Soldiers reflect on 65th anniv. of Leyte landings
Don Dencker was a 19-year-old draftee on Oct. 20, 1944, when he became part of one of the most storied military operations of World War II.
A soldier in the 96th Infantry Division, Dencker was hauled ashore at 10 a.m. by an amphibious vehicle on Leyte, an island in the Philippines, after occupying Japanese troops there had undergone relentless bombardment from an armada of Allied ships offshore.
Scrambling across the beach toward the hills beyond, his outfit wiped out the remaining Japanese resistance within three hours.