Pearl Harbor: Receding into History

Last year's Pearl Harbor Day post was about Lou Conter, the last survivor of the USS Arizona. Lou Conter died last spring.

Conter died Monday morning [April 1, 2024] at his home in Grass Valley, Calif., according to his daughter Louann Daley.

Born in Ojibwa, Wis., in 1921, Conter was 20 years old when the USS Arizona was bombed by Japanese forces at Pearl Harbor on Dec. 7, 1941.

The USS Arizona’s bombing was the deadliest of the attacks that day, killing 1,177 people—nearly half of the 2,403 who died during Pearl Harbor. Conter was one of just 334 people assigned to the USS Arizona who survived.

Conter escaped the burning wreckage. As he and others guided crew members to safety, “more often than not, their burned skin would come off on our hands,” he wrote in his 2021 memoir, “The Lou Conter Story.”

“It was horrible,” he wrote. “Absolutely horrible.”

Despite his work that day, he said he didn’t want to be called a hero.

“I consider the heroes the ones that gave their lives, that never came home to their families,” Conter said in an interview with The Wall Street Journal last year. “They’re the real heroes.”

...He got his pilot wings in November 1942, and was part of a team that flew Black Cat aircraft overnight doing bomb runs in the South Pacific, Conter said. He was shot down twice, once in September 1943 and a second time three months later. Both times, Conter said, he used a lifeboat to get to shore.

After World War II ended, he returned to California and signed up for the reserves. In the early 1950s, he served again in the Korean War.

Conter retired from the Navy in 1967 as a lieutenant commander and became a real-estate developer in California.

Pearl Harbor is nearly as remote from today's children as was the Civil War from the first Baby Boomers. We grew up in a world where the deeds of "ordinary" men like Lou Conter were taken for granted. Now such strength of character seems uncommon, and its prevalence in the World War II generation impossible to imagine. R.I.P.

Veteran's Day

Below is my post from 2013, slightly edited:

November begins on a personal note with my birthday. In recent years the celebration has been muted. (I'm at the age when I look back more than I look ahead.)

Dad, near Tokyo in 1945

Today, Veteran's Day, we remember my father and his five brothers, World War II veterans all, who have passed on. Dad's ashes are at the family church, while the others are interred at Punchbowl.

On November 19th the nation will honor the 161st anniversary of the Gettysburg Address, Lincoln's great speech in the aftermath of an horrific battle. And on November 22nd the nation will remember the life and death of John F. Kennedy 61 years after his assassination.

In a strange way revisiting traumatic events such as WW II, the Civil War, and the JFK assassination gives rise to hope. The obstacles that the nation overcame 61, 80, and 161 years ago dwarf those that it faces today, and there is no good reason why we shouldn't be equally--and ultimately--successful in solving our problems as well. © 2024 Stephen Yuen

D-Day Through the Eyes of a Hawaii Veteran

On the 80th anniversary of D-Day, KHON2 recounts the story of Normandy participant Daniel Lau (1919-2020):



Daniel was the father of one of my high school classmates.

Memorial Day, 2024

Dad, near Tokyo in 1945

On this Memorial Day my thoughts turn to my father and his five brothers who wore the uniform during and after World War II.

They were raised in a dirt-poor household of nine children in early 20th-century Honolulu and were expected to help out with family finances after high school. World War II disrupted everyone's plans, but they all answered the call--some were drafted and others enlisted--but it was inconceivable that they wouldn't.

After the war, two went on to college, and all of them led "normal" lives--raising families, buying a house, and retiring in modest comfort.

They all live in my memory, and my appreciation for them has grown mightily over the years.

May you, dear reader, only have good memories today.

82 Years Later

Last May the WSJ featured Lou Conter, 102, the last survivor of the USS Arizona, which was sunk on December 7, 1941:

The USS Arizona’s bombing was the deadliest of the attacks that day, killing 1,117 people. It accounted for nearly half of the 2,403 who died during Pearl Harbor. Conter was one of the 334 people assigned to the USS Arizona who survived.

He became the last known survivor in April, after his former crewmate Ken Potts died at 102 years old.

