
A Boy Who Became a World War II Veteran at 13 Years Old - lujim
http://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/the-boy-who-became-a-world-war-ii-veteran-at-13-years-old-168104583/?no-ist
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kiba
Remember hero exists, because tragic scenarios exist.

Without tragedy and wars, there will be no heroes and that is a good thing.

Remember, the people who get medal of honors are either dead or are involved
in horrific situations.

~~~
andyl
Thank you for your teaching.

~~~
anandr2013
I also think this is a very Campbellian view of heroes. Most of the people I
consider as heroes (Einstein, for example), have nothing to do with tragedy
(unless of course, you consider the whole human condition thing as being a
tragedy)

~~~
lujim
Einstein was a genius, but he was also a jerk to his first wife and kids. His
existence was certainly a big win for humanity I don't think of him as a hero,
just a super smart guy that followed his passion. Being a good parent, or
employee, friend is commendable but not heroic. The word heroic has become
watered down to describe people that do commendable things.

Knowing you can be killed, disfigured, or severely injured within the next few
minutes and still doing your job is heroic. Dan Carlin's hardcore history
podcast described British soldiers in WW1 looking at their watches and knowing
that in 5 minutes they would be going over the top into no man's land and
would very likely be killed or injured. That hit me for some reason. Imagine
taking your last look at the world around you and knowing that in two minutes
you would probably be dead or wrenching around on the ground in complete
agony, but you still go.

~~~
StavrosK
Are you still a hero if you die invading a country for its resources? What if
you die because someone asked you to walk into gunfire for no reason and you
did? Is it the death that makes the hero, or the defending others? If the
latter, why does the hero have to die?

~~~
lujim
I think a heroic act happens at the individual level in the moment. It's when
someone has to overcome their survival instinct to do their job in a given
moment. Are terrorist heroic? No, they want to die because they think they
will be rewarded. Where there heroic soldiers fighting on every side in WW2? I
think so. Just because Hitler was a psycho doesn't mean that a German soldier
jumping on a grenade to save his close personal friends didn't act heroically.
He wanted to go home to his wife and kids but in an instant, without thinking
about the macro political motives behind the leaders of his country, ignored
his survival instinct and saved a few friends. Dying doesn't make you a hero,
but I do think by definition a heroic act is when an individual ignores their
self preservation instinct with no expectation of reward or gain to do a task
that they might rather not do. I think the word is watered down to describe
people that do nice things, but aren't risking literal life and limb.

~~~
pangram
I'm not sure that whether the individual believes there is a reward is
relevant.

Example: atheist terrorists -- atheistic suicide bomber, say -- would be
heroic because they don't believe there is a reward?

~~~
lujim
Are there atheist suicide bombers?

~~~
anandr2013
I get what you are trying to say, and i think it boils down to how you define
a hero. If you had asked me about a heroic act, my definition would be very
close to yours, while for a hero, my definition has now become, as you put it,
a little watered down, thanks to how the word hero is used in todays culture.

On a related note, would you consider someone like Ozymandias
([https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ozymandias_(comics)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ozymandias_\(comics\)))
a hero?

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Animats
Dave Hackworth was a sergeant at 15. He entered Army service in 1945, right
after WWII, after a year in the Merchant Marine. He had a long career, fought
in all the wars of that era, won many medals, leaving as a full colonel, and
later became a military reporter for Newsweek.

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xyzzyz
We have a statue put up for the child soldiers who fought and died during the
Warsaw Uprising of 1944. It's in a pretty prominent location, hard to miss if
you're a tourist in Warsaw.
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ma%C5%82y_Powstaniec](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ma%C5%82y_Powstaniec)

Hundreds of thousands of civilians also died in that uprising, many of them
children who didn't fight. There's no statue for them.

