the war, but I had never heard of the 442 Bn until this documentary came out. Blacks started getting their due long before Japanese and Native Americans. Times have changed and for the better. I found very moving in particular the part about a Japanese family in an internment camp getting official notification that their son had been killed in action.

Pretty good, bit cheesy movie titled "Go For Broke" which was the 442d's slogan in the war. The 442d/100 was one of the most decorated units in the ETO.

BTW Mark Clark remained a dirty word in Texas well into the 1960s after what happened to the 36th Division at the Rapido.

Best

Tom

[Steve Blair]

The 442d has been covered a time or three before this...but like many things in the Italian campaign it ended up for years in more mainstream/popular/watered down history taking a back seat to D-Day and France/Germany.

And Tom,

I also liked that the interviews were honest. WWII was quite brutal and the reality was something that was out there but never really addressed. As a youngster, I read a book that was literally a combat diary and after the Bulge, there were repeated statements to the effect, "The boys aren't taking prisoners, today." One of the NCOs in my very first company as a 2LT was a grumpy but motherly Master Sergeant named Burtis. He was a Raider on Guadacanal and his comments to me matched what was said about prisoners in the "long patrol." The savagery in the Pacific especially by 1944 is not something most Americans grasp. And I think it is important that they hear it--with all the emotionalism attached to it.

This is something that Gene Sledge commented on in his masterpiece "With the Old Breed." One of the things of value that may come from Burns' effort is getting these guys to talk about it. Too many uninformed types think that combat trauma is somehow unique to the Vietnam veteran and fail totally to grasp that all wars are horrible and that savagery isn't a modern invention. The Pacific was absolutely horrific...I think only the Eastern Front and China surpassed it in terms of combat horror. That dimension is often left out today...or distorted to match one agenda or another (as in "only Americans were horrible" or "the Japanese never took prisoners"). Too many people refuse to let go of their own biases and acknowledge that the mask of the beast dwells within each of us, and that in combat that mask is often turned (or breaks) loose.

Ok...time to get coffee. Bad metaphors/pseudo-philosophic rambling always means time for more coffee.

[tequila]

An excellent book on the savagery of the Pacific War is John Dower's War Without Mercy. Not sure I buy his thesis completely (that racist ideology drove war motivation on both Japanese and U.S. sides), but he has a lot of compelling evidence.

Omer Bartov is also instructive for his work on the Wehrmacht on the Eastern Front. Another superb book is War of Extermination: The Germany Military in WWII. Ben Shepherd's War in the Wild East: The German Army and Soviet Partisans is also instructive as to German counterinsurgency tactics in the East.

[Tacitus]

BTW Mark Clark remained a dirty word in Texas well into the 1960s after what happened to the 36th Division at the Rapido.

Best

Tom

Legendary film director John Huston's 1945 documentary film "The Battle of San Pietro" comes to mind.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Battle_of_San_Pietro
Thought to be too depressing for the folks back home, he couldn't get it shown until General Marshall himself intervened.