The Twilight Warriors Part 17

Following the artillery barrage, Cho's troops surged from their concealed positions. It was a reversal of roles-the j.a.panese now charging into the lines of the entrenched Americans. j.a.panese troops swarmed over Kakazu Ridge and Kakazu West, attacking the same U.S. units-the infantry regiments of the 96th Division-that they had been repulsing the previous days.

Alerted by the j.a.panese artillery barrage, U.S. fire control batteries called in the big guns of the wars.h.i.+ps offsh.o.r.e-Colorado, Nevada, San Francisco, Biloxi, and two destroyers. The barrage from the wars.h.i.+ps rained down on the exposed j.a.panese units. Caught in the open and illuminated by star sh.e.l.ls fired from offsh.o.r.e destroyers, the first wave of j.a.panese attackers was mowed down.

One of the American heroes of the night battle was a twenty-two-year-old army technical sergeant named Beauford Anderson. With j.a.panese troops overrunning their position, Anderson and his mortar squad were trapped in the saddle between Kakazu Ridge and Kakazu West.

Anderson ordered his men to take cover in a tomb while he fought off the advancing enemy troops. With his carbine out of ammunition, he grabbed an unexploded j.a.panese mortar round and hurled it back at the oncoming enemy. To Anderson's astonishment, the sh.e.l.l exploded, killing several j.a.panese and halting their charge.

But only for a short while. With the j.a.panese again advancing toward him, Anderson broke out a case of his own mortar sh.e.l.ls. Yanking the safety pin of a sh.e.l.l, he banged it on a rock to arm it, then threw the sh.e.l.l at the charging j.a.panese. He threw another, then reloaded his carbine. Alternately firing the weapon and hurling mortar sh.e.l.ls, he forced the enemy to withdraw.

When daylight came, twenty-five j.a.panese soldiers lay dead outside the tomb. Anderson himself was wounded by shrapnel. For his actions, he would receive the Medal of Honor.

The fighting subsided during the day as each side took shelter beneath artillery barrages. At nightfall on April 13, the battle resumed. Again j.a.panese squads tried infiltrating the American lines. Again the battlefield was illuminated by s.h.i.+p-fired star sh.e.l.ls, and the j.a.panese were repulsed in savage, close-quarters fighting.

By dawn on April 14, it was clear that the counterattack was a failure. The impermeability of the Shuri Line extended in both directions. The j.a.panese were even less successful attacking from the south than the Americans had been from the north. In the gathering daylight, the survivors of the decimated j.a.panese battalions crept back to their defensive line. The bodies of hundreds of their fellow soldiers littered the northern slopes of the line, a net loss of almost four entire battalions. Fewer than a hundred Americans had been killed.

Colonel Yahara, whose initial a.s.sessment had been proven correct, was disgusted. The architect of the failed a.s.sault, General Cho, remained unhumbled. He continued to insist that offensive actions, even if they failed, were preferable to a slow defeat.

No one was willing to argue. In the gloomy atmosphere of the j.a.panese underground headquarters, the ancient code of bus.h.i.+do bus.h.i.+do still had a romantic appeal. still had a romantic appeal.

While the battle in the south of Okinawa was stalemated at the Shuri Line, it was a different story in the north. The 6th Marine Division had encountered only sporadic resistance as they raced to the northern tip of Okinawa.

Still to be taken was the bulbous Motobu Peninsula, jutting from the upper west coast of the island. The 10-mile-long, 8-mile-wide peninsula was densely forested, with a 1,200-foot-high pinnacle in the southwest quadrant called Yae-dake. It was here that the j.a.panese defenders, led by veteran commander Col. Takehido Udo, would make their stand.

