country at the outset of world war ii and famously vowed, "i shall return." next on american history tv, author james scott describes general macarthur's return, the japanese resistance, and the atrocities committed against the filipino civilians. mr. scott is the author of "rampage: macarthur, yamashita, and the battle of manila." this one hour talk was that of a three-day conference hosted by the national world war ii museum in new orleans. host: our next speaker came to the museum for the first time or his last book was released. this book was the first detailed examination of that mission in decades and introduced readers to the important aspect of the chinese experiences. james scott has come back to the museum with a brand-new book that has been receiving great reviews in many of the top of

locations around the country. manila was known as the pearl of the orient. we will hear about how this beautiful city was destroyed in the process of trying to liberate it. ladies and gentlemen, it is my pleasure to give the podium to james scott. [applause] james: good morning. pete, thank you so much. i will double check, i think this is the clicker. i am trying to determine, is this the clicker? ok.

ok, got it. sorry, technical difficulties there. peach, thank you for the warm introduction -- pete thank you for the warm introduction and all those who have gone out of their way to make this a delightful conference so far. . this morning has been tremendous as well. . thank you to all who have come out and taken time to travel from around the country and the road to be with us this weekend. this is a remarkable institution and a remarkable opportunity to study this pivotal period in world history. general douglas macarthur, driven from the philippines at the start of world war ii, famously vows to return. this is the untold story of his homecoming. the 29 days battle to retake manila in 1945 proved a fight unlike any other in the pacific war. a bloody urban brawl but forced american soldiers to battle

block by block, house by house, and even a room by room. the end of result -- the end result was the destruction of the city. a rampage by japanese troops that terrorized the civilians. landmarks were demolished, neighborhoods torched, countless women raped, their husbands and children murdered an estimated 100,000 civilians were slayed. not only did it give a glimpse of what a japanese invasion might involve, but those brief weeks in 1945 forever transformed the city once known as the pearl of the orient. it decimated generations of filipino families, the ripples of which echoed through their lives some 75 years later. to truly appreciate the tragedy of the battle of manila, it is important to rewind to the turn of the 20th century. the united states captured philippines and cuba, but unlike cuba which was granted independence, america decided to hold onto the philippines. a rationale best described by

douglas macarthur's father, who helped capture bonilla and later served as military governor -- "the archipelago is the finest group of violins in the world. it's strategic position is unexcelled." they realized that manila, which served as america's front door to the markets of china, needed a facelift to attract industry and better reflect america's global status. the u.s. hired famed municipal architect and planner, daniel burnham. over the course of his career, he helped guide cities like chicago, san francisco, oversaw the redo of the national mall in washington. burnham saw incredible potential in manila, with its vast natural resources, old spanish churches, and the ancient walled city of intramuros the 160-acre heart of the city of manila, built in

1571. "possessing the bay of naples, and the wandering roads of venice, manila has an opportunity unique in the modern history of times, the opportunity to create a city equal to the rest of the world with an unparalleled and restless addition of a tropical setting." to world war ii, manila developed into a small slice of america home not only to thousands of service members, but an employee of companies like del monte and bfgoodrich. often called the pearl of the orient, the city boasted an incredible quality of life, with department stores and social clubs, golf courses and swimming pools, and air-conditioned movie theaters. from the top of the university,

it seemed green everywhere. the city within a park on the eve of world war ii, one of the most permanent residence was general douglas macarthur, who lived with his wife and four-year-old son in the penthouse on top of the luxurious manila hotel. his life was long intertwined in the philippines where he had served often throughout his career but after his graduation of west point. he said "my mother had died, my wife had been courted, my son has been born." he was the son of a career military officer. manila was the closest thing he had to hometown. but more than just macarthur who enjoyed it, he said "to live in manila in a 1941, was to experience the good life."

but the good life ended on september 7. when the japanese attacked pearl harbor and invaded the philippines, launching the united states to work. -- war. hoping to avoid the battle, macarthur evacuated his offices to the fortified island of corregidor, out of the bay. this was far more than a strategic defeat, he was abandoning his home, forced to reduce the contents of his entire department to just two suitcases of the family could take with him. japanese troops fanned out of the capital in the 1942, running up thousands of american civilians and returning them to the university of santo tomas. macarthur endured 77 days in the tunnels of corregidor before

escaping in 1942 with his family and staff. there was an agonizing event, forced to leave behind thousands of american and filipino soldiers who had trusted him. troops who would soon face a death march, followed by years in japan's notorious prisoner of war camps. . on reaching australia, macarthur made a promise -- "i shall return." those words were drive him as the weeks turned to months and later, years. manila suffered greatly during the three years of occupation. japanese forces looted food, supplies from department stores, stole farm equipment and left fields to rot. supplies like medicine vanished. manila's economy collapsed and the social fabric began to unravel. an army of beggars flooded the streets and others resorted to be very, including plundering of the graves in search of jewelry, dentures, eyeglasses, even

