Timeless Patriotism: Guam and World War II

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And we went to hide in the caves.

My mother's brother was beheaded.

They were all beheaded there.

And so we were scared and we were crying and said, "Papa, where are you, Papa?"

The Japs were coming down.

And as I was fighting the guy, I had been stabbed.

The Americans are here.

We're safe.

[ Singing in native language ] We are honored to have one of our World War II veterans.

He is with us today, going back through Guam.

And I'd like to extend our heartfelt appreciation for Mr. Frank Wright.

I loved Guam so much.

It was one of the islands I knew really, before I went into the Corps.

Welcome back, one of our greatest liberators.

How are you?

Good.

Huh?

Will you shake hands?

Thanks.

There you go.

Thank you very much.

Marine Corporal Frank Wright was last on the island of Guam in 1944.

Things didn't look the same back then.

He's back on the island decades later for the opportunity to thank the residents of this American territory.

This island changed Frank's life forever.

It was a battle far from American shores that is still celebrated today in Guam.

Yet it is primarily forgotten by those on the mainland of the United States, except for the young men who fought here.

But I've always had an attachment for it, and I carry around a memory.

It stands out in your mind, in your heart.

Guam still remembers those Americans who delivered them from Japanese oppression in World War II.

After nearly three years of suffering and death, the United States finally returned.

[ Fanfare plays ] It is a Liberation Day celebrated yearly in Guam, decades after the final shots were fired here in the far western Pacific.

That's a beautiful gathering and knowing that we're celebrating our being liberated by the American.

[ Woman speaking indistinctly ] July 21st is the biggest celebration that Guam holds as the whole island, including the military, would participate in parade and also the people, the local people showing their gratefulness in the Americans liberating Guam at that time.

It's a way of thinking how we got here and for all those military guys that came, that died for us.

It's for those men that died and women that died during the war.

They should always be remembered.

Guam remains a paradise, a territory of the United States to this day, where the sun rises early and bright across the International Date Line.

But just below all the beauty are the scars of the islands World War II past.

The indigenous people of Guam, the Chamorros, have a long, proud history and cultural tradition dating back centuries.

Besides speaking English, the native Chamorros have their own local dialect.

They have lived on these islands for thousands of years.

They talked about a lot about life before the war in their village -- Paradise.

The reference was always [ Speaking native language ] That means "before the war, after the war."

The village would come together.

And it was a -- We lived on a coastal village, and the village would go out and fish together, catch together under the moon.

That's how it is in Guam at that time, was it -- it was a village, a community.

And they all worked together and they all longed for that.

But in a matter of, you know, some bombing and strafing, they lost it.

[ Indistinct Japanese ] The island of Guam is 5,800 miles west of San Francisco, California.

It's the largest island in what is known as the Marianas Island Group.

Guam is roughly 30 miles long and 12 miles wide.

Its landscape is volcanic, made up of slowly elevated grass-covered mountains, cliffs and rocky outcroppings, sticking out 1,300 feet above the green-blue waters of the Pacific Ocean.

Guam was once a territory of Spain until 1898, when it was captured by the United States just after the Spanish-American War.

It then became a strategic outpost for America in the western Pacific.

In the early 20th century, a small American Navy presence and a contingent of Marines existed.

The total United States Navy garrison on Guam in 1941 was 271 sailors and 145 Marines.

It was peaceful here.

Chamorro families lived off the land and sea in the numerous villages around the island.

Native farmers worked their mountainous ranches further inland.

[ Speaking Japanese ] From the NBC newsroom in New York, President Roosevelt said in a statement today that the Japanese have attacked Pearl Harbor, Hawaii, from the air.

President Roosevelt says that the Japanese have attacked Pearl Harbor in Hawaii from the air.

The Japanese surprise attack on Pearl Harbor, Hawaii, on December 7, 1941, was part of a larger plan that same day to neutralize all American military influence in the Pacific Rim, including Guam.

But the next step was to attack American possessions, in particular the ones that were -- that were strung out from Wake Island all the way through the area of Guam and Saipan.

But what was important to them was they needed to control that so they would not have any of these possessions turn on them and attack them.

