Victory in the Pacific

There was the overbearing command pressure from MacArthur, the lack of adequate intelligence, dissipated combat power, denial of air support, extended supply lines, exposed flanks, and mounting casualties with no replacements. Urban warfare Is considered the domain of the infantry. However, in Manila, it is readily apparent that success by the infantry was largely determined by the competence of Griswold's staff and USAFFE with recognized guerillas. Faced with an entirely new environment, he developed a plan of attack which exploited a common doctrinal base and compensated for his weakness in intelligence. It was a flexible plan, as he proved by adjusting missions for his two divisions inside the city and the rapid integration of the 11th Airborne. The battle for Manila dramatically showed a need for planning post-combat operations in detail. Foremost among many competing requirements is the disposal of health-threatening human remains. In Manila, American graves-registration personnel quickly handled the U.S. remains. Japanese and Filipino casualties by the hundreds of thousands littered the battlefield. While front-line units fought and moved on, logistics forces moved into areas contaminated by disease resulting from large numbers of unburied dead. Traumatized civilians tried to care for their own dead. Rear commanders had to contract Filipino laborers to clear the thousands of Japanese bodies. In the battle over 100,000 Filipino civilians were killed, some murdered by Japanese soldiers and others killed by American bombs. The battle of Manila ended on the 3rd of March of 1945, marked the end of the Japanese occupation of the Philippines. When the Battle of Manila was over, Filipino civilians in the city went out of their houses to greet the Filipino-American Soldiers as conquering heroes. They keep on shouting "Victory, Joe!", and shaking the Soldiers' hands as respect and a sign of gratitude. It was a totally blissful day in the city of Manila, as it was finally liberated from almost four years of Japanese occupation. Some of the USAFFE troops including my grandfather and individual Japanese units continued the battle throughout the country until the final surrender in the Philippines, there was no official or organized resistance. The combined Filipino-American forces fought the remaining Japanese troops in the country until General Yamashita's captivation. After the death of President Roosevelt, Harry Truman was enthroned and eventually approved the Manhattan Project. General Douglas MacArthur and other top military commanders favored continuing the conventional bombing of Japan already in effect and following up with a massive invasion, codenamed "Operation Downfall." They advised Truman that such an invasion would result in U.S. casualties of up to 1 million. In order to avoid such a high casualty rate, Truman decided over the moral reservations of Secretary of War Henry Stimson, General Dwight Eisenhower, and a number of the Manhattan Project scientists to use the atomic bomb in the hopes of bringing the war to a quick end. Hiroshima, a manufacturing center of some 350,000 people located about 500 miles from Tokyo, was selected as the first target. After arriving at the U.S. base on the Pacific island of Tinian, the more than 9,000-pound uranium-235 bomb was loaded aboard a modified B-29 bomber christened Enola Gay (after the mother of its pilot, Colonel Paul Tibbets). The plane dropped the bomb-known as "Little Boy"-by parachute at 8:15 in the morning, and it exploded 2,000 feet above Hiroshima in a blast equal to 12-15,000 tons of TNT, destroying five square miles of the city. Hiroshima's devastation failed to elicit immediate Japanese surrender, however, and on August 9 Major Charles Sweeney flew another B-29 bomber, Bockscar, from Tinian. Thick clouds over the primary target, the city of Kokura, drove Sweeney to a secondary target, Nagasaki, where the plutonium bomb "Fat Man" was dropped at 11:02 that morning. More powerful than the one used at Hiroshima, the bomb weighed nearly 10,000 pounds and was built to produce a 22-kiloton blast. The topography of Nagasaki, which was nestled in narrow valleys between mountains, reduced the bomb's effect, limiting the destruction to 2.6 square miles. The bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki inflicted thousands of casualties and caused radioactive poisoning.

