Code Talker (25 page)

After two weeks at sea, I was relieved to arrive at Peleliu, and I think pretty much everyone else was, too. Soon, we hoped, the fight would be history.

 

 

On the morning of September 15, 1944, the first wave of Marines landed across from the airfield on Peleliu's southern tip. The Japanese held their fire, making it seem as if there were no defenders waiting as American troops approached the island. But when those first invading men reached the beach, the enemy unleashed their firepower. The beach exploded. Projectiles of all types kicked up sprays of sand, water, and coral. The deadly shelling came from all directions.

Francis and I were dropped onto the volcanic coral reef that surrounded Peleliu, maybe five hundred yards from shore. The LVTs (landing vehicles, tracked) that delivered some of the Marines lumbered in over the coral on their huge caterpillar tracks, but our Higgins boat, with its four-foot draft, couldn't get in over the reef. The bow dropped open, and we clambered down the ramp, trying to protect our heads by hunching them into our shoulders like turtles. We stepped into ankle-deep water.

Ahead we could see the airfield, but getting to shore proved nearly impossible. We waded, battered by crashing waves and threatened by a constant hail of artillery shells. An undertow pulled our feet out from under us, dropping us onto sharp coral that sliced into our hands and knees. Each time the waves receded, we were pulled backward, losing several hard-gained yards. Bomb craters pockmarked the shallows, and we dropped unexpectedly from ankle-deep water into chest-deep water. Hot machine-gun bullets hissed as they hit the ocean.

Soggy American currency washed back and forth in the waves, poker and blackjack winnings from the pockets of dead Marines. With the world exploding around me, and a sick feeling in my gut, I never thought about reaching for the bills. I saw no one else who did, either.

Just to the north side of the beach, jutting twenty-five yards into the sea, were a series of steep pinnacles and crevasses, collectively called “The Point.” From the Point, Japanese hidden in five concrete pillbox bunkers targeted struggling troops as we tried to reach land. Countless geysers sprang up where mortar shells hit the ocean. Bodies sloshed in the shallow water. The forty-five minutes I stumbled and swam against the force of the waves and the undertow felt like three hours. The Japanese picked men off almost at will as we pulled ourselves toward the beach. Finally, Francis and I reached shore.

Water ran in streams from our drenched uniforms. Everything was in chaos. The bodies of American military dotted the sand, despite General Rupertus's announcement that Peleliu would be a quick conquer. Panic tried to rise as I recognized a buddy lying dead on the beach. But I'd become an expert at numbing my thoughts and concentrating on the task at hand. I gritted my teeth and pressed my lips closed against the bile rising in my throat. I pushed down the scream of anger that wanted to burst from my chest. I was a Navajo, a Marine, a code talker. I would not dwell on death. I would not lose my concentration.

The noise deafened us, and bullets slashed across the sand at waist height. I could see no cover, so I dropped and rolled, trying to get beneath the sheet of bullets. Somehow, I managed to clutch my gun and the radio. Luckily, Francis and I had not yet plugged in, so we were free of each other.

After a few seconds, I noticed that the terrain seemed to slope a little. I stopped rolling, realizing I had reached a shallow depression. It was full of rocklike shards that pressed sharp and warm against my back. Probably a bomb crater. Recent. I turned my head without raising it, scanning for Francis. He was only a couple of feet away, behind a sizable chunk of loose coral.

A runner, no doubt noting my TBX radio, dove flat out beside me and handed me a message. I inched over toward Francis till I was close enough to plug in and started cranking. He reached for the message and sent it.

“Over there,” Francis yelled above the din. We had finished sending the message and needed to move. He pointed with a twitch of his lips. Before the Japanese could pinpoint the location from which our message had been sent, we dashed toward an even smaller depression in the sand. We were, of course, still connected by our radio equipment. We kept our heads down, legs pumping, and dove into the shallow shelter.

BAM! A group of American guns—nine-millimeter artillery—exploded, the percussion pounding against our eardrums like a jackhammer breaking up rock. Someone cussed, yelling something about a failed firing mechanism. The defective American gun and the munitions surrounding it had exploded.