clothing. . anything that could be battered or sold to buy rice. families went so far as to have been a children to orphanages, or even sell them. salvation ran rampant, claiming 500 souls a day -- starvation ran rampant, claiming 500 souls a day. one man whose diary captured it, described it best -- "today we are living under conditions in which only the fittest among us can hope to survive. if you look up scum of the slide captures better than anything how dire the situation had become in manila. the quote from an american intelligence report says, it is cheaper to buy a child than a hog in the city of manila. american families locked behind the iron gates of santo tomas suffered equally. the ingenuity they had shown in

transforming this campus into a small, functioning city, faded as the daily caloric intake plummeted and starvation took hold. a medical survey conducted in 1945 revealed that the average male had lost 51 pounds. the average female, 32 pounds. to survive, they it dogs, cats, ate dogs, cats, pigeons and even rats, which you can see from this very entry, were fetching eight pesos each at the market. another diary entry, a woman said -- i reached and found it was my backbone. nearly 3700 internees at santo tomas starved to death. "we survived on hope," one of them recalled, "hope the american forces would arrive." those hopes were rewarded

january 9 1945, when macarthur's forces hit the beaches. and they began the preparation for the 100 mile drive south to liberate manila. standing in macarthur's way was a japanese general, yamashita. he wanted to about american forces down. he had proven himself early in the war, capturing singapore. , therned the nickname tiger. but his rivalry had led the letter to park him from the rest of the conflict until this time, send him to mature your -- manchuria. only after the ouster of his rival, tojo in 1944, did

his career become resurrected and he was returned to the philippines. he had come to die, but he did not plan to do so in manila. instead, macarthur divided his army and plans to fight it retracted battle in the jungles and woods. in contrast, the rear admiral who commanded the naval defense force had no intention of abandoning the city. he had spent much of the rest of the war behind a desk. on entering the philippines capital, he saw a chance to redeem himself by creating an

urban bloodletting similar to stalingrad. he divided his soldiers and marines into several geographic commands that cover northern, central and southern manila. his ultimate plan called for defense centered around the ancient citadel guarded by towering walls, some as much as 40 feet thick. he planned a perimeter of large concrete buildings, small fortresses designed to withstand typhoons and earthquakes. to make it harder for the advancing americans, the japanese barricaded the insides of the building was a desks, chairs and bookcases, and went so far as to build staggered walls inside the passageways, filling them with dirt and leaving just enough space at iwabuchi to throw a hand

grenade. his forces booby-trapped 50 intersections in manila. this is a corner of one street where the japanese had set up oil drums with concrete and sank railroad axles into the roadway. in addition, they planted bombs and even beach mines here. this is a photograph of a primitive japanese trap, they were chained together and anchor ed them to the tree. to take the city, american forces carved up manila. the 37th infantry and the first cavalry would come into the city from the north. 37th infantry would cross the river near the presidential palace and turn the west, to

drive to were the walled city and waterfront. the first calvary would envelop the city from the east and make a parallel drive alongside, while the 11th airborne would come from the south end backdoor -- close of the city's backdoor. macarthur believed the japanese would evacuate just as he had done. he was so confident of this but -- that he had his headquartered staff begin planning his liberation parade, down to picking individual jeep assignments for his senior officers and orienting the parade routes. was a mix ofthis intelligence coming into the city. guerrilla generals were reviewing the japanese troops were getting ready to leave the city. but by january, the messages coming out of the city had changed. filipino guerrillas were reporting construction of pillboxes and buildings. had fors in manila who years prayed for the

americans return watched the growing fortification with alarm and terror. "the feet is a bitter pill which -- defeat is a bitter pill which the japanese cannot swallow, defeat is a one thing that can make them turn into beasts." in the northern suburbs, american troops were treated as celebrities. nowhere was that more true than in santo tomas, where the cavalry arrived around 8:30 p.m. captured the excitement in her diary. before the americans knew what was going on, they were pulled out of them and lifted on the shoulders of our scrawny fellow internees. it was impossible to hold back the joyous internees. that night, starving internees feasted on rations while american troops spoiled children

with candy. a reporter described the scene in his first dispatch from santa tomas -- one of the unforgivable things was the smile on the face of a little girl of 4, tasting chocolate for the first time. of course, many in the city were starving as well and american troops would find themselves stormed my hungry civilians, like this young girl. but the excitement over america's arrival proved short-lived. iwabuchi gave the order to enter the city. squads began setting fires and then amending buildings. ting buildings. macarthur's pilot dusty rhodes, witnessed the scene from the air. the entire downtown section was a mass of flames rising 200 feet in the air. manila residents scrambled for belongings and fled. general robert beitler,

commander of the 37th industry described it as best we were powerless to stop it. we had no way of knowing from which of the thousands of places demolitions are being controlled. reinforced concrete and steel office buildings were literally blown from their foundation to settle crazily in twisted heaps. in addition, the japanese blew the bridges over the river which divided the city. after destroying the city of northern districts, the japanese fell back across the river into central manila. and began what would prove to be an incredibly bloody urban fight. block by block, american soldiers pressed deeper into the city, frequently slowed by the fortifications and intersections which required troops to boston their way through adjacent buildings to attack the rear of a pillbox.

