Awaiting MacArthur's Return, page 28
99. Headquarters, 6th Infantry Division, Luzon, Philippines: Report of the 6th Infantry Division, CGSC Library, 22.
100. Richard E. Womer, The Operations of the Communication Platoon, 149th Infantry, (38th Infantry Division) in the Battle of the Sierra Madres, 16 May—30 June 1945 (Luzon Campaign) (Personal Experience of a Regimental Communications Officer) (Fort Benning, GA: The Infantry School, 1945), 19. According to Womer, Filipinos would use the wire to hitch their water buffaloes to their carts.
101. Headquarters, 6th Infantry Division, Luzon, Philippines: Report of the 6th Infantry Division, CGSC Library, 32.
102. Although the southern Philippines were of doubtful strategic value, MacArthur saw clearing them as fulfilling a promise to the Filipino people. Historian Ronald Spector, in particular, views MacArthur’s decision to divert Eichelberger south as wasteful, given the difficulties the Sixth Army was having on northern Luzon. See Spector, Eagle against the Sun, 526–527.
103. Robert L. Eichelberger, Our Jungle Road to Tokyo (1950; repr., Gorget Books, 2017), loc. 194, Kindle.
104. Toshimichi Urata, “Activities of 3 Company Tominaga Company of 174 Independent Infantry Battalion on PALAWAN Island,” July 8, 1949, CGSC Library. This document is part of a collection entitled Statements of Japanese Officials on World War II (English translations) compiled by the Southwest Pacific Area’s Allied Translator and Interpreter Section (ATIS).
105. Smith, Triumph in the Philippines, 601.
106. Smith, 602.
107. Reports of General MacArthur, 1:316. The US invasion of Leyte in late 1944 saw more than half of the Japanese garrison on Panay leave to defend Leyte. Peralta took full advantage of this to expand his zone of control on Panay. See Smith, Triumph in the Philippines, 601–602.
108. Sadayoshi Ishikawa, “Action Report of the 170th Independent Battalion, 77th Brigade, 102nd Division on Panay,” in Staff Study—Japanese Operations on Panay Island, CGSC Library, 1.
109. Baclagon, Philippine Campaigns, 258.
110. Smith, Triumph in the Philippines, 601; G-3 Section, 40th Infantry Division, “40th Infantry Division, G-3 Journal Entry No. 32, 18 Mar 45,” Record Group 407, Entry 427, Box 8908, NARA II.
111. G-3 Section, 40th Infantry Division, “40th Infantry Division, G-3 Journal Entry No. 21, 18 Mar 45,” Record Group 407, Entry 427, Box 8908, NARA II. The Eighth Army would continue supplying the guerrillas on Negros until the Fortieth Division landed there two weeks later.
112. G-3 Section, 40th Infantry Division, “40th Infantry Division, G-3 Journal Entry No. 43, 18 Mar 45,” Record Group 407, Entry 427, Box 8908, NARA II. Peralta related that his men only had 100 rounds per Enfield rifle or M1 carbine and even fewer for each submachine gun.
113. G-3 Section, 40th Infantry Division, “40th Infantry Division, G-3 Journal Entry No. 68, 19 Mar 45,” Record Group 407, Entry 427, Box 8908, NARA II. Those men who were disarmed but were officially members of the Philippine Army would be rearmed at a later date.
114. Headquarters, 61st Infantry, “Subject: Combat Report; to: DC; 6th MD,” March 31, 1945, Record Group 407, Entry 1093, Box 253, NARA II.
115. G-3 Section, 40th Infantry Division, “40th Infantry Division, G-3 Journal Entry No. 129, 20 Mar 45,” Record Group 407, Entry 427, Box 8909, NARA II.
116. G-3 Section, 40th Infantry Division, “40th Infantry Division, G-3 Journal Entry Nos. 19 and 20, 20 Mar 45,” Record Group 407, Entry 427, Box 8909, NARA II.
117. Ishikawa, “Action Report of the 170th Independent Battalion,” 3–4.
118. G-3 Section, 40th Infantry Division, “40th Infantry Division, G-3 Journal Entry No. 124, 20 Mar 45,” Record Group 407, Entry 427, Box 8909, NARA II.
119. Reports of General MacArthur, 1:316.
120. Smith, Triumph in the Philippines, 601. Panay was intended to serve as the embarkation point for the Fortieth Division and the Fifth Infantry Division (en route from Europe) during the planned invasion of the Japanese Home Islands. See Smith, 604.
121. Reports of General MacArthur, 1:315.
122. Smith, Triumph in the Philippines, 608.
123. The Americal Division’s 146th Regimental Combat Team was serving as the Eighth Army Reserve at this time. See Smith, Triumph in the Philippines, 608.
124. Reports of General MacArthur, 1:315. To request air support for the guerrillas, Thirteenth Air Force organized five Guerrilla Air Support Teams equipped with jeep-mounted radios. These teams could direct air strikes if necessary and provided intelligence to pilots on areas where the Japanese had antiaircraft weapons. See Joe G. Taylor, “Air Support of Guerrillas on Cebu,” Military Affairs 23, no. 3 (1959): 149–152.
