"Presuming they don't get in trouble: Donald, Dunwood, and Zimmerman will start preparing to use the choppers as flying trucks to take a squad of men wherever they have to go. As I understand you, Alex, most of that training will be pretty basic.
"First, Zimmerman decides how they'll be armed and equipped. Then we'll find out how many men we can load on a chopper. Then we practice their getting out of the chopper in a hurry. None of this will require flying the choppers. When they get pretty good at that, we'll start making dry runs, first just taking off and landing here, and finally, flying inland a little to practice insertion and withdrawal on the kind of terrain they'll find up north.
"By the time we do all this, maybe the war will be over. If not, the Wind of Good Fortune will be back here, and we'll decide what to do next." He paused. "That's about it."
"Ernie?" McCoy asked.
"Sounds fine to me," Zimmerman said.
"Donald?"
"What about me going back with you, McCoy? We talked about that. To see about getting a fixed-wing airplane? I'd rather stay here, but. . ."
"Let's see what Dunston and I can do, begging on our knees," McCoy said.
Donald nodded.
"Dunwood?" McCoy asked.
"I don't have any problems with any of this," Dunwood said.
"Okay. That's it," McCoy said, and then added: "I don't think Bill Dunston and I should go back to Seoul together. I think we should go separately—say, an hour apart, in two jeeps. Dunwood, can you let each of us have, say, six Marines? With a couple of BARs?"
"No problem," Dunwood said.
"You go first, McCoy," Dunston said. "I'll want to explain all this to the Koreans, and I'd like to see what I can do about identifying my people the NKs found here."
"The sooner I get out of here, the better," McCoy said, scrambling to his feet. "Ernie, I don't care if you have to keep those fires burning all week."
"That thought ran through my mind, Major, sir," Zimmerman said.
[SIX]
Headquarters,
Capital ROK Division Near
Samchoh, South Korea
O83O 4 October 195O
McCoy's two-jeep convoy was stopped by two diminutive South Korean soldiers who stepped out of the ditches alongside National Route 5, about twenty miles south of Socho-Ri, with their rifles at their shoulders and aimed at McCoy, who was driving the lead jeep.
They wore the shoulder patches of the Capital ROK Division safety-pinned to the shoulders of their too-large U.S. Army fatigues, and looked, on one hand, slightly ludicrous in their outsized uniforms, not looking as if they were large enough to effectively wield the M-l Garands with which they were armed. But on the other hand, they looked tough and mean.
They were visibly surprised to see two jeeps carrying Americans coming toward them from what, so far as they knew, was territory still controlled by the North Koreans.
And even more surprised when McCoy snapped at them, in Korean, "Don't soldiers of the Capital ROK Division salute American officers?"
The rifles were lowered, and almost ludicrous salutes rendered, which McCoy returned with a salute worthy of the parade ground at Camp Lejeune.
The ROK soldiers told him that Capital ROK Division headquarters straddled the highway a mile farther south.
"Get back in your positions," McCoy ordered, and put the jeep in gear.
There were two L-4s parked, one on each side of National Route 5. The ROKs were apparently using the narrow road for an airstrip.
The L-4, essentially a Piper Cub, was the two-passenger, high-wing, low-and-slow observation and liaison aircraft that preceded the Cessna L-19.
McCoy thought the ROKs were like the Marines, being issued only equipment the Army thought it no longer needed.
There was a small tent city on both sides of the road, too, U.S. Army squad tents that had apparently been erected in the belief they would soon have to be struck and moved someplace else.
In front of two tents assembled end-to-end he spotted three flags: the Korean national colors; the blue flag of the United Nations; and a red flag with two stars on it. Two soldiers were standing with the butts of their Garands resting between their feet were guarding the tents, several jeeps parked in front of them, one highly polished with half-doors and a rack of radios in the back.
He drove up to it, the second jeep following.
The guards raised their rifles.
"Stand at ease," McCoy barked in Korean. The guards assumed a position not unlike Parade Rest, and saluted by crossing their right hands to the muzzles of the Garands.
McCoy got out of the jeep and walked into the tent.
It was full of officers and soldiers, radios, telephone switchboards, and desks.
A Korean colonel wearing impeccably fitting and perfectly starched and pressed fatigues, polished boots, with a .45 in a tanker's shoulder holster turned from the map board when McCoy pushed the flap aside and light entered the tent.
McCoy saluted.
"Good morning, Colonel," he said in Korean. "May I have a moment of your time?"
Everybody in the tent was now looking at him.
The colonel returned McCoy's salute crisply.
"Good morning," he said in faultless English. "I'm Colonel Pak. I'm surprised, Major, to see a Marine officer this far east."
"May I have a moment of the colonel's time?" McCoy said, continuing in Korean.
"And, if you don't mind my saying so, one who speaks Korean so well," the colonel replied in English. "How may I be of service to the Marines?"
McCoy decided the colonel was an officer who had most likely learned his English while an officer in the Japanese Army, and had then been one of the rare ex-Japanese officers selected to start up the South Korean Army, and as a result of that had been sent to one or more U.S. Army schools in the States. His English was American accented.
"May I come to the map board, sir?"
Colonel Pak gestured that he could.
McCoy went to the map, found Socho-Ri, and pointed to it.
"Sir, I have established a small camp here," he said.
"That far north?" Pak asked rhetorically. "How long have you been there?"
"The first element arrived two days ago, sir."
"Why do I suspect you are not the lead elements of the First Marine Division?"
"We are not, sir," McCoy said.
Colonel Pak grunted.
"What can I do for you, Major?"
"Two things, sir. I hoped you could get word to your people before they move in that direction that my people are there."
Pak nodded, then picked up a grease pencil and made a check mark on the acetate covering the map.
"And the second?"
"Colonel, it is important that I get to Seoul as quickly as possible," McCoy said.
"And you would like a ride in one of our L-4s?"
"If they are not required for a more important mission, yes, sir."
"At the moment, the CG is at I ROK Corps seeking permission to move north," the general said. "Until we get that permission, they are not very busy. Observation has not revealed any enemy forces within thirty miles of here. Have you seen any indications of the enemy?"
"No, sir. I suspect—but do not know for sure—that they are no closer than twenty miles north of Socho-Ri." Colonel Pak grunted.
"As I said, our aircraft are not being utilized at the moment, Major. But the problem I have is that I cannot afford to lose either of them—either to enemy action or, bluntly, to one of my fellow senior ROK officers who might commandeer it at the Race Track in Seoul. Having one's own aircraft, I'm afraid, has become the ROK equivalent of the German field marshal's baton. My general is known for his temper; I don't want to have to tell him, when he flies back in here in the third of our aircraft, that I loaned one of the others to a Marine who didn't give it back."
McCoy smiled.
"Colonel, if you would have me dropped at the Race Track, your pilot would not even have to shut the engine down, and anyone trying to commandeer your airplane would have to go through me."
Colonel Pak grunted, then replied: "At Quantico, Major, one of the lessons I learned—in addition to how to drink martinis—was that a Marine officer's word is his bond.'
"We try to keep it that way, sir," McCoy said, and then curiosity got the better of him. "May I ask what you were doing at Quantico, sir?"
"The idea was that South Korea was to have Marines," the general said. "But that, obviously, is going to have to be put off for the moment." He smiled at McCoy. "May I offer you a cup of tea before you take off, Major?"
"That's kind, but unnecessary, sir."
"It would be my pleasure, I insist," Colonel Pak said. "And, if you don't mind, I'd like to have your—unofficial, of course—thoughts on the possibility that the Chinese will enter this conflict."
"Frankly, sir, I was wondering if I could ask you the same thing," McCoy said.
Twenty minutes later, one of the Capital ROK Division's two aircraft bounced down National Route 5 and lifted off, very slowly, into the air.
It took an hour and forty minutes against a headwind to reach the Race Track in Seoul.
McCoy spent the entire time looking down at the ground for a stamped-out arrow or any other sign of Pick Pickering. He found none.
But there was time to think, of course, and he thought that perhaps if he couldn't get anybody to let him have an L-19—not to mention the other airplane Donald had said would be really useful, the Beaver—he might be able to get his hands on an L-4.
And he wondered what Dunston's agents were going to find up north. Both he and Colonel Pak—whom he now thought of as "the Quantico ROK colonel"—were uncomfortable with the idea that the war was just about over, and that the Chinese and the Russians were just going to stand idly by and watch while their surrogate army was annihilated by the Americans and their surrogate forces.
And the Quantico ROK colonel was right about the hunger of senior ROK officers for their own airplanes, too. No sooner had the L-4 landed at the Race Track and taxied to a fuel truck than an ROK colonel appeared and told the L-4 pilot that he had an important mission and would require the use of the L-4.
"You'll have to look elsewhere, Colonel, I'm afraid," McCoy said. "This aircraft has been assigned to me."
McCoy showed him his CIA credentials. He thought the colonel backed off more because of McCoy's fluent Korean than because of the credentials. Since the Korean didn't try to argue with him in English, there was a good chance he had no idea what the CIA credentials were, or what they said.
He stayed with the L-4 until it taxied off to the strip for takeoff.
And then, when he tried—and failed—to get a jeep from the officer in charge of the airstrip to take him to the house, he had to make his own irregular requisition.
He walked to a street not far from the Race Track, waited until the first Marine vehicle—a weapons carrier—came down it, flagged it down, and told the corporal driving that he needed a ride.
"Sir, I can't—"
"All I want to hear from you, Corporal, is Aye, aye, sir.' "
"Aye, aye, sir."
[SEVEN]
The House
Seoul, South Korea
1145 4 October 195O
Technical Sergeant J. M. Jennings came through the door in the metal gate to the house as the weapons carrier carrying McCoy stopped in front of it.
"That was a quick trip, sir," he said as he saluted.
"I got lucky," McCoy said. "Get a phone number from the corporal, and then get on the horn and tell his officer I had to borrow the truck."
"Aye, aye, sir," Jennings said. "Major, there's an Army light colonel inside "
"How did he get inside?" McCoy asked.
"Sir, I'm a tech sergeant, and he showed me orders signed by some general at UNC."
"Did he say what he wants?"
"He wants to see Major Dunston," Jennings said.
"Where's General Howe?"
"He went south to see General Walker," Jennings said. "He said to tell you he'll try to get back tonight, if not first thing in the morning."
"I'll deal with it," McCoy said. "When you talk to the corporal's officer, say something nice about the corporal."
"Aye, aye, sir."
A stocky, neat, but not natty Army lieutenant colonel was sitting at the dining room table with a tall, thin, natty Army first lieutenant. Both were drinking coffee.
"Can I help you, Colonel?"
"I'm looking for Major William Dunston," the colonel said.
"He's not here right now," McCoy said.
"Where is he?"
"May I ask who you are, Colonel?"
"And you are?"
"My name is McCoy, sir."
"My name is Vandenburg," the colonel said, then took a sheet of paper folded twice from the breast pocket of his fatigues and laid it on the table. "Those are my orders."
McCoy went to the table, picked up the orders, and unfolded them.
TOP SECRET
Supreme Headquarters
Commander-in-Chief
United Nations Command
Tokyo,Japan
2 October 1950
SUBJECT: Letter Orders
TO: LtCol D.J. Vandenburg, Inf
Supreme Headquarters CINCUNC
You will proceed at the earliest possible date to Korea, and such other places as you
may deem necessary to carry out a mission of great importance, taking with you such personnel as you may deem necessary. Travel priority AAAAA-1 is assigned.
In order to facilitate the execution of your mission, authority is granted for you to
requisition whatever support you may require from any source, and all UNC commands are directed to provide such support.
3 . Any questions regarding your mission are to be directed to the undersigned.
FOR THE SUPREME COMMANDER:
CHARLES WILLOUGHBY
Major General
Assistant Chief of Staff, J-2
TOP SECRET
McCoy refolded the orders and handed them back to Lieutenant Colonel Vandenburg.
"Thank you, sir."
"With regard to paragraph two of those orders," Vandenburg said, "what I require of you is your helicopters. And these premises, which I will use as my headquarters."
McCoy didn't reply.
"Where are those helicopters, Major?"
"With respect, sir, I don't think you have the need to know that."
"You can read, Major, can't you?"
"Yes, sir. I can read."
"You did notice those orders were issued in the name of the Supreme Commander, General MacArthur, and signed by the Supreme Commander's intelligence officer, Major General Willoughby?"
"With respect, sir, we are not a subordinate unit of the United Nations Command. And I'm sure, sir, if you would ask General Willoughby, he would confirm that.'
Lieutenant Colonel Vandenburg tried to stare McCoy down, and failed.
"Harry," he said. "Take a walk."
The slim, natty lieutenant, surprise on his face, got to his feet and walked out of the room.
When the door had closed, Vandenburg smiled at McCoy and said: "You're not what I expected, Killer. I sort of expected a gorilla in a Marine Corps uniform."
McCoy didn't reply.
"You're not going to deny that you're the legendary Killer McCoy, are you, Major?"
"I've been called that, sir," McCoy said. "I don't like it."
"Relax, Killer," Vandenburg said. "I'm one of the good guys. We even have a mutual friend."
McCoy said nothing.
"You're not curious, Killer, who that might be?"
"Yes, sir, I'm curious."
"Back in War Two, when Charley Willoughby and his boss finally got off the dime and sent an officer in a submarine onto Mindanao to establish contact with Wendell Fertig, what General Fertig told that officer—me—was that Killer McCoy and some other Marines had beat me there by two weeks."
Vandenburg let that sink in, then smiled.
"That shook you up a little, didn't it, Killer?" he asked.
McCoy didn't reply.
"Come on, fess up," Vandenburg said.
"I heard an Army officer went in later," McCoy said. "I wasn't there long."
"Let me tell you why I'm here, Killer," Vandenburg said. "You know what happened to General Dean of the 24th Division?"
"He was captured, early on, in Taejon."
"Well, the Army—the Chief of Staff of the U.S. Army—wants him back. I work for him, despite what those orders say, not Willoughby. My primary mission here is to spring Dean from durance vile. The first thing I have to do is find out where he is, and then I want to mount a mission to spring him. To find out where he is, I have to put agents into North Korea. And to spring him, I need some method of grabbing him by surprise. It occurred to me on the way over here that using those Sikorskys is the best way to do both. When I got to where they were supposed to be, in a hangar at K-16, the base commander—very reluctantly—told me that CIA had them and had flown them out. He didn't know where to. So I came here to see Major Dunston. You with me so far?" "Yes, sir."
"There's two ways we can handle this, Killer," Vandenburg said. "We can wage a turf war, which will neither help me get Dean back nor you do whatever it is you're doing. Or we can cooperate. Most of the Army doesn't like people like me any more than most of the Marine Corps likes people like you. We're social pariahs. But between us, I think we could probably do one hell of a job, even if there would be damned little appreciation down the road." McCoy didn't reply.
"I went looking for your boss, General Pickering. He's not at the Imperial Hotel. You want to tell me where he is?" McCoy hesitated before replying. "He's in the States. The President sent for him."
"And left you minding the store?"
"Yes, sir."
"Then the decision to cooperate, or not, is really yours to make, isn't it?"
"I don't know how you're defining 'cooperate,' Colonel. I don't want— General Pickering absolutely does not want—anyone around here who's going to report what he sees to General Willoughby."
"I don't like the sonofabitch any more than you do," Vandenburg said.
"You could be expected to say something like that."
"No I wouldn't," Vandenburg said indignantly, then chuckled. "Yeah, of course I would. But that happens to be the truth."
"I wish I could believe that," McCoy said.
"I wish you could, too. What about it—do we cooperate?"
"I still don't have your definition of the word."
"Very basic. You scratch my back, and I'll scratch yours."
"We have plans for the helos," McCoy said. "We're going to use them to insert and extract agents up north. There's a few of us who aren't so sure this war will be over in two weeks. We have to know what's going on."
"I don't think it will be, either," Vandenburg said. "You already have people up north?"
"We're going to make the first insertions tonight, by boat, if we get lucky," McCoy said. "We're also in the first stages of training some fire teams to use the helos. But I can't see any reason—with the understanding I don't lose control of them—why you couldn't have the helos, and for that matter, the fire teams, to make a raid to spring General Dean. Presuming you can find him. We haven't heard anything, and I wouldn't be surprised to finally learn he's in Peking."
"Either would I," Lieutenant Colonel Vandenburg said. "Okay. It looks like we have a deal. I was wondering where I could get the men for the snatch operation and get them trained. Right now, my entire command is me and Harry. Aside from West Point and having had a Chinese nanny who taught him Cantonese, he doesn't have many qualifications for the sort of thing you and I do."
McCoy nodded.
"Your turn, Killer. What can I do for you?"
"You can stop calling me 'Killer,' " McCoy said.
Vandenburg laughed.
"I wondered when you were going to get around to that. Fertig told me you hate it. That's all?"
"You know what a Beaver is?"
"The airplane?"
McCoy nodded. "I need one. I would also like to have an L-19."
"There's a couple in Pusan. You have somebody who knows how to fly one?"
"I think so. Half a dozen pilots came with the helicopters. One of them should be able to fly a Beaver."
"I'll see what I can do," Vandenburg said. "I only promise what I know I can deliver. Chances are I can get you a Beaver and an L-19. I'll give it my best shot. Okay?"
"Thank you," McCoy said.
"Does this also mean Harry and I can stay in this palace of yours?"
"Like you said, Colonel. We're social pariahs. We have to stick together."
Chapter Eight
[ONE]
The Marquis de Lafayette Suite
The Foster Lafayette Hotel
Washington, D.C.
O9O5 S October 195O
Mrs. Patricia Foster Fleming, a tall, shapely, aristocratic-looking woman whose silver hair was simply but elegantly coiffured, was in the living room of the suite when Pickering, Hart, two bellmen, and the on-duty manager entered.
She was at a Louis XV escritoire, talking on the telephone.
She held up a finger as an order to wait.
She talked another thirty seconds on the telephone, then abruptly announced that she would have to call back later, hung the phone up, and walked across the room to her husband and Hart.
"Hello, George," she said to Hart, "it's good to see you."
She kissed him on the cheek, then turned to her husband and kissed him on the cheek.
Pickering thought that he had been kissed by his wife with all the enthusiasm with which she had kissed George Hart.
Honey, that's not fair. I didn't want Pick to get shot down.
"Okay," Pickering said to the manager and Hart. "We have an understanding, right? All calls to me except from the President, Senator Fowler, and Colonel Banning go through Captain Hart, who'll be operating out of the Monroe Suite. All calls to Mrs. Pickering go on line three, which I will not answer. Right?"
"That's already set up, General," the manager said.
"Captain Hart will need the car to go to the airport to pick up his family at two-fifteen. Which means he will have to leave here at one-thirty."
"The car will be available."
"Okay, George. Take whatever time you need to get settled, then hop in a cab and go over to the CIA. Give my compliments to Admiral Hillencoetter and tell him I'm at his disposal, and that I've sent you there to get the latest briefing."
"Aye, aye, sir. Sir, Louise is perfectly capable of getting a cab at the airport. ..."
"Do what you're told, George." Pickering said, not unkindly. "How are you fixed for cash?"
Hart hesitated, then said, "Just fine, sir."
Pickering pointed at the manager.
"Give Captain Hart five hundred dollars. Charge it to me."
"Certainly, Mr. Pickering."
"That's General Pickering, Richard," Mrs. Pickering said to the manager. "You can tell by the uniform and the stars all over it and by the way he gives orders with such underwhelming tact."
"Sorry, General," the manager said. "I really do know better."
"Forget it," Pickering said.
General and Mrs. Pickering looked at each other, but neither spoke or touched until they were alone in the suite.
Then Pickering's eyebrow went up as he waited.
"God, I really despise you in that uniform," Patricia said finally. "I think I hate all uniforms."
"They make it easy to tell who's doing a job that has to be done, and who's getting a free ride," Pickering said.
"You did your job when you were a kid in France, and you did your job in World War Two. When does it stop? When does somebody else take over and start doing your job?"
He looked at her for a long moment, then said: "Ken McCoy says he has every reason to believe Pick is alive and in good shape, and that we'll have him back in short order."
"And you believe him?'
"Yes, honey, I do."
"I wish I shared your faith," she said bitterly.
He didn't reply.
"For the last four days," Patricia said, "ever since Dick Fowler called and told me you were on your way to Washington, I have had fantasies of having your arms around me. And I promised myself I would remember it isn't your fault. . . what's happened to Pick . . . and that I wouldn't be a bitch. . . ."
He looked at her a moment, then nodded.
"If you promise not to bite my jugular, Patricia," he said softly, "I'll put my arms around you."
She didn't reply.
He took a step toward her, then held his arms open. Very slowly, she walked into them, and he held her against him.
"Oh, my God, Flem," she said softly, and then she began to sob. "Oh, God, I've missed you!"
