W.E.B. Griffin - The Corps VII - Behind the Lines

When there was no reply all day, it seemed logical to assume that despite Sergeant LaMadrid's best efforts, he had been unable to jury-rig a transmitter that would reach the three thousand-plus miles to Australia.

[SIX]

Signal Section

Office of the Military Governor for Mindanao

Cagayan de Oro, Misamis-Oriental Province

Mindanao, Commonwealth of the Philippines

1600 Hours 10 October 1942

When Captain Matsuo Saikaku marched into his office, Lieutenant Hideyori rose from behind his desk, placed his hands, fingers extended and together, against the seam of his khaki trousers, and bowed from the waist.

Hideyori's office formerly belonged to the General Manager of the Min-danao branch office of the Mackay Telephone and Telegraph Company. As he stood up, a large wall clock bearing the Mackay logotype began to strike the hour.

"I understand you have intercepted some kind of radio message?" Saikaku demanded after he had returned the bow.

"Yes, Sir."

Saikaku impatiently put out his hand. Hideyori handed him a sheet of paper.

MFS FOR US FORCES AUSTRALIA

MFS FOR US FORCES AUSTRALIA

ACNOW BRTSS DXSYT QRSHJ ERASH

POFTP QOPOQ CHTFS SDHST ALITS

CGHRZ QMSGL QROTZ VABCG LSTYE

ACNOW BRTSS DXSYT QRSHJ ERASH

POFTP QOPOQ CHTFS SDHST ALITS

CGHRZ QMSGL QROTX VABCG LSTYE

MFS STANDING BY FOR US FORCES AUSTRALIA

MFS STANDING BY FOR US FORCES AUSTRALIA

"That message is being transmitted hourly, Sir, in the twenty-meter band," Hideyori said.

"For how many hours?"

"The first message we intercepted was at ten o'clock this morning, Sir. They send the message repeatedly, for a period of three minutes."

"Do you know from where?"

"No, Sir."

"I was led to believe, Hideyori, that it is within the capability of compe-tent signals people to locate the site of a transmitter by a process known as triangulation. Have I been misinformed?"

"No, Sir."

"Has this triangulation detection process begun?" "No, Sir. There is some difficulty with two of the trucks, Sir."

"What sort of difficulty?"

"Mechanical difficulty. Sir."

"I really didn't think it would be spiritual difficulty, Hideyori."

"Mechanical, Sir, as opposed to electrical. I have been informed the me-chanical trouble will be remedied first thing tomorrow."

"Who told you this?"

"Captain Kuroshio of the Transportation Section, Sir."

"Be so good as to get Captain Kuroshio on the telephone, Hideyori."

"Yes, Sir."

Lieutenant Hideyori sat down, hastily consulted a mimeographed tele-phone book, dialed a number, spoke briefly with whoever answered, and then handed the telephone to Captain Saikaku.

"Captain Kuroshio is being called to the phone, Sir," he reported. Saikaku took the telephone and waited, an impatient look on his face, until Captain Kuroshio came on the line.

"This is Captain Saikaku of the Kempeitai," he announced. "Lieutenant Hideyori informs me you are in the process of repairing two trucks. These trucks are required for a Kempeitai operation. Required immediately. I want the necessary repairs to them begun immediately, and continued until the trucks are operating, if that means your mechanics work through the night. Do you understand me?"

He listened to the reply, and then hung up.

"As soon as the trucks are made available to you, Hideyori," he ordered, "I want them manned around the clock. The sooner we locate this station, the sooner we can shut it down."

"Yes, Sir."

"What is your opinion of the message? The code?"

"I don't know what you mean, Sir."

"How soon can I expect to know what message these people are sending?"

"Sir, I took the liberty of sending the message to the Signals Intelligence Branch in Manila, asking them to attempt to decrypt the message."

"You did this on your own authority?"

"Yes, Sir. I believed it to be the thing to do."

"You are to be commended on your initiative, Hideyori," Saikaku said.

"Thank you, Sir."

"Be so good as to inform the Signals Intelligence Branch that there is Kempeitai interest in this message."

"Yes, Sir."

"And inform them that as a suggestion to help in their decryption efforts-you better write this down, Hideyori-that the message may contain the words 'Fertig,"Brigadier,"General,' and 'U.S. Forces.' Fertig is a name. The other words may be abbreviated."

"I'm sure Signals Intelligence Branch will be pleased to have your sug-gestion, Sir."

"As soon as you have word on your trucks, or from Signals Intelligence, or of any development at all, inform me. Call my office, they will know where to locate me."

"Yes, Sir."

"What we have here, Hideyori, is a weed. If we pull it from the earth now, that will be the end of it. If it is allowed to grow, it will become an increasing nuisance."

"I understand, Sir."

"One final thing, Hideyori. Have your radio operators on the watch for messages addressed to MFS."

"I have already ordered that, Sir."

"Good," Saikaku said, then turned and walked out of Lieutenant Hide-yori's office.

[SEVEN]

Headquarters, U.S. Forces in the Philippines

Davao Oriental Province

Mindanao, Commonwealth of the Philippines

1815 Hours 10 October 1942

Lieutenant Ball heard through his earphones the sound of the carrier and then a string of dot and dashes.

His heart beating and with tears in his eyes, he wrote down the letters:

MFS KFS MFS KFS

LPORD GHDSG NGFGP JKOWR DKLHI WRHFS SUHIO SWERI LPORD GHDSG NGFGP JKOWR DKLHI WRHFS SUHIO SWERI KFS CLR KFS CLR

Prior to his attachment to Headquarters, USFIP, Ball had been a radio op-erator. He recognized the call sign of the answering station. "That's not Australia. It's a Navy Station. I think Hawaii." The message, when decoded, was brief:

STAND BY AT 0600 YOUR TIME

[EIGHT]

Lieutenant Ball erred in part. While KFS was indeed a Navy radio station, it was not in Hawaii, but rather at the U.S. Navy Base, Mare Island, near San Francisco.

And there the radio message had attracted the interest of a veteran chief radioman.

"What the hell is this, Chief?" nineteen-year-old Radioman Third Class Daniel J. Miller, USN, asked, handing it to Dugan. "It's been coming in every hour on the hour in the twenty-meter band. Since yesterday."

The Chief examined the message.

"Whatever it is," he said. "It was encoded on an old Model 94. That sec-ond code group means 'Emergency SOI' "

"What's a Model 94?"

"An old-time crypto machine. They don't use them anymore," the Chief said thoughtfully.

"Maybe the Japs captured one on Wake Island or someplace and are fucking with us."

"What's an emergency SOI?"

"It means you don't have a valid signal-operating instruction, so use the Emergency One," the Chief said absently, and then, thinking aloud, "And maybe they ain't."

"Maybe aren't what?"

"Fucking with us."

"Then what the hell is this?" Miller asked.

"I don't know," the Chief said. "But I'm going to find out."

He consulted a typewritten list of telephone numbers taped to the slide in his desk, found the number of the Communications Section of the Presidio of San Francisco Army Base, and dialed it.

"Commo, Sergeant Havell."

"Chief Dugan. Let me speak to Sergeant Piedwell."

"What can the Army do for the Navy?"

"You're always telling me what hot shits you doggies are."

"Statement of fact, Chief."

"If I was to send you something encrypted on a Model 94, could you work it?"

"If I had a Model 94,1 could. What's this?"

"You got one, or not?"

"Yeah, there's one in the vault. I saw it last week and wondered what the hell we were still doing with it."

"I'm going to send a fine young man named Miller over there with a mes-sage that needs decryption. Out of school, OK, Piedwell?"