Days of Infamy (25 page)

“But we don’t have those assets today,” Marshall shot back coldly. “So the President’s question still goes unanswered. Can MacArthur be supported if the Japanese invade the Philippines? The answer is no, and the sooner we face it the better off we will be.”

“We both know,” Stark replied sharply, “that inspection reports indicate a less than adequate level of preparation and training. The general himself said they were woefully underfunded, supplies were short, and it would take at least another year even to have a remote hope of a proper national defense force for the islands.”

“Then the answer is no,” the President interjected decisively, seeing that the normally unflappable Marshall was beginning to bristle.

This was not the time for an interservice fight to explode. He needed them working together. The issue in the days to come might not even be the Philippines at all; it could very well be Hawaii itself, or even the prospect of a Japanese carrier raid striking the West Coast.

Marshall looked back at the President.

“If the
Lexington
can cripple the bulk of their carriers later today or tomorrow, and if there is an immediate transfer of all carriers in the Atlantic to the Pacific, with proper mobilization of a marine expeditionary force, backed up by infantry and heavy armor and artillery from the West Coast, yes, it could still be possible to reinforce MacArthur,
but not to provide strategic relief. He is going to have to hold out for a year or more to have that happen.”

“But that is not possible now,” Stark interjected heatedly. “MacArthur had more than enough time to prepare not just to withstand a hundred and twenty days, but six months or a year if need be. He has not, and with the catastrophic failure to protect his aircraft he lost his first line of defense on the first day. Frankly, Mr. President, I think we will lose the Philippines and must consider them to be a writeoff. To try and venture a sortie with what resources we still have left would be to invite a debacle.”

“My God,” Secretary Stimson said. “No American military force of such size has surrendered since the end of the Civil War, and that was American to American. What will the nation say?”

“It is war,” the President said coldly. “That is what it must face now. It is war. The Russians lost three quarters of a million men in the Ukraine in August and still they are fighting. The British tens of thousands at Dunkirk, Greece, Crete, and North Africa. Gentlemen, we are going to have setbacks, terrible heartbreaking setbacks, in the months, perhaps even years, to come.”

He paused for a moment.

“Especially if Germany, as I suspect they will, declares war on us as well. We must see this through and”—he paused, scanning the room—“we must work together, without blame or recriminations for the past. I, too, must shoulder responsibility for what happened yesterday. It was not just the Army or the Navy that dropped the ball yesterday, it was all of us.

“Do I make myself clear?”

The four in the room stiffened.

“So let me conclude,” and he made a point of looking at his wristwatch. “I am scheduled for a call shortly to Churchill and have to attend to that.

“There can be no directives to our remaining forces in the Pacific at this moment without a complete sense of security regarding those transmissions, so we must leave control of the battle in that region to those on the scene.

“Second, and it must stay in this room at this moment and go no further. If the Japanese attack the Philippines, which they almost assuredly will do in the days to come, our forces there will be expected to put up a valiant stand, but there is little if any hope that they will see relief. We have to look to blockade runners, submarines, longdistance aircraft transportation, and other devices to get moral support to General MacArthur and his forces, but the fact is that we will be engaged in morale-building operations of help, not in a serious effort of relief. However, the American people will require us to do everything possible to help our young men and women who are now trapped in the Philippines. We cannot simply abandon them. We must use every creative opportunity to sustain their morale and get them help even if it is limited in quantity. Both our duty and our national will require this effort.

“Third, and most important, remember that Germany is the much more dangerous threat. Despite everything the Japanese have achieved in the last two days, they are a much weaker nation than Germany. The Prime Minister and I have agreed that we need a focus on Europe, and that defeating Germany has to be our first priority.”

He paused. Not even here would he voice the deepest of concerns, triggered in part by a letter from the famed physicist Albert Einstein. The briefings on what that letter had triggered, a secret known only to a few, were terrifying when contemplated against the backdrop of a Germany that had conquered the rich resources of Russia and perhaps the Middle East as well.