"Me, too, honey." His voice was not quite under control.
He held her a long time, until her sobs subsided.
Then she said, "I wish you'd take off that goddamn uniform."
"I'll still be a Marine, honey," he said.
"My fantasy was to feel your bare arms around me," she said softly.
"Well," he said. "I guess it is like riding a bicycle. You never forget how."
He was lying on his back in their bed. She was lying half on him.
She pinched him, painfully, on the soft flesh of his inner thigh.
He yelped.
"I'd forgotten you do that, too," he said.
She didn't reply.
"Pick's got a girl," he said.
"Pick has always had a girl," she said. "He wasn't even five years old when he talked Ernie Sage into playing doctor, and it went downhill from there."
"This is serious, I think," Pickering said.
"I have heard that before, and find it very hard to believe."
"In many ways, she's very much like you."
"You know her? That is unusual."
"Yeah. I know her. And Ernie knows her and likes her too; they've become quite close."
She propped herself up on her elbows and looked down at him. "Tell me about her. What do you mean, she's like me?"
"Tough, smart, competent, and, I think, very much surprised to find herself in love with Pick. She's a reporter, a war correspondent. Jeanette Priestly, of the Chicago Tribune."
"I've seen her stories," she said. "No pictures."
"Tall, graceful . . . like you. Long blond hair. Not peroxide. Blue eyes. Good-looking young woman."
"I had a mental picture of a middle-aged frump with a short haircut," Patricia said.
"No. Very nice."
"And they're in love?"
"Yeah. And I mean love, rather than lust."
"If you think that, then it is serious."
"It had to happen eventually," Pickering said. "It's the natural order of things."
"How's... what's her name? Jeanette?... taking what's happened to Pick?"
"About like you, me, and Ernie," Pickering said. "Stiff upper lip. She doesn't say much. But there's really not much that can be said, is there?"
"Do you know what happened—I mean, in detail—to Pick? How was he shot down?"
"He was flying what they call 'low-altitude tactical interdiction sorties, seeking targets of opportunity,' " Pickering said. "What he was doing was shooting up locomotives."
"Railroad locomotives?" she asked, surprised.
"If you can take out, for example, an enemy supply train, that denies the enemy supplies and ammunition, and so on. Pick was apparently pretty good at it. He had three locomotives painted on the nose of his airplane."
"I thought he was shot down by another airplane."
"We pretty much have what is known as air superiority," Pickering said. "A lot—most—of aviation activity is in close support of the troops on the ground."
"So it was antiaircraft fire?"
"What Billy Dunn . . . You remember Colonel Dunn?"
"The tiny little man with an Alabama accent you can cut with a knife?"
"That's him," Pickering said. "Billy thinks that a locomotive blew up just as Pick was passing over it, and there was damage to the aircraft, most likely to the engine, from parts of the locomotive. Pick had to make an emergency landing; he couldn't get back to the Badoeng Strait, the aircraft carrier."
"Was he hurt?" she asked softly.
"Billy didn't think so, and the proof seems to be that he's covered a lot of distance. If he was injured, he couldn't move as fast and as far as he has."
"That sounds as if you know where he is," she said.
"We have an idea where he is," Pickering said. "He finds a rice paddy somewhere, and stamps out an arrow and his initials."
"If you know where he is, then why can't you go get him?"
"Because he has to keep moving. By the time a pilot who spots one of the arrows gets back to his aircraft carrier to report it, or by the time they can spot one of his arrows on an aerial photo—which is what happens most—and we can get people to that spot, he's three, four, five miles away. McCoy said the last time he doesn't think they missed him by more than a couple of hours."
"But you really believe he's . . . going to come back?"
"Yeah, I do."
"Don't lie to me, Flem."
The cold truth is that I don't know whether my faith that he's coming back is based on my professional assessment of the situation, or whether I'm just pissing in the wind.
"I'm not, honey."
The telephone on the bedside table rang.
"Don't answer it," Patricia said. "God, we're entitled to at least a few minutes."
"I have to, honey," he said, and stretched his arm out for the telephone.
Patricia didn't move off him.
"Pickering," he said.
"The President wants to see you," Senator Fowler said without any preliminaries.
"When?"
"Right now."
"Where?"
"Here."
"He's with you?"
"That's right."
"It'll take me a few minutes to get dressed."
[TWO]
There were two neatly dressed muscular men—obviously Secret Service agents—in the corridor when Pickering left his suite and walked down it toward Senator Fowler's suite.
"The President is expecting you, General," one of them said to Pickering, then knocked at Fowler's door and opened it without waiting for a reply.
Harry S Truman, President of the United States and Commander-in-Chief of its Armed Forces, was sitting on a couch in Fowler's sitting room drinking a cup of coffee. His hat was on the stable, and he was wearing one of his trademark bow ties. He stood up and smiled as Pickering entered the room.
"I'm sorry to interrupt your homecoming . . ." he said, extending his hand.
"Good morning, Mr. President," Pickering said.
"... but as I was taking my walk, it occurred to me this would be a good time to speak with you," Truman finished. "I wanted to do that before having to make some decisions."
"I'm at your disposal, Mr. President."
"Will you excuse me, Mr. President?" Senator Fowler asked.
Truman considered that.
"Okay, Dick, if you'd rather not hear this," he said. "But you're welcome to stay."
Fowler considered the reply, then sat down.
"When I was in the Senate, General, I learned that there were a few members of the loyal opposition who could be trusted to place the country's interest above partisan politics, and Dick headed that list."
"Thank you, Mr. President," Fowler said.
"They were most often wrong about things," Truman said with a smile, "but they could be trusted."
Fowler smiled at him.
"Will you have some coffee, General?" Truman asked. "And please sit down."
Truman pointed to the couch on which he was sitting, poured Pickering a cup of coffee, then slid to the far end of the couch and turned so that he was facing Pickering. He waited until Pickering had picked up his cup before continuing.
"Ralph Howe has told me of MacArthur's intention to move the X Corps around the Korean Peninsula and land it somewhere around Wonsan," he said.
Pickering understood it was a question.
"Yes, sir. I know. General Howe sent me a copy of his message to you. I got it in California."
"And?" Truman asked.
"Mr. President, I'm not qualified to question General MacArthur's strategy," Pickering said.
"I'll be the judge of that," Truman said. "What do you think?"
"Mr. President, there were a lot of people who thought that the Inchon Landing was a very bad idea. And from what I've learned, putting X Corps ashore at Wonsan will be a good deal easier than the Inchon operation."
"No Flying Fish Islands to deal with?" Truman asked.
How the hell did he hear about that?
"No, sir."
"You're aware that General Marshall has become Secretary of Defense?"
"Yes, sir."
"General Marshall tells me that MacArthur staged a clandestine operation under General Willoughby to take those islands just before the invasion."
Pickering didn't reply.
"Apparently, General Willoughby sent an officer to brief General Marshall on how the Inchon Landing was planned and carried out," Truman said.
"Yes, sir."
"And General Marshall told me," Truman said.
Pickering didn't reply.
"I was a little surprised to hear the story," Truman said. "I hadn't heard it from the CIA—Admiral Hillencoetter—at all, and the story I got from Ralph Howe was that it was your clandestine operation, and that not even General MacArthur knew about it until it was a done deed."
Pickering didn't reply.
"I'd like an explanation, if you don't mind, General," Truman said.
"Mr. President, I accept responsibility for what happened," Pickering said.
"Why did you feel it was necessary to keep the Supreme Commander in the dark?" Truman said.
"Sir, I was at the Dai Ichi Building meetings at which the landing was discussed. Very senior members of the planning staff raised the question of the Flying Fish Channel Islands, and when was the best time to neutralize them. It was General MacArthur's decision that they be neutralized as the invasion fleet steamed down the channel. I thought—"
" 'MacArthur is wrong. Those islands have to be neutralized earlier, and I can do it'?" Truman asked.
"I didn't think I would have much chance of getting General MacArthur to reverse his position, as doing so would fly in the face of the recommendations of his staff officers."
"So you took it upon yourself to stage this clandestine operation, without telling either General MacArthur or seeking permission from Admiral Hillencoetter to take an action known to be contrary to the wishes of General MacArthur?"
"Sir, if my operation failed, the original plan to neutralize the islands would have taken place."
"So you took it upon yourself to stage this clandestine operation, without telling either General MacArthur or seeking permission from Admiral Hillencoetter to take an action known to be contrary to the wishes of General MacArthur?" Truman asked verbatim again.
"Yes, sir. That's what I did."
"I think some people would describe that behavior as ... the phrase 'loose cannon' comes to mind."
Pickering didn't respond.
Senator Fowler shook his head in disbelief, or perhaps resignation, at what Truman had revealed.
"I'm not one of those people," Truman said. "Sometimes you have to do what you know is right, regardless of the consequences."
He let that sink in.
"And what did the Supreme Commander have to say to you when he found out what you had done?"
Pickering, without realizing what he was doing, smiled at the memory.
"Why are you smiling, General?"
"Sir . . . When I told General MacArthur, he announced to his staff that it was his clandestine operation."
Truman smiled back.
" 'Victory has a thousand fathers'? Something like that? He wasn't angry with you?"
"If he was, it didn't show, Mr. President."
"Ralph tells me that, too," Truman said. "That MacArthur seems genuinely fond of you."
Pickering didn't reply.
"That was really a question, General," Truman said.
"I'm not sure if 'fond' is the right word, Mr. President," Pickering replied. "I admire him—"
"Warts and all?" Truman interrupted.
"The latter overwhelm the former, Mr. President. I think his biggest wart... he's something like the architect Frank Lloyd Wright, who said, 'It's difficult to be humble when you know you're great.' "
Truman chuckled.
"I'll have to remember that one," he said.
"When they made me a sergeant in France, Mr. President, a wise old gunnery sergeant took me aside and told me the worst mistake I could make as a sergeant was to think I could be friends with my men."
Truman nodded.
"I think MacArthur knows that, practices that. What I suppose I'm saying is that he and Jean are lonely in the residence. Then I show up. Three things: I knew him—slightly—socially in Manila before the war. And I was with him through most of the Second War. And I'm not subordinate to him. And he knows that I like him. For those reasons, they include me in ... how do I say this? . . . their personal family."
"In other words, he's not trying to either pick your brain or influence me through you?"
"That, too, sir, frankly."
"Tell me how you think he's going to act with regard to the new Secretary of Defense, General Marshall."
"I don't think he had much respect for Secretary Johnson, Mr. President. ..."
"That wasn't the question."
"I think he will be pleased to have a soldier as Secretary of Defense, Mr. President."
"Even one he once described, in an efficiency report, as 'not being fit for regimental command'?" Truman challenged.
"Yes, sir. I know that story, sir. Your question was 'How will he get along with General Marshall?' I don't think there will be any problems in that regard."
"Did you ever hear that he described General Eisenhower as 'the best clerk I ever had'?" Truman asked.
"Yes, sir. I've heard that story."
"The United Nations has voted to permit the UN Command—which is of course General MacArthur—to enter North Korea and destroy the North Korean Army," Truman said. "You're aware of that, right?"
"Yes, sir."
"I'm concerned that General MacArthur might cross the Chinese and/or Russian borders, which would give them an excuse to enter the war. I don't want that. Do you think he understands that?"
"Yes, sir. I'm sure he does."
"How does General MacArthur rate the chances of the Chinese, in particular, entering the war when it becomes apparent that the North Korean Army has been destroyed? Even if we don't cross the border, or bomb across it?"
"I don't think he thinks they'll come in the war, sir."
"And you?"
"I don't know, Mr. President."
"You don't have an opinion, or you don't want to disagree with General MacArthur?"
"I don't think the possibility that they might enter the war should be dismissed, sir."
"I sent the Supreme Commander a personal message—phrased in much the same way as the one I sent you—saying that I would like to talk to him here," Truman said. "His reply was that he thought it would be 'unwise at this time' to come here, but he would, of course, if he was ordered to come. I have been wondering if he meant just what he said, or whether, should something go wrong—the Chinese enter the war, for example—while he was here, it would be my fault, because I ordered him to leave the Far East."
"Sir, I think he's understandably reluctant to give up his command, for any length of time, for any reason."
"I'm the President, General. I'm the Commander-in-Chief. When I send for somebody, they should come."
"Sir, you asked my opinion," Pickering said.
"Yes, I did, and you gave it," Truman said, and suddenly got to his feet. "Thank you for your candor, General."
He started for the door and then turned.
"I'm meeting General MacArthur halfway," Truman said. "That is, the Commander-in-Chief of this country is going to get on an airplane and fly to Wake Island and meet one of his generals, who is too busy to come here."
"Yes, sir," Pickering said.
"I may decide I want you to go with me. Or would that interfere with your schedule?"
"Mr. President, I'm completely at your disposal."
"Thank you," Truman said, and walked out the door.
"Jesus H. Christ!" Pickering said when the door had closed.
"Indeed," Senator Fowler chuckled. "I would hazard the guess that Ol' Harry's just a little piqued with MacArthur."
"And I'm probably at least partially responsible," Pickering said.
"I wouldn't flatter myself and think that, Flem," Fowler said.
"Well, finding the silver lining in that black cloud," Pickering said. "I guess that settles the question of his offering me the CIA, doesn't it?"
"In my professional opinion, Fleming, you are absolutely wrong about that."
"You're kidding!"
"Uh-uh," Senator Fowler said, shaking his head. "I'll give you seven-to-three for a hundred bucks that I'm looking at the next Director of the Central Intelligence Agency."
[THREE]
The House
Seoul, South Korea
O725 6 October 195O
"That's the fifth time you've looked at your watch in the last five minutes," Lieutenant Colonel D. J. Vandenburg said to Major Kenneth R. McCoy. "Expecting somebody?"
They were at the dining room table. The dishes and silverware had been cleaned away, and the table was covered with large maps of Korea, and with stacks of reports—many of them written in Korean—that reported sightings of Prisoners of War held by the North Koreans.
"Dunston," McCoy said. "I guess he couldn't catch a ride in an airplane. And General Howe. I'm getting a little worried about both of them."
"General Howe is fine, thank you for your concern," Major General Ralph Howe said, walking into the dining room trailed by Master Sergeant Charley Rogers.
Howe draped the web strap of his M-2 Grease Gun on the back of a chair and sat down. Then he gestured impatiently for McCoy and Vandenburg, who had come to attention, to relax. Rogers, after glancing at the map, sat down on the other side of the table.
"Sir," McCoy said, "this is Lieutenant Colonel Vandenburg. Colonel, General Howe."
Howe extended his hand.
"How do you do, Colonel?" he said. "This is Master Sergeant Charley Rogers." He paused. "That out of the way, have we missed breakfast?"
"Of course not, sir," McCoy said. "Ham and eggs?"
"That would be very nice," Howe said.
McCoy walked to the kitchen, spoke to the housekeeper, and then came back into the room.
"We tried to make it back here last night, it got dark, so we sat down on a First Cav airstrip and spent the night," Rogers said. "We passed on the cold rations that were offered, the horses kept us up all night, and we passed on a cold breakfast. So we are hungry."
Howe chuckled.
"Not really horses," he said. "But apparently in the Cav their sentinels are taught to shoot first, and then challenge, 'Halt, who goes there?' Charley's a little too long in the tooth to keep jumping up all night the way he did."
"The 7th Cav CP sounded like the O.K. Corral," Rogers said. "And I kept remembering what happened to them at the Little Big Horn."
Vandenburg laughed.
"Well, we're here," Howe said. "I guess Dunston is not? Where is he?"
"We took the helos to Socho-Ri yesterday, sir. I came back as soon as I could. Dunston stayed on to start the agent insertions. I caught a ride back in a Capital ROK Division L-4. I guess he couldn't get an airplane and had to drive."
Howe nodded, then turned to Vandenburg.
"Colonel, since Major McCoy is talking about inserting agents from Socho-Ri, I presume you have the need to know about such things."
"Sir," Vandenburg said, smiling, "since Major McCoy has told me who you are, I presume it's all right to tell you I'm here to see about getting General Dean back."
"Okay," Howe said. "I think I know about that. You came from the States for that purpose, right?"
"Yes, sir. My orders are from DCSOPS, (The acronym for the Deputy Chief of Staff for Operations, Headquarters, U.S. Army.) but I have been led to believe the orders came from the Chief of Staff."
"You were led wrong, then,' Howe said. "They came from the top. One of the first questions the President put to the new Chief of Staff, General Bradley, was 'What can we do about getting General Dean back?' I have a message from the President—it arrived here just after General Pickering left for the States— saying that somebody was being sent here, and ordering me to do what I could to help."
"I didn't know that, sir," Vandenburg said.
"If you had come to me, I would have referred you to Major McCoy, so you've come to the right place. You weren't told to contact me?"
"I was told to contact General Pickering, sir. But not you, sir. Maybe there wasn't time. An hour after I got my orders, I was on a plane for the West Coast."
"Or maybe," Howe said, thinking out loud, "what happened was that I got a copy of the President's message to General Pickering, in case that didn't reach him before he left."
"Yes, sir," Vandenburg said.
"I was a little surprised with the message. I'm not supposed to get involved in operations here; I'm strictly an observer. Now it makes sense. Anyway, we know what the orders are. Let's see what we can do about getting General Dean back. Is that what this is all about?"
He waved a hand toward the map and reports.
"Yes, sir," McCoy said. "But we don't have anything of value." He patted one of the stacks of reports.
"These are mostly pre-Inchon," he said. "They locate POW holding points we know are no longer there ..."
"Spit it out, Ken," Howe said.
"My gut feeling is that General Dean may already be in Peking," he said. "The ChiComs know what a valuable propaganda tool he could be—hell, is— and they know we'll probably stage an operation to get him back. If he's in China—even just a couple of miles across the border . . ."
"I take your point," Howe said. "McCoy, this is in the nature of an order. Even 'a couple of miles across the border' is not the Flying Fish Channel Islands. I don't want you staging any kind of an operation across the border unless the President gives the okay. You understand me?"
"Aye, aye, sir," McCoy said.
"So tell me what you two have decided," Howe ordered.
"Aside from dividing the peninsula between us, sir, with Colonel Vandenburg looking on the west and me on the east, not much. And I thought we'd better wait and talk to Dunston before we decide even that."
"And he's not here," Howe said. "You said he had to drive?"
"Probably, sir."
"Why couldn't he have used one of the helicopters?"
"We're going to keep them as quiet as possible, as long as possible, sir," McCoy said.
"What we need is a couple of regular airplanes, General,"
Vandenburg said. "A couple?"
"An L-19," McCoy said. "I'll settle for an L-4. And a Beaver."
"What's a Beaver?"
"Six-place, single-engine high-wing, General," Vandenburg said. "Designed for Alaska, Canada. Rugged, and they can land on a dime."
"I think I've seen one," Howe said. "Okay. I'll see what I can do."
"General, I'm pretty sure I can get both, but hanging on to them—especially the Beaver—is going to be a real problem. They're in short supply, and every general in Korea thinks he should have one. And probably should."
"But you need one more than they do, eh?"
"Yes, sir. I think it's a question of deciding priorities. I think getting General Dean back qualifies."
"Yeah, so do I. Not to mention getting young Pickering back," Howe said. "Has McCoy told you about him?"
"No, sir."
"Okay. Major Pickering, General Pickering's son, was shot down about two months ago, and has been evading capture ever since. ..."
"You know that, sir? That he's alive and hasn't been captured?"
"McCoy thinks he's alive," Howe said.
"Where is he?" Vandenburg said, turning to McCoy.
"The last sighting was east of Wonju," McCoy said.
"You sighted him?"
"We sighted where he had stamped out a signal ... his initials and an arrow on the ground, not him. I figure we missed him by no more than a couple of hours."
"You couldn't pick him up with a chopper?"
"We didn't have the choppers then, and we couldn't take one away from the 1st MarDiv—they're using them to transport wounded."
" 'Couldn't take one' from the Marines—or anyone else who has one—is past tense, Ken," Howe said. "The rules have changed."
"Sir?"
"This is absolutely not for dissemination," Howe said. "I think the reason the President called General Pickering to Washington is to give him the CIA. He asked me what kind of a director I thought he'd make, and I told him I couldn't think of anyone better qualified to take it over and straighten it out. So what we have is a changed priority with regard to Major Pickering. We can't afford to have the son of the Director on the CIA in enemy hands." He paused. "That, too, Ken, is in the nature of an order."
"Aye, aye, sir."
"Okay, Colonel," Howe went on. "You lay your hands on these airplanes you need, and I will do my damnedest to see that no one takes them away from you."
"Sir, may I offer a suggestion about how that might be done?" Vandenburg asked.
"Shoot."
"I notice the general doesn't have an aide-de-camp."
"I don't need one," Howe said simply, then chuckled and added: "I shine my own shoes."
