Warren J. Clear

Warren Joseph Clear was a lifelong American military diplomat and soldier. His relationship with Japan was complicated. Stationed as a military attaché at the American Embassy in Tokyo in the 1920s, Clear also became a member of the staff of the War Department during World War II, where he was devoted to an American victory over Japan.

Early life
In 1922, Clear was embedded with the Imperial Japanese army as a student Japanese language attache and military observer, learning Japanese customs and trading American knowledge. During that time, as a "young man," Clear was "tricked" into an arranged fight with a jiu-jitsu fighter in the Japanese Army. Clear knocked the man out with a haymaker. After the bout, General Kazushige Ugaki arranged for Clear to teach 300 of his men the basics of American boxing.

Ugaki later wrote to Clear: "I am much relieved that you won. With regards to our junior officers, occidental prestige rises or falls on such small things as physical combat between two individuals. They place too much emphasis on such things. They have little sense of proportion. The higher their regard for your military efficiency the harder they will strive to surpass it." RKO made a film in 1943 called “Behind the Rising Sun," starring Robert Ryan, portraying the role of Warren Clear. The film recreated the boxing incident.

On 1 September 1923, Clear was living in Tokyo when the Great Kanto Earthquake stuck. It was followed by a devastating fire that swept through the city. This remains the deadliest earthquake in Japanese history. While Clear was in the city rendering first aid and assistance to the Japanese, his apartment burned down, with all of his possessions inside. It took seven years for Clear's claim of $737 to be approved and paid out by the United States government due to a misspelling of Clear's middle initial. His original travel orders spelled his name with the letter "G" instead of "J."

On 25 January 1925, Clear married Harriet Agnes Aldridge. He was stationed at the American Embassy in Tokyo.

In the early 1930s, Clear returned to the United States and got stationed at the Presidio of San Francisco, where he gave speeches to the San Francisco Club and other organizations on the lessons he had learned in his time with the foreign army.

Clear was then transferred to the War Department in Washington, D.C., where he reported to the G-2, and worked alongside Millard Preston Goodfellow.

World War II
As the 1940s approached, the soldier was turned spy for a new agency called the Office of the Coordinator of Information (COI). William J. Donovan and Goodfellow recruited him and sent him to the Philippines to report on Japanese movements in the Pacific region. He was in the islands in this capacity during the invasion by the Imperial Japanese military, having to resort to eating horses and pack mules to stay alive for several months in the jungles with his men.

The quote, "There are no atheists in foxholes", was attributed to Clear among other quotes. The phrase became popular after an article Clear wrote in Reader's Digest discussing the invasion of the Philippines by the Japanese and the defence of the Bataan Peninsula; where he attributes it to a Sergeant.

Clear was ordered to protect the vital military intelligence he had gathered above all else. When he escaped the Philippines, he had to leave most of his possessions behind. This included President Roosevelt's beloved stone lions. Clear escaped the Philippines by meeting the submarine USS Trout on a rubber dinghy and sailed on board to another location. However, the airplane carrying him to Australia was shot down by Japanese bombers, and Clear had to compose his entire mission report to the COI from memory.

In his famous recounting of the events at Bataan in Reader's Digest, Clear wrote: "As long as they could pull a trigger or fix a bayonet, our men held their ground. Veterans of scores of bloody fights, many of them had been wounded, once, twice, three times, but still had staggered back to stand again with their comrades... But courage alone was not enough. Lack of food was our undoing." In 1943, Clear narrated the documentary "Divide and Conquer."

Clear returned to duty at the War Department for the rest of the War.

Later life
Clear retired in Monterey and Pebble Beach, California, where played golf and participated in many tournaments.

Clear died in 1990, at the age of 84, in Monterey, California. He is buried at Arlington National Cemetery, where his coverstone mistakenly labels his rank as "2nd Lieutenant."