...interviewing John Falconer. We're located at the Senior Center at 16836 East Palisades Boulevard in Fountain Hills, Arizona. Today's date is July 10th, 2002. John Falconer is a World War II Pearl Harbor survivor.

For the record, could you please give me your full name, address, telephone number, and your date of birth.

Answer: John Herbert Falconer. 15062 East Sycamore Drive, Fountain Hills, Arizona. I was born May 5th, 1920.

Do you remember your dog tag number?

3759144.

Where were you living at the time of the war and were you drafted or did you enlist?

I was just finishing my first tour of four years in the United States Navy, and I was aboard the battleship West Virginia.

Okay. Were you drafted or did you enlist?

They didn't have drafting until 1940. I enlisted in .

Okay. Where were you living at the time, what city and what state?

I was born and raised in Napa, California.

How did you pick the Navy as your branch of service?

I had an uncle who was a lieutenant commander in the Navy, and he was the one that talked me into -- telling me that the Navy was a beautiful place to be, all that beautiful ocean.

All right. Where did you go for boot camp and what training did you get there?

I went through training in San Diego, California, and they sent me to Radio Operator School.

Did you select Radio Operator School or did they?

They did.

Go ahead on your experiences. Tell me which wars you served in and where you went from boot camp.

I don't know if you -- if I need this microphone or not, but -- okay. But after my training in San Diego, they assigned me to the battleship West Virginia, and she was with the Pacific Fleet. And at that time the Pacific Fleet was berthed in Long Beach in San Diego, California. The battleship West Virginia was the commander of all battleships of the Pacific Fleet. We had a three-star admiral aboard. After training around Long Beach and the islands out there for a while, in January -- well, let's see, 1939 we went to Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, and joined the Atlantic Fleet and went into operations down in the Virgin Islands and that area. And we were very fortunate: We went up to New York City, and they were having the World's Fair in New York City. 1939. Then we came back through the Panama Canal and went to San Francisco. Another World's Fair.

Wasn't that something? The Navy was good to me. But in January of 1940, they sent the Pacific Fleet to the Hawaiian Islands for a six-week's cruise. That sounded pretty good. But we didn't go into Hawaii -- we didn't go into Pearl Harbor. We anchored off Lahaina Roads on the island of Maui. Our admiral would not take us into Pearl Harbor at that time, that admiral. I forget his name. But in -- needless to say, we did not return in six weeks; it was about six years, after the war was over. But in -- let's see. It was -- early 1941, Admiral Kimmel took over the Pacific Fleet, and he divided the Pacific Fleet into two task forces, and only one task force would be in Pearl Harbor at a time.

The other one would be out at sea. But during the latter part of 1941 -- in fact, in November or December -- you know, all our fuel -- and we burned a lot of fuel with that fleet. We had over 100 ships operating out there, and most of them operate off of fuel oil, and it had to come from state side. And it was becoming very low. They were having strikes and ships weren't making it out there, and so we were having difficulties in keeping the fleet in operation.

So Admiral Kimmel decided there just the Thursday before the December 7th Sunday to bring the whole fleet into Pearl Harbor. That's the first time we had had the entire fleet into Pearl Harbor for all the years that we were out there. That was on Thursday, and as you know, on Sunday we got hit. But I told you earlier, I believe, that the West Virginia was the battleship that was the commander of all the battleships. We had a three-star admiral aboard. And we weren't supposed to be in Pearl Harbor on December 7th, the West Virginia. We were scheduled to be in Bremerton, Washington, for overhaul. But the Colorado battleship, who's the sister ship to the West Virginia, she had just completed her overhaul in Bremerton, and on her shake-down crew, she ran into problems. And we could not leave -- West Virginia could not leave until the Colorado arrived in the Hawaiian waters, which she didn't, so we were at Pearl Harbor. But they did transfer the flag, the admiral --Admiral Kidd, they transferred him and all his staff to the Arizona just two weeks prior to Pearl Harbor in preparation for the West Virginia to return to the United States. "Mainland," as we call it. And this dear friend here of mine, Bill Driver, he and I were shipmates for over three years. On Saturday the 6th, I met him over at the beach, and we went to Waikiki Beach, had a nice time. See, we were single, and you had to be back by 10:00. I think it was 10:00.

