SOURCE MATERIALS - BATTLE OF MANILA.ORG
THANKS TO LTC AND MRS. RWW (R), E/2/503/173 69-70 WE ARE BACK ON TRACK WITH THE FLIPPING BOOK PROGRAM, WHICH ALLOWS US TO PRESENT A WIDER RANGE OF SOURCE DOCUMENTS IN A MORE ACCESSABLE FORMAT.
The Battle of Manila, probably more than any other battle of WWII, has suffered from the false narratives of post-war revisionism. This was not simply the result of Japanese reluctance to traverse their war crimes, but from the efforts of the US to facilitate Japan as a base for the 'police action' in Korea. The predominant revisionist approach was that the US had, by surrounding Manila, failed to afford an escape route for the Japanese to withdraw from the city, thereby causing damage and death which otherwise would not have occurred. This approach assumes, incorrectly, that the Japanese wanted to vacate Manila without fight. The second revision was to characterise the atrocities as " the Manila Naval Defence Force under the separate command of the Imperial Japanese Navy running amok." This was an ex post facto invention argued by the defense counsel of Gen. Yamashita. The third narrative was that the damage to Manila was caused predominantly by "American Bombing" and indiscriminant artillery use.
