wieberg: okinawa was really where the african-american soldiers prove themselves.an you go into that a bit more? prof. maxwell: i wouldn't put at okinawa, i think they pulled themselves in tinian some of these original, saipan tinian were nasty and fibbing landings. you have reports of white soldiers calling them black angels because those ammo depot companies that were devised not to be fighting, they were devised to be supply units, but when people start falling, when depots start blowing they picked up weapons and fought alongside their other marines. i think that is when you start to see a shift. iwo jima now, there might have still been tensions but you have the same thing happening. you had ammo depot companies finding themselves very much in the thick of battle, and gilman brooks, a montford pointer at the time that was on iwo jima states in his testimony that once the flag was raised over iwo jima, both black and whites, marines or army, they stood in altogether and there was this idea of being an american. not black, not white, being american. okinawa was

marine corps in 1942, and went on to distinction itself on okinawa and throughout the pacific theater in world war ii. today, racial and ethnic minority groups make up 40% of our active duty military. that is up from 25%, as recently as 1990. and they account for more than 47% of our active duty marines. the montford marines paved the way. tonight, we will hear their story. before we start, i want to invite all of you in the audience to submit questions in the chat box on your screen. you can do that throughout the presentation, and we will get to them at the end. jeremy, it is great to have you here, welcome to the kansas city public library. jeremy: thank you very much. as steve said i will be talking about the montford point marines , before i do that i want to preface my journey to the topic. my first foray into academic history was to study integration into combat units. it was army and marine corps related combat units and i was looking at the prevalence of racial tension in the integration. that looked at african-american journey into the military from the beginning to the majo

obviously okinawa was harrowing as well, the march back to japan was not nice.hat is why we get the atomic bombs, unfortunately. steve: still referencing world war ii, audience question, how was the postwar experience for black soldiers who returned home from war? as opposed to or compared with white soldiers. prof. maxwell: much the same as it had in previously, after world war i. a lot of the postwar cuts. a lot of african-americans get caught up in this. the army, like i said, had afforded a permanent place for originally six units that became four, they were organized into four. the cab and infantry units. still, when you draw down, they are looking to cut and shave expenses. you saw 17,000, strength of 17,000 being cut to 2300 or so. in civilian society, it is much the same. jim crow is still prevalent at the time so they are not finding jobs that can sustain families. that is what you see a lot of montford pointers staying in for 20 or 30 years. i know one of these guys that was at montford point, but one of the first marines in vietnam that landed and end

to okinawa, the japanese yamato, on april 7, 1945. an admiral who spent his career until 1942 on surface ships, told the battleship admirals and told the air admiral, from wisconsin, taken -- you take him. and in a couple of hours the ship was sent to the bottom, solely by american airpower. so these events from 1940-1945 demonstrate what mitchell had proven in 1921 is true. it is possible. and it marks the end of the battleship, after centuries as the primary arbiter of naval power, it marks the eclipse of the battleship. if that foreshadowed, in 1921, it is now come to pass. that is a tremendous prophecy and legacy of what happened off the virginia capes in the summer of 1921. let me give you the last word. the sinking of ostfriesland marked the beginning of what would be a slow and for battleships. you have seen that over the last few slides. denny air force history -- then the air force history of world war ii, disputes arose in the manner in which experiments have been conducted. the reports from the navy tended to deprecate the

later on in the war and be a key air commander the battle of okinawa. so these are the two senior marine aviators. and then among the naval aviators. there's this guy feel like stump many of you probably have never heard of he's kind of a forgotten. a forgotten light if you will in the different in the development of naval aviation, he's a carrier commander during world war ii. he's a task force commander 1944 to 45 if any of you are familiar with the battle of leyte gulf. the battle off of samara on the morning of the 25th of october when three groups of jeep carriers are surprised by japanese battleships the overall commander on the american side of those three groups of light-skinned escort carriers or jeep carriers as they're called is admiral stump. taffy one taffy two and taffy three is the group was what the groups are known for and taffy three did did most of the fighting. but the overall american commander that got other other airplanes and helped try and and coordinate a defense was admiral stump and he the navy cross for it. he'll later comma

here's our live camera, checking out the okinawa media sql. here probably you're noticing more of a breeze near the coast and right around the bay shoreline and that will eventually help cool off the entire bay area, but it'll take some time, especially for the interior. right now. temperatures ranging from 63 degrees in half of the bay. it looks like 99 conquered santa rose in the upper eighties. here's our satellite. we're showing you this. some showers and thunderstorms in the sierra. some fog down towards central and southern california. and once again, we're talking about the breezy conditions that will eventually cool off the bay area for tomorrow. so here's a look at our forecast for tomorrow morning and you could see temperatures into the afternoon hours. high spots close to 100 degrees by about three or four o'clock, so take a look at those numbers for your forecast highs for tomorrow. another hot day inland, but will cool things off by sunday. we'll have more on that coming up in a few minutes, all, mark. thank you so much. sorry abo

