Contact!: a novel of the Pacific War

by DiLouie, Craig

  A beat-up submarine, a crew gone soft, and a captain who’d lost his edge. They were still missing an officer. God, what a mess. They’d have to drill all the way across the Pacific and hope to regain some semblance of combat efficiency.

  When the drinks arrived, he resisted the urge to slam it back. He took a single sip instead and set it down with care.

  “So where are we going, anyway?” he asked.

  “Sorry, brother,” Rusty said. “That’s top secret until the briefing.”

  “We’re taking commandos into Japanese territory.”

  His friend sprayed scotch and wiped his mouth. “What makes you say that?”

  Those soldiers had been interested in Sandtiger for a reason. Just a guess, but Rusty’s reaction confirmed it. It explained why Rusty had been in Melbourne.

  MacArthur and his USAFFE headquarters operated out of Melbourne. The famous general wanted boots on the ground somewhere in the Pacific, probably the Philippines. Sandtiger would get them there.

  Charlie tapped his head. “Naval intelligence.”

  “Well, don’t go speculating to anybody else. I could get in a lot of trouble.”

  Playing taxi didn’t sound too dangerous. Then again, the last time he’d given a ferry ride, he’d fought an aircraft carrier.

  “This mission,” Rusty added, “is one of the most important of the war. That’s why I’ll be coming along with you.”

  “You’re our replacement officer!”

  “Look at you. For once, I get to surprise you. Putting this op together took a lot of doing. I’m coming to make sure it all goes right. I’ve also gotten itchy on dry land. I think the war will be over soon. A year tops. I’d like to be there at the end.”

  “You an optimist,” Charlie said. “I never thought I’d see the day. That or this op is so big you really believe it’s the start of the end of the war.”

  “What did I tell you about speculating? What I can say is my son is three years old now, growing up without his daddy. I want this goddamn war to end, and soon.”

  Charlie raised his glass to that, and they drank. “So it looks like we’re serving together again.”

  “I told you we someday would.”

  “Seeing as we’re in the same boat, I’d like to ask you a favor.”

  CHAPTER SIX

  HOTEL STREET

  Charlie and Rusty crossed the room and approached Nixon, blinking at his shouting companions. The conversation died as Charlie approached. The red-faced officers stared at him and nudged each other.

  “Hello, Exec,” the engineering officer said. “Haven’t seen you in a while.” The man’s head tilted. “Nineteen days, to be exact.”

  “We’re back in action,” Charlie told him. “We sail in five days.”

  “Yes, I just got the word.”

  The scuttlebutt traveled fast. He didn’t mind, as it would help him round up Sandtiger’s wayward children.

  “Plenty to get done,” Nixon added. “Final checks, stores, trim calculations—”

  “Plenty,” Charlie agreed. “This is Lt. Rusty Grady. He’s replacing Liebold.”

  Nixon looked up at Rusty with a pained expression.

  “Nice to meet you,” said Rusty, warned about the engineering officer’s social awkwardness.

  “Where’s Percy?” Charlie asked him.

  “The moment he heard, he ran off to Hotel Street.”

  “The crew’s gone soft,” he told Rusty. “Come on, Nixon. Let’s go.”

  If he didn’t track down Percy, the man would go on a tear and show up drunk as the boat was disembarking.

  “Sure,” said Nixon, grateful for the excuse to leave and get back to work.

  “Give ’em hell, Hara-kiri,” one of the officers said. His comrades cheered, clashing their bottles.

  As they left the club, Rusty smirked and said, “Hara-kiri. Isn’t that what John Braddock called you after you almost took a dip in the Coral Sea?”

  “Stuff it, Rusty.”

  “You’re not that guy anymore,” Rusty observed. “Yet you are.”

  They walked out of the pink concrete stucco Royal Hawaiian with its Moorish architecture. The wide and sandy beach stretched to the brilliant blue water. Sailors lay on blankets and swam with the rollers, the luckier ones accompanied by bikini-clad Hawaiian girls. A destroyer and a minesweeper steamed offshore, a stern reminder all fun was temporary.

  Nixon pointed. “There’s Chief Petty Officer McDonough.”

