Bush and Flyboys of WWII

(July 14, 2010) Below, right: Former President George H.W. Bush watches flight operations from the landing signal officer's platform aboard the aircraft carrier that bears his name, USS George H.W. Bush (CVN 77). Bush and his wife, Barbara, spent their time aboard watching flight operations, touring the ship and visiting the crew. George H.W. Bush is conducting training in the Atlantic Ocean. (U.S. Navy photo by Mass Communication Specialist 3rd Class Nicholas Hall/Released)

Review by Bill Doughty

When the former President and First Lady visited namesake USS George H. W. Bush, (CVN-77) this month, among other things, they watched flight operations, toured the tribute room where a model of his WWII ship USS San Jacinto (CVL-30) is on display, and visited the ship’s library, a place filled with books, including good reads about Navy history and heritage.

Bush, one of the “Flyboys” described in James Bradley’s 2003 primer on aviation in WWII, was barely 20 when he and his flight crew were shot down after a bombing run on Chichi Jima, the island near Iwo Jima from which the orders to bomb Pearl Harbor were transmitted.

The book, on the Navy’s supplemental reading list, describes Bush’s rescue by the submarine Finback (SS-230) and the tragic loss of his two shipmates, gunner Ted White and radioman John Delaney.

Bradley delves into the horrors of war, carefully documenting incidents of torture, cruelty, even cannibalism, and explaining how such inhumanity arises from hatred, racism and xenophobia.

Less than one hundred years after Matthew C. Perry was welcomed at Chichi Jima in 1853, the tiny island was a focal point for bombing, POW abuse and fierce fighting.

Bradley interviewed then-President Bush and transcribes emotional memories of personal loss and tragedy, focusing on his sense of duty and personal ethos, his coming to terms with the tragedy of war, and ultimate transcendence, with his return to Chichi Jima in 2002, to face the ghosts of war.

Bradley, son of the Navy Corpsman who helped raise the flag on Iwo Jima, author of Flags of Our Fathers, says he is dedicated to disproving philosopher Immanuel Kant’s contention that, for humans, “the normal state of nature is not peace but war.”

In Bradley’s words, “war is the tragedy of what might have been.”

The USS George H. W. Bush is training to prevent war, to protect and defend peace, but to respond if called upon. No doubt it will have opportunities to interoperate with American allies and U.S. Navy partners -- including Japan.

More...

The following interview with former President George H. W. Bush can be found at www.achievement.org. Both the former president and former first lady are big supporters of literacy, learning and reading. While president, Bush participated in Read Aloud events, sharing the gift of reading with young people.

http://www.achievement.org/autodoc/page/bus0int-1

Was there a book that inspired you?

George H.W. Bush: One of the historians here in Williamsburg talked about War and Peace. I had to read that in school. It was an inspiring, lengthy treatise. I read it twice. It taught me a lot about life. There was a marvelous book by Salinger called Catcher in the Rye. There was a book about discrimination called Gentleman's Agreement. These books I think helped shape my life.

Was there an experience that changed your life?

George H.W. Bush: I think the major event that shaped my life was being a Naval aviator. I got my commission and wings at 18 years old, and then I went into combat at 19. And I think, as I look back on it, that whole experience probably shaped my life more than any incident, or any event. Although I remember when I was shot down in that war. I remember how terrified I was.

ATLANTIC OCEAN (July 15, 2010) Command Chaplain Cmdr. Cameron Fish and former First Lady Barbara Bush tour the ship's library aboard the aircraft carrier George H.W. Bush (CVN 77). The library is dedicated to the former president's daughter, who is also the ship's sponsor. Bush, along with the ship's namesake, George H.W. Bush, spent their time aboard watching flight operations, touring the ship and visiting with the crew. The aircraft carrier is underway conducting training in the Atlantic Ocean. (U.S. Navy photo by Mass Communication Specialist 2nd Class Nathan A. Bailey/Released)

Warfare - 1876 to 2010

Reviews by Bill Doughty

Two books I just finished -- The Last Stand by Nathaniel Philbrick and War by Sebastian Junger -- take us into combat, more than a century apart. Each is filled with rich characters, strong personalities and gruesome details about individual acts of courage in the face of death. Both books were published in 2010.

