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At 106 years old, Vaughn Drake Jr. was the oldest known survivor of the attack on Pearl Harbor until his death on April 7, according to his obituary. Born Nov. 6, 1918, in Winchester, Kentucky, Drake served in the Army Corps of Engineers during World War II. He saw the battles of Pearl Harbor and Saipan in the Marianas, collecting an array of honors including the special congressional medal for Pearl Harbor veterans and the World War II Victory Medal. In 2016, the Lexington Herald-Leader sat down with Drake to record some of his memories of the fateful attack on...

On the night of March 9, 1945, U.S. warplanes launch a new bombing offensive against Japan, dropping 2,000 tons of incendiary bombs on Tokyo over the course of the next 48 hours. Almost 16 square miles in and around the Japanese capital were incinerated, and between 80,000 and 130,000 Japanese civilians were killed in the worst single firestorm in recorded history. Early on March 9, Air Force crews met on the Mariana Islands of Tinian and Saipan for a military briefing. They were planning a low-level bombing attack on Tokyo that would begin that evening, but with a twist: Their...

The former head of US intelligence slammed the celebrations surrounding the release of Wikileaks founder Julian Assange this week and called the Australian 'no hero.' Speaking on BBC Radio 4's Today show, James Clapper, who served as head of the intelligence community under former President Barack Obama, called Assange's actions wrong and illegal. Clapper went on to say that US assets in Afghanistan were likely killed due to Wikileaks revealing their identities in government documents.

Julian Assange's 14-year saga as a fugitive and prisoner may be coming to an end. The Wikileaks founder has agreed to plead guilty to a felony charge with the U.S. Justice Department in exchange for no additional prison time. He has already served 5 years in a maximum security prison in England after spending 7 years hiding in an Ecuadorian Embassy. Assange would only agree to a hearing outside of U.S. soil. Last month he won his right to appeal an extradition order. High Court judges Victoria Sharp and Jeremy Johnson ruled for Assange after his lawyers argued that the...

Toshihiro Mutsuda was only 5 years old when he last saw his father, who was drafted by Japan's Imperial Army in 1943 and killed in action. For him, his father was a bespectacled man in an old family photo standing by a signed good-luck flag that he carried to war. On Saturday, when the flag was returned to him from a U.S. war museum where it had been on display for 29 years, Mutsuda, now 83, said: “It's a miracle." The flag, known as “Yosegaki Hinomaru,” or Good Luck Flag, carries the soldier's name, Shigeyoshi Mutsuda, and the signatures of...

Interesting theory of what happened to Amelia Earhart from the GIs who found her plane.

BEIJING (Reuters) - Mars Wrigley, maker of the Snickers candy bar, apologised on Friday for a Snickers product launch which Chinese social media users said suggested that Taiwan was a country. Videos and pictures showing a Snickers website promoting a limited edition Snickers bar and saying the product was only available in the "countries" of South Korea, Malaysia and Taiwan triggered an outpour of anger on Chinese microblogging platform Weibo on Friday. Mars Wrigley later published an apology on its Snickers China Weibo account and said the relevant content had been amended. "Mars Wrigley respects China's national sovereignty and territorial...

Ben Salomon, a Jewish Army Captain from Milwaukee, was on the strategically important island of Saipan near the village of Tanapag on July 7, 1944, for the 2nd Battalion, 105th Infantry Regiment, 27th Infantry Division. Taking the island put them in range of mainland Japan. We Are the Mighty gives a detailed report about what happened and what was discovered by American forces who had retaken the position: “Contact with Salomon was lost for 15 hours as the American force conducted a withdrawal and then slowly took the territory back. When they found Salomon, he was laying on a machine...

In November, 25-year-old Japanese citizen Midori Nishida was checking into a flight to Saipan, a US island in the Pacific, where she was going to visit her parents. She wasn't pregnant, and said so on a check-in questionnaire, but airline staff made her take a pregnancy test anyways before she was allowed to board. The Wall Street Journal reports that Nishida was asked to give permission to an authorized medical provider to conduct a "fit-to-fly" assessment, and the form said it was for women who had a body size or shape resembling a pregnant woman. Nishida told the Wall Street...

Japanese citizen Midori Nishida was checking in to a flight in Hong Kong in November to visit her parents on Saipan, a U.S. island in the Pacific, when airline staff made an unusual demand. She had to take a pregnancy test if she wanted to board. Ms. Nishida, 25 years old, was escorted to a public rest room and handed a strip to urinate on. The test was part of the response of one airline, Hong Kong Express Airways, to immigration concerns in Saipan. The island has become a destination for women intending to give birth on U.S. territory, making their babies eligible for...

