In his original book, Eugene cries after he mercy kills a gun-wounded dove. Eugene breaks down and tells his dad that he can't stand to see an animal suffer anymore. His dad suggests that he would enjoy bird watching instead. As a result, Eugene becomes a passionate bird watcher. Eugene later gets a Ph.D. in zoology and becomes of professor in ornithology. It was common to see professor Sledge eagerly roaming the campus with his students searching for and watching birds.
Also, he never hunted again, to my knowledge never picked up a weapon. His wife would help him with his struggle with nightmares, when he was in the depths of them she would need to lean close and whisper Sledgehammer in his ear in order to wake him safely. The writing of his memoirs, at her urging, did a great deal to help him finally heal, as well as getting him back in contact with Snafu.
btw little fun fact the family of original Sledge was so touched and proud about the actor and how he portrayed him they actually gave the actor as gift the original Eugenes pipe and he still has it
I can understand why "Snafu" isolated himself i imagine a lot of them just wanted to forget it and sadly that did mean distancing themselves from those they fought with
Plus, everyone reacts differently to good bye situations. Ever have a buddy ghost on you at a party? Just disappear and go home? Some folks don't like to confront the emotions.
A good friend of my families was on Peleliu and Okinawa, I know he was at a few other places but don't remember. It was in the 1990's before he spoke to anyone about what happened. He and his wife were married for over 40 years before he told her what had happened. He did the same thing Snafu did and finally, at his wife's bidding went to a reunion in 2004 and finally found peace. I hope Snafu found the same.
@@thomast8539 Yeah I'm that guy, good of you to be understanding rather than judgemental. Lots of people over the years just saw me as someone who doesn't give a crap.
Im wondering if you know how huch the tube and base plate weighed that they carried. And yours too. I always felt a little sorry for the guys humping those plates. Thanks for your service Army. Navy here.
It looks like they may be using a system similar to the current 81mm, not sure what the weight would have been then. On the modern 81mm, the baseplate is around 25 pounds, the cannon weighs about 35 pounds, the bipod weighs about 26 pounds. I was on a 120mm crew so we were in a Stryker vehicle to carry our system. But we also had a 60mm system for dismounted patrols. P.s. Thank you for your service y'all.
I personally don’t compare band of brothers and the pacific. I absolutely love both. They are their own and very different wars. Both are masterpieces. And I agree, both opening themes are amazing and I never skip them
They are both very good. My comparisons, and criticisms, come from how the series are structured. The Pacific packs more story and events into ten episodes than Brothers did. It leave a gap of understanding. It could use two or three more for full effect. While Band of Brothers has a larger cast to know, it can handle it because of the focused story. Market Garden is it's weakest episode because of the amount of context left out.
@@dirus3142 well Hanks and Spielberg are getting together again to make another miniseries about the 8th Army Air Corps, so hopefully we can get the best of both worlds! Or maybe something totally new
I wouldn't say that Band of Brothers is better than The Pacific, it's just that Band of Brothers is easier to watch, it's not as dark, and I'd say it's more entertaining, too. There's a lot more characters, and you get more of their personalities, which are great. There's more joking around. The Pacific is really just based around a small number of people, and they're pretty much all just in shock and stone-faced the whole time. It's completely understandable, considering what they went through, but it's not as fun to watch. It's depressing, and even in the battles they win, it doesn't feel like winning.
@@fakecubedOne way I compare the 2 shows is how it tackles combat fatigue especially in the later episodes. In the later period of the war, America and Britain was facing a real problem with soldiers who were breaking down from combat fatigue, they formed a substantial percentage of Allied casualties. I feel Band of Brothers gave a little peak at how the men were experiencing combat fatigue, while The Pacific made it more central to its plot. As such The Pacific feels darker and grittier.
@@derf-vr1fc I recommend reading it. It recalls graphic details on how brutal the war was without any filter to the point this mini series doesn’t do it justice.
You should watch these two movies about Iwo Jima in WW2. Both show the same battle but from opposite sides. "Flags of Our Fathers" is the US side and "Letters from Iwo Jima" is from the Japanese side. Directed by Clint Eastwood.
The reason he didn't wake him was because he saw how he was sleeping peacefully for once. Eugene suffered from frequent nightmares after the war and on the train was one occasion in which he was sleeping peacefully
The reason he did that was that he knew both he and Sledge would never have a peaceful sleep in a long time. He wanted Sledge to relish this last peaceful sleep and so he didn't wake him up. But yeah, seeing good friends parting ways is pretty sad.
I don’t think it was a bad thing, once I had a chance to bother my brother while he was eating and decided not to, because I just him to enjoy his moment and peace at eating. I understood Snafu doing that for Sledge because he deserved a nice good sleep after the hell they went through on Okinawa.
I think you would find Generation Kill entertaining. It has the same narrative process as Band of Brothers/The Pacific but covers a Marine Recon Battalion during the 2003 invasion of Iraq.
My father's brother fought at Okinawa. The only thing he'd ever really say was that he had to kill a Japanese soldier at close range in a hut. It was either him or the Japanese soldier. He would never really talk about his time in the war. Not until I came home on leave one Christmas (1988), and attended the annual family Christmas Party and wore my Class A uniform. He sat down at a table with my father and me and talked about his time in the Army (I learned that he was a First Sergeant). On the ride home, my father said the he'd never, ever heard him talk about the war, other than years later when he told about the Japanese soldier that he killed. My father was kind of astounded to hear him talk about his time in the Army. I guess seeing my uniform just gave him that moment where he could kind of unload the chest of memories. At that point, (Christmas 1988) it had been 43 years since the war had ended. He passed away 5 years later, in December of 1993.
I thank you for your reactions. A little less then 30 years after the war ended, i was an 18 year old kid at the Marine Corps Recruit Depot, paris island SC. Every night, our drill instructors would have us say "good night Chesty, where ever you are". General Lewis "Chesty" Puller is what we call a marines marine!
My dad had the pleasure of meeting Dr. Sledge and have dinner with him in his home in Mobile two years before he past away. I met Sledge’s son when he came to visit the Peleliu battlefield, which is where i grew up, and my family’s land is Orange beach where the marines landed.
@@Silky808 Hey there. No he did not. I'm pretty sure he never wanted to go back. Cape Gloucester was bad but I think Peleliu is the one that got to him. Unfortunately he passed away a year ago this month. I have his Marine dog tags and I myself do want to visit Peleliu. I havnt decided yet but I may leave his tags there so he can be with his buddies who didnt make it and maybe close that chapter for him.
@@vonfragesq7145 I’m sorry to hear that. From a lot of the vets i met who came back, it was hard but it did help them get some closure. The island today is very beautiful and peaceful place, with the northern part of the Island occupied by the locals and the rest of the island and battlefield is seemingly untouched and taken back by the the jungle. But still a great place to visit, the last time i was home was about 8 years ago, was planning a visit but COVID happened. Anyways I thank your Dad for his service, my dad was Veteran of the army but during Vietnam era, and I am actually active duty USAF, so I truly appreciate the military and their sacrifice.
@@Silky808 Thank you for your service as well. Navy vet here. I've watched videos of marine vets going back and some actually meeting Japanese vets who survived. The last ones didn't surrender until 1947.
Friend of my Father was a Marine on Iwo Jima. About a year before he passed away he honoured me by sitting down with me and telling me some of his experiences. The thing I remember the most is he would every once in a while get this strange look in his eyes and would softly ask " why am I here and my buddies aren't?". RIP Pvt. William DIck USMC
They call it "Survivor Guilt" now. It can manifest with sadness, depression, anger, rage, all across the spectrum. God Bless them. Semper Fidelis! Sgt. Nie USMC
I'm an old combat vet and I feel this was the greatest war series ever made. I've watched it many times but your heartfelt reactions made it seem brand new to me.
To this day, one of Eugene’s sons has not watched The Pacific. His memories of what he saw from his father when growing up gives him pause. I cannot say that I blame him. I can understand how the horrors of war would last a very long time. May their lives be remembered for all time.
I remember watching this every week when it aired and even then having to deal with people complaining that it wasn't as good as Band of Brothers. In reality it's a whole different beast covering a very different kind of war being fought at the same time with far less light hearted moments of rest compared to Easy Company (which is insane considering everything they went through) But I'll always love this show, it introduced me to Rami Malek one of my favorite actors ever and then Eugene's actor played Timmy in Jurassic Park, my favorite movie of all time. So to see him all grown up and working with Spielberg again just feels so satisfying.
I like both but I lean more towards Band of Brothers. Band of Brothers was strong in some areas and the Pacific was strong in some other areas. They are both equally as good, but I enjoyed watching BoB more than I did the Pacific.
Your reactions are so heartfelt! You are an absolute angel ❤️ As a Marine, thank you for watching and showing what those before us suffered through to wear the Eagle Globe and Anchor! Semper Fi🇺🇸🇺🇸
@@suprchickn7745 you’re very welcome! After Cassie’s reactions to Pacific and how it affected her, someone in Canada when our own country disrespects everything I bled for….I’ll be a patreon of hers as long as she has a channel
Just before my grandma passed away last year I was at her retirement community and had the pleasure to have a conversation with a Vet who fought on Iwo Jima. I never been in such awe in my life. I admire those old men that fought and died for us so long ago. I'm so grateful I had the chance to speak with him. Since then we took my grandma to her hometown to bury her with my grandfather so I never knew what happened to him or if he's still alive.
I think Iwo Jima had some civilians but they were evacuated. If I remember correctly, the civilians are depicted in letters from Iwo Jima in the beginning half of the movie before the Americans arrive.
The Imperial Japanese looked down upon the Okinawans. They would have no compunction about sending a young mother out with a bomb strapped to her, because they knew the Americans probably wouldn't shoot her. Sort of like the way the current terrorists behave.
Terminal Lumbago There were and are inhabitants on Guadalcanal. There’s an account of two aces facing each other over Henderson. Saburo Sakai was the Japanese, can’t recall the American. Strange story of it being known that each had wide open chances to kill the other and each holding off, if memory serves. Sakai kept a diary/journal and survived the war. He wrote the highest praise of the American pilot. The American polot crashed into the jungle and was found by local farmers. American intelligence on Guadalcanal told American service personnel to beware locals as they might be cannibals. The farmer that the American pilot met, took him in and cared for him and helped him get back to Henderson.
Henderson Field was the Japanese constructed airfield taken and renamed by the Americans. That airfield was the whole point of the fight. That the Marines were there was, in a sense, incidental. The airfield was everything. You’ll note, the Marines went on patrols, even led by Chesty himself, but there was no push to take the whole island. The Marines needed to hold the perimeter around Henderson and that was it. I read an account jibing with the whole “don’t come out of your hole at night,” incident.
Your reactions bring so much genuine humanity and compassion to such an awful reality. You have a good heart. Thank you for having the courage to watch this series.
Many thanks for your genuine reaction. Watching this Pacific series with you brought uncontrollable crying upon me. My dad was 1st Marine Division W.W.II. Watching this, I found myself transported into his soul and witnessing the horrors and demons of war that haunted him all his life.
The US military has the Purple heart for the wounded and the US premade a load for the invasion of Japan before the bomb dropped. They only ran out of those medals in the early 2000's.
I read about the proposed invasion of the Japanese home islands. Operation Downfall would have dwarfed the D-Day landings in size and complexity. Operation Olympic was the invasion of Kyushu and Operation Coronet was the invasion on Honshu. Both the Japanese and Allied forces were contemplating using chemical weapons. It would have also required to participation of the USSR (which did declare war on Japan AFTER the Hiroshima bomb). Soviet forced over ran the Japanese Kwangtung Army in Manchuria in only a few days.
During Operation Iraqi Freedom the Marine reserve mortuary affairs unit responsible for casualty collection had 8 5 ton trucks with approximately 30,000 body bags. It's better to have and not need it.
@@drcornelius8275 it was either the 2007 documentary "the war" or "hell in the Pacific" it made note of the old breed marines becoming superstitious and personally believing invading japan that they would not survive. Guess after so much combat and close calls your luck can eventually run out.
@@drcornelius8275 An allied invasion of Japan would also have forever destroyed that culture. The Japanese were ready to fight, every man, woman and child of them. The casualties on the Japanese civilian side could very well have been high enough that they'd still be recovering.
I think it's better, more graphic than BoB, different type of warfare, much more intense. Total respect for all military who participated in the Pacific Theatre of Operations.
