The Marine officer wasn’t amused. ‘Sir, I’m
Colonel Eastwood. I’m afraid the Marine Corps has too much on its
plate at Guadalcanal at the moment to be able to assist you
here.’
Some of MacArthur’s affability disappeared.
‘Then why are you here, Colonel?’
‘Sir, ever since the Marine Corps landed at
Guadalcanal, General Vandegrift has been trying to get more
aircraft for the Cactus Air Force at Henderson Field. The Japs have
been throwing everything they’ve got at us and we’ve managed to
hang on so far. But we may not be able to hold on for much longer.
At this very moment the battle for Guadalcanal hangs in the
balance. That’s why I’m here, to make a personal request on behalf
of General Vandegrift and the Cactus Air Force Commander for
fighters from the Army Air Corps.’
The men around the table exchanged somber
glances.
‘There are proper channels to follow for
inter-service material requests, Colonel,’ General Sutherland
snapped. ‘I would suggest that following them might prove more
fruitful than gate- crashing General MacArthur’s advance
headquarters here at Port Moresby.’
Eastwood’s jaw tightened. ‘With respect,
General Sutherland, sir, we’ve been going through channels for
nearly three months now and we’ve gotten nowhere. General
Vandegrift thinks that the Army Liaison Office in Brisbane has been
giving us the run around. He told me to do whatever I had to do to
try and see General MacArthur personally. When I was at Brisbane
headquarters again yesterday and Major Hunter told me General
MacArthur was in Port Moresby, I took it upon myself to come up
here.’
‘And how did you manage that?’ MacArthur
asked.
‘I tagged a ride to the Seven Mile Dome with
the Australian Air Force, sir.’
‘You’re very resourceful,’ MacArthur said
drily, then he added more accommodatingly, ‘I know well what the
situation is on Guadalcanal, Colonel, and I know that General
Vandegrift might lose the battle for that island, just as we almost
lost Port Moresby. But the Marine Corps and the Navy undertook the
invasion of Guadalcanal, independently of, and outside my area of
command and without my support. So it’s up to the Marine Corps and
the Navy to supply aircraft to Henderson Field. We all know how
difficult it is to get Washington to send men and equipment to the
Pacific, and because of that, each service must accept full
responsibility for the actions it undertakes. I know the Navy and
the Marine Corps call me "that brass hatted bastard" but the Army
has a war to fight too, and I need everything I have at my disposal
to defeat the enemy, and more.’
‘Sir, with respect,’ Colonel Eastwood looked
MacArthur directly in eye. ‘General Vandegrift asked me to remind
you that whether we serve in the Army, Navy or Marine Corps, we’re
all Americans. And if the Japs take Henderson Field and drive the
Marines into the sea, then thousands of Americans are going to die
and the United States may well lose the war in the Pacific. He said
for once we must all pull together.’
MacArthur stuck his pipe between his teeth
and stared into the top of the dinner table. After a few moments he
looked up and turned to the Air Corps Commander. ‘Can you spare
General Vandegrift a squadron of P-40s?’
‘Not a full squadron without compromising
operations here, sir,’ the commander replied. ‘But there are
half-a-dozen or so good fighter pilots who came here as individuals
from various places. They’re mainly ex-Far East Air Force. We could
send them as a unit, I suppose.’
MacArthur nodded approvingly. ‘If they’re
from Clark Field those boys will be some of the best in the Air
Corps. Could they reach Guadalcanal without refueling?’
‘
It’s about seven hundred and fifty
miles to Henderson and the P-40s have a range of eight hundred and
fifty miles, fully loaded. That doesn’t leave much room for error.
The prevailing south-easterly wind won’t help any so they’ll be
pushing it. But if we leave off their external bomb loads and send
them with just their machine guns armed, they should make it all
right, providing the weather remains good and they make no
navigational errors.’
MacArthur lit his pipe and watched the smoke
rise toward the ceiling. ‘Then send them,’ he said curtly. ‘Send
them.’
