First of all, let me apologize for my comments in English. I'm a Sansei. born and raised in Hawaii, who worked at a U.S. base in Japan for 23 years where I learned Japanese from my native workers. While I'm able to understand and read Japanese, writing was and still is a problem; thus my comments will be in English. 1. The vanguard of Japanese American (JA) combat units was the legendary 100th Infantry Battalion (Separate) of soldiers from Hawaii formed in June 1942. The training record of the 100th Battalion at Camp McCoy WI from June to December 1942 convinced the War Department to authorize the formation of the 442nd Regimental Combat Team (RCT) on February 1, 1943. On August 21, 1943, the 100th Battalion was deployed to Oran in North Africa. This battalion became the War Department’s test on whether JA soldiers could be trusted in combat when it landed in Italy in September 1943 as part of the 34th Infantry Division. The unparalleled bravery of the 100th Battalion in the first weeks of combat forever answered this question of trust, paving the way for the 442nd RCT to join them in June 1944. 2. Because of the 100th Battalion's sterling training record and the Varsity Victory Volunteers, a group of University of Hawaii ROTC students who received positive publicity for their volunteer civilian labor for the U.S. Army, along with many organizations and leaders in Hawaii and on the mainland lobbying the government to allow JAs to serve in the armed forces, President Roosevelt authorized the formation of the 442nd Regimental Combat Team (RCT) on Feb. 1, 1943. When the announcement about the new unit was made, 10,000 young men in Hawaii signed up from which 2,686 were selected, and along with 1,182 from the mainland, they were sent to Camp Shelby in Mississippi for basic training in April 1943. Along with the cadre of those already in the Army, roughly 2/3 of the 442nd RCT were from Hawaii and 1/3 from the mainland. 3. Of the nearly 160,000 people of Japanese descent living in Hawaii in 1940, fewer than 2,000 were incarcerated compared to the mass incarceration of those on the West Coast; thus, less than 2% of the soldiers from the islands had families in the camps. Mahalo for your efforts in trying to tell the story of the JA WWII experiences, but keep in mind that, without the accomplishments of the 100th Infantry Battalion (Separate), the 442nd RCT would have never been formed! Please contact me if you would like a list of the references.
