Hunter Sniper

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

The company rolled out on the trucks, although some men were still on foot, which slowed the pace of the advance down the dirt road. Swaths of forest bordered the road, intermixed with various crops growing in the Filipinos’ fields. These trees and crops would provide good cover to any Japanese looking to ambush them on the road. All eyes scanned the roadside nervously.

The men riding in the captured trucks couldn’t help but feel that the vehicles were something of a double-edged sword.

“We’re sitting ducks in this truck,” Philly complained.

“You want to get out and walk?” Deke wondered. “I don’t. Hell, I’m not sure I could. I hope this truck can carry me all the way to Tokyo.”

“Not unless it can float, you dope,” Philly said. “We’re on an island.”

“I know we’re on a goddamn island,” Deke said irritably. “It’s a figure of speech. Anyhow, keep it up and you ain’t gonna have to worry about gettin’ to Tokyo.”

“Yeah, yeah,” Philly said, but refrained from adding insult to injury where Deke was involved, even if he was sick.

“We are in Japanese trucks,” Yoshio pointed out. “The Japanese might hold their fire, thinking that they would be firing on their own men.”

“Let’s hope that’s the case.”

As it turned out, they were headed toward Camp Downes, designated as the rallying point for US forces before the big push for Ormoc. The camp was, in fact, what remained of a former US military outpost left over from the years leading up to the Japanese occupation. The camp was named for a young officer from Texas who had died heroically while fighting insurgents not long after the Spanish-American War. Camp Downes had been in existence long enough to be shown on local maps, and the name was reassuringly American on maps dotted with mostly foreign names.

The collection of barracks and outbuildings had been taken over by the Japanese during the occupation. They had since cleared out to fortify their own defensive ring around Ormoc.

It wasn’t long before they encountered those defenses. The convoy of captured trucks was moving up the road when they began to draw fire.

“Everybody out!” Lieutenant Steele shouted.

The trucks rolled to a stop. Men didn’t need to be told twice to get out of the vehicles. As Philly had predicted, the trucks were sitting ducks. It sounded as if the Japanese had brought some of their twenty-millimeter antiaircraft guns into play, using them as ground defense weapons.

Chewed to bits by these heavy machine guns and tracer fire, the lead truck began to burn. This was a blessing in disguise, considering that the thick, black smoke created a smoke screen for the soldiers running for cover at the edges of the road. The remaining trucks backed up until they were out of sight around a bend in the road, leaving the soldiers on foot.

They could see a concrete bunker around the bend ahead, and soldiers began to return fire. However, rifles were no threat to the enemy soldiers behind thick concrete walls. Each bunker vaguely resembled a concrete jack-o’-lantern, with a low horizontal firing dugout, much like the pumpkin’s smile, that accommodated the larger weapons, including the nasty Nambu machine guns and vertical firing slits for riflemen.

It was clear that the Japanese had been planning this defense for a long time, and the company had finally stumbled into it. The enemy had been waiting patiently for the appearance, but judging by the fire that poured from the bunkers, their fingers had been itchy on their triggers.

Seeing the situation, Steele had already waved Rodeo over and was on the handset. It was too close to their own men for an artillery strike, but Steele had another plan.

“We need some tanks up here!” he shouted into the handset. “They can bust right through those bunkers if they need to!”

Steele could shout all that he wanted, but that wouldn’t make the tanks move any faster. It also didn’t mean that whoever he was talking to at division headquarters would agree or that tanks were even available. Only a handful had arrived so far on the beach, but the sight of all that armored plating and firepower was always welcome.

For now, it was just infantry facing the heavily fortified Japanese position. They were good and truly pinned down.

Captain Merrick had reached the same conclusion. He ran over to Steele’s position, dodging fire all the way. The man must have lived a charmed life.

“We need to get some grenades into those bunkers and clean them out,” he said.

“Agreed,” Steele responded. He turned to the members of Patrol Easy, who crouched nearby. “Come on, fellas. Let’s show ’em how it’s done.”

The patrol moved forward, slithering on their bellies, hugging the ground and using whatever cover they could find — piles of rocks, blasted logs, shell holes that they slid down into and crawled back out of.

They took fire the whole way. Most of it came from the Japanese machine guns, which seemed to cut the air above their heads or churn up the ground nearby. Lucky for them, the machine-gun fire was not aimed with any real precision.

However, in the first bunker was at least one sniper who kept up a withering fire. Each shot came too close for comfort. At one point Alphabet stuck up his head to get his bearings and paid the price for his curiosity.

“I’m hit!” he cried, clutching his neck. Blood seeped between his fingers.

Steele fired a couple of quick shots from his twelve gauge at the slit in the bunker that seemed to be where the sniper was shooting from, then rushed forward and slid down beside Alphabet. “Let me see that,” he said, examining the wound.

“How bad is it, Honcho?” Alphabet asked, wild eyed with fear and pain. “Dammit, I always hoped it would be quick when my number was up.”