in okinawa and in korea pointed to china, something like 5 or 600 miles away. that's the kind of provocation that we're living with day by day. now, that's almost never news. that is the dangerous stage that we're in, leaving us in a stage when they call b mistake or accident. and it becomes a nuclear war. the try no doesn't, in military terms, china doesn't threaten anybody. it's made. it's made very clear that water is interested in its business and trading in, in, in development, in, in making its own people prosperous in a way that they have never known you. when you're in china, you have a history of like a presence. the history of china right through the 19th century, as a colonial impoverished surveyed of the west, they feel that they call it the, the century of humiliation that's over. and it's been and it's been, it's, it's over in a very spectacular way because china has risen to the point where anything the west can do. it can do and often do it better. almost half of all the chinese coven vaccine is going to other countries. that's indicative of chi

and this is what really irritated that colonel in okinawa. and our order say, the utilization of government porters, and mess is not required. when we walked in there he said, you guys are going to a hotel? you're gonna be on the boq enlisted quarters. >> sir we can't function that way, i said. and that's not what our order say. and going back to what i said originally, living we had to be together 24 hours a day. we were a mobile force ready to go. if i was a down inside gone and we had orders to go do something, we'll, it'll probably take two days to get us all together. also we would be enlisted man would have to peel potatoes. because they had, well there goes the mission panel. so, that's why we lived on the economy. anything that would adversely affect our performance of duty, we could circumvent. and then, the other thing that really ticked that colonel off, we were authorized to wear and carry civilian clothes. he did not like that. we had to be in uniform. photo number one is why we were living together we have to be together 24 hour

battles of sicily in the atlantic, normandy, operation dragoon, battle of the bulge, iwo jima, carraway okinawa many, many more. during the cold war with the soviet union, american soldiers fought the spread of communism including korea with the soviets and chinese fact communist and northern part of the korean peninsula invading the south. over 5.7 million americans were engaged in that war, 5.7 million and 34000 lost their lives. almost 3 million americans in uniform in the vietnam war intended to prevent the soviets and chinese fact communist in the northern part of that country from taking over the south. over 58000 american soldiers lost their lives. there have been many battles since including but not limited to iraq and afghanistan and the war on terrorism. contrite tot the floors we hear from joe biden and kamala harris, from lebron james and athletes, contrary to the slurs we hear from antifa and black lives matter and other leftist marxism in this country, america is great country. america is not an imperialist country, not a colonizing country, our soldiers, our people are noble. we

saipan, guam, okinawa, i think the one place where trucks did not do so well was on iwo jima, largely because of the volcanic gravel that was very tough traffic ability. there, you needed weapons carriers and jeeps to try to move casualties, ammunition. nobody could really function for very long unless they had some kind of transportation systems based upon vehicles of some kind. it might be amphibious tractors or light vehicles. but, you simply cannot conduct a military operation that was firepower rich unless you had something to carry the loads of ammunition. tyler: thank you. that was an excellent question. it raises the point that even though these islands look minuscule on a map, an island like wattle canal or saipan has the capacity and need for a network and large number of trucks if you are going to be using it as a military base. marines and soldiers who came back to wattle canal after having fought there initially and then having returned when it was transformed into a rest center, said it was unrecognizable because of all the roads the army engineers and the cvs coffered -

on okinawa, can you hear me still? can hear me? i don't hear in the background while you wave your hands if you can hear me. okay, i don't want to be told afterwards which i could have heard you. okay. so i read in the international edition of time while we were on that mission. in rome the week. i met john wayne came back. i saw pictures of what we were doing to put saiawi the british and french. i've never seen him since. we were leveling portside. why do i say we look at that, you know nato i was in the marines in contrast to the we then went on a little habit you pick up in the executive branch, which i worked for for about 15 years. is he say we are going to identify with it. it's us we're on the team. i've got to get out of that. but anyway, i was glad that americans did not have to see pictures like that of what we were doing when we were doing. to the civilians of egypt i felt sorry for the british and french. who had to look at pictures like that if they did? what was done in the course of their colonial aggression? okay,

