Densho Digital Archive
gayle k. yamada Collection
Title: Sunao "Phil" Ishio Interview
Narrator: Sunao "Phil" Ishio
Interviewer: gayle k. yamada
Location: Washington, D.C.
Date: November 7, 2000
Densho ID: denshovh-isunao-01-0013

<Begin Segment 13>

gky: If you want to think about the one thing that you'd want you children to remember about your military service, what would it be?

[Interruption]

SI: I think the most important thing I want my children to remember about my service, and our service, Nisei service in the war, is that despite the fact that we were severely discriminated, that we were not trusted, we held a strong belief in the fact that if we did our duty, proved our loyalty, that the society for our children and our children's children to come would be much better because of the fact that we did this. And this I think is exemplified by the comments made by General Shinseki who acknowledges this, as well as Inouye. If it weren't for us, if it weren't for the 442nd, if it weren't for the MIS, that -- and I think in the book that Bill Hosokawa wrote, called Nisei -- have you read it? In it, he says that the -- I can't quote him word for word -- but in effect he said that the Nisei have expressed the idea that they were doing this for the security of their children, which is correct. We were doing this for our children, for posterity.

gky: You know, when you are twenty-two, twenty-four, you probably aren't about anything but the war, in the middle of a war. You probably aren't thinking about when I get out of war and have a family, you don't even know if you're going to get out of the war. So...

SI: Well this is -- what you are saying is that we were too young to think about posterity, about our children. Well, you start thinking about it. Of course, one of the main reasons is that why are we going out in harm's way, in effect. This is why. That's what I did it for. I'm pretty sure that Bill Hosokawa, after his interview with many of the Nisei regiments, came to the same conclusion, that doing it for posterity, for the security of our children, is the words that they used.

gky: Only he wasn't thinking of general children, but not his children, but the next generation.

SI: The next generation, yeah.

gky: What do you think you contributed the most, how do you think you contributed the most to the MIS during the years you served?

SI: Well, in my language work, I think I contributed as much as I could in doing language work. It involved translation as well as evaluation of propaganda work that was being broadcast, and things like that. So, you know, General -- what was his name? Willoughby was the G2 for -- G2 is intelligence -- for MacArthur. He stated that we shortened the war in the Pacific and saved thousands of lives. So, in a way, I think that's what we did. We weren't fighting with weapons, although we were trained to use weapons. Our weapon was the written word, the translation, the interrogation. And our weapon served to save quite a few lives, but also really shortened the war.

gky: How -- would you repeat that again, please?

SI: General Willoughby, Charles Willoughby, was the intelligence chief for General MacArthur, and in a speech that he made to one of the reunions after the war, MIS reunions, he said that the work of the Nisei in the Pacific shortened the war. He said two years. He used two million lives, but I think he meant countless thousands of lives. I think he meant on both sides.

gky: Can you tell me, how do you think the MIS influenced your life?

SI: Pardon?

gky: How do you think the MIS influenced your life?

SI: It had a great influence. As I say, I had a career in mind of establishing some sort of trade, export-import trade with the Far East, and if there had not been a war, I would not been in MIS and have pursued that field. As a matter of fact, actually, when I came back from the field, I applied for the Harvard Business School and they accepted me. And if I had gone there, I guess I would have pursued that. But the MIS, being in the MIS, of course, changed that.

gky: And what did you wind up doing?

SI: Worked for the government.

<End Segment 13> - Copyright © 2000 Bridge Media and Densho. All Rights Reserved.