Pro-Hong Kong and democratic activists are being persecuted in Saipan, USA! The judicial corruption in Saipan is atrocious because of the deep infiltration of the Chinese Communist Party! Democratic activists were put into jail unfairly, facing life-threatening, dangerous extradition! During our peaceful protest on Dec. 22, 2019, we were railed against and provoked by multiple young Chinese people. They were trying to snatch the phone a young girl was using to video record the protest. When we passed the “I Love Saipan” store and moved forward, a Chinese man rushed out from Dongfang Seafood Restaurant and scolded and provoked us...

WO1 John A. Ayuyu of Rota is the first fixed wing aviator from the Marianas to graduate from the U.S. Army Aviation Center of Excellence. He is the son of Juan M. Ayuyu and Alvina A. Ayuyu. WO1 Ayuyu completed his rigorous training at Fort Rucker, Alabama. WO1 Ayuyu made his dream a reality through hard work and determination. He successfully graduated from Warrant Officer Candidate School in April of 2017 and has completed the Overwater Survival Training and Survival Evasion Resistance and Escape (SERE) courses. This year, he sets his sights higher finishing at the top of his class...

his U.S. territory in the western Pacific is known for its epic World War II battle, white-sand beaches and the enduring culture of its indigenous Chamorro people. But for a certain class of Chinese parents, Saipan has become known as the latest hot spot for birth tourism, a place where women can give birth to babies who will automatically acquire U.S. citizenship.

Marvin Strombo, who had taken the calligraphy-covered Japanese flag from a dead soldier at World War II island battlefield 73 years ago, returned it Tuesday to the family of Sadao Yasue. They had never gotten his body or — until that moment — anything else of his. Yasue and Tatsuya’s sister Sayoko Furuta, 93...covered her face with both hands and wept silently as Tatsuya placed the flag on her lap. ... The flag’s white background is filled with signatures of 180 friends and neighbors in this tea-growing mountain village of Higashishirakawa, wishing Yasue’s safe return. The signatures helped Strombo find...

Donald Trump has won the Republican caucus in the Northern Mariana Islands, picking up nine pledged delegates, according to the local GOP. Trump won 73 percent of the total 471 votes cast in the remote U.S. territory on Tuesday, followed by Ted Cruz with 24 percent, John Kasich at .02 percent and Marco Rubio at .01 percent. Jason Osborne, the executive director of the Northern Mariana Islands Republican Party, shared results of the winner-take-all caucus early Tuesday morning on Twitter and Facebook. Breaking News: @realDonaldTrump has just been declared the winner of the CNMI Rep Caucus with 72.8% of the...

Father died a few hours ago. Veteran of Saipan. It has not quite hit me yet. I was care giver 24/7 for both my parents for seven years. My mother went two years ago. Just drinking.

A Navy veteran and his wife are challenging a ban on handguns in Saipan, arguing in federal court that the Commonwealth of Northern Mariana Islands is bound by the U.S. Constitution’s Second Amendment. “I’ve always been a firm believer in our constitutional rights, whether that’s freedom of speech, religion or the right to keep and bear arms or right to privacy, and I’m pretty sure that what I’m doing in this case is in defense of those convictions,” said David J. Radich, 44, a former petty officer third class. His wife, Li-Rong Radich, was severely beaten by an intruder in...

TIGHAR is able to share details of our search for a conclusive answer to the Earhart mystery thanks to the international agreement signed in Washington, DC on March 20, 2012. The Republic of Kiribati, the sovereign nation of which Nikumaroro is a part, has granted TIGHAR the exclusive right to conduct research, search, and recovery operations related to the Earhart disappearance within the national borders of Kiribati. No one is authorized to undertake Earhart related search, recovery of artifacts or research within the boundaries of Kiribati (including Nikumaroro) without authorization from both the government of Kiribati and TIGHAR.

It is the little-known battle that claimed the lives of thousands of Americans during World War II. But now black-and-white photographs, captured by Life magazine photographer W. Eugene Smith, show the everyday horrors for the U.S. soldiers fighting against Japanese forces on the Mariana Island of Saipan between June 15 and July 9, 1944. Faces etched with the pain of their experiences, war-weary men are captured transporting their wounded comrades or forcing Japanese civilians from their hiding places. The photographs were taken during a battle that claimed the lives of 22,000 Japanese civilians - many by suicide - and nearly...