I think my main problem with the Pacific when compared to BoB is that the Pacific felt like it was missing allot more events in the real story because they had to be constrained to the 10 episode format.
@@oscarjohnson2130 I don’t get why HBO couldn’t have just given them 12 episodes, they really needed to show Iwo Jima, and at the very least make mentions of tarawa, Saipan, and the Battle Of Manila. But given the 1st and 7th marines didn’t fight there i guess they felt it best to not mention it completely.
Okinawans historically have been treated like 2nd class citizens compared to the Yamato people(mainland Japanese). I have a good friend who is from Okinawa. She told me even tho Okinawa does have full Japanese rights and its people are full Japanese citizens. Ethically, they are still looked down upon even today.
Not to make an inappropriate joke, but being from Hawaii where Japanese Americans are all over the place, I gotta say that Okinawan donuts are fire lol
In WW2, it seems like a lot of that treatment had to do with the Japanese civilians and their proximity from the Emperor. The closer they were to him, the higher up in society they were.
Okinawa was a penal colony for the Japanese going back to it's feudal period. The Okinawan civilians were used as shields and boobytraps by the Japanese on a large scale. I lived there for a year and had repeated deployments there while in the Marines.
My uncle spent 30 days on Okinawa with the Marines at age 18. He found himself forced to fight Japanese soldiers who were using the civilian population as shields, as this episode shows. I can't begin to imagine the effect that must have had.
I’ve seen a few BofB and PACIFIC reactions and I gotta say, yours have been some of the best. You’re genuine in your response and honest in what you don’t know. And so appreciative in what you learn. It’s so refreshing. I’m sad you’re done with these as there aren’t any movie or series quite like them.
I highly recommend reading With the Old Breed written by Sledge from the notes he kept in his bible. I’ve read it 4 times since high school. It’s an amazing book.
Thank you Cassie for watching this and taking me through it. I watched it before but seeing it along with the expressions on your face somehow made it more emotional. Not that it wasn’t already a ton of emotion anyway. I think I’ve cried like a baby every time I’ve seen Band of Brothers and The Pacific. Thank you very much and God bless you. And thank you each and every person that’s ever served in the United States military. God bless you all.
At this point in Japan's history they were absolutely savage. The things that they did to civilians went far beyond "war crimes." 100,000 civilians killed in one month during the Battle of Manilla. At least 20K killed during the Battle of Saipan. Imagine if the Allies did have to invade the Home Islands.
If the Allies went through with Operation Downfall, it would have been 100 times worse than Okinawa. And not only that, but Easy Company would also have to take part.
@@rithvikmuthyalapati9754 As the story goes, the military commissioned so many purple hearts to be made anticipating what Operation Downfall (The invasion of Japan) would cost that we haven't had to have another batch made. Everyone knew the invasion of Japan was going to be a bloodbath the likes of which the US hadn't seen since the Civil War. This was the big thing that convinced Truman to order the Atomic Strikes. Or at least that's how the story goes. Authors, historians and etc. have argued that the Atomic Strikes were more of a warning to the Soviets than they were anything else, but considering Stalin knew about the Manhattan Project before even Truman did, it's hard to actually make that argument IMO.
@@ktvindicare From what I read, the emperor ordered everyone fight to the last man. Their history in warfare was that they would conquer and eradicate the population, they assumed that it was going to happen to them. In saipan the japanese civilians jumped off cliffs to kill themselves thinking the americans were coming to rape and murder the women and children. On the mainland it was quite possible that the men would fight to the last man and take as many enemy with them and then the entire civilian population would follow the emperor's order and it would have been a civilian catastrophe on top of a military one. In some respects dropping the bombs made them realize that further fighting would be pointless, people would die in their houses rather than on the battlefield. As for Truman, I think he had the sick idea of wanting to see what it could do to people and made it a 3 for 1: Test the weapon, cause the japanese to capitulate, and show the soviets you had it. Although 1 probably would've been enough. They didn't even have time to figure out what happened, I'm sure if they waited another few days they would have surrendered. The bomb museum is quite haunting with the relics they have there, school uniforms of kids, a set of concrete stairs with a man's shadow burned into it, melted roof tiles. There's a lot to think about about the pointlessness of war when you stand 10 meters below where the bomb went off. A few years ago I stood on the rebuilt bridge just under where it detonated thinking about the sheer ridiculousness and insanity that can lead to conflicts like that and just shake my head at those in our era that glorify and romanticize war and our so called leaders of the world that never seem to learn.
@@lurkingknight Japan has never been conquered by a foreign power in the entire history of that culture. Even the Mongols couldn't do it and they conquered fucking China! Yes. If the allied powers had invaded Japan they would have fought to the last man, I have no doubt in my mind. When they were fighting for every last scrap of turf on islands that held no value, you can only imagine what they would have done to protect their homeland.
@@ktvindicare Thank you very much for commenting this, not much people consider the consequences on Operation Downfall while criticizing the use of Atomic Bombs. It´s crazy just to read the numbers envisioned for Operation Downfall: *_up to 58 US + 3-5 Commonwealth divisions, or about 1.7 million of men needed to take part in the initial phase of the operation, with an estimated total of 6 million of men needed for the entire operation._* For comparison: during Operation Overlord a total of 10 allied divisions were used, 5 of them participating in the initial landings, a total of 156,000+ soldiers. By the time the Atomic Bombs were used the Soviet Army had 89 divisions available in the east to conduct any meaningful action against Japan but since the Soviet divisions were smaller than the allied and japanese ones, those 89 divisions represented only 1.5 million of soldiers, in the other hand, the Japanese had 55 divisions envisioned to defend the whole Japanese mainland (2.35 million of soldiers) a contingency reserve of 10 divisions, plus 20-30 million of civilians combatants, so, the argument of _"the Japanese surrendered only because they feared the Soviets after the latter declaring war on them"_ also falls quite short and is delusional AF, in 1945 the major part of the Red Army was busy enslaving and raping, I mean, "liberating" the half of Europe, and they wouldn´t get their asses out of there for the next 45 years. I leave some information from an article from a reputable source: _"The entire Downfall operations would cause between _*_1.7 to 4 million U.S. casualties*, including 400-800,000 U.S. dead, *and 5 to 10 million Japanese dead._*_ (Given that the initial Downfall plan called for 1,792,700 troops to go ashore in Japan, this estimate is indeed most sobering, and suggests many more troops than planned would need to be fed into a meat grinder)."_ www.history.navy.mil/about-us/leadership/director/directors-corner/h-grams/h-gram-057/h-057-1.html
I was raised by Pacific War vet. My best friend's dad, was a European War vet. Uncles and family friends were WW2 and Korean War vets. Another good friend's dad( who kinda filled in after my dad passed) was a Vietnam vet. So, I was raised on war stories and war movies. One of the things I really love about your reactions, is how genuine and innocent they can be. When you said at the end how all these stories and these men need to be remembered and how it needs to be taught, it made me cry.... like ugly cry. Thank you for that.
I totally recommend the documentary "He has seen war". It's about the homecoming of WWII veterans. The veterans interviewed are veterans of the Band of Brothers series and The Pacific. They also interview family members, including Sledge's sons and widow, Leckie's widow and daughter, among others. It lasts only 50 minutes and you can easily find it on RUclips and other platforms.
Since you mentioned it, my mom wanted to know what it was like on my peace keeping and my combat deployment. I told her the funny stories, about my friends but there is no way i could burden her. At times its hard to put into words even among other combat veterans.
I always found that series hard to watch particularly because it feels too recent and the pointlessness of that entire war leaves a bad taste in my mouth. What finally got me was when they talk about the capture and assault and torture of the 19 year old female soldier Pvt. Jessica Lynch. I’m a Gen Z’r so I didn’t know about her story until it was mentioned in the show. After that I then looked her up and read the full story about what those Iraqi animals did to her. It breaks my heart, and it hasn’t left my mind since. We should not be sending our daughters into war no matter what, and the Okinawan episode of ‘The Pacific’ completely demonstrates why. I cannot imagine what horrors our girls would’ve faced had we sent them into combat back then.
@@thatperformer3879 the story of Pvt Lynch is heavily disputed, just FYI. Maybe it's not the best idea to trust only one source. The Iraq War is a complicated mess built on lies, deception and a shit ton of misconceptions
@@Dorime3619 Jessica came out and said that the narrative reayed by her capture was a lie. She has not gone into a lot of the details about her time as a prisoner and rightly so, she appeared on the cleared hit podcast and discusses a lot of things about that period.
Whoever says Band of Brothers is better is insane. They're both equally amazing. Band of Brothers was a story about triumph with dabbles of that darkness mixed in and it was fantastic. The Pacific was very very dark. It not only showed the brutality of War but the side effects from it in a much bigger light. Both equally great in their own way but the Pacific was its own beast. Army, Marines it doesn't matter. To endure that terrain, some of which was taken at the cost of thousands for no reason at all, is something amazing. Semper Fi to the fallen, especially those who served in this theater of war. It was brutal
Anyone that thinks the US was wrong about dropping the atom bombs should read up on Operations Downfall and Coronet. Untold millions would have died from a conventional invasion of Japan as supposed to the thousands that did die.
Yeah, the estimated cost to just establish a beachhead on mainland Japan was something like 5-15 MILLION people, and would have nearly driven the Japanese people to "extinction" just to end the war thanks to the orders given by their emperor.
I've discussed this before with people, one said that blockade would have worked as the Japan was all that was left. He thought starving them would have been more civil than the bomb. I didn't agree.
@@scannedtomuch blockade doesn’t mean starving civilians including children inhumanely. War itself is savage even if it’s distant bombing. But directly starving people, including civilians, is undoubtedly a war crime, I would imagine.
Not to mention the fact that when the war finally ended, the US and Japan had already been fighting for nearly four years. People that say using the atomic bombs was the wrong thing to do, never seem to care that the war could have gone on until 1950 or longer.
My Grandfather was in the 5th Marine division and was all over the South Pacific. My great uncle said he never saw him drink a day in his life, till he came home from the war. Like a lot of men he self medicated with Alcohol and cigarettes (he smoked 3 packs a day after the war) for decades. I remember one time when he came to visit he raided ny parents (who didn't ever drink) liquor cabinet and found 3 or 4 bottles with about an inch of liquor in them. He pored all of it in to a huge galss and slammed it. There is no telling what demons were in his head after the war but it took one hell of a toll. The other thing i remember is he NEVER spoke about the war EVER. Except one memorial day he took out this box that had all his war mementos and he told us grand kids his story. I was only 6 at the time so i didn't really get it, but my brother always told me it changed his life.
I've watched your reactions to Band of Brothers, The Pacific, Hacksaw Ridge, and all I can think is that your parents should be proud of the way they raised you. I really think your kids are going to be able to say they have the best mom in the world
"those who disagree with the dropping of the atomic bombs at Hiroshima and Nagasaki cearly wasnt saved by them" from a veteran Marine who was preparing for the invasion of mainland Japan
Bill Guarnere said he got into an argument with someone who said that we should have found a "different way" than the atomic bombs. "Yeah, like sending me to jump into Tokyo and get killed?" I can imagine Wild Bill putting them in their place!
I've always been a bit torn over their use, but tend to end up being more thankful that they were used rather than an invasion happening. My father was in transit to Guam when the Japanese surrendered. He more than likely would have been involved if Japan was to be invaded.
I don’t disagree with the dropping of the bombs, but the idea that the Japanese surrendered because of the bombs is under informed. The Soviets declaring war on Japan, and starting a massive offensive into Japanese occupied territory is what caused the Japanese to surrender. The Americans firebombed Tokyo killing 100k people, then dropped the 2 atomic bombs, and the Japanese did not want surrender. The Soviets declared war, and the Japanese were so shit scared of the Soviets that they surrendered to the Americans exclusively. This was a bitter blow to the Soviets, as the US didn’t have to share Japan with the USSR like they did in Europe.
What a great closure for this reaction series. It has been an emotional rollercoaster for all of us. God bless you, Cassie, you're the best. Not everyone follows up with additional reading and make changes in real life. That's so heartwarming. Anyway, thank you for the series and see you soon in another ❤️
Popcorn in Bed, you should watch "Best Years of Our Lives" which deals with servicemen returning from WWII. It won the Oscar for Best Picture in 1946. Even if you don't react to it, you should watch it. It's a wonderful movie.
I second this one, just watched it for the first time over Memorial Day weekend. It was directed by William Wyler who served overseas filming war footage for news reels back in the States.
