Buss, the Emperor and Jackie is a memoir of love disrupted by naval actions during the Pacific War—from the Solomon Islands to Wakayama, Japan.
Frustrated and motivated by the start of hostilities on December 7, 1941, Buss entered the U.S. Navy desiring to help quickly end the conflict. Instead—as a fire control officer for the main batteries and antiaircraft guns of the USS Montpelier (CL-57)—the war kept him away for months, then years from Jackie his love.
His abstract mind integrated smoothly with the requirements of his warrior work. Fire control in 1942 required the ability to understand and adjust 25 electrical inputs feeding a mechanical analog computer designed to track and shoot targets moving on the seas—out to 10 miles and beyond. Starting the war anxious to engage the enemy, Buss sunk ships and bombarded islands in the South Pacific. Then in the Philippines his ship shot down four kamikazes simultaneously attacking his Cleveland class light cruiser. Discovering one pilot to be 16 years old, his heart soften. He also wept later when civilians on Saipan jumped from cliffs to rocky shores, rather than surrender to the Americans they feared.
From his letters, her diaries, interviews with his shipmates, the deck logs of his ship and other historical records, the story shows Buss and Jackie living and working apart, yet staying together. The tale weaves in a personal view of the Japanese leaders, warriors and civilians, showing them as Buss eventually saw them—people serving their homeland, neither villains nor victims. Necessarily, this includes a parallel history of Emperor Hirohita—the Showa Emperor—as the two men had many similarities, even their January 1989 deaths.
Buss, the Emperor and Jackie is scheduled for general release by Village Hiker Press during the winter of 2011. A photographic version of the Wakayama chapter was previewed during the final gathering of the USS Montpelier Association in Montpelier, Vermont, USA, June 30-July 5, 2010.
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