as one infantry major summarized it, "gains were measured by streets cleared rather than by city blocks secured ." quote "the preferred solution was to use cannons to blast the upper floors to rubble and then move in." an equally favored alternative was to brother building. -- burn the building. rifleman moved in to burn the building floor by floor when this did not work. as american cavalrymen in the philippines inched their backs pressed against the wall from room to room, hurling grenades ahead to drive out the japanese , finally, after two days, neither side would quit. both on the second floor of this

battered building. as the sun began to set, and with neither side refusing to pull out, both prepared to hunker down and spend the night inside the blasted remains of the building. as night fell, the american cavalrymen sat there fingers , pressed against the triggers of their rifles and they began to hear around 1:30 a.m., japanese forces singing on the opposite side of the building. this is from their report -- "the commotion went on for about 45 minutes, culminating in a final burst of song and loud shouting and followed by reports of exploding grenades and dynamite charges." the cavalrymen continued to sit in the dark and listen. more singing followed by more grenades and silence. these detonations went off at half hour intervals until 4:00 a.m., at which time a lasting silence settled over the building. the americans waited until

daybreak to move in where they discovered that 77 marines had blown themselves up as they listened. macarthur refused to allow the bombardment of the city for fear of killing civilians. but he relented and permitted artillery after american troops suffered heavy losses during the passing. quote, "from then on, putting it crudely, we really went to town." american forces would fire more than 32,000 mortar and artillery rounds into the city. sixth army commander general walter krueger said -- some districts were completely destroyed. between japanese demolitions and american artillery, manila was being destroyed from the inside and the outside.

men, women and children retreated a low ground where conditions inside cramped air raid shelters devolved as ours turned into days, bunkers built to house a single family often held multiple. there were so many bodies pressed close together, the air inside stagnated and the heat soared. hans steiner in a letter to his mother recounted -- "we lived like dogs. all around us were fires and explosions. it was the best imagination of hell one can get." and these shelters proved easy prey for japanese troops often tossed hand grenades inside, as was the case for this gentleman who had his cheek blown off with shrapnel from such an event. many others proved to weak to walk. in his diary santo tomas resident named peter described the parade of wounded who came to the university each day in search of help from american doctors. "they are so far beyond recognition that in many cases, one can't tell whether they are men or women, boys or girls, dead or alive." february 9, iwabuchi realized the fight was clearly lost. fortifications along the city's southern border were threatening to collapse. the americans had far more firepower and far more troops.

at that point, the battle took a evil turn, devolving from a fight over one of asia's great cities, into one of the worst human catastrophes of world war ii. an examination of the timeline of dozens of atrocities that occurred in manila point to february 9 as a fulcrum in which the violence against civilians shifted from individual attacks, to organized mass extermination. american workrooms investigators were tallied 27 major atrocities in manila. the japanese tossed babies in

the air and skewered them on their bayonets, burning thousands a life. -- alive. the lucky ones received a bullet. japanese marines went room by room, shooting and ban adding more than 50 civilians inside the headquarters, including a few infants, one just two days old. the japanese and circled the german clubs, and social hall in manila, where residents had gathered for shelter against the artillery. with everyone truck inside, the japanese set fire to the building, ultimately burning to death more than 500 men, women and children. they forced hundreds of civilians into the dining hall at st. paul's college where the chandeliers with explosives and dynamited them, killing 360.

in one of the more gruesome crimes, japanese converted a home on the sing-along street into a house of horrors.. japanese marines cut each person's head off with a sword before kicking the body into a hole, eventually filling up most of the room beneath them. war crimes investigators, by counting skulls, later determined that 200 men died this way, though miraculously, nine survived. these are photographs of their injuries, as well as a photograph from 1945 by another of the survivors which showed the layout of the house. the atrocities went beyond murder. they japanese rounded up thousands of women, locking many of them inside in these four buildings, the last one being the bayview hotel, jean macarthur's first home when she first moved to manila. there, and rooms where twice had enjoyed metal is legendary

sunsets, japanese troops assaulted hundreds of women. quote "i was raped between 12 and 15 times that night. i cannot remember exactly how many times, one victim later testified. i was so tired that it became a living nightmare." the japanese did not discriminate. they killed men and women, the old and the young, the strong and the infirm. alongside thousands of filipinos, they slaughtered russians, spaniards, germans, americans, indians, alongside two supreme court justices, a family of a senator and scores of priests. "the list of known dead the has come to my attention sounds like a who's who of philippines, judges, lawyers, bank directors, doctors, engineers and many figures of public life now lay rotting and the bruins and -- rotting in the ruins and ashes."