I have recently been learning all I can about my great grand uncle who died on the Western Front in WWI. He was born in Oxfordshire England, worked as an errand boy for a local butcher shop and then moved to Canada to work as a farmhand and lived here for two years before enlisting. He was just 19 years old when he came to Canada alone. He died in France in 1917 and is buried in Roclincourt Military Cemetery. I am privileged to have his war diaries and his pictures. Truly a brave man.
Thank you for reacting to this series. My Father (today is Father's Day when I am watching this) volunteered and served in the Pacific on an Ammunition Ship in the Navy for the whole war. He never spoke of what he saw or did in the war. I know he had shrapnel in his leg and Jungle Rot in his ears that he had to treat for the rest of his life. He died at 56 when I had just turned 15, so I never got to ask him about his experiences. Miss you, Dad.
I love that little moment Leckie has with the cabbie, just nice to see someone honoring him in even a small kind of way. I'm glad he and Vera had a good life together but I do wish for the sake of the story he had gone back to Stella. It's heartwarming to know that Snafu got hold of Sledge after reading his book, the way he left without saying "Bye" was so frustrating
"Stella" did not exist. He had an affair with a girl named "Sheila" who was not Greek. He then found out Sheila was married and cheating on her husband, so it was a no go.
If no one has told you yet, there were two TV miniseries done in the 80's called "The Winds of War" and "War and Remembrance." They chronicle the War experience of 3 families from 1939-45, in Europe, the Pacific, and the Conxentration camps. They are EXCELLENT, and both are available to watch on RUclips for free. They're long (14 hours and 18 hours, respectively) and they're old fashioned TV from 30-40 years ago, but they are amazingly well done. Shot mostly on location, too. The Winds of War has 7 parts and War and Remembrance has 12 parts. It's a commitment for sure, but if you ever feel up to tackling a wartime family saga, they're worth it. They focus mostly on the wartime experience rather than the battlefield experience, and it goes chronologically explaining everything.
When they return home it's very reminiscent of the hobbits returning to the Shire in the Lord of the Rings. It's only lightly touched on in the movie, but in the book it was several chapters long (my favorite chapter 'The Scouring of the Shire' is included). Some wounds go too deep and they are broken in certain ways. The home they've returned to is the same, but they are so different now that they feel totally out of place. They've grown in some ways, and they would look on their old selves with envy or pity or perhaps disdain. There really is no going back. They've got to just get by the best they can now.
Thank you for your great job reviewing this mini series. My father was decorated for valor as a forward mortar scout on Iwo Jima. He never came back the same.
I've seen interviews with Sledge's wife. She said that "Science was Gene's salvation". It's part of the significance of of him holding up and examining the flower at the end. He became a student of nature. He wasn't a botanist though. He was an ornithologist. I suspect getting a similar symbolic scene with birds would have been hard to pull off.
"If I were his mom I'd want him to tell me everything." He'd never tell you. Ever. Unless you've been in combat you simply can't relate to what he's been through, no way for you to understand. It's like he'd be talking in a completely different language. I made the mistake of talking about my combat experiences in Iraq to a friend when I got home. He looked at me like I had grown an extra head and had started breathing fire.
I shared my experience with my younger brother when he was deploying to Iraq. After returning, I told him to get everything off his chest before our family asked him questions. Our civilian family and friends would not understand what we experienced.
Well done, that was a heartfelt genuine reaction to a horrific war. I've spend 33 years in the Australian Military, and continue to serve now. I have been on multiple deployments all over the world and it's never easy to leave home and always wonderful to get back. But I have been lucky so far to not have to dodge bullets, my respect for the soldiers sailors airmen and marines of WW2 is immense. Lest We Forget 🌹
Great content for 👍. My grandfather was ww11 veteran with u.s army combat engineer..those men went through hell. He was purple heart, bronze star medal, and a president init citation..so proud he was my grandfather suffered PTSD for 10 years after war family said he would shred his bedsheets screaming..thank god he got better..those men are called the greatest generation for a reason..
I love your heartfelt reactions and your willingness to be educated about history. The Japanese treated their American and Allied POWs much worse than anything the Americans did to them. My mother's oldest brother, the uncle I never knew, was taken prisoner by the Japanese when the Philippines were attacked. He survived the Bataan Death March but died in a Japanese POW camp. Even a cursory reading about the death march will give you a good idea of the level of inhuman barbarity the Japanese engaged in. Another good true story to check out from the Pacific theatre is "Unbroken". There's both a book and a movie, the book being much better, but the movie is worth watching as well.
I was a Marine grunt so I'm partial towards the Pacific, but band of brothers is fantastic. Real heroes. Always like our alphas, even got married in my alphas.
My grandfather helped build the air bases all across the Pacific, which allowed our bombers to assault the Japanese home islands and bring the Japanese to their knees with hellish fire-bombing. And eventually, two nuclear bombs. He also supplied the air crews and helped keep the planes flying. He did that across island after island all over the Pacific. To keep bombers pounding Japan and fighters helping our troops on the ground. His job was to keep the planes flying and keep the airbases defended. He did his job, and he shot back a lot. It’s incredible to read his accounts of fighting off Japanese air raids from New Guinea to the Philippines and on to Okinawa. It was terrifying. I have a complicated relationship with that narrative because I know how it all ended. In nuclear destruction. My grandfather never spoke of the war. I think he had a complicated relationship with it, too. It was a God-awful war. We can say that much. I can’t say I blame him at all for the work he did, especially considering all the friends he lost in the war. And he dealt with PTSD until the day he died. He died in 1998. He refused military burial rites. It was only in the last couple of years that my father and his siblings and cousins got together to give him a proper military burial. Which he most certainly deserved. Because he was a hero. Just like countless thousands of other ordinary Americans in that war.
Both of my grandparents served in WW2, with one being a Marine during Guadalcanal. They both never talked about the war and we were asked by our parents to never bring it up. Definitely something that will never be fully comprehended by those who were not there. This Era would be called the Greatezt Generation for their sacrafice.
I was fortunate to grow up listening to first hand account from family. Who were there. From beginning to end. Almost all are gone. And yes, their stories need to be told again and again. With Great Conviction. For all those who can not thank you for bringing their story to thousands that need to be told. I will Thank you on their behalf. Semper Fi.
10:50 i just noticed this but remember back when Leckie shot the Japanese soldier which was being shot for fun by other marines that was Leckie showing mercy that scene is showing Sledge having none, hes not killing the soldier for any other reason than to kill.
So glad that you watched this series. I’m also in the camp that liked this series more than band of brothers. The pacific was very well paced, very emotional, and really good acting and character studies. One point that I wish to make (and it was mentioned in the series)…most of these men who fought didn’t make it back home until months after the war. You need a continuing military presence after a war until you can be relieved by fresh units, which takes some time. Anytime you see victory parades with soldiers marching down an American street, these are soldiers who were available locally in most cases. By the time the combat veterans made it back home, all the parades and fanfare had already ended. As a veteran myself, I encourage everyone to help out veteran organizations and help with veteran suicide prevention and homeless relief. They deserve our eternal gratitude. 🇺🇸
I was on submarines in the 90s and kept a book where I would write my fiance every cycle. I gave it to her when I got back from sea every time. The letters Lucky never sent reminds me of that book.
My dad joined the Navy 8 days before his 18th birthday because in 1943 that made you eligible for the draft. The Marines heavy recruiting in small town in rural Utah. He dropped out of HS to join. He was a radar operator on a fetcher class destroyer in the Pacific. His experience wasn’t mind bending as the Marines or solders in the Pacific but he did have nightmares much of his life contending with the kamikaze attacks. He witness the income flights on his radar display that hit or tried to hit every target of opportunity which where the radar picket ship of Okinawa. If know your the destroy too the brunt of the attacks. Thankful his ship was never hit. However his ship almost was hit by the kamikaze that stuck the USS Franklin which they along side of. That was the heart of the greatest generation!
my day is complete!! :D thank you I have bin watching reaction videos for a long time. for the first time i am considering becomming a patreon! i love your videos.
I think its cool the geography when they head home. They come back in California, first stop Texas, then New Orleans, then Alabama. Seems like they took a great journey home as they did abroad. Trying to say goodbye to eachother was probably just as hard as facing the beaches and battles in the Pacific.
Well, I won't say that I enjoyed your reactions, CassiePop! But I deeply appreciate them for the heartfelt truth you convey in each moment. Watching series like these is an act of remembrance more than anything, and I hope that it's as close as I ever get to experiencing warfare of any sort! My grandad was a POW in WW2 and spent 5 years in various prison camps in Poland. I have the diary he kept. As long as we keep these memories alive, their experiences and their souls will live on and remind us how lucky we are that they were there to do what they did.
My dad lived to be 90. He was a marine in the Pacific. Can't tell you how many times we all went to the cemetery in his hometown so he could visit his friends who died in the Pacific. He never stopped wondering why he survived. He had six children and 15 grandchildren and I have no idea how many gr great children. That's why he survived. If we hadn't stopped the war with Hiroshima and Nagasaki none of them including my dad wouldn't have had any children.
That was my stepfather's war. He served in the Navy in the Atlantic and then in the Pacific, on a tiny ship, a sub chaser. The first part of his war was escorting convoys in the Atlantic, to guard against German submarines, and the second was in the Far East. All the stories he told were the funny ones, but when I was getting ready to leave for boot camp, I asked him what one thing stood out most to him about his experiences in the war. He didn't say anything for a minute, then he finally said. "Dead friends." He went on to say that he'd lost a lot of friends, and he still thought often (this was in 1976) about how smart and creative and gifted some had been; he wondered what the world had lost when they were killed at age 22 or 23. He thought about his own life since the war, his family life and career, and wondered what their lives would have been like. He told me his ship had been assigned to participate in the invasion of the Japanese home islands. They were supposed to drop anchor less than a mile offshore at one of the landing beaches and direct traffic for the landing craft. He said that with the Japanese coastal defense artillery, they wouldn't have lasted five minutes. Every man on that ship knew the date and the hour when he was going to die. When the atomic bombs led to Japan's surrender and the invasion wasn't needed, he said they'd been given back the rest of their lives. I enlisted when I was seventeen. So did both my younger brothers. For twenty years, there was always at least one of us in the Marine Corps, and for the majority of that time it was two. Our mom and stepdad never said anything about how much worrying they did, but now I know it was very hard on them. I'm glad neither of my kids wanted to be in the military. My grandson is talking about it now - I hope he changes his mind. I'm glad I served and I'd do it again, but I don't want to have to worry about someone else I love doing it, if that makes sense.
When the nukes were dropped on Japan the marines were waiting to invade the Japanese mainland :( I would also like to add that there were a lot of guys who when they heard the news of the nukes being dropped and then the war being ended, felt as if they were born again because they knew an invasion of mainland Japan would cost countless lives
5:24 probably, it wasn't just Japanese soldiers who were shamed for surrendering, it was civilians too. I saw an interview with a Japanese woman who was a little kid during the war, she said that they gave her some "white powder" and put it in her hat, and she was supposed to take it if the Americans were going to capture her. She knew what it was to kill herself. She also went on to tell a story about the first time she saw an American soldier, he was walking down the road, whistling without a care in the world( this was obviously after the war). She said she froze when she saw him thought "what am I gonna do I don't have my white powder", but the guy just kept walking and whistling, walked right by her. She said that's when she knew that all the horrible things she'd heard about Americans weren't true. She was lucky though, there is a video of a Japanese woman jumping off a cliff at Saipan during WW2, all the civilians were told the Americans would torture and rape all the women, and not being taken alive was their duty.
@@drcornelius8275 no doubt the Marines and Soldiers lots of them said F the rules but still some did obey the rules at least with taking surrendering troops which was a very rare occurrence in this theatre.