Udo was a shrewd tactician. His defensive network on Motobu Peninsula was even more intricate than the tunnels and rabbit warrens of the Shuri Line in the south. As the Marines advanced across the peninsula, Udo's troops waited in ambush, firing from concealed positions, then vanished like ethereal ghosts back into the dense foliage.

j.a.panese snipers became adept at identifying the officers of American units. Maj. Bernard Green, a battalion commander of the 4th Regiment, was talking to his operations and intelligence officers when he was picked off by an unseen shooter. It was a lesson the Marines learned quickly: anyone carrying a pistol instead of a carbine, waving a map, or pointing with his finger as if giving directions was a sniper's target.

By April 15, the Marines were closing in on the summit of Yae-dake. The fighting grew more intense as they neared the crest. As the XXIV Corps had already discovered in the south of the island, the j.a.panese on the Motobu Peninsula had made the most of the terrain, concealing their positions in a honeycomb of tunnels and caves.

Company A of the 1st Battalion was the first to gain the summit but was pushed back by a fierce j.a.panese mortar and small-arms attack. After calling in a heavy artillery barrage, they again a.s.saulted the crest of Yae-dake, taking heavy casualties. Nearly out of ammunition, they were forced to hunker down while Marines below organized a frantic hand-to-hand resupply chain.

The resupply came just in time. At nightfall, the j.a.panese launched a screaming, suicidal banzai banzai counterattack. With the help of artillery, the Marines stopped the attackers, killing seventy-five of them at close quarters. counterattack. With the help of artillery, the Marines stopped the attackers, killing seventy-five of them at close quarters.

Finally Yae-dake was secure. For the next two days, the Marines mopped up the rest of the peninsula. In a ravine on the slope of Yae-dake they stumbled upon Colonel Udo's exquisitely concealed headquarters, outfitted with radio and telephone communications and connected to a network of caves.

But Udo was gone. Instead of sacrificing himself bus.h.i.+do bus.h.i.+do-style, the colonel had slipped away to fight as a guerrilla. Like a mythical j.a.panese warrior, Udo faded into legend, never to be found.

The battle for Okinawa wasn't front-page news back home. The Pacific war was being upstaged by the historic events in Europe. The Red Army was at the gates of Berlin. American and Soviet troops had linked up on the banks of the Elbe River. The end of the Third Reich was at hand. Okinawa was just another island in the Pacific war.

On Friday, April 13, a day later than in Was.h.i.+ngton, came a flash that eclipsed all the war news. Everyone aboard the s.h.i.+ps of the Fifth Fleet-sailors, officers, gunners, aviators-stopped in midstride.

The announcement blared over every loudspeaker: "Attention, all hands! President Roosevelt is dead. Repeat, our supreme commander, President Roosevelt, is dead."

The news had the same impact as losing a parent. Roosevelt had been elected an unprecedented four times. For teenage GIs still not old enough to vote, he was the only president most could remember. He was a larger-than-life father figure whom they credited with lifting the nation from the Depression and guiding it through the crisis of war. In the minds of many servicemen, it seemed that the country was leaderless. Who was the bespectacled little man with the tw.a.n.gy voice, Harry Truman? How could he fill the shoes of a giant like Franklin Roosevelt?

Of all the services, the Navy was most closely identified with Roosevelt. Appointed a.s.sistant secretary of the Navy by President Woodrow Wilson in 1913, Roosevelt worked to expand the Navy and founded the U.S. Naval Reserve. Roosevelt had sent the Navy and Marines to intervene during skirmishes in Central America and the Caribbean. Roosevelt had steered the Navy through World War I, and it was Roosevelt who had fought against plans to dismantle it after that war.

To the j.a.panese high command, the death of Roosevelt meant something else: it was a direct result of the war. The next day propaganda leaflets were scattered around U.S. positions at Okinawa.

