December 39th through September 45th, that you
were a technical sergeant is what it said.
Sergeant major.
You were a sergeant major.
That you were in the Philippines. Right.
In Company, 3rd Battalion.
Is that right? No.
That was in Company, 3rd Battalion, the 2nd.
The 2nd Infantry Battalion. Yeah.
In Fort James Houston, that's what I went into.
2nd Infantry Division. Right.
2nd Battalion.
Is that right?
2nd Battalion, yeah.
9th Infantry. Yeah.
What was it?
Company, 3rd. Company.
Company, 3rd, Infantry, Headquarters, Company,
88th Division. Yeah.
Headquarters, 2nd, Headquarters Company, 2nd Battalion.
9th Infantry Division.
9th Infantry, 88th Division.
Oh, okay. Yeah.
2nd Battalion, Headquarters, 147th, Glider Infantry.
And 11th Airborne Division.
division. Right, right. Okay, I have here air
raid in Philippines on in 42. Were you involved
in that or
or there when it happened or did you see it? 42? Uh-huh.
No. Okay. No. Nope. Okay, May 42, Battle of
Coral Sea. Oh, I, oh these are my notes from
class. That's what it was. Okay, that's what it
is. I was, I was thinking that's all I had
on information for me, but these are my notes
from class. Okay. Um, okay, name, Jimmy
Johnson, James
Johnson. Uh, highest rank of Ray Hill, sergeant
major? Well, tech sergeant, sergeant major. Okay.
Present address, I have all that stuff. Here?
Uh-huh. That will be here. It's 110, isn't it? 110,
they were first, yeah. Okay. Um, City Highlands.
Baytown. Oh, Baytown, that's right, this is Baytown.
Yeah. You're just on the outskirts, aren't you?
Really? Just, just kind of,
Baytown, Texas. Near Park School District.
That's right, because past the railroad tracks
over here
is. Well, near Park School District goes all
the way down to Jones Road. Mm-Hmm. Catholic Church.
That's right, that's right. Goes to Slapout
Gully. Mm-Hmm. Where's that? Spring Gully. Oh, okay.
That's Slapout Gully. Okay. And, and that's it.
That's, that's all, all that area, all this
area is
near Park School District. That's right. I
don't remember now because I have some friends that
live down there, just down the street from here.
No. Is it 7752 Ward? 520. 2-0, okay. Um,
Company Troop.
You served in, I have all that. Uh, commanded by.
Well, 11th Airborne Division was commanded by
General Joseph M. Swing. Okay.
Uh. Okay.
The 2nd Division was commanded by. Oh, God. A
little old general that went over, went overseas.
Scott and Dorey, I'd have to look all that up
to find out.
But, uh, my, my last, uh,
service was the 11th Airborne Division. Okay.
And the longest period of time. Okay, that's
fine. Okay.
Um, enlistment date.
I want to say December the 19th, 1939. Okay.
And I got out, I want to say September the
27th, 1945.
September the 7th? September the 27th. Oh, 27th.
Okay, 1935. Okay. And how old were you when you
enlisted? I was 18. Oh, good. Okay. Uh, where
did you enlist? Fort Sam Houston. Okay. San Antonio.
Okay. Uh, did you have any, any occupation
before you went in? I mean,
were you involved in any kind of work before
you enlisted? No. Not really.
I, I had worked, but
I worked on a Charles E. Harris bottom line
company. Uh-huh. I did, yeah. I worked with
Charles E. Harris bottom line company before I
went in. I worked on a truck, and then we had a
big strike.
Oh, no. Yeah. When I was 17 years old.
Goodness, that must have been something. Then a
man shot at me.
We had a strike. Like these Coca-Cola trucks
that go around and deliver. That's what I done with
the Charles E. Harris bottom line company.
Charles E. Harris Root Beer. That was the only
root beer
on the market at that time. Way back then. I'm
talking about 1937. Oh. And, uh, so, uh, we worked
from 4 in the morning till 10 at night. A
dollar and a half a day.
