Quotes that came out of WWII

 

New Guinea

True combat power is arms multiplied by fighting spirit

___ Asahi Shimbun

 We were all teenagers or barely in our twenties, totally naive to the ways of the world.  Our patriotic goal was to get even for Pearl Harbor.  All forty-eight states were united.  Aviators would be needed to defeat Japan.  We were the Flyboys…

___ Pilot Lou Grab, quoted in ‘George Bush: His World War II Years’

Japanese, had failed fully to appreciate the strategic revolution brought about by the increased capabilities of air power.

___ “U.S. Strategic Bombing Survey Report” 1946

We hold his examples of atrocity screaming to the heavens while we cover up own  and condone them as just retribution for his acts.  We claim to be fighting for civilization, but the more I see of this war in the Pacific, the less right I think we have to claim to be civilized.  In fact, I am not sure that our record in this respect stands so very much higher than the Japanese.

____ Charles Lindbergh, ‘The Wartime Journals of Charles Lindbergh’

Meet the expectations of your family and home community by making effort upon effort, always mindful of the honor of your name.  If alive, do not suffer the disgrace of becoming a prisoner; in death, do not leave behind a name soiled by misdeeds.

____ “Imperial Japanese Army Field Service Code”

Pacific War; downed aircraft

Please try to understand this.  It’s not an easy thing to hear, but please listen.  There is no morality in warfare.  You kill children.  You kill women.  You kill old men.  You don’t seek them out, but they die.  That’s what happens in war.

____ Paul Tibbets, quoted in “Duty: A Father, His Son, and the Man Who Won the War”

 If we are prepared to sacrifice 20 million Japanese live in kamikaze effort, victory will be ours.

____ Admiral Taijiro Onishi, quoted in “Hell in the Pacific”

If I had lost the war, I would have been tried as a war criminal.

____ General Curtis LeMay, quoted in “Dark Sun: The Making of the Hydrogen Bomb”

As long as there sovereign nations possessing great power, there will be war.

____ Albert Einstein

Among the men that fought on Iwo Jima, uncommon valor was a common virtue.

____ Admiral Chester Nimitz, 16 March 1945

The Limeys want us in even with our hastily made plans and our half-trained and half-equipped troops.”

____ General Joseph Stillwell speaking about joining the war alongside Britain

Eastern Front

Nice chap, no general.

____ General Bernard Montgomery, speaking his first impression of General Eisenhower

Anyone who says they weren’t scared in combat, was either crazy or stupid.

____ Everett “Smitty” Smith, 11th Arborne Division

Old soldiers never die, they just fade away.  And like the old soldier in that ballad, I now close my military career and just fade away, an old soldier who tried to do his duty as God gave him the sight to see that duty.

____ General Douglas Mac Arthur

 With the development of weapons of indiscriminate mass murder and the real possibility of a nuclear holocaust, Japan’s experience of the “horrors of war” may prove a valuable lesson for other countries as well…

____ Saburo Ienaga

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Military Humor – 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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Farewell Salutes – 

Frank V. Benak – Scottsville, MI; US Army, WWII, PTO, Cpl., Co C/128/32 Infantry Division, KIA (Papua, NG)

William L. Carroll – Riverside, RI; US Navy, WWII, PTO, USS St. Mary’s

Leroy C. Cloud – Taylor, TX; US Army, WWII, ETO, 744th Tanker Battalion, KIA (at sea)

Lou Conter (102) – Ojibwa, WI, US Navy, WWII, PTO, pilot “Black Cats”, USS Arizona (Last Survivor), Lt. Comdr. (Ret. 28 y.)

John O. Herrick – Emporia, KS; US Army, WWII, ETO, Sgt., Co B/149th Engineer Battalion, KIA )FRA)

Conrad J. Rioux – Hartford, CT; US Army, Korea, Capt., Medical Unit, 3rd Infantry Division, Bronze Star

Raymond U. Schlamp – Dubuque, IA; US Army, WWII, Pfc., 11/5th Infantry Division, KIA (FRA)

David Walker – Norfolk, VA; US Navy, WWII, PTO, mess attendant, USS California, KIA (Pearl Harbor, HI)

Julius G. Wolfe – Liberal, MO; US Army, WWII, ETO, Cpl., Co B/149th Engineer Combat Battalion, KIA (FRA)

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Did somebody say that it’s Monday?

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