We Must Preserve the Untold Stories of BIPOC WWII Veterans

They volunteered despite laws discriminating against them.

A family photo shows the four brothers (in the back row), their brothers-in-law, and a cousin who served in the U.S. military during WWII. All eight returned home safely. Photo courtesy of author’s in-laws.

Stephen Ambrose, a historian, said in Citizen Soldiers, his book about World War II (WWII), “The world’s greatest democracy fought the world’s greatest racist with a segregated army.”

Both of my husband’s Chinese American grandfathers served in the U.S. military during WWII. The photo above shows his paternal grandfather and seven grand-uncles (three brothers, a cousin, and three brothers-in-law). Thankfully, the eight of them (as well as his maternal grandfather) all returned home safely.

I never realized there were so many BIPOC Americans who served in the military in WWII. When I think about what I learned in high school about WWII, I recall the horrors of Nazi Germany and their brutal genocide of Jews (and only later learned of their targeted murders of other minority groups like the Romani). But that wasn’t enough for the U.S. to join the Allies.

It was the bombing of Pearl Harbor that finally brought the U.S. into the war. Once America joined the Allies, we started sending our men overseas to fight Japanese forces throughout the Pacific and German forces in Europe.