Once Germany was defeated and divisions and bombers began redeploying to Asia was the first time the United States was able to bring the full weight of its war machine on Japan. Early in the war, GIs in the Pacific were often outnumbered, even as they fought the tropical heat and disease, and tens of thousands were taken prisoner.
At the same time Japan attacked Pearl Harbor, they also landed troops in the Philippines which eventually was forced to surrender. Those who did were forced on the Bataan Death March and spent the rest of the war in horrible Japanese prison camps. Among them were members of a National Guard unit from Maywood.
When Japan surrendered there began a frantic effort to find and supply our troops being held by them. These camps were all across Japan and on the Asian mainland. The locations of some of the camps weren't exactly known. What was known, however, were the inhumane conditions and starvation being forced on our troops.
On August 25-- eleven days after the surrender, a U.S. search plane charted a prison camp 70 miles north of Tokyo. Some 120 prisoners were naked, but all delirious with joy when they saw Lt. Roy Bean's fighter plane.
"I had no supplies but threw over my package of cigarettes," Bean said. "In all the hell we have been thru, it did my heart more good to see those men than to go home."
--A Great Day, the Greatest Generation. --GreGen
The USS North Carolina (BB-55) My all-time favorite warship. As an elementary school student in North Carolina, I donated nickels and dimes to save this ship back in the early sixties.
No comments:
Post a Comment