Lieutenant General Sydney Rowell, the new commander of the New Guinea Force was, whatever else, an honest, straightforward man who never beat about the bloody bush and he told it to the journalist straight: ‘As far as I’m concerned, I’m willing to fight and let the enemy have the rough stuff if he wants it. I’m willing to present the Jap with the supply headaches I’ve got. But there are those who think otherwise. We need a victory in the Pacific and a lot of poor bastards have got to get killed to provide it.’
146
Nor did Rowell try to hide from the fresh troops just what kind of battle they had in front of them. For Damien Parer’s great friend from Tobruk, the ABC correspondent Chester Wilmot, had now arrived in New Guinea and was present a couple of days later when Rowell addressed the assembled troops, in more or less their own vernacular.
‘You’re going to have a tough walk in,’ he told them. ‘You’ll need to be fit and you should be. But you’ll have to walk hard so don’t think you’re in for an easy time. Yes, I know what you’re thinking, “That’s all right for the old bastard, he hasn’t got to do it himself.” That is as it may be but I know you’ll do the job well. Don’t overestimate this little man. Whenever we’ve met him on equal terms we’ve cracked him hard. You’ve seen these Japs before the war—if you met him in a pub, you’d kick the bottoms off the little buggers—go and do that now.’
147
Potts himself also had a word with a combined gathering of the 2/14th and 2/16th before they left, to give them a better idea of just what they would be facing. As a rule, the men loved Potts and his quiet but effective way of going about things, sprinkled liberally with his very good sense of humour. In a way he was an
Australian’s
Australian Army officer in that he depended less on the pips on his shoulder to have his men’s respect and more on his manner and presence. When Potts talked you listened, not because you had to but because he was worth listening to. On this occasion Potts took the men into his confidence.
He acknowledged that the issue of supply was difficult, but expressed his confidence that it would all be sorted out by the time they got to Myola. What he wanted them to know was their overall goal: they were personally going to relieve the 39th, counterattack the Japs, retake Kokoda itself and then keep going so hard they would push all the way back down the track and ‘drive the Japs into the sea at Buna and Gona’.
The latest intelligence assessments at GHQ had the number of Japs on site as 1500 which, while considerable, was far from insurmountable. Pound for pound, Potts knew the Australians were better fighters than the invaders and he felt great confidence that they would do themselves and their country proud.
And yet one more bloke talked to the Australian soldiers before they departed. His name was Tom Grahamslaw and he was apparently some local cove, vastly experienced in the territory they would be travelling to, and would be attached henceforth to Brigade Headquarters as a kind of adviser.
In the early evening, the young ANGAU officer spoke knowledgeably about what the track would be like, how best to traverse it while conserving as much of your energy as possible, and how to maximise your chances of survival in the jungle. If there was a point Tom particularly emphasised, it was that the terrain they were heading into was nothing like what they were used to in Greece and Syria, and they had to be prepared for that. And whatever else, the soldiers had to make sure they treated both the natives they came across in the highlands, and the porters, with
respect
. The natives were good people, and deserved to be so treated, but they were also people that the Australians were relying on and it would be damaging on all fronts to get their backs up.
Maybe his speech helped, maybe it didn’t. But what Tom saw as he looked out was a bunch of blokes who exuded, above all, confidence. They clearly felt that whatever the track could throw at them, they were up to it.
Dismissed.
Ugh. The news was bad. An officer from the New Guinea Force Headquarters came up and gravely informed Brigadier Potts that, as it turned out, his men might be facing many more than the 1500 Japanese soldiers they’d estimated. Some last-minute intelligence reports had come in putting the original number considerably higher and adding that the coastwatchers had just reported that the Japs might have landed as many as four thousand extra fresh troops. Potts took it on board, but did not alter his essential plan. If there were more Japs on their way, it was all the more urgent for the Australians to get to the front quickly and get started, claiming as much valuable terrain as possible. And besides, Potts counted on having his third battalion, the 2/27th up there soon. It was just a question of more Japs to kill than he’d thought.
That night, the final night before the 2/14th headed off to they knew not what, Brigadier Potts did what most of the men, whatever their rank, did. He wrote to his wife back in Perth, and it was the last letter she received for some time. In his careful copperplate that night he started.
Sweetheart,
Can just squeeze in a line before it gets dark and the lamps are frowsy in any case…
Such lots and lots of things I see and want to share with you, marvellous views, colours, groups of people and thousand and one things that delight the eye, and I try and tell you at the time but it isn’t quite, not quite as nice as a squeeze of the hand and ‘It’s lovely, Bill.’ You darling…
We’re on our toes, in the chocks and aching to go… My dear delight. I’ve only odd waking moments to dream of you and worship the memory of you.
At night I sleep so solidly that I just don’t dream and when I wake it is too late. Oh yes, I know if you were near it would be different. Did you ever work out what a nuisance you were to an early rising cocky?
Has shearing been started at Percy’s yet? Don’t overdo things Belovedest. There is only one of you in the world. How are the bairns and Dad? Has he kept fairly fit or slipped back again? Can’t see the paper so goodnight Valiant Heart.
I love you,
Bill
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Sealing it up, he kissed the envelope, put it aside for his orderly to post and turned in for the night. Tomorrow was going to be a big day.
