NOTE TO THE READER The following is an account by my father, Charles Norman Manhoff, of his experiences as a Marine in World War II. The name of the book, Magne‘s War, comes from a childhood nickname. Pronounced ―Mag-nee‖, the title was bestowed on him by a friend one afternoon shortly after they had been studying Middle Ages European history and its most prominent king, Charlemagne. Since my father was ―Charlie‖ to his friends and his family, it was probably only natural that he would get the regal, if oddly pronounced, nickname of ―Charlie-Magne‖ and eventually, just ―Magne.‖ My understanding of my father‘s important, albeit small, role in history didn‘t spring up fully formed. Growing up, at first I knew only that my Dad was something called a ―Marine‖ and had fought in a war called ―World War II‖. Naturally, as small boys will, I had a fascination with all things martial and would prod my father for stories of the war. The places he spoke of – ―New Britain‖, ―Peleliu‖, ―Bloody Nose Ridge‖, and ―Okinawa‖ –meant very little at first. Nor did the people he talked about – a close buddy named Russ Keyes, some officer he liked a lot named ―Chesty‖ and another he disliked a lot named ―Rupertus.‖ But the stories, sometimes sad and sometimes surprisingly funny, were always fascinating. As I grew, I became an avid reader of military history, particularly World War II since it had such a direct connection with my family. I realized that many of the places and names that I heard from my father‘s stories were also ones that had played crucial roles in the Pacific campaign and in Marine Corps history. I read about Lt. General (then Colonel) Lewis B. ―Chesty‖ Puller, the most decorated Marine in the Corps‘ history and the ultimate ―Marine‘s Marine‖. I read about the strange and sad career of Major General William Rupertus – the writer of the ―Rifleman‘s Creed‖ (the one that begins ―This is my rifle. There are many like it, but this one is mine.‖) repeated to this day by new Marine recruits but also the commander of the needless (something that, in fairness, was out of Rupertus‘s control) and needlessly bloody (something very much in his control) battle of Peleliu. The full story of that period in my father‘s life took years to assemble. Random conversations would reveal more and more of the story. One day, in my teens I think, I said something along the lines of, ―Dad, didn‘t you say that you were in Chesty Puller‘s regiment in Peleliu?‖ Imagine my surprise when I got the reply, ―In his regiment? Well, actually, I was his bodyguard and runner during the battle.‖ Of course, this led to some more questions about General Puller‘s character and I think that was the time that I learned about the ―pineapple juice‖ story. (In fact, in the first draft of the book, my father left that particular story out and I had to ask him to include it.) 1 Conversations like the one above over thirty years finally lead to a somewhat delayed epiphany. Gradually, knitting together his stories and the histories of the Pacific battles, I came to understand that my father had been witness to, and very much a part of, some very interesting points in American history. Finally, I told Dad that he needed to write this stuff down. Thankfully, he honored this request and the result is the book that you now hold. Russ Keyes, who you will meet in this book, was a regimental scout with my father during the war and a dear friend after it until his death in 2005. A tri-state wrestling champion, Russ was well-liked in the scout platoon but considered something of a dumb cluck. Of course, after the war, ―dumb ol‘ Russ‖ pioneered the concept of time-share boat slip rentals and made many millions of dollars. When I met him, well into his 50‘s by then, he was still the sweet, charming man that my father had befriended so many years before. You would have never have guessed that he was a self-made millionaire by his demeanor except for his habit of buying vintage Mercedes cars (that he would keep for a year and then sell at a profit). When I graduated from high school, he sent me a beautiful engraved Parker pen set that I have to this day. Russ is gone now, as are too many of the men and women who served during that war. Yet he, and my father, are what I know of those veterans. ―The Greatest Generation‖ has been said so often that it almost has become cliché, yet I know that it is true. Boys before the war and made into men during it, they came home, married, had families, and sought success in the civilian world by applying the lessons they had learned in Europe, and across the many islands of the Pacific. They didn‘t whine or complain about how horrible their experiences had been; they faced their struggles and overcame them here as they did there. They created, through both struggles, a standard of living that has not been matched by any civilized society in history. And we owe them our thanks. I would be tempted to say the Greatest Generation was followed by the ungrateful ones. The Vietnam War Memorial was dedicated to much fanfare a mere nine years after our troops left the battlefield. A beautiful memorial and one that was fairly earned by those who fought in that particular hell. Still, one can‘t help but notice that the WWII vets, with 10 times the casualties of Vietnam, had to wait almost 50 years before they received similar tribute (after ―only‖ four attempts to introduce the bill in Congress by Marcy Kaptur from Ohio). Of course, some still didn‘t like the break-neck pace that Congress set in establishing the memorial– Wikipedia, noting the controversy, includes this howler of a sentence, ―Most irksome to the critics was the expedited approval process, which is normally quite lengthy.‖ Of course, the ―expedited‖ process was only approved by Congress because, by the time the memorial was under consideration, WWII vets were dying off so fast of old age they were concerned that there would be no vets left at the dedication! 2 Nor did the design suit some people. Thomas Keane of the Boston Herald said, among other failings, that the memorial was ―vainglorious‖ and ―demanding of attention.‖ Vainglorious and demanding of attention…hmm. Well, one must defer to the experts. Mr. Keane, born in 1956, lies in the epicenter of the generation that defined those two terms in ways my father and Russ would never have imagined. Well, some of the generation at least – there were many Marines, sailors and soldiers that fought their war just as bravely. Indeed, the Marines and others in the current military endure in the same spirit as the Old Breed in World War II. Reading blogs of the rank and file in Iraq and Afghanistan, I can still hear the same tenor and tone that I hear in my father‘s story. To my mind, the modern American military in many ways surpasses even those of the ―greatest‖ name – a tough, dedicated group of soldiers and Marines that perform heroically and, despite relentless reports to the contrary by a jaundiced press, humanely in situations more subtle and frustrating than the yes/no, on/off binary world of WWII. In Peleliu, if the men wore green, they were friends and if they didn‘t, you shot to kill. In Fallujah and Kandahar, the battlefield has many more considerations and the modern soldier must combine the best skills of soldier, cop, judge advocate and diplomat – often in the same 30 minute span. Surpasses in many ways….except in the areas of courage, tenacity and spirit. There the modern soldier or Marine must settle for equality with the Old(er) Breed. While undoubtedly the formative experience in his life – at 85, my Dad still considers himself a Marine, not an ex-Marine – Dad neither bragged about his role in the war nor refused to talk about it. Rather he related his stories in a rather matter-of-fact fashion and this same tone can be heard in the book. Whether he is talking about sharing the newspaper with Tyrone Power in an unusual location, relating how he reacted to a banzai charge (running like a headless turkey), listening on Peleliu while Puller fruitlessly raged to his superiors about the slaughter of his Marines on Bloody Nose Ridge, or recounting his furious battle with a mouse on Pavuvu (Dad won), the tone is straight-forward. I should add here as well that Dad never harbored any bitterness, then or afterwards, towards the Japanese themselves. In the early 70‘s, we had a wonderful trip to the rebuilt and revived Japan and later, when I asked Dad to allow me to go to Japan to study for a year in college, he said that sounded like a very good idea. To my admittedly prejudiced opinion, the stories have the ring of truth…nowhere in the story does my father tell of volunteering for heroic charges or other such nonsense. Front- line grunts want to keep the valuable bits attached to their bodies if at all possible. In ―Citizen Soldiers‖, Stephen Ambrose relates the general feeling of front-line troops in Europe when told that they were halting so the Soviets could take Berlin.