Aloha, ladies and gentlemen, and distinguished guests.

Mahalo nui, Colonel Yokooji, for kind and generous introduction. Many thanks to your President, Dr. Howard Furumoto, and other officers of the MIS Veterans Club of Hawaii who helped organize this event.

At the outset, I would like to thank you for inviting me to participate in this special ceremony honoring our veterans.

I am pleased that I had a small role in making this day possible, by writing legislation, known as Section 523, that allowed military intelligence veterans to apply for awards for services performed as early as 1940 by waiving all award application deadlines.

I am also pleased to have sponsored a number of MIS members for decorations under another provision of law, Section 526, that allows veterans to be considered for awards as long as they receive the endorsement of a member of Congress.

Under Section 523, the Army received 31 applications and approved 30 of them, an astonishing approval rate of more than 96 percent. I am gratified that many MIS veterans have applied for recognition under this provision. I am even more pleased that the Army acted so quickly to approve these applications.

Nevertheless, I understand that many eligible veterans did not hear about Section 523 until it was too late to meet the February 1997 application deadline. I am pleased to say that, for their benefit, I have asked Congress to consider extending the legislation for one or two more years.

Some of you may also be interested to know that I have introduced legislation that would make the entire MIS organization eligible for appropriate unit decorations. As you know, MIS members were often attached, rather than formally assigned, to combat units; consequently, many of you did not receive unit decorations won by the troops you fought alongside. Under this new proposal, the MIS would be allowed to apply for its own unit decorations, even though the MIS as an organization was never deployed as a unit.

I hope that through these measures, and through other ongoing initiatives such as the Army's MIS History Project, that the MIS and its members will some day receive the accolades they earned.

But now let me return to the real subject of this ceremony, the twenty (20) soldiers from Hawaii, 19 of whom served during World War II and one during the Korean War. These 20 men will be awarded recognition long overdue for their outstanding service to our country. They are the reason for why we hae gathered today.

I congratulate each of you for your well-deserved honors. You truly represent the best that America has produced. You answered the call of duty with conviction and courage, at a time when those virtues were most in demand by a needy nation.

For many of you, in the face of discrimination and injustice at home, you set aside personal considerations to defend America on foreign battlefields, even against those of your own heritage.

Through your conduct, you proved that being an American is more about what an individual chooses to be than about where he or she comes from.

To paraphrase Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., you proved to a doubting nation that patriotism is not based on the color of one's skin but rather on the greatness of one's spirit and the quality of one's mind.

Gentlemen, you are truly heroes in every sense of the word, even if credit for your actions has been delayed by more than half a century.

For too long, men like Ray Harada and Ralph Yempuku, belated winners of the Legion of Merit, have gone without official acknowledgement of their deeds.

For too long, the secret labors of soldiers like Yutaka Masuda and Tom Tsubota, long overdue recipients of the Bronze Star Medal with "V", have been overlooked by a nation that only recently has begun to appreciate the key role that the MIS played in the Allied victory.

For some of you, sadly, this recognition comes too late. Many of your number have passed on to the next life, never having tasted the fruit of their wartime duty, the official acknowledgement of a job well done.

Others who are still with us, either because of failing memory, simple modesty, a sense of futility, or the difficulty of documenting actions undertaken more than half a century ago, will never be recognized officially by their country.

Therefore, for those few being recognized today, your decorations bear an added significance. Your medals must embody not only your own individual service, but also the blood and tears shed by those whose sacrifices will never see the light of day.

One whose accomplishments remain in the shadows is the late Richard Sakakida, one of the very first Japanese Americans to be recruited for military intelligence duties. His legendary exploits as an undercover agent and prisoner of war in the Philippines are well known to all of us here.

I speak of him now because the legislation that helped many of you was initially intended to assist only Colonel Sakakida. Section 523 is an expanded version of earlier legislation that directed the Army to consider Colonel Sakakida for the Congressional Medal of Honor.

Ironically, as you know, Colonel Sakakida has not been helped by the legislation that was originally drafted for his benefit. Applications I submitted in his behalf, for both the Medal of Honor and the Distinguished Service Medal, which are supported by a dozen members of Congress as well as the MIS veterans organizations, including the MIS Veterans Club of Hawaii, have yet to be acted upon favorably.

This is a tragedy. Yet, it is also emblematic of his life, and so very typical of the nisei soldiers of World War II in general. For Dick Sakakida was not a glory seeker. That he kept secret for so long his incredible tale of sacrifice and achievement in World War II is testimony to this fact. Dick would have appreciated receiving a medal, but he would have been even happier knowing that his example ultimately helped his fellow nisei soldiers secure the recognition that he has yet to receive.

So, again, I say to the heroes who are being honored today, that your medals must represent not only your outstanding service, but also the achievements of those MISers who, like Dick Sakakida, may never enjoy the official honors they so richly deserve.

In their memory, and in behalf of the people of Hawaii, who take pride in you and your achievements, I offer you the highest praise and honor for all you have done to keep us free.

Thank you.