But meanwhile, in the far-off Pacific, Guam has been attacked by Jap ships and planes.

It's reported almost destroyed.

Last night, Japanese forces attacked Hong Kong.

Last night, Japanese forces attacked Guam.

Last night, Japanese forces attacked the Philippine Islands.

A lot of people know about what happened on December 7, 1941, in Pearl Harbor, and that it wasn't just three hours later in Guam because of the dateline, you know, that war hit our shores and it didn't just hit like Pearl Harbor.

It also invaded and completely transformed.

Carmen Artero Kasperbauer was only six years old at the time of the Japanese attack on December 8, 1941.

Carmen had only seen airplanes when the American Pan Am flying boats arrived from the United States with passengers and supplies, something the local Chamorros looked forward to.

Our papa took us to the cathedral for the 8 of December Mass 8:00 Monday morning.

So we were on our way to church, holding our basket of flowers when I heard -- we heard drones of airplane and I got really excited and I said to my sister, "Pan Am, Pan Am, [speaking native language] Pan Am.

I want to go see Pan Am."

And she elbowed me and said, "[Foreign] Keep still."

But then I looked and I mean, I-I looked up in the sky and I felt that there were so many Pan Ams and I -- I was only able to see one Pan Am occasionally.

Seven-year-old Rosita Lujan Perez was also nearby.

And I was outside and we heard the boom-boom bombing, whatever that big noise that's getting everybody excited.

And my mother came out and said, "It's -- It's time.

We have to go."

People were running out screaming, crying.

We were all crying and scared.

It was really scary because I never heard those big noises before.

Not knowing what's going on, everybody too was panicking.

I was so scared.

All of us kids were crying because it was so scary.

And at the same time, an airplane was coming, swooping down, and everybody wanted to get out of Agana because the Japanese planes were swooping everywhere.

The Japanese really threw the hammer down by using an overwhelming air power.

I think that not only were they targeting the civilian force and military targets, but in a way they were intimidating them.

There's a certain amount of terror in screaming aircraft and explosions and confusion, and that would pave safe landings for their forces and quick occupation.

[ Speaking Japanese ] Following the softening up of Guam by air attacks, the Japanese landed over 5,000 soldiers on the island on December 10th under the command of General Tomitaro Horii.

The few American military on the island and any local Chamorro defenders, already stunned by the aerial onslaught, were outmanned, outgunned, and overwhelmed.

The small American Marine and Chamorro force were pushed back into the Plaza de Espaa, the Plaza of Spain, in the central capital of Agana, and quickly overrun.

Thousands of Japanese Imperial troops poured across the island, taking care of any further resistance from the Chamorros and the Marine barracks in the Sumay village.

Guam's naval governor, Rear Admiral George McMillan, officially surrendered the island at 6:00 a.m. on December 10th and was taken prisoner.

21 Americans and Chamorros died in the fighting.

A group of six American sailors escaped into the jungle.

The Japanese we know is not coming to save us.

They're coming to take over the island from the Americans.

So those were very traumatic time in the -- on the community.

They brought in more than enough force, and unfortunately, they used it rather ruthlessly.

Of course, we were so glad that Corporal Frank Wright came at the age of 99, but his mind is still very crisp, I think.

Please rise if you are able to for the Honorable Lourdes de Leon Guerrero, governor of Guam.

Frank S. Wright was born on July 5, 1925.

Wright entered the U.S. Marine Corps by lying about his age.

Thank you.

Thank you for letting me come here and enjoying my home people again.

I wanted to honor and respect him for -- as representing all the liberators that have come to Guam, the thousands of people.

Let's give a round of applause for our Grand Marshal... [ Applause ] The Japanese invasion signaled the beginning of almost three years of brutal oppression for the Chamorro people.

Guam had become part of Japan's master plan, which they described as the new order of the world.

The Chamorros were now considered part of the Japanese Empire.

They would be assimilated into Japanese identity and ideology, just like their other recently seized nations in the Pacific.

This meant brutal force would be applied to anyone who resisted.

One of the first things the Japanese did was to change the name of Guam to Omiya-Jima, which means "Great Shrine Island."

