Pacing his office, he paused long enough to put his hands on his hips and glare at the territories on the maps still held by the Japanese, as if willing the enemy to surrender.
MacArthur’s chief of staff came in. Born in Maryland, Dick Sutherland had been raised in West Virginia and had come to the army by way of Yale. Thirteen years younger than MacArthur, he had helped chase Pancho Villa in Mexico and fought the Germans on the Western Front during the Great War. Smart and capable, he was a tough taskmaster who oversaw the headquarters staff with an iron fist and an unrelenting attention to detail. It might be said that he was the general’s hatchet man and lobbyist, which hadn’t won him any friends in Washington.
The two men had experienced their ups and downs. They had even come close to falling out over MacArthur’s disapproval of Sutherland’s mistress — the wife of an Australian army officer — until Sutherland had come to his senses. Sutherland remained fiercely loyal to MacArthur — if a Japanese assassin had burst in, he wouldn’t have thought twice about taking a bullet for his boss.
He saw MacArthur looking at the maps yet again.
“Kind of makes you wonder why they don’t surrender, doesn’t it?” Sutherland asked.
“No,” MacArthur said. “You know damn well that we wouldn’t surrender either. We have to keep hitting them until they can’t hit back anymore.”
“From your lips to God’s ears.”
Sutherland left some papers on MacArthur’s desk and went back out, leaving the general to his ruminations.
The map that held the most interest for the general showed operations on the island of Leyte, where thousands of his troops had recently landed.
“Sir?” Another staff officer who was far junior to Sutherland poked his head cautiously through the door. They all knew that the general didn’t like to be interrupted, but from time to time, one of them appeared to update the maps.
“Go on,” MacArthur said.
As swiftly as possible, the man made a few marks on the map and retreated with a palpable air of relief from the general’s inner sanctum. Tall and imposing, MacArthur’s regal appearance tended to have that effect on his staff. He was not one to engage his staff in hale and hearty conversation.
The fact that he called his junior staff by their rank and not their actual names had convinced them that the general did not consider them worthy of notice.
It was interesting that officers in different branches of the service seemed to favor a certain “type” or look. Senior naval officers preferred a thin appearance, skinny as the fox-faced Lord Nelson in an old oil painting. Sometimes it almost seemed as if those navy boys were having a competition to see who could be the leanest.
Army generals tended toward bulkiness, and MacArthur was no exception. Heavy through the shoulders and chest, with a thick neck, six feet tall, he somewhat resembled an old bull and could project an air of intimidation.
Early in the war, he had picked up the nickname “Dugout Doug” for keeping to his bunker while his troops fought on Bataan. Those who questioned his courage seemed to have forgotten that as a young officer, he had single-handedly killed several enemy soldiers in combat, both in Mexico and in the Philippines, sometimes against overwhelming odds.
Alone again, the general nodded with satisfaction at the updated map. Truth be told, he had most of the maps committed to memory, but they gave him something to look at while he strolled around the confines of his office. The general did his best thinking on his feet.
The lines showed his own forces were advancing and that the areas under Japanese control were shrinking. In other words, things were moving in the right direction. This was progress.
The only place where the positions were murky remained in the jungle interior of the island, where small US patrols battled like-size Japanese forces. Again, the general knew that “small” did not mean insignificant to the men fighting and dying in those battles.
He was sure that the Japanese commander, General Tomoyuki Yamashita, had similar maps on the damp walls of his cave or bunker or wherever the hell it was that he had gone to ground. The picture presented by Yamashita’s maps would be far bleaker, MacArthur knew.
MacArthur had successfully landed on Leyte, returning to the Philippines. His return had been a promise made and kept. Now that he had set foot on shore, he had to seize the rest of the nation from the Japanese.
He had not shifted his headquarters from USS Nashville to the shore, though that might have been more symbolic. From the general’s point of view, remaining at sea was strictly a practical consideration. The truth was that the ship enabled far better communication thanks to its powerful radios and electronics.
Simply staying in touch with commanders across the vast Pacific counted for a great deal in terms of military success. Also, the ship provided comfortable quarters and decent food.
There were also interservice rivalries to consider. MacArthur thought there was sound advice in the old saying about keeping your friends close and your enemies closer.
Being a guest of the navy was a bit like staying at a hotel where one didn’t need to be concerned about practical matters such as changing the sheets or cleaning the bathroom. MacArthur found that he could focus all his energies on the needs of his forces.
The shore was a short boat ride away whenever he needed to get there in person. For now, the reports coming in and the occasional updates to the maps provided all the information he needed.
The maps were carefully marked with troop positions, both those of his own men and, to the extent that observation and intelligence reports allowed, the disposition of the enemy troops.
Enemy. It was a powerful word, he thought. He knew that it came from the Latin word inimicus. Julius Caesar would have used the word to describe the Gauls or the barbarians of Germania.
The word implied a certain amount of hostility, even hatred. MacArthur searched his mind, then shook his head. He didn’t feel hostility. Instead, he thought of the Japanese as his adversary or opponent. People like Admiral “Bull” Halsey crowed about “killing Japs” to the delight of the press and presumably of the folks back home as well, a growing number of whom had lost husbands, sons, or young men from their communities in the Pacific conflict. It was understandable if they wanted some blood.
Back home, the US government had even seen fit to round up Japanese Americans and put them in camps to keep an eye on them. That action had been motivated in part by hatred and bigotry toward the Japanese.
MacArthur didn’t feel the same way. However, MacArthur’s equanimity toward the Japanese went only so far. In particular, he was concerned about the treatment of American POWs held by the Japanese.
Long before the invasion of Leyte, reports had come in of Japanese cruelty to their prisoners of war. The prisoners were generally American, British, or Australian. The cruelty involved starvation, beatings, and brutality of all stripes, even murder. He believed that captured soldiers should be treated with honor.
The very thought of the Japanese cruelty toward his men was one of the only things that really angered MacArthur. When it came to the enemy, it was the one issue that made his blood boil.
It was why he had made a statement about the treatment of POWs and punishment for those who harmed them one of the cornerstones of the speech that he had made on the beach a few days before. Once the Philippines were more secure, he planned to locate and liberate the POW camps as quickly as possible.