Behind the Lines
Page 49
“There’s a list in there,” he said, and chuckled. “You’re supposed to sign for them, General. Otherwise, I suppose, they’ll start taking them out of my pay.”
“The gold will be the most valuable,” Fertig said when he’d read the list. “I’ve been signing IOUs for the supplies, food mostly, we’ve been able to get from the Filipinos. Money, as someone wise once said, talks.”
“El Supremo thinks that matchbooks talk, too,” McCoy said, chuckling, and handed Fertig a book of matches. On it was printed, “I SHALL RETURN! MacArthur.”
Fertig examined the matches.
“I’ll be damned,” he said. “Oddly enough, I think these will be very effective.”
“We have a case of those,” McCoy said, “and we also brought you typewriter ribbons, some uniforms—General Pickering got your sizes from your wife—and a case of scotch. These aren’t on the list of stuff you have to sign for.”
“Lieutenant,” Fertig said, “I am beginning to like you. In time, I may even forgive you for sending Captain Weston off on the submarine.”
“I had to do that, General,” McCoy said. “And it was a choice between him and Everly. The last time I saw Everly, he was a PFC. PFCs don’t rate too high with El Supremo.”
“Weston will see General MacArthur?”
“That was the idea, Sir.”
“And presumably, after you have analyzed my management of USFIP, you will report to General MacArthur?”
“I will report to General Pickering, Sir. And then he’ll report to General MacArthur. And probably the President.”
“You will, then, be evacuated from here?”
“The Sunfish is supposed to return for us—and to deliver some more supplies—on 14 January, Sir. There may be a little delay in that. Obviously, she can’t surface in the same place again. That’s one of the things that will have to be worked out.”
“General, I brought charts with me,” Lewis said. “Places we feel might be good for a submarine infiltration. We of course don’t know what the situation is with the Japanese, but...”
“There’s a lot of shoreline here. The Japanese can’t patrol all of it, all the time. But on the other hand, now they know you’re here, I’m sure they’ll increase patrol activity, both on the ground and by aircraft. Getting you out of here may be more difficult than getting you in. We have lost the element of surprise.”
Fertig waited for this to sink in, then went on.
“The reason I’m curious is that we have some people here—some of my men who are wounded, and whom we can’t care for properly, and some American civilians, including some missionary nurses—that I would like to send out with you when you go.”
“I think that could be arranged, Sir,” Lewis said. “If we succeed in unloading the cargo, there would be room for, say, twenty people. It would be crowded, but ...”
“I’ll make up a list,” Fertig said, and then asked, “You mentioned a case of scotch?”
“Yes, Sir.”
“Would you gentlemen care to join me in a small libation? I realize the inappropriate hour, but it’s been a long time....”
“That would be very nice, General,” Lewis said. “Thank you very much. Macklin, would you please go get the General his scotch?”
Without a word, Macklin stood up and went to fetch the scotch.
[TWO]
Office of the Military Governor of Mindanao
Cagayan de Oro, Misamis-Oriental Province
Mindanao, Commonwealth of the Philippines
1450 Hours 29 December 1942
“Let me be sure, Colonel Himasatsu,” Brigadier General Kurokawa Kenzo said to the Commanding Officer of the 203rd Infantry Regiment, “that I understand what you’re telling me. Your regiment, some twenty-five hundred men, took five days to find your missing patrol’s truck?”
“Sir, the General must understand what the terrain is like in that area. It is heavy jungle, there is no—”
Kurokawa held up his hand to shut him off.
“And that when you found the truck,” Kurokawa went on, “and the patrol sergeant and the truck driver—with their throats cut—you saw no sign of the missing patrol itself?”
“No, Sir. We have not yet been able to locate the patrol itself.”
“How many incidents of guerrilla activity does this outrage make this month in your area of responsibility, Colonel?”
“Twenty-two, Sir.”
“And how many Japanese soldiers have been murdered by these bandits?”
“Seven officers and one hundred and sixteen other ranks, Sir.”
“Counting the dead sergeant and the truck driver?”
“No, Sir.”
“Counting the missing four members of the patrol?”
“No, Sir.”
