Reunion recalls camaraderie of Japanese-American soldiers

Aaron Clemens

Tuesday, June 20, 2000 | 11:02 a.m.

Although all of the troops who fought in World War II made sacrifices for their country, the price paid by the most highly decorated unit was especially great -- and not just because of the 18,143 individual decorations its members were awarded for bravery.

The warriors of the predominantly Japanese-American 100th Infantry Battalion and the 442nd Regimental Combat Team either volunteered or were conscripted into the army of a country that placed everyone of their ancestry into internment camps. Unlike Italian-Americans or German-Americans on the East Coast, in the West, Japanese-Americans were forcibly moved from their homes to guarded inland centers with barbed wire fences.

The 100th Infantry Battalion and the 442nd Regimental Combat Team, which joined the decimated 100th later in the war, fought in seven campaigns in two countries. They included two beachhead assaults, one by glider, and the capture of a submarine.

Members of the units earned 9,486 Purple Hearts for their combat wounds. Another 680 were killed in action. The survivors gathered at the California hotel-casino for a reunion this past weekend.

One of those who counts himself lucky for earning a Purple Heart is Ben Doi.

Doi, born and raised in Fresno, Calif., served after being drafted five days before Pearl Harbor was bombed. After basic training, he and six other Japanese-Americans were segregated and sent to Arkansas instead of the battle front. After heavy casualties in the 100th, he was sent in as a replacement.

"We had to show our loyalty," said Doi, who fought to free Italy and France while his parents were interned.

Those with good neighbors to work the farmland during their imprisonment kept their land, Doi said. Most people could not pay the bank or their taxes while they were away.

"My father lost his land, we lost everything," he said. "A lot of people lost everything."

When taken to the camps, they could only bring what they could carry. During the war, Doi's many high school sports trophies were stolen from storage, but he laughed and said that although he couldn't dodge bullets, the speed he used for varsity baseball, football and track helped in combat.

But he couldn't outrun a shell that exploded near him a few weeks before the end of the war. A piece of shrapnel embedded itself in the back of his head.

"It felt like getting hit in the head with a hammer," Doi said. "The medic came over and asked if I could walk or if I needed a stretcher. I walked."

A distinction of the 100th/442nd was that their non-commissioned officers led the fight instead of ordering their subordinates to scout ahead, said their veterans.

"Who would follow a leader who wouldn't lead?" said Stanley Kimura, an original 100th man. The practice, however, led to a high turnover in leadership. Kimura once led his platoon as a private, the most senior man at the moment, he said.

Don Matsuda also led his squad as a private, because officers kept getting killed. Matsuda, of Los Angeles, volunteered for service from an internment camp.

Matsuda and Kimura recalled the famed Battle of the Lost Battalion on Oct. 25, 1944, when the 100th/442nd helped rescue a battalion trapped behind German lines in France. Doi elaborated on what they faced in the intense firefight.

"The Germans drew them into their line and then closed up," he said. They had to penetrate the fortified German line to rescue them. "We lost a lot of men to save what was left of that division," he said. Of the 275 Texans in the 1st Battalion of the 141st, 211 survived. The 100th/442nd had 800 casualties.

Gov. John Connolly of Texas later proclaimed the 100th/442nd "Honorary Texans."

"It makes you feel good that we went," Doi said. "We didn't start it, it was Hitler and people like that." He also spoke with pride on how President Harry Truman reviewed their small regiment, which was unusual.

After the war, when his parents were released from camp, Doi said they were given only enough money to travel back to Fresno. After a lot of hard work and putting off marriage to take care of the family, Doi married at age 37 and had two sons.

Doi said he received $20,000 in reparations, part of $1.6 billion paid to 82,219 former internees in 1988.

He said internees just have to forget about what they had no control over. "You can't change the past," he said.

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