125. Smith, Triumph in the Philippines, 614.
126. Headquarters, Americal Division, “Arnold to Eichelberger, SITREP, 31 MAR,” Record Group 407, Entry 427, Box 4877, NARA II.
127. G-3 Section, Americal Division, “Americal Division, G-3 Journal Entry No. 5, 3 Apr 45,” Record Group 407, Entry 427, Box 4877, NARA II.
128. Headquarters, Americal Division, “CG Americal Division to 8th Army ATTN G-3, 3 Apr 45,” Record Group 407, Entry 427, Box 4877, NARA II.
129. Boggs, Marine Aviation, 110.
130. Smith, Triumph in the Philippines, 605, 618.
131. Reports of General MacArthur, 1:315.
132. Kanako, “Guerrilla Operations in the Visayan Islands,” 6.
133. Kawanura Mikio, “Soldier Who Was Able to Share His Last Bit of Rice,” in Gibney, ed., Senso, 153–154; Kokubo Yumio, “The Death Struggle on Negros,” in Gibney, ed., Senso, 152–153.
134. Hal Randall, The Operations of the 160th Infantry (40th Infantry Division) in the Vicinity of Hill 3155, Negros, P.I., 15 April–15 May 1945 (SOUTHERN PHILIPPINES CAMPAIGN) (Personal Experience of a Regimental Supply Officer) (Fort Benning, GA: The Infantry School, 1948), 9–12.
135. Approximately 880 Japanese emerged from the hills during the final surrender. See Smith, Triumph in the Philippines, 618.
136. Reports of General MacArthur, 1:315. Bohol’s guerrillas had previously experienced a great degree of infighting and alienated the civilian population, and a Japanese punitive expedition had some success in breaking up the guerrillas until Ingeniero reconstituted the Bohol guerrillas in the summer of 1944.
137. Smith, Triumph in the Philippines, 617–618.
138. Reports of General MacArthur, 1:308.
139. Reports of General MacArthur, 1:309.
140. Headquarters, X Corps, “Questioning of General Harada,” September 15, 1945, CGSC Library, 8; Headquarters, X Corps, “Interrogation of Major General Tomochika,” September 10–11, 1945, CGSC Library, 25.
141. Keats, They Fought Alone, 406; Smith, Triumph in the Philippines, 623.
142. Wills and Myers, The Sea Was My Last Chance, 155–156; Boggs, Marine Aviation, 117.
143. Wills and Myers, The Sea Was My Last Chance, 158.
144. 10th Military District Intelligence Section, “Historical Record: Mindanao Guerrilla Resistance Movement, Part 17,” Wendell W. Fertig Papers, Box 1, AHEC.
145. Smith, Triumph in the Philippines, 621.
146. 24th Infantry Division Headquarters, “Mindanao: Historical Report of the 24th Infantry Division–V-5 Operation, April 1945–30 June 1945,” CGSC Library, 2.
147. Reports of General MacArthur, 1:312.
148. Jan Valtin, Children of Yesterday: The 24th Infantry Division in the Philippines (1946; repr., Middletown, DE: CreateSpace Independent Publishing Platform, 2014), 286.
149. Valtin, Children of Yesterday, 291–292.
150. Valtin, 301.
151. Smith, Triumph in the Philippines, 628.
152. 24th Infantry Division Committee, 24th Infantry Division: “The Victory Division” (Paducah, KY: Turner Publishing Co., 1997), 59; Verbeck received the Bronze Star for this action. See 21st Infantry Regiment, A Regiment in Action, 141.
153. Headquarters, 24th Infantry Division, “Mindanao-Historical Report of the 24th Infantry Division, V-5 Operation, 17 April 1945–30 June 1945, Philippine Liberation Campaign,” CGSC Library, 37.
154. Smith, Triumph in the Philippines, 633.
155. 24th Infantry Division Committee, 24th Infantry Division, 60.
156. Smith, Triumph in the Philippines, 638.
157. Smith, 641.
158. Smith, 637.
159. 24th Infantry Division Committee, 24th Infantry Division, 65.
160. Smith, Triumph in the Philippines, 644.
161. 24th Infantry Division Committee, 24th Infantry Division, 65.
162. 10th Information and Historical Service, Headquarters Eighth Army, “Narrative of Operations of the 30th Japanese Infantry Division Based on Accounts Prepared by Lieutenant General Gyosaku Morozumi,” in Staff Study of Japanese Operations on Mindanao Island, CGSC Library, 5.
163. Headquarters Eighth Army, “Narrative of Operations of the 30th Japanese Infantry Division,” 43–45.
164. The reasons for such uneven performance can be attributed to the disparities in the guerrillas’ ability to train in safe base areas, the uneven quantities of supplies the guerrillas received from the Allies, and the discipline and professionalism of the guerrillas and their leaders.
