Iwo, 26 Charlie by P. T. Deutermann

Author:P. T. Deutermann
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: St. Martin's Publishing Group

FOURTEEN

After another forty-five minutes we came in view of the sea. We were challenged by a perimeter guard consisting of two machine gun nests. It wasn’t a vigorous challenge—in the daylight it must have been obvious we were friendlies. Goon went ahead and begged for water. There were only six canteens between the two nests, but that was enough to give everyone two swallows. Fifteen minutes later two battered-looking AMTRACs came clattering up the beach to collect the wounded and deliver more water. The rest of us collapsed at the shoreline at the bottom of the terraces and concentrated on drinking that water.

Behind us, the daily roar of combat rose throughout the interior. There were support ships visible offshore—destroyers, attack cargo ships, a hospital ship with its big red crosses, and several transports. A steady stream of boat traffic churned through the surf about a half mile down the beach. A dozen AMTRACs were clustered at the shore, picking up supplies and dropping off wounded. I watched for a while, and then fell asleep in the growing sunlight.

Goon shook me awake in what seemed like five minutes; it was actually just after noon.

“Regiment has a mission for us,” he said.

“Aoomph,” I said. “No.”

Goon grinned. “C’mon, Loot—you’re famous now. Whole fucking island saw that ammo dump go. Now they want you to go work the Meat Grinder.”

I sat up and tried to get the sand out of my eyes, literally and figuratively. A cloud of blowflies rose off my utilities; all the rotting corpses had spawned a billion of them, and they weren’t choosy as to whether you were alive or dead.

There was frantic activity on both sides of where we’d collapsed. I saw the gunny passing out bandoliers of ammo to the remains of his platoon. Chewed to pieces as they were, they were going back on The Line. Amazing. Someone had started a small fire in the sand, where the platoon was heating something called 10-in-1 rations. Suddenly I was famished.

After eating and then scoring new (and dry!) socks, two full canteens, and a reworked Thompson submachine gun, Goon and I caught an AMTRAC that was headed up to the regimental CP. The wind coming out of the northwest felt wet; I reminded myself to get a poncho before going back up to The Line. There was enough mist and spray out at sea that we couldn’t see the gunships anymore. The wind was coming in onshore, so for once the horrible smell abated.

We made our way back up through the dunes to the regimental CP, which had moved north to be closer to what was developing into what looked like, we hoped, the last stand on the eastern end of their main line of defense. This was on the other end of the island from Suribachi, in a sector where the Japanese had reportedly been extra busy building out their positions. Suribachi was a natural defensive position, seriously high ground concealing a honeycomb of caves, lava tubes, and huge cracks in solidified lava formations.

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