“That would bring the total to one hundred twenty-two other ranks, wouldn’t it?”
“We don’t know that the members of the missing patrol are actually dead, Sir.”
“I suppose it is possible that they are off cavorting in a brothel somewhere, but I don’t think that’s likely, Colonel, do you?”
“No, Sir.”
“And how many bandits have you caught, Colonel Himasatsu?”
“None, Sir.”
“Let me state this as clearly as I can, Colonel. The performance of your regiment is not satisfactory.”
“Yes, Sir.”
“You have two weeks, Colonel, to bring me some results. Otherwise, I will recommend that you be relieved.”
“Yes, Sir.”
“That will be all, Colonel,” Kurokawa said. “Colonel Tange is outside. On your way out, will you be good enough to ask him to come in, please?”
“Yes, Sir,” Colonel Himasatsu said. He bowed, turned on his heel, and marched out of the room. Colonel Tange marched in and bowed.
“If the Kempeitai can assist me in dealing with these bandit attacks on our forces, Colonel Tange,” General Kurokawa said, “I would be most grateful. I would also solicit any suggestions you might have.”
“General, the Kempeitai has thoroughly interrogated close to two hundred Filipinos who might have some knowledge of Fertig’s activities. Seventeen of those interrogated died during their interrogation. Unfortunately, I must tell you that I was forced to conclude that those interrogated knew nothing of Fertig’s activities before these attacks occurred.”
“Then may I respectfully suggest you should interrogate another two hundred Filipinos—four hundred Filipinos, a thousand Filipinos—until we find someone who does know something?”
“Further interrogations are under way at this moment, General. I will keep you advised, of course.”
“You wanted to see me, didn’t you?” Kurokawa said. “I forgot that. I apologize. It was my intention to ask you to see me, and when my sergeant told me you were outside, I assumed it was because I had sent for you. I confess, Tange, this business is upsetting me more and more.”
“Yes, Sir. We have heard from Signals Intelligence in Manila, Sir. They have provided me with a decryption of the December 24 messages from Australia to Fertig.”
“Anything significant in them?”
“Signals Intelligence believes it was notification to Fertig that an infiltration was to be attempted on the coast, south of Boston.”
“How far south of Boston?” Kurokawa asked quietly.
“Thirty miles south. Not far from where Colonel Himasatsu’s patrol vanished.”
“You heard they found the truck?”
“Just before I came here, Sir.”
“So there was an infiltration,” Kurokawa said. “A successful infiltration.”
“There seems to be additional proof of that, Sir,” Tange said. “Signals Intelligence has reported that communication between Fertig and Australia is now being transmitted over a far more powerful transmitter using a new encryption system. By a far more skilled radio telegrapher.”
“Does that mean we will no longer be able to decrypt their messages?”
&n
bsp; “No, Sir. But it will be more difficult, and hence more time-consuming, to perform the decryptions.”
Kurokawa shook his head in resignation.
“There is talk, Tange, that shortly we will no longer have the services of Captain Saikaku available to us. Anything to it?”
“That was another reason I asked you to receive me, General. I thought you would be interested in hearing that Captain Saikaku has been ordered to Tokyo to assume duties on the Imperial General Staff.”
“How interesting,” Kurokawa said. “He requested such a transfer?”
“My understanding, Sir, is that the orders came from General Tojo’s office. Three days after Captain Saikaku requested, and I granted, permission for him to use Kempeitai lines to communicate with his sick mother.”
“Do you suppose we dare hope that Captain Saikaku will convey to the Imperial General Staff our difficulty in dealing with General Fertig?”
“Perhaps, General. But I rather think it more likely that once Captain Saikaku arrives in Tokyo, he will quickly forget anything to do with Fertig.”
“Yes,” General Kurokawa said. “Especially his initial enthusiastic pronouncement that Fertig was a small problem that could be dealt with quickly and effectively.”