All Chamorro property and goods, such as farms and livestock, were seized.

Some locals were allowed to stay in their homes.

Others fled into the mountains or jungle to hide.

Seven-year-old Juan Benavente remembers the Japanese coming to his village.

Once the Japanese were established in the area, they had a police station, and one of the first things that we were forced to do was to stop when passing the police station, face the police station and bow.

If you fail to bow, you -- If there was a Japanese soldier around you, they would slap you.

You would get a quick slap.

The police station may be vacant, but you still have to stop and bow to that building.

Seven-year-old Felix Leon Guerrero and his 15-year-old brother, Francisco, were playing baseball when a Japanese soldier approached Francisco from behind.

He should have turned around and bow to the Japanese.

You know, bow to the Japanese.

But he cannot.

He cannot see because he is facing -- his concentration is the pitcher, you know.

So he can hit the ball.

He didn't see the Japanese.

And while the Japanese just came from behind, took the bat and started hitting my brother.

And I thought he stopped for one, two, three.

And that's it.

But no.

Oh, my goodness.

I got scared, so I ran up to my father.

He is probably ready to hit the Japanese.

He is a boxing instructor.

Very -- My father is like John Wayne style.

And so the people of Tumon watching the baseball said they were praying and said, "Please don't.

Don't hit him, don't hit him.

We will all be killed," something like that, you know?

When they were building the runway, our family, my father and his brothers were forced into labor to construct the runway for a measly cup of rice to feed the family.

And we had to stop in every stop area for inspection.

The Japanese are always inspecting what you have and what you're carrying.

And if they want it, they take it from you.

We were required to go to school.

Japanese school, that is.

And every morning we bow to the Emperor of Japan.

You have to.

Otherwise you're in trouble.

Sometimes we were taken to inside the school and they showed the or the narration that says there's only one ship that belongs to the United States.

And you can see the Japanese planes shooting the Japanese -- American plane, you know.

[ Gunfire ] [ Man shouting ] [ Gunfire ] The propaganda, and you had to watch it.

One time when my mother was carrying me and was being yelled at by a Japanese soldier and he slapped her, at the same time hitting me with that, and then that's when my mother put me down and started throwing rocks at the guy.

And so that one I remember vividly because I got thrown on the ground, I got slapped by a Japanese missing my mother's face and hit me.

My mother, very beautiful woman.

She is like -- There were four sisters.

They all have green eyes.

And, um, and my mother was 16 at the time.

And I asked her the question, "How was it that all of you are just such beautiful women?

And I've read and heard the stories, the atrocities that were done to the women.

And how is it that you guys, you know, went unscathed?"

My grandfather spoke Japanese, and what he did was he told them to cover themselves up with mud and they would -- and that he would negotiate.

The Japanese punishment for disobeying an order was often severe beatings, imprisonment, or death.

Anyone caught with a radio or a weapon, or aiding any of the Americans who had fled into the jungle was tortured or beheaded.

I had an Uncle Joe and my father and Uncle Ken.

They all had a radio and they were listening, and they tell me that story all the time, and they were the only ones that had a radio.

My Uncle John, where they were listening all the time, but they were very scared about getting caught and that eventually they had to go and bury the radio to, you know, to get it out of sight.

But they were listening to what's going on about the war.

A friend of my father, John Acosta, was accused of owning a radio.

He was captured and he was executed in Pigo.

Meanwhile, the six American sailors who had fled into the jungle were being hunted by the Japanese.

But there were a few Americans that did not surrender, and they decided to hide up.

Chamorro men and women often risked their lives to provide the Americans with food, water, and other supplies.

It was dangerous work.

Carmen Artero Kasperbauer's father helped one of the Navy men.

George Ray Tweed.

And so my dad found a good hiding place up in the cliff.

And it's between two cliffs.

But you have to go way, way up high.

And it's very treacherous to climb up there to hide.

They made that be his permanent home from the time that he came to almost 21 months or something like that.

From his secret hideout, American Navy radio operator George Tweed kept up the spirits of the Chamorro people, telling them that the United States would return to liberate Guam.

Tweed also provided war updates through a secret island information network.

