by Len Levinson
“Yowee!” replied Frankie La Barbara, moving toward the left flank with his BAR.
Bannon let out a rebel yell and Longtree gave an old Apache war whoop. Everybody joined in with his own special battle cry as the recon platoon surged through the jungle. Private Donahue from the Third Squad got shot in the stomach, and Private Berryman from the Second Squad caught one in the throat, but the recon platoon had the Japanese trench right in front of them now. They were almost home.
Lieutenant Breckenridge saw Japanese faces, helmets, and gun barrels straight ahead. An American soldier bellowed in pain a few feet away from him and went crashing to the ground. Lieutenant Breckenridge aimed his carbine into the trench and pulled the trigger. It shook violently in his hands as the hot lead spat out, and Lieutenant Breckenridge leaped into the air, landing on top of a Japanese soldier in the trench.
The Japanese soldier fell to the side under Lieutenant Breckenridge’s considerable weight, and Lieutenant Breckenridge toppled onto his ass. All the Japs in the vicinity dived at him with murder in their eyes, and he rolled over, pulling the trigger of his carbine, spraying them with bullets as they fell on him.
They landed on top of him, dead or wounded, and he pushed them away with his hefty arms, still firing the carbine, working his way to a kneeling position. Meanwhile the trench filled with GIs, who screamed and shouted wildly, attacking the nearest Japs.
Bannon jumped into the trench and kicked with both his feet, connecting with a Jap’s head, nearly taking it off. The Jap went flying backward and Bannon touched down, turned around, and saw a Japanese rifle and bayonet streaking toward his heart. He dodged to the side and the bayonet ripped across his left bicep, drawing blood but doing no real damage.
The sudden pain enraged Bannon, who swung his rifle butt around, connecting with the side of the Jap’s face, busting cheekbones and shattering the Jap’s eardrum. The Jap fell back unconscious and Bannon was going to run him through, when he saw two Japs coming at him through the trench.
The trench was narrow and the Japs stood shoulder to shoulder as both of them simultaneously lunged toward Bannon with their rifles and bayonets. Bannon backpedaled to get out of the way, and tripped over the Jap he’d kicked in the face. He fell onto his back; the two Japs kept coming, angling their bayonets down at him.
It’s all over, Bannon thought without any trace of fear, for he was too hyped up by the action to be afraid, when suddenly out of nowhere came Pfc. Sam Longtree, swinging his rifle like a baseball bat. He came up behind the Japs, swung down, and cracked one of them on the head with such force that blood squirted out of the Jap’s nose and ears. The Jap collapsed and Bannon reached up to grab the gleaming bayonet on the rifle held by the other Jap. The sharp bayonet blade sliced into Bannon’s hands but he hung on and pushed the bayonet away from him.
The Jap’s forward motion impelled the bayonet onward and it buried itself nearly to the hilt in the dirt. Bannon pulled his bleeding hands away at the last moment, and Longtree raised his rifle again and brought it down with all his strength. He clobbered the Jap atop his head, fracturing his skull. The Jap collapsed and Bannon jumped to his feet, grabbing his M 1 rifle with his stinging, burning hands.
He barely had time to raise the rifle, when another Jap ran at him with rifle and bayonet aimed for a deathblow. Bannon parried the thrust, smashed the Jap in the face with his rifle butt, and slashed him from his throat to his chest and across to his armpit before he fell down.
Another Jap appeared in front of Bannon, but he was more cautious. He advanced stealthily with his long Arisaka rifle and bayonet, and when he came close he feinted, hoping to make Bannon reach and open up. Bannon lunged forward and plunged his bayonet into the Jap’s heart. The Jap looked stunned, because he couldn’t believe he had been outmaneuvered so quickly in the game. He sagged to his knees and Bannon pulled back on his rifle, but it was stuck in the Jap’s ribs and he couldn’t pull it loose. He tugged again; still it wouldn’t come out.
He heard the pounding of footsteps behind him and turned around to see a Japanese officer pointing a Nambu pistol directly at him as he charged. Bannon dived at the officer’s ankles as the Nambu fired. The bullet cracked over Bannon’s head, burying into the ass of a Japanese soldier behind him who was fighting it out with Corporal Gomez from the Second Squad.