And so we just, not me, but the other guys that
were working decided we needed to have more money.
So they decided to pull the strike, and they
did. And the guy that I worked for, and I
changed drivers,
and the guy that I worked for was an old boy
that I didn't know at the time, was hired by
the company
to come in and break the strike. And I'm
working for him. And we pulled up at a Hinky
and Peelot store.
I don't know whether you've ever heard of that.
I've never heard of that. Well, it was about
like Wine Gardens.
Uh-huh. Wine Gardens. Have you heard of Wine
Gardens? Well, I don't believe. Wine Gardens
about like Randall's is.
Oh, okay. A huge concern. Okay. And they had
Wine Gardens all over Texas, just in Texas.
But Hinky and Peelot, I don't know how far
distributed they were, but they had them all
over Houston.
And, uh, so we pulled up at a Hinky and Peelot
store to deliver root beer, and they had a
picket line.
And I told that old boy, I said, I'm not going
through that picket line to see you, Shawn.
And he said, no, I'm not going. He said, you're
going to go through that picket line or you're
going to get fired.
And I said, no, I just quit. And Dorie, I don't
know why, but all of a sudden I took off and
started running.
Uh-huh. And as I turned the corner of the
store, the boy pulled a pistol and fired and
hit that corner just as I went around it. Goodness.
And so then the company got an injunction
against the union and had to go to court.
And my dad was death on the union. She just
didn't believe in unions.
He thought that if you were a court company and
you thought that you were doing the work that
you should get compensated for,
you ought to be big enough to go up and ask for
a raise. Right.
I'd have somebody else be your mouthpiece. Right.
And so Dad was death on the union.
And I'd get up every morning and cut all this
stuff out of the paper for where we were
involved in the union
and had to go to court and be on a witness
stand, had pictures and everything.
I'd cut all this stuff out of the paper so Dad
wouldn't see it. Uh-huh.
Because he'd tear me up. Uh-huh.
But anyhow, after the strike was over, I was
the only one of the whole group that went back
to work for Charles E. Harris
and got a job inside the plant working eight
hours a day. Huh.
And making more money. Wow.
So then when I left to go into the Army, my
brother was killed, my twin brother.
I had a twin brother. Uh-huh.
And he was killed in a car wreck.
And after that I quit school and that's when I
went into the Army.
Did any of that help you?
I mean, did any of the experience with your
work help you in the Army?
I mean, did it?
Not really, though.
It didn't have much to do with the other, did it?
I told you all that. No.
Just as a cradle to why I went into the Army.
I had a friend in the neighborhood and in the
church that went into the service and every
time he'd come home on a pass,
Jim, you ought to get in the Army.
Ain't nothing like it. Uh-huh.
So that's why I went in. Yeah.
That's what, I've heard that before.
That's what my boyfriend did.
He went in because it was all glorified.
He went into the Marine Corps because it was
all glorified.
Actually, it wasn't really glorified.
Twenty-one dollars a month. Uh-huh.
Oh, he thought he was making big money when he
came into the Marine Corps. Yeah.
Twenty-one dollars a month.
He found out differently. Yeah.
Did you join the service mostly because of your friends?
He said he kind of provoked you into it.
So I could be a buddy with him. Right.
And I went into the same outfit with him. Really?
Well, that's coincidental. Yeah.
You don't usually get that lucky.
Well, at that time, you could pretty well, and
see this is prior to the war, so you could
pretty well, this was peacetime, 1939, and you
could pretty well choose where you wanted
to go. Uh-huh.
So I did. Yeah.
I wanted to go and be with my buddy.
So we did.
We were in the same outfit.
Oh, I bet that was a lie.
It was. Yeah.
You know? Yeah.
At the time, well, you enlisted in 1939. Right.
But once you got in, did you feel that the 1940
draft was necessary?
Did you feel that people should have been
drafted, or did you feel like they should
have come on their own, you know, under their
own influence?
I got mixed feelings about that draft because
it was a big fiasco. Uh-huh.
