RAF Museum to raise Nazi bomber from 1940 Blitz out of English Channel

A British museum has begun the process of lifting the only Nazi bomber to survive the World War II Blitz on London out of its shallow grave -- under 60 feet of water and shifting sands under the English Channel.

Read more: http://www.foxnews.com/science/2013/05/07/raf-museum-to-raise-nazi-bomber-from-blitz-out-english-channel/#ixzz2SdfdYCVO

Oldest surviving Nazi concentration camp survivor dead at 107

An Austrian organization that tracks the fate of Nazi concentration camp inmates says the oldest known survivor of such a camp has died aged 107.

Read more: http://www.foxnews.com/world/2013/05/02/oldest-surviving-nazi-concentration-camp-survivor-dead-at-107/?test=latestnews#ixzz2SBaD4wYF

WWII bomber jacket rescued from Goodwill, returned to 90-year-old vet

Really neat story. Worth the read: http://www.foxnews.com/us/2013/04/30/wwii-bomber-jacket-rescued-from-goodwill-returned-to-0-year-old-vet/

World War II vet who provided flag at Iwo Jima dead at 90

This Feb. 23, 1945 file photo shows U.S. Marines of the 28th Regiment, 5th Division, raising the American flag atop Mt. Suribachi in Iwo Jima, Japan. Alan Wood, a World War II veteran who provided the flag in the famous flag-raising on Iwo Jima has died. Alan Wood was 90. Wood was in charge of communications on a landing ship on Iwo Jima's shores when a Marine asked him for the biggest flag that he could find. Wood handed him a flag he had found in Pearl Harbor. You can read the full story from the associated press here.

Remains of American WWII soldier reportedly found on Pacific’s Northern Mariana Islands

The remains of an American World War II soldier missing in action for nearly 70 years have reportedly been identified after they were found on the Pacific’s Northern Mariana Islands.
The Joint POW/MIA Accounting Command confirmed to FoxNews.com that its team currently working in Saipan has received “possible human remains” and material evidence consistent with an unresolved case from World War II.

Read the full story here: http://www.foxnews.com/us/2013/03/26/remains-wwii-soldier-reportedly-found-on-pacifics-northern-mariana-islands/?intcmp=features

WWII POW from New York gets medals decades later

An upstate New York man who spent 10 months as a prisoner of war during World War II has finally received medals he earned for his service nearly 70 years ago.

The Press and Sun-Bulletin of Binghamton reports that 89-year-old James Wood of Binghamton was presented with six medals Wednesday during a ceremony with Broome County officials, who say he's one of the last surviving POWs in the county.

Wood aboard a B-24 Liberator bomber that was shot down over Hungary in July 1944. After being taken prisoner by the Germans, he spent most of the remaining months of the war on forced marches with other POWs as his captors tried to evade Allied forces.

Among the six decorations he received are the World War II Victory Medal, Air Medal and POW Medal.

Read more: http://www.foxnews.com/us/2013/03/21/wwii-pow-from-new-york-gets-medals-decades-later/?test=latestnews#ixzz2OCarKX8E

Hawaii Sen. Daniel K. Inouye dies at 88

Daniel K. Inouye, a Medal of Honor recipient from his service during World War II and, as Hawaii's senior Senator, the longest-serving member of that body, died Monday at the Walter Reed National Military Medical Center from respiratory complications. He was 88.

Read more: http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2012/12/17/hawaii-sen-daniel-k-inouye-dies-at-88/#ixzz2FMghnOVg

On 1943, when the U.S. Army dropped its ban on Japanese-Americans, Inouye curtailed his premedical studies at the University of Hawaii and enlisted in the Army. He volunteered to be part of the all-Nisei 442nd Regimental Combat Team. This army unit was mostly made up of second-generation Japanese Americans from Hawaii and the mainland.

Inouye was promoted to the rank of sergeant within his first year, and he was given the role of platoon leader. He served in Italy in 1944 during the Rome-Arno Campaign before his regiment was transferred to the Vosges Mountains region of France, where he spent two weeks in the battle to relieve the Lost Battalion, a battalion of the 141st Infantry Regiment that was surrounded by German forces. He was promoted to the rank of second lieutenant for his actions there. At one point while he was leading an attack, a shot struck him in the chest directly above his heart, but the bullet was stopped by the two silver dollars he happened to have stacked in his shirt pocket. He continued to carry the coins throughout the war in his shirt pocket as good luck charms until he lost them shortly before the battle in which he lost his arm.

On April 21, 1945, Inouye was grievously wounded while leading an assault on a heavily-defended ridge near San Terenzo in Tuscany, Italy called Colle Musatello. The ridge served as a strongpoint along the strip of German fortifications known as the Gothic Line, which represented the last and most dogged line of German defensive works in Italy. As he led his platoon in a flanking maneuver, three German machine guns opened fire from covered positions just 40 yards away, pinning his men to the ground. Inouye stood up to attack and was shot in the stomach; ignoring his wound, he proceeded to attack and destroy the first machine gun nest with hand grenades and fire from his Thompson submachine gun. After being informed of the severity of his wound by his platoon sergeant, he refused treatment and rallied his men for an attack on the second machine gun position, which he also successfully destroyed before collapsing from blood loss.

As his squad distracted the third machine gunner, Inouye crawled toward the final bunker, eventually drawing within 10 yards. As he raised himself up and cocked his arm to throw his last grenade into the fighting position, a German inside fired a rifle grenade that struck him on the right elbow, severing most of his arm and leaving his own primed grenade reflexively "clenched in a fist that suddenly didn't belong to me anymore". Inouye's horrified soldiers moved to his aid, but he shouted for them to keep back out of fear his severed fist would involuntarily relax and drop the grenade. As the German inside the bunker reloaded his rifle, Inouye pried the live grenade from his useless right hand and transferred it to his left. As the German aimed his rifle to finish him off, Inouye tossed the grenade off-hand into the bunker and destroyed it. He stumbled to his feet and continued forward, silencing the last German resistance with a one-handed burst from his Thompson before being wounded in the leg and tumbling unconscious to the bottom of the ridge. When he awoke to see the concerned men of his platoon hovering over him, his only comment before being carried away was to gruffly order them to return to their positions, since, as he pointed out, "nobody called off the war!"

The remainder of Inouye's mutilated right arm was later amputated at a field hospital without proper anesthesia, as he had been given too much morphine at an aid station and it was feared any more would lower his blood pressure enough to kill him.