*
At mid-morning the next day, Dan and a group
of pilots stood under a clear blue sky beside their P-40’s getting
a final briefing prior to taking off for Guadalcanal. Beyond their
row of fighters, a B-17 Flying Fortress stood at the edge of the
runway, engines running, in readiness to depart the Seven Mile
Drome. Just as the pilots’ briefing was ending, a staff car pulled
up beside them, the doors flew open and General Sutherland and
General MacArthur stepped out onto the airfield. Everyone was taken
so completely by surprise visitors that it took a few moments for
the flyers to stand erect and salute.
‘At ease, Gentlemen,’ MacArthur said as he
returned the salute. ‘I’ve been told you men were at Clark Field
with me. You and I have been in this war from the very beginning
and we shall see it through together wherever we are asked to
serve.’ The general’s eyes moved slowly across the faces of the
young flyers as he spoke. ‘When General Vandegrift asked the Air
Corps to assist him on Guadalcanal we couldn’t offer him a large
force, but I know he will be heartened by the fact that the few
pilots we are sending him are among the very best we have. Good
luck to you all.’
Dan’s was the last face to come under
MacArthur’s gaze and the general’s eyes lingered on it. MacArthur
stepped forward, closing the gap between them.
‘Don’t I know you, son?’
‘Yes sir, we met on a train in South
Australia.’
MacArthur frowned for a few moments as he
tested his memory. Then he said, ‘Oh, yes, Captain Rivers, from the
Carrizo Mountains in New Mexico.’ He smiled warmly. ‘You always
seem to be where the action is, Captain. The Air Corps and your
country can be proud of you.’
Minutes later, after MacArthur’s B-17 had
lifted off heading for Brisbane the six P-40’s roared down the
runway and took off for Guadalcanal.
CHAPTER
NINETEEN
During the briefing at the Seven Mile Drome,
Dan was given the responsibility for leading the little squadron to
Guadalcanal. After take-off he climbed steadily to twenty thousand
feet then carefully held a direct course due-east for Henderson
Field. With the other five aircraft behind him playing follow the
leader, Dan just hoped the light south-easterly wind and clear
skies would hold for the three hours they needed to reach their
destination at cruising speed.
A little over an hour from take-off, Dan
picked up visual reference points. Far off in the shimmering
Solomon Sea, he saw Kiriwina Island, the largest of the Trobriand
group, and straight ahead lay Woodlark Island. He held his course
for two more hours, then the island of Guadalcanal rose up out of
the sea in the distance. Well briefed on the Japanese anti-aircraft
batteries on the island, Dan’s squadron descended low over the
ocean and gave the enemy gunners a wide berth when they neared
Henderson Field.
Dan had been told to approach the airstrip on
a course between Guadalcanal and Savo Island which lay about ten
miles offshore. The stretch of water was named Ironbottom Sound
because of the preponderance of sunken warships lying on its floor.
His instructions were to look out for the remains of a Japanese
pagoda-style building on a headland called Lunga Point. As he flew
towards the point he saw transport vessels unloading troops and
supplies on the beaches, while just offshore, several warships
covering the landing traced lazy circles. Suddenly a wave of
American fighters raced in to intercept the squadron but withdrew
as soon as the P-40s were recognized as friendly. Moments later he
spotted the old pagoda perched on a rise in the centre of a rough
clearing. Dan had been told at the Seven Mile Drome that the
structure had once served as the Cactus Air Force headquarters
until it had become a reference point for every Japanese warship
and aircraft attacking Henderson Field.
Without the bombed-out pagoda, Dan might not
have recognized the clearing as an operational airstrip. On his
first pass it looked more like a lunar landscape. There seemed to
be no activity, just a cratered, pock-marked, muddy paddock with
burnt-out shells of aircraft scattered wing-tip to wing-tip around
the perimeter. But when he pulled back the stick to clear the tall
palm trees at the edge of the clearing the airfield sprang to life.
Hundreds of Marines emerged from foxholes, waving and cheering as
the new squadron roared by overhead. Dan also caught a glimpse of
camouflaged aircraft in clearings close to the field, and beyond
them, a vast tent city of troops in the jungle beneath the trees of
a nearby cocoa plantation.
On the second pass the P.40's landed and were
directed to camouflaged dispersal areas close to the airfield
perimeter. From there, the pilots were taken to a command post in a
dug-out bomb shelter covered with felled palms trees. Inside the
dugout a group of officers were conferring at a makeshift table of
old ammunition boxes. The group broke up when the pilots entered,
leaving just General Louis Woods, the Cactus Air Force commander
and an aide at the table.