My dad was also instrumental in helping two American sailors that were in hiding.

They would bring them something to eat and one time ammunition, and it was very risky for us because if that was discovered, my entire family was in trouble, probably executed.

But the Japs did a few other things besides chase me around.

When they started fortifying, they built up their defenses like mad.

They were racing against time.

A lot of Chamorro blood was mixed up in that concrete.

The Japs forced them to work for practically nothing.

And the ones who couldn't stand the gaff were beaten and tortured.

The Japanese used any means necessary to locate the Americans, including torture of those suspected of helping them.

The plan also included turning some Chamorros against their neighbors.

And we had a bunch of people that are not necessarily on our side, that are spies themselves or they're part of the undercover for the Japanese.

And so they suddenly didn't trust anybody.

In 1943, Carmen Arturo Kasperbauer's father continued to hide American escapee George Tweed on his property.

Local armed men arrived, telling Carmen's dad the Japanese wanted to speak with him.

Seven-year-old Carmen ran to get her father's gun.

They were with the Japanese and Father Duenas was beheaded.

And also Juan.

He said Juan was being beaten all the time.

And they keep asking him, "Where is the American?

Where is the American?"

And he wouldn't tell.

But when he was dying and fell down on the ground unconscious, the Japanese said, "If you don't tell me where he's staying, I'm going to kill you and your whole family."

So he said -- he's saying, "Artero, Artero."

So that's why the two of them came.

So when I took the gun and I gave it to my dad, my dad pointed the gun at them and he said, "I'll kill both of you if you don't get out of here.

I'm not going to go with you to the Japanese."

Rita Nauta is the managing director of Guampedia, an online encyclopedia of Guam culture and history.

Her parents are also war survivors.

They told Rita of the secret things the islanders did to survive.

The quiet resistance, and it's also part of that islander resistance.

This is miserable.

The conditions are awful.

But what can we be thankful for?

What do we have?

And Chamorros, like Islanders, Pacific Islanders, are known for their storytelling and their humor.

It could be seen and construed as quiet resistance, but also that resilience to just, you know, make light of something and laugh about it.

Um, and the songs like "Uncle Sam," um, and the different versions of it.

On far Pacific Island by a mango tree Lonely maid is crying, looking out to sea And then secretly there, people will be singing.

"I really believe that America will come back to free us."

So they made up the song "Uncle Sam."

Mr. Sam, Sam My dearest Uncle Sam Naturally, they were caught.

They're in real trouble because in English they will sing "Uncle Sam, please come back to Guam."

And that's dangerous in those days.

And it goes like this.

Uncle Sam, Sam My dearest Uncle Sam Please come back to Guam Please come back to Guam Eight of December 1941 People were crazy right here in Guam or Uncle Sam Sam, my dear Uncle Sam Won't you please come back to Guam?

I believe the Japanese still believe that the people of Guam is still very much Americans.

Won't you please come back to Guam?

Today, Chamorro villagers in Yona cut palm fronds and bamboo in the jungle.

It's an annual tradition on the island dating back to just after the war ended.

The freshly cut palm fronds are utilized for thatching and weaving.

These will go up on the mats on top for the roof, so no water will leak.

Got one more to do.

They are preparing large floats for the annual Liberation Day parade on Guam.

They weave this coconut leaf.

So this is what they put.

They use for the roof.

It's a lot tighter than this, so the water won't seep through as you see these holes here.

They can make it a lot tighter.

But right now, this is so beautiful how they do this.

Yeah.

...for one and to honor our elders.

Never forget.

Never forget where you came from and pass it on is a very good -- very big thing for us.

It brings joy.

It brings joy again for our freedom and it unites us as a community to have pride in building this float in remembrance of our -- the people who sacrificed for our freedom today.

So it's an honor for all of us here in our community and to every community on our island.

Next door, in the village of Mangilao, volunteers work on their Liberation Day float.

Each of the 20-plus village floats carries its own princesses.

[ Man singing in native language ] For nearly 80 years, the Chamorros have been observing these same traditions handed down by generations.

Guam's governor, Lou Guerrero, once had her secret wish for the Liberation Day parade.

