by Len Levinson
“Let’s go to the map,” said General Krueger.
The men arose and carried their glasses to the immense map hung on the wall to the left of General Krueger’s desk. New Guinea was shaped something like a hot dog on the map, with its west end somewhat higher than its east end, about two feet long. General Hawkins located Hollandia on the northern coast of New Guinea, approximately midway between the end of the Vogelkop Peninsula to the west and Milne Bay to the east. Aitape was 125 miles east of Hollandia, and Wewak, where the Japanese Fifty-first Division was believed to be located, was 100 miles east of Aitape.
“Just tell me one thing,” General Hawkins asked. “Do we know whether or not the Jap Fifty-first Division is already on its way to Aitape?”
“Light contact has already been made with patrols of Japs believed to be from the Fifty-first Division,” General Krueger replied.
General Hawkins frowned. The situation wasn’t very good. The Japs might attack before he had time to deploy his men adequately. It could be a very difficult and costly battle.
“One more question before you begin,” General Hawkins said. “Do we know whether the two Jap divisions in Madang are on the move yet?”
“We believe that they are,” General Eichelberger replied. He was standing to the left of the map, and General Krueger stood to the right.
“Let me begin at the beginning,” General Krueger said. He placed his long forefinger on the map near Madang and said: “The Jap Eighteenth Army is headquartered here under the command of Lieutenant General Hatazo Adachi. He moved his headquarters to New Guinea in March; previously he was in Rabaul. His Fifty-first Division arrived the same month. His Forty-first Division came here from China about the same time. His Twentieth Division has been here for quite some time. All three divisions were badly battered on the Huon Peninsula, but they still have a lot of fight in them. We estimate their total strength at around twenty thousand combat effectives, but only their Twentieth Division, consisting of perhaps six or seven thousand men, presents an immediate threat to Aitape.
“For our part,” General Krueger continued, “we have two regimental combat teams, the 163rd and 127th, at Aitape, commanded by General Hall. Their combined total is ten thousand men, and at first we believed they would be sufficient to defend Aitape against the Japs. But we’ve decided to be safe, because for all we know, the rest of the Jap army might be right behind their Twentieth Division, and we don’t know for sure what Japs might be west or south of Aitape. It has been decided that General Hall’s men will basically defend Aitape, while the Eighty-first Division will land here"—General Krueger pointed to a spot on the map east of Aitape—"and act as a block against any Japanese attack from Wewak.” General Krueger lowered his hand and turned toward General Hawkins. “Any questions so far?”
“It seems to me,” General Hawkins said, “that if the Japs do attack from the east, my division will bear the brunt of that attack. Is that correct?”
“It is.”
“How much time will we have to dig in?”
“Depends on when the Japs attack.”
“How soon will we leave for Aitape?” General Hawkins asked.
“Friday morning.”
General Hawkins blinked. That was only three days away. “That doesn’t give us much time.”
“You don’t need much time,” General Krueger replied. “Your transport ships are already in Pearl Harbor, waiting for you. Your supplies will be loaded tomorrow, and you will load the next day. The sooner you get to Aitape, the better off you’ll be—don’t you agree?”
“Yes, sir,” replied General Hawkins, because there was nothing else to say.
“You should be ready to leave anyway. You received your preliminary notice more than three weeks ago.”
“We are ready, sir, but we expected more than three days to get loaded.”
“You can’t always get what you expect,” General Krueger said. “The Japs aren’t going to wait for you. They’re going to attack as soon as they can.”
General Eichelberger cleared his throat. “That’s right, and they’re getting into position right now, while we’re talking.”
“Any more questions?” General Krueger asked General Hawkins.
“Not just now, sir.”
General Krueger turned to the map again. “Then I’ll continue,” he said.
General Hawkins and General MacWhitter returned to Clark Field the next evening at ten o’clock, exhausted and cranky as the result of the long flight. They were met by a contingent of staff officers from division headquarters, and General Hawkins told them there would be a meeting in his office at 0800 hours the next morning for all staff officers, regimental commanders, and battalion commanders. Then General Hawkins got into the backseat of an OD green Chevrolet sedan and fell asleep. General MacWhitter got into the back of another Chevrolet, but he didn’t fall asleep because of the huge quantities of coffee that he’d been drinking.
Both officers were driven home to their wives, who took them in tow and put them to bed. Mrs. Hawkins wanted to get laid, but the general couldn’t cut the mustard, and she didn’t press the issue. Mrs. MacWhitter didn’t want to get laid because she’d got laid that afternoon with a certain major in the Transportation Corps. She fell asleep, a smile on her face, while General MacWhitter stared at the dark ceiling of his bedroom, pondering all the imponderables of the battle that would take place to the east of Aitape, waiting for the caffeine to work its way through his system.
The next morning, at eight o’clock, the big meeting was held in General Hawkins’s office. He told the assembly of officers where and when they were going, giving them all the details that General Krueger and General Eichelberger had given him. He pulled no punches. He told them they were going into a tough battle and they wouldn’t have much time to prepare.
