Yasuyuki Kasai - Dragon of the Mangroves

“How many boats did you get?”

“Five, sir. We also got a Burmese steersman for each,” answered Yoshioka.

“Good! Take me to where they are.”

Following the two, he passed through meandering alleys between many scruffy private houses and reached the waterfront.

The five boats were moored at a floating bridge installed to connect several elevated houses. All were rather crude sportfishing boats with no special equipment. Each hull was small, and the loading capacity was limited to about twenty men for each. However hard it would be, the soldiers would have to pack themselves in like baggage. Sumi also noticed that all five were very ragged and old.

Almost all the paint had long since worn off. And the diesel engines were no more than patchy conversions from British secondhand trucks.

Sumi was disappointed.

Pondgi said nonchalantly with a carefree smile, “Master Sumi, are you worried because the ships are old? They are surely old, but they are well maintained. The engines are powerful, and the steersmen are trained, the same as Japanese soldiers. They know the Burmese seas, and they go everywhere.”

Sumi forced a smile and then thanked them for their efforts. “Well done. You did a good job in this short time. I’m pleased to get such nice boats.” It wasn’t a dig. Nothing was more important than a fast departure.

Sumi returned to the open space and heard Shimizu report that his men had completed all preparations: provisions, arms, ammunition, medical supplies, Burmese attire for disguise, and so forth. Everything was ready. They said Second Lieutenant Kakegawa, Sumi’s sidekick from the same reserve officer candidate school, had come from the 121st Infantry Regiment HQ and even taught them how to use the Sten gun. Due to deficiencies in nine-millimeter pistol cartridges, live firing exercises had been short, but every tankette gunner had learned it.

Sumi was delighted at the news, to say nothing of Kakegawa’s favor.

Also, two signalmen with a type five transmitter-receiver had come from Tankette Fifth Company HQ to join them, thanks to Captain Yoda’s generosity. In addition, Pondgi introduced a thin Burmese to Sumi. His name was Manboy.

Manboy said he knew the Heywood Channel well and would like to pilot them.

Sumi approved without reluctance.

However, they had ended up with a big group of sixteen: one commander, one vice-commander, twelve rank-and-files including two signalmen, and two Burmese. Considering they must take in garrison soldiers on their way back, he saw the number as too big. Sumi remembered Takahashi, his batman, was an only son and the heir of a farmhouse. He took off his sword silently and handed it over to Takahashi. “When you go back to the unit, put this in my trunk.”

Takahashi realized that his commander was leaving him behind. “Please, take me with you, Lieutenant,” Takahashi pleaded in an almost tearful voice. Sumi shook his head dryly. If Takahashi should get killed, the line of his family would die out.

“No. This duty is too tough for a greenhorn like you. And listen, everybody. A long-distance march is ahead of us. We don’t need the old holding us up.” Sumi picked two elder draftees among them. Each of them managed a household.

“You’d better leave the party. From now, you are under the command of First Squad. Right?”

All three said they wanted to go, but Sumi didn’t listen to their protests. He knew full well they were delighted to escape from a dangerous duty. Still, they had to make it seem as though they were disappointed. It was the etiquette of the armed forces.

Shimizu suggested that Sumi carry a sword, but Sumi turned a deaf ear to his advice. Every Japanese officer obtained a sword at his own expense and boastfully dangled it from a belt. Even a Navy admiral carried a sword as a matter of course, the dress code required it. Sumi didn’t like that and even thought it absurd. He could never understand why the Navy, whose battles were centered on operating machines, needed swords. Anyway, a Japanese sword was unfit for a Burmese disguise.

He clasped his leather belt again. With his ancestral sword detached, it was much lighter now, which also lightened his mind somewhat. Even if he were to die on the foreign island, his family’s precious sword could return home and not fall into enemy hands.

Everything was ready. He looked over the faces of his crew. “I’m going to report to the company commander. As soon as I’m back, we’ll move out. Change clothes and wait for me at the floating bridge.”

The sun had set, and the dark water of the Taungup River flowed quietly.

When Sumi arrived at the 121st Infantry Regiment HQ, Captain Yoda wasn’t there, unfortunately. But it was soon arranged that Colonel Nagashima, the 121st Infantry Regiment commander, would meet with him to get a report instead. An orderly guided Sumi to a shack, which seemed like his office. There he found a map of Ramree Island pinned up on a wall. It was a detailed one, drawn on a scale of one to fifty thousand. Many signs and arrows, standing for the courses of both armies, were scribbled on it in colored pencil. The complexity of interwoven red and blue lines showed the agony of a commander who had gotten by in difficult situations.

A few minutes later, Colonel Nagashima came into the shack. He was a tall man who wore glasses and had a gentle look. A flame of a taper on an old writing desk reflected on his lenses.

After listening to Sumi’s report, Nagashima said calmly, “The garrison has often offered opinions. Their main intention is defending the island to the death by guerilla wars. But I don’t want to let them do it. Here we made every effort to minimize the death toll. The garrison commander will carry out the creek-crossing operation on the night of the eighteenth, the day after tomorrow. I have already requested the Fifth Air Division to dispatch aircraft that day.

Although enemies are swarming around in the sea and on land, I want you to make it out with the garrison and save as many of them as possible.”

He continued, “To tell you the truth, I’m sorry to force such a duty on an officer like you, however supreme the division order may be.”

Concerned for Sumi, Nagashima gave him three packs of cigarettes.

After leaving the HQ, Sumi reflected on Colonel Nagashima’s words under twinkling stars. He thought it was lucky for Ramree Garrison to have such a commander. The fate of every soldier rested on his commander. In those days, many friendly garrisons had been wiped out after resisting until death in Pacific solitary islands like Attu or Leyte. Even soldiers in Burma circulated rumors about those terrible scenes and feared they might follow the same fate.

Ramree, in fact, wasn’t a solitary island like those on the Pacific Ocean. It was closer to a holm or a bottomland, rather than an island. But it made no difference either way. Removed from the main force by the steep mountains of Arakan and the countless creeks, it was the same isolated front line.

The agony of the garrison was much the same. No matter how ridiculous the order to swim across a sea full of enemies might be, being part of a rescue would be much better than being annihilated helplessly. Sumi couldn’t deny that he had received a significant duty in the very battlefield where destruction and massacres were everyday affairs.

“Listen, men! Our destination is Ramree Island. We head there to help Second Battalion of the 121st Infantry Regiment evacuate to the mainland!”

Sumi loudly briefed members of the rescue party standing in a row. Everyone had disguised himself as a Burmese, putting on a white shirt and wrapping around a lungi, the tubular loincloth that was part of Burmese clothing culture.

Their faces were well tanned, and only their eyes gave away their hesitation. With Sten guns under their arms, they gave an impression of statelessness rather than Burmese.