Posted on 10/17/2013 2:05:52 PM PDT by robowombat
WWII Marines Accounted For
The Department of Defense POW/Missing Personnel Office (DPMO) announced today that two U.S. Marines missing in action from World War II, have been accounted for and are being returned to their families for burial with full military honors.
U.S. Marine Corps Capt. Henry S. White, 23, of Kansas City, Mo., and Staff Sgt. Thomas L. Meek, 19, of Lisbon, La., will be buried as a group in a single casketrepresenting the two servicemen, on Oct. 18, at Arlington National Cemetery near Washington, D.C.
On July 21, 1943, White and Meek were crew members of an SBD-4 Dauntless dive-bomber that departed Turtle Bay Airfield on Espiritu Santo Island, New Hebrides, on a night training mission and failed to return. During the training mission, the aircraft was reported as crashed on a coral cliff on nearby Mavea Island. In September 1947, a U.S. Army Graves Registration Service team investigated the crash on Mavea Island, but recovered no remains. In 2012, a JPAC team excavated the crash site on Mavea Island, Republic of Vanuatu, and recovered the remains of White and Meek and non-biological evidence amid the aircraft wreckage, which included U.S. and Australian coins dating to 1942 and earlier, U.S. military captain's bars, and a military identification tag that correlates to Meek by name and service number. What was found at the crash site, along with the remains, correlate circumstantially to White and Meek, however, no individual identifications were possible.
There are more than 400,000 American service members that were killed during WWII, and the remains of more than 73,000 were never recovered or identified.
For additional information on the Defense Department's mission to account for missing Americans, visit the DPMO web site at http://www.dtic.mil/dpmo or call (703) 699-1169.
There were more than 400,000 Americans killed in World War II.
That is a lot of gold stars. I bet that more than 100,000 Americans were killed in the last six months of the war, from the start of the Battle of the Bulge until Okinawa was secured.
I’d bet you’re right. Just under 25,000 were killed in those last two campaigns you mentioned.
—Marine Corps Hymn
Welcome home Brothers, welcome home.
When we think of WWII, spare a moment for our allies too.
1.3 million Chinese soldiers, between 17 and 22 million civilians.
14.5 Soviet Union military casualties, between 20 and 35 million civilians. Soviets lost over a million 2nd lieutenants as they destroyed 80% of the German Army.
Soviet peoples paid a heavy price for Stalin’s deal with Hitler.
Our military does a superb job of recovering and identifying remains. However, the statistic that "the remains of more than 73,000 were never recovered or identified," is pretty misleading, in that it implies there exists the possibility of someday finding them. That's not the case. The overwhelming percentage of those where lost at sea, when either ships and/or planes went down, and recovery is not possible. We do know what happened to them. The more than 1,000 sailors and Marines who went down on the Arizona are actually included in that number, as the individual remains were never identified, or recovered, yet one could hardly call them "missing." I'd like to see a more realistic assessment.
It is my understanding that more Marines died in Vietnam than in WWII.
The Marines were very small, and their major influence was the doctrine of amphibious landings. Of 248 US amphibious landings in WWII, 48 were conducted by the Marines. 200 were conducted by the Army.
Not exactly
World War 2
Dead Wounded
19,733 68,207
Viet Nam
13,095 88,594
Source: http://www.history.navy.mil/faqs/faq56-1.htm
Viet nam wounded casualty figure may reflect more complete record keeping during that conflict.
Isn’t it odd that Progressives would criticize Bush about those killed in Iraq, when FDR used American lives for cannon fodder?
America demands Justice for the Fallen of Benghazi! |
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.