World War Two: 78th Anniversary of Japan’s Attack

Today marks the 78th anniver­sary of Japan’s attack of Pearl Har­bor and Mani­la and the begin­ning of World War Two in the Pacif­ic.  This link gives you information.

https://www.military.com/daily-news/2013/12/07/pearl-harbor-wasnt-only-surprise-attack-that-day.html

To hon­or those who expe­ri­enced World War Two, I am shar­ing a short excerpt of my World War Two nov­el, When the Rain­bow God­dess Wept. The link below leads you a longer excerpt of the novel.

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When the Rain­bow God­dess Wept (pub­lished by Uni­ver­si­ty of Michi­gan Press and the Uni­ver­si­ty of San­to Tomas Pub­lish­ing House)

Nov­el by Cecil­ia Manguer­ra Brainard

“After count­ing the dead once again, Grand­fa­ther walked by the dirty kitchen and he sniffed Lourdes’s fish rel­lenos. He stopped right then and there. A deep fur­row formed between his eye­brows and he became silent and pen­sive. Dur­ing sup­per­time he spoke to my father:

“Nan­do, pay atten­tion, the Japan­ese have bombed Clark Air Base; MacArthur and the USAFFE are rac­ing to Cor­regi­dor and Bataan. It is only a mat­ter of time, Mani­la will fall, and the Japan­ese will cut off all sup­plies to MacArthur and the USAFFE until they sur­ren­der or die.”

Papa, suck­ing thought­ful­ly on his pipe, replied, “The Amer­i­cans won’t let that hap­pen, Peping, there are thou­sands of Amer­i­can sol­diers there. The Japan­ese have already bombed Pearl Har­bor, the Amer­i­cans won’t allow them to do any more damage.”

“Nan­do, you are like my own son. I know you have great affec­tion for these Amer­i­cans, but don’t be naive. The Japan­ese will take over and the Canos won’t be able to lift a fin­ger about the mat­ter. And you know why? Because they’ve deployed most of their forces in Europe, that’s why. It’ll be a while before they recov­er in Asia, and when they do they’ll need our help. But right now, con­sid­er Luzon lost. The Visayas, includ­ing Ubec, will go. Min­danao will be the last strong­hold against the Japan­ese. Japan has North­ern Asia; Amer­i­ca must hang on to the south­ern part. Nan­do, pay atten­tion, when the Japan­ese come to Ubec, they’ll go after you.”

“I’m a teacher, Peping, not a politi­cian or soldier.”

“You’re an engi­neer pro­fes­sor, and trained in Amer­i­ca at that. You not only know a lot about the exist­ing roads and bridges, you can help them build new ones,” Lolo Peping said.

“If they come, the guer­ril­la regiment’s ready.”

“Good. Guer­ril­la war­fare will be the only solu­tion. But be care­ful of those Canos. The thing with Amer­i­cans is they watch out for them­selves first. Don’t believe all that malarkey about broth­er­hood and equal­i­ty, always ask if this or that ben­e­fits Amer­i­cans, Fil­ipinos, or both, before you go into it. Keep in mind that the Amer­i­cans lied to us. A man­go doesn’t turn into an avo­ca­do. They said they’d help us get rid of the Spaniards, that Amer­i­ca would hon­or Philip­pine inde­pen­dence, and what did the Canos do? They betrayed us! Once we just about beat the Spaniards, they turned against us,” Grand­fa­ther said.

To fur­ther illus­trate his dis­trust of Amer­i­cans, Lolo Peping told us what hap­pened in the island of Samar at the turn of the cen­tu­ry. The Amer­i­cans, who took over the town, arrest­ed and impris­oned all men over eigh­teen years old. The pris­on­ers had to work for the Amer­i­can sol­diers. Unable to tol­er­ate the repres­sion, the men with the help of the towns­peo­ple revolt­ed one Sun­day morn­ing. Using machetes, bam­boo lances, what­ev­er weapon they could find, they attacked the sur­prised Amer­i­cans, killing more than half the com­pa­ny. In reprisal, Brigadier Gen­er­al Jacob H. Smith ordered Major Lit­tle­ton W. T. Waller to kill all Fil­ipinos, say­ing: “The more you burn and kill, the bet­ter you will please me.” Since the rebels had fled to the hills, the Amer­i­cans method­i­cal­ly tor­tured and killed the civil­ians. They burned hous­es, destroyed crops and live­stock until at last they fer­ret­ed out the rebels. Then they killed them all.

Grand­fa­ther said that dur­ing the Philip­pine-Amer­i­can War, the Amer­i­cans killed 16,000 Fil­ipino sol­diers and 200,000 civilians.”

~end excerpt; for a longer excerpt, please click on the link below ~~

Longer Excerpt

https://cbrainard.blogspot.com/2015/12/world-war-ii-fiction-excerpt-cecilia.html

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Praise for When the Rain­bow God­dess Wept:

“When the Rain­bow God­dess Wept by Cecil­ia Brainard is the tear­ful, sel­dom-told sto­ry of the Japan­ese inva­sion of the Philip­pines dur­ing World War II as seen through the eyes of a young Fil­ipino girl. The many hard­ships that 9‑year-old Yvonne Macaraig and her fam­i­ly are faced with teach her the val­ue of hope and endurance … Brainard’s won­der­ful nov­el shows how war brings out the best and the worst in peo­ple as it describes both the atroc­i­ties and the hero­ics that befall her char­ac­ters. The novel’s theme, the vast cost of war on the human spir­it is illus­trat­ed well by Yvonne’s trag­ic loss of inno­cence. In the words of her grand­fa­ther, Lolo Peping: ‘Before man sinned, he was inno­cent. Man’s orig­i­nal sin wasn’t eat­ing the for­bid­den fruit; it was Cain’s mur­der of his broth­er.’” (Asso­ci­at­ed Press)

“Inter­weaves real­is­tic events with myths of women fight­ers and god­dess­es, as well as fan­tas­tic dreams … Brainard’s appeal­ing char­ac­ters are larg­er than life, peo­ple who change before our eyes, yet remain utter­ly con­vinc­ing … A fast-paced, sen­si­tive­ly writ­ten first nov­el.” (Kirkus Reviews)

“The strength­en­ing of the nation­al spir­it; the loss of inno­cence in two gen­er­a­tions — these themes are explored by the author, who was born in the Philip­pines, with per­sua­sive con­vic­tion and stark real­ism.” (Pub­lish­ers Weekly)

“Sto­ries of war are per­haps most com­pelling when told through the eyes of chil­dren, whose inno­cence is always so trag­i­cal­ly incon­gru­ous to the adult mad­ness that rages around them. When the Rain­bow God­dess Wept, a first nov­el by Cecil­ia Manguer­ra Brainard that chron­i­cles the Japan­ese inva­sion of the Philip­pines dur­ing World War II, is no excep­tion.” (Los Ange­les Times)“Enchanting through­out, this nov­el will mes­mer­ize the read­er right up until its vic­to­ri­ous end­ing.” (Book­list)

 

Book Reviews

Book­list, Sep­tem­ber 1, 1994

Kirkus Review, July 1, 1994

Los Ange­les Times, Novem­ber 15, 1994

Pub­lish­ers Week­ly, August 16, 1994

Asso­ci­at­ed Press, Decem­ber 18, 1994

Tags: World War Two, WWII, World War, Pacif­ic War, Pearl Har­bor, Japan, mil­i­tary, war