Free Goodbye, Darkness by William Manchester Page B

tragic tale.
    They had every reason to believe that convoys were on the way. Roosevelt cabled Manuel Quezon, president of the Philippine Commonwealth, then on Corregidor: “I can assure you that every vessel available is bearing … the strength that will eventually crush the enemy. … I give to the people of the Philippines my solemn pledge that their freedom will be retained. … The entire resources in men and materials of the United States stand behind that pledge.” General George C. Marshall, FDR's army chief of staff, radioed MacArthur: “A stream of four-engine bombers, previously delayed by foul weather, is enroute. … Another stream of similar bombers started today from Hawaii staging at new island fields. Two groups of powerful medium bombers of long range and heavy bomb-load capacity leave this week. Pursuit planes are coming on every ship we can use. … Our strength is to be concentrated and it should exert a decisive effect on Japanese shipping and force a withdrawal northward.”

    All this was untrue. Not a plane, not a warship, not a single U.S. reinforcement reached Bataan or Corregidor. The only possible explanation for arousing false expectations on the peninsula was that Washington was trying to buy time for other, more defensible outposts. As the truth sank in, the men facing Homma became embittered. Unaware that MacArthur had to remain on the island of Corregidor — “the Rock” — because its communications center provided his only contact with Washington, they scornfully called the general “Dugout Doug.” That was cruel, and unjust. But if ever men were entitled to a scapegoat, they were. Quite apart from the Japanese, they faced Bataan's almost unbelievable jungle. Cliffs are unscalable. Rivers are treacherous. Behind huge
nara
(mahogany) trees, eucalyptus trees, ipils, and tortured banyans, almost impenetrable screens are formed by tropical vines, creepers, and bamboo. Beneath these lie sharp coral outcroppings, fibrous undergrowth, and alang grass inhabited by pythons. In the early months of the year, when the battle was fought, rain poured down almost steadily. The water was contaminated. MacArthur's men ate roots, leaves, papayas, monkey meat, wild chickens, and wild pigs. They sang, to the tune of “The Battle Hymn of the Republic”:
    Dugout Doug MacArthur lies ashakin' on the Rock
    Safe from all the bombers and from any sudden shock
…
    And one soldier wrote:
    We're the battling bastards of Bataan:
    No mama, no papa, no Uncle Sam,
    No aunts, no uncles, no nephews, no nieces,
    No rifles, no planes, or artillery pieces,
    And nobody gives a damn
.
    Yet they fought on, with a devotion which would puzzle the generation of the 1980s. More surprising, in many instances it would have baffled the men they themselves were before Pearl Harbor. Among MacArthur's ardent infantrymen were cooks, mechanics, pilots whose planes had been shot down, seamen whose ships had been sunk, and some civilian volunteers. One civilian was a saddle-shoed American youth, a typical Joe College of that era who had been in the Philippines researching an anthropology paper. A few months earlier he had been an isolationist whose only musical interest was Swing. He had used an accordion to render tunes like “Deep Purple” and “Moonlight Cocktail.” Captured and sentenced to be shot, he made a last request. He wanted to die holding his accordion. This was granted, and he went to the wall playing “God Bless America.” It was that kind of time.
    Only in early spring, when Homma was strengthened by twenty-two thousand fresh troops, howitzers, and fleets of Mitsubishis and Zeroes, did the Filipinos and Americans on Bataan Peninsula surrender. Then Corregidor, the bone in the throat of Manila Bay, held out for another exhausting month. Even so, Marines and bluejackets entrenched on the island's beaches killed half the Nipponese attack force. And it wasn't until June 6 that formal resistance ended, when a Jap