Couldn't stay overnight. Just married men. And so Bill and I came back about 8:00 Saturday evening, and I said goodbye to Bill, and he got in his motor launch for the Arizona and I got on the West Virginia's motor launch. Needless to say -- excuse me -- that's the last time I saw my dear friend. He's still aboard the Arizona, still aboard. Eleven hundred men were killed on the Arizona, and they're still aboard the Arizona.

They reviewed -- removed a few of the bodies, but there -- most of them are still aboard. And dear Bill is still aboard there. Well, on that morning, I got up at 7:00 -- I went down to the radio shack, rather, at :00, and I didn't go topside, but on Saturday because we had fired our 16-inch rifles the last trip out in the -- before we came into port, they had a regulation then that you had to maintain 100 percent efficiency in everything, fuel, food, ammunition, powder. And see, a -inch gun takes 700 pounds of powder to fire it, and that shell weighs 2,100 pounds and she has a range of miles. It takes a lot of powder to -- I worked on the turret when I first went on the West Virginia, and it's quite a -- quite an experience. But this barge was alongside when we came back -- when I came back on Saturday evening still loading ammunition. But Sunday morning I didn't go topside. I just got up and got a cup of coffee and went -- I supervised the radio watch, and the radio room was clear to the bottom of the ship.

And I got up and went on down to the radio room at :00, took over the watch. I had seven men on watch with me. Everything was real quiet. And lo and behold, not long after I'd been down there, they sounded "Fire away and rescue," bugler did. And I don't know -- "Fire away and rescue" is a call that when you're in port, if there's something ashore, a problem, riot or whatever, or on a ship, you fall into muster if you're not on duty and stand by for assistance. They might send you over on a mission.

But he didn't finish "Fire away and rescue." He went into "General quarters" and "Man your battle stations."

Just then kabang, a terrible explosion took place. And I said to my men, I said, "Good God," I said, "You know that barge caught afire and now it's blown up." I assumed that barge was still alongside. And they said,

Yeah, that -- that must be it." And then all the lights went out. Of course we had emergency battle lanterns. But one reason why I'm here today is there was only one hatch to get down to the radio room. I had to have my radio officer before I could secure the radio room, so I kept the hatch open. Well, these explosions were still taking place, and the ship started listing, and I was still waiting for my radio officer. He doesn't get down there, and water starts coming down through the hatch. So I told my men, I says, "Just get right now." So we got. It was hard because unfortunately, the ladders are pretty steep aboard a battle wagon, and it was listing in that direction, so you almost had to shimmy up and here this water's pouring down on you. Today I don't know how in the world I made it up there. But I finally made my way all the way up topside to what they call the "boat deck," and that's where the 5-inch anti-aircraft rifles are. And I look out and I see this plane flying right over the water, and I'm thinking good God. I looked at it again. That's a jap plane. That was the first time I knew what was happening. Just then the gunner said,

Sparky" -- he knew me -- he says, "Grab this rifle" -- this shell here and take it down to that tub down there." It was a 5-inch projectile. They come in, the projectiles, separate from the canister that has the powder. So on my second trip hauling, I had this projectile in my arms -- it weighs almost 100 pounds -- running down to this gun tub, and on my second trip, the last thing I remember was a big explosion.

Purplish, reddish. The next thing I know, there's someone slapping me in the face, and he's saying -- it's dark. I opened my eyes. I remember that. He's saying, "What's your name, what's your rank, and what ship are you on" -- "were you on?" I thought, my God, what's the matter with him? I'm on the West Virginia.

I didn't remember anything. I said, "I'm on the West Virginia," but evidently I gave him the proper information because Tuesday morning -- I was unconscious for two days -- Tuesday morning I came to, and I had this -- I woke up and I was in the hospital bed, and I looked up and I had this tag around my neck.

I looked at it. It says John H. Falconer, Radioman, Second Class, West Virginia. I still didn't remember.