Philbrick’s book, subtitled Custer, Sitting Bull, and the Battle of the Little Big Horn, brings the West to life through the men and women who lived, fought and died in the Kansas, Dakota, Wyoming and Montana Territories.

Philbrick reveals the importance of good intelligence and command and control -- key to success in warfare over the centuries. George Armstrong Custer learned the challenges when he raced off to chase a buffalo:

“Only gradually did he realize that these rolling green hills possessed a secret. It seemed as if the peak up ahead was high enough for him to catch a glimpse of the regiment somewhere back there in the distance. But each time he and his horse reached the top of a rise, he discovered that his view of the horizon was blocked by the surrounding hills. Like a shipwrecked sailor bobbing in the giant swells left by a recent storm, he was enveloped by wind-rippled crests and troughs of grass and was soon completely lost... This same trick of western topography would lure him to his death on a flat-topped hill beside a river called the Little Bighorn.”

Sitting Bull, Hunkpapa Lakota leader

Philbrick’s carefully researched and documented book is packed with photos, maps and descriptions of the history of cruelty that unfolded in the wake of the Civil War and moved westward against Native Americans.

Custer was killed on June 25, 1876, just nine days before the United States Centennial.

In War, Sebastian Junger shows the hardships of combat from a remote outpost in eastern Afghanistan named for a beloved medic, Juan “Doc” Restrepo. Junger describes the sounds, smells and feel of combat and the long lulls before and after.

He smacks readers with sudden, shocking violence. With the forced detachment of a journalist, he reveals the life and psychology of the soldiers he came to know and care about while on assignment for Vanity Fair.

A reward comes at the end of the book when he puts his observations in the context of history and evolutionary biology.

What motivates warriors? Why is a certain size group most effective -- 30-50 for hunter-gatherer family tribes and 150 for communitiy groups, comparable to platoons or battle companies, respectively.

It is more about buddies and loyalties than big ideals and politics. A powerful motivator is simply not wanting to let your teammates down.

A fitting quote for this Independence Day introduces Book Two, entitled Killing. The quote is attributed to Winston Churchill and possibly George Orwell:

“We sleep soundly in our beds because rough men stand ready in the night to visit violence on those who would do us harm.”

Restrepo, a documentary in association with National Geographic, filmed by Junger and Tim Hetherington, earned the 2010 Grand Jury Prize at the Sundance Film Festival.

PFC Juan Restrepo

Hot, Flat, and Crowded, by Thomas L. Friedman

Review by Bill Doughty

Why do we race to use up the earth’s non-renewable resources? How can we prevent the destruction of our ecosystem? Those are key questions posed in Tom Friedman’s follow-up to The World is Flat, entitled Hot, Flat, and Crowded (Why We Need a Green Revolution -- and How It Can Renew America).”

Friedman says the crisis we face is an “opportunity”:

“Why an opportunity? Quite simply because the human race can no longer continue to power its growth with the fossil-fuel-based system that has evolved since the Industrial Revolution and thrust us into the Energy-Climate Era,” Friedman writes.

“If we do, the earth’s climate, forests, rivers, oceans, and ecosystems are going to be increasingly disrupted. We need a new Clean Energy System to drive our economies forward and bring more people out of poverty -- without despoiling our planet -- and therefore the countries, communities, and companies that invent and deploy clean power technologies most effectively will have a dominant place in tomorrow’s global economy.”

But the questions remain. How can people be convinced to take action toward a greener economy? How can the gulf of suspicion, disbelief and linear thinking be bridged? What can be done to deal with a hot, flat and crowded world?

The Navy has some answers and is taking big steps toward adopting alternative energy, reducing pollution and controlling climate change, all in order to save and protect the environment and make the world more secure -- from the Gulf of Mexico to the Arabian Gulf.

