More on Mark in the CBI

The attached photo is Mark Nider in service with the U. S. Army during World War Two.  I am just now beginning to appreciate the time Mark spent in the war.  He wrote a number of letters home to his parents that provide some insight into his service.

It would appear Mark was either drafted or enlisted late in 1943 or early 1944.  He was attending the University of Nebraska when he was called up.  For a span of about six months, Mark’s letters have either been lost or he stopped writing.  But suddenly, in the last half of 1944, he is in India.  After the war, the family found out he was serving in the China-Burma-India Theater of the war. 

The CBI is the underappreciated theater of the War.  This was one of several supply lines from the allies to aid China during the Japanese occupation.  So much attention in this area is given to the Army Air Corps and the efforts to fly supplies “over the Hump.”  Yet, a closer investigation of this theater reveals the operations in China-Burma-India as complicated and horrific.  In the area focused on Burma and China, and to a lesser degree, India; American, British and Chinese armies fought the Japanese for control of the region.  Jungle warfare with limited transportation and extreme weather conditions, flip flopping from wet to dry, created a particularly deadly challenge. 

Wounded in battle was just one challenge for soldiers in CBI.  A more common enemy than the battlefield was disease.  In one instance, in the Galahad Task Force, Lt.Samuel Wilson was reported to be the “sickest man in World War Two.  He was diagnosed with mite typhus, amoebic dysentery, malaria, infected jungle sores, nervous exhaustion, and starvation.  He suffered from all of these diseases at the same time.  At one point, 80 percent of the taskforce suffered from dysentery.

From the details I have been able to glean, Mark served in this unrecognized theater of war for at least two years, from 1944 to the end of 1945.

            In an effort to put Mark’s service into some perspective, I have begun reading books about the theater of the war.  The best I have found so far is The Burma Road The Epic Story of the China-Burma-India Theater in World War II by Donovan Webster.  This is where the information about Lt. Samuel Wilson is published.  I can only imagine that Mark suffered some of these same challenges.

Photo of Burma taken by Mark. 

Imagine the challenges of fighting in this jungle