American Officers and Men: We must express our deep regret over the death of President Roosevelt. The "American Tragedy" is now raised here at Okinawa with his death. You must have seen 70% of your carriers and 735 of your B's [presumably surface warfare s.h.i.+ps] sink or be damaged causing 150,000 casualties. Not only the late president but anyone else would die in the excess of worry to hear such an annihilative damage. The dreadful loss that led your late leader to death will make you orphans on this island. The j.a.panese special attack corps will sink your vessels to the last destroyer. You will witness it realized in the near future surface warfare s.h.i.+ps] sink or be damaged causing 150,000 casualties. Not only the late president but anyone else would die in the excess of worry to hear such an annihilative damage. The dreadful loss that led your late leader to death will make you orphans on this island. The j.a.panese special attack corps will sink your vessels to the last destroyer. You will witness it realized in the near future.

The weary Marines and soldiers on Okinawa got a good laugh from the leaflets. Orphans on this island? Orphans on this island? It was a rare moment of comic relief. Reading j.a.panese propaganda leaflets was almost as much fun as listening to Tokyo Rose. It was a rare moment of comic relief. Reading j.a.panese propaganda leaflets was almost as much fun as listening to Tokyo Rose.

Most fighter pilots weren't superst.i.tious. To Lt. Mark Orr, the night of Friday, April 13 was no different from any other night off Okinawa-black, horizonless, vertigo-inducing. He was doing what he usually did on such nights-chasing another bogey through the darkness.

This one was low, skimming the wave tops. More and more, the j.a.panese night attackers were coming in on the deck. By now they'd figured out that the s.h.i.+ps' radars wouldn't pick them up until they were almost close enough to make their attack. The night fighters were reluctant to engage them that low because they risked flying into the water.

Orr radioed that he had spotted his bogey. It was at low alt.i.tude, heading directly for the carrier task group. Orr eased the h.e.l.lcat down to the bogey's alt.i.tude, close to the water, and slid in behind him.

In the red-lighted CIC compartment aboard the screening destroyer, the FIDO was following the intercept on his radar. The two blips on the screen looked like glowworms in a column. With each sweep of the cursor, they came closer together. The h.e.l.lcat was gaining on the bogey, almost close enough to fire. Any minute now, he'd report that the bogey was dead.

The FIDO waited for the call. Nothing came over the radio. In the next sweep on the radar, the blips had merged. On the next sweep, they were gone.

The bogey and and the h.e.l.lcat had vanished from the radar screen. the h.e.l.lcat had vanished from the radar screen.

The director radioed the night fighter pilot. There was no reply. Perplexed, he stared at the empty scope. What the h.e.l.l had happened? It was if the blackened ocean had swallowed up both aircraft. Did Orr shoot down the bogey before inadvertently hitting the water? Did the airplanes collide?

The answer was never learned. No trace was ever found of Mark Orr or the bogey.

The next morning, April 14, Lt. Gen. Simon Buckner stomped onto the hard-packed beach at Hagus.h.i.+, bringing most of his staff with him. His new command post ash.o.r.e was nearly finished. He would no longer be sharing s.p.a.ce aboard Kelly Turner's flags.h.i.+p, Eldorado Eldorado.

Buckner's patience was running out. His infantry divisions had ground to a halt in the south. No amount of sea, land, or air bombardment seemed able to dislodge the j.a.panese from their burrowed positions. In his booming, resonant voice, the white-haired general made it clear to everyone within earshot that he wanted this campaign to start moving again.

Buckner gave the order that every available infantry unit was to be a.s.sembled for an all-out frontal a.s.sault, to begin on April 19. To back up the 7th and 96th Divisions, he would bring a third division, the 27th Infantry, out of reserve. Ironically, it had been the 27th Division commander who was fired by the Marine general, Howlin' Mad Smith, at Saipan because Smith didn't think the 27th was carrying its weight. It was the incident that had ignited the most recent feud between the Army and the Marine Corps, and, like a persistent headache, it was affecting decisions at Okinawa.

Now the 27th Division was taking over from the 96th on the western flank, which included the b.l.o.o.d.y Kakazu Ridge. The 96th would take the center of the front, and the 7th Division would attack the eastern end of the line.