See, and they disrupted a lot of people's lives
and brought them in, and then the ones
that were older, 37 or above, they discharged.
So I, as I say, I had some mixed feelings about it.
I went down in my own little world, though, we
were out there.
Before I ever finished the recruit drill, I was
on a 60-day maneuver, and I really didn't
have to finish my recruit drill because I'd
already stood inspections and everything else
out in the field when we was on maneuvers.
So it was kind of different with me, and I
thought maybe we needed people into the service.
I really did.
I think that it could have been politically, it
could have been a little better.
I see what you're saying.
You know, I made some very good friends in that
first draft, and that first draft didn't
take place until 1940, wasn't it?
This says 1940.
I think so, 1940.
So did you feel that the 1940 draft was
necessary in the field?
Well, I probably do.
Just for being prepared, you know.
And I saw a lot of people who weren't prepared.
A lot of things could have been different.
And yet, as I look back and reflect, there's a
lot of things that I don't see how it could
have been any different, you know.
Of course, your 20-20 vision is always, your
hindsight is always 20-20.
You can see much better rather than looking
into the future as to how things are.
And I think that the draft was necessary.
I think there could have been a lot of changes
made in the draft.
But just to have our people prepared.
Necessary but not in all cases fair. Right.
I guess maybe that's what I'm saying.
Because there's several people that, when they
finished basic training, they came along
and said, well, they're too old.
So they ship them in. Right.
Well, why were they disrupted?
You see what I'm saying?
But I think that the draft was, I really think
the draft was necessary.
It could have been worked a little different.
I think it was necessary, yeah.
I have the questions circled that I thought
were most interesting.
Describe the circumstances in which you first
heard of the attack on Pearl Harbor.
Well, when I first heard of the attack on Pearl
Harbor, I was in North Carolina.
And I thought, well, this is way out there in
the Pacific Ocean.
And it would take some doing to get to us.
So I was alarmed by it, but I didn't have any
real bad feelings about it, you know.
Of course, well, Dory, you didn't have television.
The news wasn't really broadcast that much in
that day and time, you know.
It's just since they've gotten more news on
radio and the television.
And newspapers have seen fit to display news to
the people that they didn't used to have, you know.
So I wasn't real, I was concerned, sure.
But I didn't have any misgivings about it.
You didn't hit a nerve. Exactly.
It didn't make you think it.
It didn't make that much of an impression on
me, let me put it that way.
Because it really didn't.
And I was young, 18 or 19.
That is young.
I feel young and I'm 19. Yeah.
You know. Yeah.
I don't know if I could handle anything other
than that. No.
What was it like having to leave your family
and friends?
How did that feel?
And I've been asked that question many times.
But it never bothered me. Really?
It really didn't.
That's interesting.
It really never bothered me.
And I say that for this reason, Dorie.
I've seen grown men.
And when I say grown men, they're older than I. Mm-Hmm.
They're sedentary.
They cry every night in the garbage because
everyone's sick.
And that never bothered me. Really?
It really didn't.
Well, that's good.
I mean, it made it easier on you.
It really did.
It was enough to have.
And I didn't have a lot of misgivings,
or whatever you want to call them, about being
away from home. Really?
You know, I didn't.
You might have been more prepared for it, you know?
I guess maybe the thing that was my big shocker
was the death of my twin brother. Right.
And I left home because of that.
It was never a problem, Ma'am.
It was never.
Well, that's good, you know?
Well, I think it was.
But I mean, I really don't know.
I don't know how to gauge myself by other people.
I was just looking at those grown men and how
it affected them.
And they had their families.
Some of them had children, some of them didn't,
you know,
in that first wreck.
I remember that, how they were pulled in.
And that's why I thought things could have been
worked a little bit differently. Right.
Well, I miss my boyfriend, and he misses me.
And we're not even in wartime, you know? Yeah.
So he's very homesick. Yeah.
And that shocks me, you know, whenever he said
that it didn't.
It really didn't.
