"Oh," MacArthur said, and then he laughed. "Franklin Roosevelt is truly Machiavellian, isn't he? Sending you to me, to plead Donovan's case? You've had serious trouble with Mr. Donovan, have you not, Fleming?"
How the hell does he know I can't stand the sonofabitch? Or about my trouble with him?
"And were you dispatched to see Admiral Nimitz, with the same mission?"
"No, Sir. I saw Admiral Nimitz, but not about Mr. Donovan."
"How to deal with Mr. Donovan is just one item on a long list about which Admiral Nimitz and I are in total agreement," MacArthur said. "We are agreed to ignore him, in the hope that he will go away. Neither of us can see where any possible good he or his people can do us can possibly be worth the trouble he or his people are likely to cause."
"Mr. Donovan is held in high esteem by the President, General."
"Is he? And that's why he sent you, of all people, to plead his case? The word-and certainly no disrespect to the Commander-in-Chief is intended-is Machiavellian. "
MacArthur shook his head, smiling, and took a healthy sip of his drink.
"You may report to the President, General, that you brought the matter of the OSS to my attention, and I assured you that I have every intention of offering the OSS every possible support from the limited assets available to SWPOA."
"Yes, Sir."
"As a friend, Fleming, I will tell you that I have a guerrilla operation going in the Philippines. I have high hopes for it, and a high regard for the men there who daily face death. I have no intention... no intention... of having Wild Bill Donovan get his nose under that tent!"
He looked at Pickering, as if expecting an argument. When there was none, he went on.
"I understand your people carried off the Buka operation splendidly, without a hitch," he said.
"It went well, Sir. I just saw the two men we took out."
"They should be decorated. Have you thought about that?"
"No, Sir," Pickering confessed, somewhat embarrassed. "I have not."
"Recognition of valor is important, Fleming," MacArthur said. "I have found it interesting, in my career, that I have the most difficulty convincing of that truth those men who have been highly decorated themselves. You, apparently, are a case in point."
The subject of Bill Donovan's people, obviously, is now closed.
"It may well be," MacArthur went on, "that many people who have been given high awards, myself included, feel that they were not justified."
A swinging door opened.
"General," MacArthur's Filipino steward announced, "luncheon is served."
MacArthur turned to Pickering and said, smiling broadly, "Just in time. I was about to violate my rule that one drink at lunch is enough. Shall we go in?"
[THREE]
=TOP SECRET=
Eyes Only - The Secretary of the Navy
DUPLICATION FORBIDDEN
ORIGINAL TO BE DESTROYED AFTER ENCRYPTION AND TRANSMITTAL TO SECNAV
Brisbane, Australia
Saturday 17 October 1942
Dear Frank:
I arrived here without incident from Pearl Harbor. Presumably, Major Ed Banning is by now in Washington and you have had a chance to hear what he had to say, and to have had a look at the photographs and film.
Within an hour of what I thought was my unheralded arrival, I was summoned to a private-really private, only El Supremo and me-luncheon. He also had a skewed idea why I was sent here. He thought I was supposed to make peace between him and Admiral Nimitz. He assured me that he and Nimitz are great pals, which I think, after talking with Nimitz at Pearl Harbor, is almost true.
When I brought up Donovan's OSS people, a wall came down. He tells me he has no intention of letting "Donovan get his camel's nose under the tent" and volunteered that Nimitz feels the same way. (I didn't even mention Donovan to Nimitz.) I also suspect this is true. I will keep trying, of course, both because I consider myself under orders to do so, and because I think that MacA is wrong and Donovan's people would be very useful, but I don't think I will be successful.
The best information here, which I presume you will also have seen by now, is that the Japanese will launch their attack tomorrow.
Admiral Ghormley sent two radios (16 and 17 October) saying his forces are "totally inadequate" to resist a major Japanese attack, and making what seems to me unreasonable demands on available Naval and aviation resources. I detected a certain lack of confidence in him, on MacA's part. I have no opinion, and certainly would make no recommendations vis-a-vis Ghormley if I had one, but thought I should pass this on.
A problem here, which will certainly grow, is in the junior (very junior) rank of Lieutenant Hon Song Do, the Army cryptographer/analyst, who is considered by a horde of Army and Marine colonels and Navy captains, who aren't doing anything nearly so important, as... a first lieutenant. Is there anything you can do to have the Army promote him? The same is true, to a slightly lesser degree, of Lieutenant John Moore, but Moore, at least (he is on the books as my aide-de-camp) can hide behind my skirts. As far as anyone but MacA and Willoughby know, Hon is just one more code-machine lieutenant working in the aptly named dungeon in MacA's headquarters basement.
Finally, MacA firmly suggested that I decorate Lieutenant Joe Howard and Sergeant Steven Koffler, who we took off Buka. God knows, they deserve a medal for what they did... they met me at the airplane, and they look like those photographs in Life magazine of starving Russian prisoners on the Eastern Front... but I don't know how to go about this. Please advise.
More soon.
Best regards,
Fleming Pickering, Brigadier General, USMCR
=TOP SECRET=
=TOP SECRET=
Eyes Only- Captain David Haughton, USN
Office of The Secretary of the Navy
DUPLICATION FORBIDDEN
ORIGINAL TO BE DESTROYED AFTER ENCRYPTION AND TRANSMITTAL TO SECNAV
For Colonel F. L. Rickabee
Office of Management Analysis
Brisbane, Australia
Saturday 17 October 1942
Dear Fritz:
At lunch with MacA yesterday, he justified his snubbing of Donovan's people here by saying that he has a guerrilla operation up and running in the Philippines.
At cocktails-before-dinner earlier tonight, I tried to pump General Willoughby about this, and got a very cold shoulder; he made it plain that whatever guerrilla activity going on there is insignificant. After dinner, I got with Lt Col Philip DePress-he is the officer courier you brought to Walter Reed Hospital to see me when he had a letter from MacA for me. He's a hell of a soldier who somehow got out of the Philippines before they fell.
After feeding him a lot of liquor, I got out of him this version: An Army reserve captain named Wendell Fertig refused to surrender and went into the hills of Mindanao where he gathered around him a group of others, including a number of Marines from the 4th Marines, who escaped from Luzon and Corregidor, and started to set up a guerrilla operation.
He has promoted himself to Brigadier General, and appointed himself "Commanding General, US Forces in the Philippines." I understand (and so does Phil DePress) why he did this. The Filipinos would pay absolutely no attention to a lowly captain. This has, of course, enraged the rank-conscious Palace Guard here at the Palace. But from what DePress tells me, Fertig has a lot of potential.