Preserving The Oral HistorIES of Combat Veterans
3:52 | He wanted to choose his service instead of getting drafted, so Curtis James went for the Marine Corps in 1943. As part of the V-12 program, he attended college for a year, then had his training and got his commission. Assigned to the occupation forces in Japan, the friendliness of the Japanese was a big surprise to him.
Keywords : Curtis James Newport KY V-12 Navy College Training Program Emory University Atlanta GA Parris Island Camp Lejeune Quantico VA Japan occupation duty atomic bomb Japanese
Stationed in Japan after the war, Curtis James had the opportunity to see the devastation at both atomic bomb sites. It was hard to believe. Marines went into occupation duty with a lot of animosity for the Japanese people, but were surprised to find out how friendly they were.
He was working as a staff officer at Camp Lejeune when he got a surprise assignment. Curtis James was to be one of two officers on a shipboard Marine detachment. The ship was the USS Princeton, an aircraft carrier supporting troops in the Korean War.
Curtis James was the first officer in charge of a Pentagon effort to manage crises during the Cold War. It was a brand new office inside the giant headquarters and, after running that for a while, he served in Vietnam at MACV in Saigon, managing the logistics of the war effort.
Curtis James returned from Vietnam to an assignment as director of personnel at Parris Island. This was the last post for the Marine Corps staff officer. His favorite was the Pentagon, where he initiated a brand new office to coordinate military crisis response.
Working as a Marine staff officer at Quantico, Curtis James was in attendance at some pretty high level meetings. During one of these, he was the lunch guest of the most powerful man in the world.
