there is a rock after being denied any information by nato and the us. and next r.t. visits the tiny yet largely forgotten pacific island of taiwan is the resting place for hundreds of u.s. marines have sacrificed a slipping for people's memory that's coming up next. the large concentration of litter on the beach poses an additional health hazard when the refuse is swept out to sea during the storm. despite this danger leone saw no empty aluminum cans or plastic bottles he found a base yos major recycling plant nearby where aluminum cans are crushed in both cans and bottles. leon paid a visit to the owner and manager of the plant and reward i wrote repeatedly to the washington usual suspects the president and the white house the secretary of

defense the chairman of the joint chiefs of staff members of congress so i'm here to began and hopefully an action program with prodding from my government but we've got. to be starting out there are many. thanks to all who. call that. here's the not show what i'm thinking that we should expand your operation clean up the beach on red beach one would be my primary objective because my salty language but you can understand my anger and having seen this desecration of how the ground war on red beach. leon had developed an action plan for base you that included two phases. the first would be to set up refuse containers and collection centers throughout the beaches and employ local citizens the second phase would be to establish state of the art incineration systems that

would recycle trash as well as provide electricity for the island the ons action plan could be used for any island facing diminishing land sources. the local fiji television station taped an interview with leone story and his current mission to taro. derek to cleo and out in his boat to revisit the scene of the battle. i used to have a nightmare. i granted for years afterwards. i had somehow or. fallen into the water and i had sunk down and there was a kid sitting on i sure my tank. he was a he he waved at me he and i are about twenty maybe thirty feet under water and i was looking at i'm wondering what the fuck are you doing here and he was

sitting on top of the sherman tank and the corals all round this bright yellow red blue car all was all around us and here was this kid very happily sitting on top of the sherman tank and that's a dream that i had for years. i had told my wife. if i start threshing round but just leave the bread because i get. back kind of crazy i'm not aware of it but anyway. she she knew when i made those morning sounds i couldn't talk because of i began to speak i would drown i would swallow water. later that day leon visited the residence of john and molly brown so she showed a movie about the battle for tara prior to a tour of the sites. just

tired. of hearing couch. that's three. player. plays. over the years the browns have collected munitions in their back yard a number of shells are still alive. that's right in the river just for these are. from a drive in thirty six from american history office is still along our power line yet you said you don't kick it and play for an hour when i'm right those are dangerous shells and weapons of all shapes and sizes a majority of them american constantly turn up on base she'll although these of

cause deaths and injuries to the local population over the years there is no exact figure provided by the kid about government. mike corder the local australian naval commander on the island still has the difficult task of dealing with world war two war yes. the issue here is that no one escapes turning out how they got rid of all we want it's it could be like kind of but there's a whole range of stuff that just keeps turning up or whatever and it's amazing what some people you know that sort of foreign affairs bomber discovered was that one sort of a chicken curry you know that's what i had standing upright. on the end of a bomb and having to detonate a bomb and are using it as just one corner of the chicken but. you know leon was introduced to two australian ex-pats involved in exploring the history of the battle of tara stan ghosh to his professional diver initials expert and peter scarlett has lived on the island for over fifteen years stan has done hundreds of

dives off base you know and is employed by history flights on their two year program to survey the island for lost graves there's there's a plane just sticking up for the less for the others of the waste that's a basically for the brotherhood as that what's in the water at the time or is a picture of it that's the vision of this the whole see. the waves intersections there before. the debris from the battle still covers the island and every storm on earth new ordinance stan showed leon a fifty caliber machine gun sitting in the water a few yards from the beach front home. that's it that's a fifty fifty caliber machine. still the cup again we're talking five dollars stand keeps a storage container full of the weapons and munitions he's collected. this is going for sixty no more to church and it's here with. us for a mortar is

a more mortar and edible good. still with the cues and the flaws she needs to know more than. a lot on a hill that this is full of the play this. still binds of a noble radio portable radio that was run out of a boy named track already baked goods this is the fault of the jewel but from the supposed office of from him a can that was dug up and also now tells have been making you can see the nickel couple. of books of in addition to the japanese telephony prototype for the mind gun it's a thirty seven mil room. to use the whole explosion room to a lot of room. up on your head like this right carefully around long. by the end of day to the ground commander colonel chute who had been wounded by

shrapnel during his landing the day before rallied his troops to capture the airport runway this effectively cut the enemy defenses into. day three began with an easier landing of additional marines at the western shore as the american forces began to outflank the japanese defenders that morning a chance event was taking place in the skies near by. a flight of hellcat fighter planes on routine patrol from the aircraft carrier lexington accidentally intercepted a formation of twenty japanese he cried is based from nearby marshall islands the japanese were on a mission to bomb and strafe the tower landing force. by ten o five that morning the americans had shot down seventeen of the twenty bombers and force the remaining three back to their base the marines on base year were safe from potentially devastating casualties. meanwhile supported by

