Via the Philippine News Agency:
The Philippine Veterans Affairs Office (PVAO) wants erroneous entries on the supposed “surrender” of Japanese General Tomoyuki Yamashita corrected using an original document from soldiers on the battlefield during World War II.
“[General Tomoyuki] Yamashita did not surrender, he was captured by the operatives from the USAFIP-NL (United States Armed Forces in the Philippines-Northern Luzon),” retired Maj. Gen. Restituto Aguilar, chief of the Veterans Memorial and Historical Division of the PVAO, said in an interview.
The USAFIP-NL was a scratch-built force of five Filipino infantry regiments and a field artillery battalion, consisting of roughly 20,000 men with a handful of American officers for liaison and tactical control.
American instructor, with M1 carbine, stands with Filipino guerillas after they were refitted upon making contact with the US Army in 1945 armed with M1 carbines and M1A1 Tommy Guns. They were to become USAFIP troops.
Commanded by Col. Russell W. Volckmann, U.S. Army, USAFIP-NL was formed from guerillas who fought against the Japanese occupation, and, according to the PVAO, the force, under the U.S. 6th Army, beat the last of Yamashita’s men to ground, capturing the general, who was later turned over to the Americans in Kiangan. The next day, he was flown to Baguio to formally surrender and the Allies later executed the infamous “Tiger of Malaya” for war crimes.
All that is remembered by the history books is the Kiangan-Baguio action, not the initial capture by the Filipino troops.
A minor point of history, but one that is strongly felt among the country’s remaining 4,000 WWII vets and their families.