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Within a hundred yards there were 45 more Japanese bodies. Four were in one foxhole; in death the Japs seemed to seek companionship wherever they could. Another body, its red and yellow and blue entrails spilling out like yeasty dough, lay atop the mound outside the hole. Twenty yards from this foxhole there was a little brown-skinned hand, blown there after it had pressed a grenade against the stomach. The glove encasing the hand was only slightly torn.
Next to a mountain stream which runs down the steep slope were nine more bodies within a 25-yd. area. There were plenty of bullet clips in the little leather cases which hung on the wearers' belts. Near the bottom of the slope lay the body of a Japanese captain. His silk white handkerchief was centered by a lewd ink sketch. A couple of hundred yards down the valley we found a dead Japanese officer who carried, like most Japs, photographs of his wife and children. It had rained the previous night, so the officer's open mouth was half filled with water.
It was easy to distinguish those who had used our grenades. Their chests and stomachs were both gone. Our grenades, which probably accounted for half the Japs we killed on Attu, carry a much more powerful charge. The Jap grenade is vastly inferior. Some Jap bodies were found beside three or four duds, indicating that the victim had had an exasperating time killing himself.
Pattern of Frustration. The fantastic Battle of Attu may be a pattern in our war against Japan. The suicides obviously were an act of frustration. When the Jap knows he is hopelessly beaten he tries to kill himself, after killing as many of us as he can. But in his anxiety he presses the grenade to his stomach before the plotted time. The ordinary, unreasoning Jap is ignorant. Perhaps he is human. Nothing on Attu indicates it.