Hitler's Last Stand (2018) s04e04 Episode Script

1
NARRATOR: When a U.S. Battalion is
surrounded by Germans,
Soldiers of a segregated Japanese-American
unit fight to reach them.
Pinned at the base of what
they would call Suicide Hill,
No one moves when
given the order to charge.
Until an unlikely hero
steps up to lead the way.
NARRATOR: On June 6th, 1944,
Allied forces finally land
troops in Normandy
to open the western front.
But Nazi fanatics and diehards continue
to fight ferociously for survival.
D-day was a battle.
They still need to win the war.
NARRATOR: Friday, October 27th, 1944.
The Vosges mountains, France.
American sergeant Shiro Kashino
leads his soldiers along a narrow
path deep in the forest.
At 0300 hours they
struggle to see their route.
ROBERT: It's almost unimaginable
how dark it is.
The overhang of the trees, the blackness.
The total absence of any kind of city
lights that would illuminate the sky
makes it seem like you're
in the middle of a nightmare.
NARRATOR: Afraid the men of the 442nd
regimental combat team
will lose their way in the forest,
they pin squares of white paper to their
backs for the soldier behind to follow.
NARRATOR: Their mission is to rescue part
of a battalion of American soldiers
completely cut off by German forces.
The other battalion is five
miles away as the crow flies,
but the valleys dip and peak,
to greatly increase the distance.
When they volunteered for the army,
many soldiers of the 442nd lived as
detainees in incarceration camps.
NARRATOR: After the bombing
of Pearl Harbor,
an executive order signed by
President Franklin Roosevelt
forced Japanese-Americans on
the mainland from their homes.
Anyone with 1/16th Japanese
heritage is incarcerated,
Including thousands of children,
the elderly and disabled.
ROBERT: The government built ten
so-called permanent relocation camps
spread across the United States and these
were basically army shelters.
They were big barracks
with common latrines,
set in the middle of nowhere,
and surrounded by barbed wire,
and this would be the home for more
than 100,000 Japanese Americans
for the next three years of their lives.
NARRATOR: Japanese-Americans serving in
the military on December 7th, 1941
are discharged or
reassigned in February 1942.
But many young men in the
camps still volunteer
when Roosevelt activates the segregated
442nd regimental combat team a year later.
ROBERT: Well you have to
remember, these were boys.
They were youth ranging from 17,
18 years old to 21, 22 year old.
Some of them were patriots.
They wanted to fight to prove
themselves to their country.
Some of them just wanted to get out of the
camps. It was a terrible environment.
NARRATOR: After training, the
442nd fights in Italy,
and then lands in southern France.
ROBERT: They were literally
dodging bullets abroad
and they knew they had to
win to save their lives.
On the other hand they also knew they were
representing something about themselves
and their people who were still in
the camps or were still in Hawaii.
And they understood that this was
a test of who they were as Americans.
NARRATOR: After their 3:00 am start,
the 442nd arrives at their jump off
point in the late morning.
The unit they must rescue
is still three miles away.
The lost battalion is from
the 141st infantry regiment,
a sister regiment to the 442nd,
within the 36th infantry division.
The 36th Division was pretty highly
combat experienced by this time.
JOHN: It had led the way in the invasion
of South France in August 1944.
It had plunged into the
Vosges by September.
And here's where the figurative
fun began to kind of end.
NARRATOR: As the 141st
attacked to take hill 5-9-5,
First battalion pulls too far ahead.
Germans close in from behind and separate
them from their regiment,
Cutting them off from reinforcement,
resupply and relief.
NARRATOR: The encirclement kicks off the
Second World War version
of the Lost Battalion saga.
JOHN: It was a term left over
from World War I,
when you had a similar kind of situation,
where you've had a unit,
not really lost because loss
would indicate that, you know,
they're gone, or you never
know what happens to them.
No, you know precisely where they are.
You just can't get to them.