The plan was straightforward. By sheer force of firepower and numbers, Buckner intended to break the enemy line. No flanking maneuvers, no amphibious landings behind enemy positions, no pincer attacks. Such tactics weren't the style of the son of a Confederate general. Simon Buckner's offensive would be an all-out frontal a.s.sault.

The offensive began with the heaviest land-based artillery barrage of the Pacific war. Nineteen thousand sh.e.l.ls rained onto the j.a.panese positions along the Shuri Line. While the cloud of smoke and dust was still rising, a bombardment from six battles.h.i.+ps, six cruisers, and six destroyers pounded the same positions. Then came strikes by 650 carrier-based aircraft dropping bombs, firing rockets into cave entrances, and hammering the line with machine guns.

The three a.s.sault divisions moved out. Their progress was mostly unopposed-at first. While the line was still partly obscured by the dust from the bombardment, the j.a.panese slipped back into the positions they had temporarily evacuated. With machine gun fire, mortars, and artillery, they began mowing down the Americans.

The offensive faltered. On the eastern flank, units of the 7th Division, led by flame-throwing tanks, made it to the crest of a knife-edged feature called Skyline Ridge. Minutes later, they were hurled back by j.a.panese counterattacking from the reverse slope. Other units of the 7th Division were pinned down by murderous mortar and artillery fire in a swale called Rocky Crags.

Not even the flame-throwing tanks were able to root out the j.a.panese defenders. They kept popping out from spider holes, hurling satchel charges and grenades into the faces of the Americans.

In the middle of the line, the advance of the 96th Division ground to a halt. The only success came from the much-maligned 27th Division, which succeeded in making an end run around the deadly Kakazu Ridge and reaching the next objective, the Urasoe-Mura escarpment. But the simultaneous frontal attack on Kakazu Ridge was again repulsed, and the entire division's gains were lost.

A force of armored vehicles-thirty M4A3 Sherman tanks, flame-throwing tanks, and self-propelled howitzers-was hurled into the fray. Rumbling through Kakazu Gorge and onto the reverse slope of the ridge, they ran into a firestorm. j.a.panese popped out of spider holes to blind the tank crews with smoke charges and fling satchel charges under the vehicles. Others ran up to attach magnetic demolition charges. Ant.i.tank guns blasted them from concealed positions.

It was a disaster. Separated from their protecting infantry units, the armored vehicles were picked off one by one. Only eight tanks escaped the ma.s.sacre, making it the worst loss of armored vehicles in the entire campaign.

By afternoon, heavy thunderstorms were drenching the battle zone, making the barren ground slippery and adding to the difficulties of the a.s.sault.

Grim-faced, Simon Buckner received the reports. Each of his divisions had run into a wall of resistance. By evening the American line had advanced only about 1,000 yards on either end, with a heavily fortified enemy salient in the center of the line.

With darkness falling, it was apparent to Buckner that the a.s.sault had failed. "Progress not quite satisfactory," he wrote that night in his diary.

From inside his fortified shelter at Kanoya, Admiral Ugaki listened to the explosions on the airfield. The American fighter-bombers were back. About eighty of them had slipped in through the cloud cover without being detected. The air raid alert hadn't sounded until a few minutes before the enemy bombers arrived.

Now they were bombing the base at Kanoya.

Ugaki felt a deepening sense of frustration. The next "floating chrysanthemum" operation-kikusui No. 3-was supposed to have begun that morning, but the operation was delayed by the weather. Clouds and rain again covered the East China Sea. This afternoon, just as the cloud cover was opening, the enemy warplanes appeared. No. 3-was supposed to have begun that morning, but the operation was delayed by the weather. Clouds and rain again covered the East China Sea. This afternoon, just as the cloud cover was opening, the enemy warplanes appeared.

