[Congressional Record Volume 164, Number 115 (Tuesday, July 10, 2018)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Page E985]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]





                HONORING MASTER SERGEANT AARON KLIATCHKO

                                 ______
                                 

                            HON. JEFF DENHAM

                             of california

                    in the house of representatives

                         Tuesday, July 10, 2018

  Mr. DENHAM. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to acknowledge and honor Master 
Sergeant Aaron Kliatchko, who proudly served his country during two 
World Wars and was awarded the Prisoner of War Medal, Purple Heart 
Medal, and the Medal of Freedom. He was killed in action on December 
31, 1944. Master Sergeant Aaron Kliatchko, the ``Rabbi of Cabanatuan,'' 
was honored with a formal military funeral on Friday, June 29, 2018 at 
Arlington National Cemetery.
  Kliatchko was born in 1887 to an Orthodox Jewish family. As a 
teenager, he was forced to serve in the Russian Imperial Army during 
the Russo-Japanese War, where he was taken prisoner by Imperial Japan. 
After the war, Kliatchko migrated to the United States and enlisted in 
the Army, becoming a U.S. citizen in July 1913. After moving to the 
Army Corps of Engineers in 1914, Corporal Kliatchko deployed to the 
Philippine Islands in November 1915, where he served the duration of 
World War I. He was honorably discharged in 1919 and remained in the 
Philippines until World War II.
  When the Japanese invaded in December 1941, Kliatchko volunteered as 
an American intelligence agent. By March 1942, Kliatchko was fighting 
the invading Japanese on the Bataan peninsula. There, he reenlisted 
with the Army Corps of Engineers as a Master Sergeant. He was in Bataan 
for the U.S. surrender on April 9, 1942. Once again, Kliatchko was a 
prisoner of the Imperial Japanese military, surviving the Bataan Death 
March and two prisoner of war camps. He led his fellow prisoners and 
brothers in arms in Jewish services and funerals, earning himself the 
title ``Rabbi of Cabanatuan.''
  On December 13, 1944, Kliatchko and 1,600 prisoners were forced to 
board the Japanese ``hellship'' Oryoku Maru, destined for slave labor 
in Japan. After it was sunk near Subic Bay by American bombers, the 
survivors, including Kliatchko, were forced onboard two other hellships 
to continue the voyage north. Kliatchko succumbed to wounds received 
during the ordeal on December 31, 1944, aboard the Brazil Maru as it 
arrived in Takeo Harbor, Formosa. His final resting place is unknown.
  In 1948, Master Sergeant Kliatchko was posthumously awarded the Medal 
of Freedom. Like so many immigrants who came to America, his service 
and sacrifice embodies their unique commitment to liberty and 
democracy. God bless him always.

                          ____________________