Band of Brothers: The Pacific

[Guamsst]

I liked it and so did my mom and my girlfriend. Same complaint though, it's hard to follow at times since the guys seem similar. Some hollywood BS is thrown in.

I never felt like they misled anyone with the racism aspect attributed to hanks. Only thing I saw was a comment about the war in the pacific being more "personal". The show actually shows good and bad from both sides all of which are accurate enough.

On the technical side of it, they screwed up big on a couple of things. The average person wouldn't know or care. For me though, the Japanese night attacks were just "not right". They were rapidly firing their bolt action rifles while charging the American lines. I have never heard an account of anything like this. Typically the Japanese did not fire at all and tried to sneak in close before making a bayonet charge or they fired basically in volley and then made a bayonet charge. The other technical issue I saw was the Japanese soldier who pretends to surrender then blows himself up when the Americans get close. He simply pulls the pin on his grenade and it goes off. The Japanese only had one grenade that worked that way and it was chinese so very unlikely to show up on an island early in the war. I heard lots of complaints about the U.S. gear but I will let others address that.

[Floyd1977]

Historian Stephan Ambrose began work on Band Of Brothers in 1988 talking to the actual veterans and cleaning up what was to become a very readable story line by fact checking with others who were there until it was a nice, tight narrative. What came out was a great history about one small group who, as they got closer and closer to Germany, resistance lightened and they knew they were getting closer and closer to winning.

The Pacific, however, was several stories written by now deceased vets, brought together through one still-living veteran, Sidney Phillips (who recently published a great memoir, "You'll Be Sorree!"). The darkness of this series (compared to Band Of Brothers), however, can be attributed to the nature of the combat itself, little shared or common culture between sides, plus the fact that in contrast to the European Theater, as US ground forces got ever closer to Japan, the combat became even more violent and deadly. The Pacific vets knew that the final invasion of Japan was going to be a bloodbath as none of them had any inkling of the Manhattan Project's work and they had a gloomy outlook about their futures.

[PKelly]

Well said Floyd.

I didn't pick up any kind of racism flag waving from The Pacific. I actually thought it did a good job of portraying the attitude of the conflict. There was a kind of abject hatred present among the combatants in the Pacific Theatre. This has been confirmed by every veteran I've ever talked to, including my own father who was a marine veteran of WWII, Korea and Vietnam.

I prefer Band of Brothers simply because it's a much more cohesive narrative. I likeThe Pacifc better after watching it several more times because the disjointed flow of the plot doesn't bother me. It did take a second viewing for me to identify many of the individual characters, since the muck and grime made them all look alike. Although I suspect that's pretty accurate.

[Guamsst]

When my Grandfather joined the Navy they said he was 4F due to his teeth. He said "I wanna kill Japs, not eat them" On his second attempt they let him in. When asked about the Japs he said "They wanted to cut my heart out".

With few exceptions this was how most Pacific veterans viewed the conflict. There was no Britain to save, France to free or Jews waiting for salvation. There were only Japs we needed to kill, because they wanted to kill us.

[Art]

My old daddy was in the pacific theater as a SeaBee from 1943-45. He said they all viewed the Japs as subhuman, vicious, trecherous, little brown animals. Yes they did, it's true and I heard that from many a PTO veteran. I knew people who fought the Nazis and hated them too but it was not the same thing. They tended to hate the Nazis but not the Germans as a group.

Was Hanks right that race played a role in the Pacific portion of WWII? Absolutely he was and there was sure nothing noble about that part on eilther side. One thing that isn't talked about much is the simple fact that there probably are no more racist people on the planet than the Japanese, then or now.

All things considered the European allies treated Japanese civilians with surprising magnaminity, something the Japs certainly didn't display to their victims.

Now this is based purely on the recollections of people I knew but I think their point of view was representative.

[Guamsst]

I think allot of people have trouble with the idea that any of our guys were less than knights in shining armor. We condemn the Nazis for stealing gold teeth. This makes it hard to reconcile for some people that many GIs and Jarheads came home with a pocketfull of gold teeth taken off the Japanese. We condemn the Germans for incenerating people in ovens and for some it is hard to reconcile that we burned the Japanese out of their caves.

War is never pretty, even when it is necessary, even when the overall outcome benefits the world, even when your own losses are minimal, war is the worst past time we can engage in as a species.

I have no problems with the racial overtones or the way we conducted the war in the Pacific as represented in the show. From day one the stage was set and both sides basically decided it was literally do or die. Yes, we hated the Nazis, but not like we hated the Japanese.

[Bill D]

I may have to agree that we committed some atrocities in both the ETO and PTO during WWII but your analogy sucks. The difference being that the victims were entirely different. Gold teeth picked out of the mouths of old men and women who had been gassed is a tad bit different than gold taken out of the mouth of a dead soldier that had been trying to kill you. Also, the Germans gassed and incinerated old men, women and children who had no choice. The Japanese soldiers in the caves had the choice of surrendering before they were burned.

[Guamsst]

I was in no way making an analogy. But, to many who have no idea what went on, they cannot handle even the slightest thought of doing anything slightly reminiscent of what our "evil" enemies did. Notice, I said "for some".

However, stealing teeth and burning men alive (as most people believe flamethrowers worked) are not the slightest bit noble. So yes, there is a minor connection in that none of those things were good. Personally, I think stealing teeth is a bit crazy and gross and I have no problem at all with our extensive use of flamethrowers where appropriate.

Just like the people who bash America over Dresden, there are those who have no clue about what went on. I even had a person fuming about the "War crimes" America commited by using flamethrowers and they said we were disgusting for being the country that used such horrible weapons. I asked them about the Japanese flamethrowers and got no reply.

[GillaFunk]

Netflix it and burn a copy for yourself.

I LOVED BoB and EASILY bought the package at Costco, but felt buying the whole box set of the Pacific wasn't worth it.

[John Sukey]

Got lucky, when the local video store closed down, got the complete set of The Pacific for 12 bucks plus tax.