Heard today probably the closest account of what my dad went through in WW2 that I'm likely to ever hear. God knows I didn't hear it from him. Our local NPR station, KQED, broadcast "The Silent Generation: From Saipan to Tokyo," an account from soldiers who were there. Available in streaming audio at:
http://www.prx.org/pieces/6585
My dad talked very little about his time there. Hearing this piece, I have a better idea why. They spoke of what it was like to mow down Japanese soldiers in their last, desperate Bonzai, "sake" charge. Or having to shoot people charging while holding their children. Or cleaning out foxholes and tunnels with flame throwers.
My dad did tell his brother and law and his nephew, who was 10 at the war's end, that he'd been real proud to have been the first guy in his unit to have been given a "Thompson Gun." I wonder if he was haunted though, by some of his time with the that gun.
He was a pretty good guy but prone to wild bursts of anger. A lot of the guys on this radio show described the same thing. A lot of bottled up horror and trauma that they weren't able to fully deal with.
Not that they're complaining and I'm certainly not. It had to be done. Does give me pause to consider that the cost of all out war is quite high, and that we best make sure that it has to be done, I mean really has to be done, afore we do it.