The Great Raid

One of the best movies of 2005 is out--"The Great Raid" This is one of the best movies you'll see, I really encourage you to take a couple of hours out and see this on the big screen. We had the opportunity to see an advance premier several weeks ago. I think we were the youngest people there. The director was there, and about half the Filipino population of Houston, and all able-bodied vets.
As a general rule, I do not like war movies, except for two: Saving Private Ryan and The Great Raid. The Great Raid, in case you're not familiar with the story, is about a mission to rescue about 500 POWs at the Cabanatuan POW Camp, which held survivors of the Bataan Death March and other Japanese-held POWS.
If you’ve ever held any doubts about the Japanese atrocities during WWII, this movie will disabuse you of that notion. In one scene, the POWs explain how the Japanese considered anyone who surrendered a coward, a sub-human not deserving of mercy. This is evident from the conditions which the POWs lived, not to mention tales of Japanese torture of prisoners, as well as the War Crimes trials that were held after WWII.
In another scene, Benjamin Bratt portraying Henry Mucci, the raid’s commander, is coordinating with Filipino guerrillas (led by Lapham, Pajoda or Josen?). Mucci warns the guerrilla commander that his plan is dangerous because the Japanese troops will plan a flanking attack. No, the guerrilla commander says, they won’t. They don’t have enough respect for us to consider anything but a head on attack.
But, the scene that really drives the point home is the opening scene which explains part of the basis for the raid. As the Japanese began losing, they decided to simply kill POWs. The Japanese corral POWs in a confined area, pour gas on them and set them on fire.
There are two good books on the Cabanatuan raid, William Breuer’s The Great Raid on Cabanatuan, and Hampton Sides’s Gost Soldiers. There is a monument on the ex-camp site: http://www.abmc.gov/cb.htm