Okinawa_ The Last Battle Of World War II Part 3

That morning dawned overcast, with northeast winds whipping a mackerel sea into a white-crested gray ma.s.s, pus.h.i.+ng layers of s.m.u.tty clouds scudding along at alt.i.tudes of three thousand to seven thousand feet. It was good kamikaze kamikaze weather, providing them with excellent cover. Yet Rear Admiral Tos.h.i.+yuki Yokoi, whom Ugaki had placed in charge of the weather, providing them with excellent cover. Yet Rear Admiral Tos.h.i.+yuki Yokoi, whom Ugaki had placed in charge of the kikusui kikusui attacks, waited until around noon before sending his squadrons aloft, hoping thereby to catch patrolling American fighters at that most dangerous moment of refueling-either on carrier decks or the ap.r.o.ns of Yontan and Kadena Airfields. It was a good idea that may have come to Yokoi by his recollection of how Yamamoto's carriers at Midway were struck at exactly that moment. But there would be no such surprise, for Spruance's task force commanders had long since installed the routine of keeping defensive fighter patrols aloft from sunup till sundown. Nor did Yokoi's ruse of dropping "window"-aluminum strips to create false blips on radar screens to lure American fighters away from the impact area-for radar operators picked them up almost as soon as they were dropped. attacks, waited until around noon before sending his squadrons aloft, hoping thereby to catch patrolling American fighters at that most dangerous moment of refueling-either on carrier decks or the ap.r.o.ns of Yontan and Kadena Airfields. It was a good idea that may have come to Yokoi by his recollection of how Yamamoto's carriers at Midway were struck at exactly that moment. But there would be no such surprise, for Spruance's task force commanders had long since installed the routine of keeping defensive fighter patrols aloft from sunup till sundown. Nor did Yokoi's ruse of dropping "window"-aluminum strips to create false blips on radar screens to lure American fighters away from the impact area-for radar operators picked them up almost as soon as they were dropped.

Both Spruance and Turner were aware that a ma.s.sive enemy aerial strike would arrive that day, not only from warnings from intelligence officers reading messages in the broken j.a.panese code, but through combat instincts sharpened by years of experience: once the enemy had collected enough planes, he would strike. To thwart him, Turner had deployed a wide circle of sixteen radar picket destroyers like irregular-length spokes in a wheel winding around Okinawa and some of its surrounding islands. These spokes extended from "Point Bolo," a reference point on that Zampa Cape he had so ardently desired, and which had been presented to him by the Sixth Marine Division. Each radar picket could give early warning of an enemy attack, and also carried a five-member radar direction team trained in vectoring patrolling fighters onto "bogies," unidentified targets. As might be expected, the pickets would become prime targets of the attacking enemy, especially Radar Picket Stations 1 through 4, on duty on an arc about thirty miles north of Okinawa-the point over which enemy planes from Kyushu were most likely to fly.

On that morning of April 6 all was quiet in the skies above the Great Loo Choo, although j.a.panese scout planes in the northern Ryukyus had discovered TF 58's Fast Carrier Forces and brought hundreds of fighters and bombers down on them. Half of them missed their target and flew on to Okinawa while the other half zeroed in on Rear Admiral Joseph "Jocko" Clark's Task Group 58.1. They hit the carrier Hanc.o.c.k Hanc.o.c.k and two destroyers, and a and two destroyers, and a kamikaze kamikaze Judy bomber almost sent the big flattop Judy bomber almost sent the big flattop Bennington Bennington to a watery grave. Plunging at the American's stern, the suicider was shot to bits by all of to a watery grave. Plunging at the American's stern, the suicider was shot to bits by all of Bennington's Bennington's ack-ack that could be brought to bear. When the Judy exploded astern, parts of her engine fragments fell in a shower on the carrier, temporarily disabling her rudder. ack-ack that could be brought to bear. When the Judy exploded astern, parts of her engine fragments fell in a shower on the carrier, temporarily disabling her rudder.

Later in the day Yokoi's fighters arrived off Okinawa's airfields and were intercepted by American fighters on patrol above them. At three o'clock, with the Yankee fighters presumably driven from the area, the suiciders struck. They dove on the pickets of the radar screen and that forest of masts in Hagus.h.i.+ Anchorage. Some 200 of them came plummeting down for five hours until darkness veiled the sea or magnified the funeral pyres of stricken American s.h.i.+ps.

Destroyers Bush Bush and and Colhoun Colhoun were sunk, were sunk, Colhoun Colhoun hit and staggered so frequently that she had to be abandoned and sunk by friendly fire. The ammunition s.h.i.+ps. .h.i.t and staggered so frequently that she had to be abandoned and sunk by friendly fire. The ammunition s.h.i.+ps Logan Victory Logan Victory and and Hobbs Victory Hobbs Victory also went down, creating a temporary ordnance shortage for the Tenth Army. Nine other destroyers were damaged, as were four destroyer-escorts and five mine vessels. also went down, creating a temporary ordnance shortage for the Tenth Army. Nine other destroyers were damaged, as were four destroyer-escorts and five mine vessels.

It was an impressive day's work for the first sally of the kikusui even though they had lost 135 planes. But the kamikaze kamikaze reports were as usual exaggerated, rivaling even those of the Thirty-second Army, claiming thirty American s.h.i.+ps sunk and twenty more burning. Such bloated estimates so encouraged Admirals Ugaki and Toyoda that the Navy chief began to think that perhaps the world's first suicide battles.h.i.+p-great reports were as usual exaggerated, rivaling even those of the Thirty-second Army, claiming thirty American s.h.i.+ps sunk and twenty more burning. Such bloated estimates so encouraged Admirals Ugaki and Toyoda that the Navy chief began to think that perhaps the world's first suicide battles.h.i.+p-great Yamato Yamato-might really stagger the Americans during its one-way voyage to Okinawa and eternal glory.