As I look back and reflect on it,
and I've done this many times because I thought
about those fellas
that were much older than I and how it affected them.
And yet I wasn't affected the same way.
That's really interesting.
You know?
I didn't expect to hear.
I mean, really, you hear most people saying it
was just so far and you know.
And I was getting new experiences.
And especially since you were young. See?
And I was enjoying because it was new.
I was learning. Right.
You know?
Not that I'm that brilliant, but I was learning.
And that's what I look forward to, you know? Wow.
That's a good outlook, you know?
You had a really good outlook on it then.
I guess maybe I have a funny outlook on it, Dorie.
And I always had, when we got out of combat,
I always had mixed feelings about killing somebody.
Until one day in Leyte Island.
We took Leyte Island.
And we captured one hill three different times
during one day.
We captured the hill.
And the Japanese would bring in reinforcements
and knock us out.
We would capture.
We'd get our reinforcements from the mountain.
Same thing here.
King of the mountain sort of thing.
That's what it amounted to.
And yet, I have to tell you this.
That it really put us in a fighting frame of mind
when you saw your buddies with the mussels cut
off and fried.
The Japanese were sick of them.
And they cut the mussels off and fried them for steaks.
Your own buddies and a fat part of their buddies,
they just sliced them off, made steaks out of them.
Let me tell you something.
That really put you in a fighting frame of mind. Cannibals.
Well, let's start.
But look, Laurie.
And I've seen our people.
I've seen our people in the same frame of mind.
We got up on the mountain with a lady.
And the Air Force couldn't supply us.
They were supposed to supply us by air.
And what we would do, we had an area.
And we'd mark it off.
And the airplanes were supposed to come in and
dump our supplies
in that drop zone. Right.
Well, the fog and the clouds moved in.
And the Air Force couldn't do it.
And for five days, we went without food.
Let me tell you something.
That does strange things to people.
They were almost willing to kill each other.
There we go.
Hunger does strange things to people.
And so one day, I volunteered.
And that's something you'd never do in the service.
But one day, I volunteered to go out on a patrol.
I really can't give you a good reason why I volunteered
to go out on a patrol, except maybe I
might find something to eat.
But then I might be able to kill a jamper, too. Mm-Hm.
That was my primary purpose for going to look
for jam.
To go out on patrol.
But I was going out to look for food.
And we went out.
There was a sergeant friend of mine
who was in civilian life.
He was state highway prone for the state of California.
And we went out together.
And I saw a pig.
I guess maybe I was probably a mile from camp.
I saw a pig going up the side of a little hill.
We called it a mountain.
And I put my rifle sights on him and shot that pig.
And we brought that pig back to camp.
Well, in coming back to camp, the sergeant
shot a chicken that belonged to a Filipino farmer.
And as we crossed his farm, we saw some
plants, and we went out there and dug those
plants up.
Still had the pig and the chicken.
And it was something like a sweet potato.
But it was called a kamote. Mm-Hm.
And it was just like a sweet potato.
And they may have been, but that's what they
called it, a kamote.
And we brought them back to camp.
And we used our steel hats for cooking pots.
And we butchered that pig and that chicken.
And we cut up that Kamote.
And we had some salt and pepper.
And we made a stew, or a gruel, or a soup, or whatever
you want to call it.
And we passed it around to everybody, everybody
in the outfit. Mm-Hm.
And the relationship got a little better.
But I may add one other thing, Dorie.
I smoked.
And while we were in New Guinea, they put us on rations.
They rationed us our cigarettes.
Well, my job, Sergeant Major, I knew who was
going to the hospital
and who was coming back.
And whoever went to the hospital,
I bought up their ration of cigarettes.
And I had a foot locker.
You cheated a little, huh? Huh?
You cheated a little, huh?
Well, I still bought their rations.
Well, you bought it.
I bought it.
That doesn't count.
And Dorie, I had a foot locker full of cigarettes.
I had 154 cartons of cigarettes.
Oh, Goodness.
And when we got ready to move into combat,
out of New Guinea, I took my gas mask.
