On December 22 , 1943 , Combs enlisted as a private in the U.S. Army for service in World War II . He received his basic training at Fort Knox and participated in the Volunteer Officer Candidate Program , which would have allowed him to attend Officer Candidate School ( OCS ) immediately after basic training . Instead , he was briefly assigned to teach cartography at the Aberdeen Proving Ground in Aberdeen , Maryland before completing OCS in Ann Arbor , Michigan , joining the Judge Advocate General 's Corps , and attaining the rank of captain . On July 1 , 1945 , he was sent to the South Pacific . He served as chief of the War Crimes Investigating Department under General Douglas MacArthur in the Philippine Islands , conducting tribunals for Japanese war criminals . Upon his discharge in 1946 , he was awarded the Bronze Star and the Military Merit Medal of the Philippines
Japanese war criminals
Japanese war crimes
Bert Combs