Ugaki was perplexed. Why did the enemy always seem to antic.i.p.ate his next move? Where had the American planes come from? Most still had long-range belly tanks attached, reinforcing Ugaki's belief that they must be coming from Kadena and Yontan, the recently captured airfields on Okinawa. The air raids went on for an hour. The American warplanes swarmed over the airfields on Kyushu, seeming to devote special attention to Ugaki's headquarters at Kanoya.

When the raiders finally withdrew to the south, a few j.a.panese Zero and George fighters took off to nip at their heels. It was mostly a symbolic gesture. The damage had already been done.

Darkness was falling when Ugaki emerged from his shelter. In all, fifty-one aircraft had been destroyed on the ground, and another twenty-nine shot down. Despite the setback, he gave the order to proceed with kikusui kikusui No. 3. As an afterthought, he included the enemy-occupied airfields of Kadena and Yontan in their list of targets. No. 3. As an afterthought, he included the enemy-occupied airfields of Kadena and Yontan in their list of targets.

In the waning daylight, Admiral Ugaki watched the first wave of kikusui kikusui No. 3 finally rumble into the sky. The next day at dawn, the attacks would resume. No. 3 finally rumble into the sky. The next day at dawn, the attacks would resume.

28

KEEP MOVING AND KEEP SHOOTING KEEP MOVING AND KEEP SHOOTING NORTHERN RADAR PICKET STATIONS

APRIL 16, 1945

One thing they would all agree on later: April 16 was a h.e.l.l of a day. For the tin can sailors as well as the fighter pilots sent to protect them, it was the wildest day of combat most of them would ever experience.

The day began with another ma.s.sed kamikaze attack, the second phase of kikusui kikusui No. 3. Three divisions of Grim Reaper Corsairs were on CAP stations over the radar picket s.h.i.+ps. No. 3. Three divisions of Grim Reaper Corsairs were on CAP stations over the radar picket s.h.i.+ps.

One of the divisions was led by Lt. (jg) Phil Kirkwood. Still on his wing was Ens. d.i.c.k Quiel, who knew that staying close to Kirkwood meant you had a good chance of seeing action. Their second two-plane section was led by Ens. Horace "Tuck" Heath, whose wingman was a baby-faced ensign named Alfred Lerch.

Photographs of Al Lerch showed a skinny, grinning kid who looked barely old enough to borrow his father's roadster. Lerch was from Coopersburg, Pennsylvania, and he had become a Grim Reaper by accident. He was supposed to have joined VF-87 aboard USS Ticonderoga Ticonderoga, but a broken leg caused him to miss their deployment. In January 1945 he was rea.s.signed to the re-formed VF-10 on Intrepid Intrepid.

Al Lerch was still looking for his first air-to-air victory. As he had already discovered, being the Tail End Charlie in a division meant that you got the leftovers. Two days earlier he had flown on Tuck Heath's wing while Heath methodically shot up an incoming Betty bomber and sent it smoking into the ocean. Lerch, the Tail End Charlie, never got to fire his guns.

But this was another day, and things were looking up for Lerch. En route to the CAP station, Heath developed radio trouble. It meant that Lerch was now the section leader. It also meant that he he would get first crack at the bogeys. would get first crack at the bogeys.

The action started twenty minutes after they reached the CAP station. Bogeys were reported inbound, pa.s.sing the island of Amami Os.h.i.+ma. Lerch and Heath headed north, while Kirkwood and Quiel took a station a few miles behind them. Kirkwood stayed low, beneath the cloud deck, where he could pick off any wave-skimming kamikazes, and sent Quiel to a high perch at 8,000 feet. The a.s.signment suited d.i.c.k Quiel, who was happy to be on his own. Any target he spotted was all his-if he was lucky.

Minutes later, Quiel got lucky. He spotted the bogeys. They were high, heading south, and Quiel could tell by the fixed landing gear and the peculiar straight leading edges of the wings that they were Nakajima Ki-27 Nate fighters. The Nate was an obsolete warplane that had seen its heyday in the China battles of the 1930s. Now they were relegated to kamikaze missions.