Bannon’s full weight hit the Japanese officer at the level of his shins, and the Japanese officer fell backward, trying to take aim at Bannon without shooting off his own leg. Bannon grabbed the officer’s pistol arm and kneed him in the balls, but the officer twisted to the side and Bannon’s knee landed against the officer’s hip.
The officer reached up and grabbed for Bannon’s head, trying to stick his thumb into Bannon’s eye, and Bannon drew back his right hand while holding the officer’s pistol hand with his own left hand. He punched down with all his strength and flattened the officer’s nose. The officer tried to pull himself together, but he didn’t know where he was, and his grip loosened on the Nambu pistol. Bannon plucked it out of his hand, held it by the barrel, and hammered down. The handle of the pistol whacked the officer’s forehead and made a dent in the bone. The officer would never wake up again.
Bannon turned the pistol around in his hands so he could hold it to fire, but he had difficulty because there was something wrong with his grip. Some of the tendons in his hands were cut and blood still was flowing. He held the pistol with both hands and got to his feet. In front of him, about ten feet away, a Jap who had his back to him was fighting with Nutsy Gafooley. Butsko stumbled toward the Jap, aimed with both hands, and pulled the trigger. A red hole appeared on the back of the Jap’s shirt and he pitched forward onto Nutsy, who fell onto his ass.
Bannon heard running footsteps and spun around. A Jap with fixed bayonet charged him and Bannon shot him between the eyes, then stepped to the side to let the Jap pass by and fall onto his face.
The trench was full of GIs and Japs grunting and cursing, trying to kill each other at close range. Their feet came down on the bodies of GIs and Japs who had been killed or wounded in the fight. On the left flank Frankie La Barbara stood with his BAR, machine-gunning Japs trying to attack from that direction. In front of him were piles of dead Japs, and whenever a head appeared over the top of the pile, Frankie shot it off. The trench was so narrow and filled with the Japs Frankie had killed that no new Japs could get through without being gunned down by him.
The bolt of his BAR slammed home and nothing happened, which indicated that he was out of ammo. He pressed the button that ejected the clip, rammed in a fresh one, and resumed his fire. The BAR pumped bullets out at the Japs trying to fire around the heaps of dead bodies. So far he was able to hold off the Japs on the left flank of the attack.
On the right flank Pfc. Sears, the BAR man from the Third Squad, held his finger against the trigger and raked Japs coming at him from that direction, but one of the Japs lying in the trench got off a lucky shot that hit Sears in the shoulder, spinning him around and knocking him down, opening the right flank to attack.
And attack the Japs did. They saw the way was clear and charged down the trench, hoping to surprise the GIs, who were so busy fighting they didn’t see the threat.
But Butsko saw it. He was lying behind the trench, because he couldn’t fight hand-to-hand with the flamethrower apparatus on his back. He jumped up and ran toward the part of the trench that Sears had guarded, holding the nozzle of the flamethrower in both his hands. The Japs jumped over the bodies of their fallen comrades and didn’t notice him, so intent were they on getting to the GIs in the center of the trench.
Butsko jumped in their path, landing in the bottom of the trench, and as his feet touched down he pressed the trigger. With a loud shoooooosssshhh the flaming jellied gasoline shot out of the nozzle and enveloped the Japs in hell. They screeched horribly as they roasted and fried, writhing like snakes and trying to run away, but there was no refuge from the fire that consumed them. They fell to the ground and t
he odor of burning meat filled the trench. The wind blew it into the part of the trench where the fighting was taking place.
Butsko turned off the trigger to conserve fuel, and mounds of Japs lay in front of him, the jellied gasoline still burning up their bodies, blackened and sputtering like bacon in a frying pan. The odor was ghastly, and Butsko pinched his nose so he wouldn’t smell it as he peered down the trench, trying to see if any more Japs were coming.
Meanwhile, in the center of the trench, Lieutenant Breckenridge was spinning around like a whirling dervish, holding his carbine by the barrel and clobbering Japs. They lay all around him with fractured skulls; he’d hit some of them so solidly that their heads had cracked open and their brains were splattered everywhere.
He was jubilant, because he knew his men were beating the Japs in that section of the trench. Only a few scattered Japs were still alive and fighting, but he knew that more Japs would attack his flanks before long and he wondered where Able Company was. He turned around to look but couldn’t see them coming. How long could the recon platoon hold out in that section of the trench without help?
“Japs!” shouted Nutsy Gafooley.