I couldn't remember. My eardrums were turned inside out. I had two shrapnel wounds. And things were terrible. I was very fortunate. I was able to walk and do that sort of thing, so they had me go around and put petroleum on bodies that were still alive but all their skin was practically burned off. And I was never made out to be a corpsman. It was just terrible for me. Of course, it was much worse for them. But I did that for a couple of hours, and finally a friend of mine came over and he was looking to see who was around, and he says, "John," he says -- after he talked with me, he says, "Come on over to Cincpac, Admiral Kimmel's staff. He needs you. He's looking for a radioman, a good radioman." So I went up to the doctor and I says, "Can I leave?" You know what he said. I won't repeat it. "Get." So I got. I had no clothes, nothing, just a pair of trousers that he gave me there at the hospital. So I went over to Cincpac, which was the headquarters of the submarine base, and sure enough, they wanted a radioman, so they -- I was assigned to Admiral Kimmel's staff. About two weeks later, I'm in chow line -- and it's hot there. You know, this is outdoors. And I'm in chow line, and I had a good friend there named Frank was with me, and I look up and I see a sailor about ten men ahead of me.

He's out like this looking and looking. I said to Frank, I said, "Is that sailor looking at me?" You know, he was going like this and like this. Frank looked and said, "It sure looks like he's looking at you." Pretty soon this sailor gets out of the chow line. I tell you, when you get out of the chow line, something's wrong, you know. He came up to me and as he got about 3 feet from me, he just turned white as a sheet. He says, "God," he says, "don't tell me you was on the West Virginia." I said, "Yes, I was." He almost passed out. He says, "Man," he says, "you were dead." He says, "You were dead. No pulse." He said, "You had blood running out all over you, oil all over you." He said, "I threw you in the motor launch." I said, "Well, I sure do appreciate the fact you threw me in the motor launch." And you know unfortunately, I never saw that man again, I never got his name. I just wish to this day I had gotten his name. I would like to have had some more conversation with him. But shortly thereafter, it was about January 1st, Admiral Anderson called me into his office and he said, "I've gone through your background." He says, "I'm going to the South Pacific to set up a communication facility."

He said, "I sure would like to have you join my staff."

Well, by this time, you know, I'm raring to go. I'm pretty teed off at what had happened. So I said, "Yes, sir, Admiral, I'd sure like to join you." He says, "I can't tell you where I'm going, but it's the South Pacific." I says, "Fine." So we got underway on the old cruiser Chicago. Away we went, not knowing where we were heading for. We ended up in Sula -- the island of Sula. Then we transferred to the Australian cruiser. Good gosh. So we ended up in Melbourne, Australia. We set up communications in Victoria coffee barracks there, and then about three months later, General MacArthur joined us when he got out of the Philippines. Shortly thereafter, we moved our operation up to Brisbane, Australia, and there again --I'm always getting -- I don't know how I was always getting called into these things, but a commodore called me into his office and said, "I'd like to have you go up to New Guinea with me." He says, "I'm the commodore with all the motor torpedo boats," he says, and I need a good radioman up there," he said, "to set up advance communication sites" because they couldn't operate during the daytime. They were outnumbered three to four to one. They could only operate at night, and he wanted to have me go up with five other men and throw us off in the jungle. Then we watched the Japanese movements from the island of New Britain.

That's where I -- that's how the Japanese supported New Guinea was to come from the island of New Britain. So I told him I'd go along with him. Worst thing I ever did, I think, but -- on March -- I think it was March 28th, another Sunday, I'm making a landing and I was -- I had set up a site at Tufi, New Guinea. This is about 120 miles north of Milne Bay, if you're familiar with the island of New Guinea. But I'm going to go up to Holandia up near -- just south of Holandia, because that's where we were fighting at that time.

But we couldn't go up all the way because we were going to go into Boona. We had just secured Boona. And they put me on this old tin can, my group and I. And I was going to go up to Boona and lay two there, and then after dark go on up and they'd -- they had us go into the jungle, set up our communications. Well, right at :00 -- this is another Sunday, and you know the name of this ship, of all things, was the Messiah. Another Sunday. I never thought much about it, but at 12:00 -- and we had two P-38s from the Fifth Air Corps protecting us. But at 12:00 I just -- just setting my plate down, I just finished lunch, and I look over there and my gosh, hundreds of airplanes fighting, all kinds of airplanes, mostly Japanese. So our two P-38s, boom, they go over and join the fight. About five seconds later, here's five dive bombers diving on us.

