Among its many challenging missions worldwide, the Joint POW-MIA Accounting Command (now Defense POW-MIA Accounting Agency effective 1/1/2015) continues to pursue the Wake Island project: to identify remains that were found on Wake in 2011. It has been two years since the discovery on the north beach of Wake in a location near the generally-accepted site of the massacre of the American contractors on October 7, 1943. JPAC’s team of forensic...

During World War II thousands of American, Allied, and other prisoners of war were transported on ships to Japan or Japanese-held territory. Generally packed below decks into the ship holds like so much cargo, the prisoners endured such unspeakably vile conditions that many survivors recalled the voyage as the worst ordeal of their POW experience. In the ultimate irony of war, Allied forces bombed and torpedoed a number of these unmarked “hell...

In 1899, the year that Commander E. D. Taussig took formal possession of Wake Island for the United States, journalist Margherita Hamm scoffed at the acquisition as a “mere dot on the waste of waters.” Early twentieth century surveys of the remote atoll revealed remains of old Japanese fishing camps and a shipwreck or two, but no evidence of permanent human habitation. Fishermen, feather-hunters, passers-by, and scientists did not stay long:...

The EF5 tornado that swept across Moore, Oklahoma, on Monday, May 20, left a trail of utter devastation in its wake. Quick to form and quick (relatively speaking) to dissipate, a tornado is the essence of unpredictability and violence. Recovery operations began immediately in Moore, focused on the rubble that minutes earlier had been an elementary school. As the initial shock gave way to grim purpose, a troubling question arose: why was there...

A group of dedicated and determined radio operators are headed for Wake Island in early October 2013 for a rare opportunity to transmit from this toehold of land in the mid-Pacific. The Wake Atoll Commemorative DXpedition is “dedicated to preserving the memory of the Forgotten 98 . . . who lost their lives on Wake Island on October 7, 1943 during World War II.” The operation, observing the seventieth anniversary of their deaths, honors these...

When it comes to drawing a map of a place, Wake Island is about as easy as it gets. The small Pacific atoll is small, distinctive in shape, and practically begs the casual observer to try his hand at cartography. The familiar outline of Wake atoll has been variously described as a wishbone, horseshoe, or simply V-shaped, with the three islets – Peale, Wake proper, and Wilkes – flanking a shallow lagoon that opens wide to the west. During my...