nidentifiable. The author is grateful for any assistance in identifying persons who have been pictured, named, and to correct any errors of location, description, ownership or otherwise. The images in this ion are enhanced, digitized versions of aged and damaged photographic content and represent the s best efforts to present them. The editor publishes the Battle of Manila Online website at http://battleofmanila.org As far as is known, and except where otherwise credited, images are works prepared by serving personnel or employees of the U.S. Government as part of their official duties, or are U.S. National s images in the public domain. The editor claims copyright © 2014 in respect of the digital ation enhancements only. Published in 2014 nd Edition 2024 "For Dad" COVER: Manila terrain Study Handbook, AlliedGeographical Section, SWPA - the colors indicate principal dths, important facilities and installations and was used by amember of the 1st Cavalry who reached Sto. nternment Camp, 3 February, 1945, ITE: Manila City Hall (MacArthur Memorial Archives, City of Norfolk, USA) IN ASSOCIATION WITH
14 April 1945 Mum, Do and Lit, Since last writing to you a lot of water has passed under the ge, and other way for saying that we have had a shift. I can't for security ons tell you any more. Things are still going along OK with me but of course since we our tropical paradise things haven't been the same, and the pleasant months pent there have I think made us all a little softer than we were after our er stay in the Philippines. However, far be it from my "bitching" as we Yanks say, really ppose there are millions far worse off, including these poor people with whom ome into daily contact. You know, I have seen them standing outside the mess s with their tins looking for scraps from the G. I.'s plates, and I thought t of all that they were taking it for their livestock, but one day I saw one hem eating it and I think that it is the general practice. You can see by the ved look in their faces and the general demeanour of the elder ones, what a h time they have been through, though the kids about 8 to 10 are just as ky as the Depot Hill Push. "Good day Joe" seems to be their almost universal s of address. I say "Good day, George" in return and it leaves them a little plussed. Wasn't it dreadful about the President. You can imagine just much of a shock it caused up in these parts and I think the rumour wen the ds of the camp in a few minutes. Surprising however that they have not held sort of a memorial service or even a Salute but things are at the moment in uch of an upset that I think they are thinking of more pressing things. I that I eventually receive a paper with details, I would especially like to Churchill's tribute to him. It was most disheartening having to move from our last place, n honestly say that I enjoyed every minute of my stay there, and it's hard to k that the nightly pictures, stage shows, good chow and surf and the other actions are a thing of the past. It is a case of the Fitzpatrick dialogue so it is with much regret that we say farewell to this beautiful tropical nd paradise" and to add a few of my own "with its beautiful palms swaying in breeze, cool waters lapping the seashore, cool evenings and cooler mornings, e one could wake to the sighing of the trees, and where every day was as sant as the day before." Tonight we have had what could only be classed as a super dust m. It just blew through the office sending papers everywhere and no sooner it finished than down came the rain and only that I was in the office at the , I'm sure that our table would have resembled the bottom of the city baths. his is an example of the type of weather to expect, I'm afraid that I won't to visit here after the war. This letter is I know very abstract, but at the present I t expand on it. It's mainly to tell you that I am OK and at the present ering a hangover from our last place of abode. Tip souvenirs, letters and faded, dog-eared photographs in my father's footlocker.
October-January northeast monsoon season, and stories about the mud at Tacloban are still legendary. Sometimes it was better to 'abandon ship' until a tow vehicle could be found, even for the mighty jeep. TOP LEFT:The rains on Leyte were incessand and the mud was omnipresent. Despite it all, 'Tip' enjoyed Tacloban. LEFT: Leyte laundry with genuine running water. BELOW LEFT: On rare occasions, the horse-drawn kalesas, karitelas and carabao could go through where modern vehicles could not.
A day of many fires and explosions, practically all Japanese inspired. The city is tense as the anese rush final preparations for the coming battle: street mining, anti-tank barricades, more boxes — one even on top of the Great Eastern Hotel. I got “confirmation” that the Arias Building is ed, and some say the San Miguel Brewery too. Meanwhile, the Makapilis are raising a mild wave of or by pointing accusing fingers to settle old scores or repay fancied slights. The Japanese navy are g around Ermita arresting the accused, always picking on the wrong families. Japanese blew up the bridges on the northern entrances to Manila yesterday. They’ve been ning people in Ermita of a coming fight, strongly suggesting that they evacuate the area, but most staying and digging underground shelters. It’s impossible to move — and many have everything own sunk in those homes. Those living within a kilometer of the Pasig bridges were advised to get The Hospicio de San José, a complete hospital close to the Ayala Bridge, has already been uated. Extract from the Diary of Henry Brimo
t was political cleverness for each of them, for a "little President" might be easily cast aside by an occupying invader, whereas (so it was hoped) local officials could not be ly replaced. City Hall essentially became enlivened and empowered. (NARA)
Dear Mum, Do and Lit, The heat up here is a lot worse than the former place. It gets particularly hot during the day, and keeps it up until about 5pm.when it cools down and the nights are reasonably cool. It doesn’t get daylight until about 6.15 am and even at 7 am it is still a fair way from being bright. Dusk falls about 6.30 pm. It has been very hot up here for the last week with no rain to relieve the heat. It is an oppressive heat which makes you feel sleepy and always tired, and if you do have a sleep during the lunch hour you wake up feeling like nothing on earth. I was pleased to notice that you had marked the part in the paper dealing with MacArthur and the China and Japan operations, and now that his new appointment has officially come to hand there is quite a deal of speculation between the boys up here as to what it really means as far as we are concerned. Although I know of nothing official I hope that it means we will eventually see China and Japan (though not so keen on seeing the latter) as now I am over here I might as well see what I can, as you can rest assures that a trip for me to the Orient after the war is definitely OUT. I