It is a cloudy afternoon here at our headquarters on Leyte. I will put down the details of our move and what has happened since our arrival so that I don't forget them. After waiting around for nearly three weeks the air echelon left Hollandia on December 1st. For the two weeks before we left we had an easy time. All the work was packed up and it wasn't possible for us to do anything so we met the Wacs down in the office and played hearts during the day. When we could grab a jeep we would go swimming and at night we had the jam sessions and shows three times a week. The ATC had a swell swimming pool that we frequented quite often the last three weeks that we were at Haollandia. On 2 December about 4:00 PM the loud speaker boomed out a list of men to report to the orderly room, me included. They told us to be ready to leave at three o'clock the next morning by air for Leyte. We still don't know what the deal was because Major Ching, who was going to be troop ship Surgeon, had lined us up to be the medics on the boat. We packed and were pulled out of bed at 3:30. About thirty minutes out of Palau we went into a strom that was so dense we couldn't see the end of the ship and proceeded to do a little sweating. The pilot went down and tried to get under i and up and tried to get over it. We broke through alright, however, and landed at Palau at about 5:30 in the evening. Palau is entirely a marine and naval base. The island is coral and was very cool during the night. The trees and buildings were all blasted to nothing from the naval bombardment that preceded the actual invasion of the island.
We are located on a beach about fifteen miles from Tacloban. Our headquarters is in the process of construction. Everything is in one building at present but three more buildings are practically completed and we are ready to spread out. We live in tents, which we pitch ourselves. Everybody has a foxhole for use during air raids. The first day I hired a Philippino to build me a mat, table, and frame for my mosquito netting and in payment I gave him a uniform. They are in bad need of clothes and food and have been very badly treated by the Japs. The women do our laundry for almost anything from a few Centafo's to an undershirt. We are all eating in the same mess hall at present. There are about 100 Wacs which arrived for the Wac Advanced Detachment. Since arriving we have had eight to ten alerts every 24 hours. The raids are generally carried out against the shipping in Tacloban Harbor or on the strip and as a result we are usually a few miles from the actual action. Whenever we have an alert though there is danger because ack ack opens up all over the place and the falling flak from our own guns is much more apt to hit somebody than bombs from enemy ships. We have only had one occasion when flak lit in our area. The second night, night before last, some flak or a dud (nobody knows) fell into our area with a whirring sound that soon got everybody into their foxholes. The Fifth Air Force headquarters has been having some trouble. Wednesday night when we had alerts practically all night long the Japs landed some paratroops (rumors ranging from 50 to 800) on Dulag air strip. The infantry wiped them out they hope, but the were disguised as Phiilippino's and may be in the area as spies. The paratroopers took over the L-5 strip at Fifth Air Force Headquarters and managed to cut off the Fifth Air Force for about an eighteen hour period. We then had some excitement because they tapped our telephone lines with Fifth Air Force and intercepted all conversations for a few hours before we found it out. The latest latrinograms have it that they have been wiped out now but it is hard to get the truth from anybody because nobody actually knows what is going on even though we are so close to the Japs. It is funny now that we are close to the front lines that nobody gets any more worried about us being in danger than we did in Hollandia. Raids and alerts are sounded and nobody even pays any attention to them until the ack ack starts shooting and then people start looking for their helmets and holes because there is danger. I have been swimming four times since coming here and when the rainy season is over it is going to be like a holiday resort. The beach is long and lined with coconut trees. The ships anchor off the shore and barges load our supplies directly into our area which saves valuable time and trucks that are generally needed to transport supplies from docks to the headquarters. The outfits are lined up along the beach and boats are unloaded right at the respective organizations. Occasionally the army actually tries to save time and labor - it is surprising.
The mail has been stopped since a couple of weeks before we came to Leyte. The post office closed up and I was unable to write for two weeks and now the rumor is that we will get no mail for at least two weeks. We have thousands of mail bags in HollandiaOrmoc today. The 77th Division went in behind the Japs and is heading to link up with our troops that have pinned the Japs in Ormoc the past month. They have over 25,000 troops in the Ormoc area at the present time. Our casualties for this campaign, while in comparison with Japan's have been low, have actually been quite high. The 21st Regiment of the 24th Division was wiped our practically to the man. As yet we have no bombers up here at all. We have six strips under construction but as yet only one of them is in use. We have P-47's and P-38's and some navy plans in use but no room for any light or medium bombers as yet. The 38's do a wonderful job of keeping the Japs away from our ships. I got an idea the other night how much more deadly naval fire is than ground fire. Get 500 ships in the same harbor and have them all open up with ack ack at the same time and you will have a wall of steel that you can climb up. One plane attacked some ships in the harbor and we could see the fire that went up from the ships that lit up the sky like day. We couldn't see the plane but the next day we found out that it blew into a million pieces. One of the Jap transports filled with paratroops was shot down two miles from here and nobody escaped alive. Outside of occasional skirmishes like these I have mentioned there isn't much excitement. The name "nuisance raids" is a good one because that's about all they are.
The war in Europe is still going full blast. The allied armies, today's "INVADER" says are inflicting 9,000 permanent casualties every day that war goes on. The eight allied armies are pounding the entire German line with everything they have got. The Russians are coming in from the other side and it is just a matter of time for the Germans to fold up completely. We were supposed to invade Midoro last week but as yet nothing has happened. We ill have to wait and see what happens. Yesterday was the 3rd anniversary of our entrance into the war. I am glad now that I didn't get into the war any sooner than I did because I am going to see enough of it as it is. Most of these guys have been over here for two and a half years and are going home for a month and then will be sent back here for the duration plus. It looks like at least two more years for Japan at the minimum to me.
No comments:
Post a Comment