They were trying to court-martial me for this.
I took my gas mask out of my bag that she
carried in.
And I put it in the locker.
And I took my blanket out of my backpack.
And I filled those two areas full of cigarettes.
And when we landed in Leyte and got up there,
in five days without food,
the cigarettes were furnished in those cartons
of rations
was since they didn't drop them.
Nobody got any cigarettes.
And I was the only one that had cigarettes.
And I distributed them out.
And I was the most popular person.
You were.
I was the only one that had cigarettes.
And you'd be surprised what that done to them around.
They could smoke.
And I nearly was down to my last cigarettes, whenever.
We finished that campaign
and went all the way across the mountains of Leyte
and down into Ormoc Valley,
which is Ormoc Bay is the bay between Ormoc
Island and Leyte.
And we were in Ormoc Valley on Thanksgiving, 1944,
when that happened.
And why did I start to tell you that?
I guess I was telling you about the morale
and how hunger can change a person's attitude.
I mean, right now, I saw people ready to kill
each other
because, you know, but I still had a good time.
Hey, let me recite an incident that happened,
and they still haven't got an answer for this.
We had a fellow in New Guinea, and his name was,
I'm going to have to name names.
His name was Frank Sellecki. S-E-L-E-C-T-I.
Well, he means that. Uh-huh.
A fine fellow.
And all of a sudden, Frank, he was the staff sergeant.
He was a platoon sergeant.
And all of a sudden, Frank lost his appetite.
I don't know how many times he went to the hospital,
and he was trying to find out why he lost his appetite,
but he just wasn't hungry.
So, we'd all pool our resources together,
and we'd get flour, and we'd get fruit, and
we'd get sugar.
And we'd go down to Frank's tent, and we'd cook pies,
and we'd cook cinnamon rolls.
Just Frank.
Frank, he wasn't able to go down to the mess hall.
And we'd go down there and cook and eat,
because we didn't want to go down and eat the
dehydrated potatoes
and the dehydrated eggs and beets and carrots.
So, we fed Frank, and we got ready to move out
of New Guinea
and go into combat.
And the doctors weren't going to let Frank go.
And he cried.
I'll never forget it.
He cried.
He said, look, I've come all this way with
these men.
He said, I want to go.
Okay, you can go.
If you don't lose any more weight, you can go.
So, that's when we started cooking for Frank.
You'd go down there any time of the day or night,
and Frank would be stuffing food in his mouth
and crying.
Big tears, all that.
Because he wasn't hungry.
He didn't want that food.
Well, consequently, he didn't lose any more weight,
and he moved out with us.
And as we went through Leyte Island,
every man in the outfit, without exception,
lost weight
through two different areas.
Actually, three.
Five days that we didn't have food.
Through dysentery and through what they call Beriberi.
It's an intestinal malfunction.
Everybody in the outfit, including myself, lost weight,
except Frank.
Oh, that's ironic.
It is.
And as I said to start with, they don't have an
answer for it.
Frank gained £42.
Good, great.
And everybody else lost anywhere from 5-20, £25
in the 30 days that we were fighting.
And Dory, one other thing.
This was odd, too.
In Leyte Island, they measured distance by time
instead of feet.
It was three hours to the next caribou landing.
It was four hours to the next caribou landing.
That's interesting.
It is, you know?
And see, this was a good education.
She said, hey, I had a wonderful time.
You don't normally think of measuring distance
by time,
by feet and miles.
Oh, that is weird.
It's three hours to the next caribou landing.
The caribou is an animal about like a cow,
a little better than a cow, and they use it for
farm purposes,
pulling plows and so forth, you know,
and grinding out grain and so forth. Yeah.
The caribou landed, and they were huge animals.
They were bigger than cows.
They were huge.
Well, what else can I tell you?
What further training did you receive overseas?
Well, you got hours in the glider outfit. Right.
When we got to New Guinea, they made my outfit
a parachute outfit.
I have that, too.
Oh, glider infantry.