The warship’s ammunition storage exploded during the bombings. The USS Arizona was so badly damaged that it was left to sink instead of being repaired. Its ruins are still underwater and viewable from the USS Arizona Memorial, which was built to hover over the warship.

Conter helped pull crewmates out of the burning ship.

“As we guided these men to safety, more often than not, their burned skin would come off on our hands,” Conter wrote in his 2021 book, “The Lou Conter Story.”

Gun turret: the rest of the Arizona lies beneath

He often wondered why he made it out of the USS Arizona alive.

“God didn’t want you to go that time,” he said he told himself. “There’s a lot more for you to do for the country.”

..He got his pilot wings in November 1942, he said, and was part of a team that flew Black Cat aircraft overnight doing bomb runs in the South Pacific. He said he was shot down twice, once in September 1943 and a second time three months later. Both times, he used a lifeboat to get to shore.

After World War II ended, he said he returned to California and signed up for the reserves. In the early 1950s, he served again in the Korean War...

He is now on a new mission: Go back to Pearl Harbor this December.

It has been about four years since Conter has been to the annual remembrance. His doctor had forbidden him from taking the nine hours of flights from his home in Grass Valley, Calif., to Hawaii.

“I’d like to go once more,” Conter said.

According to the Honolulu Star Advertiser, Lou Conter was one of five Pearl Harbor survivors who showed up at today's ceremony. Thank you for your service, Mr. Conter, and safe travels.

Bob and Dan, Continued

Two Senators who were friends for almost 70 years were honored this week.

Sen. Elizabeth Dole says goodbye to her husband.

Bob Dole Lies in State as Biden Hails Former Senator as ‘Giant of Our History’

“Well, you know, Bob and I, like many of us here, we disagreed on a number of things, but not on any of the fundamental things,” Mr. Biden said. “We genuinely respected one another as colleagues. As fellow Americans. It was real. It wasn’t fake. And we became great friends.”

From today's Star-Advertiser:

The Navy’s newest warship, the Arleigh Burke-class missile destroyer USS Daniel Inouye, was officially commissioned at Joint Base Pearl Harbor-Hickam on Wednesday. After days of rain, the sun shown bright during the morning ceremony as the ship, named for the powerful Hawaii statesman, war hero and Medal of Honor recipient, joined the fleet...

Daniel Inouye — as a Japanese American and World War II veteran — became an important figure in postwar U.S.-Japan reconciliation and in shaping U.S. policy in Asia more broadly. He spearheaded efforts, which, in 1994, resulted in Congress appropriating funds to create the Asia-Pacific Center for Security Studies in Waikiki. It aims to bring together military, civilian and academic leaders from across the region. After his death, the center was renamed in his honor...

Several speakers at the ceremony reflected on Inouye’s friendship with former Republican U.S. Sen. Bob Dole, who died Sunday. Inouye and the Kansan were often at odds politically when they served in the Senate, but they shared a bond as WWII soldiers who were both seriously wounded in battle during their service.

Bob, Dan, and the Way Things Used to Be

Celebrating his nomination at the Republican
Convention, San Diego, 1996 (WSJ photo)

Bob Dole (July 22, 1923 - December 5, 2021) was disabled by war injuries for most of his life:

In April 1945, while stationed in Italy during WWII, the young soldier was struck by enemy fire. As a result of his wounds, Dole was permanently left without feeling in his right hand and arm, which measured more than two inches shorter than his left after reparative surgeries; part of his left hand was also left numb. Dole, who died on Sunday at the age of 98, would live with and be shaped by the aftermath of those injuries in the years that followed, including the 30 he spent as a U.S. senator from Kansas.

The future Republican senator from Kansas met the future Democratic senator from Hawaii when they both were recovering in an Army hospital. Daniel Inouye (1924-2012), who lost his right arm in the Italian campaign, and Bob Dole became lifelong friends.

Below are Senator Dan's 2008 reflections on his shared experiences with Bob Dole. His description of how things worked mere decades ago shows how much times have changed.

Day of Infamy, 80 Years Later

Gun turret: the rest of the Arizona lies beneath

Below is a post, lightly edited, that has appeared in this journal on previous anniversaries of the attack on Pearl Harbor:

On December 7, 1941 Japanese bombers obliterated the U.S. fleet at Pearl Harbor. My father, a junior at William McKinley High, saw the silver planes flying overhead on that clear Sunday morning. He didn’t realize anything was out of the ordinary until he saw smoke rising from the Ewa (western) side of Oahu.