reinforcements and artillery fire from nearby islands the marines used all means necessary to systematically take out the japanese defenders they slowly advance toward the narrow eastern tip of the art. leon paid a visit to mother superior margaret sullivan of our lady of the sacred heart mission she showed in the declaration the japanese government is at it just hours after they took over the island now that you have money and playing on a warning that japan was going to occupy these i all of a sudden they simply showed up as a right to die is that really what i wanted to look up at the descendants of those up till now where they land and face. as his outreach to local officials continued leon and ted met with the minister of interior. for more than three years i've been trying to get our government to do something about the dozen

creation that has happened to the beach as well as so many americans died in defense of our country so i've. made was a. fight with the super bowl a lot of. leaders will deliver was. the show that leon had taped for fiji television was broadcast all the islanders. if i was all. the different schools i think the number of trips and. stuff i saw telling it was like everyone wanted to like ever stuff. and never did. all the time i was coming to think surely to hell. but because i. still. listen to. me kills many of the end of the world i did some helpless person

which i simply because i chatted. by one twelve pm on november twenty third the island was declared secured over five thousand five hundred men lay dead on the sands one thousand one hundred thirteen were american marines and two thousand two hundred ninety were going to be only one japanese officer and two enlisted men survived along with fourteen korean laborers . the entire island was a fast twisted wasteland of death and destruction. american and japanese bodies covering the island were a mute testimony to the ferocity of the bout. one marine commented that it was the closest thing to dantes inferno you'd ever seen. it was a hellish wasteland of destruction. literally covered with thousands of bodies and

ordnance. now came the grim task of collecting and bury a body. general holland smith in the marine commander was reputed to have said later that tarot was a tragic mistake. after the battle in the marines would bury their dead take detailed plot maps of the grave sites and within a matter of days return to their ships. meanwhile the burial were continued on issues. identification was made more difficult by the condition than decomposition of several bodies and a number were lost at sea. i unfortunately had the unpleasant duty of attending

a number of burials and say i can't remember how many at least a half a dozen by one a stands out in my memory in particular the chaplain who was in charge of the burial details i was standing next to him after he said as usual words before we dump the guy into the deep and i said the chap on the horizon who is a sky and he said we don't know and i said what his dog tags are in the sailcloth he said. i can't imagine anything more that needs to be said other than they absolutely absurd ridiculous treatment in yes absolutely indifferent treatment was given to all these guys who had died in defense of our country. lieutenant bonny been a posthumous medal of honor winner for as valor in the battle would be buried in the eighth marines grave site number two. the navy seabee units which were the logistic backbone of every operation would then clean up the

battlefield quickly build the infrastructure to support an airfield. this is a picture of the island after the c.b.c. cleaned it up and turned it into a modern air base you can see from the temporary cemetery there's thirty three twenty six twenty five this is part of the old pier right here the island basically had forty three cemeteries and in building into a modern air base the basically erased some of the cemetery. that we've taken has been working for the australian government as a contractor. he has made some unusual discoveries while rebuilding be infrastructure and you know there was one instance we dug a lot of that was a title this is the one that stain very interested in and we found it really in complete skeleton he still had a partial uniform loose watch. but far because a lot of the the i was how much did the metal yes or rather the rather what

was a little bit about in the front of the was. a lot of last lot i was going to be gives the side of. this and nothing else now. so you told somebody and they govern the us government about this. the project engineer the project a project manager and he wrote it off to. the bone numerous organization down but what happened was the law in the rain in the buttons in that up in the office in a rush but. allowed to bring a draft or have a truck and drop the drawing card and this bag was the title. and they would say it will box and now call on such a letter to them it's not so so i think what we should do with the bottom. and then was our reply yes which well as. with him for all that i feel almost

like he's one of the like can you at all leon had spent months seeking assistance from every level of government to address the garbage situation at base you now he discovered something even more disturbing that hundreds of marines remains still lie in the sands of the island. just as we've been told by the guys we met with the . woman down on the ground and almost anywhere you walk to see the mortal remains of somebody japanese american he was introduced to the minister of health dr. presented saxon place i don't lie the things that i want to do to help you ultimately he was granted the meeting with the president of cuba i know to talk a little on the employment of citizens of who will who will assist in the in the monitoring of the refuse collection of your country and

