Infamy: The Shocking Story of the Japanese American Internment in World War II

I read Richard Reeves’s latest book, Infamy: the Shocking Story of the Japanese-American Internment in World War II,” over the Memorial Day weekend. I’ve read several of his books and, until now, had considered “President Nixon: Alone in the White House” as his masterpiece. In my inexpert opinion, it’s the best book ever written on that troubled President. Infamy is a masterpiece that should rank alongside works like “Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee” for clearly articulating Americans inhumanity to their fellow Americans. Reeves has have connected those dots like none before him, although giving generous credit to those who tried. The World War II internment of 120,000 Japanese-Americans in isolated concentration camps remains the greatest stain on President Franklin D. Roosevelt’s otherwise stellar record. Meticulously researched, Infamy documents the post-Pearl Harbor panic and paranoia that led to Executive Order 9066, and there are villains aplenty, including California Attorney General Earl Warren (subsequently Chief Justice of the U.S. Supreme court), Deputy Secretary of War John McCloy (subsequently Chairman of the World Bank) and even cartoonist Theodor Geisel (better known as Dr. Seuss). In some ways, it was not unlike the anti-Muslim anger following 9/11, but carried to an unconstitutional extreme. McCloy’s quote “if it is a question of the safety of the country and the Constitution…why the Constitution is just a piece of paper to me.” By putting a human face on the tragedy, Reeves has produced the most readable account of this travesty of justice. Whether it was Seattle shopkeepers forced to sell their businesses for pennies on the dollar, San Pedro fishermen forced to abandon their boats, or Oregon farmers forced to leave their homes and farms behind, “military necessity” drove them to imprisonment behind barbed wire and guard towers in concentration camps located in barren deserts and remote swamps. Despite their maltreatment, most internees remained loyal to their adopted country. When finally allowed to enlist in the Army in January 1943, the 442nd Regimental Combat Team fought fiercely in the European Theater of Operations, becoming the most decorated unit per capita of the Second World War. Reeves tells the amazing story of their rescue of “The Lost Battalion,” a Texas National Guard unit that had been cut off and surrounded by German troops. Reeves weaves in the stories of Daniel Inouye, Medal of Honor winner and long-term Senator from Hawaii, and Norman Mineta, Congressman and cabinet member in both Democratic and Republican administrations. The injustice that Caucasian Americans perpetrated on 120,000 fellow citizens, placing them in concentration camps and stealing their possessions, is one of those sins that cries out to heaven for vengeance. This quote from Chapter 9 says it all: “When Private Shiro Kashino…first saw the row of huts behind barbed wire at Dachau, he said, ‘This is exactly what they had built for us in Idaho’.” Unfortunately, the racial paranoia depicted in Infamy continues to prevail today. Infamy is a tale that celebrates the ability of the human spirit to ultimately transcend adversity. It’s a compelling read!

This book adds to my growing knowledge about people and how they survived (here and abroad) during WWII. It’s a dry read early into it—mostly factual dates and news stories in the early days after the bombing of Pearl Harbor. Hoping the book develops even better life for those Americans who were interned in camps on our American soil.

Very disturbing and very moving. This is a true and cautionary part of American history from which we must learn. Wartime hysteria mixed with racial prejudice formed a wicked brew which unduly abrogated the constitutional rights of many natural born Americans of Japanese descent after the attack on Pearl Harbor. My parents were some of those who were imprisoned in "internment" camps surrounded by barbed wire and guarded by soldiers in towers with machine guns pointing at them.They were both born in America.They were American citizens! There was no due process accorded to them and their fellow internees to warrant this unconstitutional imprisonment. How could this happen in America, the Land of the free......? They were interned because their faces looked like that of the enemy in Japan. Throughout the course of WWII and this internment, there was not one documented case of disloyalty or espionage by this group of people. Even so, a good number of the young military age Japanese American male internees volunteered to join the Army after being allowed to do so. They did this to prove their loyalty and commitment to America, and to reclaim the honor of their families. Many of these volunteer soldiers paid for this loyalty with their lives or their limbs. Most of these volunteer soldiers served in the famed 100th/442 Regimental Combat Team, a segregated unit of the Army. These men formed the most decorated unit for its size in the history of the American military. This book also depicts the resiliency, resourcefulness, determination and courage of the internees. Author Richard Reeves has documented a part of American history that was rarely discussed in history class in school, but which needed to be told. America is not perfect. Hopefully, America learns from its mistakes for the good of our future generations. With the passage of the Civil Liberties Act of 1988, signed into law by President Reagan, an acknowledgement was made by the American government that the internment of the approximately 120.000 persons of Japanese descent in America during WWII was fundamentally unjust and based upon "race prejudice, war hysteria and a failure of political leadership." A formal apology on behalf of the United States was also extended to the internees. Thanks to author Richard Reeves for contributing more knowledge to American history. The United States of America is not perfect. Regardless, it is the greatest and most unique country in the world. It is a privilege to live here. God bless America!