[THREE]
USFIP Field Hospital #2
Near Composrtela, Davao Province, Mindanao
Commonwealth of the Philippines
31 December 1942
USFIP Field Hospital #2 consisted of three thatch-roofed buildings on stilts in a small clearing in the jungle on the steep side of an unnamed hill, accessible only by dirt path. One of the buildings housed the medical staff, which consisted of Lieutenant Stanley J. Miller (formerly Chief Pharmacist’s Mate, USN) and his four assistants, Sergeant Waldron Barron (formerly Seaman 2nd Class, USN), and Sergeants Manuel Garcia, Luis Delarocca, and Oswaldo Lopez (late of the Medical Corps, Philippine Army).
The Detachment of Patients was divided, according to the medical judgment of Lieutenant Miller, into two groups. Those who had a reasonable expectation of survival were in Ward #1, and those who did not were in Ward #2.
“Doc, say hello to Mr. McCoy,” Second Lieutenant Percy L. Everly said as he and First Lieutenant Kenneth R. McCoy entered Ward #2.
Chief Miller, whose only item of uniform clothing was his now badly tattered brimmed chief petty officer’s cap, raised his eyes from the emaciated, sweat-soaked Filipino lying on a crude cot and saw a young man dressed in loose black clothing. He noticed that the young man looked well fed, and was carrying in his hand what looked like a miniature rifle.
He nodded, just barely perceptibly, but did not speak.
“Chief,” McCoy said.
“We brought you stuff,” Everly said.
“Like what?” Chief Miller asked.
“Rice, a couple of porkers on the hoof, pineapples, and a bottle of booze,” Everly said, and handed Miller a bottle of Famous Grouse.
“Jesus Christ, where did you get this?” Miller asked, taking the bottle from him and looking at him wonderingly.
“And this,” McCoy said, and handed Chief Miller the rucksack that had been hanging from his shoulder.
Miller carefully laid the whiskey bottle on the bamboo floor, then took the rucksack and opened it. It contained a number of flat parcels packaged in a shiny opaque material strange to Miller. He looked up at McCoy curiously. McCoy was in the process of drawing a knife from a sheath strapped to his lower left arm. He handed the knife to Miller, who slit open one of the plastic-wrapped packages. He reached inside and removed from it a half-dozen flat olive-drab packages approximately 1.5 inches square. After placing all but one back in the plastic package, he examined the one in his hand very carefully.
“You know what this is?” McCoy asked.
“Yeah, I know what sulfanilamide is,” Miller said. “How much of it do you have?”
“Two more bags like that with us,” McCoy replied. “And another dozen bags back with General Fertig.”
“What is that stuff, Doc?” Everly asked.
Miller bent over the patient on the crude cot, carefully pulled a blood-soaked bandage from the Filipino’s side, then tore open the olive-drab envelope and sprinkled the white powder it contained on the ugly, obviously infected wound.
“This stuff was invented by a chemist named Roblin—he works for Lederle Laboratories. The original stuff came from the aspirin people, Bayer, in Germany.”
“What’s it do?” Everly asked.
“It’s an antibacterial,” Chief Miller said, conversationally. “It kills infection. If it’s as good as advertised, it’ll keep this guy alive.”
“No shit?” Everly asked.
“I never expected to see any here,” Chief Miller said. “Where did you come from, Mr. McCoy?” Before McCoy could answer, Miller went on. “Did you bring me anything else?”
“Morphine, field surgeon’s kits, Atabrine ...”
“Jesus Christ! Where did you come from?”
“Off a submarine,” Everly replied for him.
“What are you doing here?”
“I need a list of things you need. You get three thousand pounds in the first shipment.”
“Christ, I need everything!” Miller said, gesturing around Ward #2.
“You get three thousand pounds in the first shipment,” McCoy repeated. “Nothing weighing more than fifty pounds. More later.”
“When’s the first shipment?”
“The Sunfish is due back here 14 January,” McCoy said.
“How are they going to know what to bring?”
“You tell me what you want in your three thousand pounds,” McCoy said. “That’ll be radioed from Fertig’s headquarters.”
“You ought to see the way they’ve got that fixed, Doc,” Everly said.
Miller looked at him in confusion.
“Everything is on a list of numbers. Like, .45 ammo, one 600-round case is number 606, or some shit. All they radio is four-dash-six-oh-six, and they’ll load four cases of .45 ammo.”