hope that the crowd that I am with, if they do go, go as the present body, as they really are a decent lot, with a good deal of harmony existing between the officers and enlisted men and the enlisted men themselves. The other night I had occasion to use our jeep, and after doing the job and returning noticed that it wasn’t our jeep. However first M.P. that we passed soon made us realize that and things looked as though we would be doing six months until I explained it all – the jeep being parked where ours usually was – and finally talked my way out of it. The highlight of the incident was however that we had taken the jeep belonging to none other than a Major General. The other night we were all damned hungry so I went and got some bread from the mess hall, and we sat down to a tinned of roast beef and dry bread. It might not sound dainty or too palatable, but when you have nothing else and are as hungry as we were, it tasted quite alright. I couldn’t imagine myself ever eating it for supper other than here. The authorities have been busy cutting down the incidence of Malaria and all pests up here. You can imagine that there are a lot of holes here filled with water and the mosquitoes having a great time. They periodically spray the place with DDT from airplanes which pass over at about 50 to 100 feet at nearly wing to wing distance and do the whole of the town. They also have personnel going round the town doing ditches drains etc., and filling in holes, and from the Malarial angle the risk is fairly negligible now. Life is pretty quiet, although the place is itself a hive of industry. There seems no shortage of manpower as regards construction and things just seem to grow overnight. One day when coming into work there will be a vacant space and the next morning a building will be half erected. Have decided to do my own washing and not to give it to the Filipinos while around these parts. One has so much spare time on one’s hands it helps to fill in a bit of it, and I generally coincide my washing with my taking a shower which makes it a good deal easier. Tip his was an easy war. Fortunately, there were always typewriters close handy, so his letters home were plentiful.
own supporting artillery. (NARA)
Dear Mum, Do and Lit, We are now able to announce that we are in Manila, though I presume that you could follow from my previous letters that we were close handy to the place. However the security precaution has now been lifted. Things are still going along OK, but the desire to look around the city is gradually diminishing, after all ruins are ruins and you can’t appreciate any beauty in a burned out building, and even the parks that are around the place with their beautiful trees and cages for animals are just masses of burnt out debris, with the trees either completely scorched or partly blown away from the artillery. There seemed to be quite a few parks around too, within a couple of hundred yards of our building there are the remains of two. Have I mentioned about all the Jap bodies around the place. It is nothing to see an arm here, or a leg there or even the whole of a skeleton in some ditch, though they are gradually burying them or disposing of them. The day we arrived one of the boys was putting up his T bars for his mosquito net, and he unearthed a Jap body and we later found out that the place that they were camped on had been used as a burial ground for them. There is scores of mortars, TNT, and live ammunition around the place, but of course everyone has more brains than to interfere, and I suppose they will collect it all when they have more time and less important jobs to do than present. Last night I had my first introduction to night life since leaving Brisbane, and although the place is not electrically lighted we found our way down a few dark alleys to some joint – reminiscent of the Hole in the Wall. We landed in and bought a bottle of soft drink and sat behind it all night and talked to a couple of Filipino girls, who seem to be there to entertain the customers and dance with anyone who wants to dance with them. The place itself was only about 16 feet across and about 24 feet deep, so you can imagine just how good it would be. They had a couple of coves there strumming on a couple of stringed instruments. We mucked around until about 10.30 p.m. and then once again down the alley ways. There is a curfew here for 11 o’clock. I mentioned that we had only one drink. A small bottle (the size of a Coco Cola bottle) or a small type soft drink bottle cost 1 pesos. Believe me it was in addition to being the dearest drink I ever had, the worst one. Sandwiches also cost 1 peso each, in fact they never open their mouths up here unless it is a peso. A rockmelon about 6 inches round brings 3 pesos. Today I had a haircut, which ordinarily costs 1 pesos. It’s really astounding the prices. 400 pesos for an Elgin watch. 250 pesos for some worked Manila hemp or material. Of course the reason goes back to the Jap occupation, during which time things were sky rocketed. A haircut in those times cost 200 pesos, while a bundle of rice which pre-war cost 30 centavos, sold for 150 pesos. There are scores of notes (Jap of course) lying everywhere in the street. I think that one could have picked up a million pesos the other day outside our office. Was able to dispose yesterday of 10 bottles of beer for 10 peso and hope to get rid of a carton of cigarettes for the same price today so that will keep me in pocket money for a short while. Everyone else is cashing in through the black market so why not this chile. Rather funny the way they trade up here, one bloke yesterday wanted 1½ pesos for a rockmelon about five inches in diameter, and I had a chocolate which had cost me 30 cents and which the ants had got to, so I swapped him for it. We were both satisfied with the deal. I don’t like rockmelon myself but it was in an attempt to get a bit of fresh fruit that I did it, though incidentally by the time the six of us had a piece I didn’t get very much. Saw a nice movie here the other night “Sunday Dinner for a Soldier“. No war, no swing bands, no marital disagreements, and no treachery, which made it somewhat unique in entertainment. We had Mickey Rooney in "Girl Crazy". That is the type of movie we were getting here, something else to make it the last place on God’s Earth. Tip
massacre of Manila's citizens and the complete destruction of the city.
had lived with death.
served as nurses at the San Juan de Dios Hospital) and the contemplative Order of Saint Clare (the Poor Clares.)
ment (pictured) made landfall near the Government Mint where the walls had been breached. (FHL)
undertook extensive destruction of military supplies and civilian facilities in the north port area and the neighboring San Nicholas and Binondo districts, then ew across the Pasig and destroyed the bridges across the river. The Quezon Bridge was the last crossing to be demolished, it being destroyed as members of h Cavalry approached.
