The final battle before the anticipated invasion of mainland Japan, Okinawa became the deadliest battle for US forces in the Pacific with savage fighting on land, air, and especially sea. Nicknamed the Typhoon of Steel because of its intense artillery fire and bombardments on land, air and sea, the battle for Okinawa cost 49,000 US casualties including more than 12,000 deaths. For the Japanese soldiers, the battle for Okinawa was far worse with 90,000 deaths. As always, civilians suffered the most with an estimated 150,000 dead. William Agen recalled the terror of kamikaze attacks that occurred three or four times during the day and even more often at night. Raymond Goron and Phil Klenman both lost their best friends in kamikaze attacks. 23 servicemen received the Medal of Honor for their heroism at Okinawa. This podcast features the stories of six Medal of Honor recipients. Kamikazes set the LCS that Richard M. McCool commanded ablaze and resulted in 50% casualties amongst his crew, yet McCool still managed to rescue some 98 men from a sinking destroyer. Richard E. Bush threw himself on a grenade to save the wounded men in his squad. Elsewhere, a wounded Robert E. Bush gave his lieutenant a life saving transfusion of plasma with his one hand, while he used his other to fire his pistol at the advancing Japanese who were less than 30 feet away. Angry that the Japanese had his riflemen pinned down for too long on Hen Hill, Clarence Craft led a heroic attack against the Japanese defensive line killing an estimated 25 Japanese soldiers. Atop the 400 foot Maeda Escarpment, conscientious objector Desmond T. Doss rescued an estimated 75 soldiers lowering them 35 feet below the escarpment in a rope supported litter tied to a tree stump, all the while under enemy fire as he did so. While the bloody battle for Okinawa raged on, Staff Sergeant Henry E. "Red" Erwin was flying bombing runs over the Japanese mainland. On a mission to bomb a chemical plant near Koriyama, Japan, the phosphoresce smoke bomb Erwin was supposed to drop to signal to B-29s that they had reached their target exploded prematurely in the launching chute, shooting its 1300 degree Fahrenheit flames into the aircraft and, more precisely, into Erwin's face blinding him and destroying his nose. "Open the window! Open the window!," Erwin yelled as he attempted to throw the burning bomb out the window to save his aircraft. Those stories and more in this 13th episode of Always Remember - World War II Through Veterans' Eyes.

William Agen

Raymond Goron

Richard M. McCool

Richard E. Bush

Robert E. Bush

Clarence Craft

Desmond Doss

Henry "Red" Erwin

Henry "Red" Erwin receiving the Medal of Honor

Millions of Allied and Axis soldiers became POWs in WW II. His weight down to 90 pounds, sick with malaria, Edgar Kuhlow overheard two German guards talking about his condition – “He is going to stay laying here in Germany.” Forced to work in railyards 2 – 3 times a week in Munich, William Ledeker knew he was better off than the concentration camp prisoners he would occasionally see from nearby Dachau. Recovering from being shot in the back and the shoulder, Jim Lingg was still loaded onto boxcars along with other POWs by the SS. While trying to liberate the Belgium town of Viller-La-Bonne-Eau, Michael Cannella and six others were separated from their company. Badly outnumbered with an intense fire fight taking place outside, Cannella’s makeshift squad took refuge in a cellar. Unbeknownst to them, it was already occupied by nearly a dozen German soldiers. Together they all made a pact, they would lay down their guns and surrender to whoever took over the town. When the Russian forces liberated his camp, Paul MacElwee found he went from being imprisoned by the Germans to now being imprisoned by the Russians. Seldom reported in the official records of the war, opposing forces in WW 2 sometimes did not abide by the Geneva Accords and took no prisoners. American GIs like James Spaulding couldn’t forget the senseless killing of soldiers who should have been taken prisoners of war.

Edgar Kuhlow and John Ulferts

William Ledeker

James Lingg (standing far right)

Michael Cannella

Paul MacElwee

Murray Shapiro

Robert Erhardt

James and Eva Mae Spaulding

With the Germans seemingly on the run everywhere in Europe, the Allies had hoped WW 2 would be done by year’s end 1944. Those hopes were shattered when the Germans launched their largest counter offensive on the western front, the Battle of the Bulge. A frustrated Tom Carr, who served as a scout, had warned his officers for weeks that the ermans appeared to be preparing a sneak attack, only to be ignored. The Germans weren’t the only enemy American GIs faced. Samuel Erlick recalled it was all he could do just to stay warm and avoid frozen feet. Still, David Kitchen was grateful for the bitter cold that kept the war dead that littered the Ardennes Forest refrigerated avoiding the stink and maggots that would have been present otherwise. German soldiers dressed as American GIs tricked David Kitchen’s squad into giving them their rifles. Frank Caruk recalled that when German soldiers dressed as American GIs were caught they were summarily executed. Mevlin Biddle took out three German snipers and three machine gun nests single handedly his actions earned him a Medal of Honor, though Biddle did not want to celebrate the killing he had done. The Bulge desensitized a young Ross Rasmussen who afterwards was ashamed of his callousness recalling eating his lunch on the frozen corpse of a German soldier. Separated from his unit, Murray Shapiro escaped German capture thanks to an old German woman. Stan Davis spent 30 nights in his tank protecting Bastogne. Their stories in more in this 11th podcast of Always Remember – World War II Through Veterans Eyes.

Tom Carr

Samuel Erlick

Frank Caruk

Melvin Biddle

Murray Shapiro

Stan Davis