by Len Levinson
There was silence in the room. The other officers were amazed that Colonel Hutchins dared talk to General Hawkins that way. General Hawkins’s face turned red, and anger flashed in his eyes.
“I don’t like your attitude,” General Hawkins said, staring into Colonel Hutchins’s eyes.
“I don’t much give a fuck,” Colonel Hutchins replied. “My men’ve had a bad time these past few days, and I’m not sending them out there unless I have your guarantee that they’ll get all the protection they need.”
“I resent your implication that they wouldn’t get that protection, Colonel.”
“Well sir,” Colonel Hutchins said, “your conduct these past few days hasn’t exactly given me any great confidence in you. My regiment was nearly wiped out before you had the common sense to reinforce it. A lot of my men died because you couldn’t make up your mind for a few crucial hours, and I don’t want it to happen again.”
Nobody said anything. The only sounds in the tent were gulps as officers swallowed down their astonishment. From outside they heard the cackle of birds and the chatter of monkeys high in the trees. General Hawkins turned redder and his forehead was covered with furrows of concern. Colonel Hutchins had touched a sore spot. General Hawkins knew he’d made a mistake by waiting so long to reinforce the Twenty-third Regiment. General Hall had called him onto the carpet and chewed him out for waiting so long.
General Hawkins stood erect behind the map table and squared his shoulders. “It’s easy to say in hindsight what should’ve been done,” he said. “The attack on the Twenty-third might’ve been a feint, and if I’d made a major commitment to stopping it, the division might’ve been hit someplace else, with devastating consequences to all of us. Hindsight is bullshit, as far as I’m concerned. What matters is making the right decision at the right time, while the pressure is on and all the facts aren’t in. It’s true that the Twenty-third bore the brunt of the fighting in its initial hours, but ultimate results are more important to me than hindsight, and ultimately we beat the Japs and pushed them back to where they started from. I suspect we’ve caused them sufficient casualties and difficulties so that they won’t cause us much trouble in the future. If you ask me, I think they’ve shot their wad out there. I don’t think they’ve got much left. Battles ebb and flow, gentlemen, and there will always be casualties, but what matters most is who wins in the end. Now as far as I’m concerned, this matter’s closed, and I don’t want to hear about it anymore. Let’s get back to the reconnaissance in force. Are there any questions so far?”
Numerous hands went up. Before General Hawkins could indicate which officer should ask the first question, Colonel Hutchins opened his big mouth, and a cloud of alcohol fumes issued forth from it.
“Hindsight bullshit!” he said. “I told you right off the bat that you had to reinforce my regiment!”
General Hawkins narrowed his eyes as a cold rage came over him. “I thought I said this subject was closed, but evidently Colonel Hutchins didn’t hear me. Or maybe he did hear me but still doesn’t want to let me forget that he was right and I was wrong three days ago when the Japs attacked his regiment. All right, let’s open the matter one more time. Let’s let Colonel Hutchins here try to convince us of his superior tactical skill. Is that what you want, Colonel Hutchins?”
Now Colonel Hutchins was on the defensive, and he didn’t know what to say. Basically he was mad at General Hawkins for not reinforcing him when reinforcements were needed, but he hadn’t wanted to stage a contest over who was the best frontline tactician, because how could that be proved?
“I ain’t trying to convince you of anything,” Colonel Hutchins said. “You think you know everything anyway, so how could I convince you? But I still say you waited too goddamn long to make up your mind a few days ago, and you don’t have to be MacArthur to know it.”
“Sure,” General Hawkins said. “Of course you’d think that. Every unit commander wants to be reinforced as soon as the going gets tough. What’s so unusual about that? But in this division, the buck stops with me. I have to make the final decision. I have to allocate resources so that victory can be achieved. I have to say no because I can’t give everybody what he wants.” General Hawkins glowered at Colonel Hutchins. “When you wear these stars on your collar—if you ever wear them on your collar—then you can make the decisions, but until then, I’ll make them and I expect my officers to carry them out without any bullshit or back talk. This is the last discussion of this sort that I’m going to have. The next time an officer starts arguing tactics with me, I’ll relieve him of command, because I don’t have the time. Is that clear?”
