Letters from the CBI: A Soldier's Journey through the Forgotten Theater of World War II

Preface

There aren’t many of us left who remember the early days of World War II, a scary time that had our country on the ropes. Having been born in 1947, it was before my time, and even many of those who are older than me have no memory of how frightening it was. Most of us living now remember only that the United States and its allies were victorious in that war, our enemies were humiliated, and their leaders were purged. With World War I as a prelude, and after a year and a half of bloody fighting in 1917 and 1918, America’s belly was already full of war; when Hitler began to reclaim the Rhineland in 1936, and with the Austrian Anschluss and takeover of the Sudetenland in 1938, it was as if it was all starting over again. As a result, the country’s mood was decidedly isolationist. Unfortunately, the War to End All Wars hadn’t lived up to its name, and our country was not prepared for World War II. Our defenses deteriorated after the armistice of 1918, and we had merely 139,000 troops in arms in 1939. The country was in no mood for another costly European affair. We were just emerging from the Great Depression, and most Americans felt that if Europe wanted to fight it out, we should let them. We, however, would stay home. Many prominent Americans, including Charles Lindbergh and Henry Ford, joined the America First Committee, an isolationist and anti-Semitic group founded in 1940 that advocated for appeasing Hitler’s Germany. It was wrong then, and it’s just as wrong now. The United States is a world leader, and isolationism is an abdication of that responsibility. In 1940, the United States avoided war even as Hitler overran Europe and Japan took large sections of China, leaving death and destruction in their wake. Had Britain fallen to Hitler, who knows what the outcome of that war might have been.

President Franklin D. Roosevelt understood the national mood and knew he would not be able to get his country onto a wartime footing anytime soon. During the 1940 election cycle, when he ran for an unprecedented third term, he publicly declared that he would not send our boys to fight in another European conflict. However, those declarations were only for public consumption. He could see the handwriting on the wall. He knew the winds of war were blowing and his country would eventually be drawn into an even more destructive worldwide conflict.

Despite his public declarations, Roosevelt did everything he could to prepare his country for the inevitable conflict, eventually instituting the Lend-Lease program. Under this program, the United States sent large amounts of military equipment and supplies to Britain and China. This helped Britain defend itself from a Nazi invasion, supported China’s resistance against Japan, and ramped up military production in the United States. Roosevelt also instituted a draft, increasing the size of our grossly undermanned armed forces to meet the challenges that he knew would eventually come. In addition, he engaged with British Prime Minister Winston Churchill, with whom he found mutual understanding and even developed a friendship. They met in secret on a warship off the coast of Canada on August 9, 1941, to discuss strategy for the inevitable conflict. On August 12, 1941, they agreed on the Atlantic Charter, a declaration that formulated wartime strategies and established goals for the postwar world. Meanwhile, in opposition to Japan’s military actions in Manchuria and China, the United States froze all Japanese assets in the US in July 1941 and eventually instituted a series of embargoes that imposed restrictions on the Japanese economy.

On December 7, 1941, the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor, devastating America’s Pacific fleet. A declaration of war with Japan was now inevitable, and after Roosevelt addressed Congress on December 8, Congress indeed authorized such a declaration. Even so, Roosevelt worried that public support for joining the war in Europe may still be lacking since opposition had previously been so strong. But due to the Tripartite Pact between Germany, Italy, and Japan, Hitler and Mussolini made it easy for Roosevelt by declaring war on the United States on December 11, 1941, four days after the Japanese attack. Within hours of the Pearl Harbor attack, the Japanese invaded the Philippines and moved to take many of the Pacific islands. Despite Roosevelt’s efforts to prepare us, we were not yet ready for war.

Historically, military leaders have always prepared themselves for the last war they fought in, designing tactics and strategies that disregard advances in technology in favor of what had been tried and proven. World War II was no different. The Japanese air force quickly wiped away inadequately prepared British and American air forces in their Pacific and Asian holdings and used seasoned troops to attack them on the ground. The Japanese took the Philippines within a couple of months, as well as the British colonies of Malaya, Hong Kong, and Burma. They even threatened India. Much of 1942 was an unmitigated disaster for the United States, the British Commonwealth, and their allies. Meanwhile, recruiting offices in the United States were swamped with new enlistees following the Pearl Harbor bombing. War production also increased exponentially as America put everything it had into preparing for the war to come.

This book is about my father’s participation in the war effort as a soldier. Although it tells his unique story, his experience was similar to that of many other soldiers during that time. Much of this story will be told in my father’s own words, as he expressed it while he was living it, via letters he sent to his family and fiancée—my mother—while he was deployed.