My mother, a middle-schooler at Robert Louis Stevenson Intermediate, was preparing to go to Sunday services downtown.

It was a day that changed everything. Millions of Americans, including Dad and his five brothers, answered the call.

While the majority survived the War with life and limbs intact, hundreds of thousands did not, like my wife’s uncle who died somewhere over the Pacific. His body was never found.

Some found the armed services to be to their liking and made it a career, like my uncle who was the best auto mechanic I ever knew. Others, like my father-in-law, seized the opportunity offered by the GI bill and went on to college and jobs that they would never previously have considered.

At the U.S.S. Arizona memorial the names of the fallen are inscribed on the wall.

Are we worthy of their sacrifice? Perhaps......if we preserve, protect, and pass on the gifts they have bestowed to us.

Good, Albeit Biased News

L to R: Anthony Robinson, Derje Blanks, Cameron Moody (KRON4)

The hate-crime articles usually start with the history of racism against Asians.

First is the mention of the Chinese Exclusion Act (1882-1943), and next the internment of Japanese-Americans during World War II. After these two indisputable and shameful examples, writers often add the 1982 murder of Vincent Chin, who was killed by Detroit auto workers who thought he was Japanese, or the difficulty of the Vietnamese "boat people" in being accepted in America.

The history always ends with President Donald Trump and his accusations that the COVID-19 virus originated in China and the alleged scapegoating of Chinese people by President Trump and/or Republicans.

From these articles one would have thought that the violent attacks against Asian-Americans were perpetrated by MAGA-hat wearing, white supremacist trogolydtes, but one would be wrong.

Asians, at least in the Bay Area, have learned to ignore these politicized narratives because they're useless in ascertaining who is originating the current attacks (let's just say that only a minority are white, and the most violent are not).

The police finally caught a group of men who have been targeting Asians (photo at the top of this post): [bold added]

Two men have been charged with robbery in connection to dozens of purse snatchings targeting Asian women throughout the Bay Area, the Santa Clara County district attorney said Saturday.

The men — Derje Blanks, 23, and Anthony Robinson, 24 — were also charged with hate crime enhancements. The office for District Attorney Jeff Rosen said the suspects “used ethnic slurs to refer to their victims,” who were almost all of Asian descent.

“We will hold these defendants and anyone who worked with them fully accountable for their ignorant and destructive behavior,” Rosen said in a press release.

Blanks and Robinson were arrested by San Jose and Hayward police on September 8. Robinson fled in a vehicle and ran a red light, colliding with another car and injuring a two-year-old and her father, according to police.

A third suspect was arrested on Thursday, ending what SJPD called “yearlong, multi-jurisdictional investigation” into the “prolific robbery crew.”

The crime spree began in late 2020, according to the district attorney’s office. The pattern was nearly always the same: The men would follow women in parking lots to their cars, wait until the victim was inside her car and either smash a window or quickly open the door to steal a purse off the passenger seat.

Sometimes, the incidents became violent. There were “numerous incidents where victims were pulled or wrestled to the ground,” and some were injured, according to the district attorney.

Evidence shows that the defendants targeted the victims because they “believed that Asian women don’t use banks.”

“We are sensitive to the hate aspect targeting Asian females,” San Jose police chief Anthony Mata said in a release. “I commend District Attorney Jeff Rosen for pursuing hate crime enhancements.”

The Chronicle has published numerous articles and opinion pieces of the sort discussed at the top, that is, they strongly imply that Donald Trump and his followers are responsible for the recent spate of attacks on Asians.

This article, reprinted in its entirety, never discloses the race of the men arrested. (The photo of the suspects, not a MAGA hat among them, was pulled from the KRON4 website.) For many of the people in the media, if the facts contradict their politics, don't disclose the facts.

Memorial Day, 2021

Golden Gate National Cemetery, San Bruno, CA

We are still partially confined to quarters, and last year's Memorial Day post, lightly edited, is still relevant:

Today I thought about my Dad, who passed away in June, 2019. He was the last of seven boys, six of whom served during World War II.

