Bataan

“78,000 American and Filipino soldiers were fighting on Bataan along with 20,000 Filipino civilians pulled into the conflict.” (Sides 41) Moments like these help the reader to realize the horrific scale to which the battle had escalated and how much of a loss the United States and Philippines had encountered…

in the years to follow. In December the following year the Japanese General, Masaharu Homma was captured and brought to trial for his war crimes. The General was found guilty on 43 counts of different types of war crimes during his tenure in the Bataan peninsula. General Homma was executed by a firing squad in the Philippines outside of Manila on April 3, 1946. Many memorials and events are in place every year to remember those brave Filipino and American Soldiers that made a remarkable and…

Lately, there has been a lot of talk about Obama 's recent visit to Hiroshima, Japan. As the first acting United States President to visit ground zero, and a supporter of ending the use of nuclear weapons, many people were anticipating an apology from President Obama. Additionally, his visit to Japan had risen much controversy over whether bombing Japan needs an apology, and what an apology would say about our country. Although Obama did not issue an apology on his visit, there is still a…

American and Filipino injured in military hospitals. Many of them thought that the fight could no longer continue. Bataan commander General Edward King was forced to giving up his troops with the wishes of many who wants to continue to fight. Later, he took the blame for giving up his men from responsibility. The events were really bad than any imagined. They were already prisoners when the Bataan Death March began. American and Filipino forces began to be put together in the large fields…

Japan attacks America at Peal Harbor forcing President Roosevelt and the U.S. to enter the war. The Americans (with the help of the Philippines) fight Japan at Bataan. When Bataan falls, the Philippine and American soldiers become POWs and are forced to march to POW camps (now known as the Bataan Death March). Following the fall of Bataan, the Battle of Midway turns the tide of the war in the Pacific. The Battle of Midway is the first Japanese naval defeat in 350 years (The War). Meanwhile the…

Just as the US, the Japanese had done some things that would be considered immoral, but unlike the US’ unethical things that had been done, it wasn’t a controversial discussion because they had done such things as the Death March on Bataan and the attack on Pearl Harbor. The propaganda of the Japanese being the bad guys had put the them in such a spot as the US’ target of vehemence, as well as their culture preferring to die a fighter, to die in battle, rather than living and coming…

General Douglas MacArthur Born January 26, 1880, Douglas MacArthur grew to be one of the nation’s finest Military leaders of all time. His military career began in West Point on June 13, 1899-June 13, 1819. He later helped lead the 42nd Division in France during World War I for four years. After WWI, he took on positions of high authority and responsibility. From being the superintendent of West Point on June 1, 1919; Chief of Staff; Field Marshall of the Philippines; Supreme Commander of the…

The novel Women of Tammuz, written by Azucena Grajo Uranza, embodies the Filipino’s way of living and how they cope with the events happening around them in the Philippines during the Japanese era. As history suggests, the Philippines was colonised by the Spanish, then the Americans, and lastly, the Japanese. Numerous events happened in that span of roughly 400 years, and like other events, the rest is history. Historically speaking, the Women of Tammuz tackles on the perspective of Japanese…

In the fictional novel Ceremony by Leslie Marmon Silko, Tayo is a half Anglo, half Laguna Indian who recently returned from the Philippines where he fought in WWII and survived the Bataan Death March; as he is of mixed descent, Tayo does not fit in anywhere and is frequently sneered at by his peers, constricting his chances of being the traditional hero. During his hospital visit shortly after his return from the war, Tayo tells the doctors, “He can’t talk to you. He is invisible…He cries…

a new exciting life. Soon, Frazier next found himself in the middle of World War II surrounded by Japanese soldiers in Bataan. When forced to surrender to the Japanese troops, Frazier and thousands of his fellow soldiers were sent to a POW Camp called Camp O’Donnell on a very tenuous march without any food where many American soldiers died, which later became known as the Bataan Death March. Frazier went 6 days without any food and any sleep, yet somehow managed to reach Camp O’Donnell alive,…