Posted on 09/05/2007 10:41:32 PM PDT by Coleus
They lived in the Philippines, but they were members of the U.S. armed forces. More than 200,000 of them fought during World War II. Tens of thousands died before the final hard-won triumph over Japan. But in the decades following the war, the title of U.S. veteran -- and resulting compensation -- has eluded them. Now, Filipino-American World War II veterans, aided by their adult children, have stepped up a decades-long fight to get Congress to recognize them as bona fide U.S. veterans – a move that would qualify them for VA benefits.
"Our community has been lobbying for this bill for more than 40 years," said Ludivina Hughes, a Fair Lawn resident whose late father fought in World War II. "These men fought in this war, they fought side by side with Americans. Many of us fighting for them to be acknowledged are the sons and daughters of these veterans. We want the recognition that they deserve”. Some North Jersey towns have large concentrations of Filipinos. Bergenfield was home to 3,133 people of Filipino ancestry in the 2000 census; New Milford had more than 1,000 residents reporting Filipino roots, and Dumont, Hackensack and Teaneck each reported more than 800. Jersey City, however, dwarfed them all, with nearly 16,000 residents of Filipino descent.
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Fast facts • Ferdinand Magellan reached the Philippines and claimed the archipelago for Spain in 1521. It remained under Spanish rule for nearly 400 years. • Spain ceded the islands to the United States under the terms of the 1898 Treaty of Paris. The legacy of Spanish rule remains strong in the Philippines, where many people have Spanish names. • Filipinos and Americans fought together against Japan until the Japanese surrendered in 1945. In 1946, the Philippine Islands became the independent Republic of the Philippines. Source: U.S. State Department * * * By the numbers Filipino versus Asian population. Estimates based on household population. New Jersey Bergen County Passaic County Morris County Filipinos 110,817 21,628 3,838 4,641 Total Asians 620,588 118,918 22,400 40,651 Rank Third (17.8 %) Third (18.2 %) Third (17.1 %) Third (11.4 %) Source: U.S. Census Bureau, 2005 American Community Survey |
Proponents have met with the staffs of New Jersey's congressional delegation, traveled to Washington, D.C., to lobby and held forums to discuss the struggle for recognition. And the veterans and their families – who number in the dozens in New Jersey, and about 6,000 nationwide -- say victory has seldom seemed as close as it does now. After similar so-called equity bills have died in congressional committees over the years, this summer committees in both the U.S. Senate and House of Representatives approved measures that acknowledge the Filipinos' wartime service and declare them eligible for full benefits. At the same time, Congress raised the budget for veterans' health care by billions of dollars. And it has all come as the growing Filipino-American community has grown more vocal. They plan to lobby more assertively this fall, when the bill may come up for votes in both houses of Congress.
"It's a matter of honor, our dignity," said Fred Diaz, a 90-year-old veteran in Jersey City who heads a Filipino veterans group. "I fought with the Americans, I stood up to the Japanese. The American soldiers and the Filipinos were all one; we did not treat each other as separate units."
Diaz, a prim, diminutive man with an easy smile, beams with pride when he speaks about his service. One of his prized possessions is a tattered folder that holds documents – including the yellow-brown notice he received telling him he was drafted -- related to his wartime service and the struggle to regain U.S. veteran status. He always dons a uniform when he lobbies or takes part in demonstrations. He nearly always wears a Navy blue baseball cap that says "World War II veteran" in gold letters. A U.S.-born World War II veteran gave it to him, he said. Now, he gets slightly more than $600 a month in Social Security benefits. If the bill passes, he said, his monthly income could rise to nearly $1,000. Moreover, Filipino veterans living in the United States could move back to their native homeland and still receive their full military pension – something not allowed now. Another veteran from Jersey City -- 85-year-old Jose Genito -- proudly speaks of his efforts during the war to shield a wounded commander from further attack by the Japanese.
"I ran out into the open field and tried to cover him, and I got hit by shrapnel," he said, recounting the story behind the leg wounds that earned him a Bronze Star medal. "Other people warned me that my leg was bleeding badly, but I had to try to help my commander." Genito says that over time, each day that passes without action on the bill looms larger and larger. "It's been many years fighting for this, and we're in our twilight," he said. "We're in our 80s and 90s. Just since February, four veterans I knew from here in Jersey City have died."
