They landed in small boats and waded ashore. They had one set of surgical instruments, a suction machine, an electrocautery unit, and an anesthesia pocket kit. The countryside resembled the Midwest in many ways with crops, gentle rolling hills, and clumps of trees, except for the tiled roof huts. The roads were very narrow, rough, and dusty. There was a small railroad with wobbly rails winding over hills. It was April 1945, and they had landed on Okinawa, an island that was approximately 60 miles long and 8 miles wide. A terrible bombing had just occurred prior to their coming ashore. There were craters all over the island. There was a large seawall which was designed to protect the coast from invasion but now often acted as a place to go and hide from bombing raids. An operating-room tent was finally completed. The rain came and soaked the area ankle deep in mud down the middle of the ward tent. And then there were the casualties. All night they kept pouring in. New faces, new names. The grinding of the low-geared ambulances, the rush of the litter-bearers, and the pale, frightened faces of the wounded in the lantern light. Spinal taps being done by flashlight with a pouring storm and a crowded ward. It was during one of those long nights that a young, severely wounded Japanese soldier was brought into the American hospital tent. He was shaking, scared, in shock, and prepared to die at the hand of the enemy as he had been taught would happen if captured. The American surgeon did not hesitate, but had the soldier brought into the operating room and there, through a translator, explained the need for a bilateral amputation to save his life. His legs were hopelessly injured. The soldier was disbelieving and cried out to be killed. With time and discussion with the translator, consent was obtained and the operation performed. The next morning, the soldier was missing from his bed and was discovered to have crawled the length of the hospital tent to hold the feet and embrace the doctor who had saved his life. The doctor, in turn, embraced him, and both men suddenly cried with new-found joy. It was the beginning of a new day: enemies turned into friends by a spontaneous act of compassion.