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vezzy-fnord
See also the 8-year old WWI veteran:
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mom%C4%8Dilo_Gavri%C4%87](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mom%C4%8Dilo_Gavri%C4%87)

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HillaryBriss
WTF was wrong with the Navy, taking away a wounded soldier's disability
benefits and medals and putting him in jail after he'd served so bravely in a
deadly sea battle?

And why did it take until the 1980's for this man to get disability benefits
restored? That doesn't exactly renew my faith in government.

~~~
cperciva
I'm guessing that they didn't want his example to be one which other 12 year
olds would aspire to follow.

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siberianbear
There is a movie based on this man's life called "Too Young the Hero". I
enjoyed watching it a few years ago.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Too_Young_the_Hero](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Too_Young_the_Hero)

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NetWarNinja
Awesome story of these kids who sacrificed so much. But in those days males
were groomed to become the man in the family when they reached teenage years,
a lot of these kids worked in the local town factory or were farmers.

Alexander the Great was 25 years old when he conquered the known world. Man is
hardwired to conquer in all aspects of life. The desire to explore and to
experience and see the unknown or undiscovered.

~~~
Asbostos
Is it also awesome that the Japanese soldiers they fought also sacrificed so
much? If so, then how is it a good thing for people to kill each other with no
apparent purpose? If not then who decides which side is right and which is
wrong?

Add to your list the desire to kill other people. That's a human instinct
which was, as the article seems to suggest, a strong motivator for this boy.
Much like what drives westerners to travel to Syria to fight for ISIS, or what
drives a mass shooter in America. We shouldn't deny that soldiers often choose
their job for the opportunity and pleasure of killing.

~~~
lujim
Read Flyboys. The Japanese soldiers, especially the officers were acting in a
way that could truly be described as evil. One jaw dropping story involved an
officer raping a woman, killing her, and then adding her to a stew that was
fed to his soldiers. Another mind blowing tid bit was about a Japanese
commanding officer that dug up buried American airmen that had been
decapitated so he could eat their livers.

While you're at it read "With the Old Breed" by EB Sledge. The Marines in the
pacific had the joy of living in the mud next to their own excrement and the
magot infested corpses of their best buddies for months at a time so that they
could stop the kinds of atrocracies described in Flyboys.

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Asbostos
Why are child soldiers a human rights violation when they happen in Africa,
but a hero when they happen in America? Is it the difference between
volunteering and being forced to fight? That shouldn't apply to children who
are too young to make those decisions themselves.

He still broke the law, and the navy still didn't check his ID thoroughly. If
we wanted child soldiers, the age limit would have been reduced from 16 to 13.
That shows they were already socially unacceptable even during WWII.

~~~
jkot
11 years old is not old enough to break the law. Navy is the one who broke the
law, and one who should pay compensations for that.

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markdown
A brave young teenager leaving his safe space to go to war. Respect.

~~~
gambiting
The same sentence can be said about a young man from Syria going to war for
Isis. Except that you probably wouldn't put "respect" at the end of your
sentence.

No young people should go to war anywhere.

~~~
lujim
Truly just wars may be few and far between but the Pacific war was one of
them. I get annoyed by flag waving and chest thumping as much as the next guy
but very few people alive today would try to justify Japans actions in WW2. I
think it's ok to use the word "respect" in this case. Comparing a Marine or
Sailor who broke the rules to fight in the Pacific to a kid fighting with ISIS
is a real stretch.

~~~
gambiting
I don't think it is, really. A 13 year old child is not going to understand
what they are fighting for, doesn't matter if they are from Syria or from US.
We don't let 13 year olds have sex because they don't understand what they are
doing, we don't let them drink alcohol, smoke or drive for the same reason -
but going to war is somehow laudable? The only reason why there's "respect" in
here is that he fought for the "good" side. If he fought for the "bad" side we
would all be saying how horrible it was that they used children soldiers.

~~~
lujim
I would respect a "Bad side in ww2" Japanese or German boy who decided to lie
about his age to enlist and AFTER seeing the horrors of combat still acted
more heroic than most grown men. I think this guy was a complete bad ass.