165. Allied Translator and Interpreter Section, Southwest Pacific Area, “Report of statements made by General YAMASHITA, Tomoyuki,” September 1945, CGSC Library. This document from Statements of Japanese Officials on World War II (English translations).
166. “Report of statements made by General YAMASHITA.”
167. Shigia Kawai, “Narrative of Operations in Luzon,” in Staff Study of Japanese Operations on Luzon, CGSC Library, 16. Kawai was a staff colonel in the Japanese Army’s Second Tank Division.
168. Heinrichs and Gallichio, Implacable Foes, 322–324.
169. Faulkner, The Operations of the 511th Parachute Infantry Regiment, 20.
170. Headquarters, XIV Corps, After Action Report, XIV Corps, M-1 Operation, CGSC Library, 222.
171. Headquarters, XIV Corps, After Action Report, XIV Corps, M-1 Operation, Part II, Administration, CGSC Library, 24.
CONCLUSION
1. For recent work disputing the “inevitability” of Japanese defeat, see Michael W. Myers, The Pacific War and Contingent Victory: Why Japanese Defeat Was Not Inevitable (Lawrence: University Press of Kansas, 2015).
2. Quoted from an excerpt of Tatsuki John Fujii’s memoir in Grant Goodman, “Manila in June 1943,” Philippine Studies 48, no. 3 (2000): 418.
3. Rudy De Lara and Bob Fancher, Boy Guerrilla: The WWII Metro Manila Serenader (Lincoln, NE: iUniverse.com, 2000),75.
4. Republic of the Philippines, Department of National Defense, “Ruperto K. Kangleon,” https://www.dnd.gov.ph/Postings/Post/Ruperto%20K%20Kangleon/.
5. Republic of the Philippines, Department of National Defense, “Macario Peralta, Jr.,” https://www.dnd.gov.ph/Postings/Post/Macario%20Peralta%2c%20Jr/. As secretary of national defense, Peralta was part of a controversy involving advancement in rank for graduates of the Philippine Military Academy’s class of 1940, men he felt were overly entitled to their promotions. See Alfred W. McCoy, Closer Than Brothers: Manhood at the Philippine Military Academy (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1999), 112–113.
6. Confesor passed away during his term as a senator. See “Senators Profile: Tomas Confesor,” http://www.senate.gov.ph/senators/former_senators/tomas_confesor.htm.
7. McCoy, Closer Than Brothers, 135.
8. Greenberg, The Hukbalahap Insurrection, 44.
9. Greenberg, 141.
10. Republic of the Philippines, Department of National Defense, “Ramon F. Magsaysay,” https://www.dnd.gov.ph/Postings/Post/Ramon%20F%20Magsaysay/; McCoy, Closer Than Brothers, 27–28.
11. Senate of the Philippines, “Senators Profile-Carlos P. Garcia,” https://www.senate.gov.ph/senators/former_senators/carlos_garcia.htm.
12. Malacañang Museum, “Philippine Presidents-Diosdado Macapagal,” https://web.archive.org/web/20080624083728/http://www.op.gov.ph/museum/pres_macapagal.asp.
13. Andrew J. Birtle, U.S. Army Counterinsurgency and Contingency Operations Doctrine, 1942–1976 (Washington, DC: Center of Military History, US Army, 2006), 131–132.
14. Mike Guardia, Shadow Commander: The Epic Story of Donald D. Blackburn, Guerrilla Leader and Special Forces Hero (Philadelphia: Casemate, 2011), 150, 167.
15. Holmes, Wendell Fertig and His Guerrilla Forces, loc. 3200 of 4021, Kindle.
16. Jeff Gerth, “Marcos’s Wartime Role Discredited in U.S. Files,” New York Times, January 23, 1986, https://www.nytimes.com/1986/01/23/world/marcos-s-wartime-role-discredited-in-us-files.html.
17. Centina, Almost on the Carpet, 149.
18. Antonio A. Nieva, Cadet, Soldier, Guerilla Fighter: Remembering Bataan and Corregidor (Manila: Pepi Nieva, 2016), 256.
19. Peter Wong, “Daughter Tells Filipino Vet’s Story,” West Linn Tidings, November 11, 2017, https://pamplinmedia.com/wlt/95-news/378148–263690-daughter-tells-filipino-vets-story.
20. De Lara and Fancher, Boy Guerrilla, 79.
21. McCoy, “Ylo-Ilo,” iii.
22. Giles Kidd, The Operations of the 37th Infantry Division in the Crossing of the Pasig River and Closing to the Walls of the Intramuros, Manila, 7–9 February 1945 (Luzon Campaign) (Fort Benning, GA: The Infantry School, 1949), 8, 22.
23. W. G. Wolters, “Rise and Fall of Provincial Elites in the Philippines: Nueva Ecija from the 1880s to the Present Day,” Sojourn: Journal of Social Issues in Southeast Asia 4, no. 1 (1989): 63.