It was right at noontime and the sun was right straight up. I heard this whining noise, and I look up and I see these specks coming at us. Well, five of them hit us, bang, bang, bang, blew that ship right out of the water. I lost two of my men. But the ship was rolling over, and of course going into the jungle, I wore heavy army boots and I had a 3-foot saber to hack my way down through the jungle. And so the ship was rolling over, so I took my saber off and I said, "Well, I can't swim" -- I had no life jacket. I said, "I can't swim with these big boots on," so I'm taking them off, and my men were faster than me, and they jumped in the water, the ones that were still living, and they kept hollering, "John, jump in. For God's sake, jump in."

You know, finally, for some reason or other -- and I'll never to this day know why I did this, but bullets, -caliber machine gun bullets were going right by my head. I could feel them right by my ear. And I'm sitting down on the deck doing all of this, and all of a sudden I stood up just like this, and I raised my right hand. And I says, "Lord, why didn't you let me get back home and tell dad about Pearl Harbor?" And my men were hollering at me, "Jump in. For God's sake, jump in." Now why under duress you'll do some things that you never realize that you'd ever do. Here I was facing death, but nonetheless -- I figured it was the end. That's why I'm talking to the Lord. But the Lord was good to me. I did get back to tell dad about Pearl Harbor. But we went on up then, and I did land and set up communications there, and I did that now for -- all the way up for a little over a year. And I -- you know, the mosquitoes are terrible in New Guinea. You know, Ralph; you was there. And lo and behold, I came down with a terrible case of malaria. Gosh, getting old. I can't even think of what in the world was going on. So anyway, they flew me down to Milne Bay. I had a temperature of 107, they told me. I don't remember flying down there. So I couldn't -- they couldn't do anything for me there, so they flew me down to Brisbane, Australia. And at that time you took Atabrine. You took Atabrine, didn't you, Ralph, that yellow pill that was supposed to fight off malaria?

First it was quinine, but they did away with that and you had to take Atabrine. Well, it turned your skin yellow. And after I got out of the hospital down in Brisbane, I'm walking down the street one day and two US nurses, army nurses, walking down the street. And I saw them looking at me, and they walked up and said, "Gee, for God's sake, there's something wrong with you." And I said, "Yeah, I know. I just got out of the hospital." "Oh, you need to be in the hospital right now. Look at the color of your skin." I said, "I've been taking Atabrine." They never heard of it.

But this was just a little thing I thought I'd put in there. But lo and behold, I stayed there for a few more months, and they offered me warrant officer or to radio electronic school in Chicago, Illinois. I couldn't have both, only one. Well, I'd been waiting in for four years on the United States; I wanted to get back. So if I had taken warrant officer, I had to go back up to New Guinea, so I opted for the electronics school. Well, they flew me all the way to Honolulu, and in Honolulu, they placed me aboard a ship called the Henry Berg. It was a troop ship, had over a thousand men on it, troops going back home. So we get underway headed for San Francisco, and the morning that we arrived in San Francisco, it was about 5:00 in the morning, I was up early and I had my dress uniform on and I'm waiting to see that Golden Gate Bridge. I hadn't -- I'd been away for four years. And just a little bit later, crunch, the ship went up there, I fell on my rear, everything went flying. I thought, good gosh, what's going on? Hit the Golden Gate Bridge? I don't know how many of you are aware of this, but about 30 miles outside of the Golden Gate entrance is the Farallon Islands, just an island sitting out there, been there for many years. Well, this team that was operating this Henry Berg, something happened, they lost their way, and it was fog -- the fog was dense. You couldn't even see 10 feet. Ran right smack into the Farallon Islands. And I mean, it was sinking fast. And they said, "Abandon ship."

