On the occasion of ‘Araw ng Kagitingan’ (Day of Valor), I am reblogging a piece on Corregidor, the last bastion of freedom in the Pacific in World War II.
This summer, bring your families to Corregidor. Spend time to learn about our rich history. Bring the kids with you. And inculcate in them the values of honor, courage, patriotism and love of country. Develop that sense of leadership and national pride in our youth. Why did our forefathers have to make extreme sacrifices, and why – if need be – were they willing to die for them? Finally, articulate to the kids the need to be ever-vigilant still, for despite today’s convenient technologies, life continues to provide us a box-full of chocolate-minted challenges.
(Fourth of a Series: Summer Suggestions)
Flashback: mid-1942. Just a few months removed from the surprise attack on Pearl Harbor in December 1941, the well-planned Japanese offensive saw their forces march triumphantly across the Pacific, forcing the Allied forces to surrender in Hongkong and Guam (December 1941); North Borneo, Wake Island and the Solomon Islands (January 1942); Singapore (February 1942); the Dutch East Indies (March 1942), and Burma (May 1, 1942). Prior to the Pearl Harbor attack, Japan had surreptitiously annexed territories in Korea, Manchuria, the Aleutians, parts of eastern China, Formosa, French Indo-China and parts of Siam. It seemed that nothing and no one could stop the Japanese from achieving their dream of creating an East Asian empire.
At the height of the Japanese Empire in May 1942. (Courtesy of ‘The History Place’)
In the Philippines, Allied forces refused to back down, and instead dealt the Japanese forces their first significant…
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