24. Robert T. Yap-Diangco, The Filipino Guerrilla Tradition (Manila: MCS Enterprises, 1971), 80.
25. Grant K. Goodman, “The Japanese Occupation of the Philippines: Commonwealth Sustained,” Philippine Studies 36, no. 1 (1988): 103.
26. Steinberg, Philippine Collaboration, 175.
27. Brands, Bound to Empire, 219.
28. Thorpe would go on to lead MacArthur’s efforts to deal with collaborators. See Elliott R. Thorpe, East Wind, Rain: The Intimate Account of an Intelligence Officer in the Pacific, 1939–1949 (Boston: Gambit, 1969), 151–152.
29. Baclagon, The Huk Campaign in the Philippines, 4.
30. United Press, “Filipinos Attend Marine Academy,” Sunday Star News (Wilmington, NC), August 3, 1947, 14-B.
31. “Philippine Legislator Urges Pacific Pact for Aggression ‘Squeeze,’” The Evening Star (Auburn, IN), April 1, 1949, A-14.
32. Associated Press, “Every Man in Philippine Unit Volunteers to go to Korea,” The Evening Star (Auburn, IN), August 23, 1950, A-4.
33. Ricardo T. Jose, “The Philippines: Memorials and Ceremonies over 70 Years,” in Memory, Identity, and Commemorations of World War II: Anniversary Politics in Asia Pacific, ed. Daqing Yang and Mike Mochizuki (New York: Lexington Books, 2018), 70.
34. According to one recent historian, “The Battle of Manila not only physically destroyed the metropolis and indiscriminately slaughtered a massive number of civilians by atrocities and shelling, but ruined the culture and way of life, which certainly had been on the decline but was still colorfully alive, to the extent that the following generations could barely imagine what it had been like. Although the postwar physical reconstruction was quick thanks to the U.S. rehabilitation money pouring into the Philippines, prewar culture and society were never to be restored without the people bearing the emotional cost of it. Even the survivors had no enthusiasm to rebuild their lives on the very site of their traumatic experiences.”; see Satoshi Nakano, “Methods to Avoid Speaking the Unspeakable: Carmen Guerrero Nakpil, the Death of Manila, and Post-World War II Filipino Memory and Mourning,” Hitotsubashi Journal of Social Studies 48, no. 1 (2017): 39.
35. This was the argument of Theodore Friend, The Blue-Eyed Enemy: Japan against the West in Java and Luzon (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1988).
36. Jose, “The Philippines: Memorials and Ceremonies over 70 Years,” 71; Kevin Blackburn, “War Memory and Nation-building in South East Asia,” South East Asia Research 18, no. 1 (2010): 10.
37. Blackburn, “War Memory and Nation-building in South East Asia,” 17. Blackburn writes that an exception to the use of the national day of commemoration for espousing democratic ideals was under the presidency of Ferdinand Marcos, when it was used to strengthen the regime. Even so, Blackburn notes that the Philippines’ use of World War II commemoration to promote its own democracy contrasts with commemoration of resistance to the Japanese in Burma, where such memorialization encourages support for the military regime.
38. Tito Genova Valiente and Hiroko Nagai, “Introduction: Nostalgia for the Years of War When God Was Absent and Cinemas Romanced Conflicts,” in War Memories, Monuments, and Media: Representations of Conflicts and Creation of Histories in World War II (Quezon City: Japanese Studies Program, Ateneo de Manila University Press, 2011), 3–4.
39. Jose, “The Philippines: Memorials and Ceremonies over 70 Years,” 79.
40. Carl H. Landé, “The Philippines and the United States,” Philippine Studies 49, no. 4 (2001): 519.
41. Republic of the Philippines, Department of National Defense, “Ruperto K. Kangleon,” https://www.dnd.gov.ph/Postings/Post/Ruperto%20K%20Kangleon/.
42. Panlilio, The Crucible, xviii.
43. The unit was redesignated the Guerrilla Affairs Division at the beginning of 1947. See Headquarters, Philippines Command, “U.S. Army Recognition Program of Philippine Guerrillas,” 74–76. Currently, the US National Archives contain more than 1,300 recognition files for guerrilla units and subunits; for a complete listing, see https://www.archives.gov/research/military/ww2/philippine/guerrilla-list-1.html.
44. Panlilio, The Crucible, xviii.
45. Antonio Raimundo, “The Filipino Veterans Equity Movement: A Case Study in Reparations Theory,” California Law Review 98, no. 575 (2010): 620. FVEM is not a formal group but a collective name for the advocates of Filipino veterans.
46. US Department of Veterans Affairs, “Fact Sheet: VA Benefits for Filipino Veterans,” April 2008, https://www.va.gov/opa/publications/factsheets/fs_filipino_veterans.pdf.
47. Rosye B. Cloud, “Recognizing the Extraordinary Contribution of Filipino Veterans,” Obama White House Archives, July 9, 2013, https://obamawhitehouse.archives.gov/blog/2013/07/09/recognizing-extraordinary-contribution-filipino-veterans.