Lieutenant Breckenridge raised his head and saw two platoons of Japs erupt from the jungle straight ahead and charge the trench. They were reinforcements sent in from the Japanese rear, and if they ever got into the trench, they’d out numbered the GIs.
“Stop them!” Lieutenant Breckenridge hollared. “Open fire!”
The exhausted GIs, splattered with blood and gore, fell against the rear wall of the trench, and opened fire at the charging Japs. Their rifles and BARS barked and rattled, filling the air with smoke and deafening noise, cutting down the Japs who stumbled and fell or pirouetted eerily, dropping their rifles as their blood spurted in spirals in the air.
But there were a lot of them and they kept charging into the barrage. Butsko steadied himself against the wall of the trench and pressed the nozzle of his flamethrower. The fiery gasoline leaped out of the nozzle and splashed over the front row of Japanese soldiers, stopping them in their tracks and covering them with a raging inferno. They shrieked and fell to their knees as the jellied gasoline burned into their flesh and melted their bones.
The attack faltered, but the flanks of the GIs were wide open and more Japs attacked from the sides. The GIs had to divert their fire to protect their flanks, and then more Japs charged out of the jungle to the west. Lieutenant Breckenridge saw that the Japs were determined to recapture that section of the line, and began to doubt that he and his men could hold it. Where the hell is Able Company? he thought. He looked behind him but couldn’t see any GIs coming to his aid out of the jungle. He was excited and nervous and thought that maybe he should retreat while most of the recon platoon still was intact.
“Gimme the walkie-talkie!” he yelled at Nutsy Gafooley.
Nutsy handed it over, and Lieutenant Breckenridge called Able Company, but there was no answer. He decided to call battalion headquarters, but Butsko suddenly appeared beside him, holding the smoke nozzle of his flamethrower.
“Sir, we’d better get out of here!” Butsko said.
“I was just calling Battalion for help!”
“We don’t have the time!”
Lieutenant Breckenridge glanced around and could see that the recon platoon was in trouble, being attacked on three sides. If the Japs decided to work around behind them, they’d be surrounded.
“Let’s get out of here!” Lieutenant Breckenridge yelled. “Retreat!”
That was the command the GIs were hoping for, and they climbed out of the trench, heading back toward the safety of the American lines. The Japs behind them saw them going and opened fire at their backs. Private Sanchez from the Fourth Platoon got shot squarely in the back, and Nutsy Gafooley stopped a bullet with the right cheek of his ass.
Nutsy felt as if he’d been kicked by a mule, and was knocked onto his stomach. In all his months of hard fighting on Guadalcanal, this was the first time he’d ever been shot. He was surprised as much as he was in pain, but that lasted only for a few seconds, and then he went into shock.
Lieutenant Breckenridge was behind him when he fell, and he picked Nutsy up by the scruff of the neck, carrying him along to safety. Corporal Tanner from the Second Squad was shot in the left shoulder and he, too, collapsed onto the ground. Tommy Shaw was behind him and heaved him up onto his shoulder, not missing a step as he ran for shelter.
Dragging Nutsy Gafooley along, Lieutenant Breckenridge tasted bitter defeat on his tongue. He now thought that he never should have attacked that trench without support, and that his men were being cut down because of him. He’d made the wrong decision. It had been a crazy, irresponsible thing to do.
Then, before his disbelieving eyes, he saw hordes of GIs debouching from the jungle ahead of him. At first he thought he might be hallucinating, but then he heard his men cheering and knew it was no hallucination. It must be Able Company moving up to help out! The situation wasn’t as bad as he’d thought!
“Back to the trench!” he shouted to his men. “Take that trench!”
The recon platoon turned around and led the mad charge to the trench. The Japanese soldiers were still getting reorganized and weren’t prepared for an attack of such magnitude. Lieutenant Breckenridge dropped the unconscious Nutsy Gafooley onto the ground and fired his carbine ahead of him like a submachine gun as he galloped toward the trench. The Japs in the trench stumbled over dead and wounded bodies as they tried to fight off the Americans, but the recon platoon and Able Company thundered forward and dived into the trench.
The vicious hand-to-hand combat began again, but this time the GIs greatly outnumbered the Japanese and overwhelmed them totally. There were five minutes of stabbing and shooting at close quarters, and then all the Japs were dead or wounded. The GIs had cracked the Japanese line.