Yamato-named for the clan generally credited with founding the j.a.panese nation-was not only the most powerful battles.h.i.+p afloat, but also the most beautiful. On April 6, while hundreds of kamikaze kamikaze roared down from the north, roared down from the north, Yamato Yamato came trailing afterward in the spreading white majesty of her mighty bow wave. came trailing afterward in the spreading white majesty of her mighty bow wave.

Yamato had survived the Battle of Leyte Gulf, where her sister had survived the Battle of Leyte Gulf, where her sister Musas.h.i.+ Musas.h.i.+ had not. had not. Yamato Yamato could outshoot anything in the U.S. Navy. She had nine 18.1-inch guns firing a projectile weighing 3,200 pounds a distance of 45,000 yards, compared to the 2,700-pound sh.e.l.l and 42,000-yard range of the American 16-inchers. She displaced 72,809 tons fully laden, and drew 35 feet. She was 863 feet long and 128 in the beam. She could hit 27.5 knots at top speed or cruise 7,200 miles at 16 knots. And she was sortying out of the Inland Sea for Okinawa with only enough fuel in her tanks for a one-way voyage. could outshoot anything in the U.S. Navy. She had nine 18.1-inch guns firing a projectile weighing 3,200 pounds a distance of 45,000 yards, compared to the 2,700-pound sh.e.l.l and 42,000-yard range of the American 16-inchers. She displaced 72,809 tons fully laden, and drew 35 feet. She was 863 feet long and 128 in the beam. She could hit 27.5 knots at top speed or cruise 7,200 miles at 16 knots. And she was sortying out of the Inland Sea for Okinawa with only enough fuel in her tanks for a one-way voyage.

If soldiers and tanks, fliers and airplanes, sailors and boats could be enrolled in the ranks of the suiciders, it was logical that admirals and dreadnoughts should follow. There were three admirals coming with Yamato, Yamato, and the light cruiser and the light cruiser Yahagi Yahagi and eight destroyers. There might have been more of them and more wars.h.i.+ps, but Admiral Toyoda could sc.r.a.pe up only 2,500 tons of fuel for the venture. Although Toyoda had high hopes for the success of the and eight destroyers. There might have been more of them and more wars.h.i.+ps, but Admiral Toyoda could sc.r.a.pe up only 2,500 tons of fuel for the venture. Although Toyoda had high hopes for the success of the kikusui, kikusui,he could not have regarded Yamato's Yamato's sally as anything but a forlorn hope; he gave Rear Admiral Seichi Ito, commanding this Surface Special Attack Force, only two airplanes for protection. If it was the good fortune of sally as anything but a forlorn hope; he gave Rear Admiral Seichi Ito, commanding this Surface Special Attack Force, only two airplanes for protection. If it was the good fortune of Yamato Yamato and company to reach Okinawa unscathed, or at least with the huge battle-wagon and a few other s.h.i.+ps intact, their mission was to fall like wolves upon the sheep of the American troop transports and supply s.h.i.+ps in the Hagus.h.i.+ Anchorage, and then, with their fuel almost exhausted, beach themselves to support a sally by Us.h.i.+jima's Thirty-second Army with all their guns led by and company to reach Okinawa unscathed, or at least with the huge battle-wagon and a few other s.h.i.+ps intact, their mission was to fall like wolves upon the sheep of the American troop transports and supply s.h.i.+ps in the Hagus.h.i.+ Anchorage, and then, with their fuel almost exhausted, beach themselves to support a sally by Us.h.i.+jima's Thirty-second Army with all their guns led by Yamato's Yamato's 18-inchers. At three-twenty on the afternoon of April 6, exactly twenty minutes after the first of the Floating Chrysanthemums dove on the Hagus.h.i.+ targets, 18-inchers. At three-twenty on the afternoon of April 6, exactly twenty minutes after the first of the Floating Chrysanthemums dove on the Hagus.h.i.+ targets, Yamato Yamato and her escorts shoved off from Tokuyama. and her escorts shoved off from Tokuyama.

There had been a ceremony. At six o'clock, all men and officers not on duty had been broken out on deck. A message from Admiral Jisaburu Ozawa, chief victim of the Americans' "Marianas Turkey Shoot," was read: "Render this operation the turning point of the war."

The men sang the somber National Anthem, "Umi Yukaba" "Umi Yukaba": Across the sea, corpses in the water, Across the mountain, corpses in the field.

I shall die for the Emperor.

I shall never look back.

Next the s.h.i.+p's company, convinced to the man that they would never survive this voyage, gave three Banzais for the emperor and returned to quarters. At ten o'clock, Yamato Yamato was in the Pacific Ocean-racing down Kyushu's eastern sh.o.r.es with her consorts gathering about her, shooing the American submarine was in the Pacific Ocean-racing down Kyushu's eastern sh.o.r.es with her consorts gathering about her, shooing the American submarine Hackleback Hackleback away, swinging to starboard off Kyushu's southern nose to sail west through Van Diemen Strait into the East China Sea. away, swinging to starboard off Kyushu's southern nose to sail west through Van Diemen Strait into the East China Sea.

Admiral Ito was taking the Surface Special Attack Force on a big swing west-northwest in hopes of pouncing on the Americans off Okinawa at about dusk of the next day.

But Hackleback Hackleback had already alerted Admiral Spruance, and shortly before half-past eight the next morning a scout plane from had already alerted Admiral Spruance, and shortly before half-past eight the next morning a scout plane from Ess.e.x Ess.e.x spotted the j.a.panese force just southwest of Kyushu, less than four hundred miles above Okinawa. spotted the j.a.panese force just southwest of Kyushu, less than four hundred miles above Okinawa.

