Surrender and Survival: The Experience of American Pow's in the Pacific 1941-1945

n "Surrender & Survival," author E. Bartlett Kerr does an exceptional job of detailing the American and allied experience in prisoner of war captivity by the Japanese. Kerr's book traces the chronology of the Pacific Campaign through the fall of unprepared allied forces caught beneath the wave of early Japanese successes. From Wake Island, Bataan and Corregidor to the Japanese home islands, Kerr documents both the heroism and atrocities that faced tens of thousands of these American, British, Dutch, Filipinos and other POWs of the allied nations. Each chapter is broken down into sub-chapters, which makes the book easy to set down and come back too. The writing and research are near perfect, without bogging down the stories in trivial anecdotes or biased commentary. The book succeeds in fairly depicting the good and bad qualities of the Japanese warders as well as those of the captives. Serious crimes by either are not dismissed, while less than honorable behaviors are weighed against particular extreme circumstances. Failures by relief efforts and by U.S. military actions that resulted in POW casualties are evaluated candidly, citing negligence, deliberate acts, cultural differences, lack of resources or the overall fog of war. With this book, Kerr achieves an unbiased academic chronicle of the experience of WWII POWs held by the Japanese.