Griffin W.E.B. - The Corps 09 - Under Fire

I HAD THE FEELING THAT BOTH COLLINS AND SHERMAN ENTERED THE MEETING STRONGLY OPPOSED ESPECIALLY TO THE IN-CHON LANDING (THE TIDES ARGUMENT, WITH WHICH YOU ARE FAMILIAR), AND GENERALLY OPPOSED TO ANY AMPHIBIOUS OPERATION UNTIL THE SITUATION IN THE PUSAN PERIMETER IS STABILIZED, PRIMARILY BE-CAUSE THE INCHON INVASION WILL REQUIRE THE USE OF THE MARINES NOW FIGHTING IN THE PUSAN PERIMETER.

I ALSO FELT THAT WHILE COLLINS LEFT THE MEETING UNSWAYED BY MACARTHUR'S-IN MY OPINION-COGENT AND BRILLIANT EXPLA-NATION OF WHY INCHON WAS THE RIGHT THING TO DO, SHERMAN HAD COME AROUND TO AT LEAST PARTIAL APPROVAL OF THE INCHON OPERATION. HE SAID NOTHING TO THIS EFFECT, BUT THE QUESTIONS HE ASKED OF MACARTHUR INDICATED HE DID NOT THINK INCHON IS AS HAREBRAINED AS COLLINS MADE CLEAR HE THINKS IT IS.

COLLINS VERY SKILLFULLY GAVE MACARTHUR THE OPPORTUNITY TO LAY THE BLAME FOR OUR INITIAL REVERSES ON GENERAL WALKER. MACARTHUR STATED VERY CLEARLY THAT HE BELIEVED WALKER "HAD DONE AND IS DOING A REMARKABLE JOB, GIVEN WHAT HE HAS BEEN FACING AND WHAT HE HAS TO FACE IT WITH."

IF IT WAS COLLINS'S INTENTION TO HAVE MACARTHUR ACQUIESCE IN THE RELIEF OF WALKER, EITHER BECAUSE HE BELIEVES THAT WALKER HASN'T MEASURED UP, OR BE-CAUSE HIS RELIEF WOULD ALLOW HIM TO GIVE RIDGWAY, OR SOMEONE ELSE OF HIS LIKING, THE JOB, HE FAILED.

VERY EARLY THIS MORNING, GENERAL HOWE CALLED ME FROM KOREA ON A LINE THAT WE SUSPECTED WAS NOT AS SECURE AS WE WOULD HAVE LIKED. HE SAID THAT HE WOULD COMMUNICATE HIS THOUGHTS ON HIS MISSION THERE TO YOU AS SOON AS POSSI-BLE, BUT THAT, IF I SHOULD COMMUNICATE WITH YOU BEFORE HE WAS ABLE TO, I SHOULD GIVE YOU THE FOLLOWING MESSAGE:

"FROM WHAT I SEE, A CHANGE OF LEADER-SHIP AT THIS TIME WOULD BE UNJUSTIFIED AND ILL-ADVISED."

IT IS MY OPINION, MR. PRESIDENT, THAT, ABSENT SPECIFIC ORDERS NOT TO DO SO FROM YOURSELF AND/OR THE JOINT CHIEFS OF STAFF, MACARTHUR WILL PROCEED WITH HIS INTENTION TO LAND WITH TWO DIVI-SIONS AT INCHON ON 15 SEPTEMBER. IT IS ALSO MY OPINION THAT COLLINS WILL MAKE A STRONG CASE BEFORE THE JCS, AND PER-HAPS TO YOU PERSONALLY, TO FORBID IN-CHON, BUT THAT HE WILL NOT HAVE AS strong an ally in this in sherman as he probably hoped he would.

captain mccoy and lieutenant taylor re-turned from the island we hold in the flying fish channel this morning. he will return there shortly, and is pre-PARED TO LAUNCH HIS OPERATION WITHIN A WEEK. CIRCUMSTANCES REQUIRED THAT BRIG GEN THOMAS CUSHMAN, USMC, ASSISTANT COMMANDER, 1ST MARINE AIR WING, BE IN-FORMED OF THAT MISSION, AND OF THE MIS-SIONS OF GENERAL HOWE AND MYSELF.

RESPECTFULLY SUBMITTED,

F. PICKERING, BRIG GEN USMCR

TOP SECRET/WHITE HOUSE

"This looks fine to me, Captain," Keller said.

"Go with him, George, will you?" McCoy ordered. "Now I'm going to have my coffee." He handed him more typewriter paper, torn in half. "This gets burned and shred-ded with the clean copy."