Patrol planes began taking off from Kerama-retto.

At ten o'clock, Yamato's Yamato's pathetic pair of fighter escorts flew back to j.a.pan. pathetic pair of fighter escorts flew back to j.a.pan.

At ten-thirty Rear Admiral Morton Deyo was ordered to take six battles.h.i.+ps, seven cruisers, and twenty-one destroyers north and place them between the approaching j.a.panese wars.h.i.+ps and the American transports. At almost the same moment the patrol planes found Yamato Yamato sailing at twenty-two knots in the middle of a diamond-shaped destroyer screen, with cruiser sailing at twenty-two knots in the middle of a diamond-shaped destroyer screen, with cruiser Yahagi Yahagi trailing behind. The big planes shadowed the naked enemy fleet like vultures. trailing behind. The big planes shadowed the naked enemy fleet like vultures.

"Hope you will bring back a nice fish for breakfast," Admiral Turner signaled Admiral Deyo.

The commander of the intercepting force seized a signal blank and pencil to write his reply. "Many thanks, will try-" An orderly handed him an intercepted message. Scouts of the Fast Carrier Forces had found the enemy. Three groups totaling 380 planes were preparing to strike. "Will try to," Deyo concluded, "if the pelicans haven't caught them all!"

The "pelicans" had.

At half past twelve the American warbirds were over the target. Ten minutes later two bombs exploded near Yamato's Yamato's main-mast. Another four minutes and a torpedo had pierced her side. At the same moment destroyer main-mast. Another four minutes and a torpedo had pierced her side. At the same moment destroyer Hamakaze Hamakaze stood on her nose and slid under, and stood on her nose and slid under, and Yahagi Yahagi took a bomb and a fish and went dead in the water. took a bomb and a fish and went dead in the water.

There was a respite.

The Americans came again at half-past one and planted five torpedoes in Yamato's Yamato's port side. Water rushed into boiler and engine rooms, and the stricken mammoth began to lean to port. Rear Admiral Kosaku Ariga, port side. Water rushed into boiler and engine rooms, and the stricken mammoth began to lean to port. Rear Admiral Kosaku Ariga, Yamato's Yamato's captain, ordered counter-flooding in the starboard boiler and engine rooms. Ensign Mitsuru Yos.h.i.+da attempted to warn the men there. Too late. They were sacrificed. captain, ordered counter-flooding in the starboard boiler and engine rooms. Ensign Mitsuru Yos.h.i.+da attempted to warn the men there. Too late. They were sacrificed.

Still Yamato Yamato listed, and she had but one screw working. Her decks were a shambles of cracked and twisted steel plates. Her big guns would not work. The watertight wireless room was filled with water, and an explosion had wrecked the emergency dispensary and killed everyone inside. listed, and she had but one screw working. Her decks were a shambles of cracked and twisted steel plates. Her big guns would not work. The watertight wireless room was filled with water, and an explosion had wrecked the emergency dispensary and killed everyone inside.

At two o'clock the final attack began.

h.e.l.lcats and Avengers plunged from the skies to strike at the hapless s.h.i.+p. Yamato Yamato was shaken fore and aft and the entire battles.h.i.+p shuddered violently. Communications with the bridge were cut off, the distress flag was hoisted, the steering room became flooded, and with the rudder jammed hard left, mighty was shaken fore and aft and the entire battles.h.i.+p shuddered violently. Communications with the bridge were cut off, the distress flag was hoisted, the steering room became flooded, and with the rudder jammed hard left, mighty Yamato Yamato sagged over to a list of thirty-five degrees. sagged over to a list of thirty-five degrees.

"Correction of list hopeless!" the executive officer cried.

Down came the Americans for the death blow.

"Hold on, men!" Ariga shouted. "Hold on, men!"

Bombs were striking around and upon Yamato, Yamato, raising a giant clanging, flinging waves of roaring air across her decks, jumbling men together in heaps. Out of one pile crawled high-ranking staff officers. Admiral Ito struggled to his feet. His chief of staff arose and saluted him. The two men regarded each other solemnly. Ito turned, shook hands with each of his staff officers, wheeled, and strode into his cabin, either to embrace death or await it-the world will never know which. Admiral Ariga rushed to save the emperor's portrait, but met death instead. raising a giant clanging, flinging waves of roaring air across her decks, jumbling men together in heaps. Out of one pile crawled high-ranking staff officers. Admiral Ito struggled to his feet. His chief of staff arose and saluted him. The two men regarded each other solemnly. Ito turned, shook hands with each of his staff officers, wheeled, and strode into his cabin, either to embrace death or await it-the world will never know which. Admiral Ariga rushed to save the emperor's portrait, but met death instead.

Yamato was dying slowly, like the giant she was. Her decks were nearly vertical, her battle flag all but touched the waves, explosions racked her monster body, her own ammunition began blowing up-and all around her were her sister s.h.i.+ps in death agonies. was dying slowly, like the giant she was. Her decks were nearly vertical, her battle flag all but touched the waves, explosions racked her monster body, her own ammunition began blowing up-and all around her were her sister s.h.i.+ps in death agonies. Yahagi Yahagi was sinking, was sinking, Isokaze, Hamakaze, Asas.h.i.+mo, Isokaze, Hamakaze, Asas.h.i.+mo, and and Kasumo Kasumo had received their death blows. had received their death blows.

At twenty-three minutes after two Yamato Yamato slid under, a full day's steaming from Okinawa. slid under, a full day's steaming from Okinawa.

j.a.pan had lost her navy, the suicide battles.h.i.+p had failed, and it was now up to the kikusui kikusui and the men of Lieutenant General Mitsuru Us.h.i.+jima. and the men of Lieutenant General Mitsuru Us.h.i.+jima.