"Sir, I respectfully suggest that you do need an aide-de-camp," Vandenburg said. "A fairly senior one. And I volunteer for the duty."
"Where are you going with that idea?"
"I don't think any general here, from MacArthur on down, would try to take an airplane away from the aide-de-camp of—What's your official title, sir?"
"We're the Presidential Mission to the Supreme Command, United Nations Command," Master Sergeant Rogers said. "His official title is Chief of Mission. Boss, I think the colonel's had a fine idea."
Howe thought it over for ten seconds.
"Okay," he said. "Do it. Type up something appropriate, Charley, naming the colonel my deputy. Somehow, he doesn't look like an aide-de-camp."
"Even better, sir," Vandenburg said.
"Yes, sir," Rogers said. "And we get to use the airplanes, too, right?"
"Of course," Vandenburg said.
"You're a ... I was about to say 'devious man,' Colonel," Howe said admiringly. "But I think the word I'm looking for is 'ruthless.' I can see where you and The Killer are going to get along just fine."
[FOUR]
USAF Airfield K-l
Pusan, South Korea
0945 8 October I9SO
The breakout—and advance northward—from the Pusan Perimeter of the Eighth Army had done little or nothing to reduce the pressure on what had once been the only operational airfield in South Korea.
It had become, however, more of a passenger and freight terminal than a base for the fighters and light bombers it had been when the Pusan Perimeter needed fighting aircraft to keep from being pushed into the sea.
When the USAF C-47 from Seoul arrived at the port city, it had to take its place at the end of a long line of aircraft making their approaches to the field. Many of the aircraft ahead of them were four-engine C-54 transports bearing the insignia of the Military Air Transport Command, and there were four essentially identical aircraft wearing the insignia of the civilian airlines from which they had been chartered.
The warplanes were not entirely gone. The stack also held a dozen or more warplanes, USAF P-51 Mustang fighters, A-20 and A-26 attack bombers, and several Corsairs from the Marine Corps and Navy.
And when, after more than a half hour in the stack, the Gooney Bird from Seoul finally touched down and taxied to the tarmac in front of base operations, there was even a Lockheed Constellation of Trans-Global Airways sitting there taking on enough fuel to get it to Japan, where it would be topped off. The glistening, sleek, triple-tailed aircraft looked out of place among the others.
When the Gooney Bird shut down its engines and the door opened, sixteen people, ranging in rank from PFC to full colonel, got off and most of them walked into base operations to see about getting themselves some ground transportation.
Four of the passengers—a lieutenant colonel, a major, a captain, and a lieutenant, the latter three wearing the wings of Army aviators—did not go into base operations but started walking across the field to a hangar before which sat a small fleet of Army aircraft.
When they got close to the hangar, they saw a small group of officers and men standing around an L-20 DeHavilland Beaver, watching as a corporal put the final touches to the insignia of the Eighth United States Army he had painted on the door. The aircraft looked as if it was not only just about brand new but also freshly polished.
The senior of the officers was a major, also an Army aviator. He saluted the lieutenant colonel and smiled at his brother aviators.
"Good morning, sir," he said. "This came off the ship at 2100 last night," he went on, indicating the Beaver. "And as soon as that paint dries, it's going to Eighth Army Forward. How's that for efficiency?"
"Commendable," the lieutenant colonel said, then spoke to the soldier with the paintbrush: "Son, have you got some paint thinner in your kit?" "Yes, sir," the corporal said, visibly confused.
"Then how about taking that off the door?" the lieutenant colonel said. "I don't want that insignia on there."
"Sir?" the major asked incredulously.
"I said I don't want that insignia on the door," the lieutenant colonel explained, reasonably, "and asked the corporal to start taking it off."
"Sir, this aircraft is assigned to Eighth Army Forward," the major said.
"It was assigned to Eighth Army Forward," the lieutenant colonel said. "Now I'm taking it."
"Sir, you . . . you can't do that," the major said.
"Yes I can. And I will also require two L-19s."
"Sir, I can't just give you this airplane," the major said, "or any aircraft, for that matter, without authority from United Nations Command."
"You are the officer in charge?" the lieutenant colonel asked.
"No, sir. I'm the deputy."
"Well, then, son, if you have problems with this, why don't you ask the officer in charge to come talk to me?"
"Yes, sir. I'll do that, sir."
"And in the meantime, Corporal, you start getting that insignia off the doors," the lieutenant colonel said.
The major walked quickly—almost trotted—to a Quonset hut set up beside a hangar and returned in less than two minutes, followed by a portly lieutenant colonel wearing pilot's wings and the insignia of an aide-de-camp to a three-star general, and another lieutenant colonel, also a pilot, whose collar carried the insignia of the Transportation Corps.
"Colonel," the portly lieutenant colonel said, "this is some sort of joke, right?"
"What's a joke?"
"About you taking this airplane."
"I wasn't joking about that."
"This airplane belongs to General Walker," the portly lieutenant colonel said. "Do you understand that?"
"Colonel, this airplane belongs to the U.S. Army," Vandenburg said. "And I have what I'm sure is the highest priority to put it to use."
"I'd like to see that authority!"
"Certainly," Vandenburg said, and handed him an envelope.
The eyes of both lieutenant colonels grew wide as they read it.
THE WHITE HOUSE
WASHINGTON, D.C.
JULY 8TH 1950
TO WHOM IT MAY CONCERN:
MAJOR GENERAL RALPH HOWE, USAR, IN CONNECTION WITH HIS MISSION FOR ME, WILL TRAVEL TO SUCH PLACES AT SUCH TIMES AS HE FEELS APPROPRIATE, ACCOMPANIED BY SUCH STAFF AS HE DESIRES.
GENERAL HOWE IS GRANTED HEREWITH A TOP-SECRET/WHITE HOUSE CLEARANCE, AND MAY, AT HIS OPTION, GRANT SUCH CLEARANCE TO HIS STAFF.
U.S. MILITARY AND GOVERNMENTAL AGENCIES ARE DIRECTED TO PROVIDE GENERAL HOWE AND HIS STAFF WITH WHATEVER SUPPORT THEY MAY REQUIRE.
Harry, S. Truman
HARRY S TRUMAN
PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES
1st Indorsement
Headquarters, Presidential Mission
In the Field (Korea) 7 October 1950
Lieutenant Colonel D. J. Vandenburg, USA, of my staff is designated Deputy Chief of
Mission.
Major Kenneth R. McCoy, USMCR, of my staff is designated Vice Chief of Mission.
Ralph Howe
RALPH HOWE
MAJOR GENERAL
CHIEF OF MISSION
"Are there any questions, gentlemen?"
"General Walker's not going to like this!" the lieutenant colonel with the aide-de-camp insignia said as he handed the orders back.
"Colonel," Vandenburg said, man-to-man, "I understand how you feel. In your place, I'd feel the same way. Hell hath no fury like a general who doesn't get what he wants, right? But what can I do? We all live under the Chain of Command. General Howe, who reports directly to the President, doesn't need any more authority than what I've shown you he has. And he sent me here to get a Beaver and two L-19s. I don't have any more choice in this matter than you do."
Neither lieutenant colonel replied.
"Now, while the corporal is taking that paint off the door, can we look at what L-19s are available?" Vandenburg asked reasonably.
"There's only one here at the moment," the Transportation Corps lieutenant colonel said. "There should be some more coming in in the next three or four days."
"I can only hope General Howe will understand," Vandenburg said, his voice suggesting he didn't believe that at all. "He sent me to get two."
[FIVE]
Hangar 13
Kimpo Airfield (K-16)
Seoul, South Korea
1245 8 October 19SO
Major Kenneth R. McCoy was driving the Russian jeep and Major William Dunston was sitting behind him. The Marines on perimeter guard around the hangar recognized them and passed them without question, but the moment they reached the hangar, Staff Sergeant Sam Klegger, who had been left in charge when the others went to Socho-Ri, came through the door.
He saluted, and McCoy and Dunston returned it.
"From the look on your face, Sergeant," McCoy said, "you have a question on your mind."
"Good afternoon, sir," Staff Sergeant Klegger said. "Yes, sir. Actually, some of the men have been a little curious why we're guarding a hangar with nothing in it."
"There is about to be something in it," McCoy said. "About an hour ago, we got a message from Taejon saying that two airplanes will arrive here right about now. A Beaver and an L-19. When they get close to the hangar, I want the doors opened, quickly, and as quickly closed once we get the airplanes inside."
"Aye, aye, sir. Is that what they call those helos, 'Beavers'?"
"No. A Beaver is a regular airplane," McCoy said.
Sir, can I ask what's going on? What are we going to do with these airplanes?"
"We 'borrowed' them from the Army," McCoy said. "We're going to use them to look for a Marine aviator who's down somewhere between Suwon and the east coast."
"You 'borrowed' them from the Army?"
"You could put it that way, Sergeant, yes," McCoy said.
Staff Sergeant Klegger smiled approvingly.
Dunston touched McCoy's arm, and, when he had his attention, pointed skyward.
A Beaver was making its final approach.
"Right on time," McCoy said.
"If that's ours," Dunston said.
"Odds are it is," McCoy said. "There aren't that many of them."
They lost sight of the Beaver as it landed, but it quickly appeared on a taxi-way headed for them.
"Open the doors, Sergeant," McCoy ordered.
Five Marines grunted as they slid open the hangar doors.
The Beaver stopped before the open doors and shut down the engine. Lieutenant Colonel D. J. Vandenburg and Major Alex Donald climbed down from the cockpit. The Marines and all the officers pushed it into the hangar. Before they were finished, an L-19 taxied up, shut down its engine, and was pushed into the hangar by the two officers in it. The doors were closed with a loud screeching noise.
"The good news," Lieutenant Colonel Vandenburg said to Majors McCoy and Dunston, "is that—obviously—I was able to make good on my promise to try to get us a Beaver and an L-19. The bad news is that that particular Beaver was supposed to go to the Eighth Army commander, and I think we have to count on General Walker making a serious—one might even say furious— effort to get it back."
"Ouch," McCoy said.
"If we can keep General Walker, or his people, from getting their hands on it—or us—for three, four days, a week, I think they'll probably be able to get him another one, and the furor will die down. But until then . . ."
"You have any ideas how we can do that?" McCoy asked.
"As a matter of fact, Major Donald and I did discuss the problem on the way up here," Vandenburg said, smiling.
"All suggestions gratefully received, Colonel," Dunston said, smiling.
"Since we can't hide the Beaver, I suggest we camouflage it," Vandenburg said, a little smugly.
"I don't follow you, sir."
"We change the tail number," Vandenburg said. "They will be looking for . . ." He looked up at the Beaver. ". . . 507179. We change that to, say, 507167. General Walker's Beaver is now invisible."
"Very clever," McCoy said.
"We landed here as Army five zero mumble mumble mumble," Donald said. "When they asked me to 'say again,' I blew into the microphone. I figured that might buy us a little time."
"Only a little," Vandenburg said. "I think General Walker's pilot was on the horn to him before we took off from Pusan. It won't take them long to figure out we're the airplane Walker is looking for."
"And there are problems with painting new tail numbers," Donald said. "It can't be done in fifteen minutes, even if we had somebody to do it, and the paint to do it with. There's paint in the mechanics' tool kits, but they're at Socho-Ri."
"Then we'll have to change them at Socho-Ri," McCoy said. "Why can't we just take off now and tell the tower we're headed for the Race Track?"
"And never land there, you mean?" Donald asked.
McCoy nodded.
"If the Race Track tower asks questions, I'll think of something to mumble," Donald said. "But we don't have enough fuel to make it to Socho-Ri. We're going to have to refuel the airplanes."
"Sergeant," McCoy said to Staff Sergeant Klegger, "isn't there a trailer of AvGas here?"
"Yes, sir. Two, each with five hundred gallons."
"Drag one of them in here, and get started refueling these airplanes," McCoy ordered.
"Aye, aye, sir."
"And then get ready to move out," McCoy went on. "Mr. Zimmerman left you maps so that you can drive to Socho-Ri, right?"
"Yes, sir."
"As soon after the airplanes take off as you can, you get going."
"Aye, aye, sir."
"Bill, can you stay with them until they're out of Seoul?" McCoy asked Dunston. "Get them through roadblocks?"
"Sure. You're going with them?"
"Yeah. I want to show Colonel Vandenburg what we have at Socho-Ri, and the sooner we can put the L-19 to work conducting our own search for Pickering, the better."
The hangar door screeched open wide enough to admit a tanker trailer.
[SIX]
8O23d Transportation Company (Depot, Forward)
Inchon, South Korea
142S 8 October 195O
Captain Francis P. MacNamara, Transportation Corps, was not at all surprised when he got a "heads-up" call that the X Corps Transportation Officer, Colonel T. Howard Kennedy, would be in the Inchon area and would pay the Eighty-Twenty-Three a visit.
MacNamara had been expecting such a "visit." He would not have been surprised if he had gotten an official call announcing a formal inspection of the unit. Certainly, the status of readiness of the Eighty-Twenty-Three would be of interest to the staff officers of X Corps, and so far there had been no contact of any sort.
He was, of course, a little nervous. He knew that the purpose of an inspection—by whatever name—was to find fault with whatever was being inspected.
But he was ready. There had been very little "business" for the Eighty-Twenty-Three since he'd started to set up shop. There had been that interesting business of issuing vehicles to the CIA a week before, and he had exchanged twenty-seven of his vehicles for damaged vehicles. But that had not at all taxed the capabilities of the Eighty-Twenty-Three. He felt sure he could conduct one hundred vehicle exchanges a day easily, and more if pressed.
But the lack of business had permitted getting the Eighty-Twenty-Three into very good shape. Not only had his shops repaired all but seven of the exchanged vehicles and returned them to the Ready for Exchange lines, but there had been time to establish creature comforts for his men.
The squad tents in which they were housed now had wooden floors, doors, and electric lights. A section of the garage building had been converted to a mess hall, with picnic-table-type seating for the lower ranks, and chairs and tables for First Three Graders and officers.
He was serving three hot meals a day, and had set up two shower points, one for the men and a second for the noncoms and officers, which they shared on a simple schedule. Similarly, he had set up three latrines, one outside under canvas, and two—by repairing existing facilities—in the main building, one for the officers and another for the noncoms.
He had even established a unit laundry. He'd had to bend regulations a little to do this. Koreans were performing this service, in exchange for the garbage from the mess and five jerry cans of gasoline daily. Inasmuch as this service was provided outside the depot area, he didn't think it would come to the attention of anyone visiting the Eighty-Twenty-Three. If it did, he was prepared to argue that it was a question of troop morale. Men whose uniforms quickly became grease- and oil-stained, and who took a great deal of comfort in knowing that after their shower they could put on fresh clothing, were obviously going to be happier than those who had to either wash their clothing themselves or go to one of the X Corps shower points outside the depot and exchange them.
Not to mention, of course, that his laundry service returned uniforms that were even pressed. In the case of the officers, starched and pressed. The uniforms available for exchange were those that had simply been washed and dried in the enormous machines of the shower point.
Immediately after the "heads-up" call, Captain MacNamara had sent his runner to announce an officer's call, and when his four lieutenants came to the CP, he told them what was going to happen.
He said that when he walked through the shop and around the depot perimeter, as he planned to do in thirty minutes, he didn't want to see anyone unshaved or in a dirty uniform. He said, as they knew, he didn't insist that steel helmets and web gear be worn while the men were working, but he expected to see both near those working. Those on perimeter guard he expected to see looking alert and with their weapons as clean as possible, and they better be wearing their helmets and web gear.
And thirty minutes later he took a quick tour of the Eighty-Twenty-Three, and found only a few things—he insisted that a large poster of a nearly naked redhead be removed from the wall of one of the work bays, for example—that needed correction. Then he started a second tour of the Eighty-Twenty-Three, this time a slow one.
He thought it would look better if Colonel T Howard Kennedy found him keeping a personal supervisory eye on things, rather than sitting in the CP, drinking coffee, and reading Stars and Stripes.
From what MacNamara had heard—and, for that matter, seen—the war was just about over. The linkup with Eighth Army advancing from the south had been made, and he'd heard that the UN had given permission to MacArthur to chase the North Koreans back across the 38th Parallel and destroy what was left of their army.
There were a lot of implications to be drawn from that, and MacNamara had been around the Army long enough to make them.
Many of the troops here would be withdrawn, either—at first, at least—to Japan or all the way back to the States. That didn't mean they would take all their wheeled vehicles with them. For one thing, that would take a lot of shipping, and for another, it didn't make a lot of sense to haul vehicles that had been used hard in the war and needed Third and Fourth Echelon maintenance all the way back to the States when that maintenance could be performed a lot cheaper in Japan.
And MacNamara believed that it was unlikely the Army was going to allow itself to be caught again with its pants down, logistically speaking. From what he'd seen and heard, there had been almost nothing in the depots in Japan when the war started, and that had hurt bad.
It seemed very likely to MacNamara that what would happen, once the war was over in a couple of weeks, was that the Army would restock the depots in Japan with the vehicles that had come from the States. There would be ordnance depots in Japan like the Anniston Depot in Alabama, with stocks of rebuilt-to-specification vehicles ready for immediate issue.
And there was certainly a role to play in that for units like the Eighty-Twenty-Three generally, and, if he played his cards right, for Captain Francis P. MacNamara specifically.
He didn't want to get too enthusiastic about it, only to be later kicked in the balls, but it seemed possible, even likely, that he could stay on active duty long enough to get his promotion to major. He was eligible.
If that happened, that meant he would be retired as a major when he had his twenty years in, even if he got RIF'd again back to master sergeant.
But it was also possible, if less likely, that he could stay on active duty, particularly if he was right about the Army setting up an Anniston-type depot in Japan when the war was over, and go all the way to twenty years and retirement as a major.
Hell, maybe even make lieutenant colonel before he retired.
All it would take for this to happen would be for the brass to notice that he had done a hell of a good job with the Eighty-Twenty-Three and was just the man they needed for what was going to happen after the war.
Colonel Kennedy arrived fifteen minutes into Captain MacNamara's second tour of the depot.
MacNamara saw him arrive—in a three-jeep convoy—but pretended not to see him until the "visiting party" had parked their jeeps and walked down to him between two rows of Ready for Exchange vehicles.
Then he hurriedly walked to them, saluted, and announced, "Good morning, sir. Captain MacNamara, Francis P., commanding."
Colonel Kennedy returned the salute.
"Quite an operation you have here, Captain," he said. "Very impressive."
"Thank you, sir."
"Can you give me some quick stats? What's ready for issue?"
"Everything you see, sir, except for those beyond-my-capacity-to-repair vehicles"—he pointed—"over there. There are seven in that category, sir. There are five hundred seventy-nine wheeled vehicles of all types ready for issue, sir."
"Five hundred seventy-nine, eh?"
"Yes, sir. Would the colonel like a specific breakdown?"
"That won't be necessary," Colonel Kennedy said. "I didn't really realize there were that many."
"Yes, sir. And all ready for immediate exchange."
"I understand there was some difficulty in getting them off-loaded at Inchon when you came."
"The heavier stuff—the tank transporters, some of the larger wreckers— gave us a little trouble, sir. But we managed to get everything off-loaded without trouble."
"And the tides, too, I'm sure, posed a problem?"
"Yes, sir. We really had to push when the ship was at the dock to get as much off before the ship had to go back down the channel again."
"Somebody said, you know, that Inchon was the worst possible place, because of those tides, to stage a landing."
"Well, we did it, sir."
"And you think you learned from the experience?"
"Yes, sir. I'm sure we did."
"Well, perhaps that will make things a little easier for you now," Colonel Kennedy said.
"Sir?"
"As soon as you can, Captain, start moving your vehicles back to Inchon. Check with the port captain, and see where he wants you to operate for the on-loading."
"Yes, sir. I'll get right on it. I'm a little surprised that we're going back to Japan so soon."
"I didn't say anything about Japan, Captain," Colonel Kennedy said. "X Corps has been ordered to reembark to make another landing elsewhere."
"Yes, sir. Where would that be?"
"You'll be informed in good time,' Colonel Kennedy said. He put out his hand. "You've done a good job here, Captain. Keep it up."
"Yes, sir," MacNamara said.
Chapter Nine
[ONE]
Blair House
Pennsylvania Avenue
Washington, D.G.
1OO5 11 October 195O
There was a knock at the closed door of Harry S Truman's study, but the President, who was reading what he thought of as one more windy damned report, didn't pay much attention to it.
There were knocks at his study door all day and all night, followed a moment later by whoever was there—his secretary, usually—opening it and standing there waiting until she had his attention.
When, a full sixty seconds later, Truman raised his eyes to see who it was, the door was still closed. He watched the door, waiting for it to open. It didn't. He had just about decided that he hadn't heard a knock after all when there was another.
"Come in," the President called, not entirely cordially.
