Did Your Parents Serve In WWII?

Pepper said:
I strongly disagree
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Why? WWII was not Vietnam! There were many draftees who had no choice and to have to fly mission after mission without going AWOL from sheer terror (The Flak was fearsome) constitutes bravery in my eyes. None of them started the war or wanted it. In the case of WWII Allied Interference was totally justified, and I am saying this sincerely having been brought up on the other side ... and experiencing the terror of their bombing! Hitler was evil personified and that made WWII one of the few "just" wars in human history!
 

Pepper said:
No, WWII was not Vietnam
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And? Was Allied Intervention in WWII justified? And weren't there outstanding acts of bravery? No one hates war more than I, believe me, so I am a bit baffled by your response. Pacifism is fine, but what's the old saying? Something like "Evil triumphs if good men do nothing!" And I stand by my original statement that there were good and brave men on both sides.

Correction with apologies: "And there were good and brave men and women on both sides!" Honouring my mother who was one of the bravest, even though she was a civilian!
 
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My father's brothers all served. Papa was rejected due to early onset of arthritis as well as two broken clavicules and dislocated shoulder. Instead, he got married in 1939, just before the rush of weddings which took place before departure.

Granduncle was drafted in. As he was amazing to drill the troops, he was always left behind. That upsetted him. He finally jumped ship, becoming a stowaway. Once there in France, he managed to get into a Chef's school and studied with them until war was over.

He received medals still for his troops drilling skills, fencing and gun shooting. No one ever found out he'd become a chef. However, he ended up having a wonderful four years, working in the prestigious hotel kitchens. Until, one night a steak (expensive cut) was dropped on the floor, which was very unhygienic.

He saw the offending situation and was about to dispose of it in the refuse bin. His superior caught him doing that and reprimanded him. The disgusting thing that followed, I'll no tell. Just yuck enough for him to quit, right there and then.

The next morning, he took the bus to work as usual, but got off at veteran's affair department. Got a job and that's where he stayed until his retirement at 65. Sadly, he passed away in November 1966, at 66 years old.

Thanks to his wartime skills and being part of Knights of Columbus, plus wartime government bonds, he had a spectacular funeral and a coffin which had a lighted Last Supper scene.
 
Della said:
My father enlisted right after Pearl Harbor and was immediately made a drill sergeant because they had far too big a privates-to-sergeants ratio at that point.

His main war story was grabbing a grenade out of one of his trainees hands after the kid had pulled the pin and then froze. His other big memory was being on a ship with his platoon, headed to Japan, when the war ended and how weird it was to watch the water as the huge ship made a U-Turn.
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My dad enlisted right after Pearl also but they let him have a birthday and finish his junior year of high school first because he was a year underage. I didn't know they did things like that. It was only a matter of a few months though before he went.
 
chic said:
My dad enlisted right after Pearl also but they let him have a birthday and finish his junior year of high school first because he was a year underage. I didn't know they did things like that. It was only a matter of a few months though before he went.
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yes there was many underage soldiers and sailors fighting during the war..many lied about their ages.... just something those of us who never lived through a world war can ever be grateful enough to them for...they fought like tigers and died in their millions to save our future..
 
My mother, on the other hand, served in her own way. She had an older brother in the Navy and several boyfriends in the services.

She was the Belle of Norfolk, from what I've heard. She worked as a secretary in the Navy Shipyards and danced her feet off seven nights a week at the USO dances.

She said she went through ballgowns at a record rate, as the sailor's sweaty hands melted holes in the waists of the cheap rayon the dresses were made of after a few wearing.

If she wasn't dancing at the USO, she was at other activities that her church young adults group put on for the sailors, like picnics, skating parties, and wiener roasts, at one of which she met my dad whose LST was in port. It was love at first sight.

She refused to date officers. She said they were stuck up.

She and Dad were married three weeks after he got back from Japan. His ship stayed in Japan for a few months after the surrender.
 
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Both my parents were in the RAF. They both drove motorcycles and my mom was assistant air traffic controller. I forget what my dad did. That’s where my parents met. It was really sweet the way they’d explain how they met. They truly shared a romance through a tragic part of history and something I really admired about them.

Note: looking at the dates of WW2, there’s no way my parents served in that. They were far too young but they definitely were both in the RAF in England.
 
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Old Salt said:
And? Was Allied Intervention in WWII justified? And weren't there outstanding acts of bravery? No one hates war more than I, believe me, so I am a bit baffled by your response. Pacifism is fine, but what's the old saying? Something like "Evil triumphs if good men do nothing!" And I stand by my original statement that there were good and brave men on both sides.

Correction with apologies: "And there were good and brave men and women on both sides!" Honouring my mother who was one of the bravest, even though she was a civilian!
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Of course it was justified. I meant I am not impressed with the "bravery" of "Good Germans." Please don't get me started....I have no sympathy for them whatsoever.
 
My Father served in The Great War , in the Canadian Machine Gun Corps, from October of 1915, to his final return to Toronto on July the 9th of 1919. When the Armistice was agreed in November of 1918, he signed to stay behind for an additional 6 months to be a guard at a German POW camp in Belgium. The Germans were no problem they were just waiting for official permission to go home. For that 6 months of VERY easy duty, Dad got a full years pay of $ 375, plus another $300 he had saved from his monthly pay of $ 31. He used that money to buy a used Pierce Arrow touring car, and he started the Toronto Veteran's Taxi Company in 1920.

