With all the recent publicity about the 70th anniversary of the end of World War II in the Pacific, I feel compelled to write about my brothers’ experiences there. One brother was 33 years old and was a tank commander who had survived the battle of Iwo Jima. The other brother was 18 years old. Both were in training for the invasion of Japan. When Japan finally surrendered on Aug. 15, nine days after the first atomic bomb was dropped and six days after the second one was dropped, they signed the formal surrender papers on Sept. 2, 1945. The younger brother said he and his cohorts had a huge psychological letdown because they were trained and primed but were without a job to do. The older brother knew better.
After the Japanese finally surrendered, the younger brother spent two years on several islands getting Japanese soldiers out of the jungles and caves who did not know the war was over. The older brother was put in charge of building housing for occupying U.S. troops on the Japanese mainland. He told me that every old man, woman and child that he encountered had been issued and trained with sharpened bamboo spears to use against U.S. soldiers if we had invaded. They did not have the word “surrender” in their vocabulary. Yes, dropping those bombs was brutal, but it ended the war, saving hundreds of thousands of people, both Japanese and American.
Both brothers are gone now, but I will always remember the stories they told me about their experiences there.
Charles Karnes
Durango