100. Richard E. Womer, The Operations of the Communication Platoon, 149th Infantry, (38th Infantry Division) in the Battle of the Sierra Madres, 16 May—30 June 1945 (Luzon Campaign) (Personal Experience of a Regimental Communications Officer) (Fort Benning, GA: The Infantry School, 1945), 19. According to Womer, Filipinos would use the wire to hitch their water buffaloes to their carts.
101. Headquarters, 6th Infantry Division, Luzon, Philippines: Report of the 6th Infantry Division, CGSC Library, 32.
102. Although the southern Philippines were of doubtful strategic value, MacArthur saw clearing them as fulfilling a promise to the Filipino people. Historian Ronald Spector, in particular, views MacArthur’s decision to divert Eichelberger south as wasteful, given the difficulties the Sixth Army was having on northern Luzon. See Spector, Eagle against the Sun, 526–527.
103. Robert L. Eichelberger, Our Jungle Road to Tokyo (1950; repr., Gorget Books, 2017), loc. 194, Kindle.
104. Toshimichi Urata, “Activities of 3 Company Tominaga Company of 174 Independent Infantry Battalion on PALAWAN Island,” July 8, 1949, CGSC Library. This document is part of a collection entitled Statements of Japanese Officials on World War II (English translations) compiled by the Southwest Pacific Area’s Allied Translator and Interpreter Section (ATIS).
105. Smith, Triumph in the Philippines, 601.
106. Smith, 602.
107. Reports of General MacArthur, 1:316. The US invasion of Leyte in late 1944 saw more than half of the Japanese garrison on Panay leave to defend Leyte. Peralta took full advantage of this to expand his zone of control on Panay. See Smith, Triumph in the Philippines, 601–602.
108. Sadayoshi Ishikawa, “Action Report of the 170th Independent Battalion, 77th Brigade, 102nd Division on Panay,” in Staff Study—Japanese Operations on Panay Island, CGSC Library, 1.
109. Baclagon, Philippine Campaigns, 258.
110. Smith, Triumph in the Philippines, 601; G-3 Section, 40th Infantry Division, “40th Infantry Division, G-3 Journal Entry No. 32, 18 Mar 45,” Record Group 407, Entry 427, Box 8908, NARA II.
111. G-3 Section, 40th Infantry Division, “40th Infantry Division, G-3 Journal Entry No. 21, 18 Mar 45,” Record Group 407, Entry 427, Box 8908, NARA II. The Eighth Army would continue supplying the guerrillas on Negros until the Fortieth Division landed there two weeks later.
112. G-3 Section, 40th Infantry Division, “40th Infantry Division, G-3 Journal Entry No. 43, 18 Mar 45,” Record Group 407, Entry 427, Box 8908, NARA II. Peralta related that his men only had 100 rounds per Enfield rifle or M1 carbine and even fewer for each submachine gun.
113. G-3 Section, 40th Infantry Division, “40th Infantry Division, G-3 Journal Entry No. 68, 19 Mar 45,” Record Group 407, Entry 427, Box 8908, NARA II. Those men who were disarmed but were officially members of the Philippine Army would be rearmed at a later date.
114. Headquarters, 61st Infantry, “Subject: Combat Report; to: DC; 6th MD,” March 31, 1945, Record Group 407, Entry 1093, Box 253, NARA II.
115. G-3 Section, 40th Infantry Division, “40th Infantry Division, G-3 Journal Entry No. 129, 20 Mar 45,” Record Group 407, Entry 427, Box 8909, NARA II.
116. G-3 Section, 40th Infantry Division, “40th Infantry Division, G-3 Journal Entry Nos. 19 and 20, 20 Mar 45,” Record Group 407, Entry 427, Box 8909, NARA II.
117. Ishikawa, “Action Report of the 170th Independent Battalion,” 3–4.
118. G-3 Section, 40th Infantry Division, “40th Infantry Division, G-3 Journal Entry No. 124, 20 Mar 45,” Record Group 407, Entry 427, Box 8909, NARA II.
119. Reports of General MacArthur, 1:316.
120. Smith, Triumph in the Philippines, 601. Panay was intended to serve as the embarkation point for the Fortieth Division and the Fifth Infantry Division (en route from Europe) during the planned invasion of the Japanese Home Islands. See Smith, 604.
121. Reports of General MacArthur, 1:315.
122. Smith, Triumph in the Philippines, 608.
123. The Americal Division’s 146th Regimental Combat Team was serving as the Eighth Army Reserve at this time. See Smith, Triumph in the Philippines, 608.
124. Reports of General MacArthur, 1:315. To request air support for the guerrillas, Thirteenth Air Force organized five Guerrilla Air Support Teams equipped with jeep-mounted radios. These teams could direct air strikes if necessary and provided intelligence to pilots on areas where the Japanese had antiaircraft weapons. See Joe G. Taylor, “Air Support of Guerrillas on Cebu,” Military Affairs 23, no. 3 (1959): 149–152.