The officers nodded or grunted their assent. But Colonel Hutchins didn’t open his mouth or move anything. General Hawkins focused with white hot intensity on him.
“Is that clear with you, Colonel Hutchins?”
Colonel Hutchins wanted to argue some more, but he realized the time had come to give in to the two stars on General Hawkins’s collar. “Yes sir,” he said.
“Do you think you can lead this reconnaissance in force under my direction, or shall I get somebody else?’
“I’ll do it,” Colonel Hutchins said.
“You’ll do it what?”
“I’ll do it sir.”
“Good,” General Hawkins said. “Let’s get on with this meeting.”
TEN . . .
Butsko lay on the damp ground trying to get some sleep, but he couldn’t. It was his first night back at the front, and he wasn’t accustomed to sleeping on the ground, with bugs flying around him, biting him everywhere and even through his uniform. He hadn’t taken a shower since last night and smelled like a pile of shit. His crotch itched from perspiration and grit. The ground was hard. And he couldn’t stop thinking of Lieutenant Betty Crawford.
He wanted to sneak back to the hospital and put it to her, but he couldn’t. He had to go out on a patrol in the middle of the night. It was possible that he wouldn’t return alive from the patrol, which meant he’d never be able to put it to Betty Crawford again. He felt jumpy and nervous, because he had to get used to the front lines all over again.
He heard a footstep not far away, and sat up. “Who’s there?” he called out.
“Me!” said Frankie La Barbara, walking into the clearing, moonlight shining on his helmet and shoulders.
“Oh shit,” Butsko said, recognizing Frankie’s voice. “I’d kind’ve hoped you got killed by now.”
Frankie approached Butsko. “I heard you was back, but I hoped it wasn’t true. I guess it is.”
“How ya doing, Frankie?”
“Not so good. How about you?”
“Not so good either. Siddown and tell me what’s been going on.”
Frankie sat cross-legged beside Butsko, who held out his pack of cigarettes. Frankie took one, then Butsko placed one in his own mouth. Frankie lit both with his Zippo lighter. The bandage on his nose made him look comical.
“Your leg better?” Frankie asked.
“Nearly. How’re you feeling?”
“I’m supposed to be at the hospital until tomorrow, but I come back here anyway. I got tired of being at the hospital. Nothing to do there except get in trouble.”
“I’m glad you’re back, Frankie. I got a patrol I want you to go on with me.”
Frankie groaned. “Jesus, I didn’t know when I was well off.”
“Neither did I, but here we are and we got to make the best of it. You know what’s in this platoon now?”
Frankie looked around at the bodies lying on the ground. “No.”
“The worst,” Butsko said. “The lowest. The shittiest.”
“Worse than us?” Frankie asked.
“Much worse. You guys were angels compared to what’s here now, and you’re the only one of the old bunch that’s left.”
“I think you got a couple coming in from the hospital tomorrow.”
“Which ones?”
“Billy Jones and Victor Yabalonka.”
&n
bsp; “Who?”
“A guy named Victor Yabalonka came here since you been gone. He’s a good man, though, a big son of a bitch—used to be a longshoreman before the war. Shilansky’s got blood poisoning and he’s gonna ship out. Craig Delane and Jimmy O’Rourke are at death’s door. Lieutenant Breckenridge is all fucked up.”
“I saw him at the hospital,” Butsko said. “He should be back in a few days.”
“Naw,” said Frankie. “I don’t think so. The son of a bitch could barely walk last time I saw him.”
“He wasn’t so bad when I talked to him. I think he’ll be back pretty soon, but what do I know? Anyway, Frankie, I’m gonna need you tonight on this patrol?”
“Shit,” Frankie muttered. “Why me?”
“Because you got experience.”
“You used to tell me you hated my guts.”
“I do, but that don’t mean I don’t need you.”
“You wanted to leave me behind when I got malaria on Bougainville.”
