Ghosts of Bataan

[Hylander_1314]

You have the Bataan Peninsula marked right. That type of treatment from the Japs in WWII is one of the reasons the American attitude in the Pacific was, no quarter asked for, none given.

Another good one to watch out for is, Hell in the Pacific. History International will run all 4 hours in two parts, where as the Military Channel ran a paraphrased 2 hour version of it. One former Marine that was on Iwo, and Okinawa, said they would blow up the caves with granades, and, or bury them with dozers, not knowing if they were military personel or civilians. And he made the comment that it would appear cruel to most people today, but he also added the statement "we were here, not you". This was done to save American lives, as too many men were being lost to trying to explore the caves for civilians or military personel. Some units even prided themselves on the fact that they never took any prisoners.

Was the island fighting the worst? For the Americans, and their allies, it was the equivilant of the fighting on the Eastern front, that took place the German Army, and the Russian Army. The Japanese treated the civilian population of conquered territory, as badly, or worse than the German troops did. They were known to take civilian women of the places they conquered and force them to be "comfort girls". No need to elaborate on that one. They were also known to take p.o.w.'s and make them dig waist deep ditches, then make the same p.o.w.'s stand in them with gasoline up to the knees. As far as igniting the gasoline, I don't recollect any accounts of it, but who knows what's been omitted from history. Pappy Boyington told of doing and enduring this type of treatment after he was picked by a Japanese sub after being shot down over New Georgia Strait. He even claimed to be in one of the news films the Japanese made of the prisoners having to do this.

A member of the R/C model boat club Dad and I belonged to back in Michigan many years ago had a member who was captured by the Japanese. He had some horror stories he would tell us about. The forms of torture were hidious, by any era's standards. But the "whites" or "round eyes" as the enemies of Japan were called, deserved nothing better according to their own "racist" views on the Americans, and Brits, and Austrailian, and New Zealand, and Dutch prisoners. And the civilians in internment camps faired none to much better either. Far worse than the internment camps that America used for the Japanese American civilians. Not to say that it was right, but no where near what their Japanese did to the civilians interred in the camps.

Check out another one called "The War" that PBS runs. It gives you a good history of the internment camps. Along with other aspects of the War.

It was a terrible thing to endure no matter what country you had the misfortune of being in at the wrong time.