NARRATOR: Lieutenant Martin
Higgins establishes
a defensive perimeter to
secure their position.
For three days, the cut off battalion
fends off a series of German attacks.
All attempts to fight their way out, or
for the regiment to fight their way in,
have failed.
NARRATOR: As their remaining rations
and ammunition run low,
the situation for the Texan
regiment grows desperate.
It's not clear how long they can hang on.
NARRATOR: Sergeant Shiro Kashino and
the members of "I" company
fight for every advance in the forest
during the rescue attempt.
As they lead the American assault, the
Germans launch a fierce counter-attack.
"I" company's left flank becomes exposed.
Kashino identifies a platoon pinned by a
machine gun nest on the slope above.
ROBERT: Kashino was a Japanese American
who grew up in Washington State,
and he was by all accounts
a kind of all-American boy.
He played on the football team.
He found himself uprooted and sent to the
Minidoka relocation camp in Idaho.
And I think he was impatient
to get out of Minidoka,
and he saw the army as an
opportunity to prove himself.
NARRATOR: Suddenly, Kashino bursts out to
relieve pressure on the trapped platoon.
He rushes uphill giving
the Germans a moving target.
ROBERT: Kashino distinguished himself as
consistently rising to the challenge.
If that meant risking his own
life for the soldiers he was serving,
he would do it and he did it,
time and time again.
NARRATOR: Kashino succeeds.
He draws the German fire to himself, so
the other men are able to advance.
He motions for them to loop around
and take out the machine gun nest.
Still under intense fire himself,
he uses his Thompson submachine gun
to cover their attack.
ROBERT: I think that kind of action both
endeared him to his men
and proved that soldiers were
capable of doing things,
you know, beyond their imaginations.
NARRATOR: With the Germans
distracted by his fire,
the others can eliminate
the machine gun nest.
NARRATOR: As the Americans fight ahead,
a German tank creeps into
position above them.
The noise and chaos of the
battle have masked its arrival.
Tech sergeant Al Takahashi spots
the beast at the last second.
- NARRATOR: As its muzzle flares
- Feuer!
He throws himself to the side.
NARRATOR: The shell fired by the tank
lands in the dirt beside Al Takahashi,
but does not explode.
Thankfully it's a dud.
But had he jumped in the other direction,
the impact would've surely killed him.
The Americans fight an entrenched enemy,
spurred to make any Allied
advance as costly as possible.
PETER: It's relatively rare in the
war in 1944
that the Germans encircle an
entire Allied battalion.
And this chance now is too
good for the propaganda to lose.
So, German troops are ordered
to stop any rescue attempts
from the Americans of this battalion.
NARRATOR: Special mountain units are
assigned to reinforce German positions.
PETER: Gebirgsjäger, or Mountain Troops,
were already founded in the First World
War to defend the Austrian Alps.
They are trained to fight under
severe weather conditions.
To fight at high altitudes.
The peculiarity of the Gebirgsjäger
is that they are mostly
recruited from the alpine areas,
from Austria and from Bavaria.
NARRATOR: Major Franz Seebacher commands
the Heeres-Gebirgsjäger battalion 2-O-1.
PETER: Franz Seebacher is a relatively
young battalion commander.
He's only 26 years old
when he takes over command.
He is an Austrian, initially
enters the Austrian army,
later is transferred into the German Army,
and pursues a distinguished career
in the Second World War.
NARRATOR: Seebacher moves into
position with 1,000 men
armed with machine guns,
light artillery, and mortars.
PETER: The Germans have got the maps.
They know the region, they know the
strength and weaknesses of the terrain,
and they position their troops on the
defense line on the top of the hills
and can fire down on
the Americans in the valley.
NARRATOR: The German
counter attack continues
with more tank and artillery fire.
Feuer!
NARRATOR: Trees explode
around the soldiers
of the 442nd regimental combat team.
ROBERT: Without exception, every soldier I
spoke to spoke about the tree bursts.
