Now MacArthur was no longer leading a single unit on the battlefield but commanding an invasion force. All in all, his daring gunplay decades before was hard to square with the regal general currently looking over the maps and pages of typewritten documents.
There was a knock on the door, and an aide entered.
“Here are the latest reports, sir,” the aide said.
Inwardly MacArthur groaned. It sometimes seemed as if he would be buried in reports. Each day he seemed to face a blizzard of paper. “Anything I should take a look at right away?”
“I think it’s just the usual chatter, sir. Troop movements, mostly. Whatever our codebreakers were able to pick up.”
“Just put them there with the others.”
“Yes, sir.”
“Thank you, Jim.”
The aide did as he was told and then quickly retreated from the office.
Thankfully, the aide shut the door behind him, drowning out the sounds of the busy outer office.
For his headquarters, MacArthur had chosen to establish operations in the Australian Mutual Provident Society Building in Brisbane, in part because that city offered the best access to communication with MacArthur’s widespread military operations in the Pacific.
The reports that the aide had delivered largely came from Ultra, which was the secret US system used to break Japanese military codes. The intelligence had proved invaluable for planning purposes. It was like putting an ear to some enemy general’s door and listening in.
Of course, the Japanese had their own ears at the Americans’ door.
MacArthur had thought a lot about the Japanese. He thought that the best way to defeat an enemy was to understand him. He sometimes dwelled on what his adversary might be thinking about him. Trying to anticipate his next move. Probing for weakness. Using his strength against him. MacArthur had no particular hatred for the Japanese. He didn’t go around crowing about killing Japs as Admiral “Bull” Halsey did. For MacArthur, the Japanese were simply a problem to solve, and he loved the challenge of a smart adversary.
Later he would see the results of their heavy hand — even atrocities — in his beloved Philippines with distaste and sadness, but not with enmity toward all Japanese. MacArthur would eventually see to it that the bad apples were hanged for their war crimes.
He sat down, then stood up again, got out from behind the desk, and began to walk around the office, both hands clasped behind his back.
Although he was well into his sixties, he had a great deal of energy, a man very much in his prime. He was ambitious to the point that he’d even had his eye on the White House. Tall and imposing, he possessed the physical charisma of a Washington or a Lee. If he’d been a film star instead of a soldier, central casting would have picked him as a Hollywood version of a commanding officer.
But MacArthur was no empty uniform or Hollywood actor. He was, in fact, a military mastermind who usually managed to stay not just two steps ahead of the Japanese, but also at least one step ahead of the competing officers in other branches of the service.
After all, there were only so many resources to go around. This meant that each command-level officer had to be an advocate and even something of a robber baron at heart by promoting his own branch of the service and his own strategies, sometimes to the detriment of other forces. The role played by Australian and British forces added a whole new layer to the politics of it all. They were Allies — to a point.
At command level, these interservice rivalries could be bitter, akin to a blood sport. Fortunately the commanders did manage to set aside their differences when it came to defeating the Japanese. No one ever seemed to lose sight of the fact that the real enemy flew the Rising Sun banner. When push came to shove, rivalries fell aside in the name of victory.
It wasn’t always a perfect arrangement, but it was far better than the piecemeal way that the Japanese Army and Navy interacted, resulting in a dysfunctional overall military strategy. Their lack of coordination sometimes made it seem as if they were fighting two different wars.
Not that MacArthur was going to complain about that. The thought of the Japanese Army and Navy working more cooperatively made him shudder.
Lost in these random thoughts, MacArthur paced his office and read over the reports on his desk, then paused to study the maps on the wall.
Each day presented a changing situation. It didn’t help that the intelligence reports were continually mistaken. Just when the Japanese Navy seemed depleted, more ships would suddenly appear on the horizon. More submarines would make their presence known beneath the waves. There were times when so many enemy aircraft had been shot down, sometimes hundreds in a single day, that it seemed impossible that there could be more remaining. Yet more squadrons bearing the dreaded meatball symbol on their wings appeared in the sky.
On land, just when it seemed that the Japanese could not possibly fight their way out of the corner they were in, they proved everyone wrong and refused to be defeated. They would fight to the last man, exacting a terrible price and leaving the American troops to wonder, Why in hell won’t they just give up?
It was a source of exasperation but also of grudging admiration for an enemy that believed in total war and simply did not know when to quit. Even when the deck was increasingly stacked against them.
It was frankly amazing that the island nation could produce so many ships, soldiers, and aircraft. Then again, what many Americans failed to realize was that Japan was roughly the size of California, a long broad island in the Pacific with a satellite of buffer islands. What Japan did lack was natural resources, being totally reliant on imported rubber and oil to keep its war machine going. In part this was why Japan had undertaken its path of conquest — to feed its growing demand for natural resources. But it had overreached when it had attacked the United States that awful December morning at Pearl Harbor. MacArthur had been in Manila at the time, and it had soon been the Philippines’s turn to come under Japanese attack.
It was hard for MacArthur to understand the madness that had come over the Japanese people. He had met more than a few Japanese officers in the years leading up to the war and had found them to be reasonable and capable.
Hitler he could understand — one man grabbing the authority all for himself, a charismatic leader who promised to lift up a battered nation. Japan’s descent into madness had been a more collective effort. The general hoped that American democracy would always remain strong so that same totalitarian mindset did not seize the reins of power. Would America’s system of checks and balances still hold up in fifty years, or a hundred? He sure as hell hoped so. Every man in uniform was fighting for that democratic future.
Since the string of Japanese victories in the wake of Pearl Harbor, the tide had turned, and Japan’s island empire was now falling one by one to US forces: Guadalcanal, Guam, Peleliu, Saipan.
MacArthur hoped to add the Philippines to that list. He put his hands on his hips, unconsciously striking a pose as if there were a photographer in the room — which often there was. Although he was alone, the general was a man constantly aware of outward appearances.
The Philippines would not be an easy nut to crack, not if reports could be believed that several hundred thousand Japanese troops were stationed there, well equipped, with plenty of ammunition and ready to fight to the death. These were tough soldiers, some of them even elite units that had fought in China.
Surely the Philippines would suffer in the process, and this thought saddened MacArthur terribly. He had a deep affinity for the Philippines and its people. He loved the islands’ rich history that mingled the culture of the Filipino people and the Europeans who had settled there, starting in the sixteenth century with the arrival of the Spanish. Since 1898, the Americans had added their own unique spice to the mix.