Fiery Failure at Kakazu Ridge

CHAPTER ELEVEN.

The honeymoon had been brief for Major General John Hodge's Twenty-fourth Corps-hardly more than a weekend.

The day after Love Day, the Twenty-fourth's spearheads raced across the island, Seventh Division on the left, Ninety-sixth on the right, turning to their right (or south) the next day for the antic.i.p.ated rapid down-island advance. Their progress seemed as bloodless as the Marine drive in the north.

But on April 4 they found resistance "stiffening."

It grew stiffer daily until, on April 8, "greatly increased resistance" was reported. They had come into the outerworks of Us.h.i.+jima's Naha-Shuri-Yonabaru Line, and probably its most formidable position: Kakazu Ridge.

At first glance, Kakazu (p.r.o.nounced "c.o.c.k-a-zoo") did not seem especially difficult: neither unusually high nor uncommonly steep. Three-quarters of a mile south the Urasoe-Mura Escarpment seemed a much more difficult natural barrier. That was what Colonel Eddy May thought when he prepared to send his 383rd Regiment of the Ninety-sixth Division against it. Studying Kakazu from his headquarters atop another ridge, he considered its seizure a preliminary to an a.s.sault on Urasoe-Mura. His maps suggested no other conclusion, although Colonel May was not aware that the map was probably made from photographs taken when the entire area was obscured by clouds. Kakazu was a rough coral hogback about a thousand yards long running from the coastal flats in the west on a northwest-southeast keel. It was formed by two hills of the smaller Kakazu West on May's right flank, and the larger Kakazu Ridge proper to his left.

What Colonel May-and General Hodges-also could not suspect was that Kakazu's defenders under Colonel Munetatsu Hara had been fortifying their position for months. a.s.sisted by Okinawan laborers, they had constructed a subterranean honeycomb of caves, tunnels, and pa.s.sageways. This would not be the first such "impregnable" position encountered by Americans in the Pacific War: what made it unique was its complete camouflage, its incredible variety and number of fortified positions, its depth, its abundance of supplies and ammunition-including a spigot-mortar unit launching huge 320 mm sh.e.l.ls-its network of mutually supporting emplacements firing interlocking fire, and its absolute invulnerability to those nineteen-hundred-pound sh.e.l.ls hurled at it by the battles.h.i.+p Colorado Colorado cruising offsh.o.r.e. cruising offsh.o.r.e.

Because Colonel Hara had buried his headquarters deep below the main ridge, he had complicated his communications: his only problem. Although many tunnels had interconnecting pa.s.sages and there were also voice tubes, some underground positions were isolated, compelling Hara to use runners who would be exposed to enemy fire once they appeared above ground. Hara had no fear of the Americans' plentiful and powerful tanks, so superior to the j.a.panese diminutive "kitchen sinks" that had been nevertheless unstoppable against inferior or lightly armed troops in the Manchuria-Burma-Philippines campaigns. Fronting Kakazu Ridge and running its entire length was a deep gorge cut into the coral by the immemorial pa.s.sage of a narrow stream. The gorge was a natural ant.i.tank obstacle, impa.s.sable to tracked vehicles. For tanks to attempt to turn either flank of the ridge would bring down on them a storm of artillery.

Finally, Colonel Hara had emplaced outposts in tombs and concrete pillboxes on the ridge's northern face. Most effective of all, he had cleverly emplaced most of his infantry and all of his mortars on the southern or reverse slope of the ridge. They were thus in untouchable defilade, s.h.i.+elded from enemy troops, artillery, and even American battles.h.i.+ps. Not even enemy mortars, with that weapon's high, looping trajectory, could reach them. Moreover, the Americans were absolutely unaware of this reverse-slope concentration; while Hara, of course, had his entire front registered by his own guns.

Thus, Kakazu Ridge.

Colonel May was sometimes called "a soldier of the old school"-meaning that he believed that the brave charge could usually carry the day. This does not suggest that he would not maneuver, only that faced by such a forbidding unflankable position, he would instinctively fall back on the frontal a.s.sault. So he ordered two of his three battalions to storm Kakazu Ridge and Kakazu West on April 9, actually expecting both to fall by the following morning. This meant that-in accordance with American infantry doctrine-a battalion of three companies would use two of them in attack with the third in reserve, and thus, two companies would strike the main ridge and two more Kakazu West, with the remaining two on call in their rear. To achieve surprise, there would be no artillery preparation beforehand, and all units would attack before daylight.

Right at the start one of the companies a.s.saulting Kakazu West was late moving out and did not march until daylight, when it was sighted and promptly pinned down. The other company was commanded by a born fighter and leader, First Lieutenant Willard Mitch.e.l.l, a powerfully built southerner who had played both football and basketball for Mississippi State. Idolized by his men and called "Captain Hoss," he was also beloved for his un-bashful battle cry: "Watch out! Here comes 'the Hoss'-and G.o.d is on the Hoss's side!" Mitch.e.l.l returned their affection by calling them his "Larda.s.ses," a fondly derisive and droll nickname that they loved.

Mitch.e.l.l's Larda.s.ses were quick to ascend Kakazu West under cover of darkness, and not particularly dismayed to learn that they were alone on its crest and that their supporting comrades were pinned down below. They also found that the position was composed of two knolls-one on the north, and the other to the south, forming Colonel Hara's reverse slope. Between them was a shallow saddle of land. The moment that the j.a.panese emerged from their steel-and-coral fortress, Mitch.e.l.l quickly formed his company into a perimeter on the saddle, just deep enough to conceal a p.r.o.ne man. He hoped to riddle them if they charged forward to clear both saddle and northward knoll. But the enemy refused to oblige, opening fire from their own position and showering the saddle with hand grenades and satchel charges, bags stuffed with explosive. Mitch.e.l.l's men fought back with the same weapons, and a furious battle raged back and forth all morning long-with men killed and wounded on both sides.