"What is it?"

"It's the version with the typos, before I retyped it," Mc-Coy said. He sat down at the table and reached for the cof-feepot.

"Ernie," a female voice cried, "did that husband of yours tell you what he did to me?"

His head snapped to the door.

Miss Jeanette Priestly of the Chicago Tribune was com-ing through the door, trailed by Lieutenant (j.g.) David Taylor, USNR.

"Well, Jeanette," Ernie said, rising to the occasion. "How nice to see you again."

"I didn't expect you'd beat us here," Taylor said to Mc-Coy.

"Long story. I'll tell you later."

"What's this all about?"

"This would have been here sooner," Jeanette said, flashing McCoy a dazzling smile. "But this had to freshen up a little. And this must say that you look a lot better than the last time this saw you."

McCoy realized he was smiling.

The last time he had seen her, just before midnight at the Evening Star Hotel in Tongnae, she had been wearing U.S. Army fatigues and combat boots. She hadn't been near soap or running water for a week, and had spent all but an hour of the previous two and a half days on a junk running through some often rough water in the Yellow Sea. There had been a visible layer of dried saltwater spray all over her face, hands, and hair.

She was now clean, wearing makeup, an elegantly sim-ple black dress, high heels, and enough perfume so that McCoy could smell it across the room.

The only thing that was the same about her was the Leica camera in its battered case hanging around her neck.

"She insisted on coming here," Taylor said. "I didn't know what to do...."

Taylor was wearing one of his well-worn, but clean, khaki uniforms. `

"It's all right," General Pickering said. McCoy looked at him and saw he was smiling. "Hello, Miss Priestly."

He got a dazzling smile.

"How nice to see you again, General," she said.

"Zimmerman's on the air," McCoy said.

"That was quick," Taylor said, surprised. "That's damned good news."

"I'll want to know, in detail, exactly how you managed that," Jeanette said.

"Later," McCoy said.

"What can we do for you, Miss Priestly?" Pickering asked.

"Didn't Captain McCoy tell you?" she asked. "In ex-change for me not writing one story, he promised he would give me an exclusive story about something else I'm afraid to mention, not knowing how many secrets McCoy shares with his wife. No offense, Ernie."

General Pickering chuckled.

"I don't think Captain McCoy has any secrets from his wife," he said. "How was the cruise, Miss Priestly?"

"It was absolutely awful, frankly," she said. "Anyway, until what happens happens, I'm going to stick to these two"-she indicated McCoy and Taylor-"like glue."

"Fair enough," Pickering said.

"And I also wondered if there was any news about Pick."

Pickering signaled McCoy with his eyes not to mention the photographs McCoy had gotten from Dunn.

"Unfortunately, no," Pickering said.

"Damn," she said.

"Where's the film you shot on the Wind of Good For-tune?" McCoy asked.

"In here," she said, tapping her purse.

"I forgot to impound it," McCoy said. "Or to tell Taylor to. May I have it, please?"

"You still don't trust me?"

"Let's say I'm cautious by nature," McCoy said.

"Give them to me, please, Miss Priestly," Pickering said. "You have my word you'll get them back."

She shrugged, opened her purse, and took from it a rub-berized bag and handed it to Pickering.

"Thank you," he said.

"Is it really all right to talk?" she asked.

Pickering nodded.

"How are you coming with the boats?" she asked McCoy.

"What boats?" Pickering asked.

"Do you suppose I could have that roll?" Jeanette asked, pointing at one on Pickering's bread plate. "I'm really starved."

"Of course," Pickering said.

"You didn't eat?" McCoy said.

"We had some powdered eggs at K-l about 0500," Tay-lor said.

"Nothing here?" McCoy asked.

"I told you," Jeanette said. "This couldn't come here looking like this did when this got off the Queen Mary. That took a little time."

"You didn't eat either?" McCoy asked Taylor, smiling.

"You told me to sit on her," Taylor said, not amused. "I sat on her. I sat in her room in the Press Club while she had a bath, and the rest of it, and then I took her to my room while I had a quick shower. No, I didn't eat either."

"We can fix that," Ernie McCoy said, and walked to the telephone, picked it up, and, in Japanese, asked for room service.

"What boats?" General Pickering asked again.

"Didn't Ken tell you?" Jeanette said. "We're going to need a couple of boats to move the men from Tokchok-kundo to Taemuui-do and Yonghung-do. We can't use the Wind of Good Fortune. Not only can't we count on having enough water under the rudder, but a junk makes a lousy landing craft."

" `We're going to need a couple of boats'?" Pickering parroted.