That was airborne division.
They made my outfit a parachute outfit,
and I really have to tell you about this.
This is interesting, too.
According to Army regulations, hazardous duty
is strictly voluntary.
Submarine duty, Air Force, parachute jumping,
the Rangers,
this is all considered hazardous duty,
and it's supposed to be strictly voluntary.
Well, they just came out with a blanket order
and made my outfit a parachute outfit.
Everybody had to jump. Uh-oh.
Now, this is Frank Silecki that I was telling
you about.
He was a staff sergeant.
He said, since you didn't give me the
prerogative of volunteering,
I refuse to jump.
So they reduced him from staff sergeant down to private.
Oh, my goodness.
You know why?
Lack of leadership.
Oh, no. Yeah.
Oh, my goodness.
But that's not the ironic part about it.
The good part about it is that when we left New
Guinea and went into Lady,
I told you that old Frank Gainway,
he was in charge of a machine gun platoon in a
rifle company.
You've got two rifle platoons, and I had what
they call a weapons platoon.
That weapons platoon is in charge of machine
guns and 61-millimeter mortars.
Well, that was Frank's stack of bricks.
The day we landed on Lady Island,
we made a beach landing on Lady Island, and I
might add this.
This might be good.
About 40 miles up the coast, old lady.
Maybe not 40.
I don't know.
Time gets away from me now.
The Navy dropped these mechanisms that sounded,
as it came down toward Earth,
it sounded like a machine gun going off.
And when it hit the ground, it's supposed to
detonate and blow up.
Well, there were several of them that didn't do that.
But anyhow.
There were duds?
Yeah, and what happened from them.
Well, maybe not Lady and Luzon is where the
duds showed up.
But on Lady, it drew all the troops up to that area,
because they thought there was a landing up there.
So we landed.
But right after we landed, the Japanese hit us.
And we were about 300 yards in from the water.
We made that beach landing.
And they came over and dropped a pair of
troopers on us.
Frank, I told you he was in a weapons platoon. Right.
He grabbed a machine gun and got zeroed in on
that one transport.
There were several transports.
But he shot every Jap as he came out the door
and shot the plane down.
Oh, my goodness.
And this is the ironic part about it.
They made him a second lieutenant on the squad.
He was a good shot, huh? Yeah.
He was an expert.
But that's not it, see.
They made him a second lieutenant on the squad.
But then he couldn't refuse to jump,
because he was made an officer by an act of Congress,
an officer and a gentleman, and he couldn't refuse.
So they took him back and made him jump.
Oh, so he had to jump after all.
Yeah, and brought him back up.
After all that trouble.
And brought him back up.
I thought that was real good.
I bet they did that on purpose.
I don't know, but, boy, that was something.
That is.
That's amazing.
They made him a second lieutenant on the spot.
And then he had to jump.
He couldn't refuse to jump.
He was an officer.
Oh, that is funny.
You see, I had a wonderful time.
You sound like you enjoyed it.
I did.
Of course, we were having tough times, you know,
going hungry and people shooting at you.
Stuff like that.
Now what, Doreen?
Oh, let's see.
What was your opinion of the weapons you saw
used in the service,
and were they reliable?
Yes, very, very reliable.
They weren't out of date?
No, we enjoyed our weapons. Really?
Oh, yeah.
They saved your life, huh?
Yeah, they were able to kill.
That's what they were for, you know? Yeah.
What were your opinions of the equipment, the clothing,
and the rations you were issued?
You said that the rations weren't always very good.
Well, only because they weren't delivered.
Well, that's what I mean.
They weren't delivered on time. Yeah.
No, we enjoyed everything.
The equipment and everything was... Yeah.
When you think about it,
every one of us went 27 days without taking our
clothes off. Yeah.
Me, you.
No, everybody... Hey.
Everybody smelled the same?
Well, not only that, Doreen,
maybe three or four times a day,
we wade through mountain streams
to get into our point.
So we took baths as we walked...
Oh, sure enough.
We went through the streams.