Throughout the action, Mitch.e.l.l roved the besieged saddle, hurling grenades and firing his carbine, his battle cry booming from his lips. His men were his gallant equal, and one of them -Pfc. Joseph Solch-spotted an enemy spigot mortar mounted in a cave on the reverse slope. Just one of its 320 mm sh.e.l.ls could destroy the Americans on the saddle. With Captain Hoss, Solch and his buddies attacked the huge mortar, destroying it with hand grenades and killing its nine-man crew.

At about noon, sensing that the Americans had but a small force in front of him, Colonel Hara ordered his men to make a series of four furious counter-attacks on the enemy. So that they might surprise the Americans, and with brutal indifference to their destruction or survival, he sent them charging through his own mortar fire. Lieutenant Bill Curran killed both the leaders of the first charge, while his men repulsed the j.a.panese with heavy loss. When a second a.s.sault came, Solch, squatting on his haunches, fired his Browning Automatic Rifle (BAR) from the hip to repel an entire company. In the final charge, the j.a.panese-throwing "satchel charges as big as boxes of apples"-came within a few feet of overrunning the "American devils" but finally fell a few feet short.

Even so, Mitch.e.l.l's company was being badly whittled. Because his soldiers were lying on hard coral, they could not get below ground by scooping out foxholes, and thus were inviting targets for enemy riflemen and exposed to the flame and fragments of exploding mortar sh.e.l.ls.

Fierce fighting also raged atop Kakazu Ridge to the east, or left of Mitch.e.l.l's position. Here the j.a.panese popped in and out of their barricaded caves to strike the men of companies led by Captain Jack Royster and First Lieutenant Dave Belman. They also charged up the reverse slope, again braving their own mortars. An entire American platoon was pinned down by a pair of enemy machine guns. Pfc. Edward Moskala crawled toward them, clutching his BAR. When close enough but still un.o.bserved, he hurled grenades at the unsuspecting j.a.panese, rising to rush them spraying bullets. Both guns were knocked out.

Now Lieutenant Belman was. .h.i.t, refusing evacuation despite great loss of blood. Captain Royster took a mortar fragment in the face. In exquisite pain and nearly blind, he also refused to leave. But it was becoming plain to both officers that the enemy was gaining the upper hand. GIs had already begun to withdraw off the ridge crest, hunting protection in the numerous caves and holes on the ridge's northern face. After Royster radioed battalion for help, Lieutenant Colonel King ordered another company to the rescue. But this unit got no farther than the gorge, crouching with the men who had been pinned down there since sunup. King now believed that his battalion was in trouble and asked May for permission to withdraw. May refused, telling King that he'd lose as many men withdrawing as he would holding the hill. He also told him that if he was "jumpy, have the executive officer take over." Understandably, there was no reply.

Captain Royster on the ridge had a far better appreciation of his danger than either hard-boiled Eddy May or the cautious Colonel King. His and Belman's company could not possibly retreat in full view of the enemy. So Royster called for smoke sh.e.l.ls from the Eighty-eighth Chemical Mortar Battalion. They went humming up and looping down, but the wind blew them back into Royster's face. Eventually there was enough smoke to conceal a withdrawal, and the GIs began crawling down toward the gorge, many of them carrying wounded buddies with them. Ed Moskala was the last man down, but when he learned that a wounded man unable to move was still atop the ridge, he went back up to bring him safely down.

Now the remnants of King's entire battalion were pinned down in the gorge, immobilized by enemy fire. To leap erect was to die. Second Lieutenant Leo Ford, the officer now in charge, decided that the best way out was to creep down the defile to the jump-off point of Hoss Mitch.e.l.l's company earlier in the day. Snaking along inch by inch on their bellies, dragging their wounded, Ford and his men moved westward at a snail's pace. Ed Moskala, who had volunteered again to act as rear guard, covered their withdrawal. Twice he rescued wounded buddies, but on his second trip he paid for his gallantry with his life. For these acts of infinite compa.s.sion, and his bravery in destroying the enemy guns, Moskala received the posthumous award of the Medal of Honor.

By four in the afternoon, the men led by Ford reached a point opposite the north slope of Kakazu West, and were soon joined by Mitch.e.l.l's GIs moving rapidly under billowing smoke skillfully called down by Captain Hoss himself.

The Kakazu attack had failed, but it had not been a disaster. In all, Colonel May's 383rd Regiment had suffered 326 casualties, with 23 dead, 47 missing and presumed dead, plus 256 wounded. Colonel Hara's command may have lost half of its strength of 1,200; and for the defenders to lose nearly twice as many as the attackers, while fighting from a most formidable fixed position, testifies to the valor and skill of the American infantry.

Even before the failure at Kakazu became known at Ninety-sixth Division headquarters, Brigadier Claudius Easley, a.s.sistant commander of the Ninety-sixth, had prepared a second much more ma.s.sive a.s.sault under his personal command. This "powerhouse attack" with no attempt at surprise was to be spearheaded by four battalions of infantry-about three thousand soldiers-supported by eight battalions of 105 and 155 mm artillery, together with air strikes and bombardment from the sea led by the battles.h.i.+p New York. New York. There would be no tanks once again, for that gorge below the ridge was still impa.s.sable. There would be no tanks once again, for that gorge below the ridge was still impa.s.sable.