He couldn’t believe his eyes. In the early morning, General Rowell had just been driving past Seven Mile Airfield when he saw the most extraordinary thing. American transport aircraft. All together. Neatly lined up, side by side in two rows with each wing-tip almost touching the wing of the plane next to it. In peacetime it would have been perfect, an indication of a well-run operation with an emphasis on order and neatness. In wartime, especially given the recent experience at Clark Airfield in the Philippines, it was insanity! Here they were, presenting a neat target for enemy bombers. With twenty planes sufficiently spread out, and put in the revetments that the Diggers had so laboriously built, it would take twenty bombs to destroy. But all put together like this it would take just one well-placed bomb and the whole lot would go up. It was for this reason that the generally mild-mannered Rowell was unusually forceful when speaking to the American Commanding Officer, General Ennis Whitehead, later in the morning. Though it went against the grain to be just about taking orders from an
Australian
, Whitehead gradually took his point and promised that the planes would be immediately dispersed.
Osmar White and Damien Parer were among a group of correspondents who went up to watch the departure of the 2/14th up the ‘Kokoda Track’, as it was becoming known. They arrived in the back of a truck about an hour after first light on Sunday 16 August—an unusually lovely day, with barely a cloud in the sky, as if all were right with the world.
And sure enough there they all were. An entire acre of a beautiful green meadow flanked by rubber trees was filled with Australian soldiers, each making final preparations for the long haul ahead. As White noted, ‘their shirts were off and their backs were suntanned, rippling with muscle. They had set up Bren guns against surprise strafing—an automatic precaution that marked them as veterans. Some were singing, some writing letters home. One group had borrowed a small grindstone from the plantation house and were sharpening their bayonets, slouch hats pulled rakishly down and their eyes bright and reflective.’
149
It was an impressive scene and White had no doubt that he was looking at one of the finest bodies of fighting men in the world. The men looked every inch the epitome of bronzed Australian manhood that morning. Strong, tall, straight of back, clear of eye, purposeful. There was a bloody tough job to do and they were the men to do it. They had trained for this campaign and they were ready for it. But still…
But still, for the first time Osmar had a few doubts. Yes, these blokes were strong, but they were carrying packs filled with bedding, clothing, mess tins, half dixie, groundsheet, ammunition, five days’ worth of biscuits and bully beef—and all of it put together, with the steel helmets perched atop their heads, weighing sixty-five pounds! That very morning, each man had been issued with an extra bandolier of fifty rounds of ammunition, just on the off-chance that there was some problem with supplies at Myola. And some men, besides, were also obliged to carry either mortars or mortar ammunition, while still others were laden down with signals equipment.
Having himself experienced the kind of track they were about to travel, Osmar White wondered whether they could travel it and still be in shape for the fight when they arrived. And while they really were accomplished veterans of battle in the Middle East, the fact that they had their shirts off showed they were neophytes in New Guinea where the tiniest sting of a mosquito could bring the same result as a bullet from a Japanese Juki machine gun. And of those Japanese guns, White already knew, there would be many, and they would be manned by ruthless veterans in their own right.
There was no way around it. As he gazed out upon the assembled soldiery he could not escape the thought, as he later recounted, ‘of how many of them would never again see this quiet grove, the trees tinged with red with brief winter, or feel the caress of the coarse grass, or lie on their backs watching the trade-wind clouds race over a sunny sky.’
150
Certainly White wasn’t alone in wondering exactly that. And the army itself had already taken some precautions. Each soldier about to head off into the ‘Jaws of Hell’ had two identity discs hanging around his neck; these were known to the soldiers themselves as ‘dead meat tickets’. If a man was killed, one of the discs would be left in his mouth to allow the clean-up brigade to identify his name, army number and religion, while the other would be handed to the commanding officer as proof of the death. It also bore a man’s blood group, as an aid to the medical corps if he was so badly injured that he couldn’t speak for himself.
On that same morning, some four hundred miles to the northwest, there was a lot of action down at the principal pier of Rabaul’s magnificent Simpson Harbour. Yet
more
crack Japanese troops of the South Seas Force—these ones entirely unknown to Australian Intelligence or the coastwatchers—were being loaded onto ships for the short trip to Gona. Just before filing up the gangplank, each Japanese soldier turned and made a deep ritual bow in the direction of the Emperor’s palace in Tokyo, then turned and walked up into the hot, humid holds of the ship.
These reinforcements, ordered by General Horii, were soon ready and, shortly, two full battalions of the 41st Regiment would be on their way south to mop up what was left of the Australian resistance. They would sail fully laden with 230 horses and 175 Rabaul natives to help move supplies and construct roads.
Most nervous were the natives. Never in their lives had they left the environs of their island, and now they were being herded on to some kind of massive vessel, taken to an unknown fate, by these evil men who had so recently invaded their tranquillity. Not even the point of a bayonet could make them go into the hold of the ship, so they were left on the deck in the charge of Second Lieutenant Noda Hidetaka. He knew he shouldn’t, but Hidetaka looked upon the whimpering, fearful natives with some sympathy. What was
wrong
with him? Why did he get these feelings of concern for others, when it was against everything he had been trained for? It was like what happened at a recent sick parade, as he had recently confided to his diary:
‘Today the Medical inspection of those weakened by sickness was carried out to determine whether or not they are sufficiently fit for battle. The leaders of our company were present… I myself am inclined to leave behind many of those who are not really fit. Can it be that I am not sufficiently ruthless? It is a matter regarding which some self examination is necessary. I am worried because I cannot unconcernedly overlook another’s troubles… I feel that I am becoming detached from my comrades through insufficient mental discipline. Diligent people talk of their hopes. Lazy people bemoan their misfortunes. I will rectify my lack of mental discipline by diligence and industry.’
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Just like he had been taught. But for now there was nothing for it but to settle in with the nervous natives and hope that he could summon the required ruthlessness once they landed and started the campaign proper against the Australians.