No, our equipment,
we thought was excellent for us at the time.
Right, right.
Now, they got more sophisticated equipment,
but now they have, you know? Mm-Hmm.
But our equipment for us at that day and time,
at that point in time,
was sufficient for our needs.
Did it work with the climate and the weather conditions?
Well, yeah, but you had...
Over there, there was a lot of moisture.
You had to make sure that you kept your rifle clean
and oiled and everything.
But that was up to you. Right.
But it was fine.
That's interesting.
How responsive were the supply services to your
unit's needs?
Well, real good,
with the exception of the supply that we
couldn't get to. Right.
And that wasn't their fault. Right.
So it was real good.
It was good? Yeah.
That's interesting.
You think that in a time of crisis like that,
it would be chaos, you know? Yeah.
And everything would be...
No, I think their logistics and everything was
real good.
They saw...
I really think we had real good leaders.
Our generals, I think, displayed wonderful foresight
in seeing our needs and anticipating what our
needs would be,
you know, to...
That was good, you know.
It really was. Yeah.
Because it's hard to keep up with people, you
know, with everybody. Sure.
Well, my next question was,
what did you think of the quality of leadership
while you were in the service?
I just got three times.
You just told me.
We're on the ball, aren't we?
Goodness, that was my very next question.
Start here.
What did you think of the quality of leadership
while you were in the service?
Of course, we were all under General Douglas MacArthur,
and I can't give a lot of...
I don't agree with a lot of our people,
but I can't give him enough praise.
Well, he wasn't Jesus. Uh-huh.
He was pretty darn close, huh?
And he was pretty close to walking on water. Right.
But that's the way I felt it.
Hey, I'd follow that man anywhere.
But we had a lot of people that didn't feel
that way.
For a simple reason,
and this had to do a lot with Washington.
You see, we were fighting two fronts.
He was fighting the front in Europe,
and he was fighting the front in the South Pacific.
They were diverting all our equipment and
manpower to Europe
to get that over with.
Well, then after it was over with,
it really...
a phrase they've been using trickled down lately.
Right, right.
After it trickled down a little bit,
well, then they started putting their equipment
and manpower
in the South Pacific.
Well, Douglas MacArthur put out an order
that if a person was wounded
and he was in a station hospital
120 consecutive days,
he'd automatically come back to the States.
Now, we had wounded people that he'd put in the hospital
or they would put in the hospital,
and they'd be in the hospital 115, 116 days,
and he had moved into another hospital.
If you look at what the order said, 120
consecutive days,
and he kept those people over until they was up
and ready to go again.
He'd just change hospitals. Uh-huh.
It's a lie. Smart.
Keeping his people over.
He wasn't getting any replacements. Right.
Like, everything was going to Europe.
And I often said, and I probably was wrong in
saying it,
that I would have much rather have fought a
more civilized war
if there was such a thing in Europe,
because they quit fighting it sundown.
And they didn't resume fighting until the sun
came back up
the next day.
The Japanese, they hit you 7, 8, 12, 2:30 in
the morning.
They hit you all hours.
And it was terrible, the hours.
There's a lot of nights that you never got any sleep,
the Japanese.
And when we moved in to Luzon,
I wasn't really scared until one night in Luzon.
Right after we moved into Luzon,
and the Japanese hit us at 12:00,
and they hit us again at 2:00.
And the reason I'm saying that, we killed the captain,
the Japanese captain.
And I got his wristwatch.
And I may still have his wristwatch.
I don't know.
But there were five minutes difference
in his watch and mine at the time.
And I looked at my watch, and it was 12:00
when he hit us the first time.
And I mean, the way they get up and they come
running at you,
screaming and firing their rifles with
everything they had,
and just screaming, banzai, banzai!
Well, in the middle of the night.
And I got scared.
And I stayed scared the rest of the time I was
over there.
I'd be lying if I say I didn't.
But I did.
I was scared the rest of the time.
And that's why I say that it was an uncivilized war,
the war that we fought in Iraq.