[J0313]

My Granddad served aboard the USS Grenadier form the begining of the boats life till its end when they had to scuttle her form damage sustained in action in April of 1943. He told me a few very interesting things while I was growing up. Infact I heard all his stories so many times ( my Grand parents adopted me when I was 2 ) I could resite them like I had been there right along with them. He told me several times that US. fleet boats would shoot Jap survivors in the water. They did this for several reasons.

#1. Most survivors would'nt allow themselves to be rescued and thus captured. This represented a security risk for the boat becouse if the survivor and or survivors were later picked up by friendlies, they could give info that could lead to the boat being located.

#2. All nations tended to dehumanize thier enemies. This was nessasary in order to wage the kind of war that was being fought, TOTAL WAR. That means that no one is safe and everything is a legitimate target. Most American servicemen who fought in the Pacific theatre hated the Japanese at the time. This was understandable. The attack on Pearl Harbor cemented the unhuman quality of the Japanese in the minds of most Americans.

So as I stated before, history and who is a criminal and who is not is dictated by the winner. All though I know that our side was right and just in our cause to defeat the axis powers, no side came out perfectly clean in that war. So I can understand why the German Commander did what he did. He was just unlucky enough to be on the losing side of the war.