Awesome! You're the best at this! Here are some suggestions to complete Your WW2 Collection. Flags of Our Fathers 2006 Letters from Iwo Jima 2006 Midway 2019 Greyhound 2020 Stalingrad 2013 The Man with Iron Heart 2017 Schindler's List 1993 Valkyrie 2008 Downfall 2004
I'm 55 and was a kid during the seventies . I knew a lot of veterans that were still alive at the time. A few things I remember. Most of the veterans that fought in Europe did not hold a lot of ill feelings for the Germans. Yet Marines and sailors who fought in the Pacific hated the Japanese until the day they died. When hearing and being taught about the war in the Pacific ,the two most widely things spoken of was Pearl harbor and Iwo Jima. No one ever talked much about the horrors on Okinawa and the other Islands. This is why I love this series so much it shows what they had to do and the horrors they experience every island they wentt to. Island by Island. D-Day was a one time event landing in Normandy. Yet the Marines had a D-Day every island they invaded
I'm going to repost the comment I made on the previous video, because I feel like it's particularly important to understand for Episode 9: It's truly difficult to grasp the mindset of the Japanese soldier during this period of Japanese history. To imagine that, on a large scale, people could treat others with so much cruelty and treat themselves with so little self-respect. One thing that helps contextualize this, however, is how brutally Japanese soldiers were often treated by their superiors. A Japanese private was frequently subjected to corporal punishment for even minor infractions, and often beaten by their superiors as a form of domination, and how the power of superiors over their subordinates was as absolute as the Emperor's power over its people - the low level Private was essentially property of their commanding officers by their powers granted by the Emperor. And this was not limited exclusively to the military, as this extended to the militaristic schooling system that most fighting aged males went through during this time period, where older students frequently beat and tortured their younger peers in a vicious cycle: The younger students who were abused turned their abuse towards the students below them for some sense of power and domination. So when you see the Japanese soldiers holed up in bunkers willing to sacrifice everything just to get a chance to kill an American soldier, they were often terrified and deeply rageful teenagers and young adults who were beaten and abused until they learned to channel that fear and rage against an "inferior" and "weak willed" American foe. It helps explain why Japanese soldiers, especially the Korean auxiliaries who grew up under Japanese occupation (and due to their non-Japanese status, were low in the hierarchy and received some of the worst abuse), jumped at the chance to commit massive unspeakable atrocities against Chinese civilians to finally dominate somebody "inferior" to them, just for the chance to feel some of the agency that was robbed from them since an early age. In episode 9 of the show, the manner in which the the Ryuku civilians (who were considered "primitive" by Imperial Japan) are treated by Japanese soldiers is another disturbing example of this hierarchical structure at work. In war especially, abuse begets abuse, brutality begets brutality, and it's no wonder that Americans people, who didn't quite grow up with such a worldview, found themselves seeing the Japanese as subhuman and deserving of cruelty anyways. And I believe the worst part of all, was the fact that this wasn't just the Japanese following some ancient Bushido code, or a longstanding esoteric Japanese tradition. Contemporary historical scholarship typically traces the origins of this culture of brutality to the late 19th century, less than 100 years before the events of this show. It's the legacy of a handful of people influential in the creation of the new Japanese nation, and the people who came afterwards who leveraged the new national educational system to foster a worldview which celebrated brutality and cruelty in service to Japan. The worst part of it all, was that it really didn't have to be this way: Japan was not set down this path. At the critical juncture in 1900s Japan, where the powerful and the influential in Japan had the agency to choose the direction of this rising Empire, subjugation and domination over the Japanese people, of East Asia, and eventually the Pacific was the path they chose.
Thumb up for you 😉, but i think you already know it but i think it has to be, the "bushido" from ww2 is more tojo's bushido, this code is an interpretation and it's an very agressive and brutal interpretation during this time period. For example random soldier never had to kill themselves and retreat was allowed, if we look at the battles of nagashino (or others) Takeda's army was completely allowed to retreat, even switch sides (sekigahara). There thousands and survivors of takeda's army after defeats and after he committed senpuku. It was even forbidden for generals to kill themselves by their lords because he would lose them. In the film lettres from iwo jima its well done, there the tojo interpretation (strange because this one is followed by the navy guys and they hated tojo who from the army lol) and the more "traditional" interpretation followed by the Watanabe character.
One feature of the culture that played a central role in WWII was the believe among the Japanese of Japanese Racial Supremacy. Not the nonsense batted about here in the USA by race hucksters newscasters and other charlatans. But real, genuine racial supremacy. While living in Hong Kong I got to know a Japanese business man who was on assignment there. One day, when we were alone, he just broke down and cried. I asked him what was wrong. He told me that he got bad news that morning: that his assignment in Hong Kong was extended for another 5 years. I was surprised: Japanese generally enjoyed overseas assignments. But he explained that he is of marring age and the clock was ticking on his marriageability. And that he only had 2 weeks to go back to Japan every year, which wasn't enough time to meet and court a Japanese woman. He also explained that the only Japanese women in Hong Kong were the wives of Japanese businessmen. Trying to help, I mentioned that there were tens of thousands of single and available Filipino women in Hong Kong. He looked at me, sucked air in through his teeth and said word's I'll never forget: "Oh, no. We Japanese consider Filipino sub-human." And he meant it. He probably told me that because I was a male Gaijin and I was up the "racial hierarchy" far enough in his mind that as two "develop males" we could freely discuss that. I was disgusted. Needless to say, we didn't become friends.
@@Manu-rb6eo Yeah, precisely. I tried to elaborate a bit of that in my last paragraph, where the "Bushido" they practiced was distinctly modern, largely informed by reimaginings of Bushido by people like Inoue Tetsujirō and Inazo Nitobe in the 1900's. Tojo specifically wasn't the one who set the stage for this new overtly imperialistic Bushido, unfortunately the seeds for that was planted a few decades prior to his influence. The reality of "The Way of the Warrior" as it existed in medieval and early modern Japan were many competing interpretations, and many of the Samurai were unaware of it or had no scruples with ignoring it entirely, especially during wartime. It's somewhat reminiscent of 19th century Western Europeans who let their imaginations run wild regarding Knights and a Chivalric code, and how that was used to justify the unusually stuffy and conservative norms of that time period. Definitely not to mention that things like ritualistic suicide in pre-Meiji Japan, like you said, was the exception, not the norm. WWII era Imperial Japan, by forcing their troops to commit suicide on a massive scale, by their own hands or by their enemies, had no real precedent. But yeah, I really do love how Letters from Iwo Jima portrays the dichotomy between those two competing ideologies, and despite all the rhetoric from the IJN guys, Watanabe is undeniably the more honorable soldier. For anyone who wants to read more on the history of Bushido, I'd highly recommend reading "Bushido or Bull" by Karl Friday: www.ldsd.org/cms/lib/PA09000083/Centricity/Domain/93/Friday_Bushido%20or%20Bull.pdf
As an old Air Force verteran of 72 years, thank you for watching these series on our largest war. I would like to suggest that you watch Schlindler's List to gain a fuller reason as to why that war was fought. Yours Gratefully.
Just to say, your doing an incredible job, your easily the best reactor and I hope this channel grows even more and you get the credit you deserve, keep up the incredible reactions ☺️
Remember coming home unexpectedly after a year away overseas in the Navy. I wanted to surprise the family, so I didn't tell anyone. When I got there, everyone was gone -- they'd gone on vacation. Spent the days of leave I had in the empty house, then caught a flight back to my base. It was kind of sad.
The thing you have to remember is that for all the horror of this war a great deal of good came from the victory. Germany, Italy and Japan had their evil, vicious regimes removed and in their place rose modern stable democracies. In addition the war led to the decolonisation of the world and self determination for billions of people. Yes the aftermath wasn’t all sunshine and roses and other dictators either rose to power or maintained their positions but overall the world is a better place for the sacrifices of those who fought.
Several years ago I was at a gun show here in the Dallas area. Inside the building were a lot of tables. In one of them, an older gentleman was selling a book that he wrote. It was called, "Islands of the Damned". I shook his hand and he was very strong. Even though he was in his 90s, he looked like he could've been in his 70s. This man fought with the Marines in the South Pacific throughout WWII. We chatted for a good while. I bought his hard cover book and he signed it. He told me that I should watch the HBO Series the Pacific. He told me that he was one of the characters. Sure enough, after reading his book I went and got the series. I very much enjoyed it and sure enough he was one of the characters played by an Irish actor. His name was RV Burgin (Burgie). I was hoping to see him again but I think that soon after meeting him, his health began to fail and he couldn't make any more public appearances. I was very glad to have met him. Everytime I watch this series, I focus on him.
Add "Come and See" to your list of war movies to see why the Russians hated the Germans so intensely during and after WWII. It will be the hardest war movie you've ever seen.
@@fuckingbaker13 I agree, "total war" is looking into the abyss, high octane nightmare fuel. But I also agree with Cassie we owe these stories our attention we only suffer watching a glint of reality that someone had to live. If no one listens to a story is it ever truly told? The Soviet Union lost 27 million people during the war more than any other country and about half of them were civilians. The type of fighting Germany did on their Eastern Front against the USSR is rarely shown in western media. It makes The Pacific look like BoB. Few Westerners know that 80% of the German military was destroyed by the USSR.
In his original book, Eugene cries after he mercy kills a gun-wounded dove. Eugene breaks down and tells his dad that he can't stand to see an animal suffer anymore. His dad suggests that he would enjoy bird watching instead. As a result, Eugene becomes a passionate bird watcher. Eugene later gets a Ph.D. in zoology and becomes of professor in ornithology. It was common to see professor Sledge eagerly roaming the campus with his students searching for and watching birds.
That is so moving.
Also, he never hunted again, to my knowledge never picked up a weapon. His wife would help him with his struggle with nightmares, when he was in the depths of them she would need to lean close and whisper Sledgehammer in his ear in order to wake him safely. The writing of his memoirs, at her urging, did a great deal to help him finally heal, as well as getting him back in contact with Snafu.
thank you for sharing, it’s comforting to say the least to know that he found some peace in his post-war life
Thank you for telling that story.
The hunting scene gets me every time.
btw little fun fact the family of original Sledge was so touched and proud about the actor and how he portrayed him they actually gave the actor as gift the original Eugenes pipe and he still has it
oh wow
Wow, that's awesome.
Beautiful!
Yeah… I think he still takes pictures on his IG with the pipe lol
Just found out that he's also the kid in Jurassic Park!
I can understand why "Snafu" isolated himself i imagine a lot of them just wanted to forget it and sadly that did mean distancing themselves from those they fought with
You did whatever you had to do you trying to fight the insanity.
Plus, everyone reacts differently to good bye situations. Ever have a buddy ghost on you at a party? Just disappear and go home? Some folks don't like to confront the emotions.
A good friend of my families was on Peleliu and Okinawa, I know he was at a few other places but don't remember. It was in the 1990's before he spoke to anyone about what happened. He and his wife were married for over 40 years before he told her what had happened. He did the same thing Snafu did and finally, at his wife's bidding went to a reunion in 2004 and finally found peace. I hope Snafu found the same.
@@thomast8539 Yeah I'm that guy, good of you to be understanding rather than judgemental. Lots of people over the years just saw me as someone who doesn't give a crap.
Yup. Same way I hate burials and saying goodbyes.
I was a mortarman in the Army. Misfires and short rounds are terrifying.
Good old Fort Sill. Did basic there. I was a medic.
thank you both^ for your service, wishing y’all the best
Im wondering if you know how huch the tube and base plate weighed that they carried. And yours too. I always felt a little sorry for the guys humping those plates. Thanks for your service Army. Navy here.
@@gravitypronepart2201 base plate is a roughly 25 lbs for a 80mm.
It looks like they may be using a system similar to the current 81mm, not sure what the weight would have been then. On the modern 81mm, the baseplate is around 25 pounds, the cannon weighs about 35 pounds, the bipod weighs about 26 pounds. I was on a 120mm crew so we were in a Stryker vehicle to carry our system. But we also had a 60mm system for dismounted patrols.
P.s. Thank you for your service y'all.
I personally don’t compare band of brothers and the pacific. I absolutely love both. They are their own and very different wars. Both are masterpieces. And I agree, both opening themes are amazing and I never skip them
They are both very good. My comparisons, and criticisms, come from how the series are structured. The Pacific packs more story and events into ten episodes than Brothers did. It leave a gap of understanding. It could use two or three more for full effect. While Band of Brothers has a larger cast to know, it can handle it because of the focused story. Market Garden is it's weakest episode because of the amount of context left out.
@@dirus3142 well Hanks and Spielberg are getting together again to make another miniseries about the 8th Army Air Corps, so hopefully we can get the best of both worlds! Or maybe something totally new
I wouldn't say that Band of Brothers is better than The Pacific, it's just that Band of Brothers is easier to watch, it's not as dark, and I'd say it's more entertaining, too. There's a lot more characters, and you get more of their personalities, which are great. There's more joking around. The Pacific is really just based around a small number of people, and they're pretty much all just in shock and stone-faced the whole time. It's completely understandable, considering what they went through, but it's not as fun to watch. It's depressing, and even in the battles they win, it doesn't feel like winning.