I thought of Harry Truman, who made the now-controversial decision to drop the bomb. After 3½ years of all-out war, I can see why he wanted to end it.

Look at us, we can barely tolerate 14 months of being confined to our air-conditioned Internet-enabled homes.

I probably wouldn't be here if it weren't for the bomb. Dad was training in Texas in the spring of 1945 and would have been part of an invasion of the Japanese homeland that would have cost the lives of up to a million U.S. soldiers and many more Japanese.

"I was terrified at what might happen and damned relieved when the invasion became unnecessary. I accept the military estimates that at least 1 million lives were saved, and mine could have been one of them."
----James Michener

Today we remember and give thanks for the lives of Dad, his brothers, Harry S. Truman, and all who wore the uniform to give their descendants blessings that many of them could not have imagined.

Relative Importance

Two Sixties icons: JFK and Pope Paul VI (WSJ)

In the Hawaii of the '50's and '60's nearly everyone I knew was Christian. (The Jewish and Buddhist kids I could count on the fingers of one hand, and absolutely no one would cop to being an atheist.)

One's Protestant denomination was important, while Catholics were "different."

John F. Kennedy's Catholicism was such a big deal during the 1960 Presidential campaign that there was worry that he "would take orders from the Pope."

“I do not speak for my church on public matters,” John Kennedy told the Greater Houston Ministerial Association in 1960, “and the church does not speak for me.”

The culture has changed to such an extent that on general principles I admire anyone who takes his or her religion seriously. It usually means that they've thought about life and the relative importance of material things and politics.

John F. Kennedy, who nearly died for his country in World War II and was assassinated 57 years ago, would have understood.

Halloween, 2020

(Image by Willow Glen merchants)

Two years ago we had a record 132 kids show up at our door. This year the neighborhood--in fact the entire Foster City--was blacked out; the air wardens of my parents' childhood would have approved.

Our candy expenditure was near-zero. (It was not zero because I had bought a package a few weeks ago as a precautionary measure; well, the candy won't eat itself, you know.)

In 2020 we have discovered that a lot of necessary things weren't, and some frivolities were more important than we had thought.

Here's hoping Halloween will be back next year.

Memorial Day, 2020

Golden Gate National Cemetery, San Bruno, CA

Today I thought about my Dad, who passed away in June. He was the last of seven boys, six of whom served during World War II.

I thought of Harry Truman, who made the now-controversial decision to drop the bomb. After 3½ years of all-out war, I can see why he wanted to end it.

Look at us, we can barely tolerate two months of being confined to our air-conditioned Internet-enabled homes.

I probably wouldn't be here if it weren't for the bomb. Dad was training in Texas in the spring of 1945 and would have been part of an invasion of the Japanese homeland that would have cost the lives of up to a million U.S. soldiers and many more Japanese.

"I was terrified at what might happen and damned relieved when the invasion became unnecessary. I accept the military estimates that at least 1 million lives were saved, and mine could have been one of them."
----James Michener

Today we remember and give thanks for the lives of Dad, his brothers, Harry S. Truman, and all who wore the uniform to give their descendants blessings that many of them could not have imagined.

That's Still Funny

One of the silver linings in the coronavirus cloud ("bad cloud", as opposed to "good cloud" like Microsoft's Azure and Amazon Web Services) is that boredom and ennui have led to revisiting old videos.

Tosh Togo

The Three Stooges were a top-three favorite when my parents let this kindergartener watch on the old black-and-white during the '50's. I howled at the ridiculous physical comedy, complete with the sound effects of face-slapping, head-bashing, and eye-poking.

[Related: I also enjoyed watching the fake violence of pro wrestling on Saturday mornings and was later thrilled when Tosh Togo got the role of Oddjob in Goldfinger.]

But back to the Stooges, who had material for the adults, too. In 1940 they starred in one of the first anti-Hitler Hollywood films. You Nazty Spy! is filled with Nazi references such as "storm" troopers who wear raincoats while carrying umbrellas and "books" burning to erase gambling debts.

When arms dealers seek to install a puppet dictator, they entice wallpaper hanger Moe and his assistants Larry and Curly. Dialogue:

Paper-hanger Moe smears black
paint above his lip by accident.