Captain Ilecki and Lieutenant Breckenridge positioned their men in the trench for the major Japanese counterattack that they expected any moment, because the Japanese always liked to counterattack quickly while the Americans were tired and low on ammunition. Captain Ilecki and Lieutenant Breckenridge ordered machine-gun crews on the flanks to protect them from those directions, but their main effort was directed toward the jungle ahead, where the Japs kept their reserves.
It didn’t take long to put the men in place, and then Lieutenant Breckenridge joined Captain Ilecki in the center of the trench.
“You’d better call Battalion for help,” Lieutenant Breckenridge said. “If the Japs attack in force, we might not be able to hold them off.”
“Already called them,” said Captain Ilecki, a lanky man with delicate features marred by an old combat scar on his left cheek.
“Here they come!” yelled somebody from Able Company.
Japs poured out of the jungle straight ahead, screaming “Banzai!” and shaking their rifles and bayonets. Their bared their teeth like wild animals as they raced toward the trench, and the GIs opened fire in a massive fusillade, ripping apart their first wave, but the second and third waves charged past their fallen comrades.
American bullets whistled around them, but the Japs never hesitated or faltered in their charge. Leading them was an officer swinging a samurai sword, a red sash wrapped around his waist. He made a wonderful target, and about twenty bullets bit him almost simultaneously. Vomiting blood, he dropped to the ground and a sergeant picked up his samurai sword, continuing the charge, but he, too, was shot down; then a Japanese private picked it up, running forward on his short legs and screaming “Banzai!”
When the Japs came within flamethrower range, Butsko pressed the trigger on the nozzle, and the flaming jelly spewed out, gobs of it landing on the Japanese soldiers, who were surprised, then horrified, then cooked alive. Butsko swung the nozzle from side to side, splashing the Japs with flame, and then aimed high so it would drop down on them like rain.
The leading ranks of Japanese soldiers were shot down by the GIs, and Butsko burned up a
substantial number, but the rest continued their wild banzai charge and swarmed into the trench. Bayonets glinted in the sun and shots rang out at close quarters. Men stabbed and gouged each other, grunting and snarling, locked in mortal combat.
Butsko threw off his flamethrower gear because he couldn’t fight with it, and pulled his Ka-bar knife out of its scabbard, because it was the only weapon he had for hand-to-hand fighting. Before the tip of the blade got clear of the scabbard, a Jap with a samurai sword landed in front of him, raised the sword in the air, and swung down at Butsko’s head.
Butsko darted to the side and the blade clanged against the dirt and rocks piled up on the rim of the trench. Butsko slashed sideways with his knife and cut across the Jap’s stomach, twisting the blade around on the backswing and severing the Jap’s windpipe. The Jap fell to the ground and Butsko plucked the samurai sword out of his hand, returned his Ka-Bar to its scabbard, saw a Jap fighting a GI in front of him, and swung the samurai sword sideways into the Jap’s kidney.
The Jap screamed hysterically and looked at the sky, reaching around to hold his kidney together, and the GI in front of him ran him through with the bayonet on the end of his rifle. The Jap fell onto his back and Butsko stepped on his face as he charged down the trench, holding the samurai sword high in the air.
He swung down with all his strength and split the skull of a Japanese soldier in two like a coconut. Pulling the sword from the Jap’s collarbone, he swung diagonally, catching a Jap at the juncture of his neck and shoulders. cracking downward through six of the Jap’s ribs.
The sword got stuck in the bones and gristle. Butsko pulled with all his strength but couldn’t loosen it. A Jap screamed a few feet away from him, thrusting his rifle and bayonet forward, and Butsko grabbed the barrel of the rifle with both hands, stopping its forward motion. The Jap was surprised by this sudden feat of incredible power, and tried to pull the rifle away from Butsko, but Butsko held it in his viselike grip and pulled with all his strength, angling his head downward. The Jap wouldn’t let go of his rifle but didn’t have the strength to hold his ground. His face crashed into Butsko’s helmet, bashing his nose into a pancake. Stunned, the Jap’s legs wobbled and he loosened his grip. Butsko yanked the rifle out of the Jap’s hands and bashed him in the face with the rifle butt. The Jap collapsed onto his back and again Butsko slammed him in the face with the rifle butt, busting the Jap’s head apart, brains splattering in all directions.