On June 9, 2010 Secretary of the Navy Ray Mabus, who understands the issues, both as former governor of Mississippi and then ambassador to Saudi Arabia in the mid-90s, spoke to the Naval War College about Navy and Marine Corps efforts to reduce dependence on fossil fuels.

Mabus spoke about the Navy's first hybrid ship, the amphibious assault ship USS Makin Island (LHD 8), which saves millions of dollars in fuel costs by using an electric drive for speeds of 10 knots or less.

"Over the lifetime of that ship, if fuel prices remain absolutely the same, we will save about a quarter of a billion dollars in fuel. We're prototyping that engine to be retrofitted onto our guided-missile destroyers so that we can begin to move that further out into the fleet," said Mabus.

"In April (2010), we flew the Green Hornet, an F-18 Hornet,” Mabus said. “The Green Hornet, a regular off-the-shelf F-18, supersonic, flew on a mixture of regular gasoline and biofuel...”

USS Independence (LCS 2) joins USS Freedom (LCS 1) as a new generation, sleek and fast, energy-efficient Navy ship, operating with a small crew.

"We're the first all-aluminum warship," said Lt. Cmdr. Philip Garrow last April. The 419-foot ship is started with the help of a computer mouse, and steered with joysticks and powered not with propellers, but rather with four jets. The Independence's hull is also a trimaran. "We're really like a giant outrigger canoe," Garrow said.

The biofuel-powered boat John W. Finn, named after the Medal of Honor recipient who passed away last month, already takes hundreds of visitors to the USS Arizona Memorial every day in Pearl Harbor.

The Navy is building new infrastructure with carbon reduction, marine mammal protection and energy conservation in the forefront. Coordinating with the U.S. Coast Guard, the Navy conducts international fisheries enforcement in the Pacific. Environmental stewardship is tied with maritime security and Navy’s efforts are reported in the quarterly magazine Currents.

Chief of Naval Operations Adm. Gary Roughead said in an address to the Surface Navy Association, “The world is running out of oil. If we don't get serious about energy, we're delivering a terrible future to our children."

In April 2010, Adm. Jon Greenert, Vice Chief of Naval Operations, released the Navy Climate Change Roadmap. The first sentence of the executive summary states: “Climate change is a national security challenge with strategic implications for the Navy.”

Last month, Commander, Naval Installations Command Vice Adm. Mike Vitale hosted a conference with CEOs of Navy and Marine Corps Public Private Venture housing. His discussion on process improvements to provide efficient and effective service focused on the impact of rising energy costs affecting all Navy installations.

Military leaders at the highest echelons recognize the value of controlling energy costs, controlling our reliance on oil and reducing our carbon footprint.

Friedman devotes a good part of Chapter 14 to recognizing the “green hawks” of the Pentagon who support more solar energy, improved insulation and greater reduction of fossil fuel use. Energy reduction is tied to greater security, a policy especially embraced by Army and Marine Corps leaders in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Friedman uses real-world examples and scientific evidence to outline his argument, showing how unrestrained population growth causes destruction of the environment, depletes resources and puts people everywhere at risk.

The countries that invest in a new Green way of thinking will survive and be strong. He devotes a clear-eyed assessment of the challenges facing China, and asks whether Red China can turn green.

For the United States, “Green is the new Red, White and Blue,” Friedman says, and should appeal to both progressives and conservatives (in the truest sense of progressing and conserving).

In other words, the issues transcend politics.

Navy Capt. Rymn Parsons reminds us in Proceedings Magazine this week about a 2007 study that predicts increased tensions in stable regions and more volatility in unstable regions. “Infertile, inhospitable conditions may prove fertile and hospitable to extremist ideology and inviting to transnational crime.”

Parsons says, “President Obama noted in his 2009 Nobel Peace Prize acceptance speech: ‘It is not merely scientists and activists who call for swift and forceful action—it is military leaders in my country and others who understand that our common security hangs in the balance.””

According to Friedman, “the green revolution is similar to the civil rights movement in that it is about personal virtue... but the civil rights movement started with citizen activism...”

Unless there is an groundswell of such activism, “Green is still more option than necessity.”