“You wanna leave everybody behind all the time, so what’s the difference?”
Frankie didn’t know what to say because it was true: He always wanted to leave behind the sick and wounded. He puffed his cigarette and looked at Butsko’s grizzled face. Butsko hadn’t shaved for twenty-four hours, and already he had a thick growth of beard that made him resemble a gorilla.
“Sarge,” Frankie said, “I can’t handle this war anymore.”
“That’s what you think,” Butsko replied.
They heard footsteps and turned around. Pfc. Levinson, the clerk from regimental headquarters, approached. “Sergeant Butsko?” he said.
“Whataya want?” said Butsko.
“The colonel wants to see you right away on the double.”
“What for?”
“I don’t know.”
“You know, you skinny little fuck. You just don’t wanna tell me.”
“It’s something about a reconnaissance,” Pfc. Levinson said.
“I’ll be right there,” Butsko replied.
Pfc. Levinson turned and walked off into the darkness. Butsko fieldstripped his cigarette and sprinkled the grains of tobacco over the ground.
“Sergeant Plunkett is in charge while I’m away,” Butsko told Frankie: “Take your orders from him.”
“Where the fuck did he come from?” Frankie asked.
“I don’t know. Someplace in the regiment. See you later.”
Butsko stood, slung his M 1 rifle over his shoulder, and trudged off in the direction of Colonel Hutchins’s command post. Frankie remained where he was, puffing his cigarette, pissed off at the world.
Far away in the jungle, General Adachi sat behind his desk, his eyes blurring as he studied the maps in front of him. He was so tired he couldn’t distinguish details on the map, and decided it was time to go to bed.
He stood and took off his shirt, revealing his bony chest and arms. A mosquito dive-bombed out of nowhere and bit his shoulder, and General Adachi slapped it, but the mosquito got away. He stepped out of his pants and had short skinny legs. Wearing only a skimpy white garment that resembled a jockstrap, he blew out the kerosene lamp on his desk and crawled beneath the mosquito net that covered the thin futon mattress on which he’d sleep. He didn’t know it but that pesky mosquito had flown underneath the mosquito net with him.
General Adachi lay flat and rested his head on the tiny pillow. He heard the mosquito buzz around his ear, and it made him grit his teeth. The mosquito flew closer and then veered away. General Adachi wondered where the mosquito would land. He poised his hands and waited. The mosquito stopped buzzing, and a few seconds later General Adachi felt the sting on his left arm. He swung at it, and felt the tiny insect crush against the palm of his hand.
General Adachi smiled. He was glad he killed the mosquito, otherwise he’d be up all night, listening to its incessant buzz. Now he could think about the big offensive he was planning. He’d worked out many of the details during the course of the day but still wasn’t satisfied. The plan needed something he hadn’t given it yet, some little ingredient that would catch the Americans off guard and provide the Eighteenth Army with an edge.
General Adachi knew that his main problem was the diversionary attack. It would have to be swift and decisive, and really fake the Americans out, forcing them to commit the bulk of their forces to the wrong place. That was the part he’d have to work on further.
He closed his eyes, but the map of the front was engraved on his mind. He studied terrain features and troop dispositions, trying to figure out what to do, because he knew the fate of the Eighteenth Army depended upon his final decision.
The map floated through his mind, until his mind grew too fatigued to continue conjuring it up. Then, gradually, General Adachi drifted off to sleep.
Butsko entered the orderly room in Colonel Hutchins’s command post, and saw Master Sergeant Koch seated behind his desk.
“What’s going on?” Butsko asked.
Koch held his finger in front of his mouth, indicating that Butsko should be quiet. Then Koch pointed to Colonel Hutchins’s office. “They’re waiting on you,” Koch said.
Butsko nodded. He pushed aside the tent flap and saw Colonel Hutchins’s office full of officers. The four battalion commanders were there plus a few company commanders and countless staff officers. There was barely room to move around. What the hell’s going on here? Butsko wondered. Butsko thought Colonel Hutchins had called him for a briefing about the patrol the recon platoon was supposed to go on, but it appeared that something bigger was cooking.
