Come With Us

For two hours the sound truck howled Japanese into the silent bamboo and sword grass of southern Guam's jungle. Suddenly from the green wall emerged a chubby, medium-sized young man, blinking in the sun. While U.S. officers watched, the Jap trudged up the hill and saluted. Ten months after the U.S. recapture of Guam, the last Japanese officer was willing to talk surrender.

Asked the Americans with a face-saving phrase: did the officer "wish to come with us?" Said the officer, after considerable discussion, he would consider it. "Come-with-us" day was set and the Jap returned to the jungle. Nine days later, while a Marine battalion gaped, the Japanese officer marched out with 33 infantrymen, plump from eating stolen U.S. C-rations, wearing stolen U.S. fatigue uniforms.

In more places than Guam, U.S. soldiers were beginning to detect some response to the blandishments of "come with us." On Okinawa 6,932 Japanese were prisoners (2,433 were Koreans and Okinawans). In the last days they had appeared in groups sometimes 50 strong, waving red, white & blue U.S. surrender leaflets. In the Philippines 609 surrendered to the 37th Division in 36 hours.

Some fissures were at last appearing in the armor of Bushido--the stern warrior code. By Western standards, the rate of surrender was still low indeed, but Japanese prisoners, once a rarity in the Pacific, were coming in as never before. Psychological warfare units worked hard to encourage more.

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