Colonel Fitzgerald, the MP commander, took charge at once. He called all officers on the island to a staff meeting. “These people are our equals,” he said, strongly. “Our job is to teach them democracy.” However dimly, someone in the States had recognized the essentially ideological nature of the conflict with Communism. “We’re going to treat these people as human beings. I want you to understand that if a POW is abused, or refuses to work, and a U.S. guard strikes him, the guard will be court-martialed. We are here to teach these people democracy, and we can’t do it by being a bunch of
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