With the Old Breed (37 page)

The column wound around and up and down the contours of terrain, which in May and early June was covered nearly always with slippery mud varying in depth from a few inches to knee deep. The rain was frequent and chilly. It varied from drizzles to wind-driven, slashing deluges that flooded our muddy footprints almost as soon as we made them. The helmet, of course, kept one's head dry, but a poncho was the only body protection we had. It was floppy and restricted movement greatly. We had no raincoats. So, rather than struggle over slippery terrain with our loads, encumbered further by a loose-fitting poncho, we just got soaking wet and shivered in misery.

We tried to wisecrack and joke from time to time, but that always faded away as we grew more weary or closer to the front lines. That kind of movement over normal terrain or on roads would try any man's patience, but in Okinawa's mud it drove us to a state of frustration and exasperation bordering on rage. It can be appreciated only by someone who has experienced it.

Most men finally came to the state where they just stood stoically immobile with a resigned expression when halted and waited to move out. The cursing and outbursts of rage didn't seem to help, although no one was above it when goaded to the point of desperation and fatigue with halting and moving, slipping and sliding, and falling in the mud. Mud didn't just interfere with vehicles. It exhausted the man on foot who was expected to keep on where wheels or treaded vehicles couldn't move.

At some point during our moves, our mortar section completely wiped out an enemy force that had held an elongated ridge for three days against repeated Marine infantry attacks supported by heavy artillery fire. Burgin was observing. He reasoned that there must have been a narrow gully running along the ridge that sheltered the Japanese from the artillery fire. He registered our three mortars so that one fired from right to left, another from left to right, and the third along the
crest of the ridge. Thus the Japanese in the gully couldn't escape.

Lieutenant Mac ordered Burgin not to carry out the fire mission. He said we couldn't spare the ammo. Burgin, a three-campaign veteran and a skillful observer, called the company CP and asked if they could get us the ammo. The CP told him yes.

Over the sound-powered phone, Burgin said, “On my command, fire.”

Mac was with us at the gun pits and ordered us not to fire. He told Burgin the same over the phone.

Burgin told him to go to hell and yelled, “Mortar section, fire on my command; commence firing!”

We fired as Mac ranted and raved.

When we finished firing, the company moved against the ridge. Not a shot was fired at our men. Burgin checked the target area and saw more than fifty freshly killed Japanese soldiers in a narrow ravine, all dead from wounds obviously caused by our mortar fire. The artillery shells had exploded in front of or to the rear of the Japanese who were protected from them. Our 60mm mortar shells fell right into the ravine, however, because of their steeper trajectory.

We had scored a significant success with the teamwork of our mortar section. The event illustrated the value of experience in a veteran like Burgin compared with the poor judgment of a “green” lieutenant.

The short period of rest in May helped us physically and mentally. Such periodic rests off the lines, lasting from a day to several days, enabled us to keep going. The rations were better. We could shave and clean up a bit using our helmets for a basin. Although we had to dig in because of long-range artillery or air raids, two men could make a simple shelter with their ponchos over their hole and be relatively (but not completely) dry on rainy nights. We could relax a little.

I'm convinced we would have collapsed from the strain and exertion without such respites. But I found it more difficult to go back each time we squared away our gear to move forward into the zone of terror. My buddies'joking ceased as
we trudged grim-faced back into that chasm where time had no meaning and one's chances of emerging unhurt dwindled with each encounter. With each step toward the distant rattle and rumble of that hellish region where fear and horror tortured us like a cat tormenting a mouse, I experienced greater and greater dread. And it wasn't just dread of death or pain, because most men felt somehow they wouldn't be killed. But each time we went up, I felt the sickening dread of fear itself and the revulsion at the ghastly scenes of pain and suffering among comrades that a survivor must witness.

Some of my close friends told me they felt the same way. Significantly, those who felt it most acutely were the more battle-wise veterans for whom Okinawa was their third campaign. The bravest wearied of the suffering and waste, even though they showed little fear for their own personal safety. They simply had seen too much horror.

The increasing dread of going back into action obsessed me. It became the subject of the most tortuous and persistent of all the ghastly war nightmares that have haunted me for many, many years. The dream is always the same, going back up to the lines during the bloody, muddy month of May on Okinawa. It remains blurred and vague, but occasionally still comes, even after the nightmares about the shock and violence of Peleliu have faded and been lifted from me like a curse.

The 7th Marines secured Dakeshi Ridge on 13 May after a bitter fight. Some of the Peleliu veterans in that regiment noted that the vicious battle resembled the fighting on Bloody Nose Ridge. We could see the ridge clearly. It certainly looked like Bloody Nose. The crest was rugged and jagged on the skyline and had an ugly thin line of blackened, shattered trees and stumps.

Our company moved into a smashed, ruined village that an officer told me was Dakeshi. Some of us moved up to a stout stone wall where we were ordered to hold our fire while we watched a strange scene about one hundred yards to our front. We had to stand there inactive and watch as about forty or fifty Japanese soldiers retreated through the ruins and rubble.
They had been flushed by men of the 7th Marines. But we were in support of the 7th Marines, some elements of which were forward of us on the right and left, out of our field of vision. We couldn't risk firing for fear of hitting those Marines. We could only watch the enemy trotting along holding their rifles. They wore no packs, only crossed shoulder straps supporting their cartridge belts.

As they moved through the rubble with helmets bobbing up and down, a man next to me fingered the safety catch on his M1 rifle and said in disgust, “Look at them bastards out there in the open, and we can't even fire at 'em.”

“Don't worry, the 7th Marines will catch them in a cross fire farther on,” an NCO said.

“That's the word,” said an officer confidently.

