For WWII vets, kamikaze raids still hurt
The World War II veteran doesn't begrudge the sailors their 154 medals or the memorial built at Norfolk Naval Station in Virginia in memory of the 17 men and women who died in the terrorist attack.
But he thinks America has overlooked the sailors who endured months of daily attacks by 4,000 Japanese kamikazes during World War II. Japan has built its own memorial for its kamikazes, or "divine wind," who sank or damaged 238 ships in Okinawa alone, killing 4,907 sailors.
"Anyone that had to face eye-to-eye one of those kamikazes was easily as brave as those Japanese pilots," said Sholin, 79, of Bonney Lake. "People faced them over and over, like a recurring nightmare from a real-life Alfred Hitchcock film."
Back home, nobody knew the magnitude of the carnage during the 1945 Battle for Okinawa, the U.S. military's last stop before the planned invasion of Japan. The military didn't want the Japanese to know how effective their kamikazes were, so seamen were told to keep mum. Then the nuclear attacks on Japan ended the war, just months after Okinawa, and everybody went home and tried to forget.
Sholin and other vets who survived kamikaze attacks think they never received recognition for what they went through.
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About 400 veterans from throughout the country will begin arriving in Everett today for the reunion, which starts tomorrow and continues through Wednesday. "I know it's going to be a tearful reunion," Sholin said. "These guys have had this locked into their guts for all these years."
Russell MacGilvray, 81, served aboard the USS Pringle, one of 148 Navy destroyers that served "picket-line" duty during the three-month Battle for Okinawa. Sholin calls them the Navy's "sacrificial lambs," because they were positioned ahead of the aircraft carriers to take the brunt of the kamikaze onslaught.
MacGilvray keenly remembers standing on the bridge of the Pringle, off the coast of Okinawa, and seeing several kamikazes diving through the sky.
The young seaman wasn't especially rattled: He had already seen hundreds of the suicide bombers, including one who had smashed into the Pringle just 15 weeks earlier, killing 11 shipmates.
As he watched through a spyglass, his own ship's anti-aircraft guns blew up two kamikazes. But a third swooped closer, just 100 feet above the Pacific Ocean. He saw the pilot's face just before the plane crashed into the destroyer, exploding a 1,000-pound bomb.
"I never heard anything," said MacGilvray, now an Edmonds retiree. "I was unconscious, then one of the signalmen tapped me on the shoulder and told me to abandon ship. It split the ship right in half."
No rescue came as he bobbed in the frigid waters — the other American ships were on zigzag courses, avoiding more kamikaze attacks. So finally he and a fellow seaman swam to another vessel.
"I lay down on the deck and I looked at one sailor and I said, 'What the heck were you shooting at us for?' He said, 'We weren't actually shooting at you, we were shooting at the sharks that were following you.' "
MacGilvray, who suffered burns, shrapnel wounds and a concussion, was awarded a Purple Heart for that April 16, 1945, attack, which killed 93 of the Pringle's 320 crew members. But a promised unit citation and presidential citation for the entire crew never materialized.
Retired Navy Capt. Jim Boyd, 85, is driving up from Northern California for the reunion. As captain of the USS Lardner, he helped rescue comrades aboard his previous ship, the USS Borie, when kamikazes struck the destroyer at Okinawa and killed 80 sailors.
"The biggest fear really that we had, including myself, was the fear that we wouldn't be able to conduct ourselves well. It was a strange thing, it was really hard to understand, that we all seemed to be able to get up and do our jobs," he said.
Retired Adm. Robert Spiro is coming too, flying from Virginia. He was a supply officer during the war, serving aboard destroyers.
While he saw many men do valiant things without any official commendations, he doesn't think the Navy was too spare in handing out medals at war's end.
"Medals are supposed to be won for unusual heroism, and we had a good deal of that on my ship when we were hit 56 years ago," he said. "We all just did heroic things, fighting the fires. And each officer had a little container of syrettes — measured doses of morphine — (for when) someone had a leg blown off, or a gaping wound."
Some military historians argue it was tougher to earn a medal or citation during World War II than in later years, so it's not surprising that crew members of the Cole received so many medals.
Spiro agreed the standards for medals have changed. "I'm not criticizing anybody, but when you have the USS Cole in what we thought was a friendly harbor and the ship gets blown up, doesn't come near to sinking, I'm sorry but I don't see an act of heroism."
But Navy Atlantic Fleet spokesman Cmdr. Terry Sutherland said standards should be different in peacetime.
"It's one thing when you're on a picket station; in war, you expect some things. Whereas the Cole was like the bombing of Pearl Harbor, no one expected it," he said, so the impact was more traumatic.
The kamikaze-survivors reunion is to conclude with a banquet Wednesday, featuring a speech by Capt. Daniel Squires, commanding officer of Naval Station Everett.
Thursday, the group is invited to the Navy base to help welcome and tour its newest ship, the guided-missile destroyer USS Shoup.
Most reunion attendees were stationed aboard destroyers, Sholin said. In all, 85 ships will be represented.
"They're just eager to shout their stories from the rooftops, because it's been bottled up all their lives," he said. "This is a piece of history that needs to be told, and needs to be taught."
Diane Brooks can be reached at 206-464-2567 or dbrooks@seattletimes.com.