battan

BATAAN – MADNESS OR METTLE? Victorino P Mapa
There is no shortage of memorials to Bataan in both the United States and the Philippines. A dwindling few congregate at the “Shrine of Valor” in Mt Samat. To commemorate its fall every April 9. .Bataan monuments and memorials in the United States stretch from the US West Coast, the Midwest, to Florida. The last convention of the American Defenders of Bataan and Corregidor was held on May 29 2009 in San Antonio, Texas. 73 American survivors showed up. The aftermath of the battle, the infamous “Death March is better remembered, not the actual conflict .It is estimated that 2,500 – 10,000 Filipino soldiers died compared to 100-650 Americans who perished before reaching camp O’Donnell. Even today historians couldn’t agree how many died on the March or how many blended in with the population and escaped.But one thing is certain: Far more Filipinos died than Americans on their way to the prison camp. . America expected the Japanese to be its potential enemy as far back as 1923. The military planners decided that the Philippines and its 7,000 islands was indefensible and therefore drew War Plan Orange3 (WP3) It called for a strategic retreat of the Armed forces to Bataan where protected by superior air power, the Allies could hold out until reinforcements arrived from Hawaii. The surprise attack at Pearl Harbor and the consequent raid on Clark Field that virtually wiped out the US Air Force, negated the concept. With years to prepare for its defense the planners neglected to pre- stock the peninsula with food and supplies. In the haste of its retreat almost all fo the food and materiel. Were left behind. The flight to Bataan favored the Japanese. In the words of one Japanese officer the retreat was “like a cat entering a sack.” Essentially , Bataan was doomed from the start The 75,000 defenders of Bataan, were three-quarters Filipino troops. Many American historians generally disparaged them. “with the exception of the highly skilled scouts of the Philippine Division, the bulk of the soldiers were untrained, unequipped,……and uninterested in hanging around once a battle started. A division commander opined. He commented further that “ the native troops did only two things well: one, when an officer appeared, to yell attention in a loud voice, jump up and salute; the other, to demand three meals per day.” (Read Richard Sassaman’s “The Battling Bastards of Bataan.”)This was only partially true. Untrained ROTC cadets armed with World War I rifles that often wouldn’t fire and grenades that would not explode were hurriedly thrown into battle during the initial landings. They ran at the first sight of the enemy. Nonetheless Filipino troops made the stand possible. .The 26th Cavalry, an all Filipino regiment fought a series of holding engagements when the Japanese landed at Damortis. They . slowed the Japanese advance long enough to enable Fil-American forces to- successfully beat an orderly, albeit hasty retreat to Bataan. They even turned around to attack the Japanese, a move redolent of the Charge of the Last Brigade immortalized in prose by Lord Tennyson……. Men on horseback with nothing but rifles and grenades against tanks and machine guns. the last cavalry charge in recorded history. Filipino infantry stopped the Japanese on the beaches of Longoskawayan, Quinauan, Anyasan and Silaiim in what became known as the “Battle of the Points.” The Japanese landed troops along the southwest coast of Bataan hoping to cut the Fil-American troops in half. . The defenders, on higher ground obliterated the invaders. By February 13, only about three dozen of the 2,000 Japanese soldiers who fought in the Battle of the Points were still alive. The bulk of the Bataan defenders were Filipino. Most of the American troops along with General MacArthur were on the island of Corregidor. After Bataan the Japanese were masters of Asia and the central Pacific. It was the limit of their conquest. They would go no farther. Two months later in the Battle of Midway the tide would turn. The Rising Sun would set until Japan’s eventual defeat. . Circumstances thrust America’s war upon us. The choice on whose side we would be was ours..In addition to the fallen of Bataan ten percent of the Filipino population perished during the three years of the Japanese occupation. We won something. We won nothing.