those residents who were able began the long march out of the city, a dangerous journey through an apocalyptic wasteland. it was described as, "all morning we saw thousands of people walking past the advancing infantry. some of them limped with improvised wound dressings, many of them walked, heaven knows how, with open wounds." the americans were so inundated with escaping refugees that engineers had to build a catwalk to ease the flow out. on the morning of february 23, american forces had isolated the last of iwabuchi's troops. the fight to retake the walled city began with a massive artillery barrage at 7:00 a.m. one so destructive that it black it blackened the

sky, turning the day into night. in one hour, american forces fired a struggling 10,000 artillery and mortar rounds. the bombardment saw an average of three shells fired, creating a continuous rolling thunder that for residents trapped inside the city, was like being tracked underneath a freight train. quote "we cannot see each other because of the smoke. we thought we were going to die." at 8:30 a.m., troops moved in. the ensuing silence, recalled one journalist, seemed even louder than the bombardment. once inside, troops discovered survivors were almost exclusively women and children. war crimes investigators later determined that the japanese had killed an estimated 4000 men in the days leading up to the assault. the japanese had locked many inside cells at fort santiago and burned them.

hundreds of others were found piled, one on top of the other, sealed inside underground dungeons dating back to the spanish inquisition. many of the children rescued were now orphans, including these three, one carrying a bucket of utensils, and the other, if you look at the right hand corner, a baby doll. but the battle is not over. americans still had to eliminate the last of iwabuchi's forces, holed up in the government buildings. america blasted the legislature with artillery at point-blank range and sent in assault troops. the building fell at noon on february 28.

troops pounded the agriculture and finance buildings. iwabuchi decided to make his final stand inside the agricultural building and said, "if we run out of bullets, we will use grenades. if we run out of grenades, we will cut down the enemy with swords. if we run out of swords, we will sink our teeth into their throats." but he ran from america's merciless guns, which ripped gaping wounds into the concrete around him, exposing the building's sinuous veins of rebar. he had presided over one of the most barbaric massacres of world war ii. his troops had slaughtered tens of thousands of men, women and children in the most cruel and horrible ways. survival was not an option, and he knew it. he summoned his last remaining forces and apologize for leaving them to doom. he said, "if anyone has the courage to escape, do so. if not, take your life here." the admiral then retreated to his quarters on the northwest side of the building and armed

with a knife, he slit open his belly. a handful of japanese troops did surrender, like this marine pulled from the agricultural building. but most, chose to die. on march 3, 1945, 29 days after american troops rolled into the city, the battle of manila finally ended. the fight to retake the philippine capital had resulted in the deaths of 16,665 japanese. the near total destruction of general iwabuchi's forces. macarthur's total had 1000 killed and 5500 wounded. civilians were the brunt of the horror, with an estimated 100,000 killed, many slaughtered by the japanese. the dead were often so disfigured that relatives had to identify them through clothes, cigarette cases, and even keychains. for those who may not be able to read it, this is a quote from one santo tomas survivor, "the

japanese have murdered wholesale and retail. to call them beasts would be to slander the beasts. to call them fiends would be to slander the fiends. those who found remains were the lucky ones. others would have no resolution, a sentiment best captured by a santo tomas internee, john osborne in a letter. "during these recent days and weeks, i observed the searchers, seekers after lost loved ones. they have gone out daily to hispania gates, hoping to find some trace of a relative or friend. to change the dreadful uncertainty to certainty. it would be the certainty of death. first, they visit the site of the old home, now probably a heap of ashes or broken walls. then, to the homes of relatives and friends for news of the lost, and finally, they just wander the streets, looking at the dead, who today are numerous." over the city of manila hung

that awful stench of death. worse than the smell remembered an infantry major, was the taste of death, which settled on your tongue. "no amount of spitting" he said, "would clear it away." the battle for manila had destroyed 613 city blocks. an area containing 11,000 buildings ranging from banks and schools, to churches and the neighborhoods, more than 200,000 residents, left homeless. a postwar american survey estimated the damage to manila by today's figures would run more than $10 billion. beyond the structural losses were the cultural ones. from centuries-old churches, museum paintings, statues, priceless literary works, all destroyed. and, of course, the economy was in shambles. a sentiment best described by abrahamhart and door --