They were terrified of them.
If you can imagine being
in a forest with pine trees
stretching 60, 70 feet
above you, and then suddenly,
out of nowhere, artillery
fire opens up and explodes in the trees,
so you're vulnerable not just
to the hail of lead,
but to the branches that had been
burst off by this explosion.
NARRATOR: Under intense pressure from
German snipers and shells,
the Americans must withdraw.
Fall back!
NARRATOR: They halt the German
counter attack,
but also cede some of the hard fought
gains of the day's fighting.
It's a painful set back.
NARRATOR: Saturday, October 28th, 1944.
With their rescuers still
three miles away,
Lieutenant Martin Higgins and
the remains of his battalion
of the 141st infantry regiment
face mounting challenges.
After four days of isolation with very
limited rations, they're slowly starving.
But drinking water is
their biggest concern.
JOHN: You just simply
have to have access to it.
If your soldiers are
dehydrating over time,
it doesn't necessarily mean
they're going to keel over dead any minute
but it does mean as they're
more and more dehydrated,
they become less combat effective.
NARRATOR: Just beyond their perimeter,
a muddy puddle provides their only
source of drinking water.
And worse, they have to
share it with the enemy.
A dead body would contaminate the supply.
So, both sides avoid
shooting any one nearby.
But even without a corpse,
it may not be safe to drink.
JOHN: There's a recognition,
that you're going to have to get
stream water, river water,
all those kinds of things where there are
microorganisms that can make you sick.
So, Halazone tablets were vital to
purify the water that you're drinking.
NARRATOR: Halazone is a
chemical compound,
that uses chlorine to kill
bacteria and parasites.
Debate over the effectiveness of chlorine
delayed Halazone's
widespread use until 1944,
when research proved
it safe and effective.
Two dissolved halazone tablets
make a canteen of water drinkable
in about 10 minutes.
Four tablets can be used for muddy water.
It's a low tech, portable
water purification system.
NARRATOR: The lost battalion's initial
supply of tablets only lasted for one day.
They desperately need more Halazone, food,
medical supplies for the wounded,
and batteries for the radio.
The first attempt to
resupply by air failed
when cloud cover made it
impossible to identify their location.
But the pilots remain determined.
- Now with the sound of P-47s in the air
- Alright, guys.
Higgins and the men get ready for
the delivery of provisions.
They've prepared a visual cue to alert
the aircraft of their position.
JOHN: They're going to try and
signal by taking off anything
that's light colored or white colored that
they can use to string together
that might catch a
pilot's eye as he's flying over.
NARRATOR: The fabric creates a signal.
With the lost battalion
surrounded by Germans,
the pilots must drop the
canisters in the right spot.
NARRATOR: Higgins and the men watch as
the containers float down from the sky.
And one by one, they
land in enemy territory.
All the supplies fall into German hands.
JOHN: You talk about going
from the high to the low,
Here comes the planes,
here comes our supplies.
Awesome. I'm going to get to eat,
I'm going to get maybe some water
and it's like, "No, I'm not getting that.
My mortal enemy is getting that."
NARRATOR: Without re-supply,
the lost battalion's situation
grows more desperate.
JOHN: Higgins is probably worried about
the steady decline of his command.
He's got more and more people wounded.
Fewer medical supplies
to take care of them.
He's probably worried about conserving
his ammo. And there's the unknown.
Is help going to be able to get to you?
NARRATOR: Suddenly, the
Americans in the perimeter
hear the sound of an
incoming artillery shell.
(explosion)
NARRATOR: As part of the
36th infantry division,
the lost battalion is under the command of
American Major General, John Dahlquist.
The 141st is pinned down, sir.
Annoyed that the 141st could
not rescue their own men,
Dahlquist had called in the 442nd
regimental combat team to do the job.
He continues to be frustrated by
the failure of the rescue
and floundering relief attempts.
