The doomede Bastion

THE DOOMED BASTION:
Victorino P. Mapa

In the early 1920s American military leaders predicted that the Philippine archipelago’s thousands of islands could not be successfully defended. The planners therefore drew War Plan Orange 3 which called that in the event of war with Japan American and Filipino troops would retreat to the Bataan Peninsula and hold off for as long as they can until help would come.
Pearl Harbor was attacked . A few hours later Japanese planes from their bases in Formosa (Taiwan) swooped down on Clark Field and destroyed the US Air force. They landed the next day at Damortis.. General McArthur underestimated the Japanese and over-estimated his Filipino troops. Instead of immediately implementing War Plan Orange he attempted to stop the Japanese. Gen Wainwright called on the 26th Cavalry, a tough well trained regiment of Philippine Scouts to stem the Japanese advance. Two other Philippine Army divisions offered some resistance. But outside of these two contingents the rest of the troops were ill equipped and poorly trained. At the sight of the Japanese they dropped their guns and ran. The 26th Cavalry reduced to 450 men tried to block the Japanese advance . They even made a glorious cavalry charge against a modern armored column. The rush to Bataan was made at the last minute. As a result much needed provisons to sustain them were left behind. By December 24 the American-Filipino troops along with thousands of civilians funneled into Bataan. Of the 75,000 soldiers three fourths were Filipinos. Most were untrained, American soldiers fared no better. Their numbers included airmen and sailors who lost their planes and ships and were totally unprepared for infantry duties. Most of their weapons and munitions were obsolete, many dating from World War I. If this was not bad enough provisions were in short supply from the start. Many were left behind in the pell-mell rush to Bataan. Bataan was 75% impenetrable jungle, cut by streams and deep ravines and a breeding ground for malaria, dysentery, typhoid, dengue fever and other diseases that did not discriminate either armies. The stage was set for the four month siege.
The Japanese wrongly assumed that US forces would defend Manila. They therefore rushed to Manila instead of thwarting the Bataan retreat. Japanese intelligence indicated that only a ragged army of 25,000 defended Bataan. So Homma released 15,000 of his finest troops to the East Indies and replaced them with 6,000 untested, poorly trained reserves from the 65th Brigade.
MacArthur commanded the troops from Corregidor and made only a 10 hour stay on Bataan.(American GIs derisively referred to him as “Dugout Doug.”)J The initial battle line was divided in two by the steep Mount Natib whose jungle was so dense and impassable that it was left undefended. The line was held by three Philippine Army divisions, a regiment of the Philippine Scouts and American troops. Japanese troops attacked on January 2. From then on the battle was constant highlighted by stubborn defense ,hand-to-hand fighting and incredible couinter-attacks that pushed the enemy back.
But the line soon cracked and an orderly retreat was made to the towns of Bagac and Orion, the second line of defense. The fighting was without respite and soon the men “had a blank stare in their eyes and their faces covered with beards lacked any semblance of expression.” The reinforced Japanese launched a number of amphibious assaults against the southwest tip of the peninsula. They were met by heterogenous troops of ex-airmen and sailors who had no infantry training and the Philippine Constabulary who incredibly wiped out the invaders.The untrained sailors impressed the Japanese as “a new type of suicide squad who would attempt to draw Jap fire by sitting down, talking loudly and lighting cigarettes and contain the Japanese long enough for a regiment of scouts of push them back.”
By February both sides were exhausted. The incessant fighting, malaria, dysentery and beri-beri took its toll. The Japanese were greatly weakened. The defenders could have counter-attacked but they were just as physically sapped. Battle forces moved slowly forward and back – not unlike the trench warfare of World War I. In one instance Philippine scouts fought for four days to gain 40 yards. It was hard even to tell the armies apart. In Donald Young’s book, the Battle of Bataan, the Japanese 141st Infantry was attacked by soldirs of the Japanaese 9th Infantry who, after seven days in the Natib forest, like a blind, hungry rattlesnake, were striking at anything that moved.” Incredibly, the unprepared, outgunned and starving “battling bastards of Bataan” were winning.
But the end was preordained. Food, equipment and ammunition ran out. 80% of the troops had malaria. 75% had dysentery. The defenders were resisting far beyond human endurance. On April 3 a heavily reinforced and rested Japanese army supported by endless artillery barrage and overwhelming air support began to break through. On the evening of April 8 an earthquake shook the peninsula. The next day Bataan surrendered.
Bataan today is a mere blip in American history. Hardly anyone remembers it today. The recollection is made every April 9 only by a few aging and rapidly dwindling Filipino veterans. They gather at the slope of Mt Natib where a monument commemorates their gallant yet futile stand and re-live the myths that Bataan upset the Japanese timetable, that they stopped the Japanese advance so that the Allies could re-group and liberate them. Without question they resisted with valor, suffered and endured hardships far beyond human endurance and shed more blood than their American comrades. The reality however is that Bataan was a tragedy and disaster. It was a doomed garrison from the start, a pawn that the greatest industrial power was prepared to sacrifice. As a result it became the greatest military disgrace of the US Armed Forces.
The soldiers died for something and died for nothing
“ If you are able, save them a place inside of you
and save one backward glance
when you are leaving
for the places they can no longer go.
Be not ashamed to say You loved them,
though you may or may not have always.
Take what they have left
and what they have taught you
with their dying
and keep it with your own.
And in that time
when men decide and feel safe
to call the war insane,
Take one moment to embrace
Those gentle heroes
You left behind.”

MAJOR MICHAEL DAVIS O’DONNELL
1 Jan 1970, Dak To, Vietnam