by Carl Muller
With the crew on board moving in turn from port to starboard, the coil was slowly unwrapped. It took three hours to get the wire off the blades. Finally, there remained a single loop around the main shaft. The metal had been bruised white in that tremendous whiplash. Men hauled the offending wire up top as it came free. Three hours and forty minutes. Four hours. That last loop was a bastard. Finally, it was forced free and the propellers were cleared. The divers came up, shook fists in the air and on board, everybody cheered and ignored Lieutenant Wicks’ ‘As you were!’ Victor ordered two engine room men to go down, check for damage. They came up spluttering, said there was none. Cautiously they tested revolutions. Nothing awry. The evening had made the sky a denser blue and southwards, the sun was making its diagonal race for the sea.
‘We have steam,’ Victor signalled the Lihiniya, ‘Stand by.’
They reached the south-west entrance to the Colombo harbour at eight that evening and a tug took the Lihiniya in charge, pushing her to berth 10A where she would spend the night.
Victor slowly trundled the Vijaya past the Delft Quay to Kochchikade where seamen from the base waited at the mooring buoys. Home at last, and even as the orders were given to shut down steam and the boats took the thankful men ashore, two men with rifles propped against the armoury door of the Gemunu were earnestly considering the corpse of Able Seaman Abeysakes. They were also tolerably inebriated.
They were Able Seaman Hughes and Stoker Mechanic Ryan and it seemed sheer folly that the Navy had put them together on duty, and, of all things, to guard a body. They were on an eight-to-twelve. All they had to do was sit in the armoury and keep watch over their dead messmate. They were not expected to take away the flag, open the coffin, hobnob with the dead in any way.
Even the duty chief had groaned. ‘What? Those two? Who is the idiot who arranged the shifts? Never, ever, put those two together!’
The quartermaster had shrugged. ‘Now they’re gone on duty also.’
‘That’s what I’m afraid of. Anyway, I’ll check on them at lights out.’
He stomped away, muttering.
42
History—Another Easter, Okinawa and the Divine Wind
Spring 1945, and Germany was just about defeated. This too, is part of the immense battle history, but the writer has let it alone. It was decided that this work should revolve round the Asian scene. The writer sincerely hopes this decision does not take much away from this novel. Even as Germany began to collapse, Japan remained strong, and this strength was very evident to the Americans who were now at Japan’s doorstep. There were decisions to be taken. Would the Americans have to invade the Japanese mainland?
To do so, they held Iwo Jima, but they needed a closer base south. Just south of Japan. It had to be Okinawa. Many of the Marine divisions were sure that Okinawa would be their last landing, their last beach assault. But many others shook their heads. Japan would not give up. There would have to be yet another landing, they said—the mainland of Japan itself. Many hoped that it would not come to that.
But for now it was Okinawa. The Americans massed huge land, air and sea forces for the invasion. On the island, Lieutenant General Mitsuru Ushijama knew he was powerless to fight the US troops under the guns of the warships offshore. As in Iwo Jima, the Japanese decided to show no opposition on the beachhead. Let the Marines move inland . . . then wipe them out. It was the same strategy as on Iwo Jima and it was all Ushijama could do. There was no hope of reinforcements. The Americans were supreme in the air and there was little chance of shipping Japanese troops across.
Easter Sunday, April 1, 1945. All Fools Day too. The control craft lay 4000 yards offshore and far out lay the big battleships. Closer in, four destroyers steamed parallel to the beach. In the long line of landing craft, the first wave of the 7th Infantry Division was ready. Each LCI flew an identical red pennant. The men carried the beach markers they would set up as they hit the sand. Objective: Beach Purple One, southern Okinawa.
The bombardment began. Heavy 14-inch shells began to erupt just beyond the narrow beach strip. The destroyers opened up with their 5-inch guns. The beach became a haze of smoke and bursting sand. The Marines streamed in, closing rapidly . . . 1000 yards, 600 yards . . . the boats were 200 yards away when the deafening gunfire ceased. The beach was a havoc of cratered sand and smoking trees, and then the fighters screamed in from the carriers to bomb the beach from end to end, making it a long furrow of flame and exploding sand.