Colonel Hutchins sat behind his desk, looking at his map. The unmistakable odor of booze was in the air, and everybody knew where it was coming from. Butsko looked at his watch, and it was 2200 hours—ten o’clock in the evening. Nobody was smoking, so he didn’t want to be the one to take out a cigarette. He was sandwiched in between Captain Browne of Love Company and Major Girard from the staff of the Third Battalion. Butsko realized that an attack of some kind was in the offing. He could smell it in the air.
A few more officers arrived. After a while Colonel Hutchins looked up from his desk. “Are we all here?” he asked.
The officers looked at each other. Some wondered what Butsko, a mere enlisted man, was doing at the meeting.
“Everybody’s here,” said Major Cobb, the regiment’s G-3 (operations) officer.
Colonel Hutchins stood. “Then let’s get started.” A Japanese samurai sword with bloodstains on the hilt lay on his desk, and he picked it up, moving toward a large map mounted on a stand near his desk. General Hutchins stood beside the map and let the sword hang loosely in his right hand. “I know that your men are tired,” he said, “and I know you’re tired, too, but we got something we gotta do and we’re gonna do it.” He pointed the samurai sword at the map. “This is us,” he said, “from here to here.” The tip of the samurai sword described the line held by the Twenty-third Infantry Regiment. “General Hawkins wants us to conduct a reconnaissance in force across the Driniumor first thing in the morning.”
There were groans and moans all over the room. Everybody was exhausted, and the last thing they wanted to do was look for trouble on the other side of the Driniumor. Butsko know who would be the point for the reconnaissance in force: the recon platoon. That’s what he was doing at the meeting, he realized at last.
Colonel Hutchins frowned. “That’ll be enough of that!” he said. “I don’t want no more of that bitching and farting in here. We’ve got our orders and we’re gonna carry them out. Is that clear?”
Nobody said anything, but the grumbling continued. Officers wearing bandages looked at each other grimly. Other officers were exhausted and unshaven, their eyes at half mast. It was always this way. They never gave you enough sleep when they wanted you to do something big. It was as though you were a machine.
“Shaddup in here!” Colonel Hutchins shouted. “I just toldja I don’t wanna hear this pissing and moaning anymore!”
The room
became still. Nobody wanted to get on the wrong side of their commanding officer, especially when he was drunk.
“Okay,” said Colonel Hutchins. “That’s better. Now let’s get on with this goddamned fucking meeting. Basically, General Hawkins wants to know what the Japs’ve got on the other side of that river. For all we know they’ve played their last hand out, but maybe they haven’t. So we’re going across unit by unit to see how they respond. If they just let us go, we’ll know they’re finished. If they fight back, we’ll know they still got a lot of piss and vinegar left in them. First we’ll send over the reconnaissance platoon with Easy Company and see what happens. Fox Company will be right behind Easy Company, just in case. George Company will be in reserve and will thin out to occupy the positions held by Easy Company and Fox Company. How Company will travel with Fox Company to provide heavy-weapons support in case of trouble. The Third Battalion will hold itself in readiness to cross the Driniumor in case things really get hot out there. The First Battalion will be in reserve. Any questions so far?”
Lieutenant Colonel Lechler, the commanding officer of the Second Battalion, which comprised Easy, Fox, George, and How companies, raised his hand. “Do we get any artillery support?”
Colonel Hutchins shook his head. “No. We’re not going to telegraph our approach. We’re just going to feel them out. This is not a major attack. It is a reconnaissance in force. All of you ought to know what a reconnaissance in force is by now. Any more questions?”
Captain Phil Mason, commanding officer of Easy Company, raised his hand. “What time do we cross the Driniumor?” he asked.
“Oh-four-hundred hours, while it’s still dark,” Colonel Hutchins replied. “Easy Company and the recon platoon have to get across before sunup, because you don’t want to be sitting ducks out there in broad daylight, right gentlemen?”