hartendorf. the manager of one of the oil companies speaking of rebuilding his plant stated he would have to begin again, at the beginning, with a land survey. amid the sea of destruction, macarthur returned to the manila hotel to find his own personal home in ruins. gone was his vast personal library of some 10,000 volumes. gone were his father's civil war mementos. gone were his son arthur's baby books. a loss that crushed jean macarthur. quote "he wanted to know about my apartment at the hotel. she wrote to a friend. "all of that, as well as everything else i know in manila, is gone." the general remained elusive until the end of the war when he walked out of the mountains and surrendered. he was put on trial at the end of 1945 in the first war crimes trial in all of asia, accused of failing to control his troops. yamashita blamed everything on iwabuchi.

even though evidence showed that they were in contact the whole time. yamashita was no strange to such horrors. they had killed thousands of chinese. his subordinate had played a vital role in the rape of nanking. over 32 days, the battle of manila was replayed before a panel of five judges and a total of 15,000 spectators, who jammed the court room sitting shoulder each day to watch. a parade of 286 witnesses, doctors, lawyers, teachers, even gravediggers, testified about what happened in the city. yamashita was convicted on december 7, 1945. his dogged defense lawyers appealed his case all the way to the u.s. supreme court, but ultimately lost. on february 23, 1946, he was

taken to a sugarcane field 40 miles south of manila and he was stripped of all his decorations and even his officer's uniform, and hanged. yamashita's execution did little to provide solace to the victims, many of whom would battle years of psychological torment. others would wrestle with physical wounds and scores more would struggle to understand the barbarity inflicted upon them. "it was total hatred and savagery," said one of the survivors. "you cannot explain it otherwise." nearly a half-century after the battle, survivors formed an organization in manila, dedicated to preserving the story of the civilian sacrifices during the city's liberation. to memorialize those killed, the organization erected a statue at intramuros, a weeping mother cradling a dead infant and surrounded by others. it provides a powerful epithet, epitaph. "this memorial is

dedicated to all the innocent victims of war, many of whom went nameless and unknown to a common grave, or never knew a grave at all, their bodies having been consumed by fire or crushed to dust beneath the rubble of ruins." let this monument be a gravestone to each and everyone." thank you very much. [applause] >> james will start at the center section about halfway back. >> why were the internees of santo tomas spared? james: there has been a speculation for years as to whether or not there was an order put in to kill the

internees are not. of course, the japanese did murder at least 150 american prisoners of war, but no such order was found for santo tomas specifically. when the americans arrived, not only did -- there was another prisoner of war camp just a few miles away at an old spanish prison. when the americans arrived in the city, the japanese summoned all the americans together and said, you're in charge now, and left. in santa tomas, a number of japanese took a number of hostages, a couple hundred americans, inside the education building. a standoff ensued the next few days until the americans could negotiate a surrender, in which the japanese were allowed to leave. they left behind their arms, and were allowed to simply walk out of the camp in exchange for not hurting any of the americans. that is kind of what happened in santo tomas.

the japanese knew that when the americans landed on the ninth of january, and they did not reach manila until february 3. so you had almost a month where if they wanted to execute the americans, they had ample time to do it. that said, the starvation was a accomplishing that job every day until the americans actually got there. >> james, toward the right. >> thank you. i'm enjoying rampage right now. as emotionally draining as it is to read it, i am enjoying the book. how was it to write it, and how did you manage that process? james: it is an upbeat story. [laughter] kidding, of course. to give an example, there is an amazing amount of documentation for this story in the national archives. as soon as the battle for manila was over, the americans recognized they were looking less at a battlefield and more at a crime scene.

halfway to the battle, as word of the atrocities was beginning to filter in, and macarthur ordered all atrocities be investigated. so when the battle ends, an army of war crimes investigators spreads out and begins taking depositions and statements from survivors. in a lot of the photographs you saw here of injuries, not only did they take depositions, they photographed them. they put together literally tens of thousands of pages of these statements, all at the national archives in washington. over the course of my research i , was able to copy them in my research at a rate of most 4000 pages a day. i copied so many of them that i had to build a database to catalog the survivors. then, comes the difficult part of having to sift through and read the material, and it is an incredibly grim task. making sense of it all, and

putting it all together in the context of the battle. of course, as a writer, i work at home. i have a home office. my kids are off at school, and i go through all this tragic material. my kids would come home in the afternoon, and i would say, guys, dad just needs a hug. they are nine and 11 and they , dad, you are so weird. [laughter] that you are right, it is hard to read. we went through it a challenge in presenting it in the book,. we actually cut off three chapters. there are 27 atrocities, just the ones that are documented in the months after the battle of manila. that is not all of them. in cases where entire families were wiped out, there was nobody to report it, so it went unreported in american records. those are the ones we know about. so in writing that book, it is a challenge because you want to be historically accurate as possible, but you don't want readers to put down the book and walk away. so in my first draft, the editor called me and said, man, this is

