About the Book:

I was a Boy Scout when Pearl Harbor was attacked on December 7, 1941. Charlie Stern, Norm Baker and I were listening to a football game at Charlie’s home, broadcast from the Polo Grounds in the Bronx that Sunday, when the PA system there started calling out the names and rank of military officers in the stadium, telling them to report to their posts. At that time, we didn’t know the Japanese attack was underway. The next day in High School, all the students and teachers gathered together to listen to President Roosevelt’s denunciation of Japan and his declaration that “a State of War exists.”

A very young man in the combat infantry in World War II, Jay Wenk traveled and fought his way across Germany to Czechoslovakia, and then endured Occupation duty in Germany. His experiences away from combat are as crucial to his life and the lives of others as the actual fighting.

As a green inductee in basic training, he was profoundly moved by the living conditions he encounters among poor Blacks living near the camp in South Carolina. His sense of humor and his feeling for people, some of them German, but not Nazi, is unusual and enlightens all.

In the published works on WWII, this may be the first deep look into the thoughts and feelings of a young and naive boy from Brooklyn armed with a loaded rifle in Germany. His empathy for others and his humor are unique, and the events of 9/11 were crucial to his writing this account.

 His life is now involved in anti-war and pro-human rights activities, and he maintains that the evolution of Truth and Reconciliation committees in South Africa represents one of the most important steps forward in human development.