The door immediately opened and a Marine sergeant in dress blue uniform marched in, stopped precisely eighteen inches from the President's desk, saluted crisply, and barked, "An eyes-only message for the Commander-in-Chief, sir!" and extended a business-size white envelope toward the President.
"Thank you, son," Truman said, and returned the salute.
Harry S Truman knew very well that salutes were supposed to be only for members of the armed forces in uniform, but had rationalized that by reminding himself that not only was he Commander-in-Chief, but every month the Treasurer of the United States mailed a pension check to Colonel Harry S Truman, NG, Retired. He'd worn the uniform, and if he wanted to return this boy's salute, he damned well was going to.
The sergeant snapped to a Parade Rest position.
"Stand at ease," Truman said.
The sergeant snapped to a slightly—only slightly—less rigid position and stared eight inches over the President's head.
There was little question in the President's mind that he was about to read a message from Ralph Howe. All other messages were delivered by either his secretary or, in the case of Eyes-Only, by one of the Signal Corps officers or warrant officers in the message center.
Except for Eyes-Only messages from Ralph Howe and Fleming Pickering. These were invariably delivered by a Marine. Truman had finally figured out that the Marines had stationed two of their own in the message center, round-the-clock, a Marine cryptographer who got all the messages from Camp Pendleton addressed to the President, and decoded it, and another Marine in dress blues to personally deliver it.
It was just like the Marines, the President thought, to do something like that.
He realized and admitted that the thought was much less sarcastic than it had been before this damned Korean business started. He had not then been much of a fan of the United States Marine Corps, and had been quoted as saying he didn't see why the Navy needed its own army, and perhaps—to save the taxpayer's dollar—it was time to do away with it.
Korea had changed that. The Army had really dropped the ball over there, and the Marine Corps had saved their ass. That wasn't Marine Corps public relations talking. Ralph Howe had reported that from over there, and even General Walker had come right out and said that if it hadn't been for the Marines, he didn't think he would have been able to hold at the Pusan Perimeter.
Truman slit the envelope open with a small penknife, took out the contents—four sheets of neatly single-spaced typewriter copy—and read them twice. First, a quick glance, and then again, slowly.
Then he folded the sheets of paper and put them back in the envelope. He looked at the Marine sergeant.
"Sergeant . . ." The Marine snapped to attention like a spring. "That'll be all, son. Would you ask one of the Secret Service agents to come in, please? Thank you."
"Aye, aye, sir," the Marine barked, and snapped his rigid hand to his eyebrow.
Truman returned the salute again.
The Marine did a snappy About-Face movement and marched out of the office.
Truman picked up one of his telephones.
"See if you can get General Pickering for me, will you, please?" he said, and hung up.
There was another knock at the door, and the door opened and two Secret Service agents stepped into the room without waiting for permission.
"Yes, Mr. President?" one of them asked.
"I want one of you to take this," Truman said, holding out the envelope, "across the street to General Pickering in the Foster Lafayette. When he's finished reading it, bring it back."
The telephone buzzed. Truman reached to pick it up before the Secret Service agent could take the envelope from his hand.
"I have General Pickering, Mr. President," the White House Operator said.
"Pickering?" the President said.
"Yes, Mr. President?"
The President of the United States changed his mind.
That wasn't good news about his son. The least I can do is deliver it myself.
And I need to get him off the hook about the CIA anyway.
This is as good a time to do that as any.
"Have you got a few minutes for me? Right now?"
"I'll be there immediately, Mr. President."
"Hold your position, General," Truman said. "You're in your apartment, right?"
"Yes, Mr. President."
"Order up some coffee, General, if you'd be so kind. I'll be right there. I need the walk."
"It'll be waiting, Mr. President."
The President hung up and looked at the Secret Service agents.
"Organize the parade," he ordered. "I'm going across the street to the Foster Lafayette."
The parade, as Truman referred to his Secret Service bodyguard escort, was waiting when Truman came down the steps of Blair House, turned right, and walked briskly down Pennsylvania Avenue toward the Foster Lafayette Hotel.
Truman looked across Pennsylvania Avenue at the White House. There were all sorts of signs of work on the "repairs" under way. It was more than repairs, Truman thought. The building, which had been literally at the point of collapse, had been gutted and was being rebuilt.
He waved and smiled at tourists, but completely ignored the questions called out to him by a dozen members of the press who had joined the parade the moment it was formed.
They were waiting for him at the Foster Lafayette. The doorman held the door open for him, and, inside, four Secret Service agents made sort of a path to an elevator waiting for him.
Brigadier General Fleming Pickering, USMCR, was standing in the corridor outside the door to his suite.
"Morning," the President said.
One of the Secret Service agents walked quickly through the door.
"Good morning, Mr. President," Pickering said as the President walked past him into the sitting room of the Marquis de Lafayette Suite.
Two waiters were making final adjustments to an array of food on a table covered with a white tablecloth.
"That's very nice, General," Truman said, "but all I asked for was a cup of coffee."
"Mr. President, if you'd given them another couple of minutes, there would be a steamboat round of beef and pheasant under glass on that table," Pickering said.
"It's a little early for something like that, but that pastry is tempting," Truman said. He walked to the table and spoke to the waiters. "That's very nice, thank you very much."
He picked up a white sugarcoated breakfast roll and looked at the Secret Service agents.
"Would you leave us, please?" he ordered.
He took a bite of the roll, then laid it down and poured a cup of coffee from a silver pitcher. He looked at Pickering, asking with raised eyebrows if Pickering wanted coffee.
"Yes, please, thank you, sir," Pickering said.
Truman poured the coffee and handed the cup and saucer to Pickering. Then he took his own cup and saucer and the breakfast roll and sat down on a couch.
"Please sit down, General," he said.
"Thank you, sir."
"I just got a message from Ralph Howe," the President said. "I thought you would like to see it."
He took the white envelope from his suit jacket pocket and handed it to Pickering.
"Thank you, sir," Pickering said, and opened the envelope and read it.
TOP SECRET/PRESIDENTIAL
OPERATIONAL IMMEDIATE
DUPLICATION FORBIDDEN
0845 TOKYO TIME 10OCTOBER1950
FROM: CHIEF PRESIDENTIAL MISSION TO FAR EAST
VIA: USMC SPECIAL COMMUNICATIONS CENTER CAMP PENDLETON CAL
TO: WHITE HOUSE COMMUNICATIONS CENTER WASHINGTON DC
EYES ONLY THE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES
BEGIN PERSONAL MESSAGE FROM MAJOR GENERAL HOWE
DEAR HARRY
IN RESPONSE TO YOUR REQUEST THAT I SEND WHATEVER I THINK YOU WOULD FIND USEFUL AT WAKE
ISLAND
IN RE THE RELANDING OF X CORPS ON EAST COAST OF KOREAN PENINSULA
MACARTHUR GAVE ME A PERSONAL BRIEFING ON HIS PLANS AND INTENTIONS IN WHICH HE CONVINCINGLY SAID THE OPERATION WILL PERMIT HIM TO QUICKLY REACH THE YALU RIVER AND THUS KEEP THE FLEEING NORTH KOREAN ARMY FROM ESCAPING INTO CHINA AND THUS PERMIT ITS COMPLETE DESTRUCTION
HE CONVINCINGLY SAID THERE IS ABSOLUTELY NO MILITARY REASON FOR HIM TO CROSS THE BORDER
I RAISED THE CONCERNS OF MAJOR GENERAL OLIVER SMITH OF FIRST MARDIV AS PREVIOUSLY REPORTED TO YOU THAT THE TERRAIN OF NORTH KOREA AND THE EXTENDED SUPPLY LINES POSE PROBLEMS
MACARTHUR SAID BOTH HE AND GENERAL ALMOND ARE VERY MUCH AWARE OF THE PROBLEMS AND WILL DEAL WITH THEM ACCORDINGLY
I DON'T KNOW HOW MUCH MACARTHUR KNOWS ABOUT FIGHTING IN THE MOUNTAINS BUT ALMOND FOUGHT HIS DIVISION IN THE MOUNTAINS OF ITALY IN THE WINTER AND CERTAINLY LEARNED FROM THAT EXPERIENCE
I HAVE THE FEELING THAT MACARTHUR DIDN'T SEEK GUIDANCE AND APPROVAL FOR THE OPERATION FROM THE JOINT CHIEFS BECAUSE HE THINKS HE HAS A MANDATE TO OPERATE WITHOUT IT AND ALSO BECAUSE HE REGARDS AS DO ALMOND AND SMITH THIS OPERATION AS CONSIDERABLY SIMPLER THAN THE INCHON LANDING
THE NAVY HAS NO PROBLEMS WITH THE OPERATION EXCEPT FOR THE ANTICIPATED LACK OF PORT FACILITIES WHICH WILL PROBABLY DELAY THE OFF LOADING OF HEAVY EQUIPMENT SUCH AS TANKS ETCETERA
I HAD A LONG TALK WITH GENERAL WALKER WHO HAS MOVED HIS FORWARD HEADQUARTERS TO KOREA FROM JAPAN AND PLANS TO OPEN IT IN SEOUL AS SOON AS HE CAN TO CONTROL OPERATIONS IN NORTH WESTERN KOREA
HE SEEMS TO HAVE NO SERIOUS OBJECTIONS TO THE X CORPS OPERATION EXCEPT THAT HE REMAINS INDIGNANT THAT X CORPS HAS NOT BEEN PLACED UNDER HIS COMMAND
WALKER MAKES THE POINT THAT ALL KOREAN OPERATIONS SHOULD BE COORDINATED AND THIS REQUIRES THAT THE X CORPS COMMANDER TAKE HIS ORDERS FROM THE EIGHTH ARMY COMMANDER
WALKER WAS ALSO HIGHLY INDIGNANT THAT AN L-20 BEAVER SIX PLACE LIAISON AIRCRAFT WHICH HE CONSIDERS NECESSARY TO MOVE HIMSELF AND MEMBERS OF HIS STAFF AROUND KOREA WAS STOLEN BY A SO FAR UNLOCATABLE ARMY OFFICER WHILE EN ROUTE TO HIM
IN RE CHICOM INTERVENTION
MACARTHUR, WALKER FEEL THE POSSIBILITY IS VERY SLIGHT
ALMOND AND SMITH FEAR THAT ANY CROSSING OF THE BORDER FOR WHATEVER REASON MIGHT TRIGGER INTERVENTION BUT THAT THE CHINESE DO NOT POSSESS EITHER SUFFICIENT FORCES OR LOGISTICS TO CAUSE A MAJOR OR LASTING PROBLEM FOR EITHER EIGHTH ARMY OR X CORPS
IN OTHER WORDS THE MOST THEY COULD DO WAS FORCE US BACK SEVERAL MILES FROM THE BORDER
SEE ADDITIONAL COMMENTS BELOW
IN RE RESCUE OF GENERAL DEAN AND MAJOR PICKERING
LT COL D J VANDENBURG SENT BY DCSOPS TO DEAL WITH DEAN ARRIVED HERE A WEEK AGO AND IMMEDIATELY MADE CONTACT WITH MAJOR MCCOY AND KOREA CIA STATION CHIEF DUNSTON
VANDENBURG IS AN IMPRESSIVE OPERATOR AND BOTH HE AND MCCOY FEEL IT HIGHLY PROBABLE THAT GENERAL DEAN HAS BEEN TAKEN TO CHINA AND THAT THEREFORE HIS RESCUE IS HIGHLY DOUBTFUL
THEY HAVE HOWEVER POOLED RESOURCES AND DIVIDED RESPONSIBILITY AND BEGUN TO ATTACK THE PROBLEM VIGOROUSLY
VANDENBURG WILL OPERATE ON WEST OF PENINSULA AND MCCOY ON EAST
MCCOY AND DUNSTON WHO HAVE THE EXPERIENCE HAVE ALREADY BEGUN THE INSERTION OF AGENTS INTO NORTH KOREA WHO WILL BOTH ATTEMPT TO LOCATE DEAN AND POSSIBLY PICKERING AND ATTEMPT TO DETERMINE STRENGTH OF BOTH REMAINING NORTH KOREAN FORCES AND CHINESE FORCES ACROSS THE BORDER
BOTH UNDERSTAND THEY ARE NOT TO STAGE ANY SORT OF A CROSS BORDER OPERATION WITHOUT YOUR SPECIFIC APPROVAL
MCCOY IS OPERATING OUT OF A SMALL FISHING VILLAGE ON EAST COAST PREVIOUSLY USED BY DUNSTON BEFORE THE WAR
VANDENBURG SOMEHOW ACQUIRED AN L-20 BEAVER SIX PLACE LIAISON AIRCRAFT AND HAS MADE IT AVAILABLE TO DUNSTON AND MCCOY FOR TRAVEL BETWEEN PUSAN SEOUL AND SOCHO RI FISHING VILLAGE
ADDITIONALLY MACARTHUR ORDERED THAT TWO SIKORSKY HELICOPTERS SENT TO KOREA BE TRANSFERRED TO THE CIA AND THEY WILL BE USED FOR INSERTION AND EXTRACTION OF AGENTS AND ALSO TO RESCUE GENERAL DEAN AND OR MAJOR PICKERING IF THEY CAN BE LOCATED
THERE HAVE BEEN NO SIGHTINGS OF THE SIGNALS PICKERING HAS BEEN LEAVING IN THE PAST SEVEN DAYS WHICH MCCOY SAYS MAY BE BECAUSE HE IS MOVING EASTWARD AND THERE ARE FEWER PLACES WHERE HE CAN MAKE THEM
BOTH MCCOY AND DUNSTON HAVE TOLD ME WITH THE CAVEAT THEY HAVE NO PROOF TO SUPPORT THEIR POSITION THAT CHINESE INTERVENTION IS VERY POSSIBLE MAYBE EVEN PROBABLE
AT THE RISK OF REPEATING MYSELF I GROW MORE AND MORE CONVINCED THAT THE PROBLEMS OF THE CIA ARE ITS BUREAUCRACY
PEOPLE LIKE MCCOY AND DUNSTON AND I THINK VANDENBURG TOO DO THEIR JOBS ONLY TO HAVE THEIR LABOR GO FOR NAUGHT BECAUSE IT DOESN'T FIT THE PRECONCEIVED NOTIONS OF SOMEBODY SITTING BEHIND A DESK FAR FROM WHAT IS HAPPENING
I DON'T KNOW HOW EFFECTIVE FLEMING PICKERING WOULD BE IN SHAPING UP THE CIA BUT I CAN'T THINK OF ANYBODY WHO COULD DO BETTER
THANK YOU FOR UNDERSTANDING THAT I WOULD JUST BE EXCESS BAGGAGE AT WAKE ISLAND AND THAT I AM RELUCTANT TO LEAVE HERE WITH PICKERING GONE
RESPECTFULLY, AND WITH BEST REGARDS TO BESS
RALPH
END PERSONAL MESSAGE FROM GENERAL HOWE
TOP SECRET/PRESIDENTIAL
Pickering put the message back in the envelope and handed it back to Truman.
"Thank you, sir," he said.
"I'd hoped there would be better news about your boy," Truman said.
"Thank you, sir," Pickering said.
Truman smiled.
"Did you get the feeling that General Walker's missing airplane and the airplane Colonel Vandenburg 'somehow acquired' are in any way connected?"
Pickering chuckled. He said, "General Howe didn't seem to share General Walker's indignation, did he?"
"Well, maybe the airplane'll be useful in trying to locate your son," the President said.
"I hope so, sir," Pickering said. "I just hope that the airplane, and those helicopters—that was the first I'd heard about that—aren't needed somewhere else more than—"
"I would think that right now the insertion of agents is very important. We need to know what the Chinese may be up to, and we have to make every effort to get both General Dean and your son back."
"Yes, sir."
"I'm sure you're aware, General, that I've given a good deal of thought to replacing Admiral Hillencoetter at the CIA. And I'm sure you're aware you were high on my list of potential directors."
"I was afraid of that, sir. I really don't think I'm qualified to take it over."
"I do, and so does Ralph Howe, in whose judgment I place a lot of trust, but it's not going to be you, and I suppose the real reason I came over here was to tell you that face-to-face."
"Sir, you could have sent me a postcard, as long as that was the message."
Truman chuckled. "You really didn't want it, did you?"
"No, sir, I did not."
"But you would have taken it, had I asked?"
“Yes, sir.”
"Do you know General Walter Bedell Smith?"
"I know who he is, sir, but I've never met him."
"He didn't want the job, either," Truman said. "I had to work hard to convince him it was important to the country."
"From what I know of him, sir, he's far better qualified than I am for the job."
"That's what he said about you," Truman said, smiling. "He said that he had virtually no experience with the nuts and bolts of the intelligence business, and you had an enormous amount of practical on-the-job experience." He paused, then added: "He knew a great deal about you, General."
"Maybe he said that because he really didn't want the job, either," Pickering said. "I've never regarded myself as anything but an amateur who found himself in water far over his head."
"General Donovan used very much the same words to describe his own feelings," Truman said.
"You're talking about Wild Bill Donovan of the OSS, Mr. President?" Pickering asked, as if confused.
Truman nodded.
"I understand you were great friends," the President said, his smile making it clear he knew exactly the opposite to be true.
Pickering smiled back at the President and chuckled.
"I made a mistake when I disestablished the OSS," Truman said. "When I realized the country needed an organization like the OSS, I asked Donovan to come see me, to ask what he thought we needed, and how we should go about getting it."
"Despite our differences, Mr. President, I don't think anyone can fault General Donovan's leadership of the OSS in the Second War."
"What he said, in essence, was that he could have done a far better job if he had been perceived as a member of the military establishment, rather than as 'an amateur with friends in high places in water over his head.' "
"The OSS was not very popular with the military establishment, Mr. President. I don't think the CIA is, either." He paused as understanding dawned, and then said, "Oh."
"Uh-huh," Truman said. "I can't think of anyone who is as much a respected, liked, admired, proven member of the military establishment than General Eisenhower's World War Two Chief of Staff, General Walter Bedell Smith."
Pickering nodded, and said, "I completely agree, sir."
"Admiral Hillencoetter was gracious enough to offer his resignation right after this war started. When I asked him who he thought should replace him, he said I might think about bringing General Donovan back, or, failing that, to offer the job to you. General Donovan had already made it plain he wasn't interested, so your name was on my list from the beginning."
"I'm really surprised to hear that, Mr. President. I only met Admiral Hillencoetter that one time."
"At which meeting you handed him intelligence that the North Koreans were preparing for war, something which had not filtered up to him from his people in the field," Truman said. "The admiral is a good man, General. He had egg on his face, but he was man enough to admit it, and it never entered his mind to shoot the messenger."
Pickering considered that and nodded.
"So General Smith will be my new boss?"
Truman nodded.
"How does he feel about me? Mr. President, I would be happy to give up my position in the CIA. I would like to stay on active duty, if possible, until we see what's going to happen with my son."
"I didn't come here to ask for your resignation," the President said. "I came to tell you why I thought it best to name General Smith CIA Director. Which I will do as soon as I get back to my office. He's at the Army-Navy Club hoping to hear I've changed my mind. I want you to get together with him as soon as possible . . . maybe even this afternoon. The more you can tell him before we go to Wake Island, the better."
"He's going with you to Wake Island? That's a good idea, Mr. President. I think he'll mesh well with General MacArthur."
"He's not going to Wake Island, General, you are," the President said. "And after that meeting, you're going on to Tokyo, where you will implement the changes General Smith has ordered."
"Do you know what he has in mind, sir?"
"No. And neither will he until you and he get together and decide what they'll be." He paused long enough for that to sink in, then added: "But when those orders are issued, I'm sure General Smith will let it be known throughout the military establishment that they came from him, and not some 'amateur who finds himself in water over his head.' I'm also sure that he will make it known that he was quite pleased that you agreed to stay on."
"Because you told him that?"
"No. The ironic thing here is that he feels he is the amateur in deep water. He was really worried that you would want to leave."
The President stood up and, when Pickering got to his feet, put out his hand. Truman looked as if was going to say something but changed his mind. He nodded at Pickering, shook his hand, and walked to the door.
[TWO]
The Army-Navy Club
Washington, D.C.
1215 11 October 19SO
General Walter Bedell Smith's entire suite on the fourth floor of the Army-Navy Club would have fit, with room to spare, into Brigadier General Fleming Pickering's sitting room in the Foster Lafayette.
Smith, who was wearing a dark gray suit, a crisp white shirt, and a rep-striped necktie, opened the door to Pickering's knock himself and put out his hand.
"Thank you for coming on such short notice, General," Smith said.
How the hell do I reply to that? "You're welcome"? "My pleasure"? This chap is a four-star general who is about to become the Director of the CIA. People like that don't have to thank underlings for coming quickly when summoned.
Smith looked at his watch.
"Fifteen minutes," he said, smiling. "That's quick."
