Last Push for the Pacific There was one day that became known as the last push for the Pacific. The Americans had made a tremendous effort to advance west to the San Bernardino mountains, one of the three main spurs of the Sierra Madre, and thus to hold this area, about seventy miles from their headquarters. On that day the attack was put in and put in by the 2nd Battalion, 8th Marine Regiment, supported by heavy tanks of the 3rd Battalion and the 4th Machine-Gun Battalion. The attack went to points just short of the town of San Bernardino, and, while a little confused, it was a pretty fair representation of what was to be expected at all points of the line. A battalion and a half of Marines and two battalions of tanks attempted to take a position held by a little over two hundred old Japanese in trenches. The main reason for the American attack was that it gave MacArthur's men the chance to demonstrate their own offensive prowess on the Pacific side. The entire attack was made over bad country and was not pushed too strongly. During the entire battle there was no great attempt to use indirect fire except to a limited extent on either side and a great deal of maneuvering. It was one of the most disappointing battles that has been fought. For years the Japanese defenses had been regarded as one of the best in the world. The area had been one of great activity since the first arrival of the Japanese forces. There were many caves and trenches and a number of tunnels. There were a number of well-entrenched machine-gun posts and at least two guns of medium caliber. The Japanese positions were set in a solid mass of stone, with little vegetation to hold up the guns and the artillery was unable to make any impression. There were many small caves in which the Marines found dead Japanese, and those that were alive were all killed. There were no prisoners. It was in this sort of a country that the Marines had been trained and that this type of fighting had been anticipated by them. On this day they seemed to have forgotten all they had learned or all they had been trained for. But if a Marine regiment needed a real lesson, it got it on that day. The American forces were badly hit by machine-gun fire, and that was no fault of the Navy gunners. It was the American soldier's fault. He failed to advance at the right time and position and he failed to control the fire. It was said of the first day's fighting, "That the spirit of the Japanese soldier has not yet left him. That he would fight even more fiercely than usual at the eleventh hour." A few days later the Marines were to feel the wrath of the Japanese, when they attempted to retake the position. If there was one point of their training that they were to prove later, it was how to advance, when to advance, when to fire, and when to withdraw. But this was by far the largest Japanese position ever attacked. A major attack by the 6th Marines met with little success, and the men had their first real taste of the Japanese. When they advanced, some of the men, who were used to a softer country, were almost cut off by the terrain and their losses were many. The American losses were very high in this first engagement, but it was not their fault. In fact, the Marine officers did not lose as many men as they did the other forces. The Japanese were still capable of offering stubborn resistance even after they had been cut to pieces. There had been considerable talk about Japanese charges. The men of the 2nd Battalion may have had such a scare, because this battalion had lost many men in the first days at Eniwetok, on this island's largest and most beautiful harbor, where so many ships of the American fleet are stationed. These men had been caught by the Japanese in the open and had had to spend days and days fighting on an empty island. So they must have remembered that they were in the front line and would be vulnerable to surprise charges. But, for that matter, so would be any other battalion. The Marine battalion lost ninety-four officers and men killed, out of a total of three hundred and twenty-eight. They had lost many more in the two days at Eniwetok. The Japanese lost no prisoners. They suffered no losses whatever in their resistance and were able to retreat without any interference at the end of the battle, on the same afternoon on which it had started. On the 2nd Battalion's side of the field there were five hundred and thirty-two wounded and fifty-one missing. They were a part of the three thousand and fifty-one American men who were to take part in the initial assault. Some of those that had been wounded were to be killed in other battles; others would be killed before the year was over, and many of them would be held in captivity until the end of the war. The fifty-one men who were lost or missing were never heard from again. The Japanese, who were found a few days later to be on the alert and who never knew that the Americans were advancing to the west, were held prisoners. The Marines, with all their power, failed to drive the Japanese out of this section, and they were compelled to content themselves with fortifying themselves and the beachheads that they had won. Their first defeat was the most stinging that has been experienced so far in this war. CHAPTER VI The Capture of the Island of Mindanao It was early in the afternoon, a day or two after the big fight with the Japanese in the Pampanga, on the island of Mindanao, that they entered their first city that had been held by the Japanese. It was the first time that the Marines had gone into the ruins of a city and had penetrated, by main force, into the enemy's lines. It was the first time that they had made contact with the Japanese anywhere. At two o'clock, General MacArthur had ordered troops, a large force under the command of General Eichelberger, to make the jump on the Japanese-held city of Taguban. The enemy garrison in that city had fallen through lack of food and ammunition, and had evacuated the town. MacArthur was certain that he was up against an enemy that was already beaten, because the enemy soldiers seemed to be moving in long columns and were hurrying to get out of their former positions. He expected to encounter Japanese reserves and troops that were not as exhausted as those in Taguban. The Americans found that what was waiting for them was a large Japanese force and the town's two machine guns. The Japanese, who had been forced to pull back from the hills to which they had retreated, had then set up a position on a ridge, with another force of Japanese in support from a different direction, across a valley. The Marines were now in full battle against Japanese; it had come after a period of great restraint and of maneuvering. For at least a month and a half they had been facing Japanese forces at a distance of four or five miles from their beachheads. They had not been able to do any of the usual kinds of fighting that are done with other nations. Now, as their force moved on the beach, and as the Marines crossed the streams and came into the hills where the enemy had been waiting, and where the Americans were to have their first glimpse of the enemy at close range, there was a great feeling of surprise. The Marines heard that a regiment of the Japanese was hiding in an old sugar factory. They moved very fast, at a trot, and the Japanese fought with great stubbornness. The fighting developed into hand-to-hand encounters, which lasted a good deal longer than might have been expected, and where Japanese soldiers, on either side, fought almost without a break until they were killed or had surrendered. The Japanese were armed with a good many rifles and grenades, and they had taken up positions in dugouts in the old sugar-cane factory. The Americans found that Japanese soldiers who had been sleeping or lying down had only gone into these dugouts for safety. But when the Marines entered the factory, they were greeted by some forty grenades. The Americans were prepared for this and for everything else. As soon as they had cleared the factory, the Marines pressed on to the main Japanese position in the center of Taguban, on a ridge above the city. It was an old sugar-cane warehouse, and that was where the fire of the Japanese came from, and from positions around it. There were a number of bodies lying around, and as the Americans advanced they came on more of these Japanese. There were only a few prisoners to be picked up by the Americans. This warehouse was a very good one for machine-gun positions, and there were a number of snipers in the hills and on the ridges. The next day's activities took the Americans to the center of the Japanese line. They cleared the factory and fought for two days in the buildings that stood to one side of the warehouse, where there were a lot of snipers. Here, on the third day, they secured a Japanese-American named Kido and sixty or seventy Japanese and took them to a clearing. They were taken as prisoners of war, but a few of them were killed in firing from the hills. Then they came upon some more snipers and advanced into the houses of the town. As they did this, the Japanese fired upon them, from the roofs of the buildings. There was a good deal of sniping going on from these places. The Marines, who were