Saving Private Ryan was great, but here's a real story from the landing

[GFootsXtreme]

I really enjoyed that movie, and who didn't? I have read a great deal on the history of WWII and the invasion.

The one thing that always bothered me about the beach landing is that it happened too fast -- in 20 minutes they landed, stormed up the beach and took out the Germans. Now granted, that was a movie so they compressed things a lot, but the truth is that the landing was initially a disaster that took hours and hours before anything good came of it.

here is the best account i have ever read of what happened that morning...click the link to read. No politics here, simply an amazing, well told version of the events and confusion that ended up being our nation's finest hour.

http://www.theatlantic.com/doc/196011/omaha

[Brother Love]

storming the beach was time consuming and we suffered heavy casualties but i think it was necessary to achieve the objective at hand. yah we went into thinking it wouldnt be so bad but it was still necessary to do it.

[Randle Pat McMurphy]

The greatest generation. The sacrifices our country, and especially these men, made is hard to comprehend. As you know, many of these men are dying off everyday as most are well into their 80's. What is sad to me is how many of them have chosen to never tell their story.

I have a chance to meet World War II vets in my line of work. It is fascinating to see their reactions when you thank them for their service. For many, the subject is still very personal and moving. I regret not taking the time to document some of their stories and names.

Here is a link to one story I came across today: http://www.mishalov.com/doss-obit.html


Here is his story, I would be interested in hearing your reactions:

Desmond T. Doss, 87, Heroic War Objector, Dies

New York Times, March 25, 2006

By Richard Goldstein

Desmond T. Doss, who as an unarmed Army medic saved the lives of dozens of fellow soldiers under fire on Okinawa in World War II and became the first conscientious objector to receive the Medal of Honor, died Thursday, 23 March 2006, at his home in Piedmont, Ala. He was 87. His death was announced by his wife, Frances, who said he had recently been hospitalized with breathing difficulties.

Mr. Doss, a member of the Seventh-day Adventist Church, was guided all through his years by a framed poster of the Ten Commandments and the Lord's Prayer that his father bought at an auction when he was growing up in Lynchburg, Va. That poster depicted Cain holding a club with the slain Abel beneath him.

"And when I looked at that picture, I came to the Sixth Commandment, 'Thou shalt not kill,' " Mr. Doss told Larry Smith in "Beyond Glory," an oral history of Medal of Honor winners. "I wondered, how in the world could a brother do such a thing? It put a horror in my heart of just killing, and as a result I took it personally: 'Desmond, if you love me, you won't kill.' "

When Mr. Doss was drafted in April 1942 after working in a shipyard, he was given conscientious objector status, having declined to bear arms because of his religious principles. He became a medic, the only way he could adhere to the Sixth Commandment as well as the Fourth Commandment, to honor the Sabbath. Seventh-day Adventists consider Saturday the Sabbath, but Mr. Doss felt he could serve as a medic seven days a week since, as he put it, "Christ healed on the Sabbath."

While training at stateside posts, Private Doss faced harassment from fellow soldiers for his devotion to prayer and his refusal to handle weapons or work on the Sabbath. At one point, he recalled, an officer sought to have him discharged on the ground of mental illness.

He went overseas with the 307th Infantry, 77th Infantry Division, in the summer of 1944 and served as a combat medic on Guam and at Leyte in the Philippines, receiving the Bronze Star, before taking part in the battle for Okinawa in the spring of 1945.

Private Doss was accompanying troops in the battle for a 400-foot-high ridge on Okinawa, the Maeda Escarpment, on Saturday, May 5 — his Sabbath — when the Japanese counterattacked. Many of the Americans were driven off the ridge, but wounded soldiers were stranded atop it.

Private Doss remained with the wounded, and, according to his Medal of Honor citation, he refused to seek cover, carrying them, one by one, in the face of enemy fire. He lowered each man on a rope-supported litter he had devised, using double bowline knots he had learned as a youngster and tying the makeshift litter to a tree stump serving as an anchor. Every wounded man was lowered to a safe spot 35 feet below the ridgetop, and then Private Doss came down the ridge unscathed.