‘Welcome to Guadalcanal, gentlemen,’ General
Woods said without smiling. ‘The situation here is critical. We are
heading for a final showdown with the enemy. We know there is an
enemy task force heading for Guadalcanal from Rabaul, ahead of a
huge transport convoy bringing an entire division of
reinforcements. The task force will attempt to knock out Henderson
Field so the reinforcements can be landed unopposed. As you flew in
you would have seen our own troop transports and naval escorts in
Ironbottom Sound. In a couple of hours they’ll have finished
disembarking troops and the warships will head out, leaving us on
our own to greet the Japs.’ Woods shrugged. ‘But the Cactus Air
Force is used to that.’
The general paused and smiled grimly. His
eyes appraised the six young pilots of the Seven Mile Squadron.
After a few moments, he continued, ‘What we have here, is an
oddball selection of aircraft, begged and borrowed from various
places around the Pacific. Apart from our own Marine flyers, we
have Navy flyers from a flat-top that was attacked while they were
in the air, and we have more Navy pilots that set down here when
they ran into bad weather and couldn’t find their carrier. And
there’s a few Air Corps planes that we squeezed out of the Army
soon after we landed on the island. The one thing everyone has in
common here is guts. You have to have guts in the Cactus Air Force.
Some days our pilots are so exhausted they have to be helped into
their airplanes. Other days it rains so hard airplanes can’t lift
themselves out of the mud on the runway. But usually it dries
within a few hours of the rain stopping, so most days we have every
plane in the air. Night flying is out because it’s just too
dangerous. The general turned to Dan. ‘Captain, I take it you and
these men have had combat experience?’
‘Yes, sir, in the Philippines and in New
Guinea. And I was attached to the P-40 pursuit squadron that was
wiped out at Darwin.’
Woods nodded. ‘Good. Now I must tell you men,
almost everyone on this island has malaria and there’s no rest and
precious little sleep. By day, we attack enemy positions and hit
the Tokyo Express. That’s what we call the Jap convoys which bring
men and materials here from Rabaul. By night, Jap warships shell
the hell out of Henderson Field and while we’re sitting in our bomb
shelters with our heads between our knees, the Japs unload troops
and supplies on the beaches. This latest task force is the biggest
ever and if it knocks out Henderson Field, we’re finished on this
island.’ The general turned to his aide. ‘I’ll leave the major here
to familiarize you with operations. He’ll answer any questions you
may have, and get you fed and bunked down.’
‘Gather around, gentlemen,’ the major said
when the general left. He spread out a large map of Guadalcanal on
the table. ‘This will help you get your bearings.’ He pointed out
the main features of the island then pointed to several areas
shaded in red. ‘These red areas denote Japanese positions. As you
can see, Henderson Field is surrounded by the enemy and there are
also large concentrations of troops to the north-west of us.’ The
major tapped a shaded area on the map well out to sea. ‘This is
what we call ‘the slot’—it’s the route between the islands that the
Tokyo Express uses to get here.’
Dan pointed to an area on the map which was
shaded in blue. ‘And what’s in this area, sir?’
‘That’s the lower slopes of Mount Austen,
Captain. It overlooks Henderson Field and affords excellent views,
but the terrain is so bad that neither we nor the Japs have tried
to maintain a position there. We call that area Purgatory because
that’s where Japs from dishonored units are banished to and left to
fend for themselves because they failed their military objectives.
Under the code of the samurai they will never be permitted to
rejoin the ranks of fighting soldiers who have not been shamed by
defeat. They pose no real threat to us because most of them are
starving and riddled with disease anyway.’
‘How many men are there?’ Dan asked
‘We don’t know for sure. They seem to be in
small scattered groups but collectively there must be quite a lot.’
The major turned his attention back to ‘the slot’. ‘It’s up here
between the islands that you’ll be spending most of your time.
Every operational airplane we’ve got is up there again today,
repelling raiders and looking for that big Jap task force that’s
heading here.’
‘How do you know they’re coming for sure,
Major?’