At 7:15 A.M. on April 10 the a.s.sault began. Furious as the preliminary bombardment had been, it in no way depleted Us.h.i.+jima's troop strength. When the bombardment lifted, his men-safe and invisible within his steel-and-coral fortress-would reply with small arms, machine guns, mortars, and occasionally one of those huge 624-pound mortar sh.e.l.ls. Once again the Ninety-sixth fought gallantly, but flesh-and-blood advancing in the open, no matter how valiantly, simply cannot overcome an unseen enemy firing from within underground fortifications of steel and coral. It was almost as though the j.a.panese and the Americans had exchanged battle doctrines: the defenders relying upon firepower and the invaders on spiritual power, with the inevitable consequence: The Americans were stopped. Fortunately for them, a heavy rain-the forerunner of drenching downpours soon to come-squelched the battle, or their casualties might have been greater.

It required two more days of hideous combat to convince General Easley that Kakazu was simply too formidable for the Ninety-sixth to conquer alone. On April 11 Colonel John Ca.s.sidy's battalion of the 381st Regiment made its second attempt to seize the top of the ridge and was again driven back. That night the j.a.panese began bombarding the Americans pinned down in the gorge with their 320 mm spigot mortars. One of these huge projectiles, woefully inaccurate and fired so haphazardly, seemingly did strike harmlessly on the ground-but with enough force to start a landslide that buried a cave being used as an aid station, killing thirteen Americans and wounding nine.

On the morning of the twelfth, Easley ordered another attack by Ca.s.sidy's battalion, supported by heavy air strikes. When the Ninety-sixth moved out, there fell upon them a shower of mortar sh.e.l.ls so thick that they came down at the rate of better than sixty a minute. Forty-five men were lost, and that was the end of the Kakazu debacle of April 9-12.

During the failed April 9-12 a.s.saults the only appreciable gains made by the Twenty-fourth Corps was by the veteran Seventh Infantry Division on the left or eastern flank of the Ninety-sixth. From Triangulation Hill to Ouki on Nakagusuku Bay, the Seventh drove forward one thousand yards. Ouki fell to the Thirty-second Infantry on April 11, but the Americans were promptly evicted. By the night of April 12 all of the Seventh's formations were halted in front of Hill 178, a towering crag in roughly the center-east of Us.h.i.+jima's line, which was also a j.a.panese artillery observation point. Farther east the Ninety-sixth's 382nd Regiment had been stopped cold at Tombstone Ridge, where on April 11 it went into defensive positions. Tombstone may have been every bit as tough as Kakazu, but no a.s.sault was planned until General Hodge and his division commanders could a.s.sess the situation.

Casualties in the Seventh and Ninety-sixth divisions had been 451 dead, with 241 missing and presumed dead and 2,198 wounded, for a total of 2,890. Enemy losses were estimated at 5,750-all killed-although this was almost certainly exaggerated. A truer figure more likely would be about 4,000. Most of these men were killed by bombardment, for during April 9-12 the American invaders had hurled a ma.s.sive weight of metal from land, sea, and air upon the defending j.a.panese. The fact that Kakazu, Tombstone, and Ouki remained in enemy hands demonstrated to the American commanders that the key to success on Okinawa lay in possession of the reverse slopes of all those ridges from Kakazu to Shuri Castle. Seizing the forward slopes, though difficult, could be done-but any attempt to drive past them would bring upon the attackers that dreadful rain of enemy fire.

What was needed, it seemed to General Hodge, was even heavier bombardments-and there was not yet enough ammunition ash.o.r.e. The loss of those two ammunition s.h.i.+ps to the kamikaze, kamikaze, deemed not critical at first, was now one of the chief causes of delay. Kakazu would have to wait until enough 105 and 155 mm sh.e.l.ls had come across the beaches to make sustained daily sh.e.l.ling a reality. Already, after only about nine days of battle, it had become apparent that the Okinawa campaign would depend upon supply as much as battle. deemed not critical at first, was now one of the chief causes of delay. Kakazu would have to wait until enough 105 and 155 mm sh.e.l.ls had come across the beaches to make sustained daily sh.e.l.ling a reality. Already, after only about nine days of battle, it had become apparent that the Okinawa campaign would depend upon supply as much as battle.

Back to Banzai! Banzai!

CHAPTER TWELVE.

Reports of the Battle of Kakazu Ridge were received by Lieutenant General Isamu Cho (he had received another star) and Colonel Hiromichi Yahara with predictable reactions. Although neither knew the exact number of enemy fallen or even their own losses, Yahara was eminently pleased with the result. The Americans had been dealt a b.l.o.o.d.y repulse exactly as he had planned in his defense-in-depth tactics, and soon the rate of attrition among them would so whittle the Tenth Army that the Americans would cancel their offensive so that not only the homeland would be saved, but Okinawa as well.

To General Cho it appeared that the enemy had suffered grievously and was so rocked back on their heels that the time had come for a full-scale offensive of the Thirty-second Army. Since his humiliation in the earlier showdown between him and Yahara, when General Us.h.i.+jima had sided with his planning chief, the fiery Cho had not ceased to press for a counter-attack. But even his friend and mentor Us.h.i.+jima remained unmoved, until an order from Imperial Headquarters was received urging the Thirty-second Army to overrun Yontan and Kadena Airfields. This was probably the result of a j.a.panese intelligence warning that Marine Corsairs would soon arrive at these airfields in strength and would make the mission of the various kikusui kikusui more difficult than ever. Cho seized on this directive to persuade Us.h.i.+jima on April 6 to order an attack prepared for April 8. But the ever-alert Yahara pounced upon the appearance of a 110-s.h.i.+p convoy offsh.o.r.e of the Urasoe-Mura Escarpment on April 7 as proof that the Americans were going to strike the Sixty-second Division on its flank. Alarmed, Us.h.i.+jima for the second time canceled a Cho-sponsored a.s.sault. more difficult than ever. Cho seized on this directive to persuade Us.h.i.+jima on April 6 to order an attack prepared for April 8. But the ever-alert Yahara pounced upon the appearance of a 110-s.h.i.+p convoy offsh.o.r.e of the Urasoe-Mura Escarpment on April 7 as proof that the Americans were going to strike the Sixty-second Division on its flank. Alarmed, Us.h.i.+jima for the second time canceled a Cho-sponsored a.s.sault.

