Letters from friends mean much to all of us. Some people have a knack for writing interesting letters. The following quotations are from a letter from a man in the service. You may be interested in some of the things he writes:
“As we near our rendevous with destiny many of us especially we older ones often get together in informal yet searching gab-fests and bull sessions.
“What we’re fighting for can mean a lot of things to a lot of people. But to us of the Combat Team, though we may express it in many ways, we are fighting for victory for our United States and the United Nations; we are fighting to assure ourselves, our loved ones, and our posterity the right to live in these United States in peace, security and dignity. We are fighting to justify the faith and confidence which other Americans have in us, a faith which enabled them to withstand ostracism, criticism, and ridicule, and sometimes even threats of violence.
“To those from the Island, the struggles ahead are a challenge to repay faith, and confidence of their fellow Americans in the Territory who though with greater provocation to deal harshly with Japanese Americans than their compatriots on the Pacific Coast, accorded that treatment to which they were entitled. In no other locality or state in the Union and certainly in no other country would Japanese Americans have been treated with the same courtesy and respect as they were in Hawaii. The tolerance and understanding, the goodwill and sympathy, the support and consideration given them as a group certainly speak well of the genuine Americanism of the Hawaiian people and the high esteem in which Japanese Americans were justly held. To preserve this feeling of country and fellowship in many way, make what the Hawaiian volunteers are fighting for even more tangible and worthwhile than that which prompts those from the mainland.
The mainlanders and the islanders alike are agreed that we are fighting not for ourselves alone but for all persons of Japanese ancestry.
“These gab-fests also examined the alleged great and irreconcilable differences which are supposed to exist between the ‘Butaheads’ from the Islands and the mainland ‘Kotonks’. We agreed that as far as we’re concerned, the alleged differences exist largely in the minds of those not in the Combat Team. Such differences as may exist are largely individual and personal differences and not based upon the place of their respective origin. The volunteers regardless of their birth place, will be forged into one mighty fighting machine in the battle against the common foe.”
“When men know that they are soon to face death, they are not inclined to pull punches for compromise merely to save anothers feelings. They are frank, honest, critical.
“We are not a heroic group who consider ourselves ‘martyrs’ to a great cause. Neither are we sheep being led to slaughter. We know that many of us may not return, many of us. may be crippled. Yet we believe now as we approach that hour which will be our D-Day more than ever before that the Combat Team will make a valorous and creditable record in battle. We cannot we must not fail. And, God willing, we shall not fail.”
The excerpts that you have just read are from a letter written by a Japanese American soldier shortly before they landed in Europe. What has happened since their landing is already a known fact. The Combat Team is a part of the 34th Division’s 442nd Infantry Regiment.
Fort Snelling Bulletin, Fort Snelling, MN, September 23, 1944