Larry Lee Drank With The Soviets

V-E Day had a special international flavor for Larry Lee.

A 28-year-old Chinese-American sergeant, Lee was the driver for the commander of a supply unit attached to the 15th Air Force in southern Italy. Word of the German surrender came with special orders from headquarters.

His colonel was told to travel more than 50 miles inland to a camp where the Germans were keeping captured Soviet troops and give them word the war was over.

Lee drove the staff car with the colonel, his aide and a nurse to the camp. They found thousands of Soviet troops who had already figured out the news: Their German guards had fled.

The Americans were unable to explain any details of the surrender. They spoke no Russian and the Soviets spoke no English.

Undaunted, the Soviets produced their camp-distilled vodka.

“Stalin!” they shouted and drank. “Truman!” and another drink.

“It was pretty powerful stuff,” recalls Lee, now a musician and entertainer living in Spokane. “I was afraid to drink too much because I had to drive.”

In the midst of the toasting, a Mongolian prisoner approached Lee and talked to him in Mandarin Chinese.

When he was a boy, Lee’s parents sent him to China for a year to learn their native tongue. He used Mandarin occasionally while working in their Brooklyn restaurant and could understand much of what the Mongolian said.

They translated the commanders’ discussion of the war’s end from English to Chinese to Russian and back again.

The Soviet commander called for an even bigger celebration and the prisoners brought out plates of cooked meat on sticks.

“I ate a piece and didn’t care too much for it. I asked the Mongolian soldier what it was,”’ Lee said. The prisoner used a word Lee couldn’t understand. He used another word, then another, without any luck.

Finally, the Mongolian barked.

Lee steered clear of the meat while the officers finished the talks and toasts. Eventually the four Americans said goodbye and left.

Once clear of the camp gates, Lee stopped the staff car and told the officers to open the doors.

“I’ve got something to tell you. You just ate dog,” he said.

The officers jumped from the car retching. When they returned, the colonel ordered Lee to put on the car’s siren and drive as fast as possible to the nearest field hospital, where they had their stomachs pumped.