At 8.32 a.m. the Marines landed, pelted to the cover of trees, dug in. Bigger landing craft brought the tanks clanking ashore. The bustle at the water’s edge was hectic. The men wondered. Had the naval bombardment and air strike flattened all resistance? There was no opposition. All they saw was a single Japanese plane zoom along the shoreline, wing swiftly away to the north. Oh, the Japanese were there alright, but not a shot had been fired. By eleven the landing was complete. The men looked around, made short forays inland, found the going easy. It was mostly level plain, bamboo clumps and outcrops of weirdly-shaped coral. They spent the day on the beach, spent an uneasy night.
In Tokyo, the Japanese were readying to play their last deadly card: the Kamikaze Corps. They would strike terror into the hearts of the Americans. Japanese flyers would give their lives to knock out the American ships. They would be the kamikaze—the divine wind.
The Japanese believed in this wind of God. Long years ago, when the Chinese had sent a huge fleet against Japan, a furious typhoon had arisen, destroyed the Chinese ships. A wind sent by God. A divine wind. Well, now the Japanese would raise their own divine wind. Kamikaze pilots did not need good planes. All they needed was any old crate that could fly, could smash into a ship. And the suicide pilot needed very little training. All he needed to know was how to get his plane into the air and aim it at an enemy ship. And all he needed was the fuel to fly out, for he wasn’t coming back.
The Americans knew of the Kamikaze Corps. Reports had reached them of how the volunteers would parade the streets of Tokyo, hailed by flag-waving citizens, then attend elaborate religious ceremonies. They received gifts from schoolchildren and members of their families. They were each draped with a Rising Sun flag before they climbed into the cockpits of their no-return planes. We who are about to die accept your salute!
Yes, the Japanese would launch a concerted kamikaze attack on the US fleet in this Battle of Okinawa. For the Japanese on Okinawa there was little hope. They would have to fight to the end, but meanwhile the divine wind would destroy the American fleet and put an end to America’s designs on the Japanese mainland.
Then came another option. Send in the Yamoto. Let it go, bite into the US fleet. A kamikaze ship!
The battleship Yamoto lay at anchor at her inland sea base—the largest fighting ship in the world, 863 feet long and with a displacement of over 70,000 tons. She carried 18-inch guns which could hurl shells to a range of 22½ miles, each shell weighing more than 1½ tons. The Japanese were not anxious to have this behemoth lie uselessly in port, only to be destroyed by American fighters. Also, there would be no use for a battleship of such size ever again. She could move fast, true, and she had immense hitting power, but her very size made her a costly liability.
The Japanese loaded her ammunition magazines and fuelled her for a one-way journey. The orders to her Commander, Seiichi Ito, were terse. Engage the enemy. If you should go down, take the biggest American ships with you. Go down gloriously.
The Americans were told of the Yamoto’s breakout on April 6. The huge ship made 22 knots through the Van Diemen Straits, accompanied by a light cruiser and eight destroyers. After what seemed a long time in the Pacific War, there would actually be a ship-to-ship engagement.
The Americans fuelled their destroyers to tank capacity. It would be a terrible surface battle, they knew, and the destroyers would need to make as many torpedo runs as they could to breach the monster. The battleships could do little. None of their guns could come within four miles of the Yamoto�
�s range.
But the Japanese had not reckoned on the spirit of the American fighter planes that sped away from the carriers. Long before the Yamoto could meet the US fleet, the first US strike planes swooped on her out of the sky. The big ship took two well-placed bombs and a vicious torpedo. More planes closed in like angry bees around a hulking victim. For two hours the Yamoto took a pounding. She began to list dangerously, almost 35 degrees, then up-ended. Her deck was almost vertical, her battle flag plunged into the surging sea. Across her ammunition room, shells began to tumble, then crashed into the bulkheads, exploding tremendously on impact. Magazines were torn apart and, as the sea reached up hungrily, compartments burst from the pressure of air. The Yamoto died as the biblical Goliath did. It was 2.23 p.m. when she finally disappeared, the explosions of her death raising the water in furious boils and spurting ulcers. Her last battle had been a meaningless one. She could not swat away the angry bees that caused her such deadly harm. With her demise came the end of almost five centuries of naval warfare. No longer would ships fight it out, guns blazing. That would never be necessary again. Nor would Japan ever build another battleship. It was, to many naval historians, the end of an era.
