new comic

A Jack Kirby Losers story in Our Fighting Forces 159 (Sept 1975) features a one-off appearance of Mile-a-Minute Jones, an African American soldier. Kirby appears to have played on Bob Kanigher's idea of making Jackie Johnson a world heavyweight boxing champ like the real life Joe Louis from the mid-20th century, by modeling his character on Jesse Owens, the Olympic champion athlete who won golds at the 1936 Games in front of Adolf Hitler, much to the Fuhrer's annoyance.


The story begins with a group of Nazis coming across an American truck that's been blown up. They check for survivors, anticipating there to be none, but the reckoned wrong. Henry Jones, star track athlete, makes his break for freedom, eluding all of his would-be executioners save one, who also shares his fleet-footedness. Turns out this mercurial Nazi is none other than Henry's old opponent in the Olympic Games, Bruno Borman. Also like Kanigher's Easy Co. story, in which Jackie Johnson slugs it out on the battlefield with his old opponent from the boxing world, here two more old sporting opponents meet in battle in WWII.


Bruno's link with Henry is that strong that he plans to make sure the other Nazis don't kill him. Whether he would have succeeded or not, we'll never know, because it's at this point that The Losers intervene, rescue Jones, and capture Borman, who happens to be holding the map his comrades need for their mission.


The Losers have a plan to capture the Nazi general, and they succeed. The other Nazi soldiers are left imprisoned, while The Losers seek to escape the area with their more valuable prize. Those Nazi troops escape, however, and the speedy Bruno catches up with The Losers and sprints across an open field to tip off the German paratroop patrol he spots in the distance.


As the only one fast enough to have a chance of catching Borman, Jones sets off in pursuit.


Jones relives the experience of being out on the track against Bruno. Just as in the 1936 Olympics, Jones again feels the urgency of undermining the Nazi claim of white racial superiority by running faster than Borman. He gains on Borman, but it reaches the point where he has to make his move if he's going to stop him in time. He leaps, but falls short. The paratroopers are alerted.


As the Nazi paratroopers turn in pursuit of The Losers, they get a deadly surprise - somehow Bruno and Henry had sprinted across a minefield unharmed, but the paratroopers are not so fortunate.


The engineer's tape that had marked the only safe route across the field had also acted as a kind of lane marker for Henry as he ran.


The Losers' ride out of this danger zone arrives. But despite escaping, Henry feels sadness due to the loss of his competitor, who lies dead on the battlefield. There will be no more contests on the track between Mile-a-Minute Jones and Bruno Borman.


The story, written by Jack Kirby, as students of Kirby's work will know, lacks that dimension Stan Lee gave to their collaborations. Nevertheless, this one is quite readable compared to some of his Fourth World material, which gets so convoluted that it often ceases to make sense. This tale is straightforward, and makes a simple point. Along the way we've seen the Nazi assumption of racial superiority again exposed. Although little was made of it at the beginning of the story, the American truck that had been blown up was manned by an African American segregated supply unit, by the looks of it, again bringing into the picture the paradox of segregated America fighting to defeat Nazi racists in an anti-racist war.

This August 1971 issue of Sgt. Fury features an anti-racist story written by Al Kurzrok. Al was a writer for Harvey Comics, and then worked for Marvel mostly as a letterer but did write some 1960s and early 70s stories, including 5 issues of Sgt. Fury. Kurzrok didn't get to pen too many Marvel books. He clearly did his homework on this title, though, because stylistically in many ways it reads like a typical Sgt. Fury book. Although it has an anti-racist message, however, it doesn't deliver this with the same kind of punch that Robert Kanigher or Stan Lee would give a similar story. Given the rarity, even by 1971, of comics taking a stance against racism, it is noteworthy, and should be added to that elite list of anti-racist books. Let's take a look at it. Of course the story highlights Gabriel Jones, and it's another tale, like that in issue 56, that has Gabe on a journey to meet up with the rest of the Howlers. This one starts with him being captured by a Nazi officer on the orders of Hitler himself, who wants to use Gabe as bait in a trap for the rest of the Howling Commandos. Right from the start we're reading racist remarks from the Nazi, and he doesn't let up. The Nazi is motivated by his expectation of considerable reward from the Fuhrer should he succeed in his mission.


As with previous Sgt. Fury anti-racist tales, Southerner Rebel Ralston exhibits the greatest concern for Gabe, continuing the disconfirmation of the 'all southern whites are racists' stereotype that we've seen in anti-racist books in the 50s and 60s.


Gabe meanwhile has to put up with the racist rantings of the Nazi, but handles it well. When their plane gets shot down, they parachute into the snow below. The tables are not quite turned, but circumstances have evened things up a little.


But even Gabe can be pushed too far...


Even though an American patrol passes nearby, Gabe is thwarted in his attempt to get their attention and regain his freedom.


Chained together the two men, complete opposites not because of their respective races but because of their differing world views, continue to battle for the upper hand.


The back and forth dialogue between the Nazi and Gabe has, throughout, exposed the ludicrous yet sinister nature of white supremacist beliefs.


The difference emerges when it becomes clear that the troops they've spotted are American. The Nazi has no qualms about killing Gabe with his knife, and Gabe has to shoot him in order to defend himself. The Nazi's dead after all that, and Gabriel is back with the G.I.'s and will presumably find his way back to the Howlers.


I think this story could have been intended to be allegorical, the chain representing perhaps the institutions in American society that have bound African Americans to racist overlords. If so, then the abrupt ending suggests the racial conflict that had erupted in the Civil Rights era with African Americans pushed to the limit by racist whites unwilling to surrender their assumed superiority. I think that the story seeks, and to some extent succeeds, in ridiculing the racist way of thinking. All that Aryan supremacy stuff. By 1971 people had had enough of their hopes for progress being smashed - assassinations of key leaders, and still no real equality of opportunity in a lot of ways.

