A soldier carries a Filipino woman wounded during the fighting in Manila. February 23, 1945. Source: National Archives (111-SC-263686)
Los Angeles– On December 7,2007 was the 66th anniversary of the Second World War for the United States. It is just fitting and proper that a TV documentary series by Ken Burns, The War- was made for this event.
December 7 was called ” the day that will live in infamy “by president Franklin D. Roosevelt. It was the day the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor in Hawaii. The
Japanese surprise attack crippled the US Asiatic fleet and almost decimated the American fleet in the Pacific.
The attack on Pearl Harbor gained relevance today because it is compared to the attack on 9/11 Twin Towers. It now an iconic emblem against Bush “war on Terror”
Few people know that the war started in the Philippines, because it was an American colony. On December 8,1941 on the feast of the Immaculate , Japanese planes bombed the Philippine cities like Manila,Baguio,Davao and major American military
installations like Clark, Fort McKinley, Camp Crame and Sangley point.
Several days later, the Japanese forces invaded the Philippines landing in Aparri,Cagayan, Vigan, Ilocos Sur and in Lingayen and Agoo, La Union. It was a
smooth military operations well planned in advance and forces allotted for the job.
General Critique of the Film:
The documentary The War first speaks of the world war in Europe and the entry of America into the world war by the sneak attack on the Pacific fleet. About the war in Asia, it detailed the Japanese incursions into China as early as 1932 and the war preparations since 1940.
The War specifically featured ordinary Americans in five American towns or cities and the role they played during the war. They picked up ordinary Americans and
let them tell about efforts during the war. Basically paying tribute to “those also served while they stand and wait.”
The documentary commented that they do want glorify war. Basically it featured the horrors of the war and its effects on the human persona particularly the witnesses and the persons who participated in it. It was most heart rending and personal. And the film really appealed to emotions.
To some observers the supposed tribute to America's greatest generation was supposed to be propaganda to support the military in its war effort in the war in Iraq and Afghanistan. But it will be still a good debate to attribute the documentary as such.
A Filipino Point of View:
At city hall in Mariveles, Bataan, a soldier raises the American flag up a makeshift flagpole. Philippines, February 15, 1945. Source: National Archives (111-SC-202158)
We in the Filipino- American community are happy about the documentary because it featured the life of the Americans during the war in the Philippines. In the battlefields of Bataan and in concentration camps. They concentrated on the life of an American family from Sacramento, California in the UST detention camp in Manila.
Many documentaries except for the latest film on the “Great Raid” featured the Philippines. They also featured the life of the prisoners of war in Camp O'Donnell in Capas,Tarlac after the Bataan death march. Focusing on the travails on an American soldier who was reportedly died but in reality spend his war years in a prisoner of war camp in Japan until he was freed after the twin bombings Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
What is good in the documentary was that the Bataan Death March was also highlighted. The American defeat in the Philippines was so devastating that most
historians choose to be silent about this.
American prisoners of war are marched from Mariveles after surrendering to the Japanese. The journey would come to be known as the "Bataan Death March." 1942. Source: Library of Congress (LC-USZ62-128775) It is just like the defeat of the confederacy on April 9, 1865 in Appomattox, Virginia. The same date, Bataan fell to the Japanese in April 9, 1942. Too few remembered because it is much easier to forget..
The fact that a small nation likes Japan, an Asian country defeated the Americans was so much for some historian to bear. So much so to explain. The fact that more than 90,000 Filipino and American soldier surrendered to 50,000 Japanese after two weeks of continuous assault is a military debacle.
The negative part of the documentary is its silence on the sacrifices of the Filipinos on the battlefront and the mention of the Filipino resistance movement during the three years of Japanese occupation.
More than 30,000 Filipino- American soldiers died during that forced march from Bataan to Tarlac from April10 to May 1942.. It was a direct anti-thesis to the patriotic endeavor of the Japanese-American soldier’s heroism very much featured in The War in Europe.
More Comments:
The War painfully showed the destruction of Manila during the World War II and the death of more than 200,000 Filipinos during its liberation. It was the same level as it shown the Nazi pogroms in Europe – the extermination of the Jews.
Manila was the second most devastated city after Warsaw in Poland in World War II that it gained the mocker “The Warsaw of Asia”. The Philippines was rebuilt with the perseverance of its people. They said it was destroyed because of the fighting between the Japanese marines and the American forces. But it was pity the city was destroyed by the liberating forces that hoped to save it.
The same is denying the fact that more than 250,000 Filipinos served in the US military during the war. The fact that more than one million Filipinos died during the war was also neglected nor was never mentioned.
The United States Congress denied the Filipino World War II veterans their right and privileges as American veterans until today. On February 18,1946, the 79th US Congress passed the infamous Rescission Act stripping their rights and privileges to be American veterans.
Until now, for 62 years, the Equity bill is still languishing in the US Congress. Because of Republican Party opposition, the Equity bill both in the Congress
and the Senate is in limbo and the veterans are denied of what should be rightfully theirs
As The War reechoes, the allied victory was the victory of democracy over fascism. But it was good war. But inequities still exist. Filipino World War II veterans are still marginalized.
There is another war that is raging. It is a war for equity and justice still has to be achieved through hard struggle.
By Arturo P. Garcia
Justice for Filipino American Veterans (JFAV)