ultimately. a state of the art incineration system. which will have a number of benefits for. the brutality of the tower or campaign would soon hit home when the american public began to see the pictures of the casualties and devastation in late december one thousand nine hundred eighty three the gruesome carnage was so disturbing that some mothers demanded nimitz's resignation what was more striking was not just the heavy casualties but the confusion regarding the burial of hundreds of marines who gave their lives ataru the actual number of total missing people from this from this battle was five hundred eleven basically it's a very nebulous number there is a huge distance here there's eleven hundred six people lost at the end of the war

when the army came back to dig these people up and take them back to the states only three hundred ninety two were dug up and brought back to the states there's over. well over two hundred fifty probably almost three hundred people on the island today the quartermaster corps of the of the army made a reasonably diligent effort starting in february of one thousand nine hundred eighty six and winding up in. may of nine hundred forty six to find the remains of approximately three hundred maybe four hundred guys but. the report that i read issued by the guy in charge says that they could not account for almost fifty percent of the people who were brought back to the states those are real graves those are real people who were brought back but there was over three hundred that were never brought back and those people's names are still listed as missing in action today although many of them we have pictures of their graves we have

pictures of the maps of where they were buried those people those families were never told that here's your family member and return to the states those people are still lost in space this is a photograph from. bernard she leaves grave on the west side of the island near what was known as green beach and that's a photograph of his grave and he's still missing today this is someone named steve momar who no one even knows who he is and no you can't even find. a mention of him in any of the original rosters here's a picture of grave number eighteen with robert brand. norman jr frank as the sea and henry lot so they're all still missing today. this is a photograph of grave number eleven where there are one hundred forty five graves and only thirty two were disinterred this is

a plot math grave number thirty three were four hundred people were were listed as being buried but in reality only one hundred twenty nine were recovered. one of those people by the way is alexander bonny man who was who won the congressional medal of honor in the battle of sorrow and in doing so he lost his life and he was buried in one of these temporary cemeteries and never found lieutenant alexander bonnie min was one of four congressional medal of honor winners which also included first lieutenant hawkins william bordelon and the only survivor of the battle colonel david chu. bonnie minh and many other brave men were on leon's mind when he paid his respects at the marine monument which has been placed in a parking lot away from the litter on the beaches. as a fitting tribute to the many missing in action and still lost on this tiny stretch of coral leon pieces respects to a special marine soames lies here he came to the coast watchers memorial

a beautiful war and to those guys who gave their lives. in defense of their country and ours too by the way and the brits the the australians of rusal of theirs are no more allies here but soames is not he lives here or somewhere we're i'm standing and then unmarked grave and like our government recognized forgotten. and of no value. god rest him. and i feel very sad about him and his relatives in the intense difficulty of world war two many people seventy nine thousand of them basically were lost in space this is an example of different branches of the service not being able to communicate effectively with each other and show where they left all these people and this is not on usual island i mean this is an enormous mistake that happened

during an enormously difficult time in american history and this was a reticence generation of people because after world war two many people does that all the time they get on with their lives and this issue is a done issue but in reality a lot of people's families don't feel that way. leon and the crew finally headed home but for him the work has just begun. he is determined to fight until action is taken by our government i'm going to present the documentary into salad or feinstein and hopefully have her take the necessary action have appropriations provided to tara so that they garbage control program and the public education program could get underway before tara sinks under the ocean a couple of the islands in the twelve thirteen island archipelago are now mult the needs the ocean and it's only a matter of time maybe

a dozen years or twenty or thirty years before the entire island group will be called the new atlantas because there won't be any tomorrow. after nearly sixty five years of past many unanswered questions remain hundreds of americans are still lost in the sands of species and there's a dangerous as well as disastrous environmental legacy that remains on this tiny atoll and many other islands throughout the pacific campaign. for leone cooper the battle is just beginning.

and. the british stock. markets why not. find out what's really happening to the global economy with mike stronger for a no holds barred look at the global financial headlines two kinds a report. sweet and clean. and fair use for.

radioactive and dangerous. and even dead and desolate. pale keep their unique secrets and their bottoms unique lakes on our team.

the official location giuliani phone the one called talk from the. video on demand. an. apology want. to. leave. police across europe twenty six people suspected of plotting

a christmas campaign of terror those detained reported to be linked to international terrorist groups and militants in chechnya. the impact of the u.s. more than iraq and afghanistan is becoming more visible on home soil as it relates to a recent report shows a record number of young veterans are committing suicide each month. north korea attacks an island in the south with a barrage of birds delivery far but so good for us it's forces earlier farge shells and exercises directed west north brush urges car from both sides to avert an all out war. led danish authorities trying to listen to lower leaking leaks to find out whether the country's soldiers abused prisoners in iraq after being denied any information by nato and the us.