Memory Podcast

During World War II, American citizens in the Philippines experienced the horrors of Japanese occupation. Howard Hart, a survivor of Japanese captivity, describes the initial fear based on Japan's brutal behavior in other countries. Nearly 45% of Americans taken prisoner did not survive the war. Hart recalls the intense conditions and the presence of mass graves. He also believes that the treatment of Americans was relatively better compared to other occupied peoples. His firsthand account helps us understand the reality and dispel any misconceptions about this dark period. Unlike civilians in Europe and Asia, those in the United States were fortunately removed from the horrors of war. For the most part, this is a true sentiment. However, for the many American citizens who found themselves in the Philippines in December of 1941, this became merely a myth. After gaining the Philippines as a territory around the turn of the century, thousands of Americans transformed this island nation into a bustling mini-America. When the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor and subsequently invaded the Philippines, American citizens were suddenly thrust into survival just as many other populations across the globe had in years prior. With Japanese occupation swift and spanning the duration of the war, it is often hard to understand the realities of this hardship. As a child in Japanese captivity during the war, Howard Hart is a living testimony to the brutality that accompanied this position. Here he is describing the initial fear of Japanese occupation based upon their exploits throughout the Pacific. All of a sudden, the Japanese, who no one had paid any attention to, but they'd watched what had happened in Malaya, and they'd watched what had happened in Indochina, and they'd watched, more importantly, what had happened in China, where the Japanese, having invaded China, behaved in the most barbarous conceivable manner against the Chinese population. In a statistic provided by Kenneth Rose, he describes how nearly 45% of Americans taken prisoner by the Japanese would not survive the war. Hart described the intense conditions in which he was subjected and recalls large ditches in which he could only assume was intended as mass graves being dug shortly before his liberation. However, he also inserts his belief early on that Japanese treatment of Americans was much better than those of other occupied peoples. Hearing directly from the mouth of someone who lived through the Japanese captivity enables us as the viewer the ability to visualize the horrors while dispelling any myths that might have risen over the course of the last 80 years.