In 1943, when the U.S. Army dropped its enlistment ban on Japanese Americans, Inouye curtailed his premedical studies at the University of Hawaii and enlisted in the Army. He volunteered to be part of the all-Nisei 442nd Regimental Combat Team.This army unit was mostly made up of second-generation Japanese Americans from Hawaii and the mainland.
...
As his squad distracted the third machine gunner, Inouye crawled toward the final bunker, eventually drawing within 10 yards. As he raised himself up and cocked his arm to throw his last grenade into the fighting position, a German inside the bunker fired a rifle grenade that struck him on the right elbow, severing most of his arm and leaving his own primed grenade reflexively "clenched in a fist that suddenly didn't belong to me anymore". Inouye's horrified soldiers moved to his aid, but he shouted for them to keep back out of fear his severed fist would involuntarily relax and drop the grenade. As the German inside the bunker reloaded his rifle, Inouye pried the live grenade from his useless right hand and transferred it to his left. As the German aimed his rifle to finish him off, Inouye tossed the grenade off-hand into the bunker and destroyed it.
War sucks.
This kid wanted to be a surgeon, but he returned to college to study political science under the G.I. Bill. And then he became a Senator.
I think his story illustrates how we should never exclude anyone from the fight for a better future.
Where will the next Inouye come from? A kid from the inner city who served in Afghanistan? A woman who was born into the worst sort of abusive poverty?
If our society excludes anyone from national service -- and it doesn't have to be military service -- or we deny a college education to anyone capable of it, then we are discarding the potential contributions of people like Senator Inouye to our society.
Senator Inouye's was a life well lived.