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In the Military Gregg K. Kakesako |
See also: For Your Benefit
Racial harassment
punishment unclearSupporters of attorney Bruce Yamashita say they were never officially told if any officers or drill sergeants were punished for kicking Yamashita out of Marine officer candidate school because of his race.
Filmmaker Steve Okino, whose 60-minute documentary will premiere at 2 p.m. today at the University of Hawaii School of Architecture auditorium, said because of privacy issues, all they were told was that "serious actions" were taken against the OCS officers and enlisted Marines.
Studies obtained by the Japanese American Citizens League and Yamashita under the Freedom of Information Act showed that between 1982 and 1990, minority candidates at the Marine Corps' OCS course were washed out at a rate of 41 percent compared with 34 percent for whites. In Yamashita's class, 60 percent of the minority candidates never were allowed to complete the course, compared with 28 percent of white candidates.
The JACL study further revealed that over an eight-year period, Col. William Reinke, Yamashita's commanding officer, had the worst record of the four officers who headed the OCS course. The Hawaii Legislature asked Congress to reinstate Yamashita and punish the Marines involved in the matter. In October 1992, U.S. Sen. Daniel Inouye got Congress to pass legislation requiring Department of Defense schools to certify that "appropriate measures have been taken to publish and enforce" regulations prohibiting racial discrimination.
Okino's film, "A Most Unlikely Hero," traces Yamashita's struggles from the time he left Georgetown Law School to his commissioning ceremony in the halls of Congress in 1994. Yamashita, in both Okino's film and his 232-page autobiography, said that from the day he enrolled in the Marine OCS program in February 1989 he was subjected to racial harassment, greeted with epithets such as "kamikaze man." Marine drill sergeants would yell: "Go back to your own country," and "During World War II, we whipped your Japanese ass."
Just before the commissioning ceremony, Yamashita was kicked out of the program by the Marines, who said that he lacked leadership skills. Yamashita appealed the rejection, arguing that he had been denied a commission because of racial discrimination. Three years later, his legal team, headed by Clayton Ikei and Ernie Kimoto, a retired Marine major who persuaded Yamashita to consider the Marine Corps, got the military to review Yamashita's OCS records.
Okino's film will be aired twice on KHET Public Television, at 8 p.m. Wednesday and again at 8 p.m. Saturday. Yamashita's book, "Fighting Tradition: A Marine's Journey to Justice" which is being published by the University of Hawaii Press, will be available at today's book signing. He also will be at Bestsellers bookstore at 12:30 p.m. Friday and Borders bookstore in Waikele at 2 p.m. Saturday.
The Hawaii Army Museum Society at Fort DeRussy has been awarded a grant of $10,000 from the First Hawaiian Foundation, the charitable arm of First Hawaiian Bank, for the Hawaii Army Museum's "Shinseki Gallery."
"Hawaii Army Museum Society is grateful for this support," said retired Maj. Gen. Herbert Wolff, president of the society. "We are currently assembling memorabilia and artifacts from the life of Gen. Eric Shinseki, a native of Kauai who rose to the United States Army's highest post, that of chief of staff. It is most appropriate that we now honor this native son of Hawaii who was a graduate of West Point and Duke University, served two combat tours in Vietnam, commanded the U.S. Army forces in Europe and the NATO peacekeepers in Bosnia-Herzegovina," said Wolff.
Retired Adm. Dennis Blair, the former head of the U.S. Pacific Command, is expected to head the Institute for Defense Analyses, replacing retired Air Force Gen. Larry D. Welch. The IDA provides its analyses to the Office of the Secretary of Defense, the Joint Staff, the unified commanders and defense agencies on national security issues.
Moving Up
>> Pearl Harbor: Capt. Michael Donch III has assumed command of Naval Magazine Pearl Harbor, relieving Capt. John McLawhorn.
See the Columnists section for some past articles.
"In the Military" was compiled from wire reports and other
sources by reporter Gregg K. Kakesako, who covers military affairs for
the Honolulu Star-Bulletin. He can be reached can be reached by phone
at 294-4075 or by e-mail at gkakesako@starbulletin.com.