I have made as few changes to his wording and punctuation as possible, and these minimal changes have been made to enhance clarity and readability while retaining his intended meaning and tone. Occasionally, I have added clarifying information to the letters through the use of brackets. Some comments made in his letters are disparaging to people of color or of different ethnicity. I’m not proud of that aspect of this type of speech, but neither do I believe him to have been of ill will toward these people. My father lived in a time before political correctness became the norm, and he grew up where people of color or certain ethnicities were rare. Being unaccustomed to life in a cultural context that was foreign to him, it was easy for him to judge things that he did not fully understand. I also experienced this in my early days as a Peace Corps Volunteer until I became more adapted to the customs and conditions of life in a different country. I learned that it takes a while to build that bridge and see the humanity in people of different backgrounds who live in environments that are so different from ours. But with time, we understand their adaptations to those environments.

The remainder of the book consists of my commentary, including historical notes and information that Mom and Dad told me later in life as I became old enough to understand. Millions of soldiers lived dangerous and eventful lives during that war. Some of their stories are fascinating, many are dangerous, and some are tragic. Before reading Dad’s letters, I thought I knew his story. However, I wasn’t fully aware of the part he played in significant world events or how he weathered the dangers he confronted in the jungles of Burma. Dad would never have called himself a hero, but in a way, all those men and women were heroes. What they did then, as many had done before and many have done since, was part of the price to preserve our freedom. This is a story about how Lt. Louis J. Forster and his future wife, Gloria I. Galloro, weathered those times and came together to become my mom and dad. It is an emotional story for me—one that has increased my respect for my parents, members of America’s Greatest Generation.

1

The Shoebox

In early 2017, my brother, sisters, and I were cleaning out the house we grew up in to prepare for selling it. No one from our family was going to live there anymore. I had retired not too long before and had considered moving back to Durand, Wisconsin, but that would take my wife and me far away from our kids and grandkids. We had made a life for ourselves on the other side of the state. My sister Mary Sue, who had lovingly taken care of Mom in her final years, had her own house about a mile away, my sister Diane lived in La Crosse, and my brother Steve lived in New Jersey. Each of us took what we wanted from the house—mementos from our lives and childhoods, mementos of Mom and Dad. On the kitchen table were tons of pictures, and we split them up according to who was in them. There was also a small cardboard box, inside of which was a shoebox. Inside the shoebox were bundles of hundreds of letters, each in its own envelope. There was a layer of dust over all of them. I immediately knew what this was, and a quick look at the date and addresses on one of the letters confirmed my impression. They were letters Dad had sent to Mom while he was deployed to the Far East during World War II. Mom had kept them all these years. My parents had remained unmarried during his deployment, which lasted one year, ten months, and twenty-nine days. But it was clear that they intended to marry immediately upon Dad’s return. The letters began with Dad embarking on his travels in Greenville, Pennsylvania, continued by describing his train trip to Miami, and resumed upon his arrival in Karachi, which, at that time (1944), was part of India.

At first, I didn’t know what to do with the box of letters. So many things from that house were going into the thirty-yard dumpster parked in the driveway—an electric organ, old magazines, a rickety old kitchen table and chairs. I couldn’t bring myself to dump this box full of letters, but I wasn’t sure what I wanted to do with it, either. So I took it home and stored it for a few years.

I initially retired in 2013, but I didn’t adjust well to being away from work; it became clear that, for me, retirement didn’t mean retirement. I thought, We spend our lives progressing, sometimes from job to job, and raising our families, but when we’re done with all that, we do nothing? Who are we then? My dad used to say, When that old farmer leaves the farm and moves into town, he has about one year left in his life. In other words, after our careers are over, we still need a purpose—a reason for being.

After briefly returning to work in 2015, I again retired in 2017. That time, I knew what I wanted to do with the rest of my life. I had honed my writing skills during my career, so I dedicated myself to writing in retirement. In late 2021, I published a memoir of my Peace Corps experiences, Mariantonia: The Lifetime Journey of a Peace Corps Volunteer. Once that project was complete, I finally pulled that old shoebox of letters from under the bed and began digging into its contents. It soon became clear to me that there was a significant story within that dusty old box. It was about one young man’s journey through wartime danger in the jungle, boredom, frustration, and dedication at a time when all he wanted was to come home and marry his sweetheart. But he knew a happy ending was never guaranteed.

As I organized Dad’s letters and wrote my commentary for this book, I was conscious of the fact that I was reaching back through time—almost eighty years—to the period when my own parents were beginning to plan their young lives amidst the dangers and uncertainties of World War II. They made these plans while being separated for a very long time, unable to communicate through any means other than cryptic telegram messages or letters, which were often delayed by over a month. Of course, I knew my parents well as I grew up, but when I knew them, the war was over, and they could finally settle down. The letters in the shoebox were from a time when they were young and single, before they started a family. The letters gave me a look into their lives before I knew them—and the letters also gave me a glimpse of the origins of my own life.

