May 6th, 1942...USS Washington anchors in 11 fathoms of water in Scapa Flow, and takes on 355,404 gallons of fuel from the oiler Kaweah. That ship is followed by store ship Mizar, which delivers beef, fresh vegetables, fresh milk, and ice cream for the battleship.
USS Yorktown and USS Lexington hook up in the Coral Sea, and continue to fuel while seaplanes of both sides hunt for each other. At 10:30 am, B-17s from Australia contact the Covering Group headed for Port Moresby, and attack, their bombs falling wide. By midnight, the Japanese are ready to take Misma and Deboyne Islands, two pinpricks in the Louisiade Achipelago between the Solomons and New Guinea.
At the US Pacific Fleet’s codebreaking office in Pearl Harbor, code-named “Hypo,” the continuing argument between Washington and Hawaii over the Japanese target code-named “AF,” finally comes to a boil.
Rochefort comes to two of his officers, Cdr. Jasper Holmes and Ensign Mac Showers, and tells Holmes, “Jasper, we’ve got to do something to prove to the world that ‘AF’ is Midway.”
Rochefort and Holmes discuss the subject in front of Showers, and Holmes comes up with an idea that helps turn the tide of the war. A former engineering professor at the University of Hawaii, Holmes was called upon in his pre-war days by the Navy to survey the fresh-water situation on Midway. From his work, he learned that atolls like Midway lack enough land mass to provide fresh water, so they require distillation plants as the sole means of providing fresh water. Holmes suggests sending a message by the undersea cable to Midway – which still works, obviating the need for radio traffic to the island, making the Japanese think nothing is going on at Midway at all – saying that Midway report by radio to Hawaii, that the distillation plant has suffered a breakdown and the island has fresh water for only two weeks.
If the Japanese are really interested in Midway, they will pass radio message traffic on the subject through their chains of command and act upon the news. Rochefort says, “Very good, Jasper. Very good.” Then he goes back to his secure telephone and briefs Cdr. Edwin Layton on Nimitz’s staff, who takes the idea to Nimitz. Within the hour, Nimitz approves the plan.
The message is duly sent to Midway by cable, the old Trans-Pacific line, which connects Midway with Guam. Oddly enough, the line to Japanese-occupied Guam still works, so the communications crew at Midway periodically relieves the boredom by sending an obscenity to Guam. A few minutes later, angry-sounding gibberish clatters back.
In the pre-dawn hours on Corregidor, Japanese troops push towards the Malinta Tunnel, against fierce but uncoordinated opposition. The Americans have more than 15,000 men on Corregidor, 5,000 of them paperchasers in the Malinta Tunnel, but very few fighters, so they cannot organize a major counterattack. The Japanese are frustrated, too, having lost two-thirds of their landing craft. The Japanese have 21 boats to move 14,000 men. General Homma is thrown into an "agony of mind" by American ferocity.
But by dawn, the battle reaches its climax at Water Tank Hill, as O and P companies of 4th Marines counterattack, backed by the few remaining guns, which are now manned by cooks, clerks, and radiomen. US Navy Lt. Charles Brook, who has wondered since boyhood what it would be like to charge an enemy, gets his dream, but also gets a leg mangled by a grenade. By 9 am, the Americans are bogged down, as Japanese artillery takes over. By 10, the Japanese finally unload tanks on their beach. The Japanese now can drive into the Malinta Tunnel and massacre the nurses and wounded.
The Americans have no antitank weapons. Corregidor is finished...there are no reserves, no guns left, and Wainwright has a message from President Roosevelt saying that Wainwright "and your devoted followers have become the living symbols of our war aims and the guarantee of victory."
Wainwright gives the codeword "Pontiac" ordering his men to destroy their weapons and raise white flags. Col. Howard will become the first officer to ever surrender a US Marine Regiment. All across the island, US troops destroy their weapons or raid the remaining food and liquor stocks.
The Japanese send word that they will only deal with Wainwright. With his aide, Maj. Tom Dooley, Wainwright drives to Water Tank Hill and climbs on foot to the Japanese positions, noting that there are three Japanese dead for every American. The Japanese take Wainwright by launch to Cabcaben in Bataan. Homma arrives in a shiny Cadillac and in perfect English demands Wainwright surrender all the Philippines. Wainwright refuses. Homma says he will send Wainwright back to Bataan to "do what you damn well please," and continue fighting. The exhausted Wainwright draws up a surrender of the entire archipelago, and signs it just before midnight. The Japanese take the exhausted Wainwright back to Corregidor, and he flings himself on his cot, exhausted, reviewing the bitterest and most humiliating day of his life.
Incredibly, crewmen from the minesweeper USS Quail, under their skipper, Lt. Cdr. John H. Morrill, escape Fort Hughes in a 36-foot long diesel motor launch, and sail all the way to Port Darwin, Australia.
In Madagascar, the 29th British Brigade attacks the Vichy French, who are using shipwrecked Sailors to add to their land defenses. The British have advanced 18 miles in 24 hours, and both sides exchange gunfire in the tropical heat. One French battalion marches north and surrenders. That evening, the British attack the French trenches, while the destroyer HMS Anthony, loaded with 60 Marines, heads into Antsirane harbor in a daring coup de main. The destroyer sails into harbor at 10 pm and, brilliantly handled, avoids French guns. The Royal Marines seize artillery headquarters and the main barracks.
Time to retreat in Burma for Gen. Joseph Stilwell and his Chinese troops, who have to abandon their vehicles. "Abandoned the trucks, harangued the troops, and went to Magyigan while the chow was shifted. Of course, no rafts, coolies all gone down stream already. Ten days to get rafts. Down to next village and saw headman. Hired 60 carriers for tomorrow. Good eggs here. Papayas. We go two days on foot, then on boats to Homalin. If we push hard we can make it. By chance a herd of pack horses came by and we took off after them and captures them. Oh boy, what a break." Stilwell is past the age of 60.