@@fakecubedOne way I compare the 2 shows is how it tackles combat fatigue especially in the later episodes. In the later period of the war, America and Britain was facing a real problem with soldiers who were breaking down from combat fatigue, they formed a substantial percentage of Allied casualties.
I feel Band of Brothers gave a little peak at how the men were experiencing combat fatigue, while The Pacific made it more central to its plot. As such The Pacific feels darker and grittier.
same war different theaters
I know you probably won’t see this but you have to watch Chernobyl the HBO miniseries it’s amazing you won’t forget it!
Yes.
HBO has done a really good job of coming out and producing excellent movies over the last 20 years.
Yes
I'd like to see Chernobyl as well.
It's honestly a masterpiece tv series.
The little hut with the baby and dead mom is the hut Sledge called the mortar strike on in the scene before.
yup. i haven't read his book so i don't know if that happened or the series writer just put it in for dramatic effect.
Good film
@@derf-vr1fc I recommend reading it. It recalls graphic details on how brutal the war was without any filter to the point this mini series doesn’t do it justice.
@@PodreyJenkin138 "With The Old Breed"
@@PodreyJenkin138 helmet for my pillow is the book written by Robert Leckie
You should watch these two movies about Iwo Jima in WW2. Both show the same battle but from opposite sides. "Flags of Our Fathers" is the US side and "Letters from Iwo Jima" is from the Japanese side. Directed by Clint Eastwood.
^ This.
But she should also react to "The Fallen of World War II
" here on youtube, it gives the whole thing a bigger picture.
They are both very good!!!
Letters from Iwo Jima is the far superior film - she should pick that one if she just watches one
For some reason, Eugene and Snafu not saying goodbye on the train, breaks my heart every time.
It didn't hit me that way. The band between them was just loosened a bit, but not broken.
The reason he didn't wake him was because he saw how he was sleeping peacefully for once. Eugene suffered from frequent nightmares after the war and on the train was one occasion in which he was sleeping peacefully
They met up again many years later
The reason he did that was that he knew both he and Sledge would never have a peaceful sleep in a long time. He wanted Sledge to relish this last peaceful sleep and so he didn't wake him up. But yeah, seeing good friends parting ways is pretty sad.
I don’t think it was a bad thing, once I had a chance to bother my brother while he was eating and decided not to, because I just him to enjoy his moment and peace at eating. I understood Snafu doing that for Sledge because he deserved a nice good sleep after the hell they went through on Okinawa.
I think you would find Generation Kill entertaining. It has the same narrative process as Band of Brothers/The Pacific but covers a Marine Recon Battalion during the 2003 invasion of Iraq.
Was scanning the comments for this comment. Its an HBO mini series, its great.
Yee if you wanna see how war is still a fucking mess check out those devils.
Groomiiiin' standards!
"POLICE THAT MOOSTACHE!"
That would be interesting
My father's brother fought at Okinawa. The only thing he'd ever really say was that he had to kill a Japanese soldier at close range in a hut. It was either him or the Japanese soldier. He would never really talk about his time in the war. Not until I came home on leave one Christmas (1988), and attended the annual family Christmas Party and wore my Class A uniform. He sat down at a table with my father and me and talked about his time in the Army (I learned that he was a First Sergeant).
On the ride home, my father said the he'd never, ever heard him talk about the war, other than years later when he told about the Japanese soldier that he killed. My father was kind of astounded to hear him talk about his time in the Army. I guess seeing my uniform just gave him that moment where he could kind of unload the chest of memories. At that point, (Christmas 1988) it had been 43 years since the war had ended. He passed away 5 years later, in December of 1993.
I thank you for your reactions. A little less then 30 years after the war ended, i was an 18 year old kid at the Marine Corps Recruit Depot, paris island SC. Every night, our drill instructors would have us say "good night Chesty, where ever you are". General Lewis "Chesty" Puller is what we call a marines marine!
We still did that every night in bootcamp at MCRD San Diego in 2016.
He is commanding the detail guarding the gates heaven
My dad had the pleasure of meeting Dr. Sledge and have dinner with him in his home in Mobile two years before he past away. I met Sledge’s son when he came to visit the Peleliu battlefield, which is where i grew up, and my family’s land is Orange beach where the marines landed.
My dad landed on Orange beach.
@@vonfragesq7145 that is amazing! May I ask if he ever got the chance to go back after the war?
@@Silky808 Hey there. No he did not. I'm pretty sure he never wanted to go back. Cape Gloucester was bad but I think Peleliu is the one that got to him. Unfortunately he passed away a year ago this month. I have his Marine dog tags and I myself do want to visit Peleliu. I havnt decided yet but I may leave his tags there so he can be with his buddies who didnt make it and maybe close that chapter for him.
@@vonfragesq7145 I’m sorry to hear that. From a lot of the vets i met who came back, it was hard but it did help them get some closure. The island today is very beautiful and peaceful place, with the northern part of the Island occupied by the locals and the rest of the island and battlefield is seemingly untouched and taken back by the the jungle. But still a great place to visit, the last time i was home was about 8 years ago, was planning a visit but COVID happened. Anyways I thank your Dad for his service, my dad was Veteran of the army but during Vietnam era, and I am actually active duty USAF, so I truly appreciate the military and their sacrifice.
@@Silky808 Thank you for your service as well. Navy vet here. I've watched videos of marine vets going back and some actually meeting Japanese vets who survived. The last ones didn't surrender until 1947.
Friend of my Father was a Marine on Iwo Jima. About a year before he passed away he honoured me by sitting down with me and telling me some of his experiences. The thing I remember the most is he would every once in a while get this strange look in his eyes and would softly ask " why am I here and my buddies aren't?".
RIP Pvt. William DIck USMC
In my lifetime, I met three Iwo Veterans. It was like meeting a rock star, every time.
They call it "Survivor Guilt" now. It can manifest with sadness, depression, anger, rage, all across the spectrum. God Bless them. Semper Fidelis! Sgt. Nie USMC
Leckie's "Yknow what I fought for?" while staring directly at Vera is so great
I'm an old combat vet and I feel this was the greatest war series ever made. I've watched it many times but your heartfelt reactions made it seem brand new to me.
Deepest thanks for your service sir!!
I’ve cried in reaction videos before but JESUS you are a wonderful soul
What a beautiful young lady, inside and out!
To this day, one of Eugene’s sons has not watched The Pacific. His memories of what he saw from his father when growing up gives him pause. I cannot say that I blame him. I can understand how the horrors of war would last a very long time. May their lives be remembered for all time.
I remember watching this every week when it aired and even then having to deal with people complaining that it wasn't as good as Band of Brothers. In reality it's a whole different beast covering a very different kind of war being fought at the same time with far less light hearted moments of rest compared to Easy Company (which is insane considering everything they went through) But I'll always love this show, it introduced me to Rami Malek one of my favorite actors ever and then Eugene's actor played Timmy in Jurassic Park, my favorite movie of all time. So to see him all grown up and working with Spielberg again just feels so satisfying.
I like both series, but I lean more towards "The Pacific"
That was the kid! Never knew that but I always thought he looked familiar.
I like both but I lean more towards Band of Brothers. Band of Brothers was strong in some areas and the Pacific was strong in some other areas. They are both equally as good, but I enjoyed watching BoB more than I did the Pacific.
And then both Rami and the kid who played Eugene both went on to be in Bohemian Rhapsody funny enough.
Your reactions are so heartfelt! You are an absolute angel ❤️ As a Marine, thank you for watching and showing what those before us suffered through to wear the Eagle Globe and Anchor! Semper Fi🇺🇸🇺🇸
God bless you, Marine! Thank you for your sacrifice and service! I agree 100%!
@@suprchickn7745 you’re very welcome! After Cassie’s reactions to Pacific and how it affected her, someone in Canada when our own country disrespects everything I bled for….I’ll be a patreon of hers as long as she has a channel
Just before my grandma passed away last year I was at her retirement community and had the pleasure to have a conversation with a Vet who fought on Iwo Jima. I never been in such awe in my life. I admire those old men that fought and died for us so long ago. I'm so grateful I had the chance to speak with him. Since then we took my grandma to her hometown to bury her with my grandfather so I never knew what happened to him or if he's still alive.
Iwo Jima and Pelieliu were, for the most part, uninhabitable. Okinawa was fully inhabited by civilians.
I think Iwo Jima had some civilians but they were evacuated. If I remember correctly, the civilians are depicted in letters from Iwo Jima in the beginning half of the movie before the Americans arrive.
The Imperial Japanese looked down upon the Okinawans. They would have no compunction about sending a young mother out with a bomb strapped to her, because they knew the Americans probably wouldn't shoot her. Sort of like the way the current terrorists behave.
Guadalcanal seems like it wasn’t very hospitable either
Terminal Lumbago There were and are inhabitants on Guadalcanal. There’s an account of two aces facing each other over Henderson. Saburo Sakai was the Japanese, can’t recall the American. Strange story of it being known that each had wide open chances to kill the other and each holding off, if memory serves. Sakai kept a diary/journal and survived the war. He wrote the highest praise of the American pilot. The American polot crashed into the jungle and was found by local farmers. American intelligence on Guadalcanal told American service personnel to beware locals as they might be cannibals. The farmer that the American pilot met, took him in and cared for him and helped him get back to Henderson.
Henderson Field was the Japanese constructed airfield taken and renamed by the Americans. That airfield was the whole point of the fight. That the Marines were there was, in a sense, incidental. The airfield was everything. You’ll note, the Marines went on patrols, even led by Chesty himself, but there was no push to take the whole island. The Marines needed to hold the perimeter around Henderson and that was it. I read an account jibing with the whole “don’t come out of your hole at night,” incident.
Your reactions bring so much genuine humanity and compassion to such an awful reality. You have a good heart. Thank you for having the courage to watch this series.
Many thanks for your genuine reaction. Watching this Pacific series with you brought uncontrollable crying upon me. My dad was 1st Marine Division W.W.II. Watching this, I found myself transported into his soul and witnessing the horrors and demons of war that haunted him all his life.
Wow. 1st MarDiv. Those guys went thru a lot and deserve respect!
What campaigns did he serve in? From the show I can get a pretty clear idea but I’m just curious?
The US military has the Purple heart for the wounded and the US premade a load for the invasion of Japan before the bomb dropped. They only ran out of those medals in the early 2000's.
I read about the proposed invasion of the Japanese home islands. Operation Downfall would have dwarfed the D-Day landings in size and complexity. Operation Olympic was the invasion of Kyushu and Operation Coronet was the invasion on Honshu. Both the Japanese and Allied forces were contemplating using chemical weapons. It would have also required to participation of the USSR (which did declare war on Japan AFTER the Hiroshima bomb). Soviet forced over ran the Japanese Kwangtung Army in Manchuria in only a few days.
During Operation Iraqi Freedom the Marine reserve mortuary affairs unit responsible for casualty collection had 8 5 ton trucks with approximately 30,000 body bags. It's better to have and not need it.
@@cdc194 I was not aware of that but the Purple Heart medals they made was only the first batch they hadn't finished making them before the war ended.
@@drcornelius8275 it was either the 2007 documentary "the war" or "hell in the Pacific" it made note of the old breed marines becoming superstitious and personally believing invading japan that they would not survive. Guess after so much combat and close calls your luck can eventually run out.
@@drcornelius8275 An allied invasion of Japan would also have forever destroyed that culture. The Japanese were ready to fight, every man, woman and child of them. The casualties on the Japanese civilian side could very well have been high enough that they'd still be recovering.
I think it's better, more graphic than BoB, different type of warfare, much more intense. Total respect for all military who participated in the Pacific Theatre of Operations.
I think my main problem with the Pacific when compared to BoB is that the Pacific felt like it was missing allot more events in the real story because they had to be constrained to the 10 episode format.
@@oscarjohnson2130 I don’t get why HBO couldn’t have just given them 12 episodes, they really needed to show Iwo Jima, and at the very least make mentions of tarawa, Saipan, and the Battle Of Manila. But given the 1st and 7th marines didn’t fight there i guess they felt it best to not mention it completely.
Okinawans historically have been treated like 2nd class citizens compared to the Yamato people(mainland Japanese).
I have a good friend who is from Okinawa. She told me even tho Okinawa does have full Japanese rights and its people are full Japanese citizens. Ethically, they are still looked down upon even today.
Not to make an inappropriate joke, but being from Hawaii where Japanese Americans are all over the place, I gotta say that Okinawan donuts are fire lol
In WW2, it seems like a lot of that treatment had to do with the Japanese civilians and their proximity from the Emperor. The closer they were to him, the higher up in society they were.
