During Special Diet serving, eight booted officers, including a real live general, inspected camp with a bodyguard of eight soldiers with bayonets. These last pressed their faces against the screen to watch the children eat, smiling and laughing. They are so curious, so interested, that often I feel sad for them, fury mixed with sympathy and understanding of their plight, their fate being to fight us when they feel friendly. I can see how their minds worked with the reasons they were given, and for many common soldiers I feel pity and respect. It is terrible involvement for us all, so many killed in our defeat, so many more to die in theirs. We cannot go back or stop, only go on remorselessly.
Natalie Crouter
(October 30, 1898 — October 15, 1985). Resident of Vigan and later Baguio in the Philippines. Interned by the Japanese with her family in Baguio, then Bilibid Prison in Manila.
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