Miramar National Cemetery Flag Ceremony Honors Veteran of WWII’s 442nd Regimental Combat Team
Japanese-American Unit Compiled Heroic Record in Battle
Nov. 14, 2013 – The old man wearing a bright white shirt and veterans’ cap stood stiffly at attention, saluting as four soldiers in dress uniforms briskly hoisted colors into the blue sky above Miramar National Cemetery.
Sixty-nine years earlier – October 1944 – he had been in the Vosges Mountains of northeastern France, a young Japanese American wearing a helmet, dirty fatigues and muddy combat boots, and carrying a rifle. His unit, the famous 442nd/100th Regimental Combat Team was engaged in a battle to liberate the French villages of Bruyères, Belmont and …