A young girl, thin as a reed, looks out of a photograph. Where and when was this taken? Without the book title, your mind would bring you to Vietnam in the 1970s, or Cambodia. But the photo was taken in Manila.
It was 1945. The jeep behind the girl shows an American soldier. This was Liberation of Manila. This was February. There must had been great celebrations everywhere although peace would come to the rest of the country months after this month.
Just a few days before, perhaps even hours—we are not really sure—February in Manila was the coldest month in Hell.
Manila of 1945 was the Rape of Manila. The book from where I got the photograph is the Special Commemorative Edition of the Liberation of Manila, with the title Manila 1945. The Rest of the Story.
The book, and its executive editors, Lucky Guillermo and Peter C. Parsons, gifted us not only with accounts but also a book with photographs to aid us not so much in remembering those days—October 1944 to September 1945 as the book states—but, more, in not forgetting.
The accounts in the book are priceless, written by luminaries, intellectuals and historians. Varying in perspectives, the narratives, nevertheless, are one in their stories of epic violence. The editor’s note of Lucky Guillermo puts the events of those days succinctly: The Japanese Army in February, 1945, in response to the arrival of US liberating forces, unleashed a preplanned demolition and killing spree that resulted in over 100,000 civilians dead and countless others wounded, burnt and otherwise mutilated. And an entire city left in ruins.
For every essay, the book has rare photographs of those days. The mention of the rape of Manila is supported by several pages spread, which show Manila in ruins. As far as the eye can see, buildings are without roofs, trees are standing leafless and burnt. There is a shot of American soldiers walking beneath the magnificent facade of the Post Office Building, with some of the pillars displaying holes and cracks. Look closely: The liberating force is headed by a small man. Was he a guerilla?
Listen to Peter C. Parsons: They began rounding up civilians in Fort Santiago on February 4th. On the 6th they start killing off these people. They also begin rounding up civilians along Singalong Street and beheading them—this went on for a long time.
In the same chapter, a photograph shows a young man with hat in his hand looking around at the five or six dead people on the ground, the corpses’ faces flat on the ground. Were they running away?
The number of those who died in the last World War is deemed arbitrary. There were those whose bodies were never found or those who were, according to Parsons, “burned beyond recovery.” There were those who died of hunger and they may not have been counted.
Dr. Benito J. Legarda, Jr., in his essay, calls the sacking of Manila the “most vicious crime in Philippine history.” Legarda puts that gross events of February in context: The Japanese did their utmost to make the city unlivable, dynamiting the bridges across the Pasig, destroying utilities like electric power, telephones and public transportation (and for three weeks succeeding) in cutting off the water supply.
Continuing, Legarda writes: Of all Allied Cities in World War II, only Warsaw suffered more…. If Manila was second to Warsaw in terms of destruction, it was second to Nanking (or Nanjing) in the number of casualties in Asia.
Legarda has more to remember: The killings in Manila took many forms. Sometimes there were individual murders with shots to the head, or by bayoneting or beheading. Sometimes, there were massacres of whole families, or groups of people, confined in buildings and blasted with hand grenades. Women were raped, then sliced with bayonets from groin to throat and left to bleed to death under the hot sun. Children were seized by the legs and had their heads bashed against the wall. Babies were tossed into the air. Unborn fetuses were gouged out with bayonets from pregnant women.
There are more accounts in the book, more photographs. The deaths are horrifying enough until you come across a photograph of a big number of Makapili, or collaborators. In one photograph, two of these collaborators (we seldom call them traitors) are seen huddled against a wall while an old man seemingly confronts them. In two other photos, men identified as collaborators and Makapilis are escorted by American MPs along Rizal Avenue going to Bilibid detention center. Another photo has the pro-Japanese collaborators seated on the ground with Filipino guerillas guarding them.
These Makapilis, many could recall, would guide the Japanese to certain homes and leave as the Japanese started setting the house on fire. These collaborators though were our kin, their photographs part of the dearest and saddest memories of Filipino families. As were the so-called comfort women.
What happened to that young girl standing all alone? Did she lose her parents? How long did she live on? What is that small box she presses tight under her armpit? Milk? Stateside chocolate? Looking back at the image of that girl by the lonesome road, we should be happy we are looking at a survivor, with lots of memories to share about that February in Manila, many tortured and sorrowful years ago.
Happy Valentine’s Day to all!
E-mail: titovaliente@yahoo.com
Image credits: Jimbo Albano