PEARL HARBOR FOR THE YOUNG

Remember to click the header.

A lot of the sailors were still in their bunks, sleeping off their Saturday night in downtown Honolulu.

Others were getting ready for church services. Still more were finishing the Sunday breakfast that was always good food on the battleships.

Navy life was worthwhile. You got to sail all over the world while landlubbers in foreign, exotic ports admired your great battleships, your sparkling clean uniform and your athletic fitness. And you were convinced you were part of the greatest naval fleet ever to sail the oceans of the world. No other navy could compete with yours. Life was good.

The first wave of Japanese bombers and fighters struck shortly after 8 a.m. They, and the following flights, would do massive damage to the U.S. Pacific Fleet. They would kill more than 2,400 servicemen and civilians.

The President of the United States would ask Congress for a declaration of war the next day. Patriotic civilians lined up at recruiting offices for all military branches, each man hoping he would pass the physical exam. As I understand it, there has never been, before nor after, a surge of volunteering as huge as this. Americans were showing their patriotism. And that, kiddies, is why Americans won the Second World War.

I held this post back until now, because I wanted to see how our once great nation would recognize today. A few sentences on a news net work (apologizing for Japan's sneak attack) then no more. Channels such as TCM, History, CSPAN2, A&E, AMC all seemed to ignore today. And it happened to fall on a Sunday. The only movies or factoid shows on any of these stations concerned Nazi Germany and did not even mention Japan's vicious part in that war.

It took a while for me to understand why. For some reason (and I despise why I am thinking this) Our President Elect chose today, Sunday, December 7, to reveal his appointment of a Japanese American (born in Hawaii) as Veterans Affairs Secretary.

So? Well, retired general Eric K. Shinseki is the Japanese American.

So? This is nothing but a calculated slap in the face to all the veterans, living and dead, who defended this country from the Japanese in WW II.

I am quite sure that Mr. Shinseki is a total American and proud of it. This is not about him. It is, rather, a tirade against Mr. Obama whose lack of thinking betrays his shallowness and ability to fly in the face of respect and tradition.

He does not even recognize the men and women we can for our being able to speak and read and write English as our native tongue. (No thanks to the Mexican government, though. They refused to join the Allied Forces and sat back and got rich from war goods trading.)

Mr. Barack Obama, what were you thinking? Shame on you.

Lordy, what a start to a new order.

THE WARRIOR...THE VETERAN

He didn't really want to go to war.

He had a good job that paid him almost $35 a week. He could afford to buy a car (used), he could afford to get married and have a family. Perhaps within five or six years he'd be able to buy a house and raise his own vegetables and fruit. His wife could harvest and can these goodies and they'd have enough to get through the winter and share with their neighbors.

After all, his boss liked his work and he might get a couple of raises by then.

He enjoyed listening to the radio, dancing, reading the newspaper and playing cards and Monopoly with his friends and family.

He played softball and hardball in the summer, went ice skating in the winter. It wasn't any trouble to walk to the city park for these free things. After all, it was only five blocks. And he liked to play his trumpet (although Mom didn't to want hear it in the early morning).

He knew about the war in Europe, but that was their problem and they should solve it themselves. Europe was an ocean away, after all.

One winter Sunday morning, after he had eaten breakfast and read the newspaper (comics first), his Dad, as usual, turned on the radio to hear a newscast.

What? What did that announcer say? Something about a place called, um, Pearl Harbor, wherever that was.

The family listened, intently now, as they heard about a vicious sneak attack on an American Naval Base. Death and destruction rained down on a peaceful island somewhere in the Pacific Ocean.

The newscaster told of fires, ships being sunk, bodies of Americans floating in the roiling, oil covered waters. Of civilians, as well as service men, strafed by airplanes.

The newsman's voice was relatively calm, although it broke in mid sentence many times, and he could hear the tension, the horror, the almost disbelief, as the man's voice filled the silent kitchen.

His older brother's eyes met his. Without a word they agreed that they would have to do something about this ghastly event.

He didn't see the look that passed between his mother and father. His two sisters were in shock.