Let's go! Let's go!
JOHN: I think his impatience
is pretty understandable.
He's got a battalion of
his guys that's cut off.
He's got other units that need
to fight their way to them.
The last thing on Earth that he wants
is one of his battalions to be destroyed,
obviously for its own sake,
but this also can be devastating
to a division's morale,
to its fighting prowess.
NARRATOR: To deliver essential
rations and supplies,
Dahlquist plans to fire
artillery shells on his own men.
Well behind the line, items like
concentrated food rations,
water purification tablets
and medical supplies,
are carefully wrapped and
inserted into hollow shells.
You fire them into the perimeter,
because you don't really
have to worry about weather
and your observers know where the
isolated battalion is.
But it is, you know, a reasonably
ingenious kind of solution to this,
but it's only a very temporary patch,
it's designed to get you by for a few more
hours until you figure out a better way.
NARRATOR: A smoke shell lands outside the
lost battalion's defensive perimeter.
It has been fired to confirm
the coordinates of their camp.
With a series of adjustments
from their artillery observer,
The shells start to explode overhead.
They land in the trees and spill
rations on to the ground.
Once collected, the meagre supplies are
shared amongst more than 200 soldiers
who continue to hold out on the hilltop.
NARRATOR: Meanwhile, the rescue force
continues their approach.
With little ground gained,
Sergeant Shiro Kashino
and the other men of the 442nd
regimental combat team
dig in for the second night
of their relief mission.
In contrast to the Sergeant,
Private Barney Hajiro grew up in Hawaii,
and was not incarcerated.
And unlike Kashino, Hajiro's
considered a problem soldier.
ROBERT: Barney Hajiro was a
fascinating character
because he had a reputation from
the day he was in the army
of being both a kind of slacker
and a kind of trouble maker.
He was a fiery youth
who got in fist fights,
and constantly was in trouble both with
his peers and with his commanders.
Okay guys.
Prepare to move out.
NARRATOR: Now he and the others face
another long, wet night.
In the middle of the forest
there are no comfortable billets,
comfortable billets, or
structures of any kind.
ROBERT: It was the end of October.
It was starting to turn into winter.
It was cold, it started to
rain, and their nightly routine
was to dig a trench, huddle into it,
hope they were protected against tree
bursts, and just tuck in for the night.
NARRATOR: Another ongoing problem is
supplying the 442nd with food.
As with the lost battalion, the rescuers
also have had an unstable supply line.
The isolation and the terrain makes it
difficult for trucks to reach the front.
3rd battalion commander,
Lieutenant Colonel Alfred Pursall
calls for volunteers to retrieve
rations delivered to a nearby road,
Kashino agrees to lead the supply run,
but is reluctant to depart immediately.
ROBERT: Kashino sensibly pointed
out that the noise of the supply trucks
would attract the
attention of the Germans.
NARRATOR: He wants to wait for an hour,
in case the Germans target
the delivery location.
But Pursall disagrees
and issues a direct order.
Alright guys, listen up!
I need five volunteers.
ROBERT: So, he got up and gave his men the
order to follow him down the trail
to the supply trucks.
NARRATOR: Kashino leads his men
through the dark, quiet forest.
NARRATOR: In the distance, the supply
trucks make their way up a narrow road.
Before the soldiers can advance more than
200 yards, there is a massive explosion.
NARRATOR: As Sergeant Shiro Kashino leads
his men down a dark mountain path
to meet their supply trucks,
the forest around them bursts into flames.
Exactly what Kashino predicted
would happen did happen.
The Germans were able to locate the troops
from the noise of the supply train
and they opened fire.
NARRATOR: The soldiers of the
442nd regimental combat team
do not have time to find cover.
The barrage is too intense.
The blast injures eight men.
When the fire lifts, Kashino
and the others less injured
help the wounded to the aid station.
Later, when Kashino arrives at
the battalion command post,
he finds Lieutenant
Colonel Alfred Pursall.