“Not so bad,” the lieutenant announced. He dragged out a sweat-stained handkerchief from a pocket. “Put that on it and apply some pressure. You’re lucky. The bullet just grazed you.”

Although the handkerchief quickly became soaked with blood, it was clear that the Japanese hadn’t managed to kill Alphabet — at least not this time. Steele knotted the handkerchief as best as he could to create a makeshift bandage.

Once Steele had finished, Alphabet reached for the rifle he had dropped. “Better luck next time, you damn Nips!” he shouted, and fired a shot at the bunker. The bullet whined angrily off the concrete, sounding as frustrated as Alphabet.

In response, there was another shot from the Japanese sniper, causing Alphabet to duck as the bullet ripped the air just inches from his head.

“What the hell!” he shouted. “I’m getting tired of that son of a bitch.”

“We’re getting chewed to pieces here,” Steele agreed. “Where the hell are those tanks?”

Watching from cover, Deke couldn’t help but think about the sniper that he had battled earlier on Leyte. His name had been Ikeda. The two men had crossed paths more than once. Ikeda had seemed to outwit him at every opportunity, but Deke had finally turned the tables on the Japanese sniper and tricked him by rigging a scarecrow in the jungle as a decoy. Ikeda had been so sure of himself that he had fallen right into that trap.

As always, the Japanese seemed to have no shortage of snipers. Sniper warfare was just another tactic that the Japanese trained for. This sniper was likely not Ikeda’s equal but simply had the good luck to be ensconced inside a concrete bunker.

Deke smiled to himself. That sniper’s luck was about to change.

“Hey, Philly,” Deke said. “Try and hold that Jap sniper’s attention.”

“How do I do that?”

“Shoot at him, that’s how.”

Without waiting for a response, Deke began to creep closer to the bunker, using whatever he could for cover — even, as it turned out, some poor bastard’s body.

It was one of their own soldiers, killed by the Japanese. He avoided looking closely at the face to see which of the company’s soldiers it was. For all he knew, he might have shared a laugh or a canteen with this man. He figured that it didn’t matter now — the soldier was just so much dead meat, a backstop for bullets.

He stopped behind the body just long enough for the corpse to absorb a burst of machine-gun fire and for Deke to slide his rifle over the dead soldier’s rump and squeeze off a couple of shots.

He tried not to think too much about the fact that he was using a dead man for cover. They were in the middle of a battle, and whatever he could put between himself and the endless hail of the enemy’s bullets was just fine by him.

It was almost too much to hope that he wouldn’t end up just as dead in the next minute. The well-defended Japanese in the complex of bunkers were tearing them to pieces.

Deke knew he couldn’t take on the whole damn Japanese army. But he could fight at least one of them man to man, or sniper to sniper.

He could see the slit in the concrete, no more than six inches wide and a foot high, dark against the lighter face of the concrete, reminding Deke of the vertical pupil of a mountain rattlesnake.

That must be where the Japanese sniper was shooting from. Yet the man was well hidden behind who knew how many inches or even feet of concrete.

These Japanese had been preparing for the arrival of American forces for some time, and the entire island seemed to be so incredibly well defended that for every step forward that the Americans were able to take, they also seemed to be bleeding a gallon of blood for each one of those inches.

Time to make the Japs bleed a little of their own precious blood, he thought.

“Can you hit it?” Philly asked. He had scooted up near Deke and was on his belly behind a chunk of concrete that had been blown free by the artillery barrage. He had already emptied his own rifle at the trench slit without any success.

“Don’t go talking nonsense,” Deke replied. “Do you want me to shoot that Jap in the left eye or the right eye?”

“And here I always thought you didn’t brag much.”

“My pa always said it ain’t braggin’ if it’s true.”

Philly reloaded his own rifle. “All right, then. I’ll keep him distracted.”

Making the situation difficult was the fact that the Japanese were shooting at them the whole time, forcing Deke and Philly to keep their heads down, not to mention the rest of Patrol Easy.

“What we need is a tank,” Philly said. “Honcho called for tanks, but I don’t know how long they’ll take to get up here.”

“I don’t see any tanks around, do you?” Deke snapped.

But he had to agree with Philly. What they really needed was more firepower. They couldn’t do much good against concrete bunkers. The rifle felt like a puny instrument in his hands compared to what appeared to be an impregnable fortress in front of him.

He put the scope to his eye and kept focused on the firing slit, hoping for a sign of movement within. However, the Japanese sniper didn’t appear eager to show himself.

He realized that, just maybe, he had been bragging to Philly, after all. Could he really put a bullet through that slit in the bunker?

The day’s heat had continued to build so that the tropical sun beating down through the foliage felt like heated pinpricks. Sweat streamed into Deke’s eyes, making aiming the rifle that much harder. Insects buzzed in his eyes and ears, as if the buzz of bullets wasn’t bad enough.

Damn it all. He inched higher above the corpse, where he had rested the rifle, trying to get a better look at the Japanese position before him. Sure enough, there was machine-gun fire coming from the bunker, but it was the more accurate fire from the sniper that was proving to be even more deadly and taking a toll on the troops.