With Archie Goodwin as editor, this issue of Star Spangled War Stories (179, March 1974) features an Unknown Soldier story that exposes the intense racial infighting that had been a serious problem in the U.S. military during the Vietnam conflict, using a WWII setting. In the Armed Forces Journal in 1971, Col. Robert D. Heinl, Jr. wrote:

"The morale, discipline and battleworthiness of the U.S. Armed Forces are, with a few salient exceptions, lower and worse than at any time in this century and possibly in the history of the United States. By every conceivable indicator, our army that now remains in Vietnam is in a state approaching collapse, with individual
units avoiding or having refused combat, murdering their officers and non commissioned officers, drug-ridden, and dispirited where not near mutinous. Elsewhere than Vietnam, the situation is nearly as serious. Intolerably clobbered and buffeted from without and within by social turbulence, pandemic drug addiction, race war,
sedition, civilian scapegoatise, draftee recalcitrance and malevolence, barracks theft and common crime, unsupported in their travail by the general government, in Congress as well as the executive branch, distrusted, disliked, and often reviled by the public, the uniformed services today are places of agony for the loyal, silent professionals who doggedly hang on and try to keep the ship afloat."

Col. Heinl paints an extremely disturbing picture. He points out, "It is a truism that national armies closely reflect societies from which they have been raised. It would be strange indeed if the Armed Forces did not today mirror the agonizing divisions and social traumas of American society, and of course they do." It's easy to forget (for those of us who lived through the period) how troubled society was at the time, as the so-called 'Swinging Sixties' gave way to the disillusionment of the 1970s.

He goes on to say, "Internally speaking, racial conflicts and drugs... are tearing the services apart today."

The Colonel provides examples of racial troubles within the military, both in Vietnam and elsewhere. While it seems clear that the eruptions of actual racial violence usually but not always originated with the African American personnel, there is no discussion of any racist treatment which might have provoked such outbreaks, but of course one has to assume that at some point this existed, if not in the moment then historically. Col. Heinl writes:

"Racial conflicts (most but not all sparked by young black enlisted men) are erupting murderously in all services...As early as July 1969 the Marines (who had previously enjoyed a highly praised record on race) made headlines at Camp Lejeune, N.C., when a mass affray launched by 30-50 black Marines ended fatally with a white corporal's skull smashed in and 145 other white Marines in the sick bay...Even the cloistered quarters of WACs have been hit by racial hair-pulling. In one West Coast WAC detachment this year, black women on duty as charge-of-quarters took advantage of their trust to vandalize unlocked rooms occupied by white WACS. On this rampage, they destroyed clothing, emptied drawers, and overturned furniture of their white sisters."

There is little in the Colonel's report in terms of reassurance, but he does observe, "All services are today striving energetically to cool and control this ugly violence which in the words of one noncommissioned officer, has made his once tough unit divide up "like two street gangs.""

He finishes his entire piece with a general observation on all the factors he has described that were contributory to the dire situation in the military, of which racial in-fighting was admittedly only one aspect, albeit a major one: "...many a thoughtful officer would be quick to echo the words of BGen. Donn A. Starry, who recently wrote, "The Army can defend the nation against anything but the nation itself." Or -- in the wry words of Pogo -- we have met the enemy, and they are us."

Three years after Col. Heinl wrote that frightening assessment of the state of affairs in the military, the problem was clearly still in the public consciousness, and became the subject of this Unknown Soldier story, "A Town Called Hate!", written by Frank Robbins and illustrated beautifully by Jack Sparling.


When a segregated African American unit comes into town and meets a segregated white unit in the local eatery, the racial tension level spikes through the roof. That night, some soldiers in the all African American unit are mercilessly gunned down, by an assailant whose identity is unknown to the reader at this point.


After what went on earlier, the African American soldiers are in no doubt as to who the perpetrators of these murders are, and exact their own fatal revenge:


The Unknown Soldier already has a mission, but once the news of the racial conflict amongst the troops reaches headquarters, it looks like he's going to have another task. The exchange between the African American sergeant, the Unknown Soldier's aide, Chat Noire, and his commanding officer reveals racial tension present at all levels in the ranks.


For the time being, however, and very ironically, the racial conflict works in favor of the U.S. forces. The group of Nazis disguised as G.I.'s, that the Unknown Soldier has infiltrated, reaches the town. Still seeking vengeance, the African American unit mistakes the Germans for the hostile white U.S. soldiers. In taking them prisoner they find out they're Nazis, and also that they've contacted the Unknown Soldier.


Chat Noire rolls into town in the nick of time to quell the racial conflict amongst the U.S. troops. Evidence then emerges that appears to indicate that disguised Nazis shot the African American soldiers, hoping to divide the Americans against each other. Sufficient unity is recreated to turns everyone's attention to the Nazi onslaught, and succeed:


While the point has been made that racial divisions in the military are counterproductive to the mission of our armed forces, there's a kind of disturbing epilogue that only the Unknown Soldier and Chat Noire are party to. In surveying their dead after the battle, the corpse of one white soldier is found, still clutching the German weapon he'd captured, used as his own, and which had become a kind of trademark lending it's name to him as a nickname. Those German cartridge cases found at the scene of the initial crime that sparked the racially polarized battle within the U.S. forces now take on more meaning. The white unit bought the Nazi infiltrator explanation because they knew it really was one of their men who carried out the shooting. The African American unit were convinced by the evidence that they had been hoodwinked by the Nazis. But the real truth was that it had been a racist white soldier who had gunned down his African American comrades in cold blood, and the engineers' initial deductions had been correct. For the sake of the war, the problem was solved temporarily, but the racial divisions still existed.

on racial troubles."