Legislative Building. (NA) W: A Sherman moves along Rizal Ave towards the Tondo area, at the of Avenida (Rizal Ave.) cnr. Mayalhaligue. (NA) elling of the building has ceased." (The Signal Corps captions are sometimes incorrect, in this instance, the legislative building is not within the heart of Intramuros, ernal to it.) (NA342-FH-3A30220-82281AC) The location is Natividad Lopez Street, moving west towards Manila City Hall. The water tower belongs to Sternberg General Hospital, destroyed by fire during hting.
in the Legislative Building. (NA) BELOW: A Sherman moves along Rizal Ave towards the Tondo area, at the corner of Avenida (Rizal Ave.) cnr. Mayalhaligue. (NA) and shelling of the building has ceased." (The Signal Corps captions are sometimes incorrect, in this instance, the legislative building is not within the heart of Intramuros, but external to it.) (NA342-FH-3A30220-82281AC) The location is Natividad Lopez Street, moving west towards Manila City Hall. The water tower belongs to Sternberg General Hospital, destroyed by fire during the fighting.
esent a paper here, that I am not an historian. I worked ears in California as a newspaper person and printer. I retired from that to a life of reading and writing. My writing was fiction--short stories and novels—still my rence if I were not so addicted to history. Some would o suggest I am still writing fiction. But the demands of history are very interesting. I do eel that the restraints of truth are a terrible burden to under. . But I have also discovered that truth is as ve as water in your hand, it wiggles like an eel. My er partner in videos, Morgan Cavett remarked once, we had two totally contradictory interviews, one with illa Edwin Ramsey, and one with Luis Taruc. Each d up calling the other a liar (Ramsey added ofabitch") (and Taruc added a “disrespectful anizer”)—Morgan, who was running the camera, said, l, that seems to be how history is constructed; our job is o record what the participants say.” Trying to find out the truth about my father’s life and here in the Philippines, for instance, was a wonderful ng ground. So many things written about him, and even m, were untrue: his US Navy biography gives his birth as 1902. Wrong. No one knew until the late 80’s, just e he died, that he was born in 1900. The only document e he stated his correct birth date was his marriage icate; this was also the only document wherein my ’s age was entered incorrectly (probably to make it He included in his resume that h had two years of g at the University of Tenness e. And two more years Un versity of the Philippines. Wro g again. A search of records in Tennessee did not reveal him tudent at any of their campuses. And as for UP, I found a letter from the bursar at UP ati g a partial refund of my father’s tuition – at his est – as he was dr pping his classes there. [1] The trail my father left behind was an intellectual camp, and led me to the National Archives in both la and in the United States, as well as to many military itories of war documents. And, of course, to many le whom we interviewed because they either knew or worked with Commander Chick Parsons, or had good es to tell about him. While we did this, we inadvertently d up hundreds of hours of wonderful – and nowuable oral history – as about 90% of these interviewees died. I know there are several of you in here tonight can only thank God t at he has spared you! [2] Now, more to the p int of our documentary, Manila , The Forgotten Atrocities. I will say that I stumbled s the e atroc ous findings while se rc ing fo my r. I acqu red near y all the still pi tur s as w ll as the ary footage (both American and Jap nese) at College THE BATTLE OF MANILA - MYTH AND FACT by Peter C. Parsons e been on of the lucky ew in Ame ican History who has both filed War Correspondent's reports from an active war zone, and who has d a newspaper. It was only small, but owning it has earned me the right to hold a deep and abiding contempt for those of the revisionist l media hive who prefer to publish falsehoods than truths because they believe themselves the appointed filters of what constitutes history what is mere fact filler. They have paved a road to hell along which good intentions trump outcomes even when those intentions lead to rophe. To them, the evil of MacArthur is the counterpoint of Yamashita, an honorable man of good intent who should not be sanctioned by y irrespective of the consequences when he sacrificed 100,000 Manileños. s an edited text of paper pres nted at a Battle of Manila conference at the Ortigas WWII Library on 7 February, 2008 and deals with the which my colleague Lucky Guillermo nd I embedded in our film documentary, Manila 1945 - The Forgotten Atrocities.