“We need your list as soon as possible,” McCoy said, handing him a mimeographed list of available medical supplies.
“Christ, Doc, you wouldn’t believe what they brought us,” Sergeant Waldron Barron, a small, very thin, bony-featured twenty-two-year-old, said, coming into Ward #2. “Bags of rice, six fucking pigs!”
“Mr. McCoy also brought some gold,” Everly said. “Amazing what stuff comes out of hiding when you start paying with twenty-dollar gold pieces.”
“Did you bring any dressings?” Miller asked. “I mean now.”
“Standard field compresses,” McCoy said.
“Start in here, Barron,” Miller ordered. “Take off every bandage. Sprinkle the wound with sulfanilamide ...”
“With what?” Sergeant Barron asked.
“This stuff,” Miller said, taking another envelope from the package. “Watch what I do.”
He demonstrated.
“Then put on fresh dressings.”
“What is that stuff?”
“It kills infections, or it’s supposed to.”
“I’ll be damned,” Sergeant Barron said. “It really works?”
“It’s supposed to,” McCoy said.
“Christ, is that a bottle of whiskey?” Barron asked, spotting the Famous Grouse.
Miller picked it up and twisted the cap off.
“One drink,” he said, handing the bottle to Barron. “And then get to work.”
Barron looked at the bottle.
“The guy with the knee wound needs this more than I do, Chief.”
“We also have some morphine.”
“Then I will have a little taste,” Sergeant Barron said, and raised the bottle to his mouth.
[FOUR]
United States Submarine Sunfish
161° 27” East Longitude 5° 19” West Latitude
Philippine Sea
0505 Hours 4 January 1943
First Lieutenant (Captain, USFIP) James B. We
ston, USMC, put his head through the hatch in the deck of the conning tower.
“Permission to come up, Sir?” he called.
Lieutenant Commander Warren T. Houser, USN, took the binoculars from his eyes and looked down at the blond-bearded head.
“If I have told you oncet, Mr. Supercargo, I have told you thrice, you have the privilege of the bridge.”
“Thank you, Sir,” Weston said, and came through the hatch.
He was wearing khakis, and, aside from the beard, was indistinguishable from the other three officers on the bridge.
Nine days previously, orders had been transmitted to the Sunfish: OPERATIONAL IMMEDIATE
2105 GREENWICH 25 DEC 1942
FROM CINCPAC
TO SUNFISH
(1) PROCEED AT BEST SPEED CONSISTENT WITH FUEL EXHAUSTION TO COORDINATES SEVEN EIGHT ZERO XXX ONE FOUR NINE. RESERVE SUFFICIENT FUEL TO SUBSEQUENTLY PROCEED AT NORMAL SPEED TO COORDINATES SEVEN FOUR FOUR XXX TEN NINE SIX.
(2) COMMENCING 1 JAN 43 ADVISE DURING SCHEDULED CONTACT ESTIMATED TIME ARRIVAL COORDINATES SEVEN EIGHT ZERO XXX ONE FOUR NINE.
(3) PREPARE TO TRANSFER SUPERCARGO AT COORDINATES SEVEN EIGHT ZERO XXX ONE FOUR NINE. FURTHER DETAILS TO FOLLOW.
BY DIRECTION CINCPAC.
WAGAM RADM USN
When laid over the chart, coordinates 774 X 096—according to the SOI for the date of reception; they changed daily—were those of Espíritu Santo. It was reasonable to assume that the Sunfish would be refueled there.
Coordinates 780 X 149, when laid over the chart, showed an empty expanse of water in the South Pacific Ocean several hundred miles from Espíritu Santo.
To avoid detection by Japanese aircraft and/or surface vessels, the Sunfish had traveled submerged during the daylight hours for four days after leaving Mindanao. This permitted a submerged cruising speed, on her four battery-powered 2,085 Shaft Horse Power electric motors, of approximately eight nautical miles per hour. She had surfaced just after nightfall on each of the first four days—bringing very welcome fresh air into her hull—and switched to her four 4,300 SHP diesel engines. While simultaneously recharging her batteries, this had permitted a fuel-economy-be-damned speed on the surface of approximately seventeen nautical miles per hour.