Moe: What does a dictator do?

Arms manufacturer: A dictator, why he makes love to beautiful women, drinks champagne, enjoys life, and never works. He makes speeches to the people, promising them plenty, gives them nothing, then takes everything. That's a dictator!

Curly: A parasite! That's for me.

The cinematography is obsolete, but the script is not.

The Wonders That Will Unfold

Foster City lagoon and beach on Sunday, March 22nd.

The sign and where it sits is bedraggled,
but it's not wrong.

A favorite setting in dystopian movies shows humanity, or maybe just civilization, wiped out by plague, aliens, nuclear war, global warming, zombies, or any number of possible causes. These stories often start years after the cataclysm; once gleaming cities are crumbling, empty of living things except for the rats who somehow are finding something to eat.

Less than one week after the coronavirus forced everyone indoors for most of the day,  the physical world actually looks pretty good: no crowds, no noise, and a lot of beauty.

After the virus is controlled with most of us not getting sick and, it is hoped, not ruined financially, there will be a lot of reassessment:

‘Mommy, I like coronavirus because I get to spend time with you,” a patient of mine, a lawyer, quoted her son as saying. With schools closed, social events postponed and workplaces empty, usually busy professionals find themselves at home baking cookies, playing games, watching movies and doing arts and crafts to keep their children occupied. Some are surprised to find they enjoy it.

As anxiety and fear settle over the world, there’s a silver lining to this pandemic. In a self-occupied world, the coronavirus is making people reassess their priorities and values.

I do have a great deal of faith that we're going to come out of this stronger than ever, which will be manifested clearly in 3-5 years. The last time that the nation was this united (and everyone was afraid for their own lives) was World War II, and look what inventions came into use because of it: jet airplanes, nuclear power, synthetic rubber, computers, radar, and penicillin.

Today we have many more smart people who work with much more advanced tools.

Stay safe, control your fear, and await the wonders that will unfold.

Yellowflake, and I Don't Mean Tuna

I suppose it takes someone of Chinese ancestry to say this to some Asians: quit whining about the "racism" in "Chinese virus."

The plague broke out in Wuhan, the capital of Hubei province. The Chinese government covered up the burgeoning catastrophe, and the result is a contagion that has triggered a worldwide recession, and 11,000 deaths so far.

Large swaths of the U.S. are under lockdown, including two of its biggest States:

No state is completely preventing people from going outside or to work, but some measures were more drastic. California Gov. Gavin Newsom effectively banned residents from socializing outside their homes, while New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo went further in cordoning off the elderly and sick populations.

Now China is suggesting the virus' origin was really a U.S. biowarfare project. Here's the tweet from diplomat Zhao Lijian.

2/2 CDC was caught on the spot. When did patient zero begin in US? How many people are infected? What are the names of the hospitals? It might be US army who brought the epidemic to Wuhan. Be transparent! Make public your data! US owe us an explanation! pic.twitter.com/vYNZRFPWo3

— Lijian Zhao 赵立坚 (@zlj517) March 12, 2020

China through its diplomat just threw the accusation out there with no evidence. The not-made-in-China falsehood needs to be stamped out now by political leaders, journalists, and anyone with a platform. If calling it the "Chinese/China/Wuhan virus" in the daily news conference makes them stop, then good, we all can focus on the real enemy, COVID-19.

A few more comments directed at the young Asians who are triggered by "Chinese virus" and its variations:

Get your priorities straight; if some of the many thousands who are working the problem are racist, so what? Sticks and stones.

Use this time to toughen yourself. Your parents, grandparents, and ancestors endured far worse discrimination--some of it was the law of the land--and you complain about words, especially words that are not epithets?

Report on really offensive speech, if you must, after the crisis has peaked. No one wants to address complaints that are not helping to put out the fire, but the post-mortem phase is the time to go over bad decision-making and morally reprehensible behavior.

"Kung flu" is mildly racist, mildly funny, and is far, far from the worst thing I've ever heard. The journalist refuses to name names, btw, so we're not sure the story is even true.