EXCELENT TEN STARS! THIS BOOK NARRATES ONE OF THE MOST INJUSTICES OF THE WORLD WAR TWO, ONE HUNDRED AND TEN THOUSAND JAPANESE AMERICANS WERE PUT IN CONCENTRATION CAMPS, DESPITE THE FACT THAT THEY WERE LEGAL RESIDENTS AND CITIZENS, UNLIKE THE ILLEGAL ALIENS OF TODAY, THEY WERE VERY REFINED AND PRODUCTIVE. MOROEVER THEY WERE LOYAL TO THE POINT THAT MANY WERE TO FIGHT FOR THE US ,EVEN AGAINST THE COUNTRY OF THEIR ANCESTORS. THE JAPANESE AMERICANS WERE DISPOSSESSED AND UPROOTED FROM THEIR COMMUNTIES, THEY WERE HUMILLIATED BY THE AUTHORITIES AND BY THE COMMON PEOPLE WHO WERE FILLED WITH HATRED AND RACIAL PREJUDICE INSUFLATTED BY THE POLITICIANS, INCLUDED FRANKLIN DELANO ROOSEVELT, AND THE MEDIA. ONE OF THE MOST DESPICABLE ASPECT OF THIS EPISODE WAS THE FACT THAT MANY JAPANESE LIVING IN LATIN AMERICAN COUNTRIES WERE FORCIBLY TRANSFERRED TO US CONCENTRATION CAMPS OR DEPORTED, ESPECIALLY PERU, THE LATIN AMERICAN GOVERNMENTS WERE NOTHING BUT LACKEYS AND PUPPETS OF THE US, THEY DECLARED A WAR AGAINST JAPAN FOR NOT REASON AT ALL. THE IRONY WAS THAT THIS INFAMY WAS PERPETRATED BY A GOVERNMENT THAT WAS FULL OF SOVIET AGENTS.

The idea of the United States is pretty good in theory. That’s what makes the despicable parts of our history so infuriating. Most who pay attention and are intellectually honest know something (or at least should) about how we have treated indigenous civilizations, black Americans—from slavery through Jim Crow to Black Lives Matter—and virtually every large category of immigrants or easily marginalized populations. Yet large numbers of Americans believe accounting for societal and governmental wrongs is, in and of itself, unpatriotic and anti-American. They fear history. They embrace ignorance to justify their ideologies and prejudices. That’s why we are often subjected to the rule of demagogues at local, state, national and commercial levels. Today their primary targets are Muslims, progressives and those who accept the validity of the scientific method. Our seemingly endless penchant to identify new—or re-identify old—scapegoats inspired Richard Reeves to recount the story of the internment of Japanese-Americans in WWII to illuminate current events. Today, relatively few Americans know anything about the internment of Japanese-Americans. Before the term meaning of the term changed, they were known as concentration camps. Following the Pearl Harbor attack, hysteria, racism, and political expediency all converged to hastily create a policy to round up Japanese-Americans who lived in the west coast states of California, Oregon and Washington and place them in camps in the west, the mountain states and Arkansas. For no other reason than their appearance, 120,313 Japanese-Americans were wrongfully suspected being either active or potential collaborators with Japanese empire. With very few exceptions, they lost their homes, jobs, businesses and financial security. They were transported to isolated areas with harsh, unfamiliar climates. While officials claimed this was done to protect them, the camps were fenced in with the guns of the watchtowers aimed inward. Reeves’ account is mostly a compilation of anecdotal experiences of those interned: how their abrupt removal was taken advantage of by profiteers (much like European Jews in WWII) what life was like in the camps, how—despite their treatment—many tried to demonstrate their “Americanness” by serving in the military, and how some, especially older persons without family support, actually found comfort and stability in the camps. Some took $75 for cars that had been purchased for thousands just months earlier. Many sold their businesses at low costs with the promise that they could buy them back only to find out that the people they trusted sold them on to others of a big profit. A regiment of Japanese-American soldiers, virtually all who had been in internment camps, that was sent to Europe became the most decorated American battalion in WWII. On the other hand, older, first generation Japanese-Americans were forced to leave the camps—everyone who was released was given a train ticket to their destination and $25—because they realized that they had no place to return, some committed suicide. Much like the survivors of the Holocaust in the two decades that followed WWII, most internees did their best to hide their experiences from the public. Even the best movie about greed of those who profited off the internment polices, Bad Day at Black Rock didn’t portray the plight of the Japanese-American community (but it did have one of the best fight scenes in the history of cinema). While a few internees later were elected to Congress and sponsored legislation to garner a national apology and grant minimal reparations of $20,000 per internee after more than 30 years, the national monument to them, while stunningly beautiful and touching, is the hardest to find in Washington, DC, nestled on a small triangular block near the foot of Capitol Hill. And the racism encountered by Japanese-Americans still exists in parts of the U.S. There was little that was new to me. I was fortunate to have had a great professor who taught about the Korematsu case that reached the Supreme Court, which challenged the constitutionality of internment. It was unsuccessful. Together with the infamous Dred Scott decision that upheld slavery prior to the Civil War and Plessy vs. Ferguson, which maintained Jim Crow laws, Korematsu is one of the great stains on American constitutional law. The attorney general of California, Earl Warren, used his support of internment to propel himself to the governorship. He would later become the greatest Chief Justice of the Supreme Court (and most hated by conservatives) who led the most progressive decisions in U.S. history including the landmark Brown vs. Board of Education case that led to the desegregation of public schools. He rarely spoke of internment and broke down crying when asked about it in a 1971 interview. As Reeves recounts in his conclusion, President Harry Truman wrote to Eleanor Roosevelt, “These disgraceful incidents almost make you believe that a lot of our Americans have a streak of Nazi in them.” An awareness of the history of concentration camps like those of the Boer War, the Nazi death camps, and the Japanese internment camps is more important today than ever. Consider the responses of Fox News (sic and sick) to the June 3, 2017 London terrorist attacks: these “pundits” actually raise the foolish, sick (not sic) idea that the United Kingdom should consider creating internment camps! I gave it three stars because I realized that I had a greater knowledge and understanding of this history than I thought I did. It read like a long newspaper article that spent no time on the “whats,” “hows,” and “whys” behind the stories. What, for example drove the individuals behind these decisions, how were they made, and why were none of them held accountable? More cynically, it had the feel of a well-known author who strung together bits of information that research assistants were feeding him in assembly line fashion. Perhaps I would give it three stars for adults who are completely ignorant of this episode and four stars for high school students and young adults. It has lofty goals but falls far short of its promise.

