In Willie and Joe, cartoonist BILL MAULDIN, who died last week at 81, created an unlikely and imperishable pair of American icons. These unshaven, hollow-eyed, grimy World War II infantry dogfaces appeared in the pages of the Army newspaper Stars and Stripes, fighting not just the Germans during the Italian campaign but also tedium, wet socks, lousy K rations and their commanding officers. G.I.s everywhere laughed, or nodded in rueful recognition. Mauldin combined the satiric eye and brush of a Daumier with the ear of a Ring Lardner. He captioned a drawing of a sergeant addressing his bedraggled men: "I need...
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