"In late October, 1944 the First Battalion of the U.S. 141st Infantry Regiment, comprised mostly of men from the Texas National Guard, broke through German lines in northeastern France and then found themselves cut off and surrounded by the enemy. They became known as "The Lost Battalion" and would have all died had it not been for the heroic rescue operation carried out by the mostly Japanese-American soldiers of the 442nd Regimental Combat Team. Around 40 aging veterans from both units came together in Houston on November first for what may be the last time.

The veterans, all in their 80's and 90's now, and their families came from all around the country for this 65th Anniversary event, sponsored by the National Japanese American Memorial Foundation. On hand to greet them was Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Admiral Mike Mullen, who posed for photos with each veteran and hailed their courage and their contribution to U.S. history.

"You represent such a special group of that very special generation and the courage, the valor, the heroism," said Admiral Mullen.

Among those present was 88-year-old George Sakato, who wore the Congressional Medal of Honor he was awarded for his part in the battle to rescue the trapped soldiers. He says he must have had ten lives to have survived the war."

Read more here:

VOA News - World War II 'Lost Battalion' Veterans Reunite

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"If you want peace work for justice" -Pope Paul VI

Jon

What an amazing story. It gives you the chills no matter how many times you hear it.

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Kicking up dust since 1978

Great story about true American heroes bless them all.

Seki's 442nd Regimental Combat Team became the most decorated unit in US military history for its size and length of service.

No dispute about the DSCs but the MOHs given 55 years later were affirmative-action-driven. The Army Review Board study instigated by Sen. Akaka applied only to those awaded the DSC who were Americans of Asian or Pacific Island descent.
Caucasian awardees of the DSC were excluded from the upgrading study. The mission of the review could not have been more racially based.

Despite its motivation, the study found no evidence of downgrading of MOH recommendations to DSCs as Akaka and his fellow-travelers had hoped to show.

In the words of Army Command Historian, James C. McNaughton in the board's final report on September 30,1998:

"What did we find? ....in the Army awards process we found NO evidence that award recommendations were rejected or downgraded on the basis of race." (Emphasis added)

Despite these findings, 22 Japanese-Americans were upgraded from DSCs to MOHs anyway.

In so doing, the judgement of WWII combat award officers whose original decisions that DSCs (not MOHs) were appropriate at a time when the facts were fresh and
corroborating witnesses alive and on hand to verify them, were politically overruled.

"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.