A LOYAL survivor of the Japanese has what might be called a "personal" month each year.
Whether celebrated or not, it is, of course, usually the month in which they were born -- the birthday month.
Every former Far East Prisoner of War (FEPOW) has another special month -- the month of August, the month when, 56 years ago, World Car Two came to an end, the prison gates were opened and many FEPOWs were virtually reborn.
Arguments for and against the dropping of atom bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki have raged since 1945 and will probably continue.
But there is little doubt in the minds of FEPOWs that, though dreadful the effects and devastating the results were, it resulted in what all of them had yearned for desperately -- the precious gift of life and freedom.
An Australian once wrote: "The world's tears are for Hiroshima -- we are the unwanted survivors.
The dead ought to be living, the living ought to be dead. To me, Hiroshima and Nagasaki meant life from the dead."
In the summer of 1945, Field Marshall Terauchi issued a significant order to all prison camp commanders that, at the moment the Allies invaded the home islands of Japan, all prisoners of war throughout the whole of the Far East were to be killed. In my prison camp, and every other camp I have heard of, communal graves had already been dug for this eventuality and each day we paraded by this hole for Tenko at the beginning and end of our 14-hour shift in the coal mine.
Almost to the last, the fanatical War Minister, General Anami, insisted that Japan should fight to the bitter end, defending the main islands with the same techniques and tenacity employed at Iwo Jima and Okinawa.
The Japanese planned to deploy the undefeated bulk of their two million troops, plus 10,000 Kamikaze planes and all the women and children they could muster, equipped with bamboo spears in a suicidal defence.
The pre-invasion song "Two Million Souls for the Emperor" meant that there were no civilians in Japan. The purpose of the atom bombs was to stop the war and those two bombs saved at least a million lives by doing so.
Brett Collier,
Nettleham Road,
Lincoln EVERYONE has what might be called a "personal" month each year.
Whether celebrated or not, it is, of course, usually the month in which they were born -- the birthday month.
Every former Far East Prisoner of War (FEPOW) has another special month -- the month of August, the month when, 56 years ago, World Car Two came to an end, the prison gates were opened and many FEPOWs were virtually reborn.
Arguments for and against the dropping of atom bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki have raged since 1945 and will probably continue.
But there is little doubt in the minds of FEPOWs that, though dreadful the effects and devastating the results were, it resulted in what all of them had yearned for desperately -- the precious gift of life and freedom.
An Australian once wrote: "The world's tears are for Hiroshima -- we are the unwanted survivors.
The dead ought to be living, the living ought to be dead. To me, Hiroshima and Nagasaki meant life from the dead."
In the summer of 1945, Field Marshall Terauchi issued a significant order to all prison camp commanders that, at the moment the Allies invaded the home islands of Japan, all prisoners of war throughout the whole of the Far East were to be killed. In my prison camp, and every other camp I have heard of, communal graves had already been dug for this eventuality and each day we paraded by this hole for Tenko at the beginning and end of our 14-hour shift in the coal mine.
Almost to the last, the fanatical War Minister, General Anami, insisted that Japan should fight to the bitter end, defending the main islands with the same techniques and tenacity employed at Iwo Jima and Okinawa.
The Japanese planned to deploy the undefeated bulk of their two million troops, plus 10,000 Kamikaze planes and all the women and children they could muster, equipped with bamboo spears in a suicidal defence.
The pre-invasion song "Two Million Souls for the Emperor" meant that there were no civilians in Japan. The purpose of the atom bombs was to stop the war and those two bombs saved at least a million lives by doing so.
Brett Collier,
Nettleham Road,
Lincoln
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