WASHINGTON – The old men, soldiers once upon an awful time, stood as proud as age would allow.

They were former machine-gunners, like Rocklin resident Frank Kageta, now 91.

They were former intelligence agents, like Reedley resident George Yoji Kiyomoto, 90, and Roseville resident James Iso, chipper at 87.

They were, and are, Nisei – second-generation Japanese Americans who in World War II fought tenaciously for the very country that had interned them and their family members.

"We had a duty to prove, beyond any shadow of a doubt, our patriotism," Iso said.

Point proved.

On Wednesday, politicians put aside their standard partisan squabbling to present the surviving Nisei veterans with the Congressional Gold Medal. The medal is considered, along with the Presidential Medal of Freedom, to be the highest civilian award in the United States.

Past Congressional Gold Medal recipients include George Washington, Mother Teresa and Winston Churchill.

Those present agreed Wednesday that the veterans of the 100th Infantry Battalion, the 442nd Regimental Combat Team and the Military Intelligence Service earned their honors the hard way.

"You fought World War II on two fronts," Democratic Sen. Barbara Boxer told the veterans, quoting former President Harry Truman. "You fought not only your enemy; you fought prejudice, and you won."

Boxer pushed the Senate version of the bill granting the Congressional Gold Medal, allied with Rep. Adam Schiff, D-Burbank, in the House.

It was a bipartisan affair, with Republican Sen. John McCain of Arizona declaring Wednesday that the veterans "did everything that was ever asked of them and more."

Fighting their way through Italy, southern France and Germany, Kageta and other men of the 442nd made the unit the most highly decorated regiment in U.S. military history.

Some 13,000 soldiers served in the regiment, and they received 9,486 Purple Hearts for wounds or combat deaths.

More discreetly, several thousand men like Kiyomoto and Iso served in the Pacific as translators and agents with the Military Intelligence Service.

"We were doing our part," said Leo H. Hosoda, a 90-year-old Sacramento resident who served as a Military Intelligence Service translator.

They might have given up.

Some 120,000 Japanese Americans were interned during the war, deemed a potential threat to national security. One was Doris Okada, born in an internment camp in Arizona in 1944. She is now Rep. Doris Matsui, D-Sacramento, an original co-sponsor of the Congressional Gold Medal legislation.

Iso, too, spent part of the war in an internment camp, after he and his parents were forced from their San Jose home. Iso left the Heart Mountain, Wyo., camp to join the Army in 1944, following his brother Robert, who was serving with the "Go for Broke" men of the 442nd.

"We were all young and vigorous and inspired to do the best we could," Iso said.

James Iso went on to a career in the Defense Intelligence Agency and Foreign Service, spending several decades overseas. Many others returned to more domestic pursuits, putting their wars behind them.

Kageta, the one-time machine-gunner, found his way to Placer County and became a rancher.

Kiyomoto, the former counterintelligence agent, became a tree fruit farmer in Fresno County.

Hosoda, the former translator, became a payroll manager.

They've been honored before; in some ways, the tributes have never stopped since the time Truman reviewed the Nisei soldiers on the South Lawn of the White House. Hollywood dramatized their exploits, in the 1951 movie "Go for Broke!"

California pitched in by naming the portion of State Route 99 between Salida and Manteca after the 442nd.

The feel of a final salute pervaded this week's three-day series of events, which included a gala dinner and trip to the World War II Memorial and ends today with a memorial service for those killed in action.

© Copyright The Sacramento Bee. All rights reserved.