"General, this is Captain Hart," Pickering said. "If you have no objection, I'd like him to sit in on this. He has an uncanny ability to later recall who said what and to whom."
"None whatever," Smith said, and offered Hart his hand. "I suppose that 'uncanny ability' was useful to you as a policeman. Or is that an acquired skill?" Jesus, he knows all about George.
"I think I got it from my father, sir," Hart said. "He was a cop, too."
"Have you had lunch?" Smith asked.
"No, sir," Pickering said.
"Well, we could go downstairs, but if we ordered a sandwich here—they do a very nice open-faced roast beef, and a chicken club—we could talk while we eat. Your call."
"An open-faced roast beef sandwich sounds fine to me, General," Pickering said.
Captain?
"Roast beef's fine with me, sir."
Smith went to the telephone and ordered the sandwiches and "a very large pot of coffee." Then he turned to Pickering. "To get to the starting line, the President will have a press conference at five o'clock, at which he will announce my appointment as Director of the CIA. I will have to be there, so we have until, say, half past four. That should be enough time, don't you think?"
"Yes, sir," Pickering said.
Smith took an envelope from his jacket pocket and extended it to Pickering.
"The President sent this over," Smith said. "I understand you've seen it."
Pickering opened the envelope. It held the message from General Howe that Truman had shown him earlier.
"Yes, sir, I have," Pickering said.
"Have you?" Smith asked of Hart.
"No, sir."
"I told George what I thought he should know, sir," Pickering said.
"I think it would be useful if you saw the whole thing," Smith said.
Pickering handed Hart the envelope.
"Before the waiter gets here, General," Smith said, "I'd like your opinion of why this war came as a complete surprise not only to General MacArthur but to the CIA as well."
Christ, he goes right for the jugular!
Screw it. When you don't know what to say, try telling the truth.
"When the intelligence gathered by some of MacArthur's intelligence people went against the intelligence conclusions of MacArthur's G-2, it was buried," Pickering said.
"Okay. That explains MacArthur's surprise. But why did the CIA fail so completely?"
"The CIA Tokyo station chief regarded himself as a member of MacArthur's staff," Pickering said. "And was not about to disagree with the conclusions of General Willoughby, as endorsed by General MacArthur."
"And you think he should have disagreed?"
"I think he should have drawn his own conclusions from his own sources and sent them directly to Admiral Hillencoetter without discussing them with—and certainly not allowing them to be censored by—anyone in the Dai Ichi Building."
"What you're saying, General, is that the Tokyo station chief was derelict in the performance of his duties?"
"Yes, sir, I guess I am."
"Then why didn't you relieve him when you went over there and came to this conclusion?"
"There were several reasons, sir," Pickering said. "For one thing, McCoy told me he had developed his own sources—"
"I'm really looking forward to meeting Major 'Killer' McCoy," Smith interrupted. "The President seems very taken with him. Where is he now?"
"Probably in North Korea—or China—looking for General Dean," Pickering replied, and added, "and my son."
Smith met Pickering's eyes for a long moment but did not respond directly.
"You were saying McCoy said he had his own sources?"
"Which had proven to be more reliable than those of General Willoughby," Pickering went on, "so I didn't need the station chief's intel . . . which, presumably, he was already furnishing to Willoughby and Hillencoetter anyway. I didn't know if I had the authority to relieve him, or whether that had to be cleared with the CIA, and the moment I started to relieve him, Willoughby would learn of it, possibly cause trouble here, and certainly make him keep a closer eye on me than he already was."
"The President's right," Smith said. "You do have a loose-cannon tendency, don't you?"
"Is that what he said?" Pickering said.
This is not going well. If I were this man, I would not want me working for me.
So what do I do now?
Ask the Marine Corps to keep me on at least until we find out what happened to Pick?
Ask for immediate release from active duty and just stay in Tokyo? If I do that, I probably wouldn't be able to get permission to go to Korea.
"That's what he said," Smith replied, evenly, with a little smile, then asked: "What do you want to do about the Tokyo Station Chief?" Smith asked.
"If I were to become your deputy for Asia . . ."
"Please don't tell me you're having second thoughts about that," Smith said. "I need you over there."
Jesus, I didn't expect that!
"We don't know how well we would work together," Pickering said.
"I think I'll be considerably easier for you to work with than General Donovan was," Smith said. "I understand that your personal relationship with him . . ."
"Was about as bad as a relationship can be," Pickering said.
"You are taking the job, right?"
"I'm surprised it's still being offered," Pickering said.
"What are you doing, General, fishing for a compliment? Yes, it's still being offered, because both the President and I think you're the best man to do what has to be done."
They locked eyes for a moment.
"Yes, sir, I'll take the job," Pickering said. "Thank you."
"Okay. Now, what do you want to do about the Tokyo station chief?"
"One of the reasons I didn't relieve him when I first got to Tokyo was that I was afraid he'd go to Washington and spend all his time throwing monkey wrenches into my gears."
"He's gone," Smith said. "Or will be as soon as I can order him home. And he will not be sniping at you from the rear. What about his replacement?"
"Off the top of my head, I have no idea," Pickering admitted.
"I thought I was going to hear two names," Smith said. "Major K. R. McCoy and Colonel Edward Banning. I don't think McCoy has the experience, but what's wrong with Banning?"
"Absolutely nothing is wrong with Colonel Banning," Pickering said quickly and firmly.
"Why have you got him sitting around Camp Pendleton doing a job that could be done by a lot of far more junior people who don't have a tenth of his experience as an intelligence officer?" When Pickering didn't immediately reply, Smith added: "I know that he worked for you in the Second War, and what he did."
"I guess the truth, General," Pickering said, "is that while I often thought how much I need Ed Banning in Tokyo, I didn't have the balls to make waves. Either about getting rid of the Tokyo station chief or about asking Admiral Hillencoetter to name Banning in his place."
"It usually helps, if you're going to make waves, to be sure of your authority," Smith said. "Now that that question has been resolved, I take it if I named Colonel Banning as Tokyo station chief, I would have your concurrence?"
"Yes, sir."
"I'll issue the necessary orders tomorrow, as my first order of business. Or maybe even tonight. I thought I would drop by there tonight, unannounced, just to see what I could see. How soon do you want Banning in Tokyo?"
"As soon as possible, sir."
[THREE]
Office of the Chief of Staff
Headquarters X U.S. Corps
Seoul, South Korea
O825 11 October 195O
There were three full colonels sitting on folding chairs facing the folding desk of the chief of staff, who was also a full colonel.
A somewhat irreverent thought occurred to Colonel T. Howard Kennedy, the X Corps Transportation Officer: It's like Orwell said. Some pigs are more equal than other pigs.
"The general does not want any delays when we go aboard the ships," the chief of staff—the most equal of all the pigs—said. "Comments, please."
T. Howard Kennedy had another irreverent thought: That's a nice thought, but it's like hoping for a white Christmas. Nice if you can get it, but unlikely.
There were going to be delays in loading X Corps aboard the ships that would constitute the invasion fleet for the Woman landing. That was a given. There were always delays.
This maneuver was probably going to have more delays than the general was going to like, which was going to be a problem for everybody in the chief of staff's office. Major General Edward M. Almond expected his orders to be obeyed as he wanted them to be obeyed, which was sometimes impossible to accomplish, and when that happened, Almond's temper was legendary.
The chief of staff was looking at Colonel Kennedy, which told Kennedy that the chief of staff considered this meeting a conference, which was different from just being summoned by the chief of staff to receive orders. In a conference, comments were solicited before orders were issued. And conferees presented their comments in reverse order of rank, most junior first. This ensured that whatever the junior officer had to say was not influenced by the comments of the officers senior to him.
The pecking order here placed Kennedy at the bottom. The Transportation Office wasn't even a G-Section, but rather a subsection of the Office of the Assistant Chief of Staff for Plans and Operations, G-3. The G-3 and the G-4 (Supply) were supposed to be more or less equal, but the G-3 called the shots.
"There are six truck companies available," Kennedy said. "Four—two with the Marines and two with the 7th Division—are operational, and will of course be available to move people and gear to Inchon when the orders are issued. Two are in reserve, and I have given operational control of one of them to the G-4 so that he can start moving whatever he wants to move to Inchon whenever he wants to move it. Similarly, I have given operational control of half of the remaining truck company to the Headquarters Commandant here for the same purpose. The other half remains in reserve.
"The only unit over which I exercise staff control is the vehicle exchange company, the 8023d. Five days ago, I started to move it to the wharfs in Inchon for on-loading."
"Howard," the G-4 said, "I hope you're not going to tell me they're already on-loaded?"
"No. They are probably in the process by now, but, no, they're not on-loaded. I was going to go down there this morning and see how things are going."
"I'm a little confused," the G-3 said. "You said you told them to move five days ago. And they're only 'probably' in the process of on-loading? How long does it take them to move from one side of Inchon to the other?"
The chief of staff snorted.
"Bob, there are almost six hundred vehicles in the 8023d—" Kennedy started to reply.
"Almost?" the G-4 interrupted.
"Five hundred seventy-nine, Gerry," Kennedy finished.
"And their condition?"
"I sent you a report, Gerry," Kennedy said. "There are five hundred seventy-nine ready for issue, plus seven beyond the company's ability to repair. They have exchanged far fewer vehicles than was anticipated, somewhere around twenty, mostly jeeps and six-by-sixes."
"I must not have gotten your report," the G-4 said, and wrote in a wire-bound notebook.
"Okay," the G-3 said. "Six hundred, give or take, vehicles. And it's taken this long to move from one side of Inchon to the other?"
"They were set up for exchange, Bob," Kennedy explained patiently. "The CO did a very good job. But we're talking here about (a) on-loading all the vehicles, and (b) doing so according to that loading sequence schedule you sent me. That takes time."
"Time spent here will save time when we get on Wonsan," the G-3 said. "Last on/first off makes sense. A lot of thought has gone into that loading sequence schedule."
"All I'm saying, Bob, is that it takes some time to accomplish. This is not like driving these vehicles to the Battery and right onto the Staten Island Ferry. They have to be sorted at the wharf according to what goes on first."
"I can do without the sarcasm, thank you very much, Howard," the G-3 said coldly.
"I didn't think Howard was being sarcastic, Bob," the chief of staff said.
Colonel Kennedy thought: That either got me off the hook or sunk me deeper in the deep shit.
"We're going to need those vehicles at Inchon," the G-4 said. "It seems pretty obvious to me that a replacement of only twenty vehicles means that a good deal more are on the edge of needing replacement, and even more will be needing replacement after we get them ashore at Wonsan. I'd really like to see these vehicles moved up—as far up as possible—on the off-loading schedule."
"Gerry's got a point, Bob," the chief of staff said.
"I'll see what I can do."
"The general would be very unhappy if our dash for the Chinese border was delayed by broken-down trucks," the chief of staff said. "I don't want that to happen."
"I'll review the off-loading schedule and get you my suggested changes," the G-3 said.
"Great! And, just to satisfy my general curiosity, Howard, how is this vehicle exchange company fixed for tank retrievers and wreckers?"
"I believe there are twenty wreckers and fifteen tank retrievers," Kennedy said.
"Bob, make sure that when you review your on-/off-loading schedule that some wreckers—a half a dozen, anyway—and, say, five tank retrievers are near the head of the line," the chief of staff ordered.
"Even if that means off-loading them if they've already been on-loaded?"
Kennedy asked.
The chief of staff thought that over for ten seconds.
"Yeah, Howard, even if it comes down to that. And come see me, please, after you've had a chance to see how things are going down there."
"Right," Colonel Kennedy said.
[FOUR]
Wharf 3
Inchon, South Korea
113O 11 October 1950
The Waterman Steamship Line freighter Captain J. C. Buffett was tied up to Wharf 3 when Colonel Kennedy drove up to the wharf. In bumper-to-bumper lines parallel to the ship were the vehicles of the 8023d Transportation Company (Depot, Forward) waiting to be loaded.
Halfway down the lines, Kennedy touched the arm of his jeep driver and ordered, "Stop here, Tom."
He got out of the jeep and walked down the line of vehicles, looking carefully at each one. He was pleased with what he saw and the few truck tires he kicked. All the vehicles seemed ready for duty.
But when he got close to the end of the line, and the ship itself, he saw something that pleased him not at all.
A squat, ruddy-faced, middle-aged sailor was standing on the wharf. He held both hands extended before him, palms up.
Kennedy knew what he was doing, signaling the operators of the crane and winch operators on the ship as they prepared to load a vehicle aboard. Two things annoyed Colonel Kennedy: first, that an ordinary seaman, rather than an officer, was supervising the operation, and second, that the vehicle about to be loaded aboard the Captain J. C. Buffett was a heavy-duty wrecker.
He didn't have the revised on-/off-loading schedule yet, but the chief of staff had made it very clear that the first vehicles he wanted unloaded at Wonsan were heavy-duty wreckers and tank retriever vehicles. That meant they would have to be loaded last, so they could be unloaded first.
He walked up to the seaman on the wharf who was directing the boom and winch operators.
"Excuse me," he said.
"Not now, buddy. Can't you see I'm working?"
With slow and gentle, even graceful, movements the seaman signaled the winch operators on the deck of the Captain J.C. Buffett to begin to very slowly haul aboard what the White Manufacturing Company called a Wrecker, Special, Heavy Duty and the U.S. Army called a Vehicle, Heavy Vehicle Recovery 6x6 Mark III A2.
The Army and the White Manufacturing Company were agreed that the truck was heavy. It had been heavy when built for civilian use, designed to be able to pick up a broken-down tractor for eighteen-wheeler rigs. The Army had demanded a number of modifications to the basic design. The front (steering) wheels of the basic model had not been powered. The Army demanded that their version have all-wheel drive. The frame and body had been reinforced to take both the weight of the more powerful lifting arm and the additional weight it was intended to lift. And there were lifting hooks welded to the frame in places determined to be the best places to put them so the weight would be evenly distributed when it had to be loaded aboard a ship.
There was the whining hum of an electric motor and the limp cables attached to the lifting hooks on the front of the wrecker grew taut, and then the hum of another electric motor and the cables attached three quarters of the way down the frame began to draw taut.
Well, screw you, Colonel Kennedy thought, just as soon as you get that wrecker loaded aboard, at least just as soon as I can have a word with the captain, you'll just have to take it back off.
Kennedy saw Captain Francis P. MacNamara, commanding officer of the 8023d Transportation Company (Depot, Forward), standing by his jeep on the other side of the seaman supervising the loading and walked over to him. MacNamara saluted. "Good afternoon, sir," he said. "How are you, MacNamara?" Kennedy replied.
"We've just started to load, sir," MacNamara said. "I thought it best to arrange the vehicles so they could be loaded according to the last on/first off schedule before we actually started the procedure."
"Good thinking, MacNamara," Kennedy said. "There's been some changes to that schedule. I'll want to talk to you about them, but I think we might as well wait until we can talk to the captain at the same time." "Yes, sir."
There was a screeching sound of unknown origin, which lasted about fifteen seconds, then the sound of the seaman's voice.
"Jesus H. Fucking Christ!"
He sounded disgusted, or frustrated, or both.
The Vehicle, Heavy Vehicle Recovery 6x6 Mark III A2 was now suspended five feet in the air, swinging slowly back and forth.
"I said slowly, you dumb sonofabitch!" the seaman called to someone on deck. His voice did not need amplification.
The seaman then made very small, very gentle upward movements of his hands. There was another electric motor hum, and, just perceptibly, the Vehicle, Heavy Vehicle Recovery 6x6 Mark III A2 began to inch upward again.
Then there was another screeching noise, this time lasting no more than ten seconds.
The wrecker continued to rise very slowly until it was about level with the deck.
The seaman made a cutting motion across his throat.
The wrecker stopped rising and swung back and forth on the cables.
Very slowly the seaman, the palms of his hands now vertical, made a pushing motion with his left hand. There was the sound of an electric motor, and very slowly the boom holding the rear of the wrecker moved inward. When the wrecker was perpendicular to the wharf, the seaman made a cutting motion with his left hand and then a pushing motion with his right. The boom holding the cables attached to the front of the wrecker began to swing inward. After thirty seconds—which seemed longer—the truck was completely inboard and again aligned with the keel of the Captain ]. C. Buffett.
"Okay!" the seaman shouted. "For the love of Christ, don't let that heavy sonofabitch get away from you! Slowly, fucking slowly\"
Very slowly, the wrecker began to descend into a hold of the Captain J. C. Buffett. In thirty seconds or so it was out of sight, but the seaman continued to stand on the wharf, his hands on his hips, looking upward until the hum of the electric motors died.
A moment after that there was another electrical hum, a lesser sound this time. And then one of the booms swung outward.
Colonel Kennedy and Captain MacNamara were both surprised to see another seaman standing on the hook at the end of the cable being lowered to the wharf. The seaman stepped casually off the hook, then engaged in a short conversation with the seaman in charge of the operation.
Both shook their heads, and then the seaman who had ridden down on the hook shrugged, as the seaman who'd been on the wharf threw up his hands in a gesture of resignation, or frustration, or both.
The seaman who had been on the hook stepped back onto it, made a take me up gesture with his hand, and immediately began to rise into the air.
It reminded Colonel Kennedy of how a circus high-wire performer rises to the high wire.
The seaman walked over to Colonel Kennedy and Captain MacNamara. He addressed Captain MacNamara.
"That's it, pal," he announced. "That's the last of the big fuckers I'm going to try to take aboard."
"I beg your pardon?" Colonel Kennedy said.
"I said that's the last of those heavy fucking trucks that goes aboard the Captain J.C. Buffett."
"That's simply not acceptable," Colonel Kennedy said.
" Acceptable'?" the seaman parroted. "Who the fuck are you to tell me what goes aboard the Captain J.C. Buffet?"
"I think I had better discuss this with one of the ship's officers," Kennedy said. "Preferably with her captain. Presumably I can find him aboard?"
"You are discussing this with her captain," the seaman said. "Who the fuck did you think you were talking to?"
"You're the captain?"
"Captain John F. X. Moran at your service, Colonel."
"Captain, obviously I owe you an apology—"
"Not yet," Captain Moran interrupted.
"Thank you," Kennedy said. "Captain, the vehicles we're trying to load aboard your ship are essential to an operation. . . ."
"Putting the X Corps ashore at Wonsan," Moran offered helpfully.
Colonel Kennedy found that helpfulness disturbing. For one thing, that the invasion force was headed for Wonsan was classified Top Secret. Colonel Kennedy wasn't at all sure that Captain Moran had that kind of a security clearance, much less the Need to Know, at this point, the destination. He was sure that he was not supposed to casually introduce it into conversation the way he had.
"Wonsan?" Kennedy asked. "Who said anything about Wonsan?"
"Jesus Christ!" Moran said disgustedly. "If you really don't know about Wonsan, Colonel, what's going on here is the reloading of X Corps, which will then be transported around to the other side of the Korean Peninsula and landed at Wonsan."
Colonel Kennedy decided not to respond directly.
"The X Corps Operations Officer sent me here to see that the heavy vehicles, such as the wrecker you just loaded aboard, were loaded aboard last, so they may be unloaded first when you reach your destination."
"Colonel, let me try to explain this to you. When I off-loaded those vehicles when we came here, I just about completely fucked up the motors, booms, winches, and other equipment aboard. I knew it would. My gear is not designed to handle such heavy loads. But I figured, what the hell, the important thing is to get these vehicles ashore—I can get the gear repaired when I'm back in San Diego. But now I'm told I'm going to Wonsan, not 'Diego, and I have to load all this stuff back aboard, and then unload it again at Wonsan—where I understand there will be no functioning shoreside equipment to unload me." He paused, then went on: "Still with me, Colonel?"
Colonel Kennedy nodded and said, "Go on, please."
"What I can do, Colonel," Moran went on, "is use the ship's gear to load the lighter stuff—the jeeps, three-quarter-ton ammo carriers, and the six-by-sixes. I can also probably unload them in Wonsan, presuming I don't fuck up my gear any more than it's already fucked up by loading the heavy stuff." He paused, and went on: "Am I getting through to you, Colonel?"
"Yes, you are," Colonel Kennedy said. "There's absolutely no chance—"
"Not a fucking chance. Now, do I start to see how much of the light stuff I can get aboard before the fucking tide starts going down and leaves me stranded in the fucking mud? Or what?"
"Under the circumstances, I think it would be best to start loading the lighter vehicles," Colonel Kennedy said.
"Believe it or not, I'm sorry as hell about this," Captain Moran said, and then walked back to where he had originally been standing.
He looked up at the ship.
"Okay, get those fucking lines down here," he called. "We're now going to start loading the light stuff."
Colonel Kennedy turned to Captain MacNamara.
"It looks as if we have a problem, Captain," he said. "What I suppose I'm going to have to do is see the Port Master, and see if these heavy vehicles can be loaded aboard another vessel."