I am grateful beyond words for this old shoebox. The letters within were not artfully crafted, and the penmanship was often difficult to decipher. Some of them originated from under a tarp in the Burmese jungle while Dad wrote by flashlight during the monsoons. After growing up in my parents’ household, there wasn’t much I didn’t know about them, and the raw information I gathered from the letters added little to my existing knowledge of who they were. But somehow, the letters increased my respect and admiration for my parents. Throughout my life, I was always proud of Mom and Dad, but I am even more so now because of what they revealed about themselves in that dusty old box of letters.

2

A Job to Do

My father, Louis J. Forster, a native of rural West Central Wisconsin, was born in June 1917 and was raised on his father’s farm. Dad’s great-grandfather, Anton Forster, had emigrated from Austria in 1856 and, after working for several years near Mazomanie, Wisconsin, he buried his first wife there. Finally, in 1868, he and his six children drove eight head of cattle, carried all their earthly possessions, and walked almost two hundred miles from Mazomanie to a rural township called Lima, near Durand, Wisconsin. There they established a homestead on land that’s still in the family. There is a story that my great-great-grandfather Anton married three women in his life and is quoted to have said, The Lord took my first wife, and the devil took the second. The third, neither one of them wanted, so I had to keep her.

Through at least three generations, the family continued to speak German, or as they called it, Austrian. That was my father’s first language, so he had to spend some time living with the nuns at Lima before he could attend school there. In those days, farmers raised their crops, but they also raised their own workforce, so Dad learned to work at a young age. He was the youngest of the surviving boys. All but one of his older brothers bought farms of their own, but Dad had other ideas. He liked electronics and decided to learn radio repair through correspondence courses. As war approached in 1940, he decided to enlist. Unfortunately, he was only five foot two, so the army told him he was too short. Thus, the army almost missed out on my dad and his talents. He often told me, in a somewhat irritated manner, I was too short when I tried to enlist in 1940, but I wasn’t a damn bit too short when they drafted me nine months later.

Dad entered the service of his country on January 16, 1941. He took his basic training at Camp McCoy in Wisconsin and was initially designated as US Army Infantry. However, he felt that he was better suited for the US Army Signal Corps because of his radio background. The army finally agreed. After he completed basic training, Dad was sent to various places in the country during his first year in service and was on maneuvers in places like Wartrace, Tennessee and Fort Leonard Wood, Missouri. Since the army was growing rapidly after so many years of downsizing, it needed to develop men to lead. As a result, Dad advanced rapidly and ended up as a Technician Fourth Grade (T/4). Being older than most draftees and recruits, he was eventually sent to Signal Corps training and Officer Candidate School (OCS) at Fort Monmouth, New Jersey. He was in New York on the day Pearl Harbor was bombed and heard about it as he emerged from a matinee at a movie theater there. On October 15, 1942, he graduated from OCS as Second Lieutenant.

My Mother, Gloria Isabel Galloro, was from an Italian immigrant family that settled in Central Iowa. My grandma, Edvidge Valentina Trevisol Galloro, whom my siblings and I called Nonna, was a loving soul who lived to be two weeks shy of 102 years old. My grandpa, Tony Galloro, had the thickest Italian accent you could imagine. It was beautiful, almost musical. Although he was occasionally mocked for his thick accent, he was able to make friends and a living in Ogden, Iowa. He was barely five feet tall, but he was tough and held his own as a coal miner and railroad worker in Boone County. He was a minor league bootlegger during Prohibition, making wine and beer in his basement. My mom often told me about the time she unintentionally drained one of his wine vats when she was little after taking a sip from the siphon and forgetting to stop it. She also told me about one horrible day when her father and oldest brother went to work in the coal mines. Her brother, Tony, had good-naturedly asked her to bake him a pie to eat when he came home from work. But on that fateful day, both her father and her brother were caught by a huge piece of coal that fell on them in the mine. The younger Tony died that day—without ever getting to taste that pie, which I think always haunted my mom.

In the early days of World War II, Mom and one of her girlfriends went to Banning, California, and joined the Girls Service Organization, which was related to the USO and sponsored by the YMCA. She also managed to get a job at a local establishment. It was my great fortune that this was where my father was sent after Officers Candidate School to refine his radio skills during the early days of the war. Banning was located in part of what was called the Desert Training Center in those days. It included areas in the desert where General George Patton trained his troops to help liberate Africa and Europe. Maneuvers were held in many places within the vast training area that spanned Southern California and Arizona, but Dad spent much of his time in Banning and San Bernardino. He was there for many months in 1943. Dad had said he wasn’t looking to find his soulmate in that environment, but that’s where he met Mom. After meeting her it didn’t take long. Dad knew right away that she was the one, and they dated from then on. When Dad was sent on maneuvers and other assignments that took him away from her, they still corresponded. Those were happy times in California, but more difficult and frightening times were still ahead.

