100th Combat Battalion

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Pages: 5

At War
The 100th Combat Battalion was an all was an all Japanese-American force, made up of volunteers from Hawaii. The 100th battalion was created under the command of general Emmons, who was notably less racist than General DeWitt, seeing many volunteers waiting to prove their loyalty, Emmons was able to get permission to form an Japanese American unit, though they were not allowed to fight in the pacific, when it was opened up for volunteers, over 9,000 volunteers signed up to serve in the special unit. The first batch of volunteers (~1,400) were sent off to Camp McCoy. At McCoy, they went through training and loyalty tests as officers still doubted them. Soon after completing training the men were transferred to the American fifth army,
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Training for the MIS had started about 2 months prior to the events of Pearl Harbor, in preparation for war. The MIS was small compared to those who went to Europe, about 6000 men, about half that actually going to the frontlines, but they still played an important role on the pacific front. Their job was translation and interpretation of captured Japanese documents, radio communications, and code breaking, among the documents they translated was a complete list of all active duty officers and the battle plans for the defense of the Philippines. The MIS joined the army in their island hoping strategy, translating documents found of the field, and on occasion sneaking close to enemy camps to listen if on officers. One of their most dangerous jobs was talking entrenched enemy soldiers into surrender, they were pretty good at it too. According to Charles Willoughby the Chief of Intelligence “the Nisei MIS, Shortened the war by two years.” They faced dangers form both friend and foe, on one hand they were in American uniforms and on the other they looked a lot like the people who they were supposed to shoot. By the end of the war MIS members were on USS Missouri, to translate documents for the Japanese surrender, then served in the postwar occupation of Japan reestablishing order, and then repairing