Bataan Death March remembered

Paul Ruiz didn’t always have an easy time growing up as a Filipino American in the Bay Area.

“I can’t tell you how many people have told me, ‘Go back to where you came from,’ ” says the 58-year-old Benicia, Calif., resident, who graduated from De La Salle High School in 1982 and then went on to attend UC Berkeley.

Then he started to learn about the sizable yet too-often-overlooked roles that thousands of Filipino soldiers — including Ruiz’s father, Jose — played during World War II.

“I began to realize that I’m as American as anybody,” Ruiz says.

Still, many people in the U.S. don’t realize just how much the people of the Philippines gave — and how much they lost — in the fight against the Imperial Japanese Army during the Pacific War.

Spreading that information — which was pretty much skipped over in U.S. history books for decades — is one of the reasons why hundreds of people gathered together aboard the USS Hornet in Alameda on Sunday to commemorate the 80th anniversary of the Bataan Death March.

The horrific event followed the Battle of Bataan, a courageous 99-day stand that Filipino soldiers made against the better-trained, rested and supported Japanese army on the Bataan Peninsula.

The Philippines — which were a sovereign territory of the U.S. at the time — eventually surrendered to the Japanese on April 9, 1942, which led to a gruesome 60-plus-mile march that thousands of prisoners of war would not survive.

“Most of the people were sick, suffering from disease and massive starvation,” says Cecilia Gaerlan, the executive director of the Bataan Legacy Historical Society. “Those who couldn’t go on were bayoneted, shot and even beheaded.”

Ruiz says that the Filipino soldiers “were just getting up to speed when the war got started” and had no real shot at stopping the Japanese.

“It was totally unwinnable,” he says. “They were sacrificial lambs. All the soldiers there felt they were abandoned by the U.S. government.”

Despite all that, the soldiers fought valiantly and managed to derail Japan’s plan of taking over the country in just 50 days by instead holding out for nearly double that length of time. They slowed down the Japanese army’s advancement — while America continued to recover from the attack on Pearl Harbor and balanced fighting a war on two fronts — and that may have changed the course of the whole Pacific War.

“The suspicion is that Japan would have gone into New Zealand and Australia,” Ruiz says. “Their sacrifices had a material impact on the war.”

Gaerlan says she started the Bataan Legacy Historical Society in 2012 because her father, Luis Gaerlan Jr., was one of the POWs who was forced to take part in the Bataan Death March. The organization presented Sunday’s event at the USS Hornet with the Philippine Scouts Heritage Society and the American Defenders of Bataan and Corregidor Memorial Society.

The setting for the event had vast historical significance, given that the USS Hornet (CV-12) — the eighth vessel to carry the Hornet name — was such a significant participant in the Pacific theater during World War II. It was part of the Battle of Leyte Gulf, which happened in the waters of the Philippian Islands and is generally considered to be the largest naval battle of all time. The battle was a major turning point in the Pacific War, as some 800 Allied Forces ships overpowered a vastly smaller Japanese fleet in late 1944.

The history of the USS Hornet also factored into a panel discussion at Sunday’s event, focused on the bombing of the unmarked Japanese “hell ships” Oryoku Maru and Enoura Maru. The Air Group 11 (CVG-11), which was stationed on the USS Hornet, led the attacks, which resulted in the “friendly fire” deaths of huge numbers of Allied POWs.

The event also included a memorial ceremony, keynote speech from Vice Admiral Michael McAllister, commander of the U.S. Coast Guard, and performances of both the Philippines and U.S. national anthems. The centerpiece was the tolling of the bells in honor of those who paid the ultimate sacrifice during WWII in the Philippines.

Although exact figures are not known, it’s estimated that 5,000-10,000 Filipinos and 250-650 Americans lost their lives during the Bataan Death March — with another 20,0000 Filipino and 1,600 American deaths to follow in death camps.