the greatest generation
76 years after 'the toughest battle in Marine Corps history,' the fallen are still returning home
Bodies sprawled on the beach of Tarawa atoll after a battle there in late November 1943. (Associated Press photo)
The 18,000 Marines and sailors who landed on the island of Betio in the Tarawa atoll in the Pacific Ocean early on November 20, 1943, waded into what one combat correspondent called "the toughest battle in Marine Corps history."
After 76 hours of fighting, the battle for Betio was over on November 23. More than 1,000 Marines and sailors were killed and nearly 2,300 wounded. Four Marines received the Medal of Honor for their actions — three posthumously.
Of roughly 4,800 Japanese troops defending the island, about 97% were killed. All but 17 of the 146 prisoners captured were Korean laborers.
"Betio would be more habitable if the Marines could leave for a few days and send a million buzzards in," Robert Sherrod, a correspondent for Time, wrote after the fighting.
The victory at Tarawa "knocked down the front door to the Japanese defenses in the Central Pacific," Adm. Chester Nimitz, commander in chief of the Pacific fleet, said afterward.
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A veterans group is fighting to keep a Bible at the oldest continuing POW-MIA vigil in the country
Shawne Wickham, The New Hampshire Union Leader
POW/MIA symbols at a Missing Man Table (U.S. Air Force/Ilka Cole)
CONCORD, NH — The veterans group that sponsors the oldest continuing POW-MIA vigil in the country is asking a federal court to allow it to intervene in a case that centers on whether a former POW's Bible can be featured in a lobby display at the Manchester VA hospital.
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finally home
The son of a fighter pilot killed in the Vietnam War flew his father's remains home after more than 50 years
(U.S. Air Force/Jackson Proskow/Twitter)
More than five decades ago, the son of Air Force Col. Roy Knight waved goodbye to his father as he headed off to war.
On Thursday, that same son flew his father's remains back to the very same airport
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Thunder's end: the final Rolling Thunder motorcycle ride will fall silent on Memorial Day
Richard Sisk, Military.com
(U.S. Marine Corps/Cpl. Scott Schmidt)
Editor's Note: This article by Richard Sisk originally appeared on Military.com, a leading source of news for the military and veteran community.
The spectacle of hundreds of thousands of motorcycles roaring their way through the streets of Washington, D.C., to Memorial Day events as part of the annual Rolling Thunder veterans tribute will be a thing of the past after this coming weekend.
Former Army Sgt. Artie Muller, a 73-year-old Vietnam veteran and co-founder of Rolling Thunder, said the logistics and costs of staging the event for Memorial Day, which falls on May 27 this year, were getting too out of hand to continue. The ride had become a tradition in D.C. since the first in 1988.
"It's just a lot of money," said the plainspoken Muller, who laced an interview with a few epithets of regret over having to shut down Rolling Thunder.
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Pentagon suspends efforts to recover troops' remains as North Korea talks stall
Josh Smith, Reuters
An aerial view of the Pentagon building in Washington, June 15, 2005. U.S. Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld defended the Guantanamo prison against critics who want it closed by saying U.S. taxpayers have a big financial stake in it and no other facility could replace it at a Pentagon briefing on Tuesday. (Reuters/Jason Reed JIR/CN)
SEOUL (Reuters) - It was one of the most concrete agreements to come out of the first U.S.-North Korea summit last year, but now the Pentagon says it has given up hope of recovering any more remains of U.S. troops killed in the 1950-1953 Korean War in the near future.
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Trump, who likes people who weren't captured, honors former POWs anyway
Jared Keller
President Donald Trump. (U.S. Air Force/ Tech. Sgt. Vernon Young)
President Donald Trump wants to honor former prisoners of war, even if he prefers U.S. service members who, you know, weren't prisoners of war.
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