Subject to draft
The designation of the Philippines as a U.S. territory before and during World War II enabled the United States to draft Filipinos, who were considered American nationals. They have all the legal protections that citizens have, but they do not have full political rights, such as the right to vote for president. Under U.S. law during the war, Filipino veterans were entitled to U.S. military veteran benefits. But after the Philippines gained independence in 1946, Congress passed the 1946 Rescission Act, stripping the Filipinos who had served in World War II of their U.S. veteran status. Though most of the veterans have died, those still alive say they hope to see the day they can regain their veteran status. Most of the Filipinos who served during World War II, they point out, did not live to see measures passed in 2000 and 2003 that allowed for those living in the United States to receive care in VA hospitals and be buried in military cemeteries.
They live mainly on fixed incomes, and say they could use the monthly military pension that other veterans and their widows receive. Now, those living in the United States receive Social Security benefits, which is several hundred dollars less per month than the pension they would receive if the equity bill passes. But it is equally important to them, they say, to be rid of the "second class" cloud they say has hovered over them since World War II. They find it bewildering that they were U.S. nationals when they were drafted and while they fought – with more than 50,000 losing their lives in the war – only to see their status stripped. The equity bill also provides recognition to Filipino World War II veterans who remained in the Philippines. Under the measure, those veterans, who number about 12,000, would receive a smaller monthly pension than their counterparts in the United States.
Doing it for dad
Hughes' father, Francisco de Asis, was one of those who lived in the Philippines. He died when she was just 3, and before she and her mother came to the United States. Her father was among roughly 80,000 Filipinos and Americans who fell captive to Japanese forces after a four-month battle. He was among those forced into the nearly two-week Bataan death march, but he escaped and hid in the home of a family for a few months, Hughes said. "Somehow, he made it back home from that family house," she said. "He walked for about 10 hours, hiding through mountains so he wouldn't be seen and captured again, until he got to our house." But even though the fight for recognition here has centered mostly on Filipino veterans living in the United States, Hughes says her passion for the equity bill is driven by the recognition that eluded her father. He could have benefited from the extra hundreds of dollars per month, she said, that the bill would give to veterans living in the Philippines.
But mostly, she said, she still feels she owes it to her father to fight for the honor she said he still deserves. "He was proud of his service; he even kept a diary of it, which my brother in the Philippines has," she said. Rep. Bob Filner, chairman of the House Veterans' Affairs Committee and a longtime proponent of equitable status for the Filipino veterans, said the United States has an obligation "in both historical and moral terms" to provide them U.S. veteran status. He said that over the years, a reluctance to steer money from other veteran programs and a view that the Filipino veterans were "foreigners" have stymied his efforts to garner support for the bill. But he is more hopeful now that the measure has moved out of congressional committees, and the veteran affairs budget has increased by billions. "They helped us win the battle in the Pacific," said the California Democrat. "They held up the Japanese advance after Pearl Harbor for months and months so we had time to prepare." For his part, Diaz said he will continue to chase the dream of U.S. veteran status. "I am proud that I was able to contribute, help recover the Philippines from the Japanese," he said. "Why do I keep fighting for recognition? Well, because I'm still alive."
Last time I looked, The Philippines was an independent country and its politicans were closing American bases to the spirited applause of their constituents.
You’re either independent or you’re not.
I rememeber meeting a Fillipino veteran in Vallejo California. He was a very nice fellow. Most Fillipino vets were paroled by the Japanese shortly after the Fall of Corregidor but many took the opportunity to join guerrilla units.
All kinds of kudos to those old warriors.
I do have to wonder if we’ll see members of the French resistance units who fought alongside also attempting to claim VA benefits...
Wonder what Michelle Malkin thinks about this.
We gave more money to Japan after the war to rebuild than we gave to the Phillipines.
I’m more than willing to see these guys get their VA benefits.
Can we really extend VA and pensions to every Tom, Dick and Harry that fought proxy for us?....
What about our boys who died there to free them from Jap butchers?
are they paying us...no, they ran us out last time I looked
it’s hard to save the whole world at once
if they gave us free base reign to counter the Red Chinese then geez...we might just happen to have some free medical there .
As they were considered U.S. nationals at the time and were subject to our draft, they deserve the status of U.S. Veterans and all that entails.
