Jeff Shaara - The Frozen Hours

“Sir, do you play chess?”

Smith nursed the pipe, soaking up the wonderful aroma. “Once or twice. Not good at it.”

Craig chuckled. “I’ll bet. Remind me never to play you. You checkmated Almond pretty effectively.”

Smith shrugged, pulled at the pipe again. “Not really. I’m not too sure that what Tokyo has in mind will contradict what Almond’s been ordering us to do, what he still expects us to do. It sounds like MacArthur has finally noticed that eighty-mile gap between us and Eighth Army.”

“But what’s the threat? G-2 keeps telling us that all those Chinese we ran into are a figment of our imagination. Almond still seems to believe that.”

Smith held the pipe in his hands, shook his head. “I don’t have the first idea what General Almond believes. But he wants to keep this show for himself, wants us to claim as much glory as anyone else in winning the war. If MacArthur tells him to reinforce Eighth Army, he will. But unless they tell him just how to do that, he’ll spread us out even further. Count on it.”

Craig slumped, his elbows on the small desk. “Where do you suppose the Chinese have gone?”

Smith poked at the dying embers in the pipe. “Nowhere. Litzenberg feels them in his bones, knows he’s being watched every step he takes.”

“I know. He told me that. We took a ride out near his vanguard, met a recon patrol just coming back in. They saw enemy on every hilltop but couldn’t get close enough to get any more details. I tell you, sir, Litz is a nervous wreck. Every night, they get ready for another attack. If he’s that nervous, I’m guessing his men feel it, too. The quicker we can move Murray up in support, the better. And Puller…”

“We’ll get Puller. Even MacArthur knows that if they keep Puller for nothing but mop-up duty, Lewie’s gonna blow up in somebody’s face. It won’t be mine.”

Craig laughed again. “And Almond will avoid Puller’s wrath, and make sure Third Division gets their share of the headlines. Two birds with one stone, and he wins both ways. You and your chess game.”

“If you say so. Have we heard from General Barr?”

“Seventh Division? Not lately. The army doesn’t go out of its way to talk to us.”

Smith tapped the spent pipe on the edge of the desk. “He will. Barr’s a part of this, too, and he’s no happier with Almond than I am. They have to include the ROK in any drive to the Yalu, and I don’t think Tokyo trusts them to push hard without the army’s help. Seventh Division is on our right flank, and they won’t just sit still while we get the glory.” He paused. “I have to tell you, Eddie. I hate politics. But this war is too complicated to be left to generals.”

Craig laughed again. “Tell that to MacArthur.”

Smith didn’t laugh. “He’s bombing civilians, you know. Taking out villages all over North Korea, in the name of squashing the North Korean army. Almond said as much right here. Bridges, sure, they’re a tactical target. But villages? He calls them hiding places for the enemy. What do those civilians call them? Home . I can’t believe that any North Korean is happy there are Chinese soldiers in their front yard. The civilians we’ve seen so far seem happy as the dickens that we’re here. We start wiping out villages, bombing targets indiscriminately, those same civilians will turn against us. All those guerrillas we’re supposed to be dealing with are leftovers from the North Korean army. But if their civilians join in the fight, or worse, if they decide the Chinese are the better option, things get a whole lot tougher.”

Craig looked at him, seemed puzzled. “How? If there are as many Chinese out there as Litzenberg believes, that’s trouble enough. How much harm can angry civilians do?”

Smith slipped the pipe into his pocket. “Poisoned water wells. Snipers on every hillside. Scorched earth waiting for us everywhere we try to march. On Okinawa, the Japanese made great use of Okinawan civilians to do their dirty work, freeing up the soldiers for the fight. Same thing could happen here. The Chinese would welcome North Koreans willingly carrying their lunch for them.”

Craig had lost the smile now. “Hadn’t really thought of it that way.”

“Neither has Tokyo. But I bet General Lowe has made a point of this to the president. It’s our job to kill the enemy’s soldiers. After that, it’s the government’s job to make the enemy’s civilians happy. We don’t help that process if we’ve massacred the helpless.”

HUNGNAM, NORTH KOREA—NOVEMBER 15, 1950

As Almond promised, the orders came once again, exactly as Smith expected. To the east, closer to the coastline, ROK units were to advance as rapidly as possible to the Yalu, thus granting them the full propaganda value of liberating their fellow Koreans from the grip of the oppressive communist government. The American army would move in support of the ROKs, primarily units of Barr’s Seventh Division. Once the ROKs had wet their toes, it opened the way for the rest of the UN forces, primarily the Americans, to finish their drive to the river as well, sweeping away any enemy troops they encountered along the way. As Smith predicted, Tokyo insisted that the Marines begin to shift their march more to the west, closing the gap between Tenth Corps’ left flank and the right of Eighth Army, who would be making their own drive northward. That task would fall to Litzenberg’s Seventh. But Almond had held tightly to his own ambitions to have Tenth Corps shove their way north. At the base of the Chosin Reservoir, the town of Hagaru-ri spread out around a fork in the main road, which provided a route up both sides of the reservoir. With Litzenberg moving up the left side, Murray’s Fifth Regiment would slide up to the east. While Litzenberg would satisfy MacArthur’s apparent nervousness about closing the gap to their west, Murray’s Fifth would continue the push as rapidly as possible toward the Yalu, which just might allow Ned Almond to claim bragging rights as to which troops had reached that goal first.

Through all the machinations, Oliver Smith recognized with increasing discomfort that his troops had been spread out like soft butter on an enormous slice of bread. To his relief, Tenth Corps had indeed ordered the army’s Third Division to take control of the area patrolled by Chesty Puller’s Marines. Immediately Puller was ordered to advance his First Regiment northward, first to secure the ground around the towns of Sudong and Chinhung-ni, and eventually to continue toward Koto-ri, filling in the gap left open by the advance of the rest of Smith’s division.

The great supply dump at Koto-ri was only one of several all along the lengthy route from the seaports to the south. Though Ned Almond seemed completely oblivious to the hazards of supplying his troops along such a narrow and vulnerable route, Smith took the precaution of creating more of these supply depots in every place that could be fortified and protected. With the cooperation of the navy’s supply teams, enormous convoys were pushed northward, Smith intending that they extend all the way to the base of the reservoir. If more were required farther north, he would create those as well.

The maps showed clearly that Hagaru-ri was a crucial intersection, where the Marines would divide their forces in two directions. It was obvious to Smith that the town be fortified as strongly as any along the way, and once Puller’s Marines had reached Koto-ri, some fourteen miles to the south of Hagaru-ri, Smith could then position several of his own units, along with army and other UN forces made available to him, to reinforce and support the advances northward Almond had ordered.

Throughout all the planning, Smith was becoming increasingly concerned that Tokyo and Tenth Corps seemed unwilling to accept that there was an enemy in front of them still, whether or not the reconnaissance efforts had discovered just where they were. The euphoria that spread through the entire theater after the success at Inchon seemed to return, Ned Almond’s optimism reinforced by the same spirit coming from Tokyo. The bloodying of the First Cavalry and the Marines’ confrontation with the Chinese at Sudong had seemed to fade from the memory of the strategic planners in Tokyo. Even more alarming to Smith, MacArthur’s intelligence officers, under General Charles Willoughby, had once again trumpeted their claim that whatever Chinese forces the army and Marines had confronted were minimal in strength and unlikely to pose any additional threats.