I glanced around for better cover. There were many loose rocks, and Francis and I piled some up to create a makeshift blockade. Like every other day on the islands, you had to do for yourself or die.

At five o'clock in the afternoon, Japanese Colonel Kunio Nakagawa ordered his crack 14th Division troops to cross the airfield and attack us Americans. Tanks and troops advanced toward the beach. But this time we were ready. The thinly armored enemy tanks were vulnerable to our Marine artillery and to just about every other Marine weapon. When heavy Marine Sherman tanks bombarded them, the lighter Japanese tanks crumpled as though made from tin. Then a Naval bomber targeted the enemy, sending them back to the far side of the field in retreat.

Around midnight, Colonel Nakagawa bombarded us with mortar fire. And the next morning he again attacked, with mortars and grenades. We Marines suffered heavy losses, but kept fighting. The Japanese retreated. Whether their retreat had already been planned, or whether something in the fracas caused them to panic, I don't know. But those men from the Land of the Rising Sun suddenly drew back toward the caves and pillboxes of Umurbrogol Mountain. The so-called mountain was actually a series of coral ridges, riddled with caves, that ran north of the airfield in a northeasterly direction.

Although we Americans had chased the Japanese from the airfield, we couldn't make use of it. From their fortifications in Umurbrogol Mountain, the Japanese targeted anyone who dared enter the open area surrounding the intersecting runways. But there was no other way to get to them. So, on day two, we were ordered to cross that airfield.

I remember approaching the field. It was wide open with no cover, the kind of place any fighting man wanted to avoid at all costs. The terrain was pockmarked and alien looking, like a gray moonscape devoid of life. The splintered trunks of dead trees poked out of the rock at wide intervals. Not a blade of grass, nothing green, was visible. It was difficult to believe that this island had once been so densely forested that our American intelligence people hadn't been able to penetrate the trees with their surveillance cameras.

As we drew close to the field, shots whipped out of a Japanese bunker. We hit the ground. Our riflemen, who were ahead of us, targeted the bunker, but the deadly Japanese artillery continued to pepper us. Someone ran up to the side of the concrete bunker with a flamethrower. We held our fire as he inched his way along the front of the blind bunker, then ran to the narrow front opening and thrust the nozzle of the flamethrower in. Flames bloomed, and within seconds Japanese soldiers ran from the bunker, babbling, their uniforms on fire.

My stomach twisted and I felt like throwing up. The men's screams echoed above the sound of bombs exploding. Marines raised their rifles and picked them off. The screams stopped.

After that we rushed toward the bunker. Someone made sure there were no more enemy troops inside. Artillery fire swept nonstop over the airfield. We couldn't move forward under the heavy fire, so we took shelter there for a few minutes.

When we left the bunker and started to move forward again, we were totally unprotected. Many men got shot, killed or mutilated, crossing that airfield. The corpsmen were flooded with medical emergencies—too many to handle with their thin-stretched resources. The corpsmen who served with the United States Marines were Navy personnel, but they wore uniforms just like ours except for a red cross on the sleeve. We all called them “Doc,” and we admired their bravery and selfless behavior under fire, when they'd endanger their own lives to help a wounded man. I saw many of my brave corpsmen friends get cut down, on every island. There were never enough “docs.”

Injured men struggled to their feet and kept moving. Men dragged and carried their dying buddies across the field.

By the end of day two, Francis and I were still alive, no thanks to the 110-degree heat. Sweat blinded us, leaking from under our metal helmets like a tropical downpour.

The Marines field-tested a new grid system during our attack on Peleliu, blocking maps of the island off into squares. Both air and artillery strikes were coordinated by means of those squares. The new mapping method helped us direct strikes toward the Japanese while keeping friendly fire away from our own men.

