World War 2 Far East Soldiers

[jesmond]

This is just my opinion due to the fact that my father was a prisoner of war in the far east for over 3 year, so hear goes with my rant, whilst i applaud the men and women who were involved in the D Day landings, it hacks me off that the veterans of the far east campaign seem to be relatively forgotten when it comes to ceremonies, commemorations and obviously the massive televised and printed material that appears. The second world war was not confined to europe, there was the far east, the north africa campaign, rant for now over, thanks for reading.

[derekpara]

I share your view. Jesmond. The troops in the Far East during WW2 called themselves ' The Forgotten Army' and with good reason.
Their valiant efforts, particularly at Kohima, where they fought the Japanese across a tennis court and it was mostly close quarter , hand to hand battle in terrible conditions. I recommend anyone to read the book, ' Not Ordinary Men' to get an understanding of what they went through. Their war was largely overshadowed by the Landings in Europe and the on-going battles that followed.

We owe a great debt of gratitude to those men of the Chindits and other units and they sould never be forgotten.

D

[jesmond]

It was the shear cruelty that the pows went through that beggars belief. My dad always said that as a pow you expect "some bad treatment" but the torture etc etc etc was horrendous. He also said given a choice then a pow in Europe would have been totally different but we cant make those choices when it comes to war and they were sent where they were needed. Forgotten soldiers is a phrase that has been used many many times.

[tamborine]

Veteran of Kohima, under Gen Slim, did make a short speech to commemorate their battle. I recall he had long grey hair, wore his medals but not in uniform.

[zebo]

Totally agree. Next year, in May, there'll be all the ceremonies for 'the 75th anniversary of the end of WW II'. Can we start a compaign to have it held at the true end, August?
My Dad told the tale of Mountbatten addressing them in India, 'You're called the forgotten army. It's not true, most people have never heard of you', that's minus the refined expletives.

[jesmond]

Totally agree as the far east part of ww2 did not end until August 15th i believe, so they had to endure suffering for longer than the soldiers who fought in europe. We have ve day but rarely is vj day mentioned, will wait and see if there will either be a combined ceremony for both days when it endedin europe and the far east or just ve day.

[BigT65]

Unfortunately the forgotten army is still forgotten its about time they got the recognition they deserve after all they won't be around forever

[jesmond]

I have seen that we are having allsorts of ceremonies next year to celebrate ve day but not a thing mentioned about vj day and those still serving or imprisoned in the far east had to endure their war for a few more mobths, hacks me off to put it politely

[Peter Pedant]

sorry Jezz long post gone up in smoke

they suffered greatly and are remembered
perhaps their suffering and awful condition on return 1945 made - celebration somewhat muted

[Peter Pedant]

// Totally agree as the far east ww2 did not end until Aug 15, so they had to endure suffering for longer than the soldiers who fought in europe.//
]
the end of the pacific war was unbelievably chaotic - the enemy was most definitely not at the gates when the Emperor ordered his generals to surrender. [the war has developed not necessarily to our advantage]

for example Hiroshima ("dont go to hiroshima: there is nothing there") - all the ruins over three weeks were dumped in the rivers. and the result is a completely flat wasteland.

the ship surrender - where the dignitaries go to the american warship and sign their lives away, I think is 2 Sep - three weeks later. Basically the war ended with the americans 800 miles south

[Peter Pedant]

// He also said given a choice then a pow in Europe would have been totally different but we cant make those choices when it comes to war//

and yes my father was a POW in Germany ( 5 y ) and....
wished he had joined the south african forces because they had a better war