Well, I was raised around the San Francisco area and I knew how cold that water was, especially at 5:00 in the morning, so I wouldn't abandon ship. I kept running around the ship. I figured I'd be safer staying on there until something came out to rescue us. Well, at :00 that morning, sure enough, I'm still aboard -- and there was only about two or three of us still aboard -- here comes a small boat. And I just go down the ladder and climb on the boat and go to Treasure Island. While I was in Honolulu, I had called my grandmother and grandfather, who lived in San Francisco, and told them I was on the way and what ship I was on. I knew what ship I was going on. So they had called my dad, who at that time lived in Santa Rosa, California, and they came down to meet me. And lo and behold, they took me to Treasure Island, and I'm going down to headquarters, and I hear this hollering, "I want to see my son right now. I want to see him."

God," I said, "that sounds like my dad." He was a pretty feisty fellow. And sure enough, it was my dad.

Of course I hadn't seen him for five years. What a happy -- what a happy day that was. Well, I finished my -- they gave me 60 days leave, incidentally. I enjoyed that. Then they sent me to Chicago to electronics school. On the completion of that, they sent me to Stamford, Connecticut, to set up a mobile communication organization, and they had a special school there to teach you how to operate mobile communication sites. And from there, they sent us to be with the Marines out at California. Where's the Marine setup there? Camp Pendleton. I can't think of the name of it. So we operated with the Marines making landings. And then we went out to Honolulu and ended up landing on April 3rd on the island of Ie Shima, which is 12 miles northwest of Okinawa. It's only one mile in circumference. In fact, this is a picture of Ie Shima, but you don't see the island but this is where we were. I took these pictures, incidentally.

But from the time we landed there until this time and the war was over, we sustained 376 major bombing runs on us because we had -- we established the fighter intercept group there, and the Japanese bombers had to come over more or less Ie Shima to hit Okinawa. And the war in Okinawa was, you know, furious. It was going on a long time. And -- so they were determined to blow us off that island. But -- and that is the island that Ernie Pyle was killed on. If you look at this picture, you'll see they built a temple for Ernie Pile. I had coffee with him many times and breakfast -- well, not many times because he didn't -- he was killed only the third day or fourth day after we landed. But then the war was coming to an end, we thought, anyway. Now, you must realize that the Japanese still had 2 million men in uniform at this time, no Navy, and they had -- let's see -- about 5,000 kamikaze pilots. Now they raised hell with us. We lost a lot of ships at Okinawa from the kamikazes. I think we lost 30 or 40 ships there from them. So to land on the mainland of Japan would have been very costly. They estimate today -- or they estimated then that it would have taken about a million American lives and two to 3 million Japanese lives if we had gone ahead and landed. Now today there's a lot of dispute on this, but I kind of go along with that figure. Well then we dropped the atomic bomb, Hiroshima and Nagasaki, and of course that -- that convinced the Japanese that the war should end. Now, we had caused a lot more damage in Tokyo and Yokohama by fire bombs than the atomic bombs did. Killed a lot more than that. They had -- Tokyo -- when I went into Tokyo right after -- when we signed the peace treaty, it was nothing but trash. It was blown apart. But, you know, it's a strange thing: I went up there when they signed the treaty -- they sent me up there to set up communications at Yokosuka -- and I was quite surprised. The Japanese, some in uniform and mostly civilians, would come up and throw their arms around you and say, "Thank you. Thank you." It's amazing.

But they were so happy that the war was over, and they'd been suffering terrible from -- from our bombing raids. But that ended the war; it ended World War II anyway. So -- do you want to say something?

What did you do after the war then and how did the war -- being in the war and what you saw affect your life as a civilian?

Well, I didn't become a civilian. I stayed in the Navy for 30 years, so I continued on in my Navy career. And I didn't retire until 1968. I was in the Korean War, sailed up to Yellow Sea. And so, you know, it's one of those things.

I have a question to you on the hatch that was open at the time when you were attacked in Pearl Harbor? Had it been shut, had that radioman made it on time down and if you closed the hatch, would you have been able to open it up to get out?