do (Rico) Jose and Edgar Krohn and, Ernie de Pedro at o Tomas, and the material to be found at the Lopez, a and Intramuros locations. Videographer Lucky ermo, my partner in this film, has a surprising ction of WWII footage. I found that the state of the war crimes papers in la was very poor with bundles of papers being tied her with a twine that was cutting into the deteriorating les. The photos seem to have disappeared long ago, and woman whom I asked about them got very surly and operative. This was probably an appropriate reaction to atural charm. In Maryland I learned to use white cotton gloves to le any archival photographic material. All pictures d were imprinted with the National Archives permiso logo – [“Reproduced at the National Archives”]; all al material was similarly marked as OK. You could stay from 9:00 a.m. to about 9:00 p.m. And we did. We carefully inspected as we left. I wanted to live there, I inside there. There are two very basic books on the Battle of la, Bibles sort of. One is Alfonso Aluit’s By Sword and published in 1994; the other is a US Army publication 963 by Robert Ross Smith called Triumph in the ppines. There are a lot more, including one I refer to n published to commemorate the 50th Anniversary of atastrophe. More on this one later. But there is little that be added to what is written in the first two. The many oirs and personal stories lend depth and color and r, and it is recommended to any student or researcher to them all. There was also an early equivalent of Aluit’s in Spanish called El Terror Amarillo en Filipinas, by nio Perez de Olaguer which was published in Spain in while the wounds were still open. An abridged version is--in English--with a new title, a bit more politically ptable these days, Terror in Manila, February 1945. This undertaken by the Memorare Manila 1945 Foundation 005. These three books form a deeply and broadly rched platform from which to dive into the subject. I ot know of any of these in the mid-90s. The memories ose times were so dire that many memoirists, like des Montinola and Elena Lizarraga only dared face pain after the passage of 50 and more years. [I am appy to say that Lourdes marches on st ongly—though s not here tonig t bec use she is seeing a doc or.] When I c me across t e War Crimes Investigat on t [3] compiled during February, March, and April of , I nearly swooned. There were dozens of people there I knew r had known both before nd after the war. I r knew that my father’s office manager in Hong Kong lived on Calle Estrada and that his father, Eustacio os, had been wantonly killed by a Ja n se soldier when ft his burning hous . I read about the massacre at the z Rub o home on Vit Cruz, com lete with my own r’s testimony. And the simultaneous massacre on the side of the shared-wall at the home of Lianteng Sy (on gtas St.)—whose only surviving family member is a frie d of mine. On and on. I also discov red that the massacre and rape of la w s not owned by a Spanish and mestiz elite. Here the names and pictures of Filipino after Filipino, plus Russians, G rmans, Chinese, Spanish, Americans, (of whatever nationality) all being killed criminately. But at heart, it was a Filipino event, a no massacr : a nearly tot lly forg tten occurrence. And became what I wanted to p rtray in our document ry. at that time my main effort w s to discover material t the Philippine resistance movement, the guerrllas, and ever possible about my father in particular. Finally, there was, on pages 33-35, the b azing mony of Nicanor Roxas, a secretary to President Laurel e provisional g vernment, te li g what he had been tol o Duran, th second supreme head of he MAKAPILI, Japanese had pl nned to destroy Ma ila and the a population. He said that the Japan se had located y artill ry and aimed it at Manila from positions und ng the city. [4] In the d cumentary f lm by David riff it is aid that Yamashita asked for instructions Tokyo and the destructio of Manila and its population his nswer. I had not come cross this brief mentary before doing my own, and I am surprised and ied that our conclusions are nearly ide ical. At he MacArthur Memori l in Norfolk, Vi ginia, w guerrilla reports being r dioed to MacArthur’s GHQ ning the build-up of defenses within the city of Manila
oors of the Bayview Hotel can be seen. (NARA 342A30228-82291AC via Tewell) T - "After the preliminary patrols have made their way down y Blvd., scene of some of the most barbarous fiighting in the a, Luzon, Philippine Islands campaign, the Infantrymen are d up in trucks for the assault on the Manila Hotel and the ern wall of Intramuros. Here, the trucks are shown eding cautiously forward on the heavily mined boulevard, y heads north along Dewey Boulevard." (NARA 3A-30225, 283 via Tewell)
Captain Bartolomeo Cabangbang, who came in by submarine with my father on the east coast of Luzon, and Lt. Edwin Ramsey, leader of the East Central Luzon Guerrillas Area. This defensive/offensive build-up started immediately after the departure of President Laurel and others of his cabinet to Baguio. The communiqués are replete with locations of pillboxes, ammunition dumps, fortifications, troops, and information about buildings and bridges being prepared for demolition. This began while Yamashita was still in Manila. [6] The fortification was going on during December and January.There is even one astonishing recommendation from Cabangbang in which he recommends to MacArthur that US planes bomb a certain location on the Escolta where Japanese had stored weapons and explosives. That President Laurel was told by General Yamashita that Manila would be declared an Open City [7] may have been true. Even the guerrilla messages confirm this. But his words were belied by the heavy fortification of key points and intersections throughout the city, especially south of the Pasig River, and the setting of explosive charges in the important buildings and bridges. The Japanese Military Dispositions map shown in the video (albeit briefly) shows at least 15 manned fortifications throughout Manila during February 1945. A radio message to MacArthur on January 13, 1945, from Cabangbang, tells of Yamashita’s reneging on his promise of an open city. His logic now was that “the complete demilitarization of the city would lay it open to a possible paratroop invasion from Mindoro.” The General’s reasoning is baffling, especially in view of the further observation in the same report that “As of January 7 [Japanese troops] have constructed foxholes and pillboxes on practically all street corners.”