“Despite the legitimate rage the American people are currently focusing on Japan, we must not allow our emotions to cloud our reasoned judgment. We will do what we have to to contain the Japanese while we focus on defeating Germany first.

“Take the risks we have to with Hawaii, but remember we are now in a global war, and we cannot allow the immediate and urgent to drive out the permanent and important. Make your plans and allocate your resources accordingly,” Roosevelt concluded in a commander’s tone. Clearly, he was now truly speaking as commander-in-chief. His subordinates nodded yes.

“We’ll meet again tomorrow when the picture becomes clearer as to the fate of
Enterprise
and
Lexington.”

He rolled his wheelchair back to the door and knocked once. A Secret Service agent stepped in and guided the President out of the room.

Marshall and Stark sat back down, gazing at each other.

“If we tell Douglas he is a writeoff,” Marshall said, “it will be ugly. He doesn’t trust any of us on a good day, and this is certainly not a good day.”

“We don’t tell him,” Stimson replied sharply. “That issue is closed and, as the President said, stays here.”

DOUGLAS MACARTHUR WALKED
alone through the flaming wreckage strewn across the field, .30-caliber ammunition still lighting off from a burning P-40, at the edge of the tarmac.

His escorting guards, armed with Thompsons, walked just behind him, weapons cocked and poised.

Fire crews raced past him, most not even noticing the presence of the general, snaking out hoses in futile efforts to save what was left—and there was damn little left.

Inwardly he was now allowing a moment of self-doubt to settle in.

Intelligence reports had indicated that it was all but impossible for the Japanese to launch a heavy strike from Formosa. The range was simply too great; only their heavier two-engine bombers or his own B-17s could have leapt the distance. But they had indeed done so, swarms of their planes striking just before dusk of the evening before, all but destroying his ability to repulse an invasion.

General Wainwright, his second in command, walking by his side, had the good sense not to say a word, as silent as MacArthur was as he took in the scene of devastation.

Beyond everything else, they were cut off. The cable links via Pearl Harbor and Hong Kong had been severed, and given the severity of the onslaught, they could not trust any radio communications.

If the extent of damage to Pearl Harbor, which the Japanese radios were openly boasting about, was true, he knew he was indeed cut off.

Though he would never admit it to anyone, his hope of survival now rested with the ability of the Navy to send relief, and from past experiences, he held little trust that they would place him at the head of their priorities this day.

He finally turned to Wainwright.

“Make sure the surviving aircraft are sent out to secondary fields now. Prepare, as planned, for a Japanese landing on Lingayen Bay within the week, perhaps as early as today. I’m going back to Manila.”

Wainwright saluted, saying nothing as he turned and stalked away.

Once in his staff car, flanked ahead and behind by scout cars mounting machine guns, he started back to the city. Already, panicked civilians, particularly the wealthier ones, were loading up, heading out of the city, scattering out to the countryside to sit out the impending fight.

Plan Rainbow Five. Would Knox and Stimson, let alone the President, honor it? Or would they leave him and his men out here to die, forgotten, now that the Navy that was supposed to bring relief was at the bottom of Pearl Harbor?

He could sense the answer to that one. And he knew, as well, that the so-called fortress position of Bataan was that in name only. If forced back there, his forces would hold out less than two months. He had tried to warn them that he needed ten times the supplies provided so far, and at least another division, preferably two, of well-trained American troops to form the nucleus of a Philippines Defense Force. For what was obviously pending for these islands, the fault rested in Washington, not here.

Any hopes for relief were gone, especially in light of the civilian broadcasts monitored throughout the night, describing the bombardment
of Hawaii and what must now be a carrier battle off their coast. The Navy would undoubtedly lose more ships rather than pull back and regroup. While he thought it unlikely, within the week the Japanese might very well attack Hawaii again, this time with a landing force, and then he and his valiant men would be completely forgotten.

