Discover Nikkei

https://www.discovernikkei.org/en/interviews/clips/623/

His testimony has more credibility because of his race

Being assigned to military intelligence gave me some credentials later on to say I was in military intelligence. There’s a certain mystique about that—actual or assumed—[which] nevertheless works in one’s favor.

And the other opportunity, besides meeting Aiko, was to meet other Nisei people with whom we’re still in contact. That helped because then I was able to flush out, to a great extent, the archival kind of material that we were running across. Then, I guess, being able to testify before [Congress], being able to prepare myself to testify with authority, required the knowledge and the skills—most of which were transferred to me from Aiko. With her assistance, I could go before the congressional committees and say with authority, with back-up material, with resources, what I was able to say.

Because I was not Japanese American, there was no doubt about my testimony. But if somebody else [a Nikkei] had said the same thing, if Seiichi Watanabe had [made a similar statement] under the same circumstances, with the same background as mine, it wouldn’t have carried the weight that I was able to present. [My testimony was acceptable] just because of my face [being a Caucasian].


discrimination interpersonal relations racism Redress movement

Date: August 26, 1998

Location: Virginia, US

Interviewer: Darcie Iki, Mitchell Maki

Contributed by: Watase Media Arts Center, Japanese American National Museum

Interviewee Bio

Jack Herzig was born on July 30, 1922 in Newark, New Jersey to German American parents. At eighteen, he became a member of the New Jersey National Guard in Fort Dix. He was nineteen when Pearl Harbor was bombed and subsequently, volunteered as a paratrooper. Later, through the Counter Intelligence Corps in Maryland, he was assigned to Kyoto, Japan as a counterintelligence officer where he met Aiko Yoshinaga. He later married her in 1978.

Upon learning about the injustice done to his wife and other Japanese Americans, he became involved with researching the National Archives. His experience working for the U.S. Army in various posts including the Pentagon in Washington, D.C. and as a counterintelligence officer in Europe, Japan and Washington, D.C. gave him the background to help Aiko understand the significance of the documents they uncovered. He testified before both the House and Senate subcommittee hearings on the “Magic cables,” presenting detailed information that disputed the allegation that the diplomatic cables intercepted to and from Tokyo contained treasonous information about disloyal Japanese Americans. (March 1, 2007)

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