They’d have the remainder of that day and the next day to get ready to leave, and on Thursday they’d begin loading onto trucks for the move to the transport ships at Pearl Harbor. All men would be confined to the post. The officers could tell their subordinates when they were leaving but not where they were going.
The meeting dragged on, for there was much information to impart. A lengthy question-and-answer period followed. Finally, at 1230 hours, everybody seemed to understand what they were supposed to do. General Hawkins dismissed everybody and then fled to the officers’ club for a few martinis and some lunch.
That afternoon all soldiers in the field were summoned back to their barracks and told that they were moving out the day after tomorrow. They were ordered to settle their affairs and pack all their personal belongings into their footlockers, which they would bring to the supply room the next morning for storage.
The soldiers didn’t have many affairs to settle. They had no mortgage payments to worry about, no telephone or electricity to cut off, no magazine subscriptions to cancel. They just stuffed their civilian clothes into their footlockers, and a small percentage of the men had books to pack in with their civilian clothes. Some men tucked away photographs of their wives and girl friends, and others regretfully threw out their photographs of Betty Grable and Rita Hayworth.
They fidgeted and sweated as they rolled their shelter halves and pushed gear into their full field packs. Old veterans and young replacements dreaded the thought of going to the front lines. They didn’t know exactly where they’d disembark, but they’d been told they’d be in the thick of a brutal battle and they’d better get ready for it.
They hoped they were ready as they stuffed their field packs or sat on their footlockers, writing to loved ones back in the States, saying they were shipping in two days and telling then-wives, girl friends, mothers, and fathers not to worry, that everything would be all right, although the GIs didn’t believe that themselves. Each one wondered if he’d be alive two or three weeks from then, when the Eighty-first was on New Guinea and the bullets were coming thick and fast.
SEVEN . . .
It was the next night, and Buts
ko sat on an upholstered chair in the solarium, gazing out the window at stars twinkling in the sky. He knew that his men in the recon platoon were confined to their barracks, making final preparations for the move to the transport ships the following day. He had mixed feelings, because on one hand he wished he could be with them, but on the other hand he was glad he didn’t have to go into the meat grinder again.
He was worried about his men the way a father would worry about his sons. He was afraid they’d be lost without him and Lieutenant Breckenridge wouldn’t be able to bring them through. Lieutenant Breckenridge was smart, but he didn’t have the experience Butsko had, and experience is as important in war as it is in any other field.
“Hello, Sergeant,” said a familiar voice behind him.
Butsko turned around in his wheelchair and saw Lieutenant Breckenridge standing there in his fatigues. “I was just thinking about you,” Butsko said.
“Here I am,” Lieutenant Breckenridge replied. “I thought I’d take some time out to come over and say good-bye.”
“Well, have a seat, for Chrissakes,” Butsko said, pointing to a chair. “You’re not gonna run right out the door, are you?”
“I can stay a few minutes, but I’ve got to get back to the company pretty quick because we’re pulling out in the morning, you know.”
“I know. In a way I wish I was going with you.”
“In a way I wish my leg was in a cast so I wouldn’t have to go.”
Lieutenant Breckenridge pulled the chair over and sat facing Butsko. He took out a pack of cigarettes and offered them to Butsko. Butsko picked one out with his stubby fingers. Lieutenant Breckenridge took one for himself and Butsko snapped his Zippo to flame, lighting both cigarettes.
Lieutenant Breckenridge inhaled deeply and blew the smoke out his nostrils. He was still smoking his customary pack and a half a day; he’d been unsuccessful in his efforts to stop or even cut down.
“I sure wish you were coming with us,” Lieutenant Breckenridge admitted. “I’m going to have a helluva hard time without you.”
“Bullshit,” Butsko said, trying to give Lieutenant Breckenridge some confidence. “You know what you’re doing. You don’t need me.”
“That’s what you think.”
“That’s what I know. Just don’t take any dumb chances and don’t volunteer for anything. Stay calm, especially when the shit hits the fan, and you know it’s gonna hit the fan. Don’t ever be afraid to retreat, if that’s what you gotta do. It’s better to be a live coward than a dead hero. And whenever you stop someplace, dig in. Even if you don’t feel like it, dig in. If the men give you any shit, and you know they’re gonna give you shit as soon as they go ashore, just kick ass. That’s the only way to treat them. It’s the only thing they understand. You can’t reason with them because they’re too fucking stupid, and the ones who aren’t stupid are crazy. If you can keep them in line, they’ll come through for you; and if you can’t, you won’t last long.”
Lieutenant Breckenridge thought for a few seconds about what Butsko had told him. “I’ll do whatever I have to do to get through this goddamned war.”
“Now you’re talking,” Butsko said, a tone of approval in his voice.
Together the men sat in silence a few moments, thinking about the battles they’d been in and the battles that were to come. Butsko wished he had some more good concrete advice to give Lieutenant Breckenridge, but there was nothing else to say. If Lieutenant Breckenridge didn’t know what to do by now, he’d never know.
Lieutenant Breckenridge glanced at his watch. “I’d better get back to the platoon,” he said. “I’d like to stay longer, but I can’t.”
“I understand,” Butsko said.
Lieutenant Breckenridge stood and held his hand down to Butsko. “Wish me luck, buddy.”