125. Smith, Triumph in the Philippines, 614.
126. Headquarters, Americal Division, “Arnold to Eichelberger, SITREP, 31 MAR,” Record Group 407, Entry 427, Box 4877, NARA II.
127. G-3 Section, Americal Division, “Americal Division, G-3 Journal Entry No. 5, 3 Apr 45,” Record Group 407, Entry 427, Box 4877, NARA II.
128. Headquarters, Americal Division, “CG Americal Division to 8th Army ATTN G-3, 3 Apr 45,” Record Group 407, Entry 427, Box 4877, NARA II.
129. Boggs, Marine Aviation, 110.
130. Smith, Triumph in the Philippines, 605, 618.
131. Reports of General MacArthur, 1:315.
132. Kanako, “Guerrilla Operations in the Visayan Islands,” 6.
133. Kawanura Mikio, “Soldier Who Was Able to Share His Last Bit of Rice,” in Gibney, ed., Senso, 153–154; Kokubo Yumio, “The Death Struggle on Negros,” in Gibney, ed., Senso, 152–153.
134. Hal Randall, The Operations of the 160th Infantry (40th Infantry Division) in the Vicinity of Hill 3155, Negros, P.I., 15 April–15 May 1945 (SOUTHERN PHILIPPINES CAMPAIGN) (Personal Experience of a Regimental Supply Officer) (Fort Benning, GA: The Infantry School, 1948), 9–12.
135. Approximately 880 Japanese emerged from the hills during the final surrender. See Smith, Triumph in the Philippines, 618.
136. Reports of General MacArthur, 1:315. Bohol’s guerrillas had previously experienced a great degree of infighting and alienated the civilian population, and a Japanese punitive expedition had some success in breaking up the guerrillas until Ingeniero reconstituted the Bohol guerrillas in the summer of 1944.
137. Smith, Triumph in the Philippines, 617–618.
138. Reports of General MacArthur, 1:308.
139. Reports of General MacArthur, 1:309.
140. Headquarters, X Corps, “Questioning of General Harada,” September 15, 1945, CGSC Library, 8; Headquarters, X Corps, “Interrogation of Major General Tomochika,” September 10–11, 1945, CGSC Library, 25.
141. Keats, They Fought Alone, 406; Smith, Triumph in the Philippines, 623.
142. Wills and Myers, The Sea Was My Last Chance, 155–156; Boggs, Marine Aviation, 117.
143. Wills and Myers, The Sea Was My Last Chance, 158.
144. 10th Military District Intelligence Section, “Historical Record: Mindanao Guerrilla Resistance Movement, Part 17,” Wendell W. Fertig Papers, Box 1, AHEC.
145. Smith, Triumph in the Philippines, 621.
146. 24th Infantry Division Headquarters, “Mindanao: Historical Report of the 24th Infantry Division–V-5 Operation, April 1945–30 June 1945,” CGSC Library, 2.
147. Reports of General MacArthur, 1:312.
148. Jan Valtin, Children of Yesterday: The 24th Infantry Division in the Philippines (1946; repr., Middletown, DE: CreateSpace Independent Publishing Platform, 2014), 286.
149. Valtin, Children of Yesterday, 291–292.
150. Valtin, 301.
151. Smith, Triumph in the Philippines, 628.
152. 24th Infantry Division Committee, 24th Infantry Division: “The Victory Division” (Paducah, KY: Turner Publishing Co., 1997), 59; Verbeck received the Bronze Star for this action. See 21st Infantry Regiment, A Regiment in Action, 141.
153. Headquarters, 24th Infantry Division, “Mindanao-Historical Report of the 24th Infantry Division, V-5 Operation, 17 April 1945–30 June 1945, Philippine Liberation Campaign,” CGSC Library, 37.
154. Smith, Triumph in the Philippines, 633.
155. 24th Infantry Division Committee, 24th Infantry Division, 60.
156. Smith, Triumph in the Philippines, 638.
157. Smith, 641.
158. Smith, 637.
159. 24th Infantry Division Committee, 24th Infantry Division, 65.
160. Smith, Triumph in the Philippines, 644.
161. 24th Infantry Division Committee, 24th Infantry Division, 65.
162. 10th Information and Historical Service, Headquarters Eighth Army, “Narrative of Operations of the 30th Japanese Infantry Division Based on Accounts Prepared by Lieutenant General Gyosaku Morozumi,” in Staff Study of Japanese Operations on Mindanao Island, CGSC Library, 5.
163. Headquarters Eighth Army, “Narrative of Operations of the 30th Japanese Infantry Division,” 43–45.
164. The reasons for such uneven performance can be attributed to the disparities in the guerrillas’ ability to train in safe base areas, the uneven quantities of supplies the guerrillas received from the Allies, and the discipline and professionalism of the guerrillas and their leaders.
