“Boy, are we glad you guys could help us out,” one of the pilots said. Maybe it was the harsh lighting from the trucks, but he looked pale and shaken. It was a reminder that, in the end, the planes were flown by guys just like the ones on the ground. Even the most routine day might quickly become a struggle for survival, whether you were in the air or in the lush jungle.
At times the enemy emerged from hiding to make an organized attack. When this took place, it served as a reminder that the Japanese were far from defeated.
“I sure do prefer when they show themselves and attack us rather than sneaking around,” Deke remarked.
“Yeah, it makes it easier to mow them down,” Philly said.
Patrol Easy was accompanying the 305th Field Artillery Battalion near Villaba, helping to serve as their eyes and ears while the artillerymen wrestled their heavy guns down the muddy roads. Rain came and went, often in heavy downpours, so that Patrol Easy and most of the artillerymen wore their drab green ponchos. Rain sluiced off their helmets and made a constant din, reminding Deke of rain falling on an old tin roof back home.
There had been rumors that the Japanese were dug in along the ridges, ready with their own artillery. The 305th was being sent to fight fire with fire.
The artillery unit troops still got wet despite their ponchos, sweating through their shirts in the heat and humidity from the physical effort of coaxing their guns through the muddy places. There were an awful lot of those.
The 105-millimeter howitzers were mounted on rubber tires, now so liberally coated in mud that it was hard to tell where the gun began and the road ended. An erudite gunner could have pointed out that the word howitzer originated with the Prussian artillery and referred to the mobility of a gun. These guns were not all that mobile at the moment, being bogged down in Schlamm — to borrow another Prussian word, this one for mud.
While the artillerymen labored, Deke and the others dealt with the occasional Japanese snipers taking potshots at the column.
“Got ’em, I think,” said Deke, firing at a spot where he suspected a sniper was holed up. At least, the sniper had gone quiet.
Danilo waded into the brush to verify that the sniper was dead, somewhat like a retriever going after a downed pheasant. Deke covered him until he disappeared into the greenery. Danilo soon emerged, dragging a corpse behind him and displaying a rare grin. He deposited the body at Deke’s feet.
“One,” Danilo said, revealing that he could at least count that high in English. It was a reminder of the emphasis that had been placed on tallying the number of Japanese killed. Even Danilo had gotten in on the act.
“Hell, I don’t want him,” Deke said.
Nonetheless, Deke couldn’t help but study the body with some interest. The dead sniper was a small and compact man, likely around Deke’s own age. The ragged state of his uniform and a patchy beard indicated that the man had been living rough. Considering that the Japanese had fled into the hills, the man’s appearance made sense.
Philly bent down and quickly went through the man’s pockets. There was nothing of interest there, other than what appeared to be a letter with the black-and-white photograph of a young woman folded inside.
Yoshio scanned the letter. “It’s from his wife,” he announced. “She says everything is fine at home and that he should be careful.”
“He ought to have listened to her,” Philly said. He glanced at the photograph. “She’s not bad looking. Maybe I’ll look her up when I get to Japan.”
He dropped the letter and photo into the mud, and they walked on.
Their destination was a distant ridge where Japanese troops had been spotted. One of the landmarks that stood out was Bugabuga Hill, a rocky outcropping that rose higher than the neighboring hills, resembling a crooked thumb rather than a middle finger. Raising binoculars to his eyes, Deke could just make out the distant sight of a Japanese battle flag on that peak. Something about it made his blood boil, and he would have liked nothing better than to sprout wings, fly over there, and rip that flag down. As it stood, it was going to be a long slog to get there.
Intelligence reports indicated that these enemy troops were under the direct order of General Suzuki, one of Yamashita’s minions. Along with his superior officer, Suzuki had played a role in the Sook Ching massacre in Singapore during 1942 — with help from the Imperial Japanese Army’s Kempeitai, or secret police, employing thousands of civilian males to intimidate the population and quell any resistance. The GIs didn’t know it, but they were up against a war criminal.