On Okinawa, the Marines secured the northern two- thirds of Okinawa with little resistance. Lieutenant General Ushijama had moved all his men to the south, near the principal city of Naha. From that point would they oppose the US advance. The US 7th Division’s objective was the ruin of the old Shuri Castle in the south. From this castle, Japan had once ruled the Ryukyus.
On May 2, the Marines encountered two Japanese tanks which they quickly accounted for. The Marines were confident now, although advancing with care.
The US ships had set up 16 picket stations around the island, each station manned by two destroyers. They were certain that the Japanese would strike, send in their planes from the nearby island of Kyushi, strafe the landing forces and help their men on Okinawa. The Americans were ready for battle, but they did not expect a roaring divine wind!
The Japanese learnt of the pickets with glee. Why, the US ships were at station, very much like sacrificial lambs.
At picket station One were the destroyers Bush and Calhoun. They worked their patrol a thousand yards apart, fifty miles north of Okinawa. On April 6, the kamikazes came. They zeroed in on the US vessels all around the Okinawa coat—355 suicide planes, sent to kill and die.
The Bush and Calhoun were hit time and again. They both sank. So did four other ships and seventeen were badly damaged. And more Japanese martyrs would come in, desperately, fanatically. They were not coming to relieve the men on the island. They were coming in to wipe out the US fleet.
Through April, May and June over 3000 suicide sorties were mounted. The kamikazes sank 21 ships, damaged 66. It was Japan’s last hurrah.
On June 21, Lieutenant General Ushijama killed himself. It was all he could do—die for his emperor, as the Marines smashed through all Japanese resistance. The last battle of the Pacific was over.
And no, there would be no US invasion of the Japanese mainland, for in Los Alamos, New Mexico, atomic scientists had put the finishing touches on a new weapon—a weapon so fearsome that it would make all the Yamoto’s massive guns seem like a child’s popgun.
Carrying this weapon, Colonel Paul Tibbets took off from Tinian Island on August 6, 1945. The time was 2.45 a.m. His B-29 bomber was the Enola Gay.
At 9.15 a.m. he would drop this single weapon above the headquarters of the Japanese 2nd Army at Hiroshima.
The Atomic Age was upon the world.
43
Of the Unhinging of Bollocks and Converting the Captain and a Porthole to the Stars
The coffin lay on a makeshift bier of wooden boxes, on each of which was stencilled in red: .303 CLIPS 2000—X.
The Navy, as is now known, has its system of watches. A sailor (and two or more if necessary) is given a rifle and told to conduct a routine guard duty for four hours. Earlier that evening, in the quartermaster’s lobby, someone had declared, ‘Hell, I’m not going to that bloody armoury with that dead bugger in there. Not in the bloody night anyway.’
As we also know, Ryan and Hughes were inseparables. They had only two goals in life which, they said, were all that any sailor needed: sex and booze. They were more so, inseparable in the pursuit of both. They picked up women on the strict understanding that the said woman would do for one what she would do for the other. If they ever argued, it was about who should perform first. Sometimes such an issue was decided with the flip of a coin, and one would stand over and watch the other perform while the other would tell the bemused woman, ‘So let him look. Anything I fuck he also fucks.’ Being in the same Blue Watch, they got into trouble together, and were punished together. This time they had gone to the armoury together to watch over Abeysakes’ remains from 8 p.m. to midnight. They would be relieved at midnight by Stoker Mechanic Bollocks and Signalman Herft.
At midnight, Herft yawned hugely and blinked his way to the quartermaster’s lobby. Bollocks was already there, a little fellow with no conversation. A dreary companion in the dreary hours of the graveyard shift.
‘Who’s there now?’ he asked.
‘Ryan and Hughes,’ the QM said, ‘if I know those buggers they would have gone off by now. Anyway, you guys get going. It’s after twelve also.’
‘You go ahead,’ Herft told Bollocks, as he watched the kettle, ‘I’ll bring a pot of tea.’
‘Fine. Bring a mug also,’ Bollocks reminded, and dragged off down the road to the end of Flagstaff Street where the armoury stood . . .