They were US nationals at the time of the fighting. So they should be considered US vets. Whether they should get VA benefits is another question. Many Filipino veterans immigrated to the US directly after the war and acquired citizenship. I don’t think there should be any doubt about their right to VA benefits. The ones that didn’t and stayed in the Philippines at the time of independence lost their status as US nationals. In my opinion, if a Filipino vet immigrated to the US and acquired US citizenship in a reasonable period after the war (maybe within 15 years) then they deserve to get VA benefits. Otherwise they have shown that they didn’t value US citizenship highly enough (not that that is an insult to Filipinos, but it should be disqualifying for US government benefits).
Give them the benefits.
Filipino politicians are not the same as the Filipino people
The Filipinos were 80%+ for retaining the bases in 1991.
The politicos were trying to squeeze the last possible dollar out of the US for base agreements, and so delayed the treaty. The volcano intervened, and the US decided that rebuilding Clark AFB was not cost effective given the end of the Cold War. The Filipino politicians went around blaming each other for losing the bases, to deflect the popular disgust.
Even today, if the US were to propose installing new bases (pointless as that may be), the Filipinos would have a strong majority for them, which you may not hear because the media will focus on the tiny and noisy minority of leftists and ultra-nationalists.
I quite agree with your opinion.
They were never subject to the US draft.
In 1941-42 they were subject to a draft for the Philippine Commonwealth, the status of which as an independent country was ambiguous. My grand-uncle was drafted and served on Bataan.
In 1942-46 they were not subject to any draft, and those who served as guerillas or in US or Philippine regular units were all volunteers. Several uncles fought as guerillas, though as far as I know none of them applied for benefits.
Only about 50% of those Filipinos who served on Bataan survived to be paroled by the Japanese. The rest died in battle, on the Death march, or, like a granduncle, from starvation and disease in the POW camps.
There is a very strong case from the Filipino point of view that it was US strategy that put the Philippines on the Japanese invasion route. If the Philippines had been fully independent without US forces it could have negotiated an arrangement with Japan as did Thailand or French Indo-China, and escaped the worst of the war.
Alternately the US could have avoided war with Japan altogether had it wanted to, and thus also spared the Philippines. Or it could have put the war off for several years anyway.
President Quezon spent 1941 tearing his hair out about Roosevelts provoking the Japanese with embargoes, etc. He was terrified - with good reason, seeing the disasters that war brought. The cost of US strategy (which was eminently justified in the big picture) was paid partly by a ruined Philippines with a million dead.
Japan attacked us, there was no reason to ‘put the war off for several years’. Doing so would not have made the situation any better
Why did Japan attack the US ?
a. Because it had been forced into a corner by US embargoes, of steel, oil, and eventually of credit, so that it could no longer trade to obtain raw materials. Its economy was facing collapse.
It had to choose between accepting Roosevelts ultimatums vs
continuing its war against China and its aggression against the European colonies in Asia.
If Roosevelt had let Japan do as it wished in Asia it would have happily done so without attacking the US or its Asian posessions.
That would have been better for the Philippines but much worse for the world. The Philippines paid dearly.
The volcano threw the US out - or rather, the US chose to leave, post-volcano.
The Filipinos were all for the US staying, save for a noisy few. I saw Philippine polls throughout 1991 that had 80%+ in favor of the US bases.
I bet those Filipino polls were not reported by the US media, which no doubt concentrated on the nastiest anti-American leftists it could find to represent the Filipino point of view.
Did you miss this?
“Under U.S. law during the war, Filipino veterans were entitled to U.S. military veteran benefits. But after the Philippines gained independence in 1946, Congress passed the 1946 Rescission Act, stripping the Filipinos who had served in World War II of their U.S. veteran status.”
FRENCH “resistance” units obviously wouldn’t be entitled to U.S. benefits anymore than, say, British vets. That’s because they weren’t fighting on behalf of the U.S. as part of U.S. military units. The Filipinos were.
happily continued the rape of Manchuria and pillaging of the weaker nations. That was the reason for the embargoes, but lets act like history starts with those. Japan was not an innocent bystander by any stretch of the imagination and it was using an attack on Pearl Harbor as a training tool for a decade before the actual attack.
Yup.