too much, we have to take a look at how we can sort of tighten this, so we ultimately cut about three chapters and focused -- as hard as it is, there is a pattern to the atrocities. there are sometimes you have to say for a reader, -- so many times that you have to say to a reader, they locked these people into a building and set it on fire. so we took the approach of trying to find some of the more unique -- a lot of the atrocities are characters, the way that they were done. so it will blow up. -- reading a chandelier to explode. cutting a second-floor hole into a floor, we tried to find those that were unique and different, but you are right, it was absolutely a struggle. we are probably right up against that line of readability for some people. that said, feel free to buy the book. it is a great book. i do want to turn anybody off. -- i don't want to turn anybody off. >> james, in the right section

towards the front. >> hi, so did japan ever acknowledge these atrocities? any kind of reverberations? and how is it poisoning or not poisoning the current relationship? james: the japanese did. once the survivors' group formed and began bringing awareness, one of the most important things they did in the 1990's was take out ads in filipino newspapers and said, was in member of your -- has any member of your family been killed or lost in the battle of manila, and if so, we would like to hear from you. they had an overwhelming response. all these letters and surveys came in. they had so many that they put them all together in an archive that you can actually go to and look at them along with that, with raising the awareness, they took on the campaign to build the statue in intramuros. there's another one at one of the schools and other markers. the japanese, in the the 1990's, japanese ambassador did

come out for one of the ceremonies and there was an apology done at the time. that said, this battle continues even today. in manila earlier this year, a statue was put up in front of the bayview hotel in recognition for what happened there. they had permission from the city of manila to put it up. it was erected. about a week later, it was put down. it is still sitting today in a public works yard in the philippines. it came down at the behest of the national government. they said it was in the way of the public works project. there has been a lot of talk about the fact that there has been pressure from the japanese government to not have the statue put up. that legacy of what happened in manila, it plays out even today. >> james, the next question is with dan in the center section. >> my father fought in the philippines. although he was not directly

involved in the battle of manila, he fought northward in the battle of baguio, which happened after the fall of manila. i remember him telling me about the atrocities you talked about, he had seen, some of which i will not get into. what he did say was that the soldiers had heard about what happened in manila and they absolutely took no prisoners. there was not to be one japanese soldier taken alive, because they had heard of that. my question for you is, how would you evaluate the effectiveness of walter krueger, who interestingly enough, along with courtney hodges, who we heard about, are the only two four-star generals to rise from private to general? how would you evaluate krueger as general? james: that is another broader question. that is a tough one.

do you mean as how you handled manila and the philippines? there was a lot of back-and-forth between macarthur and his senior military commanders, like krueger, over what they were expecting to find in manila. with krueger and others who were there, they had a lot greater sense of what was going to go down in the city than macarthur was willing to recognize. because they were looking at the intelligence coming out of the city and seeing the fortifications of it. and, of course, macarthur tended to go with his gut instinct more than what he was hearing out of it. so i think you saw the fears of what guys like krueger and other senior commanders, they all wrote in their diaries and correspondence that they were worried that macarthur was very

much like -- there will be a liberation parade, the city will fall, there will not be any fight. that ran counter to what a lot of them thought. the reality, however, few of them wanted to push back against macarthur and force their views and concerns on him. so as a result of that, macarthur is kept in the dark about how bad things are getting. of course, he doesn't visit the city very often during the battle, he comes in after the internees are liberated. he visited about five times throughout the entire 29 days he was there, so he doesn't get the full grasp of what his generals are seeing. but at the same time, i think his generals missed valuable opportunities to tell him what was actually going on in the city and were reluctant to push back on him. >> james, on the right section towards the front. >> after the war, did macarthur ever return to manila? james: he was in manila after

the fall of manila, but he only goes back twice more for the rest of his life. manila was granted independence from the u.s. in 1946, july 4. he goes back for the ceremony, and shortly before his death, he went on a so-called reunion tour and went back to visit a lot of old friends. but those are the two times he went back. it is interesting, one of the things i find interesting about the battle of manila and about this story is that in some ways, macarthur grows up with an overbearing mother and he is trying to live up to the image of his father. he spent his career in the shadows of these two formative figures. his first marriage doesn't work out.