"Yes, sir," MacNamara said. "Colonel, can I make a suggestion?"
"Absolutely."
"Let me take them overland, across the peninsula," MacNamara said.
"I don't think I follow you," Kennedy admitted.
"Colonel, maybe I jumped the gun a little, but when Captain Moran told me that X Corps was going to be relanded at Wonsan, I looked at the maps."
"And?"
"Excuse me, sir, I have to get the line moving," MacNamara said, and trotted toward the lines of vehicles ready to be loaded. He jumped up on the running board of a GMC 6x6, and a moment later Kennedy saw a soldier appear behind the wheel. He started the 6 X 6's engine and drove down the wharf toward where Captain Moran was impatiently waiting for the truck with MacNamara still on the running board.
MacNamara dropped nimbly off the truck as it passed Kennedy.
"Sorry, sir. That man was asleep," MacNamara said, as if he considered that a personal insult.
"You were saying something, Captain, about moving the heavy vehicles overland?" Kennedy asked.
"Yes, sir. Colonel, I've got a map in my jeep. Can I show you what I think?"
"Why not?" Kennedy said.
[FIVE]
Office of the Chief of Staff
Headquarters X U.S. Corps
Seoul, South Korea
172O 11 October 19SO
"Kennedy," the chief of staff said, "this was not what I expected to hear from you when I told you to report on your progress."
"I know," Colonel Kennedy said. "I wish it were otherwise."
"Well, what do you want to do about it?"
"If we could get an LST . . ."
"Fine. See the Port Captain, and tell him I want these heavy vehicles available as soon as possible at Wonsan."
"Sir, I did that. He says there is no space on the available LSTs. They can't carry all the tanks we want to move as it is."
"Jesus Christ! Kennedy, we've got to do something!"
"Captain MacNamara has an off-the-wall idea—"
"Who's he?"
"He commands the vehicle exchange unit."
"Let's hear it."
"He suggests moving the wreckers and the tank retrieval vehicles by road."
Kennedy was surprised when the chief of staff did not frown, snort derisively, or say "Jesus Christ!" disgustedly, as he was wont to do when presented with a wild and/or stupid idea. In fact, the chief of staff was apparently giving the idea some thought.
The chief of staff snorted, but thoughtfully, not derisively.
"Think of it as a chess game, Kennedy," he said. "As we move pieces around the board—in this case the landing beaches at Wonsan."
"Okay," Kennedy said agreeably.
"First the landing craft go in."
"Right."
"And right on the heels of the landing craft—sometimes right with them— come the LSTs."
"Right."
"And what happens to the LSTs after they land the tanks? They get out of the way, right?"
"That's true."
"They wait for the freighters to come in close and drop anchor, right, and then take on supplies and ferry them to the beach, right?"
"Uh-huh."
The chief of staff raised his voice: "Sergeant Miller! Bring me a map of the east coast."
"Coming up, sir!" Sergeant Miller replied, and a moment later entered the chief of staff's office, removing a map from its tube as he walked. He laid it on the chief of staff's desk, anchoring its corners with two cans of Planters peanuts, a coffee cup, and a large stapler.
The chief of staff stood up and leaned over the map. Colonel Kennedy walked around the desk and stood beside him.
"We own Suwon,' the chief of staff said, pointing. "And we own Wonju and Kangnung. And Highway Four runs all the way from Suwon to Kangnung. And we're only talking about"—he made a compass with his fingers—"about 120, maybe 140 miles, tops. All of it on a paved highway."
"That's about right," Colonel Kennedy agreed.
The chief of staff used his fingers as a compass again.
"And about that far, 120 miles or so, from Kangnung to Wonsan."
"Uh-huh, that's about right."
"The last I heard, the Capital ROK Division has moved at least this far"—he pointed—"close to Kansong, which is only seventy-five miles, give or take, from Wonsan, and on another paved highway."
After a moment's hesitation, Colonel Kennedy said, "According to the map, the highway ends fifteen miles north of Kansong."
Now Colonel Kennedy received one of the chief of staff s derisive snorts.
"The highway does, Howard. But there are villages all along the coast here"—he pointed—"from Kuum-ni to Tokchong. I'll bet there are roads of some sort to all of them."
"There probably are," Colonel Kennedy agreed.
"Tokchong is only thirty-five miles south of Wonsan," the chief of staff said. "I think there is a good chance that by the time the invasion fleet arrives off Wonsan, we'll own that real estate."
"That would seem a reasonable assumption," Kennedy agreed.
"Worst case," the chief of staff said, "for some reason, the vehicles cannot make it over the highway to Kangnung. That seems unlikely."
"Uh-huh."
"Presuming they can make it Kangnung, they can't make it much farther north along Highway Five. That also seems unlikely, but let's take that for the purpose of argument. The LSTs dump their tanks at Wonsan and immediately head for Kangnung. They make about fifteen miles an hour, which would get them there in eight hours. An hour there to load the trucks and another eight hours back to Wonsan, where—since the vehicles would not have to be unloaded by cranes, et cetera—they could simply be driven off the LSTs and be available."
"Interesting," Colonel Kennedy said.
"That's a lot better—getting them there seventeen hours after the landing— than not getting them there at all, right?"
"Absolutely."
"And the farther north they could go along Highway Five, the less travel time for the LSTs. And if the Capital ROK Division has by that time taken Wonsan, which I think is likely, we won't have to use the LSTs at all. Just drive these vehicles all the way to Wonsan, and set up shop, maybe even before X Corps lands there."
"That's certainly a possibility," Colonel Kennedy agreed. "Okay. So the thing to do, I think, is see if the vehicles can make it to Kangnung. I suggest the best way to do that is make a trial run. Send a couple of wreckers and a couple of tank retrievers and see what happens. It would probably be best—the NKs may have some left-behinds in the area—to send a couple of tanks with them." "I agree."
"If the test run is successful, we can start moving all the heavy vehicles. Obviously, it would be better to have them on the east coast, however close to Wonsan, than sitting on the wharf in Inchon, on the other side of the peninsula." "Obviously," Colonel Kennedy agreed.
"Go see Bob and tell him I said to give you a couple of tanks, and then get your show on the road, Howard." "Right," Colonel Kennedy said.
[SIX]
Andrews Air Force Base
Washington, D.C.
11O5 13 October I95O
There was already a line of limousines parked not far from the Independence, the President's Douglas C-54 transport, when Senator Richardson K. Fowler's Packard limousine was passed by the Secret Service agents and allowed to drive onto the tarmac.
The dignitaries the other limousines had carried to the airport, and some of their aides, were gathered around the movable stairway leading up to the aircraft. Two USAF master sergeants stood at Parade Rest on either side of the stairs.
When Fowler's Packard stopped, Captain George F. Hart, USMCR, got out of the front passenger seat and immediately went to the trunk, opened it, and took out two Valv-Paks and handed them over to another Air Force master sergeant, who was in charge of the luggage.
Fred Delmore, Fowler's chauffeur, got from behind the wheel and opened the rear passenger door. Mrs. Patricia Fleming, in a thigh-length Persian lamb coat, got out first, followed by Senator Fowler and finally Brigadier General Fleming Pickering, USMCR.
Fowler stood by the car, making no effort to join, or even greet, the dignitaries gathered at the stairway. After a moment, one of the dignitaries, a bald Army officer, broke away from the group and walked to the Fowler limousine.
He was wearing an ordinary woolen olive-drab "Ike" jacket-and-trousers uniform, identical to those worn by enlisted men. The only differences were the solid gold piping on his overseas cap and a small circle of five stars pinned to each epaulet. General of the Army Omar Bradley had recently been promoted to the highest rank in the Army by Truman, the first—and, as it turned out, only—such promotion since World War II.
After a moment, several of the others started after him.
"Good morning, Senator," Bradley said, smiling and putting out his hand.
"General Bradley, how are you, sir?" Fowler replied. "I don't think you know General and Mrs. Pickering, do you?"
"I'm afraid I don't," Bradley said. He offered his hand to Patricia Fleming. "An honor, ma'am," he said.
Pickering saluted, and Bradley returned it. They shook hands.
"How do you do, sir?" Pickering said.
"I've been looking forward to meeting you, General," Bradley said. "General Smith has been saying all sorts of nice things about you, and I wanted you to know that I'm really pleased that the two of you will be running the CIA."
"General Smith will be running it, General," Pickering said. "I'm just a temporary hired hand."
Three other men had now walked up to them.
"I don't think you know any of these people, do you, Flem?" Fowler said, then proceeded to introduce him to Secretary of the Army Frank Pace—whose youth surprised Pickering—and two State Department officers, Dean Rusk and Philip Jessup.
There wasn't time to do more than shake hands as the Presidential caravan rolled up.
Harry S Truman got out the black Cadillac first, and a moment later a tall, thin man in what Pickering thought of as a "banker's black" suit joined him. He was Averill Harriman, who was Truman's National Security Adviser. He held the personal rank of Ambassador-at-Large.
Truman headed for the stairway, but then saw Fowler and the Pickerings and turned and walked toward them. After a moment, Harriman followed him.
"Senator," Truman said, smiling. "How nice of you to come to see us off."
"Your Majesty's loyal opposition could do no less," Fowler replied.
Pickering saluted. Truman nodded and smiled at him.
"I'm sorry he didn't have more time at home, Mrs. Pickering," Truman said.
"A little time is better than none, Mr. President," Patricia Fleming replied.
"How nice to see you, Patricia!" Harriman exclaimed, putting out his hand.
Her face was stony, and she ignored the greeting and the hand.
The smile vanished from Harriman's face, and he turned and walked directly toward the stairway.
"Jesus, Pat," Pickering said.
"Mr. President," Patricia Fleming said, "I'm not among Averill Harriman's legion of female admirers. . . ."
"I somehow sensed that," the President said.
"I'm one of those old-fashioned women who think husbands should not sleep with other people's wives, and if they can't manage that level of decency, they should at least not flaunt their infidelity in their wife's face."
"I'm married, oddly enough," Truman said, "to a woman who shares that philosophy. I'm going to have to get you and Bess together, Mrs. Pickering." He paused, and added: "It was nice to see you again."
He started toward the Independence.
Pickering looked at his wife.
"Was that necessary?"
"I thought so," his wife replied.
They looked at each other a moment.
"Bring Pick home, Flem," she said softly.
"I'll damned sure try, honey," he said.
She nodded, then wrapped her arms around him.
She stayed that way a moment, then raised her face to his and kissed him.
Then he walked quickly to the steps to the Independence, where George Hart was waiting for him.
As soon as they had gone through the door, the steps were pulled away and there came the sound of an engine starting.
[SEVEN]
There were no layovers. The Independence stopped at San Francisco, but just long enough to take on fuel and food, and to give the President and his aides time to deal with the messages that had come in for him while they were flying across the country. No one got off the airplane.
There was a Presidential compartment—and two others, one occupied by General Bradley and the other by Ambassador Harriman—on the Independence and there was a steady stream of visitors to both. Pickering did not expect to be summoned to any of the meetings, and he wasn't. He wasn't at all sure why Truman had ordered him to make the trip, and he suspected that Harriman would probably do his best to have the President ignore him.
At San Francisco—not surprisingly, it was Trans-Global's headquarters— there were four Trans-Global Lockheed Constellations, one of which sat, its engines idling, at the end of the runway when the Independence took off for Hawaii.
Pickering thought that not only was it a far more graceful-looking aircraft than the Presidential Douglas, but also a hundred miles an hour faster. He wondered why the President wasn't furnished with the fastest aircraft available, and then he thought, again, how wise Pick had been in insisting that Trans-Global buy the Lockheeds, rather than take advantage of the surplus Air Force Douglas transports available so cheaply.
He then thought that the war was making a good deal of money for Trans-Global. The Air Force had not only contracted for as many contract flights as Trans-Global could make aircraft available for but also was filling every seat made available on the regularly scheduled flights, and there were now far more of those than there had been when the war started.
That was the good news, Pickering thought. The bad news was that Chief Pilot Pickering wasn't around to see how well his airline was doing. Worse than that, Pickering was growing less and less confident that Pick would be found. He refused to allow himself to dwell on the details of why that was likely, even probable, as all of them were unpleasant to contemplate.
He had no idea how he was going to deal with Patricia if his growing fears turned out to be justified.
From San Francisco, the Independence flew across the Pacific to the Barber's Point Naval Air Station, which is about fifteen miles from Honolulu.
As they were making their approach to the airfield, Pickering idly wondered if they would wake the President—there were beds in all three compartments— for the landing. The question was answered immediately after the airplane stopped moving when Truman, obviously freshly shaved, appeared in the rear compartment and went around making small talk with everyone there from Army Secretary Pace through Brigadier General Pickering to a young man in civilian clothes whom Hart had identified to Pickering as an Army Warrant Officer Cryptographer.
Truman went down the stairway to both greet Admiral Arthur W. Radford, Commander-in-Chief, Pacific, and to stretch his legs a little while the aircraft was being fueled and fresh food brought aboard. His walk was cut short when another batch of messages requiring his immediate attention was brought to the aircraft.
They were on the ground less than an hour.
Pickering had just about made himself as comfortable as possible in his seat for the Hawaii-Wake Island leg of the flight when one of the Air Force stewards touched his shoulder.
"The President would like to see you, General," he said. Truman, now in his shirtsleeves, was alone in his compartment when Pickering entered it. The Presidential bed had been returned to its couch function, and Truman was sitting on it before a table covered with documents. "You wanted to see me, Mr. President?" Truman held out two sheets of message paper.
"Have a look at this, please, and tell me what you think, please," the President said.
TOP SECRET/PRESIDENTIAL
OPERATIONAL IMMEDIATE
DUPLICATION FORBIDDEN
FROM SECRETARY OF DEFENSE
VIA WHITE HOUSE COMMUNICATIONS CENTER
0905 WASHINGTON TIME 14OCTOBER1950
TO COMMANDER IN CHIEF PACIFIC
EYES ONLY ADMIRAL RADFORD
PLEASE INSURE FOLLOWING MESSAGE FROM CHIEF PRESIDENTIAL MISSION TO FAR EAST TO THE
COMMANDER IN CHIEF CLASSIFIED TOP SECRET/PRESIDENTIAL IS DELIVERED TO THE PRESIDENT ONLY
REPEAT TO THE PRESIDENT ONLY ON ARRIVAL AT BARBERS POINT
BEST PERSONAL REGARDS
GEORGE C MARSHALL
BEGIN PERSONAL MESSAGE FROM MAJOR GENERAL HOWE
1235 TOKYO TIME 13OCTOBER1950
DEAR HARRY
WONSAN ON EAST COAST OF KOREA FELL TO CAPITAL ROK DIVISION SEVERAL HOURS AGO
MACARTHUR NEVERTHELESS INTENDS TO CONTINUE WITH PLAN TO MOVE X CORPS BY SEA TO WONSAN AND TOLD ME THAT DESPITE QUOTE BRILLIANT PERFORMANCE ENDQUOTE OF ROKS THEY DO NOT HAVE THE NECESSARY TRANSPORT AND HEAVY ARTILLERY HE FEELS IS NECESSARY TO SUPPORT RAPID MOVEMENT TOWARD CHINESE BORDER AT YALU RIVER
IN MY OPINION HE IS CORRECT AS ROK FORCES ARE STILL EQUIPPED MOSTLY WITH HAND-ME-DOWNS
I ALSO HAVE THE FEELING THAT HE WANTS A STRONG AMERICAN PRESENCE THERE TO INSURE (A) THE CAPTURE OF PYONGYANG AS SOON AS POSSIBLE (B) THE ROKS DO NOT GO ANY FARTHER THAN THE YALU AND (C) THE ROKS PAY MORE ATTENTION TO THE GENEVA CONVENTION THAN THEY PROBABLY WOULD IF AMERICANS WERE NOT AROUND
WHAT THE NORTH KOREANS DID TO THE SOUTH KOREANS DEFIES DESCRIPTION AND THEY WILL CERTAINLY SEEK VENGEANCE UNLESS HE SITS ON THEM
MACARTHUR ALSO SAID HE IS QUOTE THINKING ABOUT ENDQUOTE TRYING TO FORM AN ARMORED COLUMN TO TAKE PYONGYANG EVEN SOONER THAN X CORPS COULD GET THERE
HE SAYS HE IS REASONABLY CONFIDENT ORGANIZED RESISTANCE WILL END BY THANKSGIVING AND THAT HE HAS QUOTE REASONABLE HOPES ENDQUOTE OF BEING ABLE TO WITHDRAW EIGHTH ARMY TO KOREA BY CHRISTMAS
THE REPORTS OF AGENTS INSERTED BY CIA (MAJOR MCCOY)IN THE EAST AND LTCOL VANDENBURG IN THE WEST IN WHICH I PLACE MORE FAITH THAN INTEL MACARTHUR IS GETTING FROM HIS SOURCES ALL REPORT (A) BREAKDOWN OF NORTH KOREAN EFFECTIVENESS (B) THAT NORTH KOREANS MADE STRONG EFFORT TO TAKE OUR POWS WITH THEM
VANDENBURG TELLS ME HE THINKS RESCUE OF GENERAL DEAN BECOMES MORE UNLIKELY BY THE DAY ALTHOUGH HE AND MCCOY ARE PREPARED TO STAGE RAID USING HELICOPTERS IF HE CAN BE LOCATED
MCCOY INSISTS NO NEWS IS GOOD NEWS ABOUT PICKERING'S SON I CAN ONLY HOPE HE'S RIGHT
MCCOY SAYS HE IS GETTING QUOTE UNCONFIRMED AND THUS UNRELIABLE ENDQUOTE REPORTS OF EXTENSIVE MOVEMENT OF CHINESE TROOPS TOWARD YALU
REMEMBERING HOW RIGHT MCCOY WAS THE LAST TIME I CAN ONLY HOPE HE WILL BE WRONG NOW
GENERAL WILLOUGHBY AND MACARTHUR FEEL INTERVENTION IS NOT EVEN A REMOTE POSSIBILITY
I STILL THINK PICKERING WOULD HAVE BEEN BEST CHOICE TO STRAIGHTEN OUT THE CIA BUT I UNDERSTAND YOUR CHOICE OF BEDELL SMITH WHO VERY MUCH IMPRESSED ME THE FEW TIMES I MET HIM
RESPECTFULLY
RALPH
END PERSONAL MESSAGE FROM GENERAL HOWE
TOP SECRET/PRESIDENTIAL
Pickering read it and handed it back to the President.
"Anything in there you don't agree with?" the President asked.
"I don't think General Howe is right about me and the CIA, Mr. President."
Truman smiled.
"Anything else?"
"No, sir."
"I'm sorry there's no better news about your son, General," the President said. "But I'm one of those people who believe that the opera isn't over until the fat lady sings."
"I've heard that, Mr. President," Pickering said.
"That'll be all, General," the President said. "Would you ask one of the sergeants to ask General Bradley to come up here?" "Yes, sir."
Chapter Ten
[ONE]
No. 7 Saku-Tun Denenchofu,
Tokyo, Japan
O915 14 October 195O
Clad only in underpants and brassiere, Miss Jeanette Priestly, of the Chicago Tribune, bent over a bed while stuffing an Army-issue rucksack. She looked up as Mrs. Ernestine Sage McCoy—whose exquisitely embroidered kimono almost but not quite concealed the evidence of her advanced pregnancy—came into the bedroom.
Jeanette smiled as Ernie carefully lowered herself onto the foot of the mattress.
"I used to have one of those," Ernie said.
"A rucksack?" Jeanette replied, surprised. "You were a Girl Scout?"
"I meant a flat belly, with a cute little navel that used to drive the boys wild when I wore a bikini," Ernie said. "Now look at me!" She patted her stomach. "I look like a boa constrictor that just swallowed a whole pig."
Jeanette laughed. "Not quite that bad," she said.
"Bad enough," Ernie said.
Jeanette's tone turned serious. "Can I offer a word of advice?"
"No," Ernie replied sharply, then softened the edge. "Thank you, but no. I know what you're going to say: Go home and have the baby."
"I feel like a shit leaving you alone in your condition," Jeanette said.
"I'm not due until the middle of December," Ernie said. "You'll be back before then, right?"
"I'll be back in a week," Jeanette said. "But I don't want to walk in here a week from now and . . . hear something unpleasant."
"You want to be here when something unpleasant happens, right?"
"That's not what I meant, and you know it," Jeanette said. "But yeah, if something does go wrong—and so far you have a lousy record of going all the way through the childbearing process—I'd like to be here."
"What'll happen will happen," Ernie said. "I'm doing everything the doctor told me to do, which really means not doing anything on a long list of things I'm not supposed to do. I'll be all right."
"If I say, reassuringly, 'Certainly, you'll be all right,' you'll use that as an excuse not to go home. If I say—"
"Jeanette, this is home. This is the first house Ken and I have ever owned."