You’d be surprised to hear how many people think Japan just whacked us out of the blue just for spite. While it’s true that a conflict between the U.S. and Japan was becoming increasingly likely given both countries’ desire for hegemony in the Pacific, Japan was prompted to attack for the reasons you gave.
You don’t attack a vastly more powerful enemy, particularly while engaged with other countries, without a good reason.
Ex-Royal Laos get VA benefits. Why not these old timers from the PI ?
That would have been better for the Philippines but much worse for the world. The Philippines paid dearly.
Japan needed to secure the oil-rich Dutch East Indies, and the sea routes to Japan. The Philippines sat right on that route, as well as the British "Gibraltar of the East" at Singapore. Japanese strategy was to destroy British and America's ability to strike the ships on these sea lanes and interrupt supply to the Home Islands with their fleets.
Immediately after December 7/8, Japan pushed its eastern defensive perimeter of islands out as far as possible to force the US to fight through an arc of islands from the Aleutians to Wake to the Marshalls and New Guinea.
Had Pearl Harbor been completely destroyed, and if the Carriers had been caught in harbor there, the US would have been forced to start it's counter attack from the West Coast without the ability to fully supply the effort. Japan missing the chance to destroy the oil storage tanks at Pearl permitted the remaining US Fleet to continue opertions. If one bomb had hit these all would hve been destroyed and all of the Pacific fleet's fuel east of san Fransisco would have been gone.
Coral Sea and Midway would never have been able to happen when they did. It would have been 1944 before offensive action would have been able to start. Guadalcanal and New Guinea would have been a disasters, if even attempted. Parts of Australia would probably been occupied.
The Philippine Scouts and Filipino members of the armed Forces of the US were brave and resilient comrades. They should be given their US Veteran status.
Sorry. You sound quite like like the apologists who say we "forced" Japan into war.
We did no such thing. It was well within our rights, no, it was our moral DUTY to do whatever we could to make life difficult for the Japanese, who were in the process of trying to brutally subjugate China in the 1930's. Don't you remember that?
Or do you think we should have let bygones be bygones, that what the Japanese did to Manchuria and China was none of our business?
I do not buy your argument for a second.
We knew full well what was going on in China...If we had known full well what was going on in Germany as well, should we have just avoided conflict there as well? Hm?
Sure. The Japanese weren't hurting US. Why should WE bother them. Heck. We could say the same thing about the Nazis. Or the Soviet Union in the Cold War. They weren't directly attacking us, why should we impede them in any way.
Churchill was right about classifying some people as appeasers who feed the crocodiles hoping they will be eaten last.
I am just curious...do you subscribe to the "theory" that Roosevelt knew about the attack on Pearl Harbor in advance, but did nothing and sacrificed the lives of 2,000+ men to get the USA into the war?
These guys deserve the recognition and the benefits. This is shameful.:(
Is it true that at the time of the war, the Phillipines were a U.S. territory? If that is the case then they should get VA bennies.The fought along side American troops against the japs so in my judgement they should qualify and a hell of alot sooner than 60 years on.
You sir, have a very screwed up view of how things were.
The last time you looked wasn't during World War II. The Philippines gained independence from the US in 1946. During the war, Filipinos served in the US armed forces, and were even subject to the draft.
They fought as bravely and suffered as greatly as anyone in the US armed forces, and turn our backs on them is shameful.
I lived in the Phillippines. Not all of them protested our presence. They had a very corrupt government at the time with a growing muslim presence.
Somewhere or other Churchill wrote of the Filipinos that they were about the only colonial people that “stood by their salt” when the Japanese attacked, aiding the colonizer against the Japanese.
From what I’ve heard the Filipinos served faithfully and suffered greatly, we should take care of them.
Its the Merchant Mariners vying for vet status that get my goat. Unless I’m misinformed they made much higher wages than sailors, got substantial bonuses for the Murmansk run and other war zone sailing and weren’t subject to the draft.
To me, them asking for vet benefits now because they got shot at while performing civilian tasks would be like a factory worker in a military industry trying for vet status because their factory got bombed by the enemy.
I subscribe to the view that Roosevelt should have been impeached in his first term for conspiring with a junior member of the British Parliament to drag us into the 2nd European land war in a generation.
The fact that he bungled us into a Pacific Ocean war would have been the 2nd Article.