Friedman answers the big question of how to achieve a citizen activism and a tipping-point breakthrough in American understanding of the threats, challenges and opportunities: “Leadership.”

“Whenever you face a big challenge, like ending segregation or fighting a world war, the quality of leadership is often the deciding factor,” Friedman writes. “In the case of the Energy-Climate Era, we need leaders who can shape the issues so that people understand why ignoring them is such a threat and why rising to them is such an opportunity. We also need leaders who not only understand the importance of dealing with this problem in a systemic way, but who can actually generate the vision and authority to pull that system together.”

As a follow-up to The World Is Flat, lays out a harvest of choices. He concludes with some gentle suggestions: “First, pay attention and personally lead as environmentally sustainable a life as you can.” Then, translate personal commitments into national and international commitments by choosing and supporting good leaders.

(Friedman’s book was published before the terrible oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico, where the Navy is working with the U.S. Coast Guard in support of the Department of Homeland Security to help clean up and control oil pollution. Nearly 100,000 feet of oil boom has been provided by the Navy; Navy skimmer systems are working with full crews at various locations along the coast. Naval Air Station Pensacola is serving as a staging facility and is on a front line of the crisis.)

The World is Flat, by Thomas Friedman

Review by Bill Doughty

“The Curse of Oil” is one of the final subchapters of the CNO-recommended The World is Flat - A Brief History of the Twenty-First Century.

Oil-rich regions of the world have the most fundamentalist, least democratic and most warlike countries. Friedman shows how political and religious leaders in these countries often substitute critical thinking and creativity with supersition and intolerance.

In a world of growing population and diminishing resources, Friedman plants the seeds for new ways of thinking about energy, education, economic competition and, ultimately, the environment...

The World Is Flat, first published in 2005, follows in the footsteps of Friedman's earlier works, especially The Lexus and the Olive Tree, and recalls the works of Alvin Toffler (Future Shock) and John Naisbitt (Global Paradox - the Bigger the World Economy, the More Powerful Its Smallest Players).

A flat world means a level playing field, with opportunities opening to every person on earth who is willing to meet the challenges of competition and innovation.

Friedman’s book is very typically first-person, has lots of examples from his family and, in his trademark style, includes travel vignettes and recent economics history lessons. His book is on the Navy Professional Reading Program's "Division Leaders Collection" of recommended titles.

He walks the reader through three phases of American history. The first he calls "Globalization 1.0," lasted from 1492 to 1800. Globalization 1.0 was characterized by power and muscle of individual countries, according to Friedman.

Globalization 2.0, he says, was an expansion of global integration through increased trade and opening of markets, thanks to steamship, trains, and the wiring of the world through phone lines and computers.

Now, he says, we're living in 3.0, where people - individuals - are empowered and pushed by "not horsepower, and not hardware, but software (and a) global fiber-optic network that has made us all next-door neighbors."

In The World is Flat, Friedman gives examples of the new wired globalization at work. At a McDonald's near Cape Girardeu, Mo., the person taking your order at the drive-through is actually at a call-center 900 miles away in Colorado Springs. If you call JetBlue to make a reservation, you might be speaking with a homemaker in Utah, working part time. Many of us have talked to a customer service representative who identifies himself as "Bob" or "Mike" but whose real name might be Rajendrakumar-prakash.

Friedman puts numbers to what we all suspect: 5,000 of Wal-Mart's 6,000 suppliers are from China. But the wires go both ways. On Oct. 17, it was announced that Wal-Mart had the winning bid ($1 billion) to purchase Trust-Mart, one of the biggest retail chains in China. This makes Wal-Mart one of the biggest retailers in the fastest growing market in the flattened world.

Friedman sees the globalization and leveling of the playing field less as a threat and more as an opportunity. More consumers may mean more investment by developing countries, not just in the world's economy, but also in world peace and dealing with the world's problems. We're all invested in the future, after all.

Friedman is not a blind optimist. He questions how globalization trends will impact cultures, fundamentalist religions, and nationalism.

