Army & Navy: By the Gods

As spring and warmer weather came to Tokyo, U.S. soldiers strolled arm in arm with Japanese girls along the carp-filled Imperial moat, lolled amorously on the grass of Hibiya Park, made love in the back of Army jeeps. It was hard to remember that they had once been scheduled to fight their way into Honshu at just this season. But Eighth Army commander Lieut. General Robert Eichelberger remembered.

Blazing up with his favorite expletive (“By the Gods”), he cracked down with an order prohibiting “public displays of affection”. Impatiently sidestepping the question of fraternization, he dusted off the Army’s catch-all phrase: “prejudicial to good order and military discipline.”

The order would not affect the bulk of U.S. servicemen, who avoid fraternization as a matter of choice. Still less would it disturb those who seriously pursue it. Tokyo now has dozens of “one-night inns” to which any G.I. who wants to can find the way.