"They put them in these internment camps," he said. "They lost their homes, a lot of them did. They lost everything they had but the clothes on their back."

It was a Relocation Center. The government ordered ethnic Japanese of the West Coast because of what was learned via intercepted MAGIC intelligence. Because of this action the government bore responsibility for the welfare of the people ordered to evacuate. The civilian run War Relocation Centers were the best results of what the government could provide on short notice in a time of war when speed was of the necessity.

Internment camps were run by the Department of Justice and held only enemy aliens who had been deemed security risks and their U.S. citizen family members who were allowed at their choice to stay with them. Internees included 10,995 Germans, 16, 849 Japanese (5,589 who voluntarily renounced U.S. citizenship and became enemy aliens), 3,278 Italians, 52 Hungarians, 25 Romanians, 5 Bulgarians, and 161 classified as “other�E Only a small fraction of enemy aliens were interned. Japanese citizens with families were sent to Crystal City, Texas and lived side-by-side with German and Italian families. Single men were sent to internment camps in other states. Not all enemy aliens were placed in internment camps, and no American citizen was forcefully placed in an internment camp. If you were interned it was determined that you, a spouse or parent was an enemy alien and a security risk.

Those that had losses could have filed claims under he 1948 Evacation Claims Act which was amended several times throughout the 1950s. Claims up to $100,000 were eligible for hearings and when all was concluded there were only 15 appeals to the settlements offered by the government out of more than 26,000 claims filed. How much fairer could that have been?

In early March of 1942 the Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco was given responsibility for handling evacuee property. On March 11 of that year "an Alien Property Custodian was appointed ...and on March 15 the Farm Security Administration assumed responsibility for assisting with (evacuee) farm problems." [Personal Justice Denied" Report of The Commission on Wartime Relocation and Internment of Civilians.]

Of course in the fog of war losses occurred in some cases and that's why the Evacuation Claims Act was passed when the war was over.

No other group in the United States got that kind of special treatment for war losses, and there were plenty of losses other than those by the Japanese.