On August 15, 1945, Japanese Emperor Hirohito announced the surrender of Japan. On the following month, the 2nd of September, Japan was officially surrendered to the Allies. Many officers and others accused of war crimes are held for investigation and trial while others are expected to be sent back to Japan. That morning, on the deck of the U.S.S. Missouri in Tokyo Bay, the Japanese envoys Foreign Minister Mamoru Shigemitsu, and Gen. Yoshijiro Umezu signed their names on the Instrument of Surrender. The time was recorded as 4 minutes past 9 o'clock. Afterward Gen. Douglas MacArthur, Commander in the Southwest Pacific and Supreme Commander for the Allied Powers, also signed. He accepted the Japanese surrender "for the United States, Republic of China, United Kingdom, and the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics, and in the interests of the other United Nations at war with Japan." On the same day, in the Philippines, the Tiger of Malaya, General Tomoyuki Yamashita with approximately 30,000 of his men was captured by the Filipino-American Soldiers with recognized Igorot Guerilla units at Mt. Napulawan, in Hungduan, Ifugao province. He was then turned over to the Americans on the way to Kiangan, Ifugao. General Tomoyuki Yamashita then ferried to bagabag airport in Nueva Viscaya, from there, he was flown to Baguio City for the signing of the "Instrument of Surrender" on the following day, September 3, 1945. Ranking officers of the U.S. Army attend, including General Jonathan Wainwright in Camp John Hay, Baguio City. The surrender document was signed by Major General Edmond Leavey, Deputy Commander of the US Army Forces for Western Pacific, General Tomoyuki Yamashita of the Imperial Japanese Army, and Denhici Okochi, Vice Admiral of the Imperial Japanese Navy for the formal surrender of the entire Japanese forces in the Philippines. On September 6, Col. Bernard Thielen brought the surrender document and a second imperial rescript back to Washington, DC. The following day, Thielen presented the documents to President Truman in a formal White House ceremony. The documents were then exhibited at the National Archives after a dignified ceremony led by General Wainwright. No Filipino representatives are present nor did any attend the previous day's signing of the surrender documents at Tokyo Bay. Surrenders of Japanese forces in other parts of the Philippines will take place over the following weeks (though it will be decades before the last Japanese holdouts emerge from hiding). Japanese soldiers are interned in prison camps, while civilians are gradually repatriated to Japan. On October 1, 1945, they were formally received (accessioned) into the holdings of the National Archives. According to Sheldon Garon, a professor of history, the Japanese military was deeply concerned about worsening conditions in Japan because they were undermining the war effort. Authorities, for example, planned the evacuation of a few hundred thousand school children to spare them the urban conflagrations but were not prepared for the mass exodus of adults who bailed because they knew the military could not protect them. Roads out of Tokyo were clogged with these refugees: 8.5 million fled Japanese cities in the final five months of the war, paralyzing transport networks. This rural-escape survival strategy meant demoralized workers were abandoning factories, compounding existing shortages of war-related production. Garon attributes Japan's delayed surrender to military intransigence and diplomatic incompetence, dithering that subjected Japan to needless devastation. Finally, it was the Soviet entry into the war and the atomic bombings that precipitated a hasty surrender. But it was overdue because the signs of defeat, including a devastating series of setbacks on the home front, had been gathering for some time: endless fire bombings, growing shortages of food due to the U.S. blockade "Operation Starvation," bereaved families and the subversion of people voting with their feet. In September 1945, after Japan's formal surrender, Prime Minister Hideki Tojo, General Tomoyuki Yamashita, Masaharu Homma, and other Japanese officers were executed. Hideki Tojo shot himself in a suicide attempt, but he was nursed back to health and on April 29, 1946, with other Japanese wartime leaders, he was indicted for war crimes before the International Military Tribunal for the Far East in Tokyo. At the trial, he was found guilty and then hanged. Yamashita, general in the Imperial Japanese Army and its commander of the Philippine Islands, had been hanged by the neck until dead. Yamashita has blamed several war crimes in the Philippines including the Manila massacre. And General Homma, who arrived in Tokyo to surrender to U.S. forces on Sept. 14, 1945, was brought to trial in December. He was formally charged with having been responsible for the Bataan Death March, which occurred shortly after the Japanese conquest. It was estimated that some 10,000 Filipino and U.S. troops died during the forced march. Convicted of ordering the death march and for condoning other atrocities, Homma was executed by a firing squad.

The war with Japan was finally over, it took millions of Filipino and American casualties since the outbreak of war. The Japanese occupation of the Philippines has finally ended but the horrors, torment, and slavery still lingered in the Philippine soil for years. After the war, my grandfather Teddy surrendered his weapons such as his Springfield Rifle and M1911 Pistol. He brought home his Military Kit like his aluminum lunch box, small water container, even his helmet, uniform, and combat shoes. My grandfather Teddy was promoted to the rank of Corporal and awarded medals from the United States. The Medals include the Bronze Star, Purple Heart, Asiatic-Pacific Campaign with two bronze stars, and Victory Medal. These medals include Clasps, Presidential Unit Citation Badge with two bronze oak leaves, and the Combat Infantry Badge of the US Army arrived in the Philippines on the 2nd of January 1958. He also received a Medal which has an image of General Gregorio del Pilar, engraved in between the Cross, this was the Philippine Army's wounded Soldier's Medal(Now Wounded Personnel's Medal) from the Republic of the Philippines. His Bronze Star Medal was awarded for his meritorious achievement on or about 14 December 1941, while the wounded Soldier's Medal and the Purple Heart were awarded when he received wounds in action on 25 March 1942, during the battle of Bataan. My grandfather