<Begin Segment 64>

TI: Okay, so let's keep talking. So you did ten days pretty much on a road, and then what happened?

RM: Then, finally arrived there at destination, that's a staging point, see, then they organize and a group who were gonna go where and then start off from there. And we started off 24th of February, finally get into the combat zone. And the way I found out the date was later on, I was awarded the medal and says that service is February 24th to certain date but the incident happened just one day but they cover up in about two weeks' time so that if people find out that, try to find out what happened, but they couldn't pinpoint what took place because my citation stamped "top secret."

TI: Right.

RM: 'Cause they don't want our enemy to know what happens.

TI: But let's talk about that period. Because at that point is when you entered the jungle as a combat unit and so why don't you talk about how that worked? I mean, what, at that point, what was your role and what did you do?

RM: Well, they formed the unit and I was assigned to 2nd Battalion. Then 2nd Battalion...

TI: And Roy, before we get that, why don't you explain roughly the three battalions and how the, each battalion was, was organized?

RM: Well --

TI: And where the Niseis --

RM: The group was regimental size and approximately three thousand, two hundred, I mean, 2,998, the exact number were assigned at the time. So they divided into three battalions, regimental size, so each battalion had approximately a thousand, nine hundred some men to each. And they divide that into two, so about five hundred men to each column, this called combat unit. And they color code it, see, 1st battalion had two column, two combat team, red and white; 2nd Battalion is blue and green; and 3rd Battalion is khaki... let's see...

TI: I can't remember, but there's six colors.

RM: Orange and khaki.

TI: Right, okay.

RM: So and I happened to be assigned to blue combat team I&R. I&R stand for Intelligence and Reconnaissance, in other words, a scout unit. So have to go first, the day --

TI: And before you go there, so there were six columns --

RM: Yeah.

TI: There were fourteen MIS, how were --

RM: Fourteen language team there. And two were picked by regimental headquarters so Sergeant Miyasaki and Sergeant Yoshimura were assigned to regimental headquarters. So there leave twelve others so divide in three battalions so each battalion had four linguists assigned. Then they're divided into two combat team each, so therefore two were assigned to green combat team and two were red and two were white. Each column had two linguists there.

TI: Okay. So roughly --

RM: And the way --

TI: For every five hundred fighting men there were two linguists, right?

RM: Two linguists to five hundred people. And one is supposed to be strong in English and one strong in Japanese. In other words, a Kibei and a Nisei team up to each, originally started that way. And so I team up with Sergeant Nakada and me and, Sergeant Sugeta and Bob Honda and Sergeant Honda and Sugeta, Sergeant Sugeta together.

<End Segment 64> - Copyright © 2003 Densho. All Rights Reserved.