FOREWORD
At the outset I wish to say that the Army Medical Department owes aspecial debt of gratitude to Professor James H. Stone for his unique anddistinctive account of military medical service activities in India andBurma during World War II.
When this volume first came to my attention in manuscript form, it appearedthat Professor Stone's presentation of the entire picture of medical supportrequired in an Asian theater of operations, albeit in World War II, hadconsiderable applicability to the problems being encountered in SoutheastAsia today.
Professor Stone, presently with the Department of Humanities, San FranciscoState College, San Francisco, Calif., is a former Medical Service Corpsofficer who served with distinction as a military historian during WorldWar II. Instead of filling his usual role of author, in this volume heis an editor-compiler, bringing together into one unit, five separate reportsfrom this theater. We are indeed fortunate that, as a patriotic gesture,he made an outright gift of his manuscript to the Army Medical Department.This valuable information--particularly the lessons learned concerningjungle operations, line versus medical command responsibility, and medicalplanning--will now be available to all members of the Army Medical Department,and to other students of medicomilitary history.
This volume, in part, expresses forthrightly and candidly the experiencesof many dedicated medical personnel who labored and in the main, succeededunder great hardship and against many odds; it may well become a primerfor medical plans and operations in Asian environments.
This work is, in truth, in many ways a passionate account of a nonendingbattle to save lives and preserve the fighting strength in a theater ofoperations which, at least for those who were there, was the end of theline. It makes for fascinating reading despite, or perhaps because of,the fact that it is a true and unvarnished report of a way of life whichour medical troops endured in a far-off land under most trying circumstances.
I recommend this volume most highly and urge all members of the ArmyMedical Department to read it, and to profit from its pages.
LEONARD D. HEATON,
Lieutenant General,
The Surgeon General.