No, the water flooded that -- that whole third deck, what was called the "third deck," was completely flooded. See, my ship went down to the bottom. And the West Virginia had a depth of about 22 feet, and the water there was 35 feet deep. And we -- we wouldn't have been able to get out, so -- incidentally, the officer that did not make it down to the radio room on the West Virginia, it was just about a year ago, maybe two years ago -- I'd been looking for him for years -- all these years, and I finally came across a list of officers to a naval magazine, and there was -- there was his name. So I went down through the -- it was quite a job. I finally got his home address and telephone number and got ahold of him, and he told me what happened. He had got within 20 feet of the radio room, and one of the torpedos that came through knocked him out and he was unconscious and someone carried him out. But, you know, unfortunately, just three months -- now after all those years I'm looking for him, three months after I found him, he goes to the Lord. I -- I would have liked to have gotten together with him. Okay?

Did Tokyo Rose have an impact on your life during military service?

Oh, she sure did. She sure gave us a lot of happiness.

She played the best American music and she'd tell us, "Now you down there on PT Boat 111, we're going to get you tomorrow. Today's your last day and we're going to get you." She identified all kinds of troops. We're going to get you. We just laughed -- well, most of us did. But the music, you couldn't get any music down there -- you know, American music -- and she played the best American music. And you know, we sent her to prison for ten years after the war was over, but -- let's see, President -- who did I say? President -- oh, President Ford in 1977 gave her a full pardon.

Tokyo Rose was an American citizen, but she had gone to Japan just before the war started to visit kin folks.

And she was there, unfortunately, when the Japanese started the war, and they conned her into -- well, you know, they didn't con her; they just told her she had to do it, so it was beyond her control. But we all enjoyed her music, and we just ignored her remarks about "Hey, Yankee, you're gone tomorrow." So that was -- she was quite a gal.

How did you finish your military career then and what -- what area of the military, doing what?

The last eight years of my military service I was in Navy intelligence, cryptologic intelligence. We broke messages, and that's about as far as I can go into detail.

When you left the military, did you get into any civilian occupation or did you fully retire?

No, I was employed -- I was hired -- I received my BSEE, and I was employed by the National Security Agency for 15 years and retired from the National Security Agency. And I used my 20 years -- 30 years, rather, of the Navy time as federal service time, which was quite a break because I was an electronic engineer with NSA and my chief's pay when I retired from the Navy was pretty lousy. So it made quite a difference in my retirement pay, which I appreciated.

Is there anything from the emotional standpoint that has left a continual stand -- or an impact on your life emotionally from what you saw in the war?

Well, sometimes it gets to me, yes. Yes, I lost a lot of good friends, and when things occur in this country that people will have less respect for -- for our flag and our country, it sort of gets to me and I think of all my good friends and the millions of men and women who died to preserve this society. It does get to me.

But on a whole, I think our country's a great country and you try to go on with it.

Could you describe the diagram, which is a handout?

Oh, yes, this is how the ships were moored in Pearl Harbor. I think you all have a copy of it. And it shows the times and the type of bombers and the planes that came in and the times they came in to do their attack. So I thought it was kind of interesting to -- to give you that. And we had a total of about 96 ships in Pearl Harbor, and we lost 18 of them. And the two -- the two battleships we lost was the Arizona and the Oklahoma. And I lost my captain, Captain Bennion.

He was a -- one of the finest captains I ever served with, but he was killed from a fragment that came up from the Arizona. He was up on the bridge directing the ship's movements, telling you what to do. He got hit right in the stomach, and he stayed on his -- he wouldn't go anywhere and he stayed up on the bridge and eventually passed away up there.

Could you explain some of the other handouts, too, if you will. One is the picture I believe of the Japanese commandos coming in to surrender and the plane that they come in on, why it was -- how it was painted, et cetera?

Yes, on Ie Shima, which was the last landing that we made in World War II, the Japanese end boys after -- they wanted to go down to the Philippines and talk peace terms with General MacArthur. He was assigned that responsibility. So they decided to land on Ie Shima, us being the nearest to Japan, the mainland of Japan. It was only about 300 miles from Japan. So what they did -- that plane there is a Betty Bomber, Japanese Betty Bomber. They painted them -- they had -- I think they had four of them. They painted them all white and put great big green crosses on each side of the fuselage and on the tail because just a few days before, we were shooting these down, you see, so they wanted to make sure that -- that we didn't fire at them. And they -- when they -- after they landed on Ie Shima, they transferred to our C-54s, and we flew them on down to the Philippines. And then after they conversed with MacArthur, they came back up and took their planes back to Tokyo. Oh, this 75-cent deal.