Two years after the liberation is when the parade festivities started, and it started with a whole focus around, hey, let's get a queen and a liberation queen.

And villages would get their daughters to participate and compete in the Liberation Queen contests.

And so when I was growing up, I dreamt to be one of the queens, but, hey, I'm governor, so... [ Laughs ] [ Saw buzzing ] Nearby, in the village of Dededo, the local mayor recruits students to work on their float for the upcoming parade.

"Peace for all" is our theme this year.

It's about what we find.

We have a lot of natural things, the leaves and the moths in the -- on the float, the beauty of our people and our community.

In the village of Piti on Guam, the mayor says some things have changed over the years about the float-building process.

As a child, the parade was filled with floats that were created with a lot of natural material, a lot of Chamorro ingenuity, if I could say.

Now, thank goodness for [laughs] you know, modern technology.

We don't all run to natural materials.

And so you'll see in our float that it's hardly any material.

There's hardly any natural material.

[ Engine droning, gunfire ] Our victory had decisively stopped the enemy advance, throwing him from offense to defense.

We had reversed the wartime strategy of the Japanese Empire.

In the spring of 1944, the United States' successful island-hopping campaign in the Pacific War brought the Americans closer to Japan.

The U.S. strategy included attacking the Marianas Islands, starting with Saipan and then Tinian.

Guam would soon be struck as well.

For the villagers on the island, this began a period of even more intense brutality as the Japanese sensed what was coming their way.

On July 10th, all Chamorros were ordered out of their villages by bayonet-wielding soldiers.

Thousands, from infants to the elderly, were forced-marched to a jungle area called Manenggon concentration camp.

My wife, 15 months old, her mother was half white, and so she walking with my family as well on the way to Manenggon.

She was being carried by her mother, who had little reddish hair, white skin, was just picked up by the soldier and shoved her on the ground and started beating her with a sword, and she was being protected.

And anyway she got -- she was killed.

And so my -- so my wife now is, you know, she never forget -- she never -- she doesn't remember her mother.

She was only 15 months old, but she would never remember her mother.

Everybody was panicking.

We walked.

It was hot.

We were hungry and too scared.

Too scared of what's going on.

Then the Japanese had already planned that everybody is going to Manenggon, wherever that place is.

[ Birds chirping ] "That place" was the middle of the jungle.

It had no food or shelter.

Today, all that's left of the camp is a statue next to the Manenggon River.

People are hungry, you know.

And in fact, my father would go out and the rest of the adults would go out and look for food, you know.

The fruit is coming out, right?

Bananas, bananas, yeah.

Teresita Paulino is a war survivor who lives on Guam today with their many children and grandchildren.

As a seven-year-old, the Manenggon concentration camp left her with nightmares.

We were there as a group, but we all helped each other.

Whenever they're -- they're out there doing something in the field and bring it home, I remember we -- they always share.

We always share to one another.

So that's the beauty part.

I remember growing up and I always say I never -- I was -- never go hungry at that time.

There's always food on the table.

The whole people -- 22,000-plus -- were prisoners of war.

And in the end they were all put in concentration camps to be exterminated.

As the United States Navy inched closer to Guam in July of 1944, the horrific Japanese plan for the Chamorro people began to unfold.

In one tragic incident, 30 local villagers were forced into caves near what's known as Fena Lake.

The massacre in Fena, in Agat is my mother's brother, Galway Cruz, was beheaded.

They was beheaded at that -- when the Japanese were gathering all the young guys to go against the American, I guess.

And they don't want, so... The Japanese then used machine guns and threw grenades into the caves.

Few locals survived.

It wasn't until after my dad passed that our family learned the full story that he was shot and he was at Fena Cave, and had he not pretended to die, to be dead, none of us would exist.

And we didn't know that until after he died.

Tensions were rising on Guam.

On July 15th in the island's southern village of Malesso, Japanese officers assembled dozens of men and women for a work detail.

And these are the people such as teachers and those that look Americans were also a part of this group that were herded into the cave.

Grenades were thrown in, and any bodies that's moving, bayonets would be used to finish them off.

Fortunately, a few survive.