decided to retire from the Army, he chose to live his life with his family but he kept on telling himself that he is ready if possible, for another call of duty for the country. He took the Civil Service Commission Examination and passed it the following year. It is the Constitutional Commission of the Philippines with responsibility for the civil service. It is tasked with overseeing the integrity of government actions and processes. Eventually, they were settled in Caloocan City including my great-grandmother Maria. My grandfather Teddy had also an opportunity to be employed as an officer in the United States Naval Base in Subic, Olongapo for a few years. On the 4th of July 1946, the Independent Republic of the Philippines has granted by the United States, this is also known as the Fil-American Friendship Day. The Philippines has finally been liberated from foreign powers for centuries since the Spanish colonization era. The Motherland is now a sovereign Nation because of the great contribution of the heroes who risked their lives for the country. My grandparents lived together in Caloocan City for a few years until the birth of their first two children. They eventually settled in Tondo, Manila and my grandfather decided to continue his employment in Manila Railroad Company, as working in the US Naval Base, he was in a very distant place away from his family. My grandparents had eight children; Maria Luz, Zenaida, Estela, my mother Evangeline, Roberto, Ramon, Elizabeth, and the youngest, Wilfredo. My grandparents lived a simple but joyful life together with their children in Manila. My grandfather supported enough his family with his minimum wage and pension from the United States. The 2nd to the youngest among the children of my grandparents, my Aunt Elizabeth finished her studies through financial support from the U.S. as she was the youngest child at the time when the scholarship has been offered for the Veterans who served during the war with Japan. My great grandmother Maria died of breast cancer on November 12, 1961, when my mother was seven years old, she was buried in Manila North Cemetery. My grandfather Teddy used to visit his hometown in Lubao, Pampanga with his daughters but often only my mother every summer vacation. At a young age, my mother was a listener to my grandfather's stories, including his battle deployments and unforgettable scenes during the Japanese era in the Philippines. My grandfather had a minor shell shock, causing him to be a hot-tempered person but in a disciplinary way. She also stated that my grandfather was a man with a principle, a good and responsible father. According to my grandmother Antonia, my grandfather had not received enough benefits from the US government because of the bribery inside the Philippine Veterans Affairs Office(PVAO). The Filipinos working inside the said office used to accept bribery at that time to benefit the other Soldier's claim of their Military service in the USAFFE during the war, to have higher Medals like Bronze, Silver Medal, Distinguished Service Cross, and to receive financial benefits from the US government. From that moment on, my grandfather had never expected to have other benefits he deserves anymore. My grandfather also mentioned that because of bribery, there were a bunch of fake Soldiers who received enough benefits which they do not deserve. Because of this unjust thing that happened to my grandfather, his family, cousins and friends described him as "The Unsung Hero". They believe he was a hero who deserves to be awarded higher Medals for his heroism like the Silver Medal and even the Distinguished Service Cross. A few days after the incident, there was a danger about to happen to my grandfather. Upon his years of working in Manila Railroad Company, my grandfather Teddy witnessed the corruption inside the office. According to my mother, my grandfather Teddy confronted a Filipino officer working in Manila Railroad Company. He uttered furious words inside him, he stated all the unethical acts happening in the office in front of the officer. He also reported the said corruption to President Diosdado Macapagal. One day after his work, he went out of the MRR office to go home on a train. While standing, waiting for the train there was a gunshot aimed at him from nowhere when someone or something pushed him away causing him to lose his balance and had able to save himself from being shot. He then looked around but he did not see the gunner and he noticed that nobody also was closer to push him right away. He then told the incident to his family when he arrived. He believes that the spirit of his mother was the one who saved his life from that assassination attempt. On that night, he called his mother by praying and had to thank her for guiding his way. He knew that the officer in the Philippine Veterans Affairs Office was responsible for it but he just decided to be silent despite the fury he felt, for the sake of his family. When my grandfather reached the age of sixty-eight, he suffered from emphysema due to his smoking habit and was confined to the Chinese General Hospital for three months, at the same time, his family has been told by the Doctor that he only lives for two more years. In the first quarter of 1989, my grandfather was already badly suffering from his illness. He asked his family to bring him back to Lubao as he wanted to die in his hometown. From that moment, his family was settled in Sto. Tomas, Lubao in their ancestral house with his aunt Dorothea and cousin Stefania. My mother was taking care of my grandfather when he was already bedridden. My mother then passed the responsibility to my father when she left to manage something for their total settlement in Lubao. My grandfather Teddy also had to tell his story to my father during the war with Japan. Therefore, my father became also a listener of my grandfather's patriotism. He mentioned to my father the quote, "When the war broke out, love of country was the only weapon I had." My grandfather died on the 16th day of October 1989, at the age of seventy. He was buried in the old cemetery of San Nicolas, Lubao. During his black parade, the Philippine and U.S. flags were on the top of his coffin, a pledge of respect to a Filipino hero who never hesitates to serve and was willing to die for his country. His story is a brilliant thing to be read nor be heard and his great contribution to the country remains and is immortal. The legacy he left to us will never be forgotten and will always be in our hearts forever.