Taylor, Hart, and Kim would be aboard Wind of Good Fortune, Kim to control the militia, and Hart to operate the radio to report what was going on-especially if some-thing went wrong.
It was a good plan of operation, and it almost worked.
They managed to get past Taebu-do and Taemuui-do without, so far as they could tell, arousing any interest whatever.
But as they approached Oe-ri on the south end of Yonghung-do, hoping to pass there, too, undetected, the junk sailing up the Flying Fish Channel attracted the atten-tion of a Norm Korean sentry. First, there was a siren, and then the Wind of Good Fortune was in the light of a search-light, and finally there came machine-gun fire, which, after a moment, walked its way through the water and into the hull of the Wind of Good Fortune.
And a moment after that, two rounds of five-inch naval gunfire landed on the machine-gun position. The search-light went out, the machine gun stopped firing, and the outer of the two Jamaica boats-which held Lieutenant Diceworth's team-cut free from the Wind of Good For-tune and headed for the village.
As a Royal Marine handed twenty-round magazines to a U.S. Marine firing his Browning Automatic Rifle from the bow of the boat, two more rounds of five-inch from Char-ity landed in Oe-ri.
The second boat from HMS Jamaica-carrying Mc-Coy's team-now started to edge ahead of the Wind of Good Fortune, headed up the Flying Fish Channel for the north end of the island and the village of Nae-ri.
With the loss of the element of surprise, there was no need now to land in the middle of Yonghung-do and go overland.
The distance was a little over three miles, and the boat was making-even against the rapidly receding tide-close to fifteen knots. It took them just over fifteen min-utes to reach the end of the island, but that was appar-ently enough time for the North Koreans on the southern end of the island to notify the North Koreans on the northern end that they were under attack. When McCoy's boat turned out of the Flying Fish Channel toward the village of Nae-ri, they were immediately brought under rifle fire.
They've probably laid a telephone line across the island, McCoy thought, as he watched a Royal Marine sergeant speak into the microphone of his field radio: "Mother, Mother, Baby Two, Baby Two, Sixteen, Sixteen," he said, lowered the microphone, and turned to McCoy.
"On the way, sir," he said. "If the captain remembers, Sixteen is four rounds from Charity's five-incher, sir."
"Good show, Sergeant!" Captain McCoy said, in the best English accent he could muster.
A few moments later, there was the thruttle-thruttle sound of a large-caliber round moving in the air, and then an enormous explosion in the village of Nae-ri. And then another, and another, and another.
McCoy, who was riding in the bow, gestured to the coxswain to make for the shore, and then to Sergeant Jen-nings to get on the bow with his Browning Automatic Rifle.
[THREE]
TOP SECRET
0500 GREENWICH 25 AUGUST 1950
FROM OFFICER COMMANDING HMS CHARITY
TO HMS JAMAICA
PERSONAL AND IMMEDIATE ATTENTION VICE ADMIRAL SIR WILLIAM MATTHEWS, RN
SIR
I HAVE THE HONOR TO REPORT, BASED ON INFORMATION FURNISHED ME BY CAPTAIN GEORGE F. HART, USMC, THE FOLLOWING:
THE ISLANDS OF YONGHUNG-DO AND TAEMUUI-DO WERE SUCCESSFULLY IN-VESTED BY U.S. AND ROYAL MARINE FORCES EARLY THIS MORNING AND ALL RESISTANCE WAS ENDED AT 1500 LOCAL TIME THIS AFTERNOON.
U.S. AND BRITISH CASUALTIES ZERO KILLED AND ZERO WOUNDED.
ENEMY CASUALTIES SEVEN KILLED SIX WOUNDED NINE PRISONERS.
IT IS THE INTENTION OF CAPTAIN K. R. MCCOY, USMC, TO INVADE THE IS- LAND OF TAEBU-DO AS
SOON AS TIDAL CONDITIONS PERMIT. HE REPORTS WHITE FLAGS HAVE BEEN HOISTED PRE-SUMABLY INDICATING A DESIRE OF THE ENEMY TO SURRENDER. CAPTAIN MCCOY REQUESTS THAT BRIGADIER GENERAL
PICKERING, USMC, BE APPRISED BY YOU OF THESE DEVELOPMENTS.
MOST RESPECTFULLY SUBMITTED
DARWIN JONES-FORTIN, RN COMMANDING HMS CHARITY
TOP SECRET
[FOUR]
the residence of the supreme commander un command/allied forces in japan
the embassy of the united states
tokyo, japan
1930 25 AUGUST 1950
"Oh, Fleming," Mac Arthur said, rising from an armchair in the upstairs sitting room, "there you are. Thank you for coming."
"It was good of you to receive me on such short notice," Pickering said, "and even kinder to ask me to supper. I know I'm intruding..."
He walked to Jean MacArthur and kissed her cheek.
"Don't be silly," she said. "We don't see enough of you socially, Fleming."
"This isn't exactly social, Jean," Pickering said.
"For the next ten minutes, it will be, while we have a cocktail and hors d'oeuvres," MacArthur said.
A Filipino steward offered Pickering a tray, on which sat a squat crystal glass dark with whiskey.
"Your health," Pickering said, as he picked it up.
"Do you hear often from Patricia?" Jean asked.
"I call her, or she calls me, just about every day," Picker-ing said.
"And how, poor dear, is she bearing up?"
"The tough part is not knowing," Pickering replied hon-estly.
"And there's still no word about your son?" MacArthur asked.
"Only in the sense that my station chief in Pusan reports that there is no word that Pick has been captured."
"And would he know?" Jean MacArthur asked.
"He would," Pickering said. "Actually, he's very good at what he does."
"Forgive me," MacArthur said. "He didn't-the CIA didn't-seem to be able to give us advance knowledge of what happened on June 26."
My God, if I get into that, I'll really be in trouble.
"Yes, I know," Pickering said. "That's one of the reasons I was sent here, to see if I can prevent a blunder like that from happening again."
"And I can think of no one better able to do that," MacArthur said. "Your report will be to Admiral Hillenkoetter, I presume?"
"I haven't even begun to prepare a report," Pickering said. "But when I do, it will go to the President."
"Despite the perhaps unkind things I have said about the OSS in the past, I questioned President Truman's deci-sion to abolish it immediately after the war," MacArthur said.
"He seems to have quickly realized his mistake," Picker-ing replied. "He formed the CIA several months later."
"I sometimes wonder..." MacArthur said. "Let me phrase it this way: President Truman seems to understand what a threat Joseph Stalin and company pose to the world. Frankly, I have often wondered if many of those close to President Roosevelt were similarly concerned. Many of those were still in the upper echelons around President Truman when he abolished the OSS."
"I'm sure it pleased those people, General," Pickering said. "But my best information was that it was senior offi-cers of the military who wanted to bury the OSS, and suc-cessfully urged Truman to do so."
"Why would they want to do that?"
"Because they couldn't control it themselves."
"That's a hell of an accusation, Fleming," MacArthur said, "and let me quickly and emphatically disassociate myself from any group of senior officers... I was never asked what I thought should happen to the OSS. Had I been asked, I would have said I felt it to be quite valuable to the nation. And when the CIA was formed, I was de-lighted when they sent their experts to assist me here."