After the Tinta massacre, a group of men were all gathered and told to dig a hole on the ground.

[ Shovels digging ] [ Gunfire, men screaming ] Then the Japanese slaughtered the whole group of men.

Today, a memorial stands at the location of the savagery.

My uncle believed at that time that if they do not take action, the Japanese will wipe out the whole village of Malesso.

And this inspired the group to finally take action.

On July 20, sunset, they put a plan together to kill the Japanese.

The person holding the rifle will shoot the first Japanese descending from the hill.

The people, especially, the young men, were inspired and they joined the fight.

It's either "we kill them or they kill us."

And they were successful in eliminating the Japanese.

Today, the seaside village of Malesso is quiet.

It's a traditional settlement with boats and cast nets, carabao, and coconuts.

The sounds of seabirds in the trees mixed with church bells.

[ Birds chirping, bell tolling ] [ Choir singing ] Those who gather on this day honor the memories of those who died under Japanese occupation, and the seven local heroes who fought back against their Japanese captors.

Today we delve deeper into the heroic actions of the seven brave men who led a victorious rebellion in the village of Malesso during World War II.

So, it first started actually back in 2021 with the plaque that was erected in front of the San Dimas Catholic Church in Malesso, and we also invited all the families of the seven heroes.

And the families of Juan Naputi, raise your hands or stand up.

[ Applause ] It was very emotional for a lot of people, because it was the first time that their family member, one of the seven heroes, was being remembered.

On July 18, 1944, battleships and airplanes of the U.S. Navy Fifth Fleet began pounding the island's defenses and the 18,000 Japanese defenders.

Many of Guam's towns and villages were flattened.

The United States was softening up the island for a ground attack.

The Japanese were becoming desperate.

I remember planes.

We're all looking up at planes flying overhead and bombs going off.

The Americans had to use overwhelming force themselves because the Japanese now have dug in.

They've got bunkers.

They've got areas that machine guns are set up to literally annihilate any forced landing.

And they also have geography.

And the geography of Guam in particular is you have heights.

And along those heights was dotted with machine-gun nests, mortar pits and guns at the top.

So when you land in Guam, you're going to pay a price to do it.

It's the day.

The LSTs unload their AMTRACs.

We attack again.

A joint assault force of Army, Navy, Marine Corps and Coast Guard.

American Marines such as Frank Wright came ashore on Guam on July 21st under heavy fire.

American forces first landed on the western side of the island.

Wright, a veteran of the 4th Raider Battalion and the 3rd Marine Division, still vividly remembers that day.

American tanks met the Japanese tanks as they were coming down.

This particular spot where I was, right up there.

Frank Wright and his fellow 3rd Marines began to go about digging foxholes.

Where I was at that particular time on it, there was a lot of, I guess you call it coral patches or something.

And I always carried two knives with me to help dig, dig into this stuff.

Wright's unit soon faced a Japanese counterattack and banzai charge.

One fanatic Japanese soldier hurled himself into Frank's position.

And as I was fighting the guy on it, and I slashed him, and I slashed down at his arm, and he pushed me back.

And when I went down on my back in my foxhole, well, then he -- he made a stab at me.

That's when he hit it.

And he hit it on the slant.

It didn't hit it right straight down into me.

It was on the slant.

And then when I cut his throat like that, he bled quite a -- quite proficiently all over me.

Fortunately for Frank Wright, he survived the bayoneting but still bears the scars of that day.

It went kind of sideways down in my stomach.

On August 10, 1944, the island of Guam was finally secured.

Many Japanese still had to be rounded up in the hills, but the organized battle was primarily finished.

All over the island, the Chamorro people, still in disbelief and somewhat in shock, met up with their American liberators.

Carmen Kasperbauer's dad didn't believe the men were Americans.

The proof of liberation came from the seven-year-old's nose.

Even though I was a kid, I know the Japanese soldiers smell.

They smell like miso and dango, you know, like the food that they eat.

But this is different.

Bad odor.

These soldiers smell different.

[ Laughs ] You know, when you're a little kid, that's how you identify things.

And my mother hugging them must be good.

Carry me out to the ship.

