The Ghost Mountain Boys - James E. Campbell [103]
Chapter 15
THE BUTCHER’S BILL
BACK AT DOBODURA, GENERAL HARDING had just gotten the news of Stutterin’ Smith’s success. In the big picture, the breakthrough did not amount to much. Buna Village and Buna Government Station had not been touched. With the rest of the 126th—the 1st and 3rd Battalions were still fighting alongside the Australians west of the Girua River—Harding figured that he might have been able to overwhelm the Japanese. But without a numerical advantage, he would have to continue probing their positions for a weak spot. It was a slow, costly business that was bound to keep the grave diggers busy.
On the coast, his 128th Infantry Regiment was bogged down, too. Though Colonel Mott had shaken things up by relieving two officers, the change did nothing to affect the tactical situation. The Japanese were dug in too well. Only tanks or more troops would change that.
Earlier that morning, as Stutterin’ Smith’s troops pressed the attack, General Sutherland flew in from Port Moresby and Australia’s General Herring came in from Popondetta to meet with Harding. Though they had ostensibly come to discuss battle strategies, from Harding’s perspective, the generals had already reached their own conclusions. Sitting on empty ammunition boxes under a small grove of trees at the edge of a kunai field, neither Sutherland nor Herring appeared very interested in listening. But Harding continued to press the issue. Having already argued for tanks and artillery, he asked for the 127th Infantry, which had arrived in Port Moresby on Thanksgiving Day. He reminded the generals that he barely had a third of his 126th Regiment.
By lunchtime, Herring was on his way back to Popondetta. Sutherland, though, stayed on. He and Harding were making small talk when suddenly Sutherland dropped his bomb: MacArthur, he said, was “worried about the caliber of his infantry” and the aggressiveness of its officers. Sutherland wanted to know how Harding intended to rectify the situation. The general bluntly defended his men. Anyone, he said, who thought that his troops were not fighting “didn’t know the facts.” Sutherland then asked him if he intended to replace any of his top officers. Harding replied that he did not.
Sutherland had heard enough. That afternoon he returned to Port Moresby and recommended to MacArthur that he relieve Harding of his duties. What was lacking at Buna, Sutherland said, was not artillery, troops, tanks, or planes. What was missing was inspired leadership. That Sutherland had not even been to the front lines to assess the situation did not prevent him from commenting on Harding’s alleged inability to motivate his men. Harding would later say that Sutherland’s report to MacArthur must have been a “masterpiece of imaginative writing.”
MacArthur had already ordered Major General Robert L. Eichelberger, I Corps commander, to report to him in Port Moresby. MacArthur had great faith in the general. If anyone could remedy the situation at Buna, it was Bob Eichelberger.
Though he had never commanded troops in battle, Eichelberger’s résumé was top-notch. Early in his career, he had served in Panama and on the U.S.-Mexico border. Later, at the tail end of World War I, while assigned to the American Expeditionary Force in Siberia, he had been awarded the Distinguished Service Cross for acts of bravery. Having attended the Command and General Staff College at Fort Leavenworth and the Army War College, after which he became superintendent of West Point, Eichelberger possessed superb leadership and organizational skills and a keen understanding of military theory.
On November 29 when MacArthur summoned him, Eichelberger was at Rockhampton, Australia, training the 41st Division in jungle warfare. Early the next morning, as Sutherland was on his way to Dobodura to talk with Harding, Eichelberger boarded a plane for Port Moresby.
At MacArthur’s headquarters, Eichelberger and his chief of staff found MacArthur with Generals Kenney and Sutherland. Sutherland had already told MacArthur of his meeting with Harding,