FORGOTTEN UNITS
It is un-intentional and nothing much can be done about it, but each time we celebrate days in memory of veterans of our various wars of various wars, we skip certain of our armed forces - ignoring their fine work.
In World War II, for example, today's youngsters might get the idea it consisted of two sites - the ETO and the South Pacific.
Thousands of men and a few women who can attest to the fact that there were other “theaters of operations” worthy of remembering and honoring.
Among such groups you seldom hear about you find some of the most unusual aspects of the war in relation to various peoples and cultures with which we seldom meet.
I know just a few veterans who were, for example, members of military units who served in the area known letter-ly as “the CBI”. Translated, that works out as having made reference to the thousands of our troops we had in the China, Burma and Indian sectors during World War II. Many young people today are taken by surprise when they find we had a viable presence in such places at all. Older people do not always remember the CBI, North Africa, Aleutian Islands, and a score of other such sites.
One GI I know who served in the China-Burma-India sphere does not fly to this day commercially. He feels that “catlike”, he used up the major portion of his “nine lives” during several years of service as a member of a crew who's assignment was to fly fifty-five gallon drums of gasoline across the “Hump” dividing Indian and Burma above other G.I. persons trucking such supplies below them on the the celebrated and dangerous “Burma Road.” His name was Owen and he remembers quite often - about every time he fills his car's fuel tank today, - how the metal barrels, worn and used to near-extinction, would crack and develop obvious leaks at high altitudes above the Himalayan range. Patch with pitch and pray was the only actions to be taken.
Take Bob's experiences, as an army cook in India. Bob died recently and his widow passes along to me copies of a fine, little monthly magazine edited by Dwight O. King of Newport Beach, CA. -just as Bob added copies to my reading over the last decade or two. His army years in India were less rigorous than Owen's in some ways but being so far from home and family in New Jersey among people who's culture was almost primitive despite its age and history was a disturbing Bob had to force himself to “get used to.” The magazine ”Ex-CBI Roundup” for December of is year has a letter in it from John Beaudoin II, of Wakefield, KS who has a memory a lot like Owen's gas cans. He flew out of Bangladesh as it is now called, placing river mines from the air. In preparation for an early morning mission, their B-24 had been loaded then night before. During the night they had a heavy rain. The B-24 was not designed to stay dry when rain falls. The ship was awash with water around the base of the mines and it was too late to unload and re-load so they took off any way. The interesting factor John remembers so well, was the fact that the particular type of mine they carried that morning was activated when block of salt melted in the water and a lever was released which armed the bomb to explode.
There was humor on the CBI front, as well. One trio of muleskinners in the land army gave their mules names. One rugged little stead was called “Loco” because he seemed to be just that. When three new skinners were assigned mules to care for and tend, they named them: “Wine”,“Women” and “Song”.
The CBI was a big part of The War and next Veteran's Day- - don't you forget that. Get a copy of “Ex-CBI Roundup” and learn much of their war.
A.L.M. December 15, 2004 [c687wds]