Just then a swishing, rushing sound of shells passing low overhead made us all duck reflexively, even though we recognized the sound as our own artillery. Large, black, sausage-shaped clouds of thick smoke erupted in the air over the Japanese as each of those deadly 155mm bursts exploded with a flash and a
karump.
The artillerymen were zeroed in on target. The Japanese broke into a dead run, looking very bowlegged to me (as they always did when running). Even as they ran away under that deadly hail of steel, showing us their backs, I felt there was an air of confident arrogance about them. They didn't move like men in panic. We knew they simply had been ordered to fall back to other strongly prepared defensive positions to prolong the campaign. Otherwise they would have stayed put or attacked us, and in either case fought to the death.

More of our 155s swished over, erupting above the Japanese. We stood in silence and watched as the artillery fire took its toll of them. It was a grim sight, still vivid in my mind. The survivors moved out of sight through drifting smoke as we heard the rattle of Marine machine guns on our right and left front.

We received orders to move out along a little road bordered by stone walls. We passed through the ruins of what had been a quaint village. What had been picturesque little homes with straw-thatched or tiled roofs were piles of smoldering rubble.

After bitter fighting, the Awacha defenses and then those around Dakeshi fell to our division. Yet, between us and Shuri, there remained another system of heavy Japanese defenses: Wana. The costly battle against them would become known as the battle for Wana Draw.

The boundary between the III Amphibious Corps (Marines) and the XXIV Corps (Army) ran through the middle of the main Japanese defensive position on the heights of Shuri. As the Marines moved southward, the 1st Marine Division remained on the left in the III Amphibious Corps’ zone of action with the 6th Marine Division on the right. Within the 1st Marine Division's zone of action, the 7th Marines occupied the left flank and the 5th Marines the right. The 1st Marines was in reserve.

Beyond Awacha-Dakeshi, the Marines next faced Wana Ridge. On the other side of Wana Ridge lay Wana Draw, through which meandered the Asato Gawa. Forming the southern high ground above Wana Draw was yet another ridge, this one extending eastward from the city of Naha and rising to the Shuri Heights. This second ridge formed a part of the main Japanese defensive positions, the Shuri Line.

Wana Draw aimed like an arrow from the northwest directly into the heart of the Japanese defenses at Shuri. Within this natural avenue of approach, the Japanese took advantage of every difficult feature of terrain; it couldn't have provided a better opportunity for their defense if they had designed it. The longest and bloodiest ordeal of the battle for Okinawa now faced the men of the 1st Marine Division.

For the attack against Wana on 15 May 1945, the 5th Marines sent ⅖ forward with ⅗ in close support. The 1st Battalion came behind in reserve.

Before ⅖'s attack began, we moved into a position behind that battalion. We watched tanks firing 75s and M7s firing
105s thoroughly shell the draw. The tanks received such heavy Japanese fire in return that the riflemen of ⅖ assigned to attack with the tanks had to seek any protection they could in ditches and holes while they covered the tanks from a distance; no man on his feet could have survived the hail of shells the enemy fired at the tanks. And the tanks couldn't move safely beyond the cover the riflemen provided because of Japanese suicide tank-destroyer teams. Finally, we saw the tanks pull back after suffering some hits. Our artillery and naval gunfire threw a terrific barrage at the Japanese positions around the draw. Shortly after that the tanks withdrew. Then an air strike was made against the draw. The bombardment of the draw seemed very heavy to us, but it wasn't anything compared to what was to become necessary before the draw was taken.

We moved from one position to another behind ⅖ until I was so confused I had no idea where we were. Late in the afternoon, we halted temporarily along a muddy trail running along the treeless slope of a muddy ridge. Marines of ⅖ moved past us going the other direction. Japanese shells whistled across the ridge and burst to the rear. Our artillery roared and swished overhead, the explosions booming and thundering out in the draw across the ridge.

Nearby our regimental Protestant chaplain had set up a little altar made out of a box from which he was administering Holy Communion to a small group of dirty Marines. I glanced at the face of a Marine opposite me as the file halted. He was filthy like all of us, but even through a thickly mud-caked dark beard I could see he had fine features. His eyes were bloodshot and weary. He slowly lowered his light machine gun from his shoulder, set the handle on his toe to keep it off the mud, and steadied the barrel with his hand. He watched the chaplain with an expression of skepticism that seemed to ask, “What's the use of all that? Is it gonna keep them guys from gettin’ hit?” That face was so weary but so expressive that I knew he, like all of us, couldn't help but have doubts about his God in the presence of constant shock and suffering. Why did it go on and on? The machine gunner's buddy held the gun's tripod on his shoulder, glanced
briefly at the muddy little communion service, and then stared blankly off toward a clump of pines to our rear—as though he hoped to see home back there somewhere.

“Move out,” came along their file.

The machine gunner hoisted the heavy weapon onto his shoulder as they went slipping and sliding around a bend in the trail into the gathering dusk.

We were told to spread out, take cover, and await further orders. Some of us found holes. Others scooped out what they could. Soon several Japanese shells exploded not far from me. I heard a shout for a corpsman and then, “Hey, you guys, Doc Caswell got hit!”

I forgot about the shells and felt sick. I ran in the direction of the shout to look for Kent Caswell, praying with every step that he wasn't hurt badly. Several other Marines were already with Doc, and a fellow corpsman was bandaging his neck. Doc Caswell lay back in the foxhole and looked up at me as I bent over him and asked him how he was doing (no doubt a stupid question, but my throat was constricted with grief). He opened his lips to speak, and blood trickled out from between them. I was heartbroken, because I didn't see how he could possibly survive. I feared that vital blood vessels in his neck had been severed by the shell fragments.