Catalina Alumnus Tadash Nagaki

We have figured out in earlier posts here, here, here, and here, that our EJZ was in training on Catalina Island from mid-December 1944 to mid-January 1945.

One of his predecessors in OSS training at Toyon Bay was Nebraska farm boy Tadash Nagaki.  He was joining the 442nd Infantry Combat Regiment - "Go for Broke" - in July1943 when OSS put out a call for Nisei to volunteer for dangerous missions.  Tad was Nisei; he wanted a combat unit; soon enough he was at Toyon Bay.

Tad Nagaki was part of OSS Detachment 101, charged with clearing the Japanese from the jungles of Burma and rescuing downed Allied airmen, so that the Burma Road could be re-opened and the Ledo Road built.

Tad Nagaki's big brass:  Merrill and Stillwell

This is from Mary Previte's excellent essay.

Ex-CBI Roundup was a newsletter for veterans of China-Burma-India theater, from all branches, published 1946 through 2009.  Clark King and Gary Goldblatt are scanning the 600 issues and putting them up here, as well as assembling a great deal of background information on CBI here.  Thank you, Gentlemen!

Previte's essay is from the June 2002 issue.  It's riveting, all the way through; here are a couple of quotes to tempt you:

". . . Just before the war started, a tiny handful of Army Intelligence specialists were alerting superiors of the importance of training Japanese language interpreters to master the incredibly complex Japanese language.  But, could youth of an alien race - only one generation removed from the land of their ancestors - be trusted in battle or in top secret intelligence work?  While one hand of the Army was removing Japanese-Americans from the West Coast, another was searching for qualified Nisei for its language and intelligence effort.  In San Francisco, the Army opened a small-scale language school in a converted hangar at Crissy Field, The Presidio.  It hand-picked 58 Nisei for its first class - sitting on apple boxes and orange crates.  When the top brass saw its value, the school was transferred to Camp Savage, Minnesota, where it was reorganized as the Military Intelligence Service Language School. . ."

Remember Camp Savage, Minnesota?  Our EJZ got a letter from there while in Chicago conjugating Japanese verbs, if that's what you do.

". . . The OSS trained the Nisei team first in radio school in Naperville, Illinois, then the Military Intelligence Service Language School in Fort Savage, Minnesota, then six weeks of survival and demolition at Toyon Bay on Catalina Island.  They toughened up with fitness training in the mountains, exercised with water drills from LST boats.  They could survive by fishing or shooting mountain goats.  Catalina Island was ideal for coastal surveillance and commando training.  It was 1944, after begging for action since 1942, the Nisei were about to get their chance. . ."

". . . Late in 1944, Tad Nagaki arrived in Myitkyina (pronounced mich-chi-naw).  Burma, at a bend in the Irrawaddy River. Myitkyina was the strategic key to the entire plan in the north.  It had the only hard-surface, all-weather airstrip in Burma, north of Mandalay.  This was the airfield the legendary Merrill's Marauders had seized. . ."

Tadash Nagaki had to earn the trust of - as in, not get killed by - the Kachin mountain people, who understandably hated Imperial Japanese soldiers, whom he resembled phenotypically.  Take a good look at this old photo of Kachin in World War II, with their characteristic hats and stoles.  I do believe we shall see more of these people in future pages of the Zdrojewski CBI Photobook.

Just google "Kachin World War 2"

Julie