I was aware of the appalling internment of Japanese Americans in unconstitutional concentration camps during World War II, but a book like this is important in spreading the word about this shameful episode in American history. There have been other books on the topic, but it's important to keep reminding people about what the U.S. government and the American people are capable of if allowed to stray too far from our fundamental principles of liberty, equal protection under the law, and due process. Also, I frankly don't recall learning about any of this at school, instead hearing and reading it about it on my own. The book is a clear, concise, compelling narrative of how the U.S. went crazy after the bombing of Pearl Harbor, rounding up harmless individuals minding their own business just because they happened to be of Japanese ancestry. (No like-minded massive roundup of Italians or Germans occurred despite the fact we were at war with those nations as well, showing this was clearly a case of hysterical racial prejudice). It's also scary that the Supreme Court pretty much backed up the U.S. government's clearly unconstitutional action, and in fact delayed weighing in until it was too late to make much or a difference in any case. This was a failure of the moral conscience of America, and a lesson about what could happen if we don't stand up for our liberties not just in good times, but when we're threatened as well. I also look forward to seeing a dramatic portrayal of this disgraceful period in the new Broadway musical "Allegiance," generated by former Star Trek star George Takei, who spent time with his family in one of these camps as a child. I highly recommend that this book be required reading for late grade school or early high school. We should learn not to take our constitutional rights for granted.

Arrived well within the stated 9-24 day estimated delivery time at 12 days from time of sending (based on e-mail). Padded envelope was torn, though the book was intact on receipt. Contents of book were better curated than his comments on interview with Leslie Stahl at the New York Historical Society Museum. Much of his writing was limited and his interview contained not only omissions, but actual errors that were not repeated in the book. I knew Edison Uno when he was on faculty at San Francisco State and was the evening Millberry Union Dormitory manager. As a sansei, we chatted about his work toward mounting an Executive Order 9066 Exhibit (1972-3). He didn't live to see the Smithsonian's exhibit in 2009 or the reparation signed by President HW Bush in 1988; that's truly sad in view of his work and the fact that the constitutionality of FDR's order doesn't preclude any future or other president from acting against any other group that can be defined by race, ethnicity, religion, etc. At least now, Asians are not precluded from citizenship as being non-European Caucasian and therefore not capable of civility. Constitutionality of citizenship for other races has been clearly defined since the Civil Rights Act of 1964, though you couldn't tell by the recent statement by ostensible Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump with respect to Hispanics and the delayed responses from other candidates of both the Democratic and Republican parties. That's a sad commentary on the continued racism/bigotry in our society.

With its encyclopedic coverage of the subject and lucid style, Richard Reeves' book is THE place to start any inquiry into this shameful chapter of American history. FDR defined December 7, 1941 as "a date which will live in infamy," but the ease with which he and the country surrendered to the forces of racism and greed is the real story of infamy remaining from those troubled times. This is a truly epoch-making book, the first on the subject by a major mainstream writer. Most earlier studies have been undertaken by Japanese-Americans whose families were directly impacted by the "relocation" policy or by narrowly-focused scholars with little name recognition. As a professional journalist and historian with an established fan base (he has produced important books on several presidents), Reeves brings the little-known subject of America's own World War II concentration camps into the realm of general American history.