so when he gets to manila in 1935, when he is asked to build a modern army, his mother comes with him. she actually dies soon after they arrive, she was living in the manila hotel with him. he orders the room shut for a year at the hotel. he marries his wife, his son is born. he is at this point in his life where he has risen up, it risen to the top rank in the army. he has done all these accomplishments. for the first time, he is really happy. he actually says at one point, now i am back in manila with my wife and my family, i knew i would never again be lonely. so for him, when the japanese take manila and he is forced out, there is a huge personal

connection for him, and a huge anguish there. he leaves so fast, they don't take down the christmas tree. if you go to the macarthur memorial, it's missing a lot of relics from there, because so much of his family's history was lost there. so the story is like a greek tragedy for macarthur. he is driven out of one place in his life, he finds happiness, and he leaves everything. when he vows to come back, he is almost like ahab in moby dick, where he comes back, and the obsession to come back leads him to destroy everything. after the battle of manila, when the city is so totally wrecked, you couldn't even figure out where the roads were anymore, it was so destroyed. i think it lost that appeal for him, then. at that he also takes over as supreme commander at the japanese occupation and all, but i think manila, for macarthur, died in that battle. >> next question will be in the center section. >> how much of macarthur's obsession with the philippines is responsible for the level of

inhumanity committed to the japanese? look at him and look as his presence there and his potential return, they look at him as a reason to increase that level of carnage and destruction? james: i don't believe that is the case. the japanese, one of the fascinating things they did, what they took over his house they inventoried it. , the inventory is in the macarthur memorial. it has a breakdown of how many handkerchiefs he had, i think it was about 160, how many pearl necklaces his wife had left behind. there is a locket with hair in it. so the japanese, beyond using his house as an occasional place for dignitaries to stay well in -- state when they were in manila, i don't think that connection factored in any way into the destruction the one on their. iwabuchi, for him, it was doing

everything in his power to slow down the americans, and it was more of like, how do we destroy the city and do that? how do we turn it into this urban quagmire? it is also important to note that these weren't haphazard killings that the japanese did. we have captured battlefield about it, because if there were -- battlefield orders that say how to go about it, because if there were concerns about expending too much ammunition, the orders say, in order to spare ammunition, lockdown civilians in houses and burn them, throw them in the river. these atrocities were ordered. they were methodical. but i don't think they were in any way related to deep personal attachment to the philippines. and also you have to look at, these atrocities tended to follow the imperial japanese army. they followed at nanking, in singapore, from place to place

to place. >> we have the next question with dr. weinberg. but first, i will take the floor moderator's privilege and ask my friend and museum volunteer, bob wolfe, please stand. as a 20-year-old serving our nation, he was on occupation duty in the philippines and actually attended some of the proceedings. [applause] >> and now, dr. weinberg has a question. >> as you certainly know, the yamashita trial and his hanging is the only one really of the far eastern trials about which there has been a good deal of controversy. when i spoke on that subject at a prior meeting of this very annual conference, i mentioned a

point that perhaps is relevant now. there was one incident, as the japanese retreated, of the kind you describe in manila. there was one such incident earlier when the japanese advanced. that was in february, 1942, in singapore. they are the two incidents of this kind between december '41 and the japanese surrender in '45. no unit was involved in both. the two incidents have only one thing in common -- james: yamashita. >> yamashita was a commander in both instances. those who want to believe that is a coincidence are entitled to

their view, i don't share it. [laughter] james: yes, he [applause] james: he ordered, after singapore, he ordered the "severe disposal of chinese." i think the singaporean government listed above 50,000 killed in the wake of the fall of singapore. >> next question is to day dan's -- dan's side on the left, please. >> mr. scott, thank you, an amazing talk. my question is on the aftermath. you said moments ago, independence 1946, i actually thought it was in 1948. you also said moments ago in one of your answers that manila is so devastated you couldn't even tell where the streets ran originally. with the philippines getting independence so soon after the conclusion of the war, no longer

being a u.s. territory, was there any sense that the americans have left us, they have turned their back on us, they could have done more to facilitate reconstruction, it seems like the filipinos were on their own now. james: that is a good question. manila remained devastated for many years. the old walled city of intramuros was filled with squatters all the way up to the 1970's. some of the old buildings, as you saw the photographs of, like the old general post office, which are beyond, when we sent over our surveyors, they were like, this building these to be leveled and start over, they tried to repair them and reuse them. some of those buildings are still there even today. what essentially happened in manila, was that rather than be -- rebuild, you go south of another city.

it is like a brand-new city. that is where the high-rises and the banks are. so the old urban heart of manila struggled along. that is changing now. if you go to the old walled city of intramuros it is like downtown charleston, south carolina. they have carriage rides, i think there's even a starbucks. but some of the places like the german club, where 500 people were burned, it is still an empty field. still hallowed ground. there is a lot of decadence and ghosts of this battle that linger through there. and beyond that, there is room much of a impact the battle had not just on the architecture and landscape but on the lives of filipinos. that is so important to stress. this is a battle in which literally 100 civilians died for every 1 american.