165. Allied Translator and Interpreter Section, Southwest Pacific Area, “Report of statements made by General YAMASHITA, Tomoyuki,” September 1945, CGSC Library. This document from Statements of Japanese Officials on World War II (English translations).
166. “Report of statements made by General YAMASHITA.”
167. Shigia Kawai, “Narrative of Operations in Luzon,” in Staff Study of Japanese Operations on Luzon, CGSC Library, 16. Kawai was a staff colonel in the Japanese Army’s Second Tank Division.
168. Heinrichs and Gallichio, Implacable Foes, 322–324.
169. Faulkner, The Operations of the 511th Parachute Infantry Regiment, 20.
170. Headquarters, XIV Corps, After Action Report, XIV Corps, M-1 Operation, CGSC Library, 222.
171. Headquarters, XIV Corps, After Action Report, XIV Corps, M-1 Operation, Part II, Administration, CGSC Library, 24.
CONCLUSION
1. For recent work disputing the “inevitability” of Japanese defeat, see Michael W. Myers, The Pacific War and Contingent Victory: Why Japanese Defeat Was Not Inevitable (Lawrence: University Press of Kansas, 2015).
2. Quoted from an excerpt of Tatsuki John Fujii’s memoir in Grant Goodman, “Manila in June 1943,” Philippine Studies 48, no. 3 (2000): 418.
3. Rudy De Lara and Bob Fancher, Boy Guerrilla: The WWII Metro Manila Serenader (Lincoln, NE: iUniverse.com, 2000),75.
4. Republic of the Philippines, Department of National Defense, “Ruperto K. Kangleon,” https://www.dnd.gov.ph/Postings/Post/Ruperto%20K%20Kangleon/.
5. Republic of the Philippines, Department of National Defense, “Macario Peralta, Jr.,” https://www.dnd.gov.ph/Postings/Post/Macario%20Peralta%2c%20Jr/. As secretary of national defense, Peralta was part of a controversy involving advancement in rank for graduates of the Philippine Military Academy’s class of 1940, men he felt were overly entitled to their promotions. See Alfred W. McCoy, Closer Than Brothers: Manhood at the Philippine Military Academy (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1999), 112–113.
6. Confesor passed away during his term as a senator. See “Senators Profile: Tomas Confesor,” http://www.senate.gov.ph/senators/former_senators/tomas_confesor.htm.
7. McCoy, Closer Than Brothers, 135.
8. Greenberg, The Hukbalahap Insurrection, 44.
9. Greenberg, 141.
10. Republic of the Philippines, Department of National Defense, “Ramon F. Magsaysay,” https://www.dnd.gov.ph/Postings/Post/Ramon%20F%20Magsaysay/; McCoy, Closer Than Brothers, 27–28.
11. Senate of the Philippines, “Senators Profile-Carlos P. Garcia,” https://www.senate.gov.ph/senators/former_senators/carlos_garcia.htm.
12. Malacañang Museum, “Philippine Presidents-Diosdado Macapagal,” https://web.archive.org/web/20080624083728/http://www.op.gov.ph/museum/pres_macapagal.asp.
13. Andrew J. Birtle, U.S. Army Counterinsurgency and Contingency Operations Doctrine, 1942–1976 (Washington, DC: Center of Military History, US Army, 2006), 131–132.
14. Mike Guardia, Shadow Commander: The Epic Story of Donald D. Blackburn, Guerrilla Leader and Special Forces Hero (Philadelphia: Casemate, 2011), 150, 167.
15. Holmes, Wendell Fertig and His Guerrilla Forces, loc. 3200 of 4021, Kindle.
16. Jeff Gerth, “Marcos’s Wartime Role Discredited in U.S. Files,” New York Times, January 23, 1986, https://www.nytimes.com/1986/01/23/world/marcos-s-wartime-role-discredited-in-us-files.html.
17. Centina, Almost on the Carpet, 149.
18. Antonio A. Nieva, Cadet, Soldier, Guerilla Fighter: Remembering Bataan and Corregidor (Manila: Pepi Nieva, 2016), 256.
19. Peter Wong, “Daughter Tells Filipino Vet’s Story,” West Linn Tidings, November 11, 2017, https://pamplinmedia.com/wlt/95-news/378148–263690-daughter-tells-filipino-vets-story.
20. De Lara and Fancher, Boy Guerrilla, 79.
21. McCoy, “Ylo-Ilo,” iii.
22. Giles Kidd, The Operations of the 37th Infantry Division in the Crossing of the Pasig River and Closing to the Walls of the Intramuros, Manila, 7–9 February 1945 (Luzon Campaign) (Fort Benning, GA: The Infantry School, 1949), 8, 22.
23. W. G. Wolters, “Rise and Fall of Provincial Elites in the Philippines: Nueva Ecija from the 1880s to the Present Day,” Sojourn: Journal of Social Issues in Southeast Asia 4, no. 1 (1989): 63.
