Posted on 12/03/2005 2:47:26 PM PST by Poundstone
Any pics?
I know how you feel. Back in the mid 80s, I was traveling from Oahu to Anchorage in a C-130. We stopped at Midway to get fuel. That was quite an experience.
Thank you for posting this. I was just researching the civilian employees of --- I think ---Pacific Construction Inc. on Wake when the Japanese invaded. Not sure that's the right name. Don't have my notes to hand.
I thought they were sent to a prison camp in China and died there. The civilians I mean.
Thanks ever so much for the first hand account.
Appreciated.
Just curious, were you Space A or on duty?
It was a sureal experience for me. I spent a few days trere in the 80's and 90's.
Is that the one where MacArthur only shook hands with Truman and didn't salute him? Truman was real mad that an Army officer would fail to salute his Commander-in-Chief and it contributed to Truman's thinking that MacArthur was getting to big for his britches.
I've never been to Wake but I was able to fly down to Iwo Jima when our Squadron was in Okinawa.
I don't think I can describe the feelings I experienced while standing at the top of Mount Suribachi, looking down at the beach where the Marines landed. It was a very powerful moment.
I have some pics somewhere, I'll have to dig them out and scan them so I can post them. They are truly unbelievable.
Semper Fi.
Whichever Marines were working those 6'' guns they sure knew their business. That was a classic example of luring in the ships until they couldn't avoid getting bloodied-up.
BUMP! with thanks for a good read. (My ambition is to visit Bikini Island some day.)
Have been through Wake several times while in service, shuttling troops to a different war. Also been through Christmas Island in the Marshall Islands, 1400 miles due south of Hawaii, another tiny island that was a refueling point in WWll. It is truly a memorable experience to have seen these places that we have read about and wondered about.
One of my earliest memories was when I was 4 years old and we were forced to land on Wake Island. Our Pan Am Clipper was having landing gear trouble on the way from Tokyo to Hawaii and we landed there in order to get it fixed. I remember blinding white sand and quonset huts and little else.
Never having been in the miltary, I don't know what this sentence means: "All the billets are unaccompanied." Please explain.
aircraft revetments built during the time Wake was occupied by the Japanese.......
This news to me....Japan never occupied Wake Island...they tried!!!!
Are you thinking of Midway ?
You must be thinking of Fantasy island. Wake was occupied by the Japanese for the entire war after attacking it.
Our POW's went through 4 years of hell on Wake. The island was attacked at the same time as Pearl Harbor, and captured within a week or so. There was no way for us to send help to them.
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