He challenges Americans to address the erosion of mathematics, science and technology. Nearly one in five scientists and engineers in the United States is an immigrant, and foreign students now earn slightly more than half of U.S. doctorates in engineering.

Friedman tells his daughters - and all Americans - to do their homework, study and read!

He describes an eye-opening moment at one of India's huge outsourcing companies, Infosys, watching hundreds of employees. He stood `'at the gate observing this river of educated young people flowing in and out . . . They all looked as if they had scored 1600 on their SATs. . . . My eye kept . . . telling me . . . `Oh, my God, there are just so many of them, and they all look so serious, so eager for work. And they just keep coming, wave after wave.

How in the world can it possibly be good for my daughters and millions of other young Americans that these Indians can do the same jobs as they can for a fraction of the wages?'"

Everyone will not agree with Friedman's views, style, or premise, but he is right that we cannot ignore or stop the waves of change, the waves of history, or the realities of a world under “the curse of oil.”

The Navy's new professional reading program's list is packed with titles about history and, in the case of The World is Flat, books that put history - and current events - in context.

The Depths of Courage - American Submariners...

Review by Bill Doughty

The U.S. Navy celebrates the 110-year anniversary of its submarine force today.

The first use of a submarine in combat was by the Confederacy in 1864 in the Civil War. The U.S. Navy formally embraced the technology and tactics of undersea warfare at the turn of the century and has been continuously improving the technology ever since.

There were some serious fits and starts - especially during the volatile early 1940s after Imperial Japan’s attack on Pearl Harbor. Flint Whitlock takes us into the war in the Pacific in The Depths of Courage - American Submariners at War with Japan, 1941-1945.

Written with former enlisted submarine torpedoman Ron Smith, Whitlock explains the challenges of faulty torpedoes and the heroic efforts by leaders like Adm. Charles Lockwood to correct problems and achieve victory.

The authors provide a sensory description of a fleet submarine in WWII, taking the reader aboard and describing the cramped quarters, noise (especially when under attack), and heat - 130F in the engine compartments, and smells: diesel fumes, equipment, cigarette smoke, and odor of eighty sweating unbathed bodies.

The Depths of Courage takes us through the Second World War, aboard submarines, showing their role and contribution in cutting supply lines, defending U.S. surface ships, and attacking the enemy. We go with the subs to every sea battle, island by island, through the Philippines, all the way to Yokohama.

The authors touch on wartime atrocities, especially the poor treatment of prisoners of war, briefly exploring the motivation of the enemy.

“The ill treatment can be attributed to the perversion of the warrior code of Bushido.” There was no mercy - only contempt, hate and cruelty - to those who did not believe in their form of religion.

The parallels to enemies we face today in overseas contingency operations and acts of terrorism are obvious.

In WWII President Roosevelt told the nation that submarines were helping us win. After the war, Adm. Nimitz credited the “spirit and courage” of the submarine force.

A dozen U.S. Navy submarines were in Tokyo Bay when the surrender documents were signed on the battleship USS Missouri on Sept. 2, 1945.

The Depths of Courage reminds us that the price of victory was high: 3,131 enlisted men and 374 officers lost their lives, out of 15,000 who served. We lost 52 submarines, out of 288 that fought - more than one out of five.

This book helps us reflect on the sacrifice of the brave Sailors who served - an serve - on U.S. Navy submarines.

Retired Vice Adm. Albert Konetzni, Submarine Force Commander for U.S. Pacific Fleet, 1998-2001, writes in his foreword to the book:

“Americans must learn from history! The Depths of Courage is a history book that comes to life as it intertwines the individual stories of young Americans with the phenomenal history of our submarines in World War II.”

Trade-Off by Kevin Maney

Review by Bill Doughty

Avatar 3D, iTunes, the NFL and Hulu; Ozzy, Roomba and Yuengling beer – Kevin Maney dissects these and dozens of other cultural icons and oddities to explain a strategy for leadership and management success in the 21st Century.

“Fidelity,” as in “hi-fi” high fidelity (think Apple), is balanced with convenience (think McDonald’s).

