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.