|
Purveyor, Fine Asian Porn
Industry Role:
Join Date: Jul 2004
Location: San Francisco Bay Area
Posts: 38,323
|
Something to really be concerned about :
Quote:
In the 442nd Regiment they were awarded 9000 Purple Hearts (many doubles and triples), 18,000 individual decorations including 1 Congressional, 52 Distinguished Service Crosses, 600 Silver Stars, 5200 Bronze Stars, 15 battlefield commissions and many others.
They were called ?little men of iron? by one attached white division and ?Honorary Texans? by its Governor from their service with the Texas 36th Division.
They also had 680 Killed in Action, this is almost one-third of a Regiment.
The same day the war with Japan started 1500 American Japanese in Hawaii built coastal defense units on the beaches. Then they were incarcerated in an Army Stockade ?for their safety?.
There were American Japanese in two Regiments of the Hawaii National Guard, they were discharged but soon after they were asked to volunteer for the Regular Army ? 10,000 volunteered. They were first sent to Wisconsin where they made their first snowman and then Mississippi for Basic Training.
Some were transferred to special language schools to be interpreters, translators and interrogators. In Asia, these were called ?American Samurai?. They served with outstanding distinction. Eventually 6000 served proudly against their once mother country. General McArthur?s Intelligence Chief General Willoughby said their service shortened the war by two years and obviously thousands of American boys are still alive because of their service.
They fought in Europe, Alaska, China, Burma and India. They served with Merrils Marauders and with General Stillwell in China. There were 18,000 in Europe.
In Feb ?43 the 442nd was formed from 1500 volunteers from American Concentration Camps and 3000 from Hawaii. They trained ?til April ?44 and by May 1 they were on the way to Naples, Italy and joined the 100th which numbered 1300 Hawaiians and had 900 casualties since Sept. ?43.
Japanese officers in the 442nd reached the rank of full Colonel with several Lt. Colonels and Majors. One 1st Lt during the war became an honored U.S. Senator, Daniel Inouye, as did Senator Masayuki Matasunaga.
One Japanese I believe reached the rank of Admiral in the Navy Medical Service.
It is about time that we fully recognized the outstanding achievements of Japanese Americans in WWII.
|
The Bay Area is home to 2 of the 3 Japantowns which survived the war (San Francisco and San Jose - the 3rd remaining Japantown is Little Tokyo in LA). There had been over 40 Japantowns around the U.S. prior to the war.
I've talked to many Japanese Americans who endured the WWII internment camps, and even a few that served in the 442nd. The WWII internment camps were truly one of the darkest stains in this country's history, and I hope it is not allowed to happen again.
Hawaii State Senator Daniel Inouye served in office from 1963 until he died late last year (the 2nd longest serving Senator ever). I had the opportunity to hear him speak a few times about what life was like for Japanese Americans during WWII. Some amazing stories of courage and perseverance.
Quote:
During the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor in 1941, Inouye served as a medical volunteer.
In 1943, when the U.S. Army dropped its enlistment ban on Japanese Americans, Inouye curtailed his premedical studies at the University of Hawaii and enlisted in the Army. He volunteered to be part of the all-Nisei 442nd Regimental Combat Team. This army unit was mostly made up of second-generation Japanese Americans from Hawaii and the mainland.
Inouye was promoted to the rank of sergeant within his first year, and he was given the role of platoon leader. He served in Italy in 1944 during the Rome-Arno Campaign before his regiment was transferred to the Vosges Mountains region of France, where he spent two weeks in the battle to relieve the Lost Battalion, a battalion of the 141st Infantry Regiment that was surrounded by German forces. He was promoted to the rank of second lieutenant for his actions there.
At one point while he was leading an attack, a shot struck him in the chest directly above his heart, but the bullet was stopped by the two silver dollars he happened to have stacked in his shirt pocket. He continued to carry the coins throughout the war in his shirt pocket as good luck charms until he lost them shortly before the battle in which he lost his arm.
On April 21, 1945, Inouye was grievously wounded while leading an assault on a heavily-defended ridge near San Terenzo in Tuscany, Italy called Colle Musatello. The ridge served as a strongpoint along the strip of German fortifications known as the Gothic Line, which represented the last and most unyielding line of German defensive works in Italy.
As he led his platoon in a flanking maneuver, three German machine guns opened fire from covered positions just 40 yards away, pinning his men to the ground. Inouye stood up to attack and was shot in the stomach; ignoring his wound, he proceeded to attack and destroy the first machine gun nest with hand grenades and fire from his Thompson submachine gun.
After being informed of the severity of his wound by his platoon sergeant, he refused treatment and rallied his men for an attack on the second machine gun position, which he also successfully destroyed before collapsing from blood loss.
As his squad distracted the third machine gunner, Inouye crawled toward the final bunker, eventually drawing within 10 yards. As he raised himself up and cocked his arm to throw his last grenade into the fighting position, a German inside the bunker fired a rifle grenade that struck him on the right elbow, severing most of his arm and leaving his own primed grenade reflexively "clenched in a fist that suddenly didn't belong to me anymore".
Inouye's horrified soldiers moved to his aid, but he shouted for them to keep back out of fear his severed fist would involuntarily relax and drop the grenade. While the German inside the bunker reloaded his rifle, Inouye pried the live grenade from his useless right hand and transferred it to his left. As the German aimed his rifle to finish him off, Inouye tossed the grenade into the bunker and destroyed it. He stumbled to his feet and continued forward, silencing the last German resistance with a one-handed burst from his Thompson before being wounded in the leg and tumbling unconscious to the bottom of the ridge.
When he awoke to see the concerned men of his platoon hovering over him, his only comment before being carried away was to gruffly order them to return to their positions, since, as he pointed out, "nobody called off the war!"
The remainder of Inouye's mutilated right arm was later amputated at a field hospital without proper anesthesia, as he had been given too much morphine at an aid station and it was feared any more would lower his blood pressure enough to kill him.
Although Inouye had lost his right arm, he remained in the military until 1947 and was honorably discharged with the rank of captain. At the time of his leaving the Army, he was a recipient of the Bronze Star Medal and the Purple Heart.
Inouye was initially awarded the Distinguished Service Cross for his bravery in this action, with the award later being upgraded to the Medal of Honor by President Bill Clinton (alongside 19 other Nisei servicemen who served in the 442nd Regimental Combat Team and were believed to have been denied proper recognition of their bravery due to their race). His story, along with interviews with him about the war as a whole, were featured prominently in the 2007 Ken Burns documentary The War.
While recovering from war wounds and the amputation of his right forearm from the grenade wound at Percy Jones Army Hospital, Inouye met future Republican presidential candidate Bob Dole, then a fellow patient. While at the same hospital, Inouye also met future fellow Democrat and Senator Philip Hart, who had been injured on D-Day. Dole mentioned to Inouye that after the war he planned to go to Congress; Inouye beat him there by a few years. The two remained lifelong friends. In 2003, the hospital was renamed the Hart-Dole-Inouye Federal Center in honor of the three World War II veterans.
|
On a lighter note, NinaVain is prolly on "the list"...  
ADG |