The Mighty Moo by Nathan Canestaro

Author:Nathan Canestaro [CANESTARO, NATHAN]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Grand Central Publishing
Published: 2024-06-11T00:00:00+00:00

Manila: “The Best Audience in Asia”

Halsey was surprised by the lack of Japanese resistance in the Central Philippines, and by late September was eager to press his luck. Cowpens and the task group steamed north to the nerve center of Japanese power in the region, Luzon and Manila. It was a target-rich environment, with nineteen airfields capable of hosting more than one thousand planes—and likely better defended than anything the air group had seen. Halsey, as always spoiling for a fight, signaled the fleet: BECAUSE OF THE BRILLIANT PERFORMANCE MY GROUP OF STARS HAS JUST GIVEN, I AM BOOKING YOU TO APPEAR BEFORE THE BEST AUDIENCE IN THE ASIATIC THEATER.10 The Moo’s fliers weren’t nearly so confident; even the normally stoic Clem Craig noted in his journal that they were “heading for Manila and rather expect it to be a hot place.”11

Flying from a launch point off the east coast of Luzon, the Moo hit Manila on the afternoon of the first day of strikes. The Moo’s bombers struck targets on opposite sides of the Pasig River, which bisects the city’s central port area. When they arrived, there were fifty ships of various sizes in the harbor. Sherwin Goodman was a nineteen-year-old Avenger tail gunner from Charleston, Virginia. He described how earlier strikes had already worked these ships over, and he recalled how some “were already afire, and pillars of smoke were rising up several thousand feet.”12 As the Moo’s planes closed in on their targets in the central port district, the city’s antiaircraft batteries put up a spirited defense. As Goodman later described it, “All the way down our glide bombing path the AA bursts were bracketing our plane. I couldn’t hear the bursts but the thick, greasy smoke was everywhere.”13

The Moo’s planes made good drops on the port facilities on the edge of Manila Bay and machine shops on the other side of the river. Goodman’s pilot put his bombs right on target, a large tool and machine plant, and it went up in a flash of smoke and fire. Given the intensity of the flak, the pilots and aircrew counted their blessings that they returned home safely. Seeing planes from other squadrons going down in flames, Sherwin Goodman thought to himself, “There but for the grace of God…”14

The weather soured the following day, September 22, but Halsey, not to be deterred, followed through on his planned strikes. Cowpens mostly had the CAP and ASP duty for the day, although VF-22 provided high cover for the day’s raid on Manila. It was engine failure, not enemy fire, that caused the day’s only loss. One Cowpens Avenger went into the drink twenty-five miles from the task group, and destroyer Dortch rushed to the scene to look for survivors. She fished crewmen D. G. Knight and Donald Robie from the stormy seas, but pilot Ens. Earl Snell, from Columbia, Missouri, was never found.

Halsey ordered Task Force 38 to retire from the area at sunset and steam toward a refueling rendezvous 250 miles to the east of Samar.

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