after the war, a lot of leaders weren't paying attention, they were off in india and okinawa establishing home economics there. you have all these social factors that were pushing women out of jobs pushing women into back into the home you also have this wave of interest in child development and psychology and this is when you had doctors spock home economists embrace that because it seemed to them they had solved a lot of the physical drudgery of housework. which had been such a focus of the early field and now they were focusing on relationships within the home and loving relationships and personal development. that all sounds really great except that those people putting together that material were for the most part men or coming as pediatrics or psychology and they had really sexist traditional attitudes about women's roles and this just permeated the curriculum so hard. i read some of the speeches from the founding of the national council on family relations which exist to this day with a much broader mindset. they emphasize the differences between men and women. this is like how i l

was overmatched in terms of artillery and most pacific theater battles, the exception perhaps being okinawabut by and large, it is a disadvantage for the japanese in their war against western allies. and the western allies certainly prioritized use of artillery, in part to save on manpower, bullets, not bodies, shells, not bodies, as a way to win the war. the typical u.s. infantry division had four artillery battalions, three work hundred five millimeter and one was a hundred 55 millimeter -- three were 105 millimeter and one was 155 millimeter. you had one antiaircraft artillery battalion, and antitank guns too. there was so much artillery and so much priority on it that in a u.s. infantry division, you have all this collected equipment in a brigade-sized command that was committed by a one-star general. so you had three generals in a u.s. division, the three-star major general commanded, assistant division commander one star, and a one star commander who commanded division artillery. if artillery is the biggest killer and wounder, it is also personal. you will notice veterans account and

after the war, proceeds a lot of leaders were paying attention because they were off in india and okinawa establishing schools of home economics there. and you had all of these social factors that were pushing women out of jobs that were pushing wwomen into back into the home and also had this wave of interest in child development and psychology and this is when you have doctor spock parenting guides. and economists embraced that because it seemed to them like they had solved a lot of the physical drudgery of housework. which had been such a focus of the early field. and now they were focusing on relationships within the home and d loving relationships and personal development that all losound great except that those people putting together that material worked were for the most part men were coming out of pediatrics for psychology and they had really sexist traditional attitudes about women's roles and they didn't just permeated the curriculum. so far. and it's really like i read the home of the speeches from thefounding of the national council on family relations . which you know, exist

one is to the marionettes in u-boat jima, the other is to japan and okinawa. check out our website, go to the travel page for information on that. all the other tours that we'd have that many of our speakers are featured as tour historians. rob, you know where to find him. he's here in new orleans. thank you for leading a wonderful roundtable. >> each day this week we're showing american history tv programs normally seen on the weekends. on c-span 3. wednesday, a look at women's roles during world war ii. lisa keller talks about how the influx of women joining the workforce and military changed traditional expectations. and provided the initial spark for the women's movement. wednesday night, at eight eastern, here on c-span 3. in 1945, americans recapture the philippine island at the mouth of manila bay. which have been lost to the japanese in 1942. next kevin maurer talks about his book, rock force the american paratroopers that took back corregidor, the mccarthy memorial hosted this event and provided the video. >> welcome. thank you for joining us. the los

overseas for us in 2022 to the pacific one is to the marianas and iwo jima and the other is to japan and okinawa. so check out our website and go to the travel page for information on that and all the other tours. we have that many of our speakers are featured as tourist historians and rob, you know where to find them. he's here in new orleans. thank

overseas for us in 2022 to the pacific one is to the marianas and iwo jima and the other is to japan and okinawa. so check out our website and go to the travel page for information on that and all the other tours. we have that many of our speakers are featured as tourist historians and rob, you know where to find them. he's here in new orleans. thankwelcome. thank you for joining us. the loss of corregidor and the philippines in 1942 was a devastating blow to the united states and to general douglas macarthur. by 1945 in the minds of many americans and filipinos corregidor the rock was not just a military target. it was the site of a military defeat that had to be redeemed in february 1945 a daring mission was launched to recapture this island. au

mussolini being taken down by the mob and okinawa island which was the final staging before the invasionof japan and auschwitz was discovered that cow was discovered and allied troops most especially the troops closing in on berlin and there were just so many things have happened which is why devote the time with this book really comes out early next year. >> host: you -- u.n. ashland virginia. >> caller: thank you for this wonderful program. it's interesting to look back andst see a lot of things that e aren't aware of and and i hope that mr. shirley will bring more things at a positive way. i the poem in the reagan library. i can give it to you to see the proclamation he made where he proclaimed in 1983 karen shared a for companies and to do as much as they can to help the lesse fortunate. that's a real positive message that needs to come out even more in these times. i wanted to see if you could comment on two people. i received a letter from president reagan and charles wic ahead of the u.s. information agency related to information andti i sent to him concerning the -- in the early