Arnold "Dutch" Nagel volunteered to be a paratrooper in WW 2 because of the extra $50 per month jump pay paratroopers received and the distinctive uniforms they wore. By war's end, he had participated in 4 combat jumps - Sicily, Maiori, Italy, Operation Market Garden in Holland, and on D-Day at Sainte Mere Eglise, France - and had fought in the invasion of Sicily, the liberation of Naples, Italy, D-Day, and the Battle of the Bulge. Nagel was one of only three men from Co. C, 1st Squad, 1st Platoon of the 505th 82nd Airborne Division to survive the war. 45 years later he became perhaps the war's last casualty when he made a commemorative jump to mark the opening of the Airborne and Special Operations Museum back where his service began at the home of the 82nd Airborne Division, Fort Bragg, North Carolina.

In August 1942 the US launched its first major amphibious landing of WW 2 in the Solomon Islands. The battle became a bitter war of attrition as both sides fought feverishly for months on land, sea and air for the strategically important islands. Jefferson DeBlanc became a fighter ace in just one day as he shot down six Japanese fighters before DeBlanc himself was shot down. With his back, arms, and legs wounded from shrapnel, DeBlanc still managed to swim six hours before he came ashore at Kolombangara, only to be captured by a tribe of headhunters. From his vantage point atop the control tower at Henderson Field on Guadalcanal, Carl "Bud" DeVere watched daily dogfights as Joe Foss and Foss's Flying Circus shot down 72 Japanese aircraft during three months of bloody combat.

Jefferson DeBlanc

Map of Jefferson DeBlanc's fateful dogfight with the Japanese Zeros

Carl "Bud" DeVere

In the aftermath of the Japanese surprise attack at Pearl Harbor, and the declaration of war against Germany and Japan, millions of Americans didn't wait till their draft numbers were called upon. They immediately enlisted, including nearly 200,000 underage Americans. In the rigorous basic training that followed, young Americans learned that war was for keeps as they learned the fighting skills that would keep them alive in combat. As Colonel Sin, Commander of the 506th Parachute Infantry Regiment of the 101st Airborne Division, told his recruits, "Y'all ain't going over there to die for your country. You're going over there to make that other son of a bitch die for his!"

Photo below is of Milburn Henke, credited as the first US soldier to set foot on European soil in WW 2.

Samuel Erlick with his medals

As he looked into the USS California's CL compartment located on the ship's lower level, John McGoran "...saw pure horror, my first realization that the game was now for keeps. I saw bodies, many bodies, some of which I knew, just by their eyes, were lifeless." Like the rest of the US Pacific fleet battleships moored at Ford Island's "Battleship Row", the USS California had been hit by torpedoes in the massive surprise attack against the US Naval base of Pearl Harbor on December 7th, 1941. The surprise attack shattered the fragile peace the US had precariously maintained amid gathering war clouds. In the aftermath of the blood attack, loss of life was staggering - 2,638 officers and enlisted men including 68 civilians. McGoran's buddies were among the dead.

"You're not going to leave me here to die?" Sgt. George Barlow asked his buddy, John Snyder. Barlow had just saved the lives of everyone in his squad by throwing himself on a live grenade the Japanese had hurled into their machine gun emplacement at Iwo Jima. Barlow's lower torso had been blown away, and Snyder knew his friend wouldn't survive until morning without help. Pinned down, could Snyder find a medic?