L
OK. I live in the Philippines. I know some of these brave veterans and I know that they deserve to be given what was promised to them.
The Philippines was a U.S. Territory at the time and most of these guys WERE drafted, but they would have joined the U.S. Army anyway. Some of these guys risked, (and some lost), there lives protecting/hiding U.S. soldiers out of the extreme respect the Filinos had for our soldiers.
The U.S. govt made a promise and then reneged on it after the war was over, just like they have done to U.S. military retirees living overseas.
Did you know that a military retiree living overseas whom has reached medicre eligibility must pay for maedicare part B (almost $100.00 per month), in order to still be eligible for the military health care benefits (Tricare), but medicare is not available to U.S. citizens living outside of the U.S. and therefor the part B premiums must be psaid but the retiree must pay 25% co-pay and $150.00 a year deductible that his/her counterpart in the U.S. does not have to pay.
Our govt needs to start honoring their promises and treating everyone equally.
Ken
Yes. The Philippines was a U.S. possession from 1898 to 1946 (albeit occupied by Japan 1942-1945). From 1935 to 1946 it was a commonwealth with a significant level of self-government, but was still technically a U.S. possession until full independence after the war.
I've wondered why we don't allow Filipinos more advantages when it comes to immigration over other nationalities, given our special relationship.
They had a “very corrupt government” since 1907. The government of 1991 was nothing special that way.
The Muslim presence is not growing, there are actually very few Muslims, but they have been troublesome for 400 years. I have ancestors who were fighting them in the early 19th century.
People that protested the US presence were always a tiny clique.
Japan was not of course an innocent bystander. It was a primary villain.
The US did nothing much for China from 1931 to 1940, and had no obligation to do so in 1941. The key was the fall of France in 1940, and the vulnerability of the Allied colonies. Roosevelt could not sit back and see the Allies defeated through a Japanese “stab in the back”. For geopolitical reasons he also had to get the US in the war.
Both the US and Japan had been wargaming and planning strategies for 40 years. Why do you think the US gave Manila such heavy coastal fortifications before 1914 ?
But that did not mean that war was inevitable in 1941.
that is far out revisionist blame the victim spinning.
the US abandoned the Philippines after being attacked at Pearl because they could not defend them against Imperial forces.
ultimately we spent a lot of capital and lives freeing them from the Japs
what makes you think if the Philippines had been independent they would have capitulated to a Vichy arrangement with Japan?
Thailand?
Hell, the government were gxddamned collaborators with the Jap monsters.....they killed or helped kill their own citizens who resisted the Japs and even our own OSS and others and went so far as to declare war on the Allies...or tried to. That cowardly government was ultimately overthrown by it’s own folks in 44.....thank God.
Helluva strategy....accommodate and become the enemy rather than fight for your own sovereignty...great.
French Indochina?
basically the same Collaborators from Vichy France by extension except for the Vietminh and mountain and Delta folk resisting the Japs
collaboration and submission are not victories nor rarely pragmatically justified.
who taught you this stuff?
Roosevelt flawed as he was did not need to provoke the irrationally brutal and optimistic Imperial forces.
Type Rape of Nanking into Google just for starters....all before Roosevelt coulda tweaked those poor wuttle Jap sissies...
geez man... I pinged a professor, let's ask him
I think I have a very conventional view in fact.
By now, it shouldn’t come as a surprise that the press is capable of creating - perhaps deliberately- impressions that may be 180 degrees to the facts, through selective reporting alone.
enabled the United States to draft Filipinos, who were considered American nationals...Miss this?
Yes, they were a very catholic nation. But if I understand correctly, muslims completely dominate one of the islands.
I’ve read that the muslim presence currently is growing. Can’t say for sure, I haven’t been there in over a decade.
True.
These warriors we're fighting for something higher, regardless of who they fought with also.
...their own freedom.
Leaving aside pure opportunism, the Japanese invaded for the sake of oil because there was no other way to obtain it given Allied hostility. The US had embargoed them, and the Allies (principally the British and the Dutch) went along.
No embargo = no economic imperative to go out on a strategic limb.
The Japanese also needed to obtain the cooperation of Thailand and French Indochina, once they had decided on war, and they did, without an invasion. The Japanese South Sea offensive was actually principally staged and supplied through Indochina, out of Saigon and Haiphong.