He was on his own and he knew it.

WINSTON CHURCHILL LOOKED
at the clock. The call was scheduled for fifteen minutes from now.

The night had been quiet, a nuisance raid of a few bombers an hour earlier, nothing of course anywhere near the dark nights of the winter of 1940–41. But nevertheless, there would be some more deaths to read about in the morning, a row of homes in the East End collapsed, or perhaps another beloved memory of London before the war gone forever. Or should one say “wars” now? He, like Roosevelt, had made an official call for war against Japan.

New situation maps were going up in the planning room even as he sat alone in his tiny cubicle of an office. The Japanese had already hauled down the Union Jack over Hong Kong. That was of course a foregone conclusion and he pitied the small garrison stationed there, the chaps knowing their defense of the city would be merely a symbolic one and then God knew how many years of dark internment afterward.

It was Singapore that was the concern, what so many called the Gibraltar of the East.

He thought of his friend, his “personal agent,” Cecil Stanford. His last report, cabled out the day before things had boiled over, was an update on the sighting of the Japanese transports, obviously
moving with hostile intent, past French Indo-China, and without doubt heading either for Malaya or the Dutch East Indies. Cecil had reported his intent of heading to the north end of the Malay peninsula to “sniff things out,” and he had not heard a word since. He hoped his friend was still alive up there. The Admiralty had reported their intent to stage a sortie by
Prince of Wales
and
Repulse
to intercept the Japanese transports and destroy them before they could offload. Gallant move, but it did cause some trepidation. Singapore, like so many other far-flung points to defend, had been far lower on the priority list for precious Spitfires and bombers, what with events in North Africa, the Middle East, and the bloodletting in the North Atlantic. He was assured that the battleship and battle cruiser would be beyond effective range of Japanese aircraft ranging out of Saigon, but nevertheless it was cause for concern. They were the only two heavy ships Britain had in the Pacific, doubly precious now that the American fleet had been destroyed.

Only four months ago he had been aboard
Prince of Wales
, crossing the Atlantic to meet with the American president off of Newfoundland. He had grown fond of the ship, the lads aboard who were obviously so proud that “their” Prime Minister, their former First Lord of the Admiralty, had crossed the Atlantic and back with them. More than one he had come to know on a first-name basis, and he could picture their cheerful eager faces. Those aboard that ship had become something personal to him, and he offered a quick prayer for their safety. Furthermore, Admiral Tom Phillips had been his planner for the seven months he was First Lord of the Admiralty before becoming Prime Minister. He had a personal affection for him. His thoughts had been going all day to Tom on that lonely bridge off Malaya.

The phone on his desk rang and he picked it up.

“Sir, we are connecting now to America,” a crisp young female voice announced.

“I’m standing by.”

He could hear the shifting in tones, a bit of crackling. This was a secured cable link, carefully guarded, a scrambling system installed
at both ends so that if somehow the Germans did manage to tap into it, all they would hear would be garbled gibberish.

There was a click on the other end, a voice with a distinctly American accent spoke.

“Mr. Prime Minister, sir, I will connect you to the President.”

A momentary pause.

“My naval friend?”

Who could not recognize that voice, Winston thought with a smile.

“Yes, my naval friend, and how are you tonight?”

It was a bit of a boyish code they had developed, given that the President had once been an assistant secretary of the Navy and he had twice served as First Lord of the Admiralty.

“I am well, sir, and you?”

“Your speech to the Congress today was riveting. It has galvanized the world to action against those perfidious foes we now face together in the Pacific.”

There was a momentary pause, a soft laugh. Both were masters of flattery when flattery would advance what they wanted. He took pride, of course, in his own ability to say the right words when necessary. He had known that Franklin liked to deliver what he called fireside chats, which had a different tone than parliamentary speeches, but the President had certainly delivered a historic speech when it mattered. He sensed that “a date which will live in infamy” would equal his own “we shall fight them on the beaches.”