24. Robert T. Yap-Diangco, The Filipino Guerrilla Tradition (Manila: MCS Enterprises, 1971), 80.
25. Grant K. Goodman, “The Japanese Occupation of the Philippines: Commonwealth Sustained,” Philippine Studies 36, no. 1 (1988): 103.
26. Steinberg, Philippine Collaboration, 175.
27. Brands, Bound to Empire, 219.
28. Thorpe would go on to lead MacArthur’s efforts to deal with collaborators. See Elliott R. Thorpe, East Wind, Rain: The Intimate Account of an Intelligence Officer in the Pacific, 1939–1949 (Boston: Gambit, 1969), 151–152.
29. Baclagon, The Huk Campaign in the Philippines, 4.
30. United Press, “Filipinos Attend Marine Academy,” Sunday Star News (Wilmington, NC), August 3, 1947, 14-B.
31. “Philippine Legislator Urges Pacific Pact for Aggression ‘Squeeze,’” The Evening Star (Auburn, IN), April 1, 1949, A-14.
32. Associated Press, “Every Man in Philippine Unit Volunteers to go to Korea,” The Evening Star (Auburn, IN), August 23, 1950, A-4.
33. Ricardo T. Jose, “The Philippines: Memorials and Ceremonies over 70 Years,” in Memory, Identity, and Commemorations of World War II: Anniversary Politics in Asia Pacific, ed. Daqing Yang and Mike Mochizuki (New York: Lexington Books, 2018), 70.
34. According to one recent historian, “The Battle of Manila not only physically destroyed the metropolis and indiscriminately slaughtered a massive number of civilians by atrocities and shelling, but ruined the culture and way of life, which certainly had been on the decline but was still colorfully alive, to the extent that the following generations could barely imagine what it had been like. Although the postwar physical reconstruction was quick thanks to the U.S. rehabilitation money pouring into the Philippines, prewar culture and society were never to be restored without the people bearing the emotional cost of it. Even the survivors had no enthusiasm to rebuild their lives on the very site of their traumatic experiences.”; see Satoshi Nakano, “Methods to Avoid Speaking the Unspeakable: Carmen Guerrero Nakpil, the Death of Manila, and Post-World War II Filipino Memory and Mourning,” Hitotsubashi Journal of Social Studies 48, no. 1 (2017): 39.
35. This was the argument of Theodore Friend, The Blue-Eyed Enemy: Japan against the West in Java and Luzon (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1988).
36. Jose, “The Philippines: Memorials and Ceremonies over 70 Years,” 71; Kevin Blackburn, “War Memory and Nation-building in South East Asia,” South East Asia Research 18, no. 1 (2010): 10.
37. Blackburn, “War Memory and Nation-building in South East Asia,” 17. Blackburn writes that an exception to the use of the national day of commemoration for espousing democratic ideals was under the presidency of Ferdinand Marcos, when it was used to strengthen the regime. Even so, Blackburn notes that the Philippines’ use of World War II commemoration to promote its own democracy contrasts with commemoration of resistance to the Japanese in Burma, where such memorialization encourages support for the military regime.
38. Tito Genova Valiente and Hiroko Nagai, “Introduction: Nostalgia for the Years of War When God Was Absent and Cinemas Romanced Conflicts,” in War Memories, Monuments, and Media: Representations of Conflicts and Creation of Histories in World War II (Quezon City: Japanese Studies Program, Ateneo de Manila University Press, 2011), 3–4.
39. Jose, “The Philippines: Memorials and Ceremonies over 70 Years,” 79.
40. Carl H. Landé, “The Philippines and the United States,” Philippine Studies 49, no. 4 (2001): 519.
41. Republic of the Philippines, Department of National Defense, “Ruperto K. Kangleon,” https://www.dnd.gov.ph/Postings/Post/Ruperto%20K%20Kangleon/.
42. Panlilio, The Crucible, xviii.
43. The unit was redesignated the Guerrilla Affairs Division at the beginning of 1947. See Headquarters, Philippines Command, “U.S. Army Recognition Program of Philippine Guerrillas,” 74–76. Currently, the US National Archives contain more than 1,300 recognition files for guerrilla units and subunits; for a complete listing, see https://www.archives.gov/research/military/ww2/philippine/guerrilla-list-1.html.
44. Panlilio, The Crucible, xviii.
45. Antonio Raimundo, “The Filipino Veterans Equity Movement: A Case Study in Reparations Theory,” California Law Review 98, no. 575 (2010): 620. FVEM is not a formal group but a collective name for the advocates of Filipino veterans.
46. US Department of Veterans Affairs, “Fact Sheet: VA Benefits for Filipino Veterans,” April 2008, https://www.va.gov/opa/publications/factsheets/fs_filipino_veterans.pdf.
47. Rosye B. Cloud, “Recognizing the Extraordinary Contribution of Filipino Veterans,” Obama White House Archives, July 9, 2013, https://obamawhitehouse.archives.gov/blog/2013/07/09/recognizing-extraordinary-contribution-filipino-veterans.