The Nates were spread out in a loose gaggle, two flights of three each. In a wide pursuit curve, Quiel swung in on their tails. He selected the furthest aft Nate fighter and opened fire. The unarmored j.a.panese fighter burned almost instantly.

Quiel nudged the Corsair's nose over to the next Nate and repeated the process. That Nate burned almost as quickly as the first. Both were leaving blazing trails down to the sea.

But now Quiel was overtaking the rest of the slow-flying Nates. The j.a.panese pilots were all flying straight ahead, seemingly unaware that two of them had just been shot down.

Quiel pulled up to the right, then swung back in a pursuit curve on the four remaining j.a.panese fighters. He shot down another one. Then another. But with the Corsair's speed advantage of nearly a hundred knots he was again overrunning the two surviving fighters.

As Quiel bore down on them, one of the Nates abruptly rolled inverted and did a split-S-the bottom half of a loop, disappearing into the clouds. Quiel guessed that he would impact the water before pulling out.

The single remaining Nate continued boring straight ahead, apparently fixated on one of the picket destroyers in the ocean. Quiel was overtaking him too fast to get a shot. He tried to slow the Corsair, s.n.a.t.c.hing the throttle back, putting the propeller into full low pitch, extending several degrees of landing flap.

It wasn't enough. Seconds later, Quiel found himself alongside the Nate fighter, wing tip to wing tip. Time seemed to freeze while Quiel stared at the enemy pilot 30 feet away. The Nate's c.o.c.kpit canopy was open. Quiel could see the young man's face, the leather helmet with white fur trim. The j.a.panese pilot refused to look at him. As in a trance, he had his eyes riveted on his target-the destroyer straight ahead.

Quiel opened his canopy and yanked out his .38 revolver. There was almost no relative motion between the airplanes. He'd shoot the son of a b.i.t.c.h the old-fas.h.i.+oned way. At this range he couldn't miss.

Quiel was aiming the pistol, about to squeeze off a round, when an explosion erupted just ahead of him. Then another. Antiaircraft fire was erupting all around him. d.a.m.n d.a.m.n. The gunners on the destroyer were shooting at both airplanes, not bothering to distinguish between them.

In the next instant, the Nate was gone, diving almost straight down at the destroyer. Quiel dove after him, trying to get into firing position again. Antiaircraft fire was bursting around both airplanes.

Quiel couldn't get another shot. Helplessly he watched the j.a.panese plane crash into the destroyer's forward gun turret. He thought it was the end of the destroyer.

It wasn't. To Quiel's amazement, the tin can emerged from the smoke and debris of the crash, seemingly unfazed. Still steaming at full speed, the destroyer had shrugged off the kamikaze hit as if it were a mosquito bite.

Phil Kirkwood, true to form, had tangled with a flock of twenty kamikazes that were bearing down on another destroyer. In less than a minute Kirkwood shot down a Val dive-bomber as it was beginning its run. Seconds later he flamed a Nate fighter, also bearing down on the destroyer.

Kirkwood kept shooting, chasing each kamikaze down through bursts of antiaircraft fire. He splashed three more before they could reach the destroyer.

When the enemy airplanes had finally stopped showing up, he rejoined with Quiel. They were on their way back to the CAP station when Kirkwood spotted the silhouettes of kamikazes attacking yet another destroyer. In the s.p.a.ce of a few minutes, Kirkwood shot down yet one more Nate, exploding it into the water a hundred yards short of the destroyer.

For Kirkwood and Quiel, the melee over the picket stations was over. Together the pair had accounted for ten enemy airplanes. The day's action put Quiel on the roster of aces and elevated Kirkwood to double ace status. By downing six in a single mission, Phil Kirkwood had accomplished a feat almost unmatched by anyone else in his squadron.

Almost. What he didn't know was that twenty miles to the north, his Tail End Charlie, Al Lerch, was making history.