"A fact—you told me—you carefully concealed from him until very recently."
"I thought of it as my house, our house," Ernie said. "You know why I couldn't tell him. He was trying to be a good Marine officer."
"And for being a very good Marine officer, they started to kick him out of the Marine Corps. There's a moral in there somewhere."
Ernie exhaled audibly.
"So what happens to him when this war is over?" Jeanette asked. "Which it may be by the time I get to Korea, from what they're saying at the Dai Ichi Building."
"I wish I knew," Ernie said. "He doesn't say anything—good Marine officers don't criticize the sacred Marine Corps—but he has to be bitter about what they did to him."
"What would you like to happen?"
"What almost did," Ernie said. "When we thought he was being 'involuntarily released,' which is the euphemism for getting kicked out, we went to see Colonel Ed Banning and his wife, and the Zimmermans, in Charleston. . . ."
"Who's Banning?"
"He and Ken and Ernie go all the way back to the 4th Marines in Shanghai. He's the one who sent Ken to Officer Candidate School. They were together all through World War Two. Anyway, before this goddamn war came along, Banning—who was about to retire—and Zimmerman were going to develop an island. . . ."
"Develop an island?" Jeanette parroted.
"You know, build houses on it and sell them. Their idea was to sell them to retired Marines. But I saw the island, and I think they could sell them to just about anybody. The island is just off the coast, and it's just beautiful. Anyway—"
"Where are they going to get the money to do something like that?" Jeanette interrupted.
"Banning owns the island; he has money," Ernie replied. "A lot of money. He was Ken's role model for living on Marine pay, but he doesn't have to play poor when he retires. And Ernie's wife has the King Midas touch. They own a half-dozen businesses outside Parris Island. Anyway, they asked Ken to go in with them. He seemed to think it was a good idea. But that was when his choices were going back to being a sergeant or the island. Now . . . now they gave him his golden major's oak leaf back. I don't know what he'll do."
"You want to do this island-building thing?"
"Oh, yeah, I want to do the island-building thing."
"Then tell him, 'I've been chasing you around for all this time, now it's your turn to do what I want for a while.' "
"He would, but it's not that easy. As you're about to find out."
"Meaning what?"
"You got the brass ring," Ernie said. "You will have succeeded—or will, as soon as Ken gets Pick back—in getting Don Juan Pickering to the altar, succeeding where God only knows how many women have tried and failed. But its not going to be easy. You better win the Pulitzer prize now, because when you march down the aisle to the strains of 'Here Comes the Bride,' you'll have taken yourself out of the competition."
"Two questions, and no bullshit, please. Do you think Pick's coming back?"
"Yeah, I do. No bullshit. I think I would know if he wasn't. I really love the sonofabitch; he really is like my brother. Next question?"
"You don't think Pick would like it if I kept working? Maybe get a job on a newspaper in San Francisco?"
"You never thought about this, huh? Your girlish mind was full of visions of the Sugar Plum Fairy? Moonlight? Violins playing 'I Love You, Truly' to the exclusion of everything else?"
"Don't be a bitch, Ernie," Jeanette said, and added, thoughtfully, "No, I guess I never did."
"Looking into my crystal ball, I see you, seven months after you march down the aisle, in this condition," Ernie said, and patted her swollen belly.
"I like the notion," Jeanette said. "I don't know how I'm going to like actually going through what you're going through."
"I think you'll like it," Ernie said. "There's something really satisfying about being pregnant. Anyway, shortly after that, you'll have a baby. When that happens, I don't think you'll really mind being a wife and mother, instead of a dashing war correspondent. To answer the question: No, I don't think Pick would like it at all if you kept on working. Knowing him as I do—and I know him, I think, better than anybody—what he will expect of you, when he comes home from setting a speed record between San Francisco and Timbuktu or wherever, will be to find you at the door wearing something very sexy, with the bed already turned down, champagne on ice, and the baby asleep in clean diapers."
"I just can't stop working, for Christ's sake!"
"It'll be your choice," Ernie said. "Like I say, I know him. He's really a great guy. But he's not a saint. What he is is a man, and all of them are selfish. They want what they want, and all we can do is learn to live with it. If we can't do that, we lose the man."
"Jesus Christ! And here I was feeling sorry for you."
"Don't feel sorry for me. I like my life—I love my life—with Ken."
"Yeah, that shows," Jeanette said. "Jesus Christ, Jeanette Priestly, wife, mother, and diaper changer!"
"Jeanette Pickering," Ernie corrected her.
"That does have a nice ring to it, doesn't it?" Jeanette asked.
She closed the rucksack and pulled the straps tight.
"You noticed, I'm sure, that amongst my delicate feminine apparel were two sets of GI long Johns?"
"I noticed."
"They itch," Jeanette said. "But Korea is cold at night. It is better to itch and scratch than to freeze your ass. Write that down."
Ernie laughed.
"You don't have to go with me to Haneda," Jeanette said.
"Yeah, I do," Ernie said.
Jeanette reached down to the bed and picked up and put on an olive-drab undershirt and a pair of olive-drab men's shorts. Over this, she put on a set of fatigues, then slipped her feet first into Army-issue woolen cushion sole socks and then into combat boots.
She looked at Ernie.
"How do I look?' she asked.
"Oddly enough," Ernie said, "very feminine."
"Bullshit, but thanks anyway."
She picked up the rucksack and walked out of the bedroom.
[TWO]
Near Jaeun-Ri, South Korea
1145 14 October 195O
Major Malcolm S. Pickering, USMCR, who had at first known to the minute how many days and hours and minutes it had been since he had had to set his Corsair down—how long he had been on the run—now didn't have any idea at all.
He wasn't even sure if he had eaten his last rice ball yesterday or the day before yesterday.
All he was sure about was that deciding to move northeastward was probably the worst fucking mistake he had made in his life. And might well be the last major mistake of his life.
There was nothing in this part of Korea but steep hills and more steep hills. No rice paddies. Damned few roads, and from what he'd seen of the traffic on them, it was mostly long lines of retreating North Korean soldiers, most of them on foot.
North American P-51 fighters, carrying the insignia of the South Korean Air Force, regularly flew over the roads, strafing anything they saw moving. They flew so low that there was no question in Pickering's mind that if he just stood in the middle of one of the roads he would be seen by one of the P-51 pilots, who would then stand the airplane on its wing, do a quick one-eighty, and then come back and let him have a burst from the eight .50-caliber Brownings in its wings.
The P-51 pilot would logically presume that anyone on these roads was a North Korean. The South Koreans were holed up someplace out of sight. He'd also come across, making his way over the mountains, a dozen or more rock formations that by stretching the term could be called caves. They didn't go deep into the mountains, but far enough so that a family of five or six could go into one of them and not be visible from either the ground or the air.
When one of the South Korean P-51s, or a section of them, caught a platoon, or a company, of North Koreans in the open and strafed them, the dead and wounded were left where they had been hit. There were very few North Korean vehicles of any kind, and the few trucks he had seen—some of them captured 6 X 6s and weapons carriers—were jammed with the walking wounded. They had kept their arms and used them to guarantee their positions on the trucks.
There was therefore the smell of rotting bodies that seemed to be getting worse, not better, even though it was getting chilly all the time, and freezing cold at night.
There was no question that the tide of war had changed. The North Koreans were not only retreating but bore little resemblance to an organized military force.
So obviously all he had to do was . . .
Make himself invisible to the P-51 pilots, so they wouldn't blow him away. To that end, he had plastered his face and hands with mud, so they would not be a bright spot on the ground to be investigated and strafed. Or maybe just strafed, skipping the investigation, and . . .
Make himself invisible to the retreating North Koreans, who would almost certainly shoot him if they could, not for a military reason but to see if he had anything to eat, and . . .
Wait for friendly troops to come up one of the roads. There were several problems with that. Friendly troops would, like the P-51 pilots, conclude that anybody here in the middle of nowhere was a North Korean. American troops might take such people prisoner. From what he had seen, the South Koreans would not.
The major problem was that he had been on short rations since he'd been shot down, and over the last four or five days the short rations had diminished to zero. And since he had stopped eating, he could feel his strength diminishing with each step—each labored breath—he took.
He didn't think, in other words, that he was going to make it.
He was not going to give up, but on the other hand there wasn't much difference between what he was able to do and giving up. Unless, of course, he gave up by taking a dive off the nearby cliff or putting the .45 to his temple, and even being hungry, dirty, tired, and sick seemed better than those options. With his luck, he thought, he wouldn't get killed taking a dive off the cliff, he would break both legs and arms and lie in agony for Christ only knew how long.
There was another option to checking out, if that's what was going to happen, and that was to lie on one of the boulders and let the sun warm him while he thought of Jeanette.
At first, when he thought of Jeanette, the thoughts were erotic. Now when he thought of her, there was little lust in the fantasy. He remembered how she smelled and the soft touch of her fingers on his face.
It would be very nice, he thought, if he wasn't going to make it, if he went to sleep in the sun thinking of Jeanette and then just never woke up.
He thought about asking God to give him at least that, but decided against it. He asked God to make it as easy on Jeanette and his mother and father, and Ernie, and even Killer McCoy. It wasn't right, he thought, to ask God for special treatment, but his parents and Jeanette and the others shouldn't have pain on his account. Maybe God would see it that way, too.
He had just turned onto his stomach when he heard the sound of tearing metal. That caught his attention, and then he heard the sound of clashing gears and an engine racing.
He got up, and walked as quickly as he could manage around an outcropping of rock to the cliff he decided he would not take a dive from, and looked down at the road.
It was a convoy of U.S. Army vehicles. A very strange one. In the lead was a jeep. Behind it were two M-26 tanks, a tank recovery vehicle, a heavy-duty wrecker, another tank recovery vehicle, and then another heavy-duty wrecker. Pickering closed his eyes and shook his head to make sure he wasn't delusionary. When he opened his eyes again, the convoy was still there. It wasn't moving, and he saw why. The first heavy-duty wrecker had collided with the trailer of the tank recovery vehicle and knocked its rear wheels off the road. Pickering went down the hill as fast as he could. He made it to the road.
He put his hands over his head and started walking down it. "American!" he shouted. "Don't shoot!"
And then he began to sing and shout, as loud as he could manage: "From the Halls of Montezuma, "American! Don't shoot! "To the Shores of Tripoli "American! Don't shoot! "We will fight our nation's battles! "American! Don't shoot! "On the Land and on the Sea! "American! Don't shoot!"
Captain Francis P. MacNamara, commanding officer of the 8023d Transportation Company (Depot, Forward), who had elected to lead the test over-the-road run to the east coast, who was examining the considerable damage the wrecker had done to the retrieval trailer, heard the noise.
He drew his .45, worked the action, shouted "Heads up!" and stepped into the center of the road.
A tall, thin human being, too large for a Korean, was walking down the center of the road with his hands in the air. He was wearing what looked like the remnants of some kind of coveralls. His face was streaked with mud.
And he was making strange sounds.
I’ll be a sonofabitcb if he isn't singing! And it's "The Marines' Hymn"! I'll be a sonofabitch!
"Who the hell are you?" Captain MacNamara demanded.
"Major Malcolm S. Pickering, United States Marine Corps," Pick croaked . . . and then fell first to his knees, and then flat on his face.
MacNamara hurriedly holstered his .45 and ran to him.
He first felt for signs of life, then turned him over and wrapped his arms around him and held him like a baby.
"Get some water up here!" he shouted. "And there's a bottle of bourbon in the glove compartment in my jeep. Bring that. And some blankets."
"And if you happen to have some food," the walking skeleton in his arms said, very faintly.
"You got it, Major," Captain MacNamara said.
Five minutes later, Major Malcolm Pickering, USMCR, was laid out on several blankets on the trailer of the tank recovery vehicle. He had been given a stiff drink of Captain MacNamara's Old Forester—which he had promptly thrown up—and half a dozen spoonfuls of ham chunks in pineapple sauce, three of which he had managed to keep down.
The blankets had been provided by Technical Sergeant Alvin H. Donn, U.S. Army, who was the NCO in charge of the M-26 tanks. He had also held Major Pickering up in a sitting position while Captain MacNamara had, with all the tenderness of a mother, spoon-fed him the ham chunks in pineapple sauce, and while he had thrown up.
There were now a dozen men standing at the side of the tank recovery trailer looking down with mingled amazement, curiosity, and pity at the human skeleton on the blankets.
Sergeant Donn pointed to Staff Sergeant James D. Buckley, the commander of the second tank.
"Stay with the major," he ordered. "Try to get some food in him. No more booze."
When Buckley had taken his place, Donn slid off the trailer and nodded his head at Captain MacNamara, a signal he wanted a word with him. MacNamara followed him to the recovery vehicle tractor.
He had made a snap judgment when he had first met Sergeant Donn. A goddamn good NCO, as he himself had been. He had then thereafter treated him accordingly.
"That guy's in really bad shape," Sergeant Donn said. "We've got to get him to a hospital."
"We'll have to get this out of the way," MacNamara agreed, slamming the tank retriever trailer with his fist. "Fuck it, we'll just push it the rest of the way off the road. Maybe we could lay him on the hood of the jeep. But where the hell do we take him?"
"I've got a radio in the tank that sometimes lets me talk to light aircraft," Donn said. "We could give that a shot." MacNamara nodded his head.
They walked past the second tank to the first, and crawled onto it. Donn lowered himself into the turret and came up a minute later with a microphone and a headset.
"What do they call this circus?"
"Task Force Road Service," MacNamara said. That had been Colonel Kennedy's whimsical suggestion/order.
Donn pushed the round black transmit button on the microphone. "Road Service to any U.S. aircraft hearing my call," he said. "Road Service to any U.S. aircraft hearing my call." There was no reply.
He made the call twice again. This time there was a reply. "Go ahead, Road Service." "Who are you?" Donn asked.
"I'm an Air Force P-51, call sign Air Force three oh seven."
"Air Force three oh seven, we just picked up a shot-down pilot. We have to get him to a hospital, and right now."
"Who and where are you, Road Service?"
"We're a small convoy, two M-26s and wreckers and tank recovery vehicles. We are approximately six miles northeast of Jaeun-Ri."
"Say again location?"
"We are approximately six miles northeast of Jaeun-Ri."
"Hold one, I'll see if I can find it on the chart." There was a long silence before Air Force three oh seven came back on the air.
"Road Service, I think I have you. I think I'm about twenty miles south. Let me get a positive location, and then I'll try to get a helicopter from the Navy. I should be there in a couple of minutes."
Another voice came over the air.
"Road Service, say again your location.'
"Approximately six miles northeast of Jaeun-Ri. Who are you?"
There was a long silence.
"I'm about five miles from your position. Have you got any flares?"
"Affirmative. Who are you?"
"Wait sixty seconds, and then start shooting flares at sixty-second intervals."
"Okay. Who are you?"
There was no reply.
It took Sergeant Donn about sixty seconds to get flares from inside the tank. As soon as he had one loaded, he shot it off.
He had just fired the third flare when there was a strange noise.
Fluckata-fluckata-fluckatafluckata-fluckata-fluckata.
"What the hell is that?" Sergeant Donn asked.
"It's a helicopter," Captain MacNamara said. He had heard the sound before.
"Jesus, the Navy sent one that quick?"
"I don't think that's a Navy helicopter," MacNamara said.
"Okay," the radio said. "Enough flares. I have you in sight. Are there any telephone wires, cables, anything like that down there?"
Donn and MacNamara looked.
"Negative. No wires or cables."
"Okay. Here we come."
A Sikorsky H-19A helicopter, painted black, came down the valley, flew over the convoy, slowed, stopped forward movement, turned around, and fluttered to the ground.
A half-dozen heavily armed men, dressed in what looked like black pajamas, erupted from the passenger compartment. Another one started climbing down from the cockpit.
"What the hell is this?" Sergeant Donn asked.
The man who had climbed down from the cockpit trotted up to them. When he saw Captain MacNamara, he said, "Oh, Jesus, look who it is!" And then, "Where's the pilot?"
MacNamara pointed to the tank recovery vehicle trailer.
The man made a follow me signal with his hand to the other men in black pajamas as he started to trot to the trailer. They began to trot after him.
So did Sergeant Donn, who was more than a little curious about the guys in the black pajamas, and the black helicopter with no markings in which they had arrived.
He got there about the time the first guy in the black pajamas did.
The first guy looked down at the human skeleton.
"Hello, you ugly bastard," he said. "Where the hell have you been hiding?"
The human skeleton raised one hand and grasped the hand of the guy in the black pajamas. Sergeant Donn saw tears form and roll down the human skeleton's cheeks, and when he glanced at the guy from the chopper, he saw tears on his cheeks, too.
After a moment, the guy from the chopper turned his head.
"Okay, let's get him on the bird," he ordered. He turned again to the human skeleton. "You hurt, Pick?"
"I'm fine," the human skeleton said.
"Three guys on each side of the blankets," the guy in the pajamas ordered. "And be careful with him."
"Aye, aye, sir," one of the men in pajamas said.
An Army major wearing pilot's wings walked quickly—almost trotted—up to them.
"Can you raise the Badoeng Strait? the man in pajamas, Major Ken McCoy, said.
"Jesus, I don't think so, Ken," the pilot, Major Alex Donald, said.
"Hell!"
"Maybe the P-51 can," Donald said.
"And you can talk to him?" McCoy asked.
"No problem."
"How are we fixed for fuel?"
"Not well. No matter where we go, we'll have to refuel first."
"Okay. Let's go."
Donald started for the helicopter.
McCoy turned to MacNamara. "MacNamara, right?"
Yes, sir.
"What the hell are you doing out here in the middle of nowhere?"
"Trying to get to Wonsan.'
"You're not going to get there on this road," McCoy said. "It ends at a lake—no ferry—about three miles from here. I'll leave one of my men with you, and he'll get you onto a road around the lake."
"Thank you," MacNamara said. "I appreciate that."
"I owe you," McCoy said. He put out his hand and then trotted to the helicopter.
Before he got there, an Air Force P-51 flew over them, very slowly. When McCoy climbed into the cockpit, the voice of the P-51 pilot was already coming over the headset.
"Road Service, Air Force three oh seven. I have you in sight. How do you read?"
McCoy grabbed the microphone.
"Air Force three oh seven, this is Army four zero zero three."
"Zero zero three, are you the black helicopter on the ground?"
"Air Force three oh seven, can you contact the aircraft carrier Badoeng Strait! They're operating in the Sea of Japan."
"I don't know. Who is this?"
"Please call the Badoeng Strait. Let me know if you get through."
"Who is this?"
"A friendly word of advice, Air Force three oh seven—do what I ask, and do it now."
"Stand by."
There was a sixty-second wait, and then: "Negative on contact with the Badoeng Strait."
Major Donald was now sitting beside McCoy. He put his hand out for the microphone, and McCoy gave it up.
"Three oh seven," Donald ordered, "climb to ten thousand and try it again on the emergency frequency."
"Stand by."
This time the delay was on the order of four minutes, which gave Donald time to fire up the H-19A.
"Army four zero zero three, Air Force three oh seven is in contact with the Badoeng Strait."
Donald handed McCoy the microphone.
"Air Force three oh seven, stand by to relay message to Badoeng Strait. Message follows: 'For Colonel William Dunn. Bingo. Killer. Heads up. En route.' Got that?"
"Got it. Stand by."
This time the wait was less than sixty seconds.
"Army four zero zero three, Badoeng Strait acknowledges."
"How are you fixed for fuel?"
"What do you have in mind?"
"Could you fly cover for us for a while?"
"Affirmative. I have one hour fuel aboard. Who are you?"
"Thank you, Air Force three oh seven. We're taking off now."
McCoy turned to Donald and made a lifting motion—take it up—with his hands.
Then he said, "Oh, shit!"
Donald took his hands off the controls and looked at McCoy. "I told MacNamara I'd leave him somebody to get him on the right road," McCoy said.
He leaned between the seats of the cockpit so that he could shout into the passenger compartment.
"The Army's lost," he called. "Leave two men and a map behind to get them on the road around the lake."
Sixty seconds after that, two men in black pajamas got out of the H-19A and ran just far enough away so that Donald could see them. When he did, the H-19A lifted off.
[THREE]
USS Badoeng Strait (CVE 116)
37.9 Degrees North Latitude
129.59 Degrees East Longitude
The Sea of Japan
13O5 14 October 195O
Lieutenant Colonel William Dunn, USMC, still in his flight suit, had been on the bridge ever since the captain had sent for him after getting the cryptic message from Air Force three oh seven on the emergency frequency.
"Bridge, Radar," the squawk box announced.
"Bridge," the talker replied.
"We have a slow-moving aircraft at a thousand feet at fifteen miles heading three hundred degrees."
"Acknowledged," the captain responded personally. "Keep me advised."
The captain turned to Colonel Dunn.
