Honcho paused near Deke and Philly’s foxhole as he made his rounds, then lit up a cigarette and watched the plane overhead.
“He’ll let headquarters know if he sees any sign of the Japanese,” Honcho said. “I just hope to hell the Japanese don’t pull a Saipan on us.”
“If they come, I’ll be ready,” said Private Frazier, who was listening nearby, holding on to his BAR.
“That’s the spirit,” Honcho said. His expression didn’t match his words, however. His sad frown spoke volumes. It was as if the lieutenant had seen and heard it all before — which he had.
By now they had all heard about the fight for Saipan, where the cornered enemy had launched massive waves of banzai charges involving thousands of Japanese troops. At first the US Marines had been overwhelmed. Hundreds of Americans had died in the savage close-quarters fighting as waves of the enemy washed over them like surf dashing upon rocks.
Sheer firepower had eventually carried the day, securing the American lines and wiping out thousands of Japanese troops. In all of the war, including in Europe, there had been no other example of close-quarters fighting on that scale. You would almost have to go back to medieval times for something like that. No one was eager for that scenario to play out here.
So far the enemy seemed content to dig in and let the Americans come at them.
“Everybody get something to eat,” Honcho said to Patrol Easy and the platoon under his command. Although he had made no secret of the fact that he didn’t want to be in charge of anything bigger than the sniper squad, it was clear that he took his duties seriously. He looked around to make sure that the hollow-eyed, exhausted men were listening. “Make sure your canteens are full. It might be a long day.”
Honcho might have said more, but at that moment a warning shout was heard. Somebody was pointing at the sky. The US reconnaissance plane was still overhead, flying low and slow, but that wasn’t what they were pointing at. As the men on the ground looked up, they saw two aircraft drop out of the sky and begin vectoring toward Camp Downes. The roar of approaching aircraft engines was getting louder by the second.
“Holy hell!” Philly cried. “Those are Japanese planes!”
In disbelief, Deke looked up and heard the roar of approaching aircraft engines just seconds after he spotted the planes themselves, shooting like arrows above the treetops, almost impossibly fast. No wonder — top speed for a Japanese Zero was 350 miles per hour, thanks to its powerful Mitsubishi engine.
Deke’s sharp eyes managed to get a glimpse of the meatball insignia on the wings.
Zeros, all right. Two of them. Headed right for Camp Downes. Even with their foxholes, the entire unit was vulnerable to attack from above.
There was barely time to react. Soldiers caught in the open ran for cover or threw themselves flat.
Deke hit the dirt like everybody else, but he kept his eyes on the planes. Part of him couldn’t help it — he had never seen enemy planes this close before. It was both terrifying and fascinating. He gripped his rifle tight, cursing the fact that the weapon was useless against the fast-moving planes. By the time he got it to his shoulder, they would be gone.
The planes must have been launched from an interior airfield, possibly even the one at Ormoc — a perfect reminder of the urgency of capturing the airfield. Two airplanes weren’t going to win the war, but they sure could rain destruction upon the soldiers clinging to the beachhead and defending Camp Downes.
A new sound could be heard over the whine of the racing engines. This one sent chills down Deke’s spine. It was the chatter of machine guns blazing down at soldiers who scrambled to get out of the way of the line of fire. Each Zero was equipped with twin 7.7-millimeter machine guns, which were unleashing their fury at the targets below.
Some men were too slow getting out of the way of the bullets digging stitches into the ground. Hit multiple times, they went sprawling in the sand, never to get up again. One man wasn’t killed outright, but the heavy slug had broken his arm, leaving it dangling. As the second plane began hammering the ground, the man just stood there in shock.
Seeing the dazed and wounded man, Doc Harmon and one of the orderlies broke cover and ran to help him. Deke couldn’t decide if the medical men were brave or foolish. They got on either side of the wounded man and guided him toward the hospital tent. Its thin canvas walls could provide no protection from air-to-ground gunfire, but it served as cover, if nothing else.
“Take cover!” Honcho yelled, but it was too little, too late. The planes were already on them like hawks on a rabbit, chewing up the men on the beach with their heavy-caliber machine guns.
As if the machine guns weren’t enough, the planes each carried two bombs that they dropped with unnerving precision. These were small bombs, weighing just over one hundred pounds, which was just about all the extra weight that the Zero could manage. But what they lacked in size, they made up for in accuracy. Flying at such a low altitude, there was almost no way that the planes could miss their targets below.
Seconds later, the ground shook as the bombs detonated, filling the air with fire and smoke, shrapnel and concussion. Deke found himself diving for cover with everybody else. He got a mouthful of sand for his trouble, but it was better than tangling with the debris that spread overhead. When he raised his head, he saw a chunk of red-hot metal the size of a silver dollar embedded in the sand nearby, still smoking. If that shrapnel had come just a foot closer—
One of the bombs managed to hit a tank. It was hard to say if the tank had been targeted or if it was just bad luck, but the so-called Satan tank exploded in a fireball of its own, probably helped along by the fuel it carried for its flamethrower. The combustible jelly fed flames that spewed from every crevice in the tank. It was clear that the tank crew never had a chance. Maybe they never even knew what hit them, which would have been a blessing.
The result of that bomb strike was one less behemoth with which to dislodge the Japanese defenders around Ormoc. Here in the middle of the Pacific, a wrecked tank wasn’t something that could be easily replaced.
The twin Zeros rushed out to sea and turned as if on a dime, heading back in for a second pass. Those Japanese Zeros were nothing if not nimble.
The men on the ground were also quick. They had been through this before on other landings. The beach was not undefended. Antiaircraft batteries sprang into action, filling the sky with tracers and flak, trying to knock down the Zeros.
One of the planes was hit and began trailing smoke, but rushed away and disappeared toward the interior of Leyte. It would remain to be seen whether the plane reached its hidden base. The second plane strafed the beach one last time for good measure, its machine guns churning up the sand. Then it, too, vanished.
“That was exciting,” said Philly, picking himself up off the ground and brushing sand and gravel from his uniform and helmet. “I guess those Japanese still aren’t ready to give up. Nobody told them that the battle was over.”
“Nope, not until we’ve killed off the last one,” Deke agreed.
Looking around at the devastation, he felt a bit stunned by the attack. In addition to the burning tank, bombs had also hit one of the buildings at the camp, so that the building was on fire, its flames spreading to the thatched roof of a neighboring building. A handful of soldiers rushed to carry supplies out of the burning buildings before it was too late. Several wounded men lay on the ground, some struggling to get up, some not moving at all.