But then both the American failure at Kakazu Ridge and the "remarkable" destruction wrought upon the enemy fleet by the first of the kikusui kikusui convinced Us.h.i.+jima and Cho that the time to strike had indeed come. This misconception was strengthened by "a stirring telegraph order" from Naval Headquarters claiming that convinced Us.h.i.+jima and Cho that the time to strike had indeed come. This misconception was strengthened by "a stirring telegraph order" from Naval Headquarters claiming that Ten-Go Ten-Go had been "very successful." "There are signs of uneasiness among enemy forces and odds are seven to three in our favor." Everyone involved in the Okinawa defense should unite in "a general pursuit operation." had been "very successful." "There are signs of uneasiness among enemy forces and odds are seven to three in our favor." Everyone involved in the Okinawa defense should unite in "a general pursuit operation."

Isamu Cho, though not as rational as his rival Yahara, was at least as clever. Everywhere he seemed to see signs of enemy weakness, among them slackening aerial activity on April 10, as well as a Navy report of a reduction in the number of American s.h.i.+ps in the Hagus.h.i.+ Anchorage. The calculating Yahara could have explained the first as a result of the same cloudy, rainy weather that discomfited everyone on the island-Cho included -and the second as caused by the visible stream of unloaded enemy s.h.i.+ps sailing back to base for reloading and return. But Cho was then at his argumentative best, and over the precise but uninspiring protests of the unhappy Yahara, General Us.h.i.+jima ordered a "powerful" counter-attack for the night of April 12-13.

Cho's plan was for ma.s.sive infiltration of almost the entire east-west front of the U.S. Seventh and Ninety-sixth Divisions. Three battalions of the j.a.panese Twenty-fourth Division would strike the Seventh on the east (or right of the American line), while three more from the Sixty-second Division would a.s.sault the battered Ninety-sixth. They would, of course, attack at night, a j.a.panese preference born of a desire to negate that dreaded American artillery. Breaking through the advance American units, the troops would then spread out in the rear area to a point four miles below Kadena Airfield. There they would take refuge in known caves and tombs. On the morning of April 13 they would emerge to slaughter Tenth Army's rear-echelon troops, usually technical, headquarters, supply, and soldiers armed with nothing more lethal than a pencil. In the melee that would ensue, troops of both sides would be so hopelessly intermixed that the enemy would not dare to bring his artillery, air, and naval gunfire to bear. Meanwhile, other battalions remaining in place opposite the Seventh and Ninety-sixth would launch a furious attack intended to compel the Yankees to retreat, perhaps in such panic that they would be included in the general slaughter of the enemy's rear echelon. Cho did not specify what would happen next, whether he intended actually to overrun the airfields as Imperial Headquarters had suggested, destroying installations and aircraft at will, or would be content merely with unnerving Buckner and disorganizing his two forward divisions.

With troops marching in drenching rain to their jump-off positions on April 12, Hiromichi Yahara became so apprehensive that he committed an act of insubordination so incredible that in any Western army it could not have ended otherwise than in a court-martial and dismissal-or perhaps worse. He went to Lieutenant General Takeo Fujioka, commander of the Sixty-second Division, and Lieutenant General Tatsumi Amamiya, commander of the Twenty-fourth, and actually persuaded them not to use three battalions each in the forthcoming operation, but only two. Not six, but four battalions would march to the plan of Isamu Cho.

Three flares burst over Kakazu Ridge during the early darkness of April 12. Two were red, the first signaling, "Commence artillery fire," and the other, "We are attacking with full strength tonight"; and the third, shaped like a dragon, was for "Make all-out attack." Almost instantly, at about 7 P.M., there fell on the Americans the heaviest j.a.panese artillery concentration of the war. On the sector of the battered Ninety-sixth alone about twenty-two hundred rounds exploded, while within five minutes another two hundred rocked the Seventh's zone. Fortunately these Yankees with their painfully acquired battle savvy had dug their holes so "dry and deep" that few casualties resulted.

First to strike the Americans was the Twenty-second Infantry Regiment, which had marched for two days in pouring rain from its base on Oroku Peninsula just south of Naha. Loaded down with 110-pound packs and bags of food-an immense burden for these normally small soldiers-they had been told by their commander, Lieutenant Colonel Masaru Yos.h.i.+da, to move in "a sinuous eel line," and they did indeed feel more like fish than flesh as they lay huddled and s.h.i.+vering in cane fields to escape detection by enemy air. By nightfall they were already dispirited and bewildered, moving over unfamiliar terrain and with no precise plan. Instead of attacking en ma.s.se, they sought to infiltrate the Seventh Division's sector in twos or threes or a squad or two, but got nowhere. One ma.s.sed attack of about a hundred j.a.panese was riddled by GIs firing rifles and machine guns, killing about a third of them, wounding another third, and compelling all survivors to take refuge in a cave.