[8] Does this sound like anyone is thinking “open city?” In the video you will hear testimony from one woman, Lita Rocha Clearsky,[9] who was warned by a Japanese officer to get out of Manila, to take everything and leave because Manila would be “no good.” And Ramsey’s agents reported that four German nationals in Manila received a circular from Japanese High Command to evacuate the city. [10] It was known to the Japanese officers that Manila and its civilian population were going to suffer horribly; some were good enough to tell people to leave. Charo Manzano, who had spent months in Ft. husb nd N rcis , told me that she was continually being warned by Japanese to move; t ey moved and they survived Japanese planned out their neighborhood killings and knew about them in ad ance. There was for he most part not much ran omness about thes attacks on civilian . Some peopl were lucky enough to be forewarned. Manila 1945 - The Forgotten Atrocities questions, if not demolishes, two xic myths, specifical y: 1. That the city was destroyed because the A erican forces did not let the Japanese have an escap route; that they completely bottled up the Japanese who were forced to lash out, understandably and reasonably, in a fight to the death, much as cornered rats do; [the burning and demolition of the city began on the first three days of February—long before there was any ncircle ent by US forces.]; And that the concept of “shelling” be applied to both Americans and J panese, ven moreso to the latter who had heavi r weapons set up all around the city. and 2. The equally indefensible, from my point of view, tenet that Yamashita intended to leave Manila an Open City. On this latter yth, a brief observation: Gen. MacArthur had left the city OPEN in 1941. There were no American or Filipino troops in Manila. All fortifications, like Forts Santiago and McKinley and Nichols Field were abandoned.[Side note: at the end of the war the Japanese were saying that every living Filipino was a guerrilla, regardless of age or sex, but in the early days no one knew this, not even MacArthur, nor any Filipino.] Yamashita, after telling Pres. Laurel he was going to declare Manila an Open City, dedicated 4,000 of his Shobu Force to defend North Manila. There was no OPEN CITY in 1945. And Yamashita was not a misunderstood and disobeyed saint. It was in fact se very forces t at b gan the ires a d massacres of civilians ven before the America s had set foot within the city. It is also interesting that the Japa ese planned def nse of the city of gradually falling back from their north M nil positions, crossing the Pasig and literally digging
la they set it on fire. Not content with torching Binondo Tondo, they also began setting fire to the Ermita area. uch for the bottle theory. Two books, one by three British writers, The Battle Manila, and By Sword and Fire by Alfonso J. Aluit, fall the trap of blaming the Americans. The irony of the sh book is that the conclusions of the authors do not ide with the man who is largely responsible for funding writing of the book, Roderick Hall, who is a survivor e Japanese Occupation and of the Battle for Manila; it all the more personal for him since the Japanese itously killed his mother. [11] The British authors put it this way: “The third lesson rban warfare) is even more mundane: never surround a entirely, but always leave an escape route so that the y is not forced to fight to the death. Again, the ricans failed to bear this in mind.” [12] Among my nses to this is: even if they were trapped, is that enough cuse their wanton massacring of civilians? Aside from act that many if not most of the most egregious acres occurred before the Japanese were sealed in. And they had made every building in the city a fortress, it n’t seem to me they were planning an exodus. Or do mean “fight to the death of all civilians?” This was a rogue concept. They began rounding up civilians in Fort Santiago on uary 4th. On the 6th they start killing off these people. also begin rounding up civilians along Singalong t and beheading them—this went on for a long time. ebruary 9th behold the massacre of more innocents at aul’s College; the near elimination of Elpidio Quirino’s y; the Vincentian Fathers and the Chinese civilians at aules Church on San Marcelino met horrible fates on day. And the next day, the 10th is a particularly black for Manila. The German Club was turned into a brutal cynical killing field with no one spared on account of sex, nationality. [Note: I have interviewed one of the survivors of that massacre and her ordeal is told in my o.] Various killings took place house to house ghout Ermita and Malate and Paco not to mention committed at the Red Cross HQ on Isaac Peral. And the Japanese were still not “bottled up” or ed. Although some think this might have happened as res thi be a act on February 17th, t e date of the acre f S n Juan de Dios Hospital s aff. But Aluit puts it this way: “…[General] Douglas Arthur bears as much respons bility as [Rear Admiral] Iwabuchi does f the cruel fate that was infl cted on la. “By adopting the strate y of bottling up the adversary n area with a resident population of ne million, the ric ns permitted the Japanese no al ernative but a last , scorched earth stand. That the Japanes behaved like the ered rat of l gend was to be expected.”[13] I have words to ibe this observation that cannot be printed. Aluit’s own unting of daily activity in the battle defi s the logic of he conclud s. This amounts to one of th mo t unjustified i accurate st tements ever made ab the Battle of la. This p rase “bottl ng up” the Japan se in error, I feel; nese w o wanted to were fleeing from Manila uring the wo weeks of the battle. Robert Ross Smith says that about 0 of them escap d across the Marikina Riv r. They had y free p ssage to th east, past Ft. McKinley. And even in February here was no action t e ther Ni lsen Field nor at McKi ley. And they had such strong defense in the outh anila (Nichols Field) that the American penetration there delayed until the 12th. Roderick Hall as written me saying that it is his own on that MacA th r should have pl ned a d lau ched two ltaneous att cks on the City, so that from the very ons t of attle for Manila, Feb 3, the Japanese w uld have had their s full on two fronts. H eans that landings should have rred on both L ngayen and Batangas beaches at the s me And that this might have saved many lives. The researc materials available today were available to writers in the early to mid ‘90s. The chain of command e Japanese military organization was well understood, r understood by any others than by me. To establish an , sign tures had to go all the way up and down t e chain ommand in the Japanese military system. Signatures of officers, chief-of-staff, and commander-in-chief would all to be on the form that had to be delivered to the staff er in charge of coded signals; the order would be copied to