NARRATOR: Kashino calls out his commanding
officer
for putting them in a needlessly
dangerous situation.
Those men died out there because of you!
He adds that any of
the men would rather starve
than for others to suffer the
casualties caused by the order.
From a military perspective,
Kashino crosses a line.
Sergeant, that's how the army works.
ROBERT: It's a complete
violation of military law.
A junior ranking non-commissioned officer
cannot question the
direct orders of a superior.
NARRATOR: With the attack
on the supply detail,
casualties amongst the Japanese-American
soldiers continue to mount
across their front, after two
days of fighting to rescue
the members of the 141st
infantry regiment.
And the lost battalion still remains about
two miles past their present location.
ROBERT: They would advance
through the dark forest,
they would meet a hail of
machine gun fire, duck for cover,
and then they would crawl up
the hill a little bit more.
As a result, the men really
never knew where they were.
They just knew that somewhere out there
someone was firing a gun at them,
and they had to keep going.
Sunday October 29th, 1944.
In the morning fighting,
the soldiers from the Japanese
American unit gain a little ground
against the entrenched German defenses.
But for 36th infantry division commander
Major General John Dahlquist,
this is not good enough.
Dahlquist believes that there
should be more progress.
He takes the unusual step of visiting
the front during the battle.
Forward!
Come on!
JOHN: He does not trust his leaders.
And in that sense, perhaps he's more of
a micromanager than is necessary.
JOHN: This is something that
should be an incredible force multiplier,
to have a two-star general right
there in the front line saying,
"Hey, you know what? I'm not just telling
you guys to go forward.
"I'm leading you forward."
As barrages descend, the men are
forced to take cover.
JOHN: Dahlquist never really adjusts to
the reality of the moment,
of saying, "Oh, now I see what
you guys are up against."
NARRATOR: Instead, he causes confusion by
ignoring the chain of command.
He engages directly with the soldiers
and badgers them to advance.
Finally, 3rd battalion commander,
Lieutenant-Colonel Pursall
reaches a breaking point.
These are my boys!
He shouts for
Dahlquist to get off his front.
For Lieutenant Colonel Pursall to turn on
the General this way,
he would have to be
completely at his wits end.
And from an enlisted
soldier's perspective,
to see these two key authority
figures bickering in this way
does nothing for your unity and morale
to go forward on this mission.
NARRATOR: Within the lost
battalion's defensive perimeter,
The sound of planes again fills the air,
with the goal of dispensing
lifesaving supplies.
It's the third attempt to deliver goods by
air drop, and it proves successful.
Food, medical supplies, and
ammunition spill out from canisters.
It all buys Lieutenant Martin
Higgins and his men some relief.
JOHN: It's gotten better. It's gotten more
manageable, but it is not at an end.
You hope in that time,
that friendly forces are going to be
able to fight their way to you.
Until that happens,
your crisis has not ended.
NARRATOR: In the meantime, Sergeant Shiro
Kashino
and the soldiers of 3rd
battalion of the 442nd
have fought to close in
on the lost battalion.
They face another advance
across treacherous terrain.
At the end of the ridge,
just over a mile away,
Higgins and his men wait for rescue.
But to get there, third
battalion must clear the slope.
The dug in German soldiers
exact a toll for every gain.
Even as they try to ascend, the German
fire closes in from all around them.
NARRATOR: After trying to outflank
the Germans,
members of the 442nd regimental combat
team have stalled along a narrow front,
in their quest
to reach the lost battalion.
ROBERT: The battle was really
one of inches,
and they were almost
helplessly pinned down.
And not knowing where the next
explosion would come from,
not knowing where the next
grenade would be thrown,
not knowing where the next
machine gun fire would open up.
Fix bayonets now!
NARRATOR: An order comes
down the line: Fix bayonets.
A bayonet is a knife blade attached
to the end of a military rifle.