"That's probably your helo," he said. "Who else would it be?"
"Sir," Dunn said, "it just occurred to me that an Army pilot probably has never made a carrier landing."
"Why the hell is he coming here?" the captain asked, and then without waiting for a reply, ordered: "Turn into the wind. Prepare to recover U.S. Army helicopter. " Then he had another thought, and issued other orders. "Engine room, full astern. Flight deck, make all preparations for a crash landing."
"Turn into the wind, aye, aye, sir," the talker parroted into his microphone.
'Prepare to recover U.S. Army helicopter, aye, aye, sir. Engine room, full astern,
aye, aye, sir. Flight deck, make all preparations for a crash landing, aye, aye, sir."
There was immediately the sound of a Klaxon, and another voice on the squawk box: "Make all preparations for a crash landing. Firemen and Corpsmen, man your stations. Make all preparations for a crash landing. Firemen and Corpsmen, man your stations."
Then another voice on the squawk box.
"Bridge, Radio."
"Bridge," the talker replied.
"We are in radio contact with Army four zero zero three on Emergency Frequency One."
"Acknowledge,' the captain said.
"Acknowledged," the talker parroted.
The captain turned to a small control panel near his seat, moved several switches, and picked up a microphone.
"This is the captain of the Badoeng Strait," he said.
"Good afternoon, sir," the speaker replied metallically.
"Have you ever made a carrier landing?"
"No, sir, I have not."
"Jesus Christ!" the captain softly said to Dunn, and then pressed the microphone button again. "I'm going to turn you over to Colonel Dunn, who is a highly experienced carrier aviator. I'm sure he'll be able to help you."
He handed the microphone to Dunn.
"Army zero three," Dunn called, "what we're doing now is losing headway—losing speed—so that the deck, which will be your runway, will be moving as slow as possible. You with me so far?"
"How slow is 'as slow as possible'?" Major Alex Donald inquired.
"Just fast enough to maintain what we call steerageway," Dunn said. "You'll hardly notice that it's moving at all. But we can't stop a ship this large right away. Have you enough fuel to circle around for a couple of minutes?"
"Affirmative," Donald replied.
"And you won't have to worry about the wind, either. The ship will be heading into it."
"Okay."
The captain issued another order.
"Engine room, make turns to maintain steerageway."
The talker repeated the order.
"Badoeng Strait, can I fly over the deck? Approaching from the back end, into the wind?"
The captain raised his eyebrows in exasperation, then nodded.
"Permission granted," Dunn said.
The H-19A approached the Badoeng Strait head-on.
"I thought he said he was coming in over the 'back end'?" the captain said.
When the H-19A was several hundred feet from the ship, it veered to its right and flew down the length of the carrier at about the height of the flight deck. Dunn and the captain could see the pilot looking at the ship.
When the H-19A was several hundred feet aft of the ship, Donald turned it around and then flew toward the stern, carefully adjusting his speed to that of the carrier, so that he was moving very slowly toward the deck.
"Jesus Christ, look at that!" Donald's voice came over the radio. "The whole fucking fire department's waiting for us."
It was clear to both Colonel Dunn and the captain that the pilot of the helicopter believed his microphone switch was in intercom rather than where it was, in transmit.
Neither officer felt this was the appropriate time to bring the pilot's error to his attention.
"Don't fuck this up, Alex," another voice said, one Colonel Dunn recognized as that of Major Kenneth R. "The Killer" McCoy, USMCR.
"I have no intention of fucking this up," Donald said.
The exchange caused snickers, chuckles, and several laughs from officers and sailors on the bridge and elsewhere on the ship.
The amusement on the bridge was instantly stilled when the captain said, "Knock that off!"
The H-19A was now over the aft edge of the deck, thirty feet above it. It inched down its length.
When it reached the bridge, on the superstructure called "the island," both the captain and Colonel Dunn could see the men in the cockpit. And vice versa. Major McCoy recognized Colonel Dunn and waved and smiled at him.
"Jesus H. Christ!" the captain said.
Colonel Dunn nevertheless waved back.
The H-19A continued its slow passage over the flight deck.
"I think I have this fucking oversized ferry figured out, Ken," Donald's voice said. "What's happening is that the deck is moving faster than we are."
"So?"
"Not much faster," Donald said, thoughtfully. "So if I went right up to the front. . . and sat down very carefully, what would happen? All we would do is maybe roll back a little. Shall I give it a shot?"
"Why not?"
The captain grabbed his microphone and opened his mouth. And then closed it.
The captain, an experienced aviator himself, realized that the pilot of the helicopter had condensed the essentials of carrier landing to one sentence: Sit down very carefully. In the time available, the captain realized he had nothing to add to that.
The H-19A was now at the forward end of the landing deck, where, very slowly, it inched downward toward the deck. One wheel touched down, and then, very quickly, the other three.
"I'll be a sonofabitch," the captain said softly. "He's down!" Then he raised his voice. "Mr. Clanton, you have the conn!"
To which Lieutenant Commander Clanton, a stern-faced thirty-five-year-old, replied, "I have the conn, sir. Captain is leaving the bridge!"
The captain, with Colonel Dunn on his heels, headed for the ladder to the flight deck.
On the flight deck, fifty men—a dozen of them in aluminum-faced fire-fighting suits and another dozen in Corpsmen's whites, six of these pushing two gurneys—raced toward the helicopter. Through them moved tractors and fire-fighting vehicles loaded with other sailors.
They all reached the helicopter even before Donald had shut down the engine, and long before he could apply the brake to the rotor.
By the time the captain and Colonel Dunn reached the helicopter, a very thin, very dirty, heavily bearded human skeleton in what was just barely recognizable as a flight suit was very gently removed from the passenger compartment and onto a gurney.
The human skeleton recognized both Colonel Dunn and the captain. His hand, fingers stiff, came up his temple.
"Hey, Billy!' he said, then: "Permission to come aboard, sir?"
"Permission granted, you sonofabitch!" Colonel Dunn replied as he returned the salute. Despite his best efforts, his voice broke halfway through the sentence.
"Make way!" one of the doctors ordered, and the gurney started to roll toward the island.
McCoy climbed down from the cockpit.
The sight of a man in black pajamas in itself attracted some attention, as did the black helicopter with no markings. Eyes grew even wider when the man in black pajamas saluted the captain crisply, barked, "Permission to come aboard, sir?" and then crisply saluted the national colors.
The captain returned the salute.
"Good to see you again, Major," the captain said.
"Where'd you find him, Killer?" Dunn asked.
"The Army found him—actually, he found an Army convoy that got lost trying to get to Wonsan—in the middle of the Taebaek Mountains. We must have flown right over him fifty times in the last ten days."
"Me, too," Dunn said. "That's rough territory. Hard to spot anything from the air."
Major Alex Donald walked around the tail assembly of the H-19A. Not being at all familiar with the customs of the Naval service, he did not ask permission to come aboard, but instead simply saluted the captain and Lieutenant Colonel Dunn.
"Well done, Major," the captain said.
"He needed some help, as soon as we could get it for him," Donald replied.
"I presume, Major," the captain said to McCoy, "that's why you felt the risks in bringing him here were justified?"
"Yes, sir. That and because I knew you have the communications facilities 1 need."
"Well, Colonel Dunn will see that you have what you need," the captain said. "And when you're finished, perhaps you would be good enough to come to the bridge and tell me what you can to satisfy my curiosity."
"Yes, sir. Thank you, sir," McCoy said.
[FOUR]
Communications Center
USS Badoeng Strait (CVE 116)
37.9 Degrees North Latitude
129.S6 Degrees East Longitude
The Sea of Japan
1315 14 October 195O
The communications officer on duty answered the buzz to unlock the port himself. When he saw Lieutenant Colonel Dunn and a man wearing what appeared to be black pajamas, he opened his mouth to say something, but Dunn cut him off.
"This officer has a message to dispatch," Dunn said.
"Yes, sir?"
"You want to let us in, please?" Dunn asked.
"Yes, sir," the commo officer said, and stepped out of the way.
"May I have the message, sir?" the commo officer said.
"I'll have to type it out," McCoy said.
"One of my men will be happy—"
"I'll type it myself, thank you," McCoy said. "Lieutenant, this is one of those messages that the fewer people see, the better. There will be no copies. Can you handle a Top Secret encryption yourself?"
The commo officer looked between McCoy and Dunn, then said, "That's unusual, but yes, sir."
"Can I have that typewriter a moment?" McCoy asked a white hat seated at a work table.
The commo officer nodded his approval and the white hat stood up.
McCoy sat down, rolled the carriage to eject a standard message form made up of an original and three carbons, then rolled a single sheet of paper into the machine.
He typed very rapidly, then took the message from the typewriter and handed it to Dunn, who read it.
"Two things, Ken," he said, somewhat hesitantly. "Considering the addressees, isn't that 'dirty, unshaven, and very hungry' business a little informal?"
"If I just said, 'in pretty good shape' or something like that, everyone would wonder what I wasn't saying," McCoy said.
"And can you do that? Ask somebody 'not to disseminate' Top Secret information, and then give it to them?"
"I guess we'll find out soon enough, won't we?" McCoy said, and smiled, took the sheet of paper from Dunn, and handed it to the commo officer.
"Will you encrypt this and send it Operational Immediate, please?"
The commo officer took it, read it, looked at McCoy, and then sat down at the cryptographic machine and began to enter McCoy's message.
TOP SECRET
OPERATIONAL IMMEDIATE
1320 14OCT1950
DUPLICATION FORBIDDEN
FROM OFFICER IN CHARGE CIA SEOUL ABOARD USS BADOENG STRAIT
EYES ONLY MASTER SERGEANT PAUL T KELLER USA COMMUNICATIONS CENTER SUPREME HEADQUARTERS
UNITED NATIONS COMMAND TOKYO
ENCRYPT USING SPECIAL CODE AND TRANSMIT AS OPERATIONAL IMMEDIATE THE FOLLOWING
MESSAGE BEGINS
EYES ONLY
DIRECTOR CIA WASHINGTON DC
DEPUTY DIRECTOR CIA FOR ASIA
CHIEF PRESIDENTIAL MISSION TO KOREA SEOUL
CIA STATION CHIEF SEOUL
COMMANDANT USMC WASHINGTON DC
MAJOR MALCOLM S. PICKERING USMCR RETURNED TO US CONTROL 1200 14OCT1950. TRANSPORTED USS
BADOENG STRAIT AS OF 1300 14OCT1950.
SUBJECT OFFICER IS DIRTY, UNSHAVEN, AND VERY HUNGRY, BUT IS UNWOUNDED, UNINJURED, AND IN
SOUND PSYCHOLOGICAL CONDITION.
FOLLOWING CIVILIAN PERSONNEL SHOULD BE CONTACTED BY MOST EXPEDITIOUS MEANS, ASKED NOT TO
DISSEMINATE INFORMATION ABOVE TO OTHERS AND ON AGREEMENT BE NOTIFIED OF SUBJECT OFFICER'S
RETURN AND CONDITION.
MRS FLEMING PICKERINC C/O FOSTER HOTELS SAN FRANCISCO CAL
MRS K.R. MCCOY, TOKYO, JAPAN
MISS JEANETTE PRIESTLY C/O PRESS RELATIONS OFFICER, SUPREME HEADQUARTERS UNITED NATIONS
COMMAND TOKYO
MCCOY MAJ USMCR
MESSAGE ENDS
K.R. MCCOY
MAJOR USMCR
[FIVE]
The captain, who was sitting in his chair facing aft, as if expecting them, waved Lieutenant Colonel Dunn and Major McCoy onto the bridge.
"Colonel Dunn get you everything you needed, Major?" the captain asked.
"Yes, sir, thank you," McCoy said.
"The ship's surgeon was just here," the captain said. "There's nothing life-threatening wrong with Major Pickering. But that's because he's here. The doc said he wouldn't like to hazard a guess how much longer he would have lasted if you hadn't found him when you did." He paused, and shook his head. "And what a way to die that would have been."
"Sir?"
"I suppose I'm violating the major's privacy, but I think you have a right to know, if I do. What was really threatening his life was dehydration. He has dysentery. That's unpleasant anytime, but it usually won't kill you, according to the doc, if you have enough liquids. Pickering heard somewhere that you get dysentery from bad water—and he'd had some bad water and had dysentery— so what he decided to do was not drink water he hadn't boiled. That might not cure the dysentery, but it might. Drinking more bad water would not cure it."
"My God!" Dunn said.
"Major Pickering told the doc," the captain went on, "that he'd run out of boiled water four, five days ago, and hadn't had a chance to boil any more. So he didn't drink anything. Meanwhile, the dysentery continued to drain what liquids were left in his body. They're dripping glucose into both arms now, and the doc says he should have the dysentery under control shortly. The doc also says he belongs on a hospital ship, not here."
"Sir, I knew you had the communications I needed," McCoy said.
"I won't ask you questions, McCoy, that I know you won't answer. But those pajamas of yours do make me curious."
"When I put them on this morning, sir, I had no intention of going aboard a man-of-war."
"Meaning you're not going to explain them, right?" the captain said, smiling.
"They're sort of a disguise, sir. I can't pass for an Asiatic in the daylight, but at night, in clothes like this, if they can't get a good look at me, I can."
"Until you open your mouth, you mean?"
"I speak Korean, sir."
"Who don't you want to spot you as an American? Can I ask that?"
"At first light this morning, sir, we inserted agents north of Wonsan," McCoy said.
"Using that black Sikorsky?"
"Yes, sir."
"You were on the ground, behind enemy lines, this morning?"
“Yes, sir.”
"How often do you do that sort of thing?"
"It's what we do, sir. We do it just about daily."
"You're a braver man than I am, Gunga Din," the captain said.
"It's not what you think, sir. If you know what you're doing, it's not all that dangerous."
The captain snorted.
"I'm not being modest, sir. What scared me was just now."
"Excuse me?"
"When we came out to the Badoeng Strait, sir, and Major Donald told me had no idea how we were going to land on a carrier. That was high-pucker-factor time for me, sir."
The captain smiled. "I took the liberty of seeing what I could do about that," he said. "Take a look."
He pointed down to the flight deck. McCoy followed his finger and saw Major Alex Donald and two other men in flight suits standing near the H-19A. They were making gestures with their hands. Donald was nodding his head.
"Those are helo pilots," the captain said. "I asked them to give your pilot a quick course in carrier takeoff in a helicopter."
"Sir, I am profoundly grateful," McCoy said.
"Major, I would be pleased if you and Colonel Dunn and your pilot would take lunch with me in my cabin," the captain said.
"That's very kind, sir."
Major McCoy suspected—correctly—that even the captain of a vessel like the USS Badoeng Strait did not routinely luncheon on what was served by a white-jacketed steward to the four of them in the captain's cabin.
It began with cream of mushroom soup, went through roast beef with Yorkshire pudding, baked potatoes, and green beans, and ended with strawberry shortcake.
Over their coffee, the captain asked another question.
"If you're uncomfortable answering this, McCoy, just don't answer it. But do your agents get information for you? Anything you can tell me?"
McCoy hesitated, then said: "May I have your word that it will go no further than this cabin, sir?"
"You've got it."
"In the last several days, we've been getting reports that elements of the Fourth Chinese Field Army—which has been at the Korean border since June— have begun to send at least elements of the 38th, 39th, 40th, and 42d armies across the border."
"My God!" Dunn blurted.
"I suppose my ignorance is showing," the captain said. "Fourth Field Army? What did you say, 38th, 39th, 40th, and 41st armies? Five armies?"
"Fortieth and 42d" McCoy said. "The Chinese field army is something like one of ours. Like the Eighth Army. What we would call a 'corps' they call an 'army' A field army is made up of two or more armies, like our armies usually have two or more corps. The last reliable word I had was that the strength of the Fourth Field Army was about six hundred thousand men."
"My God, and you say they're crossing the border, Ken?" Dunn asked.
"What I said, and why I don't want any of this to go further than this cabin, is that I have been getting reports, which I so far can't confirm, that elements of the Fourth Field Army—elements of those numbered armies—have begun to slip across the Yalu."
"We've been flying—and so has the Air Force—reconnaissance missions all over that area," the captain protested.
"Bill Dunston, the Korea station chief, saw the last intelligence from Supreme Headquarters, the stuff they furnished Eighth Army and X Corps. According to that, aerial reconnaissance—even the covert stuff, across the border— has not detected the Fourth Field Army as being there, and I know it's there."
"It's the first I've heard of it," the captain said, more than a little doubtfully. "How the hell can you hide—what did you say, six hundred thousand men?"
"In caves, in valleys, in buildings, you put them down by first light, and nobody moves, absolutely nobody moves, during daylight. They've had a lot of experience doing that," McCoy said.
"I'm having trouble—no offense, McCoy—accepting this," the captain said.
"None taken, sir."
"You think the Chinese are going to come in, don't you, Ken?" Dunn asked.
"I think it's a strong possibility."
"What—can I ask this?—do you do with your intelligence, these reports, who do you send them to?" the captain asked. "Can I presume they go through Supreme Headquarters?"
"I'm right on the line of what I can't say, sir," McCoy said. "We share some of our intelligence with Supreme Headquarters, General Willoughby. My boss, the Assistant Director of the CIA for Asia, gets my reports, and the decision as to what to do with them is his."
"You share 'some' of your intelligence with Supreme Headquarters?" the captain asked. "Why not all of it?"
"That's politics, sir," McCoy said.
"What's politics got to do with it?"
"If there is a difference of opinion, sir, about the reliability of some intel.. . What General Willoughby puts out, he puts out in the name of General MacArthur. If Willoughby says the moon is made of blue Roquefort cheese, that means MacArthur agrees. Once that announcement is made, we can't say the moon is made of Gorgonzola, even if we are sure it is, because that would be telling General MacArthur that he's wrong." He paused. "I suspect I'm having diarrhea of the mouth, sir."
"I don't know about that, Major," the captain said, "but frankly, it seems to me that, for a relatively junior officer, you seem to know a hell of a lot about how things work at the highest levels."
"Sir," Dunn said. "I have something to say that (a) will almost certainly annoy Major McCoy and (b) should not leave this cabin."
"Let's hear it," the captain said, "whether or not the major is annoyed."
"Christ, Billy!" McCoy protested.
"Let's have it, Colonel," the captain ordered.
"When Major McCoy was attached to Naval Element, Supreme Headquarters," Dunn said, "he turned in to Supreme Headquarters an analysis which indicated the North Koreans were planning to invade South Korea in June. His conclusions went against those formed by General Willoughby. Not only was McCoy's analysis ordered destroyed, but they tried to kick him out of the Marine Corps, and almost succeeded."
"I find that, too, hard to believe," the captain said. "Where did you get that?"
Dunn replied, "From General Pickering, sir, the Deputy Director of the CIA for Asia."
"Jesus H. Christ!" the captain said.
"In what I personally regard an act of courage," Dunn went on, "McCoy got his draft copy of his analysis to General Pickering, for whom he had worked when they were both in the OSS during World War Two. General Pickering took McCoy's analysis to Admiral Hillencoetter, the Director of the CIA. The Admiral didn't believe it, either, apparently, until the North Koreans came across the border. But when that happened, the admiral gave McCoy's analysis to the President, who thereupon called General Pickering to active duty, named him Deputy Director of the CIA for Asia, and ordered the Commandant of the Marine Corps that McCoy not only not be involuntarily separated but that he be assigned to General Pickering."
"I really don't know what to say," the captain said.
"Sir," McCoy said, "with all possible respect, I ask you to forget this conversation ever took place."
"Forget this conversation? How could I ever do that? But you have my word that what was said in this cabin will never get out of this cabin. And if I owe you an apology, Major, consider it humbly offered."
"No apology is necessary, sir. None of this conversation would have happened if I hadn't run off at the mouth."
"What I think happened there, Killer," Dunn said, "is that even you, the legendary Killer McCoy, was understandably emotionally upset with relief when you snatched your best friend literally from death's door. Under those circumstances, a moment's indiscretion is understandable."
"I didn't do anything, Billy," McCoy said. "I told you, Pick found a lost army convoy."
Thirty minutes later, the black H-19A lifted off the flight deck of the USS Badoeng Strait without incident and headed for the eastern shore of the Korean Peninsula.
[SIX]
USAF Airfield K-l
Pusan, South Korea
14O5 14 October 195O
After Ernie McCoy dropped her at Haneda Airfield, outside Tokyo, Miss Jeanette Priestly of the Chicago Tribune had been told that there were no direct flights from Japan to the airstrip at Wonsan. Just returned to service, the airstrip would take nothing larger than twin-engined C-47 aircraft. But inasmuch as there were very limited refueling capabilities at Wonsan, and the C-47 could not make it to Wonsan from Tokyo with enough fuel remaining to make it back to K-l at Pusan, Tokyo—Wonsan service was out of the question.