Filipino civilians were the intended targets of Japanese aggression. It was the intended use of atrocity as a weapon of war. The means had become the end. (MacArthur Memorial Archives, City of Norfolk, USA)
1945. One of the more valuable, east recognized roles of the as was to identify, and if needs be, with the armed Makipili who had collaborating "unreservedly" with perial JapaneseArmy and Navy in hilippines. The Makipili had ed anti-American ultranationalist s convinced of the necessity to ate Western colonial influence in lippines. Many had been attached anese units, and the Kempeitai, g them a fearsomely effective ting machine of revenge and l murder. (NARA 34230997-56693AC) The ever durable Filipino kariton art does service as a Manila ance" as refugees flee the PGH. well)
naval garrison unit. [14] If this was the procedure for local decisions, consider the added complications of needing permission from Tokyo. Neither Iwabuchi nor Yamashita could have ordered the massacres that occurred without having received such orders, or received permission to commit them. The important thing to remember is that they were doing what their Emperor would want, a “logic” that was behind all atrocities and brutalities committed by Japanese military forces during the war.[15] It is important to note the hidden role of Emperor Hirohito in all the military actions of the war; and it is inconceivable to think that he did not know of the horrible things his troops were doing in China and elsewhere in Southeast Asia, as far back as the various “Rapes” in China and the Bataan Death March, including the horribly-conceived Ishii Unit 731 which had its biological warfare counterpart here in the Philippines—in Mindanao and who knows where else. [16] This, by the way, introduces another myth, that of the gentle, mild mannered marine biologist who happened also to be the Emperor of Japan. He was in fact a deeply militaristic person, having been taken away from his parents at an early age to be brought up by family members who were generals and admirals. He was interested in all facets of the war; he had agents reporting to him from the various fronts, and he knew about the horrors being committed in Bataan. He even had a relative in the armed forces in China, and it can surely be said that he even knew of the darkly secret doings of the Ishii Unit 7 and its devilish human experiments often sans benefit of anesthesia. The fact that no one was tried from this “medical” group is a black mark on post war justice. I wish that the Emperor would come under more severe attack these days (it is beginning—with books like Herbert Bix’s Hirohito and the Making of Modern Japan.) The fire bombings from B-29 attacks on Japanese cities were much worse than those of the two atom bombs; they killed more people, destroyed more cities and were more ghastly in their manner of killing—by suffocation, by melting, and by simple cremation. But the Emperor gave in only after the second A-bomb was dropped. I think that had he known there was no third bomb, we would be still fighting in Japan today. Yes, the Emperor was a war criminal of the first order. J p nese soldiers that revealed they had been rdered t kill l civilians on the fi ld of battle; instru tions were give as to how to carry ut these orders in a most efficient manner (burning of groups that had been herded in o houses, bayoneting, handg enad ng, and la tly, shooting). Decisions of this sort throughout the Japanese-occupied war theater were normally dictated from okyo. This was true ven of the disastrous order to move Australian prisoners from one side of Borneo to the o her – a decision which caused the elimination of ALL 2,500 Australian POWs (except for he six who escape ).[17] The un amed and undistributed film by USMC photograp er C ptain David B. Griffin hows the inding of on such diary. It also shows very-young Carlos P. Romulo stati at the Japanese had orders from as high as Tokyo to inflict death and d struction on t Filipino populace. His warn gs that the guilty would b brought to trial proved toothless.But his statement that the film would be a witness against them was accurate, if only belatedly. It would be a good resear h project to find out why is filmwas suppressed. One c ptured J panese soldier, Taguchi Hiroshi [18]says h does not know why he was o dered to do such things, but he was. And he ob yed. He could only surmise that it was because the Filipinos preferr d the Americans to t e Japanese. As simplistic as this must sound, it is also probably a absolut truth li it mind et of the simple J panes soldier, that it had not started as a r cist war, but t had become one now, and the Filipinos h d become unw r hy of the trus the Japanese had most generously extend t them. The ulture of the J panese military, the Emp ror worship, the pride factor, the various codes of Bushido and Samurai all conspired to identify the unworthy Filipinos with theAmerican , and beyond this, guerri las all. Hiroshi was of a low rank, and one cannot expect him to ave had a grand s rategic thought in his ad. Here I feel constrained to add a viable alternativ motiv , on of a grand strategy brought to my attentio by serious WWII commentators and observers: Tokyo was fa ing a more serious predicament tha the mer loss of the Philippines. By this time, it was app rent, but u spoken at cabinet level that the ar was lost, and t at Japan eeded to negotiate s me sort of peace arrangement. But with what? There was very little to bargain with, in the political sense, so in the absence of anything positive, the