Maney argues that companies and individuals succeed best when they specialize and become the best in their field – or become indispensably convenient. Those who try to be both simultaneously may be doomed. And, innovation always trumps complacency.

Crocs, Motorola, Edsel and Segway scooters – all get put on the scale in Trade Off to examine “the ever-present tension between quality and convenience.”

Maney tells us:

“In any market segment, there’s usually at least one high-fidelity player that every other player admires and strives to imitate. That entity does things better than anyone else. People love the product or service. They want to own it, to make it part of their identity. They will tolerate terrible inconveniences – high prices, difficulty in obtaining it – to acquire it. Like some strange law of quantum physics, at the pinnacle of fidelity, convenience can almost disappear. Instead, pure desire takes over. Even lust.”

He gives some examples of the high-fidelity world: Apple, Bose and Cirque du Soleil.

“On a grander scale,” he says, “the U.S. and forces are the highest-fidelity of militaries.”

As the Navy continues as a “Global Force for Good,” it personifies innovation and quality – fidelity. As individuals commit to education and invest in their future, they help tip the scale for success in their favor.

What’s the future of books in a world of Amazon, Kindle and the Web? In Trade-Off Maney gives hopeful insights as to why there will always be a place for reading – and books.

Life in Mr. Lincoln’s Navy by Dennis J. Ringle

Review by Bill Doughty

President Abraham Lincoln barely makes an appearance in Life in Mr. Lincoln’s Navy. The stars of the book are the average individual Sailors who populate the book.

Sailor stories in letters, diaries and reports are used to show life aboard ironclads and wooden steam ships in the 1800s.

The minimum age for Sailors was 12, in the lowest rating: “Boy.” Photos in the Ringle’s book clearly show young uniformed boys serving.

In 1864, monthly wages started at $10 for Boy; $16 for Ordinary Seaman; $20 for Coal Heaver; $25 for Coxswain, Quartermaster or Gunner’s Mate; and $35 for Yeoman, as examples.

Ringle brings us aboard Civil War ships, where Sailors contended with roaches, rats and lice; fog, flies and mosquitoes; and the danger of fire, floods and sickness, not to mention combat itself.

The Navy issued weapons like battleaxes, pikes and cutlasses to its Sailors. The Ames 1843 pistol was smooth-bore, .54 calibre. Cannons and torpedo mines were among the chief armaments.

Combat on the ironclad warships and man-of-wars is described as hell on earth. A crew member aboard USS Hartford, in action against Confederate forts protecting New Orleans, described the deafening noise:

“The noise and roar at the time was terrible and cannot be described, but to help the imagination there was two hundred guns and mortars of the largest caliber in full blast, double this by the explosion of shells then add to this the hissing and crashing through the air, and shipping, confine this in a half mile square, it may give some idea of the noise and uproar that has taken place.”

The surgeon assigned to the steam frigate USS Cumberland described the terrible close-range battle with the Confederate ironclad CSS Virginia:

“The sanded deck is red and slippery with the blood and wounded and the dying; they are dragged amidships. There is no time to take them below. Delirium seizes the crew; they strip to their trousers; tie handkerchiefs around their heads, kick off their shoes; fight and yell like demons; load and fire at will.”

The Navy developed some of the most effective means for dealing with medical challenges, from microbes to trauma injuries, by opening hospitals, training surgeons and starting the first hospital ship, USS Red Rover.

During the Civil War the Navy welcomed Blacks, including escaped slaves, so that by the end of the war African-Americans made up 20 percent of the Navy. (Jim Crow laws and mandated 5 percent caps after the war subsequently rolled back advances in diversity and opportunity.)

Foreign sailors also served during the war. Hispanic-American Adm. David Farragut’s flagship, USS Hartford, was comprised of 35 percent foreign sailors.

Ringle briefly takes us ashore for liberty in Port Royal, off the coast of South Carolina. Port Royal, whose community continues to be a supporter of the U.S. Navy, was one of the best liberty ports during the war.