Butsko raised his hairy right arm and shook hands with Lieutenant Breckenridge. “Good luck, kid. Keep your head down and kill a Jap for me.”
“I’ll do my best, Butsko.”
“I’m sure you will.”
They released each other’s hand, and Lieutenant Breckenridge took a step backward. He looked down at Butsko, and Butsko looked up at him. A few seconds passed, then Lieutenant Breckenridge shrugged and winked to break the tension.
“Well, so long, Sergeant,” he said.
“Take care of yourself, Lieutenant.”
Lieutenant Breckenridge turned and walked toward the door. A figure in white emerged from the dimness of the hallway and entered the solarium. Lieutenant Breckenridge’s jaw dropped a half-inch at the sight of the figure in white, because she was none other than Lieutenant Diane Latham, who’d pushed him off a cliff.
They looked at each other, and neither could think of anything to say. They passed each other warily, like two tractor-trailer trucks on a winding two-lane back road in Georgia. Lieutenant Breckenridge entered the corridor, making his way stolidly to the elevator, and Lieutenant Latham carried her tray of medication to the soldiers sitting at the usual ongoing nonstop poker game. She distributed medication to them and then worked her way around the room, finally stopping before Butsko.
“Time for your medication, Butsko.”
He held out his hand. She put the tiny paper cup of pills into it. He tossed the pills into his mouth, and she gave him a cup of water to wash them down.
“I see you just had a visitor,” she said. “He didn’t look too happy.”
Butsko held the cup of water to his lips. “You wouldn’t be too happy, either, if you were a soldier and you were going back to the front tomorrow.”
Butsko drank the water, and Diane Latham looked at him but didn’t really see him. In her mind she saw Lieutenant Breckenridge running through the jungle, bullets flying around him and explosions going off everywhere.
“Where’s he going?” she asked.
“If he knew, he wouldn’t tell me; and if I knew, I wouldn’t tell you.” Butsko handed her back the cup. “I got a funny feeling that he ain’t gonna come back.”
She widened her eyes. “What makes you say that?”
“Because he was wounded on New Georgia, and then he got wounded again on Bougainville right after we got there. I think he’s one of them hard-luck cases, and the next time the Japs won’t miss.”
“My goodness,” she said, “that’s an awfully pessimistic point of view.”
“It’s just a feeling I got. Might not be anything to it. I hope I’m wrong.”
Diane didn’t want to say it, but she had the same negative feeling too. Something told her that Lieutenant Breckenridge might not come back alive from wherever he was going. This made her feel bad, because she thought she’d been very cruel to him. It was possible that he’d die young, and she’d done nothing to make his life happier. In fact, she made his life unhappier because she’d pushed him off a cliff.
Diane Latham was a decent person, and she’d more or less forgotten about what Lieutenant Breckenridge had done to her. It didn’t seem to weigh as much as what she’d done to him. She couldn’t be responsible for his behavior, but she could be responsible for her own. She felt a powerful desire to apologize to him and wish him luck before he shipped out.
“Where is Lieutenant Breckenridge now?” she asked.
Butsko had been eyeing her slyly, and he figured she was thinking about Lieutenant Breckenridge out of more than idle curiosity. He knew enough about women to know that the ones like Nurse Latham didn’t hold grudges for long and felt guilty whenever they’d been mean to somebody.
“He’s back with his platoon,” Butsko replied.
“Where’s that?”
“What do you wanna know for?”
She looked away from Butsko. “I want to say good-bye to him.”
“He’s with Headquarters Company of the Twenty-third Regiment, Eighty-first Division.” Butsko told her where that unit was located on the post.
“Thank you very much, Sergeant Butsko,” she said, and she walked off with her tray of pills, passing them out to
the other men in the solarium.
When the tray was empty, she returned to the nurses’ station. She still had a half-hour before she went off duty, and she occupied her time with paperwork, glancing at her watch every few minutes, anxious to see Lieutenant Breckenridge and make everything right between them so she wouldn’t have a guilty conscience anymore. Somehow her entire relationship with him seemed changed, now that he was leaving for the front and might never come back.
Finally it was time for her to go off duty, but her replacement hadn’t arrived yet and she couldn’t leave until her replacement arrived. She called the nurses’ residence and found out that her replacement wasn’t there. As she hung up the phone her replacement appeared in front of the nurses’ station, only three minutes late.
Diane took the elevator down to the ground floor and walked quickly to her yellow Packard, putting down the roof and sliding behind the wheel, starting the engine and flicking on the headlights. She drove out of the parking lot and headed in the direction of the address Butsko had given her, aware it would be considered odd for a nurse to appear in male territory, asking for a young lieutenant. The men probably would think the worst possible thoughts about her, because men tend to think that way about women, but she wanted to see Lieutenant Breckenridge and apologize for kicking him off the cliff.
She drove on streets lined with barracks occupied by soldiers from the Eighty-first Division, and could see feverish activity through the windows and on the grounds surrounding the barracks as men packed and repacked, carried footlockers to their supply rooms, and tried to keep busy so they wouldn’t worry too much about getting killed when they arrived at the front.