U.S. troops managed to hold our narrow strip of beach, as well as the unusable airfield, through the second day of fighting. But we couldn't get supplies. The enemy's continuing heavy artillery fire kept Higgins boats—also called LCVPs (landing craft, vehicle and personnel)—from landing. LVTs (landing vehicle, tracked; also called “amtracs”) were similarly unable to land. Even the LSTs (landing ship, tank), which were oceangoing ships capable of depositing heavy equipment directly on shore, proved unable to land. Normally, those craft would come ashore day and night with ammunition, medicine, food, and water. Then trucks would load everything up and bring it to the front lines while the landing craft went back for more. There was no naturally occurring drinkable water on Peleliu, and in the extreme heat we men were hurting bad. The coral rock that the island was made of seemed to absorb and magnify the heat. We found ourselves longing for rain, something we never would have anticipated after the soggy jungles of Guadalcanal or Bougainville. But rain didn't come.

I found myself constantly wetting my lips with my tongue, until my tongue grew too dry to make a difference.

Some of our ships finally resorted to filling oil barrels with water and dropping them into the sea as close to the island as they could. Usually the waves and the tide carried them in for the last half mile or so. Many of those barrels still had oil in them when they were filled with our drinking water. And the oily water caused cramps. Each man had to decide for himself whether he wanted to chance drinking that water. You couldn't tell someone else what to do any more than he could tell you. That was a lonely feeling, if you let yourself dwell on it.

We all missed the barrel-sized seabags that, on most islands, were filled with clean water and hung where anyone could fill his canteen. Now the bags all hung limp and empty. I drank as little as possible of that oily water, but I did drink it. I tried to just wet my lips, which were dry and cracked. But once my mouth felt that cool water, I just had to drink.

The lack of fresh water wasn't as tough for us men from the reservation area as it was for many other Marines. Accustomed to rationing our food and water, we were no strangers to hunger and thirst. Still, though, it was pretty darn difficult.

The constant enemy barrage was especially rough for the wounded. They couldn't get off the island any more than food, water, and ammunition could get on. I pitied them, lying on stretchers in the sun in 110-degree heat, hoping and praying to be evacuated. Unlike the Japanese, we Americans never abandoned our wounded on the battlefield. Often, dead American bodies accompanied the wounded on Peleliu. Because of the island's coral-rock composition, many of the dead couldn't be buried the way they were on other islands. They, too, were carried to the beach and hauled away when landing boats were able to make it to shore.

Peleliu seemed different from the other islands. I can understand why General Roy Geiger referred to it repeatedly as the worst battle of the South Pacific war. The shelling was everywhere and the enemy was invisible, hidden in their caves with metal doors that slid shut when our weapons got too close. It just seemed to rain bullets, and there was nowhere to go that was safe from the Japanese barrages.

The prelanding bombardments that had been carried out from our aircraft carriers had not beaten down the enemy, but the bombs had splintered darn near every tree on or near the beach, effectively eliminating cover. No vegetation stood taller than our knees. It was a nightmare.

“Chief!” one of the second lieutenants called.

Crouching nearby, I responded, “Yessir.”

“The U.S. Army, Eighty-first Division, needs a couple of you guys on Angaur. Their communication specialists need help.”

I knew that the Army had no Navajo code talkers at their disposal. Although Philip Johnston—without the consent of his associates in the Marines—did propose that the Army should develop a code talker program, the Army officers who were contacted about it failed to see the benefits offered by the program, so they never complied. They were stuck with the outdated method of communication. And now the Army needed our help in transmitting their plans and strategies during their attack on Angaur.

Angaur was a tiny island, three miles long, east of the Philippines, just southwest of Peleliu, also in the Palau Islands chain. U.S. troops had not yet secured Peleliu, but Marine command agreed to lend some code talkers to the Army. It made sense that we code talkers who were attached to the 3d Marine Division, and merely on loan to the 1st Marine Division on Peleliu, be asked to go.

Francis; my old partner Roy Begay; Roy's new partner, Roy Notah; and I made the trip to Angaur, an island with no airfield, and so accessible only from the water, in a pontoon plane. The plane landed out beyond the surf in full daylight, then taxied in toward the beach, dropping us as close to shore as it could. Luckily, there was very little enemy fire when we reached shore.