Soldiers train to wield
bayonets in a thrusting motion
to cause deep and fatal internal wounds.
But they're rarely used.
JOHN: A lot of people would rather be in a
gunfight than a knife fight,
because a knife fight is very personal,
and very much physical and all that,
versus just trading bullets with
someone in the abstract.
The bayonet is really the
desperation kind of weapon.
An officer gives an order to
fix bayonets only under
the most desperate circumstances.
NARRATOR: As the soldiers
attach the blades,
they discover that any discernible
movement attracts a hail of bullets
from the German defenders above.
NARRATOR: Trapped and exposed,
more men are shot,
including sergeant Shiro Kashino.
ROBERT: We don't know a lot except that he
was constantly exposing himself to fire,
and at a certain point he was wounded for
the third time within a matter of days
NARRATOR: Barney Hajiro sees that his
platoon leader is bleeding.
He insists that Kashino seek medical care.
Years later Hajiro would tell me, almost
with incredulity that, you know,
"Here I am, I'm a private and I'm telling
a sergeant he's gotta go back,"
and he was amazed that Kashino, who had
never turned away from any challenge,
must've been so wounded that
he in fact did go back.
NARRATOR: Overlooking the ridge,
Major Franz Seebacher
observes the American
forces amassing below.
The Americans don't receive
a lot of support from the air
or support of armor or artillery.
They are fighting like the Germans.
A battle of attrition and both sides
are low on ammunition and men.
In the end, it is a brutal place to fight.
NARRATOR: But Seebacher knows
he has no choice.
They must protect these heights of land,
to have any chance of halting the Allied
advance before they reach the Rhine river.
Still pinned down on the ridge
by heavy machine gun fire from above,
the Americans receive the order to charge.
But for an instant, no one, including
Private Barney Hajiro, advances.
ROBERT: Hajiro told me many years later
that you can't go backwards,
you can only go forwards.
He looked at his men, he saw
that they were pinned down,
he knew that they would all die on
that hill if they didn't do something.
NARRATOR: With his Browning
automatic rifle ready,
Hajiro locates extra ammunition
and turns to his assistant B.A.R. man,
Private Takeyasu Onaga.
Onaga tells Hajiro to
take his P-38 if he gets shot.
ROBERT: Hajiro remembered
that very vividly,
that a look of sadness just crossed
his fox hole buddy's face.
And it was probably in that
split second before Hajiro stood up
and started leading the charge.
NARRATOR: With Hajiro in the lead,
the rest of "I" company follows.
ROBERT: I think the best part
of him came out in battle,
and it's one of those strange
circumstances that men can be tested,
and find within themselves resources
that they never knew they had.
And I think that was
very true of Barney Hajiro.
NARRATOR: Men are immediately cut down by
machine gun fire and artillery blasts.
Close on the heels of his
friend, Assistant B.A.R. man Onaga
stops to lift a tree that
has fallen on a fellow soldier.
Onaga then continues his
advance up the hill,
targeting enemy soldiers with a grenade.
Without warning, a
bullet rips into his throat.
Hajiro sees his friend fall.
ROBERT: I think he was angry.
I think he was horror stricken,
and also remember he was
losing his ammunition man.
So he knew he had a
magazine to make his point,
and he ran like a mad man
firing all the way.
NARRATOR: The soldiers of the German
201st mountain batallion
hold steady against
the American attackers.
PETER: It's undoubtedly unnerving to see
men coming up the hill,
screaming and shouting.
This is a situation when the
war gets purely emotional
and totally unpredictable.
NARRATOR: Pinned down for days,
the stalemate breaks
and taking prisoners isn't a priority.
Private Barney Hajiro
continues his charge up the hill,
and locates another machine gun nest.
ROBERT: A BAR weighs 15 or 20 pounds,
you're wearing you're helmet,
you're carrying this equipment.
You're running up a steep hill.
I don't know how he did it.