After Pearl Harbor, they asked you to submit a request for articles lost aboard the ship. Well, I was on the West Virginia over three and a half years, and, you know, I had quite a bit of material on there, so I think I put in a request for 75 dollars. Well, I'm in Tufi, New Guinea, in, let's see, 1943 when I received this check with that little notice, and I thought at first -- I didn't look real clear. I thought, oh, I got my 75 dollars. Then I looked again. I said, what's that little dot doing ahead of the seven? 75 cents? So I sent this back to my dad, the only reason I have it, and he kept it and gave it to me after the war was over. But I always thought it was kind of -- kind of neat. They -- I don't know how much I'd get for it today if I cashed it. Treasury Department wouldn't have enough money, would they?

(Inaudible.)

Huh?

(Inaudible.)

Oh, any questions? Yes.

(Inaudible.)

Oh, when I went through radio boot camp in -- oh, San Diego. They had an operator school there.

(Inaudible.)

Oh, yes. Oh, yes, uh-huh. Uh-huh. Yes, Ralph.

(Inaudible.)

Oh, yes. Well, they counterflooded it.

(Inaudible.)

Oh, yes, yes. I forgot that. Yes, and the counterflooding of the West Virginia, you know, the Oklahoma was right ahead of us, and she capsized. And I'll tell you they counterflooded her, which you know what that means, put water on the opposite side in the bilges. It would kind of balance it. Well fortunately, our ship was capsizing, but one of our officers managed to get water pumped into the other side of the ship and he kept her more or less upright, even though we sunk right down to the main -- the main deck was flooded, but it didn't capsize. And, see, the West Virginia was raised, got back in the war in '44.

She was in the Philippine War. And then when the peace was signed in Yokahama, Tokyo, I was up there, and lo and behold, what do I see? The West Virginia. She was the only ship that was sunk at Pearl Harbor that was at the signing of the peace in Tokyo. I thought that was kind of great. Of course, I didn't recognize her because they really changed her when they modernized her after they took her up to Bremerton in Washington.

Any other questions? (Applause.)

What was your final rank in the military?

My final rank was Master Chief Communication Technician.

Thank you very much, John. Really enjoyable.

I'm not on the program, Ladies and Gentlemen, but I can't leave such a performance go unrecognized. As you know, this group, our World War II group, are dying off at the rate of 500 per day, so we won't be around much longer. It's only through the efforts of people like the master chief, Ralph, and others that we're propagating what happened during World War II. And just one other observation. I've just come back from Washington, and I know you're going to be happy to hear this: They're thinking of reinstituting the draft. And the reason for it is it's costing too much money to keep the all-volunteer force. For one thing, we're paying doctors, we're giving bonuses to aviators, to submariners, to anybody that we need to stay in the service, we're paying them extra to do it, and we're running out of money. So it's no secret what's going to happen in Iraq. We don't have enough people to do the job. Many of you know the draft was never stopped.

People 18 to 26 have to register right now. And whenever the whistle blows, they'll be called up immediately. So it does my heart good to see something like this happen because too many people, I think from your experience and my experience, think that freedom is free, and as you well know from the Master Chief Sparks -- incidentally, I've never known a radioman that was not called "Sparks." And I'm a little jealous, too, because he has 40 years and I only have years, so I'm a little jealous of you, Sparks. But too many youngsters today don't realize the sacrifices that were made and think that freedom is free. I've been talking much too long here, so I'll give you -- yes.

(Inaudible.)

Oh, okay. My name is Admiral J.R. Rohleder, R-O-H-L-E-D-E-R, U.S. Navy, retired.

East Brodiea, B-R-O-D-I-E-A, Drive, Fountain Hills. And incidentally, that means dessert flower, "brodiea." And one thing you'll be pleased to know, Chief -- Master Chief -- I'm sorry -- while you were sweating out the Japan situation, I was on a corsair coming back and forth from carriers to drop napalm. We didn't drop bombs; we dropped napalm. So you were so right that we burned the hell out of them. (Applause.)