My uncle was a Soldier on Okinawa. To this day he despises the Japanese and never talks about his experience other than to say “bad things happen in war. The best you can do is to get over them and move on.”
After I served in Iraq I wish he would talk about before he passes. But I completely understand why he doesn’t and I respect his wishes.
Those guys didn’t talk. My dad was a medic in the South Pacific. Went ashore w the Marines. That is the sum total of everything he ever said about it in all my years growing up from 1948 to 1969, 17 yrs old when he enlisted.
I had an uncle who was a B-25 pilot in the Pacific Theater during WWII. He was shot down over China and his whole crew survived six months behind enemy lines while the Chinese helped them get to General Chang's lines. The Japanese knew they were alive and tried everything to get them. Whenever the Japanese found evidence of my Uncle's presence at a village they killed everyone in the village and burned it down.
My uncle loved the Chinese people and hated the Japanese until the day he died.