  Smokey sprawled in the shade of a palm tree. Nearby, a concertina-wire barrier segregated the beach from the adjacent beachfront, which was open to civilians. Hands clasped on his chest and an old cowboy hat covering his face, he lay stretched out next to a neat pyramid of empty Pabst Blue Ribbon cans.

  Charlie nudged him with his foot. Smokey growled and pushed up the brim of his hat.

  “Thought you might be dead,” Charlie said.

  The quartermaster grinned at the inside joke. “I heard you might be.”

  “Close but no cigar.” Charlie pointed. “Is that the chief?”

  Chief of the Boat Spike Sullivan sat cross-legged on the sand near the surf’s edge. A bronzed giant in shorts and sunglasses, still as a statue.

  “He’s meditating,” Smokey explained. “Learned it from the Jap prisoner we shot. Said it keeps him calm.”

  A strange habit for a sailor, but one didn’t begrudge Spike anything. The man stood six-three and weighed two-twenty.

  “So what’s the dope, Exec?” the quartermaster said.

  “You can start rounding up the boys. They’ve been at liberty long enough. Tell them we sail in five days. No time for retraining. We’re going to hit the ground running and drill all the way out there.”

  “Sounds fine.”

  Charlie glanced at Rusty. “Navy Intelligence has a big one for us.”

  “Sounds fine,” Smokey repeated. He was just happy to get back to sea.

  They left him to continue their search for Percy. After a short visit to Charlie’s room so he could change, they caught a bus into downtown Honolulu.

  Military police everywhere. Hawaii was still under martial law, ruled by Lt. General Emmons. The Hawaiian Department controlled the newspapers, limited telephone calls to the mainland, and imposed curfews and blackouts. It interned people of Japanese descent, censored all outgoing mail, and confiscated land. The Department even issued special currency, rendered void if the islands fell to the Japanese. The military had turned Hawaii into a fortress.

  Charlie and his comrades got off in Chinatown. Long lines of servicemen wrapped around the block. Old Chinese ladies laughed at the sailors from beauty parlors and second-floor apartment windows. Shoeshine boys joked with them. Local women walked past carrying boxes of empty milk bottles. A small boy crossed the street with a gas mask swinging from his hip.

  Hands thrust in their pockets, the sailors fidgeted in the bright sun. Keeping an eye on things, military police sweated in their helmets.

  Hotel Street meant one thing, and that was prostitutes.

  Living in a collection of brothels scattered among other businesses, some 200 women did a lively trade, charging $3 for three minutes. Assembly-line sex on a bullpen system. Matrons lingered outside the boogie houses, eyeing the customers and weeding out the drunks. Inside, the man paid his fee, received a poker chip, and entered a cubicle where he undressed. The prostitute came in, inspected him for VD, and serviced him before moving on to the next room.

  Despite being illegal, the Hawaiian Department sanctioned it, seeing it as good for morale. And by regulating it, they reduced VD, a big concern for the military because it depleted manpower available for the war.

  “Somebody told me each girl works twenty days a month and has a quota of 100 men a day,” Nixon said. “The girl keeps $2. That’s $48,000 a year.”

  Rusty whistled. “I’m in the wrong profession.”

  “Five hours a day of it,” Nixon noted.

  “Hardly pennies from heaven,
” Charlie said. “I’d rather earn my pay being depth-charged.”

  “Most came over from San Francisco,” Nixon added. “Work for six months and then go home with their earnings.”

  “You seem to know a lot about it,” said Rusty.

  Nixon nodded happily. “I intend to go into business after the war.”

  “Not a brothel, I hope.”

  “No, no,” the engineering officer stammered. “But it’s an interesting model.”

  Charlie eyed the buildings and felt the old curiosity about what it’d be like to touch a woman again, even if it was only for the briefest time. He found the idea exciting and thought about it more often than he’d admit, but he was too prudish to do it. Despite his urges, releasing into a stranger after three minutes wasn’t a great time. The reality probably didn’t stack up against the idea.

  Best to focus on getting Sandtiger ready for war, Charlie thought. After the war ended, he’d have all the time in the world to think about women.

  “It’s going to take forever to find him in this crowd,” Rusty said.