Okinawa was a penal colony for the Japanese going back to it's feudal period. The Okinawan civilians were used as shields and boobytraps by the Japanese on a large scale. I lived there for a year and had repeated deployments there while in the Marines.
@@feldweible And it STILL pales compared to what they did to the Chinese.
My uncle spent 30 days on Okinawa with the Marines at age 18. He found himself forced to fight Japanese soldiers who were using the civilian population as shields, as this episode shows. I can't begin to imagine the effect that must have had.
Unimaginable heart break and probably a anger that could not be quenched.
I’ve seen a few BofB and PACIFIC reactions and I gotta say, yours have been some of the best. You’re genuine in your response and honest in what you don’t know. And so appreciative in what you learn. It’s so refreshing. I’m sad you’re done with these as there aren’t any movie or series quite like them.
Try "Das Boot". In my opinion right up there with them.
Eugene’s book “With the Old Breed” is a classic. A must read.
It’s a must read. I remember reading that book when I was deployed in Afghanistan and thought man we got it made compared to them men back then.
I highly recommend reading With the Old Breed written by Sledge from the notes he kept in his bible. I’ve read it 4 times since high school. It’s an amazing book.
It was required reading at Drill Instructor School at MCRD San Diego when I went through in 1981.
Thank you Cassie for watching this and taking me through it. I watched it before but seeing it along with the expressions on your face somehow made it more emotional. Not that it wasn’t already a ton of emotion anyway. I think I’ve cried like a baby every time I’ve seen Band of Brothers and The Pacific. Thank you very much and God bless you. And thank you each and every person that’s ever served in the United States military. God bless you all.
At this point in Japan's history they were absolutely savage. The things that they did to civilians went far beyond "war crimes." 100,000 civilians killed in one month during the Battle of Manilla. At least 20K killed during the Battle of Saipan. Imagine if the Allies did have to invade the Home Islands.
If the Allies went through with Operation Downfall, it would have been 100 times worse than Okinawa. And not only that, but Easy Company would also have to take part.
@@rithvikmuthyalapati9754 As the story goes, the military commissioned so many purple hearts to be made anticipating what Operation Downfall (The invasion of Japan) would cost that we haven't had to have another batch made. Everyone knew the invasion of Japan was going to be a bloodbath the likes of which the US hadn't seen since the Civil War. This was the big thing that convinced Truman to order the Atomic Strikes. Or at least that's how the story goes. Authors, historians and etc. have argued that the Atomic Strikes were more of a warning to the Soviets than they were anything else, but considering Stalin knew about the Manhattan Project before even Truman did, it's hard to actually make that argument IMO.
@@ktvindicare From what I read, the emperor ordered everyone fight to the last man. Their history in warfare was that they would conquer and eradicate the population, they assumed that it was going to happen to them. In saipan the japanese civilians jumped off cliffs to kill themselves thinking the americans were coming to rape and murder the women and children. On the mainland it was quite possible that the men would fight to the last man and take as many enemy with them and then the entire civilian population would follow the emperor's order and it would have been a civilian catastrophe on top of a military one. In some respects dropping the bombs made them realize that further fighting would be pointless, people would die in their houses rather than on the battlefield. As for Truman, I think he had the sick idea of wanting to see what it could do to people and made it a 3 for 1: Test the weapon, cause the japanese to capitulate, and show the soviets you had it.
Although 1 probably would've been enough. They didn't even have time to figure out what happened, I'm sure if they waited another few days they would have surrendered. The bomb museum is quite haunting with the relics they have there, school uniforms of kids, a set of concrete stairs with a man's shadow burned into it, melted roof tiles. There's a lot to think about about the pointlessness of war when you stand 10 meters below where the bomb went off. A few years ago I stood on the rebuilt bridge just under where it detonated thinking about the sheer ridiculousness and insanity that can lead to conflicts like that and just shake my head at those in our era that glorify and romanticize war and our so called leaders of the world that never seem to learn.
@@lurkingknight Japan has never been conquered by a foreign power in the entire history of that culture. Even the Mongols couldn't do it and they conquered fucking China!
Yes. If the allied powers had invaded Japan they would have fought to the last man, I have no doubt in my mind. When they were fighting for every last scrap of turf on islands that held no value, you can only imagine what they would have done to protect their homeland.
@@ktvindicare Thank you very much for commenting this, not much people consider the consequences on Operation Downfall while criticizing the use of Atomic Bombs.
It´s crazy just to read the numbers envisioned for Operation Downfall: *_up to 58 US + 3-5 Commonwealth divisions, or about 1.7 million of men needed to take part in the initial phase of the operation, with an estimated total of 6 million of men needed for the entire operation._*
For comparison: during Operation Overlord a total of 10 allied divisions were used, 5 of them participating in the initial landings, a total of 156,000+ soldiers. By the time the Atomic Bombs were used the Soviet Army had 89 divisions available in the east to conduct any meaningful action against Japan but since the Soviet divisions were smaller than the allied and japanese ones, those 89 divisions represented only 1.5 million of soldiers, in the other hand, the Japanese had 55 divisions envisioned to defend the whole Japanese mainland (2.35 million of soldiers) a contingency reserve of 10 divisions, plus 20-30 million of civilians combatants, so, the argument of _"the Japanese surrendered only because they feared the Soviets after the latter declaring war on them"_ also falls quite short and is delusional AF, in 1945 the major part of the Red Army was busy enslaving and raping, I mean, "liberating" the half of Europe, and they wouldn´t get their asses out of there for the next 45 years.
I leave some information from an article from a reputable source:
_"The entire Downfall operations would cause between _*_1.7 to 4 million U.S. casualties*, including 400-800,000 U.S. dead, *and 5 to 10 million Japanese dead._*_ (Given that the initial Downfall plan called for 1,792,700 troops to go ashore in Japan, this estimate is indeed most sobering, and suggests many more troops than planned would need to be fed into a meat grinder)."_
www.history.navy.mil/about-us/leadership/director/directors-corner/h-grams/h-gram-057/h-057-1.html
I was raised by Pacific War vet. My best friend's dad, was a European War vet. Uncles and family friends were WW2 and Korean War vets. Another good friend's dad( who kinda filled in after my dad passed) was a Vietnam vet. So, I was raised on war stories and war movies. One of the things I really love about your reactions, is how genuine and innocent they can be. When you said at the end how all these stories and these men need to be remembered and how it needs to be taught, it made me cry.... like ugly cry. Thank you for that.
I totally recommend the documentary "He has seen war". It's about the homecoming of WWII veterans. The veterans interviewed are veterans of the Band of Brothers series and The Pacific. They also interview family members, including Sledge's sons and widow, Leckie's widow and daughter, among others. It lasts only 50 minutes and you can easily find it on RUclips and other platforms.
I cannot agree more. This really puts it all together.
Since you mentioned it, my mom wanted to know what it was like on my peace keeping and my combat deployment. I told her the funny stories, about my friends but there is no way i could burden her. At times its hard to put into words even among other combat veterans.
Generation Kill is another amazing mini-series about war. It shows how people changed from 1940s to now
I always found that series hard to watch particularly because it feels too recent and the pointlessness of that entire war leaves a bad taste in my mouth. What finally got me was when they talk about the capture and assault and torture of the 19 year old female soldier Pvt. Jessica Lynch. I’m a Gen Z’r so I didn’t know about her story until it was mentioned in the show. After that I then looked her up and read the full story about what those Iraqi animals did to her. It breaks my heart, and it hasn’t left my mind since. We should not be sending our daughters into war no matter what, and the Okinawan episode of ‘The Pacific’ completely demonstrates why. I cannot imagine what horrors our girls would’ve faced had we sent them into combat back then.
@@thatperformer3879 the story of Pvt Lynch is heavily disputed, just FYI. Maybe it's not the best idea to trust only one source. The Iraq War is a complicated mess built on lies, deception and a shit ton of misconceptions
@@Dorime3619 Jessica came out and said that the narrative reayed by her capture was a lie. She has not gone into a lot of the details about her time as a prisoner and rightly so, she appeared on the cleared hit podcast and discusses a lot of things about that period.
@@thatperformer3879 ruclips.net/video/01k4vjNnR6c/видео.html
This was an emotional episode. I still remember the day my son came home from Afghanistan. Overwhelming feelings of joy, pride, and relief.
This is an awesome of this series. The pacific has to be by far the best mini series ever made.
Whoever says Band of Brothers is better is insane. They're both equally amazing. Band of Brothers was a story about triumph with dabbles of that darkness mixed in and it was fantastic. The Pacific was very very dark. It not only showed the brutality of War but the side effects from it in a much bigger light. Both equally great in their own way but the Pacific was its own beast. Army, Marines it doesn't matter. To endure that terrain, some of which was taken at the cost of thousands for no reason at all, is something amazing. Semper Fi to the fallen, especially those who served in this theater of war. It was brutal
Anyone that thinks the US was wrong about dropping the atom bombs should read up on Operations Downfall and Coronet. Untold millions would have died from a conventional invasion of Japan as supposed to the thousands that did die.
That’s a tough revelation.
Yeah, the estimated cost to just establish a beachhead on mainland Japan was something like 5-15 MILLION people, and would have nearly driven the Japanese people to "extinction" just to end the war thanks to the orders given by their emperor.
I've discussed this before with people, one said that blockade would have worked as the Japan was all that was left. He thought starving them would have been more civil than the bomb. I didn't agree.
@@scannedtomuch blockade doesn’t mean starving civilians including children inhumanely. War itself is savage even if it’s distant bombing. But directly starving people, including civilians, is undoubtedly a war crime, I would imagine.
Not to mention the fact that when the war finally ended, the US and Japan had already been fighting for nearly four years. People that say using the atomic bombs was the wrong thing to do, never seem to care that the war could have gone on until 1950 or longer.
My Grandfather was in the 5th Marine division and was all over the South Pacific. My great uncle said he never saw him drink a day in his life, till he came home from the war. Like a lot of men he self medicated with Alcohol and cigarettes (he smoked 3 packs a day after the war) for decades. I remember one time when he came to visit he raided ny parents (who didn't ever drink) liquor cabinet and found 3 or 4 bottles with about an inch of liquor in them. He pored all of it in to a huge galss and slammed it. There is no telling what demons were in his head after the war but it took one hell of a toll. The other thing i remember is he NEVER spoke about the war EVER. Except one memorial day he took out this box that had all his war mementos and he told us grand kids his story. I was only 6 at the time so i didn't really get it, but my brother always told me it changed his life.
We are here to tell their stories, that they'll not be forgotten.....
Semper Fidelis
Doc G
I personally prefer this series to Band of brothers. I like the Grit they portray the pacific theater with.
I've watched your reactions to Band of Brothers, The Pacific, Hacksaw Ridge, and all I can think is that your parents should be proud of the way they raised you. I really think your kids are going to be able to say they have the best mom in the world
"those who disagree with the dropping of the atomic bombs at Hiroshima and Nagasaki cearly wasnt saved by them" from a veteran Marine who was preparing for the invasion of mainland Japan
Bill Guarnere said he got into an argument with someone who said that we should have found a "different way" than the atomic bombs. "Yeah, like sending me to jump into Tokyo and get killed?" I can imagine Wild Bill putting them in their place!
It would have been years of this kind of hellish war, and millions more dead. As horrible as it was, it was the lesser evil.
I've always been a bit torn over their use, but tend to end up being more thankful that they were used rather than an invasion happening. My father was in transit to Guam when the Japanese surrendered. He more than likely would have been involved if Japan was to be invaded.
@@gregall2178 Same here. My father was en route to the Philippines when Japan surrendered, thank God.
I don’t disagree with the dropping of the bombs, but the idea that the Japanese surrendered because of the bombs is under informed. The Soviets declaring war on Japan, and starting a massive offensive into Japanese occupied territory is what caused the Japanese to surrender.
The Americans firebombed Tokyo killing 100k people, then dropped the 2 atomic bombs, and the Japanese did not want surrender. The Soviets declared war, and the Japanese were so shit scared of the Soviets that they surrendered to the Americans exclusively. This was a bitter blow to the Soviets, as the US didn’t have to share Japan with the USSR like they did in Europe.
You're a good hearted soul, it's refreshing!!