icans with their greatest fears -- that the invasion of Japan only be accomplished at the price of the greatest bloodbath merican manhood the world had ever known. What better o place fear in the heart of the American planners than to retaking Manila the most costly and terrifying presage of the a minor indication of a far more catastrophic outcome ing across the Japanese beaches and through every Japanese and city. Manila was merely a junior grade indication of they might face on the homeland, the Filipinos an expendable to pay. That the forecasts of American casualty figures for the on of Japan took into account an extrapolation of the military ivilian deaths during the Battle of Manila suggests that this ach was at least partially successful. This alternate view es even more cynicism and cruelty than I had at first ned. In Manila, the thoughts of an escape route for the “bottled panese” is totally irrelevant. I have talked to Emmanuel mpo, a guerrilla with the ROTC Hunters, who has told me that uthern part of the city would have been easy for the Japanese ve from had they wanted to. And this seems to confirm Rod thoughts that the southern attack began too late. The yen invasion was on January 9; the 11th Airborne oopers (511th Parachute Infantry) did not begin to attack in cinity of Nichols Field until February 4th; they waited to be d by the 188th Infantry coming down from Tagaytay Ridge. the combined forces, being shelled by Japanese artillery Fort McKinley), engaged the Japanese 3rd Naval Battalion attle to reclaim the air base. These were among the strongest se positions in Manila and the US forces could not claim ssion until February 12th. The oncoming American force was somewhat manned and also somewhat lost and it actually depended on llas for their advance to the city, which went along the coast Cavite. But this begs the question. The Japanese in Manila few exceptions) did not intend to escape, and no one has yet n about their trying to or wanting to. Aluit himself writes that Yokoyama pointed out to Iwabuchi, as late as February 21, an e route that a few others had been using, into the foothills of ierra Madre. Iwabuchi gave no response ary 14 w en Yokoy ma offe ed to organize a cou ter-attack e Iwabuchi and his troops.[19] Th rear admir l was engaged yokus i” (glori us self-annihilation). The orders came fr m high up in the military command; were carrie out willingly nd ev n gleefully. T a cus Arthur f equal culpability is a re l travesty of history a d is y unfair to a brilli nt milita y m n wh personally red f r ountry and its people. I suspect that in doi g this, Mr. Aluit es onding to some revisionist pressure to bash Americans. British authors seem to be flexing their intellectual military ess in t e com ts of heir English ivory tower. It is always a a d e sy sh t to demean Americans, especially d ad ones. se c ses it is the t uth t at gets demeaned. I confess to finding a definite and fairly strong antiican, or at least anti-MacArthur bias in Aluit’s book. But this altogether unusual. One of my oldest and best friends is Dr. d Steinberg is certainly no l ver of MacArthur, and is quick it show. Aluit mocks General when, at his speech in Mal c ang e, returning the reins of government to President Osmena, he ed up and could not proceed. Aluit quotes the part of rthur’s rem niscence that says “It had killed something in m my men die.” And says that the General had nothing to say the 100,000 civilian dea hs. But why did he omit a very rful and evocative sentence coupled t that quoted: “To s it might have s emed my moment of victory and men al personal accl im, but to me it seemed only the nation of a panorama of physical and spiritual disaster.” Does make the man sound like a revenge-driven egomaniac, which at Al it claims for MacArthur? You can do anything with ive—and out-of-context--quoting. He also emeans th American milit ry po icy of trying to ct “precious American lives.” And e also does a deep intake eath at the discovered cache of food at Santo Tomas ment Camp, point ng ut th scarcity of food i Ma ila. Here is the monumental horde of food (in part): 2-oz bottles of Bovril; 120 pounds of coffee; 388
brigade, no water, no leadership - nothing can be done other than clear out the irreplaceable valuables, whether they belong to you or not. Another Signal Corps photographer (at right, kneeling) catches the action. The dentist's sign "Dr. E. Vergel de Dios" places the action at 447 Evangelista St., Quiapo as per the 1933 Manila telephone book. (ACME photo by Stanley Troutman for theWar Picture Pool) RIGHT: Traffic alongAzcarraga, Cnr. Avenida. (NARA)
of Manila, and lacked length and a cross-runway, problems which the Japanese sought to address by having American POW labor, using only hand remove a sizable hill which prevented its construction. The new runway work, commencing in 1942, had not been completed by the time of the ion in 1945, a matter which gave the prisoners still working as slave labor great pleasure. It is now generally known as Manila International Airport. nal Archives) (via Tewell)
condensed; 122 kilos of tiki tiki; 300 2-5/8 oz cans of sardines; 300 6oz cans of dried peas; 6 pounds of black bean soup; kidney beans, 1239 kilos; mongo beans 283 kilos. Ok, it seems like a lot at first glance, but here were about 3,500 people already on starvation diets. You figure how long this might last the prisoners. And yet the author writes: “It startles the mind that there was this much food of this kind at this time available in Manila. At least it was available for the Americans at Santo Tomas.” And why does he give a dig at the Lichaucos who were doing miraculous work at their home on the banks of the Pasig, by taking in hundreds of refugees? “In Santa Ana Marcial Lichauco had the problem of feeding 113 refugees in his home at 2915 Herran Street, but there was powdered milk and oatmeal for his daughters.”Was this because Jessie is anAmerican? And how can a book of this magnitude and quality (it is possibly the best yet on this subject, given my own quibbling caveats) fail to mention the dirty work of the Makapilis? They get two mentions in the entire 456 pages. One is to comment that after the Japanese are routed from one building there were two Filipinos left inside, both of them Makapilis. The other mention of them gives an account of two Filipinos guiding some refugees to a “safe” place, only to return later, laughing with the Japanese soldiers who proceeded to kill the civilians who had thought they were well off. That’s it. I am terribly disappointed in these uncalled for and rather stupid remarks of Aluit’s; I can only imagine the kind of nationalista pressures being put on him. Filipino historians, expert in this phase of the war, tell me that it was the Makapilis, Filipinos, leading the Japanese to houses which they themselves set on fire. The Japanese then would kill those who fled the flames. Aluit’s treatment of this grave Filipino problem is a serious flaw in his book. I have talked with Filipino historians who have told me that had the American thrust towards Tokyo by-passed the Philippines, the suffering here by starvation and by Japanese brutality would have been nearly as bad, or worse, than what actually transpired. Guerrilla leader Ramsey wrote that “Manila [is] doomed with widespread starvation.”