MT. SAMAT, Bataan - American Ambassador Kristie Kenney had every reason to choke with emotion as she spoke on April 9 about the “valor and courage” of Filipino and American soldiers who fought side by side here in the Second World War some 64 years ago.

Attending the 64th Araw ng Kagitingan (Day of Valor) rites held at the Monumental Cross here with President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo, Kenney became emotional after disclosing that two of her own relatives and an in-law fought in and survived World War II.

These were her father, father-in-law and a cousin, who Kenney said, as a Marine captain was among the thousands who surrendered to Japanese forces in this province on that fateful day of April 9, 1942 and took part in the “Death March.”
To reporters later, she said she lost her father recently while her cousin died 10 years ago. He had gone to Texas after the war and took up farming. Her father-in-law, on the other hand, is now 92 “and still farming in western Texas,” the American ambassador said.
MANILA – The first ever complaint of a Filipino World War II veteran for unpaid benefits as a soldier under US command has been filed in the US Court of Federal Claims against the government of the United States.
Rodrigo B. Ramos, a native of La Union province, had apparently become weary of the long wait for US legislation to correct the infamous Rescission Act of 1948, which deprived Filipino soldiers who fought alongside American counterparts of equal benefits and privileges. Ramos, now 80, fought as a constabulary and later a guerrilla recognized by the US Army during WWII. Later, he enlisted in the US Navy. He filed the suit last November. Citing six allegations of violations of presidential proclamations, orders, directives and other statutes concerning the payment of salary, allowances and privileges, Ramos asked that the defendant United States of America would grant him pay back in the amount representing the difference between what he actually received during World War II and what was mandated by the primary basic pay statute in existence at the time of their induction into the US Armed Forces, plus interest and attorney’s fees. Ramos also demanded that he be recognized as a US citizen by birth since he said he was born in the Philippines during the period that the Philippines was a US colony.