these civilians, in some cases, it was entire families wiped out. in some cases, it affected multiple generations, infants and grandparents affected. the trauma that went on afterwords, psychologically, one individual who survived a massacre-- one of them, who watched his entire family murdered, it took him two years to even speak again. so the trauma that lasted on and on, it still echoes even today. it is a much younger population today, but there is still very much, a lot of people who were children during the battle of manila still remember. i am amazed at the efforts to memorialize it. if you go to the statue at intramuros, they have plaques. the effect it had on family, i even see it on social media posts.

there is a huge debate i am following on one of these world war ii in the philippines posts that i monitor from time to time over this. almost 75 years later, yet the effect of the battle still plays out to all -- place out on a daily basis through all of these lives. >> we have two more questions, one is from kurt online. it's a quick what will you be one. doing with those three cut chapters? then, we will take the final question in the back row, straight across in the middle section. james: kurt, shoot me an email, i will send them to you. [laughter] >> two quick questions. where there are japanese tried for these war crimes? besides the general? secondly, macarthur won out and roosevelt authorized going to the philippines after the meeting in honolulu, as opposed of going toplan

formosa. i am wondering if there was in a second guessing about in the aftermath of what happened, particularly in manila? james: his chief of staff was put on trial as well, he was actually hanged with the same round as tojo. they also tried other commanders, including the only senior officer commanding the southern forces. he was commanding them to survive -- he was the only one who survived. the northern commander and central command were killed. he survived. he changed his plea to guilty when he was put on trial. he said i did it, i'm guilty. as a result of that, they sentenced him to death. because he had spare them the trial, they sentenced him to death by musketry instead of hanging. but he was never executed. because all the prisoners being held in the philippines, and the

president, who had lost a bunch of his own family, his wife and some of his children during the battle, he did a pardon for all of the thousands of filipino prisoners of world war ii still in the philippines. --said, quote if someday, "japan is our neighbor, it will be an ally, and we cannot have this animosity hanging over us"" so, he issued the pardon. it is a controversial decision, still, today. as a result, it spare the lives of some of the war criminals from the battle of manila. that said, his grandson, i did a panel with him in september in san francisco, and they have a foundation. he goes around and talks about the legacy of friendship. it sort of ended efforts to prosecute and hang and punish those were criminals from the battle of manila. as for the question of macarthur and the strategy, i am sure most people here are familiar with

that strategy debate of whether to go back to the philippines or to go to taiwan, and, of course, macarthur makes the impassioned plea to fdr in hawaii. he made it based on -- when you really study the battle of manila, you see the point macarthur was trying to make, was that there was a moral reason for the united states to go back to the philippines. this was an american colony built in our image from the time of the spanish-american war up until world war ii, and we had a moral obligation to liberate them as soon as human it possible. if you like at it from that time. and -- look at it from the time period and that perspective of the filipinos and from the perspective of that time period, it was true. you also have to look at what was going on at that time in the city. i can't stress enough how manila, how awful the conditions were on the eve of the battle. it was a humanitarian catastrophe. had we actually waited until the end of the war and let manila

wither, it would have been a whole different catastrophe. it may not have had the destruction of buildings, but wholesale starvation. all the internees at santo tomas would be dead by the time it was liberated, you had about 7000 prisoners of war and they would've passed away by starvation. by the time set of thomas is mas isted, -- santo to liberated, they were averaging 580 calories a day. so that stretch from february 3 until the end of the war, there is no way they would have made it. it would have been a different catastrophe had we not gone when we did. >> james, thank you very much. james: thank you. [applause] are watching american history tv. 48 hours of programming on

american history every weekend on c-span3. follow us on twitter @cspanhis tory for information on our schedule and to keep up with the latest history news. >> i am always enthralled by the chamber itself. the walls themselves. if they could speak, what would they tell us? >> c-span snow is book "the thete," transforms you into senate wing of the capital, revealing rich architectural trip -- details of the chamber, it's always and private workspaces and elaborate historic meeting rooms. this keepsake is filled with beautiful color photos of the art and architecture that pervades the senate's space and also offers information about the senate this history. to order your high-quality paperback copy of "the senate" for just $18.95 plus shipping, visit c-span.org/senatebook.

>> next, former nasa chief historian roger launius talks about the apollo space program . he describes how the cold war influenced the first missions and the excitement of the moon landing in 1969. he also explores apollo's legacy and speculates on the future of space travel. we recorded this 15-minute interview at the annual american historical association meeting in chicago. steve: roger launius, is a space historian and former chief historian for nasa. let's talk about the apollo program. let's begin at the 1950's. that was the starting point, explain. roger: it is hard to get a grip on it for those who didn't live through it. this cold war rivalry between the u.s. and the soviet union was incredibly intense and one of those areas of competition was in the space. because technology was going to