What a great closure for this reaction series. It has been an emotional rollercoaster for all of us. God bless you, Cassie, you're the best. Not everyone follows up with additional reading and make changes in real life. That's so heartwarming. Anyway, thank you for the series and see you soon in another ❤️
Popcorn in Bed, you should watch "Best Years of Our Lives" which deals with servicemen returning from WWII. It won the Oscar for Best Picture in 1946. Even if you don't react to it, you should watch it. It's a wonderful movie.
Yep. I would add Twelve O'Clock High to her list as well.
That was a great movie. The wounded sailor really was a vet who lost his arms in the war.
One of my favorite films. I believe Popcorn would appreciate it.
@@thomast8539 Most definitely. Awesome movie. Great characters throughout.
I love your reactions. Can I suggest an old movie called "The Best Years Of Our Lives". It's about 3 people returning home after the war.
I second this one, just watched it for the first time over Memorial Day weekend. It was directed by William Wyler who served overseas filming war footage for news reels back in the States.
Great film. I would also add Twelve O'Clock High to her list.
One of my favorite all time films. Great suggestion!
Great movie.
I have been suggesting it to reactors for some time ;-)
I have recently been learning all I can about my great grand uncle who died on the Western Front in WWI. He was born in Oxfordshire England, worked as an errand boy for a local butcher shop and then moved to Canada to work as a farmhand and lived here for two years before enlisting. He was just 19 years old when he came to Canada alone. He died in France in 1917 and is buried in Roclincourt Military Cemetery. I am privileged to have his war diaries and his pictures. Truly a brave man.
Thank you for reacting to this series. My Father (today is Father's Day when I am watching this) volunteered and served in the Pacific on an Ammunition Ship in the Navy for the whole war. He never spoke of what he saw or did in the war. I know he had shrapnel in his leg and Jungle Rot in his ears that he had to treat for the rest of his life. He died at 56 when I had just turned 15, so I never got to ask him about his experiences. Miss you, Dad.
I love that little moment Leckie has with the cabbie, just nice to see someone honoring him in even a small kind of way. I'm glad he and Vera had a good life together but I do wish for the sake of the story he had gone back to Stella. It's heartwarming to know that Snafu got hold of Sledge after reading his book, the way he left without saying "Bye" was so frustrating
"Stella" did not exist. He had an affair with a girl named "Sheila" who was not Greek. He then found out Sheila was married and cheating on her husband, so it was a no go.
If no one has told you yet, there were two TV miniseries done in the 80's called "The Winds of War" and "War and Remembrance." They chronicle the War experience of 3 families from 1939-45, in Europe, the Pacific, and the Conxentration camps. They are EXCELLENT, and both are available to watch on RUclips for free. They're long (14 hours and 18 hours, respectively) and they're old fashioned TV from 30-40 years ago, but they are amazingly well done. Shot mostly on location, too. The Winds of War has 7 parts and War and Remembrance has 12 parts. It's a commitment for sure, but if you ever feel up to tackling a wartime family saga, they're worth it. They focus mostly on the wartime experience rather than the battlefield experience, and it goes chronologically explaining everything.
I agree. I liked The Pacific more than Band of Brothers. I identified with the characters much more, especially John, Sledge, and Lucky.
When they return home it's very reminiscent of the hobbits returning to the Shire in the Lord of the Rings. It's only lightly touched on in the movie, but in the book it was several chapters long (my favorite chapter 'The Scouring of the Shire' is included).
Some wounds go too deep and they are broken in certain ways. The home they've returned to is the same, but they are so different now that they feel totally out of place. They've grown in some ways, and they would look on their old selves with envy or pity or perhaps disdain. There really is no going back. They've got to just get by the best they can now.
Very true! When I saw that scene in LOTR, I was reminded of how it must be like for servicemen returning home.
Tolkien served in WW1. He had a few friends go with him. They did not come home. His Hobbits did.
Unfortunately, for many, Memorial Day is just a day for a cookout, or a car sale.
I always watch a WW2 movie. "The Battle of the Bulge" was a go to. "Midway (2019)" for this year.
Thank you for your great job reviewing this mini series. My father was decorated for valor as a forward mortar scout on Iwo Jima. He never came back the same.
I have watched dozens of reaction videos, but yours are the best. Your emotional roller coaster was so honest and real, it made me choke up at times.
I've seen interviews with Sledge's wife. She said that "Science was Gene's salvation". It's part of the significance of of him holding up and examining the flower at the end. He became a student of nature. He wasn't a botanist though. He was an ornithologist. I suspect getting a similar symbolic scene with birds would have been hard to pull off.
"If I were his mom I'd want him to tell me everything."
He'd never tell you. Ever. Unless you've been in combat you simply can't relate to what he's been through, no way for you to understand. It's like he'd be talking in a completely different language. I made the mistake of talking about my combat experiences in Iraq to a friend when I got home. He looked at me like I had grown an extra head and had started breathing fire.
Thank you for your service!
I shared my experience with my younger brother when he was deploying to Iraq. After returning, I told him to get everything off his chest before our family asked him questions. Our civilian family and friends would not understand what we experienced.
@@HollywoodMarine0351 Yeah, I ended up at a support group with other vets. Only people who would understand.
Well done, that was a heartfelt genuine reaction to a horrific war. I've spend 33 years in the Australian Military, and continue to serve now. I have been on multiple deployments all over the world and it's never easy to leave home and always wonderful to get back. But I have been lucky so far to not have to dodge bullets, my respect for the soldiers sailors airmen and marines of WW2 is immense. Lest We Forget 🌹
Snafu had a very tough life growing up. He was apparently orphaned at age 9 and was an only child.
Great content for 👍. My grandfather was ww11 veteran with u.s army combat engineer..those men went through hell. He was purple heart, bronze star medal, and a president init citation..so proud he was my grandfather suffered PTSD for 10 years after war family said he would shred his bedsheets screaming..thank god he got better..those men are called the greatest generation for a reason..
Honestly these are some of the best reactions to BoB and The Pacific on here! You were brilliant!
I love your heartfelt reactions and your willingness to be educated about history. The Japanese treated their American and Allied POWs much worse than anything the Americans did to them. My mother's oldest brother, the uncle I never knew, was taken prisoner by the Japanese when the Philippines were attacked. He survived the Bataan Death March but died in a Japanese POW camp. Even a cursory reading about the death march will give you a good idea of the level of inhuman barbarity the Japanese engaged in. Another good true story to check out from the Pacific theatre is "Unbroken". There's both a book and a movie, the book being much better, but the movie is worth watching as well.
I was a Marine grunt so I'm partial towards the Pacific, but band of brothers is fantastic. Real heroes.
Always like our alphas, even got married in my alphas.
Speaking of Alphas... there’s a meme comparing Marine Alphas with Army’s current Pinks & Greens.
“USMC Brand Name / Army Great Value” 🍻
@@HollywoodMarine0351 I sent that meme to my buddy who joined the Army as a Green Beret after the Marine Corps. He just got his pinks and greens.
My grandfather helped build the air bases all across the Pacific, which allowed our bombers to assault the Japanese home islands and bring the Japanese to their knees with hellish fire-bombing. And eventually, two nuclear bombs. He also supplied the air crews and helped keep the planes flying. He did that across island after island all over the Pacific. To keep bombers pounding Japan and fighters helping our troops on the ground. His job was to keep the planes flying and keep the airbases defended. He did his job, and he shot back a lot. It’s incredible to read his accounts of fighting off Japanese air raids from New Guinea to the Philippines and on to Okinawa. It was terrifying. I have a complicated relationship with that narrative because I know how it all ended. In nuclear destruction. My grandfather never spoke of the war. I think he had a complicated relationship with it, too. It was a God-awful war. We can say that much. I can’t say I blame him at all for the work he did, especially considering all the friends he lost in the war. And he dealt with PTSD until the day he died. He died in 1998. He refused military burial rites. It was only in the last couple of years that my father and his siblings and cousins got together to give him a proper military burial. Which he most certainly deserved. Because he was a hero. Just like countless thousands of other ordinary Americans in that war.
Honestly Band Of Brothers and The Pacific should be mandatory learning in all schools. Enjoyed your reaction.
These days it would be considered racist and some form of phobia. Only in america where it’s ok to be a sheep.
Both of my grandparents served in WW2, with one being a Marine during Guadalcanal. They both never talked about the war and we were asked by our parents to never bring it up. Definitely something that will never be fully comprehended by those who were not there. This Era would be called the Greatezt Generation for their sacrafice.
That scene of Sledge's father at his door, unable to help, just cuts right thru the chest
I was fortunate to grow up listening to first hand account from family. Who were there. From beginning to end. Almost all are gone. And yes, their stories need to be told again and again. With Great Conviction. For all those who can not thank you for bringing their story to thousands that need to be told. I will Thank you on their behalf.
Semper Fi.
10:50 i just noticed this but remember back when Leckie shot the Japanese soldier which was being shot for fun by other marines that was Leckie showing mercy that scene is showing Sledge having none, hes not killing the soldier for any other reason than to kill.
So glad that you watched this series. I’m also in the camp that liked this series more than band of brothers. The pacific was very well paced, very emotional, and really good acting and character studies.
One point that I wish to make (and it was mentioned in the series)…most of these men who fought didn’t make it back home until months after the war. You need a continuing military presence after a war until you can be relieved by fresh units, which takes some time. Anytime you see victory parades with soldiers marching down an American street, these are soldiers who were available locally in most cases. By the time the combat veterans made it back home, all the parades and fanfare had already ended.
As a veteran myself, I encourage everyone to help out veteran organizations and help with veteran suicide prevention and homeless relief. They deserve our eternal gratitude. 🇺🇸
I was on submarines in the 90s and kept a book where I would write my fiance every cycle. I gave it to her when I got back from sea every time. The letters Lucky never sent reminds me of that book.
My dad joined the Navy 8 days before his 18th birthday because in 1943 that made you eligible for the draft. The Marines heavy recruiting in small town in rural Utah. He dropped out of HS to join. He was a radar operator on a fetcher class destroyer in the Pacific. His experience wasn’t mind bending as the Marines or solders in the Pacific but he did have nightmares much of his life contending with the kamikaze attacks. He witness the income flights on his radar display that hit or tried to hit every target of opportunity which where the radar picket ship of Okinawa. If know your the destroy too the brunt of the attacks. Thankful his ship was never hit. However his ship almost was hit by the kamikaze that stuck the USS Franklin which they along side of. That was the heart of the greatest generation!
my day is complete!! :D thank you
I have bin watching reaction videos for a long time. for the first time i am considering becomming a patreon! i love your videos.
I think its cool the geography when they head home. They come back in California, first stop Texas, then New Orleans, then Alabama. Seems like they took a great journey home as they did abroad. Trying to say goodbye to eachother was probably just as hard as facing the beaches and battles in the Pacific.
Well, I won't say that I enjoyed your reactions, CassiePop! But I deeply appreciate them for the heartfelt truth you convey in each moment. Watching series like these is an act of remembrance more than anything, and I hope that it's as close as I ever get to experiencing warfare of any sort!
My grandad was a POW in WW2 and spent 5 years in various prison camps in Poland. I have the diary he kept. As long as we keep these memories alive, their experiences and their souls will live on and remind us how lucky we are that they were there to do what they did.
My dad lived to be 90. He was a marine in the Pacific. Can't tell you how many times we all went to the cemetery in his hometown so he could visit his friends who died in the Pacific. He never stopped wondering why he survived. He had six children and 15 grandchildren and I have no idea how many gr great children. That's why he survived. If we hadn't stopped the war with Hiroshima and Nagasaki none of them including my dad wouldn't have had any children.
"War is hell." -- Gen. Sherman
It is well that war is so terrible, otherwise we should grow too fond of it. -- Robert E. Lee
Sherman said a lot more than that.
You're right, the war I hate? War is hell in the Second World War?
Hell is hell, only sinners go to hell. War is much worse because it consumes the innocent as well.
@@RyanE8787 hey that's the quote i wanted to write 🤣
That was my stepfather's war. He served in the Navy in the Atlantic and then in the Pacific, on a tiny ship, a sub chaser. The first part of his war was escorting convoys in the Atlantic, to guard against German submarines, and the second was in the Far East. All the stories he told were the funny ones, but when I was getting ready to leave for boot camp, I asked him what one thing stood out most to him about his experiences in the war. He didn't say anything for a minute, then he finally said. "Dead friends." He went on to say that he'd lost a lot of friends, and he still thought often (this was in 1976) about how smart and creative and gifted some had been; he wondered what the world had lost when they were killed at age 22 or 23. He thought about his own life since the war, his family life and career, and wondered what their lives would have been like.
