castner's cutthroats, Alaska National Guard

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brighamr

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i was watching a documentary yesterday on "castner's cutthroats". Anyway, these guys showed exactly why "we the people" need to own guns, and have outdoor survival skills. At the time of WWII, the army was ill prepared to operate in Alaska (not used to the weather). The cutthroats were all from Alaska and grew up hunting, fishing, etc. Long story short, they lived off the land for most of a winter, supplying the army with dried fish and such. Then they used their hunting skills to stalk and get rid of the Japanese on Attu Island.

On a side note, the documentary showed the modern Alaska National Guard practicing. I never knew an M16 could be completely mashed in snow and still operate reliably.


Castner's cutthroats were pretty inpirational to me. If you're interested, here's a short wiki: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Castner's_Cutthroats
 
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Nowadays the LIEberals would force them to change thier name to Castners' Loveable Fuzzy Snow Bunnies.
Link didn't work, but that's OK.
 
Nowadays the _____ would force them to change thier name to Castners' Loveable Fuzzy Snow Bunnies.
Click to expand...

I personally think that there would be no unit in the Marine Corps more dangerous than "Rainbow Junction Happytime Fun Brigade". Especially if they had to put pink bows on their Kevlar helmets. To make them even more tough, they would have to take assigned designations on their nametapes like Cuddles, Muffins, Kittenfluff, Sunshine, and Bunnysnugglecandykisses.

They would be stone cold killers. They would be black-souled massacre machines. If one was stabbed, he wouldn't bleed, he would simply leak hatred.
 
IIRC, there are two different scout units that get mixed up. The first was the special scout group--the cutthroats--that helped re-take attu and kiska in 1943 and fought in the Aleutian Campaign. The second was the statewide territorial guard that was developed at about the same time and served to monitor the coasts and backcountry during the final years of the war, in the runup to the invasion of Japan, and as the cold war started up. The second group was about as close to a true fighting militia as the US had during WWII. The first was much smaller and was something of a prototype for later special forces units. Folks always seeem to get them mixed up though.

A new movie about the Attu battle just came out. And here's a story about a forgotten vet who was honored on his deathbed up here:

http://www.alaskastar.com/stories/030807/mil_20070308038.shtml
 
Cosmoline - thanks for the clarification. The second group (militia-like) was what inspired me. Basically a bunch of hunters that patrolled the back woods, the TV show claimed that this group was later migrated into the National Guard, do you know if this is the truth? I kind of liked the idea of a non-national guard, non-marines unit that actually did secure Alaska during the early years.
 
I believe they closed up the ATG in the late 40's or so and merged it in with the state nat'l guard, but they continued to use native "eyes and ears" patrols through the cold war.

I haven't read the books for awhile but I don't think Castner's group lasted much after the islands were retaken. It did however form a prototype example of using an elite, highly skilled group of soldiers as a spearhead to go in first ahead of the main landing. This pattern was developed and perfected as the war continued. Sometimes it's hard to remember the sequence of events, but when we re-took the islands in the spring of '43 we had just started to turn the tide. Most of our heavy ground fighting in both theaters hadn't taken place yet. The island fighting on Attu was a harbinger of what was to come, and set the style of Japanese defense (undefended beaches, deeply dug fortifications, banzai charges, suicide). It remains second only to Iwo Jima in percent of US forces killed or wounded in the Pacific, though I doubt one in a hundred Americans even knows it happened. The fighting was brutal and victory wasn't certain until the very end. A banzai charge blasted through our lines and nearly took the key heavy guns, and it was only the coordination of wounded men and supply troops throwing grenades that stopped the Japanes. The weather conditions were, well, Aleutian. Cold enough to kill you or freeze your limbs, but never cold enough to freeze the ground for heavy equipment. Warm enough for neck-deep mud pits but never warm enough to dry anything out. Constant wind. Fog. More wind. Constant rain. Freak winds of mind boggling power. Totally unreliable weather for flying. Basically the worst possible conditions to fight in.
 
Excellent story link, Cosmoline. Thanks. My father was a radio operator on a C47 during the war. They flew supplies for several years in the Aleutians and throughout Alaska. He loved to tell the stories too.
 
Wow! I love those old DC's. There are still a few kicking around her. Era had one they did tourists flights on for awhile.

Have you ever seen "Island in the Sky," that John Wayne film about the C47 pilots doing the runs from Canada to the UK?
 
I can't imagine there's a John Wayne flick I haven't seen, but that one escapes me. It will go on my "to see" list. Have a great Holiday!
 
I personally think that there would be no unit in the Marine Corps more dangerous than "Rainbow Junction Happytime Fun Brigade". Especially if they had to put pink bows on their Kevlar helmets. To make them even more tough, they would have to take assigned designations on their nametapes like Cuddles, Muffins, Kittenfluff, Sunshine, and Bunnysnugglecandykisses.
Click to expand...

I'm sorry but this reminded me of one of the cardinal rules of paintball.

"Beware of people wearing Disney character / Hawaiian shirts, they will either get you shot, or shoot you."
 
Guys, this isn't the thread for goofing around in. A lot of brave men risked their lives and many gave theirs to liberate AMERICAN SOIL from a brutal foreign empire and keep it free.

It's bad enough that virtually nobody remembers them or that US soil was even taken during WWII, but let's knock off the nonsense, all right? Salt in the wound is not called for. It's like making fart noises while the old VFW guys walk by in a parade.
 
It was also only a few years ago that the very existence of the Navajo code talkers was declassified and became known. They made the story into a movie, which I haven't seen because I've heard it was not especially well-done or historically accurate, but I have spent some time on the Navajo reservation and I bought a couple of books by non-"name" publishers that tell the story much more accurately. As usual, the real story would have been a better movie than the messed up Hollywood screenplay they actually filmed.
 
A good book on the Aleutian war was given to me by a favorite uncle who fought in that war.

The Thousand Mile War; World War II in Alaska and the Aleutians. By Brian Garfield, published by Doubleday in 1969.

An excellant read. I will hope those whom have never experienced a "Willawaw" understand what it meant to fight Mother Nature and the enemy equally hard.

My uncle (who was a SeaBee) went from training in Texas to Attu to Iwo Jima with the same equipment and gear. He lamented leaving his wool socks behind.
 
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