You have to have a rush of adrenaline that
just powers you through these things.
NARRATOR: He continues to climb, but as he
approaches a third machine gun nest,
his luck runs out.
ROBERT: Barney just felt this
bullet rip through his arm,
and he had to fall but by that
time you know his men were behind him,
they were taking out the Germans.
What he set out to do he accomplished.
That is lead this charge up the hill.
NARRATOR: The medic wants to send
Hajiro down to the first aid post,
but he refuses.
NARRATOR: He lost his BAR, but
his fighting spirit was still there,
he said, "If I had a
gun I would've kept firing".
- Get outta here!
- I'm okay! I'll keep fighting!
NARRATOR: In the end, Hajiro acknowledges
the gravity of his injury
and agrees to withdraw,
though he refuses help.
ROBERT: He wanted to make sure that the
people who needed help more than he did
could get it,
and I think it's a kind of
badge of honor to be the last man
and to make sure that everybody
else is taken care of before you are.
NARRATOR: After losing Shiro Kashino and
Barney Hajiro, along with numerous others,
the 442nd pushes the Germans back.
But they've not yet made contact
with the lost battalion.
The next morning, on Monday, October 30th,
a patrol of Japanese-American soldiers
advances through the woods.
ROBERT: The battlefield was deserted,
there was a strange calm,
and so they inched forward,
not knowing exactly what to expect,
being afraid that maybe there were
machine guns awaiting them.
Maybe there was more mortar fire.
NARRATOR: They discover a communications
wire and decide to follow it.
When you've got two friendly units in
such close proximity, it's always dicey.
I think now also within the forest, given
what's happened for almost a week,
I think that only adds
to the stress level.
NARRATOR: They detect movement
and ready themselves.
A figure emerges from behind a tree.
It's a fellow American
from the lost battalion.
ROBERT: Mutt Sakumoto, who was the first
one to encounter the Los Battalion,
didn't know what to say and so he
just sort of fumbled and said,
"Hey, you guys want some cigarettes?"
And that turned out to be a
just a great, humble,
wonderful acknowledgement of what
both sides had been through.
A cigarette was just a great relief after
the horrors they had experienced.
NARRATOR: After seven days of isolation,
the surviving members of first battalion,
141st infantry regiment, are rescued.
Of the original 274 soldiers,
211 descend the hill,
Including 32 wounded.
NARRATOR: There's much press coverage,
but the images released by
the United States Army
do not acknowledge the role of
the Japanese-American soldiers
who sacrificed so much.
From the segregated 442nd,
52 are killed during the mission
and 280 are wounded.
Their casualties likely exceed
the number of men rescued.
Two weeks later, Major General
John Dahlquist orders the 442nd assembled
to award a presidential unit
citation for the action.
He's angry when the number of soldiers
present was lower than he expected.
One of his officers has to inform him:
"That's all that's
left of the 442nd, sir."
After he recovers, Sergeant Shiro
Kashino continues to fight.
He will earn a Silver Star,
two Bronze Stars,
and six Purple Hearts for his service.
While nominated for a
Distinguished Service Cross,
He's wrongfully convicted by
court martial and stripped of his rank
and disqualified for the medal.
More than 50 years later, a military
investigation clears Kashino's name.
ROBERT: His fellow soldiers
petitioned the army
for some recognition after many years,
which he finally got, but unfortunately
about six months after he died.
NARRATOR: While Private Barney Hajiro
is nominated for the Congressional
Medal of Honor,
He receives the Distinguished
Service Cross instead,
because of his Japanese heritage.
It would take more than
55 years for the American government
to acknowledge that
he had rightfully earned
the nation's highest military award.
It was conferred on June 21st, 2000
by President Bill Clinton.
By the end of World War II,
the 442nd regimental
combat team proves to be
one of the most highly decorated
units in the United States Army.
They would return to Italy to break the
Gothic Line in the spring of 1945,
while the war in Europe still raged on.