He told me his ship had been assigned to participate in the invasion of the Japanese home islands. They were supposed to drop anchor less than a mile offshore at one of the landing beaches and direct traffic for the landing craft. He said that with the Japanese coastal defense artillery, they wouldn't have lasted five minutes. Every man on that ship knew the date and the hour when he was going to die. When the atomic bombs led to Japan's surrender and the invasion wasn't needed, he said they'd been given back the rest of their lives.
I enlisted when I was seventeen. So did both my younger brothers. For twenty years, there was always at least one of us in the Marine Corps, and for the majority of that time it was two. Our mom and stepdad never said anything about how much worrying they did, but now I know it was very hard on them. I'm glad neither of my kids wanted to be in the military. My grandson is talking about it now - I hope he changes his mind. I'm glad I served and I'd do it again, but I don't want to have to worry about someone else I love doing it, if that makes sense.
When the nukes were dropped on Japan the marines were waiting to invade the Japanese mainland :(
I would also like to add that there were a lot of guys who when they heard the news of the nukes being dropped and then the war being ended, felt as if they were born again because they knew an invasion of mainland Japan would cost countless lives
5:24 probably, it wasn't just Japanese soldiers who were shamed for surrendering, it was civilians too. I saw an interview with a Japanese woman who was a little kid during the war, she said that they gave her some "white powder" and put it in her hat, and she was supposed to take it if the Americans were going to capture her. She knew what it was to kill herself.
She also went on to tell a story about the first time she saw an American soldier, he was walking down the road, whistling without a care in the world( this was obviously after the war). She said she froze when she saw him thought "what am I gonna do I don't have my white powder", but the guy just kept walking and whistling, walked right by her.
She said that's when she knew that all the horrible things she'd heard about Americans weren't true. She was lucky though, there is a video of a Japanese woman jumping off a cliff at Saipan during WW2, all the civilians were told the Americans would torture and rape all the women, and not being taken alive was their duty.
You should watch “The Fallen of World War II” here on RUclips.
Thank you so much for this! I enjoy your reactions and living this story with you. This series truly is hauntingly beautiful.
You're right. The Japanese were not bound by the Geneva Convention, but we WERE.
@@drcornelius8275 no doubt the Marines and Soldiers lots of them said F the rules but still some did obey the rules at least with taking surrendering troops which was a very rare occurrence in this theatre.
I have to say you're amazing to be will to expose your honest reaction to this series. My hats off to you.
Awesome! You're the best at this! Here are some suggestions to complete Your WW2 Collection.
Flags of Our Fathers 2006
Letters from Iwo Jima 2006
Midway 2019
Greyhound 2020
Stalingrad 2013
The Man with Iron Heart 2017
Schindler's List 1993
Valkyrie 2008
Downfall 2004
Tora tora tora
Midway 1976 (much better)
Stalingrad 1993
If you REALLY wanna feel emotions:
Come and See 1985
Also the Pianist, Dunkirk, Battle of Britain, Battle for Sevastapol
Generation War (mini series)
Oba the last samourai (not the one with tom cruise)
Eternal Zero
A Bridge to far
Merry christmas (WW1)
Yamato
Patton
;)
Stalingrad 1993 is must, & come and see
I'm 55 and was a kid during the seventies . I knew a lot of veterans that were still alive at the time. A few things I remember. Most of the veterans that fought in Europe did not hold a lot of ill feelings for the Germans. Yet Marines and sailors who fought in the Pacific hated the Japanese until the day they died. When hearing and being taught about the war in the Pacific ,the two most widely things spoken of was Pearl harbor and Iwo Jima. No one ever talked much about the horrors on Okinawa and the other Islands. This is why I love this series so much it shows what they had to do and the horrors they experience every island they wentt to. Island by Island. D-Day was a one time event landing in Normandy. Yet the Marines had a D-Day every island they invaded
I'm going to repost the comment I made on the previous video, because I feel like it's particularly important to understand for Episode 9:
It's truly difficult to grasp the mindset of the Japanese soldier during this period of Japanese history. To imagine that, on a large scale, people could treat others with so much cruelty and treat themselves with so little self-respect. One thing that helps contextualize this, however, is how brutally Japanese soldiers were often treated by their superiors. A Japanese private was frequently subjected to corporal punishment for even minor infractions, and often beaten by their superiors as a form of domination, and how the power of superiors over their subordinates was as absolute as the Emperor's power over its people - the low level Private was essentially property of their commanding officers by their powers granted by the Emperor. And this was not limited exclusively to the military, as this extended to the militaristic schooling system that most fighting aged males went through during this time period, where older students frequently beat and tortured their younger peers in a vicious cycle: The younger students who were abused turned their abuse towards the students below them for some sense of power and domination.
So when you see the Japanese soldiers holed up in bunkers willing to sacrifice everything just to get a chance to kill an American soldier, they were often terrified and deeply rageful teenagers and young adults who were beaten and abused until they learned to channel that fear and rage against an "inferior" and "weak willed" American foe. It helps explain why Japanese soldiers, especially the Korean auxiliaries who grew up under Japanese occupation (and due to their non-Japanese status, were low in the hierarchy and received some of the worst abuse), jumped at the chance to commit massive unspeakable atrocities against Chinese civilians to finally dominate somebody "inferior" to them, just for the chance to feel some of the agency that was robbed from them since an early age. In episode 9 of the show, the manner in which the the Ryuku civilians (who were considered "primitive" by Imperial Japan) are treated by Japanese soldiers is another disturbing example of this hierarchical structure at work. In war especially, abuse begets abuse, brutality begets brutality, and it's no wonder that Americans people, who didn't quite grow up with such a worldview, found themselves seeing the Japanese as subhuman and deserving of cruelty anyways.
And I believe the worst part of all, was the fact that this wasn't just the Japanese following some ancient Bushido code, or a longstanding esoteric Japanese tradition. Contemporary historical scholarship typically traces the origins of this culture of brutality to the late 19th century, less than 100 years before the events of this show. It's the legacy of a handful of people influential in the creation of the new Japanese nation, and the people who came afterwards who leveraged the new national educational system to foster a worldview which celebrated brutality and cruelty in service to Japan. The worst part of it all, was that it really didn't have to be this way: Japan was not set down this path. At the critical juncture in 1900s Japan, where the powerful and the influential in Japan had the agency to choose the direction of this rising Empire, subjugation and domination over the Japanese people, of East Asia, and eventually the Pacific was the path they chose.
Thumb up for you 😉, but i think you already know it but i think it has to be, the "bushido" from ww2 is more tojo's bushido, this code is an interpretation and it's an very agressive and brutal interpretation during this time period. For example random soldier never had to kill themselves and retreat was allowed, if we look at the battles of nagashino (or others) Takeda's army was completely allowed to retreat, even switch sides (sekigahara). There thousands and survivors of takeda's army after defeats and after he committed senpuku. It was even forbidden for generals to kill themselves by their lords because he would lose them.
In the film lettres from iwo jima its well done, there the tojo interpretation (strange because this one is followed by the navy guys and they hated tojo who from the army lol) and the more "traditional" interpretation followed by the Watanabe character.
One feature of the culture that played a central role in WWII was the believe among the Japanese of Japanese Racial Supremacy. Not the nonsense batted about here in the USA by race hucksters newscasters and other charlatans. But real, genuine racial supremacy. While living in Hong Kong I got to know a Japanese business man who was on assignment there. One day, when we were alone, he just broke down and cried. I asked him what was wrong. He told me that he got bad news that morning: that his assignment in Hong Kong was extended for another 5 years. I was surprised: Japanese generally enjoyed overseas assignments. But he explained that he is of marring age and the clock was ticking on his marriageability. And that he only had 2 weeks to go back to Japan every year, which wasn't enough time to meet and court a Japanese woman. He also explained that the only Japanese women in Hong Kong were the wives of Japanese businessmen. Trying to help, I mentioned that there were tens of thousands of single and available Filipino women in Hong Kong. He looked at me, sucked air in through his teeth and said word's I'll never forget: "Oh, no. We Japanese consider Filipino sub-human." And he meant it. He probably told me that because I was a male Gaijin and I was up the "racial hierarchy" far enough in his mind that as two "develop males" we could freely discuss that. I was disgusted. Needless to say, we didn't become friends.
@@Manu-rb6eo Yeah, precisely. I tried to elaborate a bit of that in my last paragraph, where the "Bushido" they practiced was distinctly modern, largely informed by reimaginings of Bushido by people like Inoue Tetsujirō and Inazo Nitobe in the 1900's. Tojo specifically wasn't the one who set the stage for this new overtly imperialistic Bushido, unfortunately the seeds for that was planted a few decades prior to his influence. The reality of "The Way of the Warrior" as it existed in medieval and early modern Japan were many competing interpretations, and many of the Samurai were unaware of it or had no scruples with ignoring it entirely, especially during wartime. It's somewhat reminiscent of 19th century Western Europeans who let their imaginations run wild regarding Knights and a Chivalric code, and how that was used to justify the unusually stuffy and conservative norms of that time period. Definitely not to mention that things like ritualistic suicide in pre-Meiji Japan, like you said, was the exception, not the norm. WWII era Imperial Japan, by forcing their troops to commit suicide on a massive scale, by their own hands or by their enemies, had no real precedent.
But yeah, I really do love how Letters from Iwo Jima portrays the dichotomy between those two competing ideologies, and despite all the rhetoric from the IJN guys, Watanabe is undeniably the more honorable soldier.
For anyone who wants to read more on the history of Bushido, I'd highly recommend reading "Bushido or Bull" by Karl Friday: www.ldsd.org/cms/lib/PA09000083/Centricity/Domain/93/Friday_Bushido%20or%20Bull.pdf
As an old Air Force verteran of 72 years, thank you for watching these series on our largest war. I would like to suggest that you watch Schlindler's List to gain a fuller reason as to why that war was fought. Yours Gratefully.
Just to say, your doing an incredible job, your easily the best reactor and I hope this channel grows even more and you get the credit you deserve, keep up the incredible reactions ☺️
Remember coming home unexpectedly after a year away overseas in the
Navy. I wanted to surprise the family, so I didn't tell anyone. When I got
there, everyone was gone -- they'd gone on vacation. Spent the days of
leave I had in the empty house, then caught a flight back to my base. It
was kind of sad.
The thing you have to remember is that for all the horror of this war a great deal of good came from the victory. Germany, Italy and Japan had their evil, vicious regimes removed and in their place rose modern stable democracies.
In addition the war led to the decolonisation of the world and self determination for billions of people. Yes the aftermath wasn’t all sunshine and roses and other dictators either rose to power or maintained their positions but overall the world is a better place for the sacrifices of those who fought.
Several years ago I was at a gun show here in the Dallas area. Inside the building were a lot of tables. In one of them, an older gentleman was selling a book that he wrote. It was called, "Islands of the Damned". I shook his hand and he was very strong. Even though he was in his 90s, he looked like he could've been in his 70s. This man fought with the Marines in the South Pacific throughout WWII. We chatted for a good while. I bought his hard cover book and he signed it. He told me that I should watch the HBO Series the Pacific. He told me that he was one of the characters. Sure enough, after reading his book I went and got the series. I very much enjoyed it and sure enough he was one of the characters played by an Irish actor. His name was RV Burgin (Burgie). I was hoping to see him again but I think that soon after meeting him, his health began to fail and he couldn't make any more public appearances. I was very glad to have met him. Everytime I watch this series, I focus on him.
Add "Come and See" to your list of war movies to see why the Russians hated the Germans so intensely during and after WWII. It will be the hardest war movie you've ever seen.
No ! Omg dude that movie is a fucking horror film ...
@@fuckingbaker13 I agree, "total war" is looking into the abyss, high octane nightmare fuel.
But I also agree with Cassie we owe these stories our attention we only suffer watching a glint of reality that someone had to live. If no one listens to a story is it ever truly told? The Soviet Union lost 27 million people during the war more than any other country and about half of them were civilians. The type of fighting Germany did on their Eastern Front against the USSR is rarely shown in western media. It makes The Pacific look like BoB. Few Westerners know that 80% of the German military was destroyed by the USSR.
Thank you so much to you Cassie, for the huge emotional effort you did while you watched this TV show.
Please do Generation Kill next. It is very different but very good.
I agree, It would be very interesting to see her do GK.
Joseph Mazzelo who played Sledge, also played John Deacon In Bohemian Rhapsody So him And Rami Malek were reunited.