It took Herft all of ten minutes to make the tea and cadge a tin mug. Very sweet tea. Keeps one awake, especially when the minutes drag by as though stuck up to the ears in chewing gum. He didn’t see Ryan or Hughes. He should have met them since they had to report end of watch to the QM, but plainly, such procedures meant little to them. Chances were they had just dumped their rifles and drifted down road to the port where sundry daughters of the night roamed for custom. Ryan and Hughes always bundled in one of these women after night watch. For some time, however, they had been quite restrained—ever since the night they had brought in a hermaphrodite and discovered that their prize had a penis. The hullaballoo had been quite extraordinary!
Herft heard voices on approaching the armoury. No, one voice. Bollocks. The man was going on about something. Herft paused at the door. It was Bollocks to be sure and he was well inside and his voice was edged with pure terror.
‘D-don’t you try to get up! Don’t! You get up you bastard I’ll—I’ll shoot you! I will! Lie down! D-did you hear? Don’—don’t get up! I’ll shoot! I’ll-I’ll shoot you!’
Herft rushed in and Bollocks wailed, swung his rifle, blindly squeezing the trigger. It wasn’t loaded, of course, and Herft dropped the kettle, grabbed at the gibbering stoker. He received a stinging blow with the barrel.
Bollocks was white, sweat-drenched, utterly ghastly. He hung grimly to his weapon, finger hooked under the trigger guard, and then drooled. Yes, actually drooled.
Herft wrenched at the gun, pulled it free, almost breaking Bollocks’ finger. The man screamed and rushed for the door, turning his ankle on the fallen kettle, falling heavily. Herft grabbed a leg and hung on. Bollocks was trying to swim for the road. There was little else he could do. Herft dragged him back, leaned over and punched him hard on the back of the neck. Bollocks subsided, whimpering.
Herft had not really taken note of the armoury. Satisfied that Bollocks would behave, he looked around and nearly jumped out of his skin. There was the coffin. The flag lay on the floor. The coffin lid had been removed. Abeysakes, dead and poker stiff, was not a pretty sight. Also, he had not remained in the confines of his coffin. He was practically half-way out, entire head, shoulders and up to the midriff, and on his chest was a tin mug and on the floor an empty arrack bottle. Hughes and Ryan had had a party and, being congenial souls, had invited Abeysakes to it.
At the subsequent inquiry it was
grudgingly admitted that the two incorrigibles had gone on duty with a bottle of hooch and a mug. In the armoury, they had settled down to finish the bottle and midway, had decided to toast the corpse.
‘Oi, Abey, you’re aksherlly dead? What the hell men, howerbout a small drink?’
‘That’s true. Not good we are drinking and ‘e’s just lying there.’
‘So—so givvim also a drink.’
‘I say—pukka—puk-kah idea. Oi, Abeysakes, you wanta drink?’
‘He can’t hear, men, inshide that bloody thing.’
‘So open, men, openitt.’
They pulled off the flag, found a lid that moved, yanked it off.
‘Bugger is dead? How to put a drink if he’s like this flat? Sleeping. Oi, Abey! Gettup, you ol’ bugger. Have sum arrack, you want?’
‘Nothin’ doing. Bugger won’t budge. Must be stuck inside or something. Come on, help to make him sit.’
Together they had tried to raise up the corpse. This was not easy, but they succeeded in dragging the body halfway up the box by its shoulders, and it must have looked very peculiar, poker stiff and all.
‘If—iffew don’ don’t wanter drink just say,’ said Hughes, getting peeved, ‘now becos he’s dead mus’ be thinking he can’t put a shot.’
‘Balls,’ said Ryan pouring the last of the arrack into the mug. He swallowed a mouthful and gave the rest to Hughes who tossed it down. With some care, he placed the empty mug on the corpse’s chest. ‘When ‘e gets the smell ‘e’ll quickly get up an’ arsk.’
Hughes wagged a finger. ‘An’ when you ask you won’ get. Because bottle finished. Serves you right.’
‘Ah, just let the bugger be. Come go!’
‘Where?’
‘Goan’ sleep. Dam’ sleepy now. See the way e’s sleeping.’
Ryan still had some of his wits intact. ‘But not twelve yet.’