Rickabee remembered again that Corporal McCoy had not applied for OCS. A report he had written about Japanese troop movements when he worked for Captain Ed Banning in the Fourth Marines in China had come to the attention of General Forrest. Forrest's reaction had been blunt and to the point. "I think we ought to put bars on that corporal's shoulders. Right now he and I are the only two people in The Marine Corps who don't seem to devoutly believe that all Japs are five feet two, wear thick glasses, and that we can whip them with one hand tied behind our backs. Captain Ed Sessions had marched a very reluctant Corporal McCoy before an officer candidate selection board. Before he did that, Captain Sessions had informed the president of the board that if he found reason to reject Corporal McCoy as suitable officer material , he better be prepared to defend that to General Forrest.
"Going off at a tangent, McCoy, accepting what you just said," Rickabee asked, "why do you think the Japanese haven't located and taken out Ferdinand Six?"
"Yeah," Pickering said thoughtfully.
"They know where they are within a mile or so. So the question is really, why haven't they taken them out?"
"OK."
"That's rough terrain. Steep hills, thick jungle. Which also explains why they don't try to take them out with aircraft, it would be a waste of effort. They can't see them from the air, and even if they did, bombing or strafing them would be a waste of effort. And by the time they got within a couple of miles on the ground, the Coast watchers would know about it.
The Coast watchers have natives who know the terrain. They can keep out of the Japs' way. And the Japs know that. They're not stupid.
"They must know what Ferdinand Six is costing them," Pickering said.
"Yes, Sir. But they also know that radios don't function forever in the jungle, and that white men can't live there for any length of time. They're patient, the problem will solve itself."
"You were saying that you think the Japanese have broken the code?"
"What are they using?" McCoy asked, looking at Captain Sessions.
"An old SOI," Sessions offered, meaning Signal Operating Instruction. "When they repeat it, they jump ahead, using Howard's serial number. I think you're right. They've broken it.
"I have no idea what you're talking about," Pickering said.
"General, they have a code book with a different code for each of thirty days," Sessions explained. "When they run past thirty days, they start over again from the beginning. But not in the same sequence this time-not one, two, three. This time, say, if Howard's serial was 56789, they use the code for the fifth day; and the day after that, they count ahead six days, the second number of his serial number. You understand how it works, General?"
"I do now."
"So what I was saying," McCoy went on, "was that even if we got a submarine, found a beach which would take rubber boats, and managed to get the replacement team and their hundred-pound radios ashore, it wouldn't do us any good, because we have no way of letting-Howard and Koffler-know when and where to meet the submarine. If we tried to tell them, we have to assume the Japanese would intercept the message. The Japs would then ambush them on their way to the beach. And they'd be waiting for the submarine to surface."
Colonel F. L. Rickabee was very impressed with Lieutenant K. R. McCoy. Having placed a great deal of confidence in Major Ed Banning's ability, he had not given a great deal of thought to the problems of extracting the-Howard and Koffler-from Buka... until his somewhat strained luncheon the previous afternoon with a somewhat intoxicated and very upset Brigadier General Fleming Pickering.
After giving the problem some hard thought, he had come up with very much the same conclusion that Banning had obviously reached in Australia-that getting those two guys out was impossible. It seemed pretty clear that McCoy had reached the same conclusion now that the facts were available to him.
This should shut Pickering up, Rickabee thought with a great sense of relief. As a veteran of the Makin raid, McCoy was obviously an expert in rubber boat landings. Pickering would accept his judgment. And McCoy was a Mustang: A former Marine would not decide they couldn't go and pick up the dead and wounded unless it was really impossible.
Better he should get this painful truth from McCoy than from me again.
"I gather that you and Major Banning are in agreement, then, McCoy, that there is absolutely nothing we can do for Joe Howard and Steve Koffler?" General Pickering asked, his voice now sounding very tired.
"No, Sir," McCoy said. "I didn't say that."
"Well then, goddamn it, let's have it!"
"I thought of two ways we might be able to carry this off," McCoy said.
"One's kind of wild."
"Let's hear it, McCoy."
"I started out with the submarine idea," McCoy said.
"Christ, there's so much I don't know!"
"We can get answers. Go ahead," Pickering said.
"Yes, Sir. OK. Step one. We find a beach that will take boats. Depending on what the surf and the beach are like when we get there, we put ashore the radios, the replacement Marines, and an Australian Coastwatcher. We'll also bring one, or better, two natives who know the island and can find Ferdinand Six. If the surf is bad, we just put the natives ashore. We don't try to land the radios and the replacement team. Then the natives find Ferdinand Six and tell them where the submarine will be probably a different beach. Maybe with a little bit of luck, there would be native boats to go out to the submarine-"
"I like it," General Pickering said, looking triumphantly at Colonel Rickabee.
Oh, shit! Rickabee thought.
"Then," McCoy went on, "as I was thinking about that, I had a wild hare."
And how, Lieutenant McCoy, Rickabee wondered, would you describe your previous "Errol Flynn Fights the Nasty Nips" idea as a tame hare?
"Well'?"
"Use an R4D, just go in, off-load the replacement team and radios, and pick up the guys that are there," McCoy said.
"I thought it was pretty well established that there was no airfield."
"There's beaches," McCoy said. "Maybe there's the right kind of sand, packed so it will take an R4D."
"I don't think so," Sessions said.
"You're talking about landing an R4D on a beach?" Rickabee asked incredulously. "It would just sink in."
"I've been nosing around for the Mongolian Operation," McCoy said. "We can make that flight only one time. If the Japs see the plane, we have to hope they think it was some guy just got lost. But if two planes got lost, they would be very suspicious. So we're going to have to take everything we'll need in with us and get it safely on the ground. And it's a one-way ride; there's no way the plane can get out again. So the question came up-they're still talking about it-of what to do with the airplane."
"I have no idea what you're talking about, McCoy," Pickering said.
"General, I'll have the Mongolia file in your hands this afternoon," Rickabee said.
"I want to hear about it now."
"General, we're getting into Need to Know," Rickabee said, gesturing toward Dillon and Hart.
"I'll decide who needs to know what," Pickering said icily.
"Go on, McCoy."
"Sir, we're setting up a weather observation station in the Mongolian desert. The only way we can get in is by air. So they're going to add auxiliary fuel tanks to an R4D that will give us the necessary range from the Aleutian Islands-"
"The Japanese hold Attu in the Aleutians," Pickering interrupted.