Along the muddy road, they began to meet refugees from the Japanese occupation of the Philippines. First, the refugees came in a trickle, and eventually there was a flood involving hundreds of civilians. Many had taken to the hills to escape the fighting during the US invasion, but now that the Japanese had themselves taken to the hills where the refugees were hiding, they were once again fleeing.
Deke watched as crowds of men, women, and children flowed against the advancing troops. They were ragged and haggard from living in the hills without enough to eat or proper shelter. Many were sick, struggling to carry young children or a few meager possessions. Some rode skinny cows or ponies. He could tell from their clothes that these people came from all walks of life, because under the mud and dirt some wore dress shoes or the remnants of a suit. They had all been thrown together by this great calamity that had upended society.
The sight would have been heartbreaking, except for the fact that there was no air of sorrow surrounding the Filipinos. Sure, they were exhausted, but they looked overjoyed to see the Americans. A few waved tattered US flags that they had hidden away and held on to all through the Japanese occupation in hopes of this very moment. An end to their suffering at the hands of the Japanese had arrived. They were flowing back now toward the areas that had been liberated by US forces.
“God bless you! God bless you!” cried one elderly grandmother in English. She looked as if she barely had the strength to stand. Deke gave her a chocolate bar, which she accepted but promptly handed over to a knot of small children nearby.
Deke shrugged and gave her another. “For you,” he said.
The old woman broke off a piece for herself and once again gave the rest away.
One older man paused to confer with Lieutenant Steele and one of the artillery officers, pointing out exactly where Japanese troops were dug in on the ridges ahead. It turned out that he had even made a rough map that would have gotten him killed if the Japanese had caught him with it. The officers thanked him, and the man shook his fist at the distant hills before moving on.
The road passed through open spaces covered in thick green cogon grass with a few binayuyo trees growing at the roadside. The binayuyo trees with their magnolia-like leaves sometimes had small clusters of fruit that resembled grapes. Danilo picked a handful and prompted Deke to have a taste. The dark-purple fruit was rather sweet and pulpy, almost like a prune or frost-ripened persimmon. The starving refugees were so hungry that they didn’t stop at devouring the ripe fruits but also ate the sour green binayuyo fruit out of desperation. Meanwhile, the GIs shared whatever rations they could spare, and then some, with the hungry hordes.
It became more apparent what the refugees had gone through at the hands of the Japanese marauders in the area. The survivors on the road were the lucky ones. As the troops advanced deeper into the territory into which the enemy had fled, they began to pass bodies that had been stabbed to death with bayonets or even partially beheaded. Some of the dead women showed signs of having been raped, their bodies left partially naked. Dead children lay near some of these bodies, indicating that mother and child had been cruelly killed by the Japanese. Clouds of flies and swarms of ants lost no time in descending upon the dead. Though battle-hardened, seeing the dead women and children was too much for some of the GIs, who stumbled out of the formation to vomit.
Deke felt his earlier fury grow. What the hell was wrong with the enemy to do this to civilians who were just trying to get out of harm’s way? It made no sense to him.
The intelligence provided by the Filipino who had drawn the rough map simply verified what the officers already knew, which was that the enemy was dug into those hills. It was Deke who spotted them, his eyes being some of the sharpest.
“I’ll be damned,” he said. “That hill is covered in Japs.”
He was pointing toward a ridge to the left of the landmark Bugabuga Hill. Sure enough, large numbers of Japanese could be seen scrambling into fortified positions. It was the most enemy troops that they had seen in one place for some time. They could handle infantry. What was more worrisome was that the Japanese appeared to have several artillery pieces that they were preparing to fire. Clearly, they planned to bombard the advancing American column.
Seeing the threat, officers from the 305th began shouting orders to get their own guns into play. The problem was that unhitching the guns from the trucks pulling them and getting the howitzers into position wasn’t a quick task. But to the credit of the drivers and crews, some swung their trucks around so that their guns at least pointed in the right general direction. The GIs on the road scattered to get out of their way.
Deke decided to do what he could to buy them some time.
“How far away do you reckon those Nips are up on that hill?” he wondered.
“A thousand yards, at least,” Philly said.