[20] There were guerrilla reports that the Japanese planned to take the entire new harvest of rice for their Ramsey ha written earlier that “In Manila [an] average of 100 persons [are] dying d ily due [to] starvation. And Cabangbang h d written on December 24 that the “Nip is busy killing civil ans in Manila Districts and Bulacan towns just north of Manila” by gathering men, women and children and achine-gunning them. Town officials were being hanged and beaten. Thi ppare tly was a sort of preview s ow of th ngs to come, or better yet, a dress rehearsal. Which brings me to yet another myth ab u the Battle of Manila: the number of dead. The first time a number appears it is in Robert Ross Smith’s book. He tells how the US Army used the figures of the funeralistas who were tasked with picking up the bodies. To this is added an rbitrary number of t se who were killed and never found; and another estimate of thos who were bur ed beyond re overy. To show ow arbitrary th s figures are, on pair of historians shortly after th war, wro e that there were 240,000 civilia s who died during the b ttle. I would like to add the deaths by st rvation. If they were dying at the rate of 100 very day in December, what would have been the rate in February when f od an water were essentially unavailabl ? So ould this add anoth r 6,000 peopl , mostly women and c ildren?And ose who died of some disease or sickness? Hardly any med cines or med cal care was available. Why not add another estimate: say, another 6,000. And what about the apport on ng the responsibility for these d aths. Remember that everything here is an estimat , an arbitrary divvying up of ms. It seem that the convention is to s y tha of the 100,000, 30,000 were ca s d by shelling (meaning American rtillery, thus absolving Japanese artille y of any culpability her ?); the rest were caused by J pa ese atrociti . W at do we do now? Do w add 12,000 to the accepted figur ? Do we include these in t at number and subtract 6,000 from th American and Japanese responsibilities? If one would listen to Manila movie maker Nick de Ocampo, for instance when he spoke to the Man la Studies Associa i n last August, one would hear this incredibly inept observation: “I is obv ous that the destr ctio of Manila w s caused by the Americans.” The destruction of Manila i cludes the building and its inhabitants. Why would the Ame c ns dest oy the bridges and then p dd e across the Pasig River? Why woul they fight their way up to the fou th floor f he UP (Padre
crashing down with the debris? This represents to me the cannon type of historical comment. I feel that the Japanese, rules of war, Geneva Convention (which they had signed but atified”), by all human considerations had a duty to evacuate selves from Manila; they chose not to; in one sense ALL the s and demolitions are attributable to them. Other than saying t is entirely possible that the conventions in place are fairly ate. No one will ever know for sure. But it remains certain t was the Japanese who blew up most of the important ngs and destroyed the bridges and other infrastructure. And were shelling Manila every bit as heavily as the Americans. Yanks were using portable howitzers, whereas the Japanese using bigger guns from all land-based compass points around ity. Further, the Japanese were shelling as heavily as they , whereas the Americans were circumspect because of the ctions under which they were operating. It is a grave error to der that the word "shelling" applies exclusively to the icans. the devil is in the details, it was a matter of intent - the icans intended to do damage to the Japanese military targets, e Japanese cared not a whit. When you listen to and watch the people who survived, will feel their anger towards the heavy artillery shelling by the icans; but you will also sense their hatred of what the ese did. On balance, then and today, they were glad to be ted even at great cost to themselves and their beautiful city. Mrs. Lita Rocha Clearsky has told us of how her aunt tried ng the neck of an American artillery director for having very tly killed her sister, Lita’s (and Johnny’s too) mother. Friends y father had their husbands killed byAmerican shells. And no an forget Carmen Guerrero’s spitting on the first American ame across. Luckily for him she had no saliva, only lots of ion. What is interesting is that having given a long paragraph ed to the horrors of Japanese brutality that killed and tortured bers of her family, her most heated vilification is saved for the s, and seems to have become a sort of fashion statement. The “shelling” was not merely from the Americans, ver, and I know that there are people in here tonight that distinguish between the Japanese and the American fire, between mortars and howitzers. But after theAmericans m Ft. McKinley. And it is really hard to unders and how ng sp tters for the Americans could not make out that peopl rooftops ving at them w re NOT Japan se. And why did y continue to direct artillery at Phil ppine General H spital for r a week? I have a number f people who say they stopped ving and to k to the r shelt rs because ev y time they ved in fr ndship and hope, down came the shells! On thing that no ne mentions are the "infernal noise chines" [m nti ne by Mod to Farolan i his war crimes imony] meant to simulat artillery fire that the Japan se had up at PGH. I have learn d that the e machines produced a h a d a noise that duplic ted exactly the sound of large g s. haps it is too inconveni nt a truth to include. Yamashita never declaredManila an Open City, not when was t ere and had the power and the authority to do so, and ainly not later whe he was holed up in Baguio. The intent ms clear from the start to defend it to the last an and to kill the civilians therein. Don’t forget his leaving behind 4,000 of own forces to defend north Manila. Nor that his reason for ging t “puppet” gover ment to Bagui was to save th ir s! I think we should also remember that when these accused erals, like Yamashita, Ho ma, Yokoyama were testif ing y dad took us to several of the hearings at the US Embassy] y were no under ny constraints to tell the trut before any istian God; their purpose was to p otect thei own God, their peror. Bett they should be found guil y of s m US law n a man, god, w o we are f nding of lat w s responsible for much of the cruelty m ted out by his roops throughout theast Asia, where they treated the captured and surrendered “logs,” nd treat d the civilians as worse. These generals kered t US legal system, and died happily in covering up r Empero /God. A more eloquent and better summary is provided by mandoAng in is book The Brutal Holocaust: H writes: According to reliable evidence gathered from priso ers of ar, military person el, Philippine officials and civilians, and apanese documents, the rape of Manila was not a random
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