Late in 1943, almost three years after being drafted, Dad received notification that he was about to be assigned. He didn’t know where he was going, but he hadn’t been training all this time to sit on his skills in some backwater of the war. He was pretty sure that he was about to be sent overseas—somewhere. He wanted to introduce his fiancée to his family before he left. They had thought of getting married before he was assigned to a place thousands of miles away, but there wasn’t much time. Their plans would have to wait, much like the plans of many other young people during that time. First, there was a job to do, and it was an urgent job that required many to make sacrifices. My dad was one of those men whose lives and plans were on hold—for the duration of the war.

3

Assignment Overseas

Dad didn’t know where he was going, but it was obvious he was probably about to be assigned overseas. It was late 1943 and he had been in the Army for more than two and a half years, training and burnishing his skills as a Signal Corps officer. It was time to put them to use. Back then, soldiers didn’t know where they were being sent when they were deployed, and they sometimes didn’t find out until they arrived. Most often, they got on a ship somewhere and could vaguely sense which direction they were sailing in. But since the United States was fighting all over the world, the final destination was often still in doubt. Dad confirmed in a letter that he didn’t know where he was going or even where he was until after he arrived. He had left his sweetheart near his hometown of Durand, Wisconsin, where she visited him and his family in anticipation of his new assignment, and he said goodbye to her at the train station in Eau Claire, twenty-five miles away. He was initially sent to Greenville, Pennsylvania, but that was just for a few days, only one stop along the way.

Dec 13, 1943

Dearest Gloria

Still haven’t received my mail but I guess you’d like to get some from me. I wrote a letter to the folks so I’ll just write a note.

I imagine you’re still [in Durand] but I suppose you will take off before long. I don’t believe there is any chance of me coming home before Christmas so you can leave there as soon as you like. I’m afraid I won’t see you until I get back & I hope it won’t be too long. I miss you terribly already. It’s funny when I said goodbye to you at the station it seemed so easy. I guess I was excited about the new assignment & everything. I hope you didn’t have any trouble, you certainly looked very calm when I left you. Frankly I was afraid you’d go to pieces & make a fuss but I was proud of you the way you stood up under it, so calm & sweet.

I don’t know any more than I did when I wrote you last night. I might have to take off in a hurry & I might not be able to let you know when I’ve left so if you don’t hear from me for a while don’t worry. I’ll be O.K. Just take good care of yourself, I don’t want to come home to find a wreck. I’m sure I won’t.

I guess I’d better close I write more tomorrow.

With love

Shorty

As promised, he wrote again the next day. He teased her, as he often did, knowing that the possibility of receiving any mail from Gloria was remote so soon after he had left her.

Dec 14, 1943

Dearest

No letter as yet. Your breaking my heart little girl. If I don’t get a letter pretty quick I’ll come home & see what’s wrong. Then you’ll be sorry. I guess there is still time for letters from you but it seems like a terrible long time since I left. It is almost a week ago since I kissed you goodbye. How am I going to be able to stay away a year or so, I’ll go batty.

Still no more news but rumors are that we won’t leave until about Christmas. We probably will spend the holidays enroute to our new station. What a way to spend them. I hope by a year from now I’ll be able to be with you for good.

Tomorrow I’m going out to do a little firing on the range. Rifle & carbine are on the list. I hope to do O.K. but I’m afraid I’ll get mighty cold out there. I still am not used to this cold climate.

I’m getting over my shot that I got yesterday but my shoulder is still a little sore.

Got my check today for travel $174.21 was the amount. I expected a little more but even so I cleared about 100 bucks.

I don’t know whether you’re still [in Durand] or not but will send the letters there till I hear different.

Don’t forget I love you & give my regards to everyone.

Love

Shorty

Louis J. Forster was called a lot of different names in his life, and he didn’t seem to mind as long as they didn’t call him late for supper. Later on, in civilian life, many people called him Louie. Shorty was probably a name that soldiers gave him in the army since he was only five feet two inches tall. But much earlier, he had acquired the name Jack. Although his middle name was John, that wasn’t the origin of his nickname. It came from his older brother, Fritz, who called him Little Jackass, and Jack was shorthand for that. From then on, family members and even friends called him Jack. However, Gloria met him in Banning, California, where fellow soldiers probably called him Shorty, so at first, Gloria knew him by that name.

Dec 16, 1943

Dearest Gloria

I finally got your letters today and was I glad to get them. I was beginning to wonder whether you loved me or