Cooperative Living June 2020 - 12

CoverFeature | by George Stuteville, Contributing Writer
'I Think of Them
Every Day'
Recalling the decisive fight to the finish
on Okinawa, 75 years later
ames Riffe always goes back to
this one story from the six hellish
weeks of his life when he led a U.S.
Army combat platoon on the Japanese
island of Okinawa - the last battle of
World War II.
In the quiet kitchen of his
Gainesville, Va., home, away from
the blare of television, the Northern
Virginia Electric Cooperative member,
who will be 99 in July, says he has
even imagined a headline for the story.
" I'd call it, 'Why Not Me?' "
Each day, for 75 years, Riffe says
he not only thinks about it, but relives
a moment from the final and the
bloodiest battle of the Pacific campaign.
MILITARY TRAINING MAKES
A GOOD LEADER
Born in Panther, a tiny West Virginia
settlement near the Virginia and
Kentucky border, Riffe realized early
on that education would get him to
the better life he dreamed about. He
J
learned that lesson after one year in
the Civilian Conservation Corps, a
Depression-era government work
program built on a quasi-military
model, and two summers at Fort
Benjamin Harrison, Ind., in the
Citizens Military Training Program.
Riffe graduated from high school
in 1941. With straight A's, the class
valedictorian and football team captain
earned a scholarship to Davidson
College in North Carolina. At Davidson,
he joined the Reserve Officer Training
Corps because, he says, he liked to drill.
In February 1942, Riffe registered
for the draft. The U.S. Army called
him to active duty in August 1942
with the Army Reserve, 80th Blue
Ridge Infantry Division at Camp
Forrest, Tenn. The Army promoted him
quickly, from staff sergeant to second
lieutenant out of Infantry Officers
Candidate Training at Fort Benning,
Georgia, in 1943, and first lieutenant
at Camp Roberts, California.
THE AFFABLE LIEUTENANT
WITH AN APPALACHIAN DRAWL
In November 1944, Riffe left
California on a long ocean voyage to
Espirtu Santo, an island in the South
Pacific. He took command of the
First Platoon: I Company, of the
106th Infantry Regiment, 27th Infantry
Division. The 23-year-old first
lieutenant had just three months to
train 28 young men, mostly teenagers,
for the " Operation Iceberg " assault
on Okinawa.
Most of the soldiers in his platoon
came from a New York National Guard
unit. They liked their affable lieutenant
with the soft Appalachian drawl,
especially after they learned he had
come up from the `rank` they were,
enlisted privates.
" I got to know them all well, " Riffe
says. " As an officer, I had to censor their
letters before they sent them home to
make sure there wasn't any information
in them that could hurt us if it got in
the wrong hands. They shared their
private thoughts. One soldier was
writing to two girls, promising to marry
each one. He was killed during the
battle on Okinawa. "
Riffe used all his training skills to
fashion a confident and competent team
of soldiers who relied on each other.
'FOLLOW ME!'
On April 1, 1945, Easter Sunday, the
U.S. Tenth Army began its amphibious
assault on Okinawa, 375 miles from
mainland Japan. The U.S. Navy and
British Commonwealth ships in the
British Pacific Fleet supported the Tenth
Army's four Army and two Marine
Corps divisions. The Allies' mission
was to take fortified, heavily defended
Japanese positions on Okinawa and
ultimately establish a base for an
invasion of Japan's home islands,
scheduled for Nov. 1.
Fierce fighting ensued. Almost every
Col. James Riffe as he appeared
during his career (above) and at
a ceremony at the World War II
Memorial in Washington, D.C.
10 | Cooperative Living | June 2020
day, Riffe said to his men what infantry
lieutenants say in combat, " Follow me! "
as the 27th Division fought Japanese
soldiers positioned on high ground
and in mountain caves.
The caves protected them from
co-opliving.com
PHOTOS COURTESY OF JAMES RIFFE
http://www.co-opliving.com
Cooperative Living June 2020

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