I wish I knew those people, those guys, those men.

But carried us out.

You know, God bless them.

And I hope they're still alive and remember Guam.

Following Guam being secured, American Navy Seabees, or construction battalions, went about setting up refugee camps for the villagers who had lost everything.

Another American plane came overhead and dropped a message telling us to go south and follow the road.

So suddenly I see all these, now all these tents.

It's like tent city.

I guess the Army had built it for the people that didn't have any homes to have temporary shelters.

We were taken to Pigo, Pigo Cemetery.

At Pigo, you have just hundreds and maybe thousands of Chamorros on the side of the hill.

It was the rainy season.

It was muddy.

Later on, the American, you know, start identifying where you're from so that you can go back to your village.

I remember that we're really happy that finally we're, you know, we were liberated and everybody feels comfortable.

They can just move on in their life, do something now for the future.

Today, Guam is made up of a mix of nationalities and cultures.

Some Japanese also call Guam home.

Over 10,000 active-duty American military members and their families live and work on the island.

The distant echoes of World War II may have faded.

However, the past is still everywhere.

Visual reminders include pillboxes, cannons, and machine guns rusting away on nearly every beach and under jungle canopies.

New Chamorro generations have tried to put the island's World War II past behind them and instead are focused on their global future.

One of the things that amused me when I went to Guam was the amount of Japanese tourists that were there.

The Japanese people who really love Guam, the new generations there, they have no idea about what went on here.

Again, in our Chamorro culture, we call it [Foreign] We make things right and not just for the community, but the land, the waters, the -- you know, because we're all -- we're all interconnected.

So, last 20 years we've been doing this.

We come out the day before.

We start setting up our camp.

In the morning, my family all comes out.

Camping out and barbecuing, so the celebration is going to be off the wall.

You're going to see a lot of smoke, a lot of smoke, a lot of barbecue.

What's fun about it is it's kind of like this boulevard party starting, you know, the day before.

And everyone just comes out, hangs out and talks to one another.

They'll cook all night.

They'll cook in the morning.

And it's just a good way for us to get together and enjoy the holiday.

[ Cheering ] The annual Liberation Day parade on Guam is about celebration.

It also recognizes a hard-earned peace, the remains of deep gratitude for all Chamorro traditions and their culture.

[ Cheering ] There is reverence still for those such as Marine Frank Wright, whom they call their liberator, those American heroes, alive and dead, who helped this island and its people... [ Drums beating ] ...rise from the days of Japanese oppression and transform Guam into what it is today, an American territory that survived a brutal occupation during a world war.

There's that sense of gratitude, that expression of gratitude to the liberators that came on these shores.

It's become a responsibility to those people that lived those experiences and made it happen by taking the time to commemorate.

It is tremendous.

Tremendous reception.

Tremendous people.

This is something that I've looked forward to for many, many years and have them and their families carry on the tradition.

I love the people.

Wow.

Wow!

Um... Because for someone to want to come back to what was a war zone for him to check on his people, to check on his brother or sister, and it just solidifies the ties that I think as Chamorro people, we need to make greater with America.

Despite this time in their history, Guam resonates today with breathtaking beauty, American patriotism, and friendship.

That's the Chamorro way.

And the origin of the holiday and the commemoration is for the island and the people that experienced it and lived it to be able to come together and heal together.

This Greatest Generation will not be with us forever.

And I am afraid that 20, 30 years from now, our celebration and our commemoration of liberation will not be the same.

See ya next year, Guam.

I will remember the men that died there.

They left their homes.

They left their wives.

They left their family.

They left their farm to come and liberate us people on Guam, and they died for us, to liberate us.

Out in the West Pacific On waters blue and calm Rest a lovely island The tropical island of Guam Funding for this program provided by... Our founder and decorated World War II Navy fighter pilot Jack Taylor prioritized honoring the military from day one.

It made him so much of who he was that he named a company after the ship he served on, and he carried with him the lifelong lessons he learned -- integrity, hard work, team spirit, and doing the right thing.

Enterprise -- proud supporter of military organizations and charities serving those who serve.

Support for this program was also made possible by... Additional support provided by...