Both countries (or their Vichy French masters in the case of Indochina) cut deals that spared them the worst of the war. The Philippine government also was panicked into contemplating such deals, but ultimately this was impossible because of its status.
The cost to the US for its (very necessary) abandonment of isolationism was 400,000 dead. The cost to the Philippines was about 1,000,000 dead.
Muslims have always been about 5% of the population, being the majority in a few small islands and a portion of the
large island of Mindanao.
No, they aren’t growing. Their militancy waxes and wanes. They were most troublesome recently in the mid-1970’s.
Back in the mid-19th century and earlier they were the periodic scorge of the islands, making their living through piracy and slave-raids. All over the Philippine southern coasts there are the ruins of watchtowers that guarded against Muslim raiders.
These are the same shopworn arguments used against Iraq: if we'd only left things alone . . . ." Or, 9/11: "If we had just not backed the Jews/gone into Kuwait/blah blah." Funny how NO OTHER POWER in history has any control over its own destiny. The Japanese were just manipulated into taking 1/3 of China, all of Korea, all of Indochina, Indonesia, and so on.
There are BAD nations in the world. Nothing we could have done would have kept the Philippines free in 1942; but WE, among all others, DID liberate them.
“the US abandoned the Philippines after being attacked at Pearl because they could not defend them against Imperial forces.”
The US did not abandon the Philippines. US forces in the Philippines fought to the end. The US was simply incapable, in the short term, of a successful resistance, given the way US military resources had been allocated by the end of 1941. Which is a another issue entirely - had the US put the effort into strengthening the Philippines that it did in assisting Britain, the Philippines need never have fallen. Just as a for instance - the US had shipped thousands of fighter planes to Britain by November 1941. The Philippines had 100 fighters to defend it in December 1941.
“what makes you think if the Philippines had been independent they would have capitulated to a Vichy arrangement with Japan?”
This is very likely because Manuel Quezon, the president of the Philippine Commonwealth, in his panic, was proposing such an arrangement.
“Hell, the government were gxddamned collaborators with the Jap monsters”
The “government” mostly left the country - Quezon and Osmena. Some of the rump that was left cooperated. Many didn’t and were executed. That government was irrelevant as the country was under Japanese military administration.
“collaboration and submission are not victories nor rarely pragmatically justified.”
You are perhaps a bit naive. This does work for a weak country quite often - like it works to hand your wallet over to a mugger. It did work for Thailand and French Indochina. Bangkok and Saigon and Hanoi were still standing in 1945, Manila wasn’t. The Japanese massacred the Filipinos (and the Chinese, etc.) because they were hostile to Japan. The Japanese did not massacre (or much less so) the Indonesians, the Vietnamese or the Thais.
My point is that cowardice was an option to an independent country, and that would very likely have saved the Philippines most of the costs of WWII. The Philippines did not have the option of cowardice, partly because it was not independent.
This is my response too. I laud these brave soldiers-—the Japanese treated them far worse than they treated our own men-—but you can’t on the one hand be an independent country and then say, “But we won’t take care of our vets.”
#1 “Roosevelt “provoked” Japan “
This is perfectly valid. He did. More than that, he put them up against the economic wall - they had six months supply of petroleum and no way to get more without grabbing Borneo and Surabaya.
#2 “and “allowed” Pearl Harbor to occur”
This is not valid and does not follow from #1
Your cryptographers, etc. would have a lot to say about #2, but not #1.
I am in fact on Roosevelts side on this. He did right. But what he did came with costs. There were other paths that could have been followed, that would have been much less costly over the short term but perhaps disastrous in the long.
“Nothing we could have done would have kept the Philippines free in 1942”
Yes there were. It was the end result of two decades of negelect of the US armed forces, right up to 1940, long after Europe started re-arming. The US was the last major power to put itself on a war footing.
And it came from a stinginess towards the Philippines in the 1930’s. The Philippines had to build a military from nothing, on a shoestring, using its own pitiful tax base, while in a dangerous neighborhood, while being exposed to attack through the presence of US bases. This stinginess was impossible to rectify in the two months the Philippine Army had to mobilize in 1941.
And then the first fruits of US rearmament went not to its obligatory responsibilities in Asia but to Britain. A fraction of the weapons and shipping and funds that went to Britain in 1940-41 could have secured the Philippines.
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