The author’s account of life in Lincoln’s Navy is comprehensive and fascinating -- exploring what Sailors did on and off duty, how they trained, what they wore, how they slept, what they ate, even how they went to the bathroom.

And what about reading? For those Sailors who could read, Ringle reports:

“Some ships, especially the larger vessels, maintained libraries on board. In 1864, the Navy Department purchased seventy-five Bibles, eighty Webster dictionaries, twenty-five atlases, and twenty copies of George Bancroft’s History of the United States for distribution to the fleet. One warship, USS Dictator, possessed a superb library that contained over two hundred books of various titles.”

Life in Mr. Lincoln’s Navy is on the list of the Navy’s Professional Reading Program.

The war to preserve the Union was fought with heroism, at great loss. Life in Mr. Lincoln’s Navy is another opportunity to reflect on the causes of war and how it impacts service members, who sacrifice so much for their country, particularly poignant when considering the War between the States, not-that-many generations ago.

Writer Tom Hicks appearing on Tom Ashbrook’s On Point radio show last week said, “War is not a good thing. War, to me, feels like a psychosis, mass psychosis. It’s a terrible thing.” Hicks is author of “Fiasco: The American Military Adventure in Iraq, 2003-2005″ and “The Gamble: General David Petraeus and the American Military Adventure in Iraq, 2006-2008.”

The Navy's Maritime Strategy states, "We believe that preventing wars is as important as winning wars."

Top: Sailors relax aboard USS Monitor; one Sailor leans against the smokestack and reads; Above: a recruiting poster promises a way to avoid the Army, with the promise of prize money.

Honor by Fire

Review by Bill Doughty

Honor, courage and commitment in the face of prejudice, fear and disenfranchisement: This book shows the story of triumph of American democracy over small-mindedness and bigotry as its author introduces us to a special group of service members from World War II.

Lyn Crost, correspondent for AP, Star-Bulletin and Honolulu Advertiser, documented this important slice of history just three years prior to her death in 1997 at the age of 80.

One hundred years ago Imperial Japan considered Okinawa a stepchild. Okinawans were treated as second-class citizens. Many emigrated to a land of opportunity – Hawaii.

Japanese from Okinawa and mainland Japan who came to the Hawaiian islands and the West Coast of the United States embraced their new country, a land of freedom and opportunity.

Their children (nisei, or second generation), became loyal Americans, willing to serve in the U.S. military and risk their lives for the country of their birth.

After the attack on Pearl Harbor on Dec. 7, 1941, however, many non-Japanese Americans questioned the patriotism of Americans of Japanese Ancestry (AJAs).

Racism brought about internment – imprisonment – of Japanese families, mostly those living in California, including some of the families of the AJAs serving in the military.

Ironically, AJA service members – exemplified by the 442nd Regiment, 552nd Field Artillery Battalion (pictured at right with Crost), Military Intelligence Service, and others – fought against racist German Nazis, Italian Fascists, and Japanese imperialists, while their families experienced discrimination back home.

Nisei demonstrated superior intelligence collection, communication skills and bravery under fire. Crost’s history of AJAs in WWII in Honor by Fire is a chronological work of love, a tribute to the achievements and legacy of these proud Americans, both in the Pacific and in Europe.

There are universal timeless lessons in this book.

Crost shows the success of the nisei approach to treating and interrogating prisoners – by building trust and showing empathy.

Each of the Marine divisions at Iwo Jima had a team of nisei linguists who worked with Marines and Seabees in clearing caves (pictured below), trying to persuade Imperial Japanese soldiers to surrender instead of committing suicide, then interviewing them to gather intelligence.

Linguists also translated diaries and documents that revealed vital information about the enemy, information provided immediately to Fleet Admiral Chester Nimitz and Army and Marine Corps leaders.

The AJAs used their trust-building techniques to communicate with Japanese civilians and soldiers on Okinawa near the end of the war, persuading hundreds hiding in tunnels or caves to surrender. Unfortunately, many women and children chose to believe Imperial Japanese Army propaganda and jumped from cliffs into the rocks and sea below.