  He pointed. “There’s our man.”

  Hard to miss Percy with his loud Aloha shirts.

  The communications officer swayed on his feet, sweating booze. Charlie reached to hold him steady.

  “Unhand me,” Percy cried. “I’m a decorated war hero.”

  “Actually, it was a unit citation,” Nixon said.

  “Either way, I don’t want to go back. I’m staying right here on active duty.”

  “We sail in five days,” Charlie said. “We have a lot of work to prepare Sandtiger for her patrol. We need to get started by tomorrow.”

  “Tomorrow! Who cares about tomorrow?” Percy pointed at the brothel in front of him. “My first time at the Bronx. They have Hawaiian and Japanese girls. I’m gonna cross something off my list of things to do before I die.”

  “Penetrate Japanese hooker,” Rusty said. “That just leaves climbing Everest.”

  Percy scowled at him.

  “This is Rusty Grady,” Charlie said. “He’ll be replacing Liebold. I served with him on the 55.”

  “There’s only room for one funny man on this boat,” Percy growled.

  “You’re still the champion,” Rusty assured him.

  “What about an instrument? You play one?”

  “The fiddle, though I’m not too good with it.”

  The communications officer’s face went red. Charlie stiffened, ready to jump between the two men.

  “Christ, why didn’t you say so?” Percy exploded. “I taught Harrison here the harmonica. I play banjo. Man, we are gonna jam!”

  “The boat, Percy,” Charlie said. “Let’s go.”

  “Come on, Exec,” the man begged. “One last hurrah.”

  “At this rate, it’ll be curfew before you get in there.”

  “The line’s not moving at all,” Nixon said.

  The matron came out and waved her arms. “No more! Go home!”

  The servicemen grumbled. Some shouted questions and abuse. A moment later, a line of women left the brothel carrying signs. The sailors erupted in catcalls and wolf whistles.

  “Hey, baby doll,” a sailor called out. “What gives?”

  The woman struck a sultry pose and raised her sign. “We’re on strike, sailor!”

  The crowd roared in surprise at the news.

  “Interesting,” Nixon said. “The military fixes the price, so it must be the working conditions. They can’t live anywhere else in the town. They can’t even leave the district. Maybe they want some changes.”

  “Hookers of the world unite,” Rusty said.

  “Just my rotten luck,” Percy groaned.

  The brothels were all emptying. Two hundred women marched toward the police station, just a few blocks away.

  “I’ll be there, Exec,” Percy shouted over the confusion.

  “What?”

  “Remember I said you got to hang loose in the submarines? Well, you also have to get your kicks while you can. I always have a backup plan.”

  “We’re with you girls!” a sailor cried. “Come on, boys!”

  A mob of servicemen surged after the women, cheering them on while the MPs blew their whistles. Roaring sailors pushed past them.

  “We’d better make tracks,” Rusty said. “This could get ugly.”

  “You’re right about that,” Charlie said. “Percy—”

  The communications officer had disappeared.

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  HIGH TIDE

  Three days later, Charlie entered the briefing room and set his peaked cap next to several others on a side table. Exhausted from preparing Sandtiger, he felt confident she would be ready to sail on schedule. Scattered all over island deep in liberty, the crew heard the call and returned to base. Still no Lt. Percy, though. Charlie knew the lieutenant would keep his promise and show up for the loadout. Still, Charlie planned to give the man hell.

  In the corner, Saunders spoke to Cooper and Rusty in a quiet but urgent tone that didn’t invite interruption. Charlie studied his new commander from across the room. The captain’s record spoke of being aggressive in pursuit and cool under fire. If not an artist in combat, a very capable technician.

  The scuttlebutt told another story. During his last two patrols, Saunders had become unpredictable. He’d start an approach cool and methodical only to suddenly veer into reckless shortcuts. One of these resulted in Flagfin strafed by a Japanese plane. No wonder Rusty was worried.

  Nine patrols, a lot for a commander. ComSubPac typically pulled captains off the line after five. The intense pressures wore a man down. Saunders apparently had enough clout to go the full nine. This patrol would be his tenth time out.

  “Coffee, Commander?”

