“He couldn’t get it off, so he took a machete and cut the man’s wrist off, and when he did that, of course, the man was bleeding profusely. [I tried to help him], but when I looked back, I saw a Japanese guard sticking a bayonet through his stomach.”
These were the words of an American soldier who observed the death of a comrade at the brutal hands of the Japanese military during the Bataan Death March. Whereas American and Filipino forces were weakened by the fighting against the Japanese, they slowed down the enemy’s timetable to capture Manila.
It is believed that 60,000–80,000 Filipinos and Americans were taken prisoner, where the Japanese were infuriated over their unwillingness to surrender. For the next three years, the Americans were starved, beaten, and killed at the hands of their Japanese captors.
There were about 12,000 Americans who were taken by the Japanese, and they immediately felt the sting of this military power, which did not recognize the rules governing warfare. For sixty-five miles, the Americans were ordered, with no food, water, or rest, to march to Camp O’Donnell.
During the Bataan Death March, the Americans faced cruelty of the highest order, as when they stopped walking for water or rest, they were bayoneted by soldiers. Americans had their possessions stolen from them, had no protection from the sun, and fresh Japanese guards were rotated to maintain a quick pace. This was one of the worst moments of World War II, as there was nothing that could be done to help these men from the heinous treatment that was openly committed against them. It was not until 1946 that an American military court sentenced Lieutenant General Homma Masaharu to death for his command responsibility during the Bataan Death March.
America was vulnerable when President Franklin D. Roosevelt ordered General Douglas MacArthur to flee Corregidor across the open waters of the Pacific to reach Australia. The Japanese held the advantage through their momentum to conquer territories from the Aleutian Islands, parts of China, Burma, Southeast Asia, and toward the borders of Australia at the Solomon Islands. Fighting a two-front war, most American resources were sent to General Dwight D. Eisenhower in the European Theater of Operations, while MacArthur was given what remained.
The “island hopping” campaign began after the fighting at Guadalcanal through the strategy of largely bypassing strong Japanese garrisons. American forces starved out larger Japanese garrisons, prevented supplies and reinforcements from reaching them, and essentially took them out of the war. The Allies captured islands that had fewer enemy troops and weapons, where it would be quicker and involve fewer casualties to push the Japanese toward their own “home islands.” Supported by the Higgins landing craft, numerous Marine and naval assaults took islands such as Guam, Peleliu, Saipan, and Tarawa.
In July 1944, Admiral Chester Nimitz, MacArthur, and Roosevelt met to discuss future operations. Nimitz wanted to forgo these islands and take Formosa, while MacArthur was devoted to his pledge of “I Shall Return” to the imprisoned Americans. There were about six hundred prisoners of war held at Cabanatuan; many had been sent to different camps in Japan and other occupied territories. These Americans were in poor physical condition due to lack of food and disease, and faced the real threat that the Japanese government would kill them before they could be liberated. MacArthur’s return to the Philippines was exhilarating for the Supreme Commander of Allied Forces in the Pacific, as the Japanese were continually defeated by American forces.
As the Americans fought the enemy in the Philippines, frequent reports indicated that the Japanese High Command ordered defenseless American soldiers to be shot or burned alive with gasoline. While these Americans were not far from MacArthur’s lines, there was plenty of fighting to be done before they could be rescued. Eleven soldiers escaped from the “Palawan Massacre,” which pushed MacArthur to save Americans from almost certain death at the hands of their captors. The Japanese War Ministry intended: “Whether they are destroyed individually or in groups, and whether it is accomplished by means of mass bombing, poisonous smoke, poisons, drowning, or decapitation, dispose of them as the situation dictates. It is the aim not to allow the escape of one, to annihilate them all, and not to leave any traces.”
Before and during the assault on the Philippines, Lieutenant General Walter Krueger was briefed about the Japanese atrocities targeting Americans. After his 6th Army landed at Lingayen Gulf on Luzon Island, it was determined that a secret combat mission should be conducted to prevent further killings by the enemy. A graduate of West Point in 1908, Krueger fully understood the topography of the Philippines; as a younger officer, he had been tasked with mapping many of the areas he later encountered as a commanding general. Krueger was an aggressive officer, more suited to leading troops in the field against retreating Japanese forces.
Krueger ordered this mission, but it was a difficult task, as there were seven thousand enemy soldiers near Cabanatuan. He placed responsibility on Lieutenant Colonel Henry Mucci, the commanding officer of the inexperienced 6th Ranger Battalion. Mucci, from Bridgeport, Connecticut, was a 1936 graduate of the United States Military Academy at West Point. He had three previous years of Army experience and survived the Japanese attack at Pearl Harbor. He was a well-liked, charismatic officer who often smiled but was a strict taskmaster in training and combat.
At first, the 6th Ranger Battalion guarded the field headquarters of Krueger’s 6th Army, but Mucci was determined to lead his forces into battle against the Japanese. Many of these soldiers came from the Midwest and western United States as farm and cattle hands, and had trained in the mountains, tropics, and harsh conditions of New Guinea. Mucci was driven to turn these men into “killers” against the enemy, continually stressing marksmanship, bayoneting, hand-to-hand combat, and a willingness to meet and defeat the Japanese in the field.
An untested force was now ordered to carry out an operation behind enemy lines, in stealth, and with enough power to overwhelm the Japanese guards. Mucci weeded out married men and any soldiers who did not want to serve in the Rangers. Part of the plan to reach Cabanatuan was as follows: “The Rangers would move to Guimba, about seventy-five miles east of base camp, on 28 January and pick up an eighty-man guerrilla force and native guides at a nearby guerrilla camp. They would then march on a route chosen by local civilians and rendezvous with the Alamo Scouts and a second eighty-man guerrilla force at Balincarin, about five miles northeast of the objective, on 29 January. They would complete their plans there and, unless the situation had changed, conduct the operation that night.”
Next week will be the second half of this story that chronicles the “Great Raid.”