They all listened in silence for aother half hour. His father spoke. "It's time to get ready for church." Silently they all got up and prepared for the service. Shaving, he thought about, but could not voice his outrage and anger. That would come later.

At church, the congregation chattered among themselves until the preacher asked them, several times to be silent.

He apologized for changing the scheduled sermon and asked all of to join him in singing "For Those In Peril On The Sea". After the song, he asked the assemblage to pray for those who had been wounded or killed in the cowardly attack. And then he asked them to pray for those who would fight in the inevitable war.

The young man didn't really hear anything else the preacher said. He could only see the redness of pure fury. His mind locked on killing those weasel Japs.

The only Japanese he knew had a fruit and vegetable store a block from his home. He didn't consider them enemies. Hell, they were friends and neighbors and Americans.

When the family arrived home, his other two brothers, their wives and two other sisters were waiting in the living room. They hadn't needed keys. Mom and Dad rarely locked the front door when they went out, except at night when they went to bed. The four young men (well, Earl was 36 and Albert was 30) spoke for a long time about enlisting in the army and fighting Japs.

Mom and Dad didn't want them to go to war. They were afraid for their children.

But all four of them stood in the enlistment office line the next day.

The eldest son, Earl, was told he would not be accepted because he was a machinist and would be needed to help make the weapons of war. The next (Albert), was told he wouldn't be accepted because he was needed in his executive position in City Hall. The two youngest were accepted immediately.

Of these two, one would be killed over Germany when the bomber he was piloting was destroyed. The youngest one taken prisoner by the German Army and managed to survive imprisonment. He died sixty years later.

One of the sisters joined the women's Army Corps and was honorably discharged after the war ended.

Two of the other sisters went to work in defense plants and the other raised a fine group of children (seven plus one adopted).

To my loyal, American loving forebears, I salute you on your day.

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I watched the Arlington Cemetery ceremony on TV this morning. The Presidential Seal was conspicuous on podium. George W. Bush did not show up for it. Remember him? The guy whose daddy got him out of a shooting war. Richard Cheney stood in for him.

I am disgusted with Dubya.

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There a couple of poems by men who were at Pearl Harbor in the header.

JAPAN CAN STICK IT WHERE THE SUN DOESN'T SHINE.

I have just read an article about a Japanese group protesting something their Defense Minister Fumio Kyuma, said.

His remark, referring to the dropping of bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki during WW II was only partly correct: "I understand that the bombing ended the war, and I think that it couldn't be helped."

Seems Nobuo Miyake, director-general of a group of Japanese atomic bomb survivors "The U.S. justifies the bombings saying they saved American lives, It's outrageous for a Japanese politician to voice such thinking. Japan is a victim."

There is an old remark that popped into my head when I read this crap. "My heart pumps p*** for you."

Some Japanese (the loud mouths, apparently) choose to forget several things. Like how they attacked and decimated Korea, the rape of Nanking, the Bataan Death March, the Sneak Attack on Pearl Harbor and the 1001 other outrages their armed forces perpetrated on civilians when they started World War II.

And make no mistake about it. America had refused to become embroiled with Hitler and the Nazis until Pearl was attacked. The Japanese government had signed the Tripartite Agreement with Germany. It was a "fight one, fight all" pact. (Italy was the other signee.) The great Japanese Admiral Yamamoto had warned against this, but was ignored.

The idea that Japan was a "victim" is enough to turn anyone's stomach. Before the Emperor could publish his surrender, the Japanese Army tried to pull off a coup against him. It failed, primarily, because an aide hid the signed surrender until it could be announced safely.

Japan's military wanted men, women and children to resist an invasion. There were arms caches, ammunition caches, new jet aircraft, all hidden from spying agents and aircraft reconnaisance. Japanese civilians were trained to use these weapons.

The cost in civilian and military deaths and maimings would have been horrendous. And interestingly enough there would have eventually been a war crimes trial that would have made the Nuremburg trials look small and inconsequential compared them. The Japanese can thank Harry Truman it never happened. The trial they did have was comparatively small potatoes.

I understand that some Japanese still living suffered from radiation. But they are still alive as are some of our veterans who suffered massive injuries.

It is time the Japanese nation took responsibility for its actions.