  Charlie turned toward the only other man in the room, an Army officer in dress uniform.

  “Thank you.” He accepted the mug. “You clean up well.”

  “You too. Last time I saw you, you were covered in engine grease.”

  “I had a feeling we’d be meeting again.”

  The man smiled and extended his hand. “Lt. Jonas Cotten,” he drawled. “Sixth Army Special Reconnaissance Unit, Alamo Scouts.”

  Charlie shook it. “Lt. Commander Charlie Harrison, XO of the Sandtiger. You guys have an odd way of introducing yourselves.”

  “Singer always does that. He likes to test anybody we’ll be working with.”

  “I understand it was a test. I just don’t see the point of it.”

  “The point ain’t the answer; it’s how the man answers,” Cotten explained. “If it matters to you, you passed with flying colors.”

  “I’m wondering why it matters to you. I’m not the captain.”

  “So I hear.” The sergeant’s eyes shifted to Saunders. “What kind of man is he?”

  “I don’t know yet, Lieutenant,” Charlie said. “I haven’t served with him. But his record says he’s one of our best.”

  “Call me Jonas. We Scouts are an informal bunch.”

  The pow-wow broke up. The men grabbed chairs around the gleaming table. Saunders dropped a thick packet marked TOP SECRET on the table in front of him. Operations orders from ComSubPac. OPERATION HIGH TIDE on its face.

  Charlie glanced at Rusty and raised his eyebrows. What were you and Saunders talking about? Rusty frowned and shook his head as if to say: Don’t ask.

  “Gentlemen, welcome,” Cooper said. “Your mission is a ferry ride and happens to be one of the most important of the war. You’ll be putting the first American boots on Japanese soil. D-Day in the Pacific.”

  The men grinned at this news. The squadron commander pulled down a giant map of the Pacific Theater over the wall.

  He tapped a collection of islands with a pointer. “In one month, we’re invading Saipan. Operation TEARAWAY. At the same time, we’ll take Tinian next door.”

  Saipan was an island in the Marianas, a crescent of volcanic islands along the edge of the Philippine Sea. About 135 miles n
ortheast of Guam, which the United States had won in the Spanish-American War of 1898 and was now occupied by the Japanese Empire. After the Great War, Japan gained control of the northern Marianas, Marshalls, and Carolines, formerly German colonies.

  Before the current war, these islands threatened the United States. Once fortified, they could be used to cut off access to America’s Western Pacific interests, namely the Philippines, Guam, and Chinese trade. In American hands, however, they provided a strategic base of operations. Air bases for bomber planes able to reach the Philippines, Taiwan, and Japan itself.

  Electrified by the news, Charlie sat up straight in his chair. While the tide had turned against the Japanese Empire, victory still felt abstract. Cooper’s simple statement made it real for the first time.

  Two and a half years of desperate fighting had led to this. After so long, the veterans knew how to kill Japanese soldiers, sink Japanese ships. But they were tired. They were all tired. Worn to the nub.

  Maybe Rusty was right. This was the beginning of the end.

  “The submarines have done a hell of a job isolating Japanese bases from resupply,” Cooper said. “Air attacks have reduced them. The strategy is to bypass the strongpoints and capture islands we can use as bases. Island hopping, leapfrogging, call it what you want.”

  Island hopping allowed the Americans to gain the most ground with the least time and resources. It also offered the advantage of surprise because the Japanese never knew where the Americans would strike next.

  The strategy was working. Since Operation CARTWHEEL began late last year, Admiral Nimitz captured Makin and Tarawa in the Gilberts then the Marshalls. Allied planes destroyed Truk naval base and began to bomb the Marianas. This had set the stage for the invasion of these islands.

  “Good thing MacArthur invented this brilliant strategy,” Rusty said, which prompted groans from the Navy men and a smirk from Cotten, who served under the general. Despite MacArthur’s claims, the strategy originated in the Navy, largely based on war plans drafted in 1911.

  “Dugout Doug will continue to isolate Rabaul and advance toward the Philippines,” Cooper said. “He’s made a lot of progress in the Solomons and Papua New Guinea. He was also kind enough to lend the Scouts, so let’s play nice.”