The internment of Japanese-Americans during World War II is the most well-known example of modern discrimination against Asians. Despite having their assets seized, their families imprisoned, and their good names sullied, Japanese-Americans responded by giving their lives for the country that mistreated them. To this humble blogger the Nisei soldiers of World War II are the shining example of how to respond to unjust treatment and how to change hearts and minds.

To the aggrieved Asian-Americans of today: no one's throwing you into internment camps, and one's asking you to die in the Vosges mountains. Help out however you can, share your complaints with friends and family, and never repay evil with evil.

Lastly, physical attacks on Asians should be fully prosecuted, but isn't that one of the dumbest things you've ever heard? Are there really people who beat up those who they think have a deadly, highly contagious disease?

"Frozen Flash of History"

Today is the 75th anniversary of Raising the Flag on Iwo Jima, one of the most famous photographs of the 20th century. SF Chronicle:

It was 75 years ago this month that photographer Joe Rosenthal took one of the most iconic photos of the 20th century: six servicemen raising the American flag on Iwo Jima after the U.S. captured the island in one of the bloodiest, most famous battles of World War II.

After making that photograph, Rosenthal returned to San Francisco and was hired by The Chronicle.

In that single engagement the U.S. suffered 6,821 combat deaths (roughly equal to the total deaths in Iraq and Afghanistan since 2001) and 19,217 wounded. Japanese casualties were 18,000, with 99% fighting to their death.

The Pulitzer committee didn't wait for the year to finish, as was its custom, and awarded Joe Rosenthal the Pulitzer Prize in April, 1945.

Day of Infamy, Plus 78 Years

Arizona Memorial in 1995

My father was there, and to honor his memory I am reprising this post.

On December 7, 1941 Japanese bombers obliterated the U.S. fleet at Pearl Harbor. My father, a junior at William McKinley High, saw the silver planes flying overhead on that clear Sunday morning. He didn’t realize anything was out of the ordinary until he saw smoke rising from the Ewa (western) side of Oahu. My mother, a middle-schooler at Robert Louis Stevenson Intermediate, was preparing to go to Sunday services downtown.

It was a day that changed everything. Millions of Americans, including Dad and his six brothers, answered the call.

Arizona Gun Turret

While the majority survived the War with life and limbs intact, hundreds of thousands did not, like my wife’s uncle who died somewhere over the Pacific. His body was never found.

Some found the armed services to be to their liking and made it a career, like my uncle who was the best auto mechanic I ever knew. Others, like my father-in-law, seized the opportunity offered by the GI bill and went on to college and jobs that they would never previously have considered.

At the U.S.S. Arizona memorial the names of the fallen are inscribed on the wall. Are we worthy of their sacrifice? Perhaps......if we preserve, protect, and pass on the gifts they have bestowed to us.

Living with No Resolution

9/11 has been called this generation's Pearl Harbor, but unlike World War II the problem wasn't mostly resolved in 3½ years. 18 years later the threats are still active, and we continue to wait in security lines at airports. Whatever anxiety the rest of us feel, however, pales before that of New York City inhabitants:

9/11 Memorial (Architectural Digest)

“What we’ve seen lately, is an unusual amount of propaganda directed at attacks on U.S. soil and an unusual amount of that pointing to New York as a target,” said John Miller, NYPD Deputy Commissioner of Intelligence and Counterterrorism...

Rita Katz, the director of SITE Intelligence Group, which monitors and tracks radical groups online, said New York City remains a top target for terrorists because it “embodies American culture, making it a highly symbolic location.”

The NYPD operates the largest counterterrorism apparatus of any law enforcement agency in the U.S., with hundreds of staff officers and analysts and extensive relationships with outside intelligence agencies.

Like West Coasters who live on a fault line, New Yorkers have learned to live with the threat of a sudden turn for the worse.

Fresh Eyes

The City of Hiroshima donated a half-size scale replica of its famous Torii Gate to Honolulu in 2001. The friendship offering stands in the small McCully-Moiliili triangle park, where King and Beretania streets split near the University of Hawaii.

The park itself was unkempt, but the area around the gate was neatly mown.

Thousands of people drive by every day with hardly anyone giving it a second thought. I'm like them back home in the Bay Area, but as someone who hasn't lived in Honolulu for a long time I have fresh eyes.