Crost tells compelling stories of AJA heroism, taking readers to New Guinea, Italy, Burma, Anzo, Philippines and German death camps. She introduces us to dozens of individual soldiers along the way.

Tech. Sgt. Herbert Miyasaki, Gen. Frank D. Merrill (of Merrill’s Marauders) and Tech. Sgt. Akiji Yoshimura. Merrill's evaluation of the nisei: "As for the value of the nisei group, I couldn't have gotten along without them. Probably few realized that these boys did everything that an infantryman normally does plus the extra work of translating, interrogating, etc. Also they were in a most unenviable position as to identity, as almost everyone from the Japanese to the Chinese shot first and identified later."

Among the best known of the AJAs of WWII: then-2nd Lt. Daniel K. Inouye, whose platoon engaged in combat against fascists in Italy at Mount Nebbione on Apr. 20, 1945. Crost reports what happened:

Inouye’s platoon encircled and destroyed an enemy patrol and mortar observation post, then advanced to within forty yards of the main enemy force, which was shielded in a hilltop rock formation with three machine guns hidden in a bunker. There was no cover on the hillside leading to it. Inouye crawled up the hill alone to locate the weapon emplacements; as he was taking out a grenade, he was hit in the stomach by machine-gun fire. The blow knocked him down, but he managed to get up, pull the pin from the grenade, run to within five yards of the nearest machine gun, and throw the grenade inside the position. As the gunners struggled to their feet, he raked them with his tommy gun.

His men ran to help him but were pinned down by enemy fire. Inouye, bleeding from the stomach, staggered farther up the hill and threw two more grenades into the second position before he fell again He dragged himself toward the last machine-gun nest, stood up, and pulled the pin from another grenade. He had just drawn back his right arm to throw it when his right elbow as smashed by a rifle grenade, which almost tore off the arm. By reflex action, his right hand was still clenching the grenade and its safety handle. His men ran to help him but Inouye yelled at them: “Go back!” Reaching down with his good left hand, he took the grenade out of the clenched fist of his shattered right arm and threw it at the remaining machine-gun next, destroying it. Then, with his left hand controlling his tommy gun and his right arm flapping against his side, he started finishing off the surviving gunners. Before he was through he was hit again by gunfire, this time in his right leg and he fell down the hill... Inouye refused to be evacuated until his men were deployed in defensive positions against a possible counterattack.

In this attack, twenty-five enemy troops were killed and eight others captured. Inouye’s right arm had to be amputated. His dream of becoming a doctor was ended...

At the war’s end, Inouye, like a lot of AJAs, had to deal with racism back in the United States.

Passing through California on his way back to Hawaii, Capt. Inouye tried to get a haircut at a barbershop near San Francisco. An attendant met him at the door and said, “You’re a Jap and we don’t cut Jap hair.”

Today, Senator Daniel K. Inouye, a recipient of the Medal of Honor, is the second-most senior member of the U.S. Senate, chairman of the U.S. Senate Committee on Appropriations and senior member of the Commerce, Rules and Indian Affairs Committees.

The outright racism Inouye experienced 65 years ago is thankfully less overt today, though one could argue that fear-borne incivility is making a resurgence.

Educated voices, on the other hand, call for collaboration, embracing differences to achieve harmony. Crost's conclusion:

“I have learned that we are dependent on each other, and that the future will be based on the ability of our diverse races, religions and cultures to weave an understanding that will rise above inevitable conflicts. My Japanese-American friends have taught me this lesson.”

While this book is not on the Navy’s Professional Reading Program list, it is recommended by the U.S. Army Center of Military History on its history site about the 442nd Regimental Combat Team. Other titles referenced include Masayo Duus’s Unlikely Liberators: The Men of the 100th and 442nd, Thomas Murphy’s Ambassadors in Arms: The Story of Hawaii’s 100th Battalion, Orville C. Shirey’s Americans: The Story of the 442nd Combat Team, Ronald Takaki’s Strangers from a Different Shore: A History of Asian Americans, Chester Tanaka’s Go for Broke, and Daniel K. Inouye’s Journey to Washington.