After engaging in additional rescue efforts under fire over the next two weeks, Private Doss was wounded by a grenade that riddled him with shrapnel. He cared for his injuries alone for five hours, rather than have another medic emerge from cover to help him. While he was finally being carried off on a litter, he spotted a soldier who seemed worse off. He leaped off the litter, directing his aid men to help the other soldier.

Soon after that, Japanese fire hit him, and he suffered a compound arm fracture. He bound a rifle stock to his shattered arm as a splint, evidently the closest he ever came to handling a weapon, and crawled 300 yards to an aid station.

President Harry S. Truman presented him with the Medal of Honor on Oct. 12, 1945, for his actions on Okinawa. The citation credited him with saving 75 soldiers on that ridge, but he later said that the number was probably closer to 50.

Mr. Doss spent more than five years in hospitals being treated for his wounds and lost a lung to tuberculosis. Because of his infirmities, he was unable to seek steady work. He devoted himself to his religion and worked with young people in church-sponsored programs, living for many years in Rising Fawn, Ga., before moving to Alabama.

In addition to his wife, Frances, he is survived by his son, Desmond Jr., of Astoria, Ore., from his marriage to his first wife, Dorothy, who died in 1991; three stepchildren, Thomas Duman of Hixson, Tenn.; Michael Duman of Piedmont; and Marilyn Shadduck of Palm Springs, Calif.; a brother, Harold, of Kearneysville, W.Va.; nine stepgrandchildren; and five stepgreat-grandchildren.

Only one other conscientious objector has received the Medal of Honor: Cpl. Thomas W. Bennett, an Army medic in the Vietnam War who was killed in February 1969 tending to wounded soldiers in Pleiku Province.

"From a human standpoint, I shouldn't be here to tell the story," Mr. Doss told The Richmond Times-Dispatch in 1998. "All the glory should go to God. No telling how many times the Lord has spared my life."

[The Judge]

Desmond T. Doss: Medal of Honor Citation
He was a company aid man when the 1st Battalion assaulted a jagged escarpment 400 feet high. As our troops gained the summit, a heavy concentration of artillery, mortar and machinegun fire crashed into them, inflicting approximately 75 casualties and driving the others back. Pfc. Doss refused to seek cover and remained in the fire-swept area with the many stricken, carrying them 1 by 1 to the edge of the escarpment and there lowering them on a rope-supported litter down the face of a cliff to friendly hands.

On 2 May, he exposed himself to heavy rifle and mortar fire in rescuing a wounded man 200 yards forward of the lines on the same escarpment; and 2 days later he treated 4 men who had been cut down while assaulting a strongly defended cave, advancing through a shower of grenades to within 8 yards of enemy forces in a cave's mouth, where he dressed his comrades' wounds before making 4 separate trips under fire to evacuate them to safety.

On 5 May, he unhesitatingly braved enemy shelling and small arms fire to assist an artillery officer. He applied bandages, moved his patient to a spot that offered protection from small arms fire and, while artillery and mortar shells fell close by, painstakingly administered plasma.

Later that day, when an American was severely wounded by fire from a cave, Pfc. Doss crawled to him where he had fallen 25 feet from the enemy position, rendered aid, and carried him 100 yards to safety while continually exposed to enemy fire. On 21 May, in a night attack on high ground near Shuri, he remained in exposed territory while the rest of his company took cover, fearlessly risking the chance that he would be mistaken for an infiltrating Japanese and giving aid to the injured until he was himself seriously wounded in the legs by the explosion of a grenade. Rather than call another aid man from cover, he cared for his own injuries and waited 5 hours before litter bearers reached him and started carrying him to cover.

The trio was caught in an enemy tank attack and Pfc. Doss, seeing a more critically wounded man nearby, crawled off the litter; and directed the bearers to give their first attention to the other man. Awaiting the litter bearers' return, he was again struck, this time suffering a compound fracture of 1 arm. With magnificent fortitude he bound a rifle stock to his shattered arm as a splint and then crawled 300 yards over rough terrain to the aid station.

Through his outstanding bravery and unflinching determination in the face of desperately dangerous conditions Pfc. Doss saved the lives of many soldiers. His name became a symbol throughout the 77th Infantry Division for outstanding gallantry far above and beyond the call of duty.