The a.s.sault on the Ninety-sixth Division's front, however, was much heavier, better organized, and of longer duration-personally directed as it was by General Fujioka. Guileful and stealthy as always, a long column of j.a.panese sought to penetrate the Ninety-sixth's position by pretending to be GIs marching openly down Highway 5 in a column of twos. Twenty of them slipped past scrutiny until the Americans, realizing that they were not friendly troops on their flank, opened fire with all weapons. Those who survived scurried for cover in caves and tombs, but fifty-eight of their comrades were left dead on the field. Two more attacks were mounted against the Ninety-sixth, but both failed with heavy loss.

General Fujioka next tried to roll up his enemy with two companies following an artillery barrage against Kakazu Ridge. A small force staged a diversion around the western flank of Kakazu West while the main body tried to overrun the draw between that point and Kakazu Ridge. First to meet them was Pfc. William Daily at the trigger of a heavy machine gun in the draw. Unable to depress his gun enough to strike the approaching enemy below him, Daily began tossing grenades. Their explosions alerted Staff Sergeant Beauford "Snuffy" Anderson, holed up in a tomb with his light mortar section. Anderson left the tomb to hurl all of his grenades at the j.a.panese, and then emptied his carbine. Glancing about him, his eye fell on a dud enemy mortar. Seizing it he spiraled it football-style into the draw and was rewarded by an explosion and screams. Rus.h.i.+ng back into the tomb he collected his own mortars, wrenched them from their casings, yanked out the safety pins, slamming the sh.e.l.l against a rock to release the setback pin, and spiraled this heavier and more lethal "football" into the draw. Again an explosion and screams ... With this impromptu "pa.s.sing attack," Anderson sent all of his fifteen lethal footb.a.l.l.s spinning into the darkness below, and by this effective exercise in Yankee battle ingenuity he stopped an entire enemy platoon. In the morning he counted twenty-five enemy bodies, plus seven abandoned knee mortars and four machine guns. For his bravery and quickness of thought, Anderson received the Medal of Honor.

Other j.a.panese who had infiltrated Kakazu West met the same end. When an enemy officer approached a BAR man and asked him if he were j.a.panese, the GI snorted, "No!"-and shot him dead, along with ten of his men following in single file. Soldiers of a company command post under attack in a tomb sallied forth to kill twenty j.a.panese. On the western slope of Kakazu West a single American machine gunner mowed down twenty-three more sons of Nippon.

Another enemy force nearly broke through the draw, until they were illuminated by star sh.e.l.ls fired over the battlefield by American wars.h.i.+ps offsh.o.r.e, a technique developed at Peleliu and so successful that night actually could be turned into day. Silhouetted against the dark, the enemy was easily riddled and their attack broken in blood. Dawn revealed a draw covered with sprawling corpses.

General Cho's desperation attack was also hurled back on Kakazu Ridge proper. When the Ninety-sixth's heavy mortar crews were informed that about forty j.a.panese were threatening to overrun their battalion observation post, they decided to risk close support of their riflemen buddies up front. Hoping that their comrades would be safely below ground in pits and foxholes, they sent about eight hundred high-explosive sh.e.l.ls humming skyward, to come plunging straight down with a horrible whistling noise that was the last sound many j.a.panese ever heard. Marine artillery also joined the bombardment, firing sh.e.l.ls that drew a curtain of explosives around the endangered position. In the morning enemy dead were "stacked like cordwood" below.

In their headquarters below Shuri Castle a sorrowing General Us.h.i.+jima and a despairing General Cho heard nothing but depressing reports from the front. Nevertheless, it was still hoped that a battalion of the Twenty-second Regiment that had slipped through American lines undetected to enter the Ginowan area might hide out in caves until daybreak, when they could emerge to shoot up the American rear echelons-and even perhaps reach Yontan and Kadena to destroy enemy aircraft. But in scattering for sanctuary during the night, they had become so fragmented that daybreak showed them incapable of concerted action. So they remained hidden until nightfall of the thirteenth, when half of them successfully slipped back into their own lines. Two final j.a.panese counter-attacks were repulsed during the early-morning darkness of the fourteenth, one of them with losses of 116 men, closing out Isamu Cho's abortive counter-offensive.

It had not, of course, been a proper Banzai!: Banzai!: howling, howling, sake- sake-crazed troops, screaming and screeching as they ran through the darkness banging canteens on bayonets and yelling in singsong English what they presumed to be blood-curdling oaths-"j.a.panese boy drink American boy's blood!"-only to be herded into enemy barbed wire by American mortars falling behind them, there to be riddled or sometimes even exterminated by accurate machine-gun and rifle fire. But it was still a reversion to bamboo-spear tactics, and worse, a decision to come outside of the caves and tombs and pillboxes from which they had successfully halted the two-division advance of General Hodge's Twenty-fourth Corps, and expose themselves to the devastation of overwhelmingly superior American artillery, mortar, and naval gunfire, as well as accurate small arms. Us.h.i.+jima, in authorizing this romantic regression into the failed tactics of the past, had blessed an operation ill conceived, understrength, misdirected, haphazard, and uncoordinated. As a result, more than half the force involved-1,594 men-were killed. To approve a plan calling for splendid defensive fighters to take the offensive at night while moving over unfamiliar terrain and woefully inferior in numbers and firepower was simply to grasp the muzzle of military success rather than the pistol grip; and also to surrender his own enormous advantage in terrain and tenacious troops: natural obstacles made una.s.sailable by improved fortifications, thus canceling out his enemy's superior firepower, and manned by invisible troops movable only in death.

He did this because, like Isamu Cho, his heart had conquered his head; and because most j.a.panese commanders from Midway-Guadalca.n.a.l to Okinawa itself could never shed that Bus.h.i.+do- Bus.h.i.+do-born, carefully cultivated conviction that the soft, spoiled, luxury-loving Americans would quail at the first flash of a Samurai Samurai saber. saber.