By 1927 he owned 15 taxis and he employed 35 men, all of whom were CEF veterans. He sold the company in 1928, and bought a 40 room hotel in downtown Toronto. That was his retirement investment. I was born in 1946 from his second marriage. He died in 1981 at age 83. JimB.
 
My dad fought in WWII at the Battle of Guadalcanal. To hear him tell the story, he saved the whole fleet. Just kidding, of course, but my dad told some really interesting stories about the battles he fought in. He had a really close friend from Nevada that they would take turns visiting each other. The friend told me stories that made me go out a buy a book about the battle of Guadalcanal. I never knew how hard our men fought in that battle. The Japanese finally left

My dad was 18 when he enlisted in the Marines and was sent to advanced tactical training. He spent 4 months on Guadalcanal. I asked him if he was ever scared. He told me he was never scared, but there were times when he was afraid of what was going to happen in situations where they would run out of ammo and had to wait until they were restocked.

I remember when my dad’s friend visited him from Nevada on one occasion and I asked him if he was ever scared. He said, “Hell no. We were short on food, short on medicine, short on ammo. We were short on everything except Japs.” He said he kept thinking about what the enemy did at Pearl Harbor and that drove him harder. He said they had a lot of men that were dying from different illnesses because they didn’t have enough medicine. I knew my dad had Malaria, but he seldom talked about it. He said he almost died and that explained why every time my sister or I got sick, dad would make mom take us to the doctors. It must have really shook him.

My dad’s friend said my dad saved his life by killing a Jap that had stabbed him with his bayonet and was ready to stab him again when my dad shot him. About a month later, he saved my dad’s life. That’s a long story. My dad’s best friend enlisted when he was 20 and in college, but dropped out to join the Marines. Both my dad and his friend said they fought alongside of men in their 40’s. Some had already served their time earlier, but then when WWII happened, they reenlisted.

Dad said he lost about 20 pounds while there and on some nights, he thought he was going to die with the Malaria. His temperature went as high as 104. He only stayed in bed for 9 days. Dad said General Vandegrift pinned his Purple Heart on him and also his Silver Star. My dad wanted to be buried in Arlington originally, but then decided to be cremated and have his ashes scattered over his college campus.

To listen to the stories about what went on at Guadalcanal made me wonder how any of them survived. No food, no ammo, all kinds of diseases and injuries, it just makes one wonder how so many survived and drove the enemy from the island. I found it amazing.
 
Pepper said:
Of course it was justified. I meant I am not impressed with the "bravery" of "Good Germans." Please don't get me started....I have no sympathy for them whatsoever.
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Pepper I hate to say this since I like you, but you have watched too many movies about those evil Krauts! Most had been drafted and were not sadistic killers!

To say no to fervent Nazis meant not only that you could lose your life but also that of your family. Trust me when I say this. Open your mouth, say the wrong thing and your family ends up dead or in a camp. That makes for a lot of reluctant and silent followers!

People forget what a dictatorship is all about. A classmate of mine, an eight year old girl, blurted out innocently that her mother listened to the BBC. Next day her mother was arrested and sent to a KZ. If you have peole like that in charge, plus Nazi neighbours, you do as you're told.

And then there's the incessant propaganda! Repeat a lie often enough and people will believe it! (Why do you think I am so anti Fox News and Tr..p!)

My father was a kind man who was torn from his family, given a rifle, here you are, now kill the enemy! Same with those guys in the bombers. Do you think they enjoyed bombing London and other cities? To them it was a dangerous job they had to do because propaganda had told them "it's either them or us!"

There might have been some Nazis among them who liked the idea but all you have to do is to look at My Lai to see that evil exists even among Americans!

In closing, I thanked the Allies in my sermons every Remembrance Day without feeling the slightest guilt about betraying my heritage. If Hitler had stayed in power I would have been dead by the time I was twenty because of my big mouth!

Just a little reminder, without prejudice and with great respect for the average American:

United States war crimes - Wikipedia
 
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I made friends over the years with a very intelligent Vietnamese guy over years of working with him.

His story kind of blew my mind. He was a physics teacher in the mid 60s when the authorities in Vietnam came into his classroom, put handcuffs on him and took him off to be a soldier in their army. He wasn't even allowed to say goodbye to his wife. So he had a guy take a note to her before he was hauled off. He was in that war 7 years and then South Vietnam was defeated. He was told to get out of the country and so he went to the US.
 
OldFeller said:
I made friends over the years with a very intelligent Vietnamese guy over years of working with him.

His story kind of blew my mind. He was a physics teacher in the mid 60s when the authorities in Vietnam came into his classroom, put handcuffs on him and took him off to be a soldier in their army. He wasn't even allowed to say goodbye to his wife. So he had a guy take a note to her before he was hauled off. He was in that war 7 years and then South Vietnam was defeated. He was told to get put of the country and so he went to the US.
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This supports what I wrote about the Nazis! Have ruthless people in power and good people are turned into killers!
 

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