Allied military planners faced a bitter truth as they planned for a possible invasion of Japan: there were no distinctions between soldiers and civilians.

James Allen describes his experiences aboard the USS Wahoo (SS-238) during her second war patrol in the waters off Guadalcanal.

Mary McLeod Bethune was a passionate educator and presidential advisor. In her long career of public service, she became one of the earliest black female activists that helped lay the foundation to the modern civil rights movement.

Jack Baldwin describes an experience he had with a young civilian in Germany a couple days after the war ended that remained with him for the rest of his life.

From January 1943 to June 1945, writer Kurt Vonnegut served in the US Army. His experiences with the 106th Infantry Division during the Battle of the Bulge and then later as a prisoner of war in Dresden imprinted his life and provided traumatic (and sometimes comedic) material for his novel Slaughterhouse-Five and other works.