Maybe it was Deke’s imagination, but he thought he saw a glimpse of movement through the slit in the concrete, even the black gaze of the Japanese sniper’s eye.

But of course he was too far away to actually see that. He knew it was all in his imagination. Maybe he was still feverish.

Deke lined up his sights on the slit and fired. However, he had flinched at the last instant because a bullet had passed too close for comfort. He saw a puff of concrete dust through the scope but wasn’t sure exactly where his bullet had struck.

“You missed,” said Philly, who was watching through his own rifle scope.

“That ain’t exactly helpful.”

“Aim a little to the left,” Philly said.

Deke wiped the sweat from his eyes and put his finger back on the trigger, lining up the sight on the target. Slowly, slowly, his finger took up tension on the trigger until he felt the satisfying jolt of the rifle stock against his shoulder.

This time there was no puff of concrete dust. The bullet sang right through the slit. When the sniper did not reappear, it seemed to indicate that Deke’s bullet had done its job.

“Did you get him?”

“I reckon.”

“What are you waiting for?” Philly demanded. “Shoot some more of those bastards.”

Philly was right. Every sniper duel was so intense that it was easy to forget the bigger battle taking place.

Deke put his eye back to the scope and began to search for another target. Before he found anything to shoot at, he heard a sound behind him on the road and swiveled around to take a look.

Tanks. Two of them. Coming up the road toward Ipil. He turned to watch the behemoths approaching. The breeze carried the smell of exhaust as their powerful engines churned. Both tanks rushed forward, their treads clanking. To a man on the ground, the churning tracks appeared strong enough to pulverize anything in their way. The tanks were not buttoned up, but their commanders stood in the hatches atop the turrets, trying to size up the situation before them.

They held their fire for now. The fact that the tanks hadn’t even brought their machine guns into play seemed odd.

At the sight of the tanks, a few of the men even cheered.

“Here comes the cavalry,” Steele shouted. “I’m glad to see them, that’s for sure.”

“I don’t know what the hell they’re waiting for,” Philly complained. “Why the hell don’t they shoot?”

After coming up the road in a rush, the tanks took their time getting into position, like two bulls preparing to charge. When they began to draw fire, the tank commanders pulled the hatches shut, disappearing inside. They were soon seemingly oblivious to the rain of fire headed their way. Even the fire from the Japanese antiaircraft weapons that had been adapted to defend the bunker bounced off. The frustrated Japanese doubled their rate of fire, which made things only worse for the men on the ground.

Formidable as the tanks appeared, their guns were no match for the thick concrete of the bunkers, cleverly angled to deflect shells.

The tanks tried anyway, firing their main guns into the nearest bunker at almost point-blank range. Whang! With that awful sound, one of the shells bounced off without detonating and flew into the trees, where it exploded with an earsplitting release.

What the Japanese hadn’t planned on were the flamethrowers. One of the tanks pulled back slightly, pivoted on its tracks, and then advanced again until its main gun was practically touching the bunker. A stream of orange-and-red flame suddenly shot from where the machine gun was normally located.

“I’ll be damned. They’re Satans!” Philly shouted, using the nickname for tanks that had been rigged with flamethrowers to release hellfire against the enemy. These tanks had first made their appearance on Guam and Saipan. They were both hated and feared by the Japanese.

The Satans had been aptly named. The tank had been aiming for the bunker’s horizontal slit, from which the Japanese defenders were firing. Instantly the front of the bunker was covered in a fireball.

Deke shuddered at the sight of the flames. He could only imagine what it must be like to face a flamethrower. In fact, he didn’t want to imagine too hard. Deke had given himself over to violence — there wasn’t any other choice as a soldier if you wanted to survive — but some part of him remained amazed at the sheer cruelty of this weapon of war.

The scorching flame seemed so much more inhumane than a simple bullet. The fire would reach deep into the bunker, licking into every corner. The flames were sticky, in a sense, because they were fueled by a jellied gasoline that clung to whatever it touched. Those enemy troops who weren’t burned to death often suffocated as the hungry fire sucked the oxygen from the confined space inside the bunker.

All in all, the flamethrower was a horrible weapon but was highly effective when there was no other hope of rooting out the enemy.

The tank gave one last burst with its flamethrower. No sooner had the flames subsided than a couple of soldiers ran forward and lobbed grenades through the smoking, blackened gap. If anyone had managed to survive the inferno, the grenades would surely finish them off.

Nearby, Philly made a gagging noise. “Ugh, that smell! Makes me sick to my stomach.”

Philly was more than right. The stink of the burning fuel from the flamethrowers mingled with the smell of burned flesh. “I won’t mind getting out of this place and finding some fresh air,” Deke agreed.

But they weren’t done yet with Ipil. One by one, the tanks knocked out the bunkers and the enemy soldiers inside them, with teams of GIs following up with grenades. By the time that nightfall approached, the bunkers as well as the area surrounding the old US military base known as Camp Downes had been secured.

The next prize would be Ormoc itself, and they all knew that the Japanese would not give up the town easily.