The radarman in the picket destroyer Laffey Laffey stared at his scope. There were at least fifty bogeys, more than he'd ever seen in a single cl.u.s.ter. They looked like fast-multiplying amoebas spreading over the fluorescent screen. stared at his scope. There were at least fifty bogeys, more than he'd ever seen in a single cl.u.s.ter. They looked like fast-multiplying amoebas spreading over the fluorescent screen.

The bogeys were headed straight for Laffey Laffey.

Escorting Laffey Laffey at the lonely radar picket station were a pair of support gunboats, LCS-51 and LCS-116. The gunboats had been on station for two days without firing a shot. There'd been several nerve-jangling late-night calls to battle stations but no kamikaze attacks. Their luck seemed to be holding. at the lonely radar picket station were a pair of support gunboats, LCS-51 and LCS-116. The gunboats had been on station for two days without firing a shot. There'd been several nerve-jangling late-night calls to battle stations but no kamikaze attacks. Their luck seemed to be holding.

Laffey's skipper, Cmdr. Julian Becton, had already seen his share of action. He'd been the executive officer of the destroyer Aaron Ward Aaron Ward when it was sunk off Guadalca.n.a.l in April 1943. After fighting in several more surface actions in the South Pacific, he took command of a new destroyer, USS when it was sunk off Guadalca.n.a.l in April 1943. After fighting in several more surface actions in the South Pacific, he took command of a new destroyer, USS Laffey Laffey, in February 1944. The 2,200-ton Laffey Laffey was the second destroyer to bear the name. Her predecessor, DD-459, had also gone down off Guadalca.n.a.l in 1942. was the second destroyer to bear the name. Her predecessor, DD-459, had also gone down off Guadalca.n.a.l in 1942.

Becton and his new s.h.i.+p joined the bombardment force at the D-day landings at Normandy, firing more sh.e.l.ls than any other destroyer in the invasion. By the end of 1944, Laffey Laffey had transferred to the Pacific, joining the fight in the Philippines, then at Iwo Jima, and now at Okinawa. had transferred to the Pacific, joining the fight in the Philippines, then at Iwo Jima, and now at Okinawa.

Two days ago Laffey Laffey had been in the Kerama Retto anchorage taking on ammunition and supplies. As they were leaving, Becton exchanged greetings with the skipper of the destroyer had been in the Kerama Retto anchorage taking on ammunition and supplies. As they were leaving, Becton exchanged greetings with the skipper of the destroyer Ca.s.sin Young Ca.s.sin Young, which had taken a kamikaze hit a few days earlier. Young Young's captain was a friend and Naval Academy cla.s.smate of Becton's. "Keep moving and keep shooting," yelled out Ca.s.sin Young Ca.s.sin Young's skipper. "Steam as fast as you can, and shoot as fast as you can."

It was good advice, Becton thought. So were the parting words from a gun captain on another destroyer, Purdy: Purdy: "You guys have a fighting chance, but they'll keep on coming till they get you. You'll knock a lot of them down, and you'll think you're doing fine. But in the end there'll be this one b.a.s.t.a.r.d with your name on his ticket." "You guys have a fighting chance, but they'll keep on coming till they get you. You'll knock a lot of them down, and you'll think you're doing fine. But in the end there'll be this one b.a.s.t.a.r.d with your name on his ticket."

Now it was the morning of April 16, and Laffey Laffey was on station at RP1, which had become the kamikazes' favorite hunting ground. The crew's chow line had been interrupted once already by a call to general quarters. A snooper had come close enough for the forward 5-inch gun batteries to open fire. The snooper fled, but in his place came the swarm of bogeys. Now they were circling overhead, staying just out of range of the antiaircraft guns. was on station at RP1, which had become the kamikazes' favorite hunting ground. The crew's chow line had been interrupted once already by a call to general quarters. A snooper had come close enough for the forward 5-inch gun batteries to open fire. The snooper fled, but in his place came the swarm of bogeys. Now they were circling overhead, staying just out of range of the antiaircraft guns.