Divine Vengeance
There it was again, that free-falling sensation in his gut that caused Second Lieutenant Anthony Vega to break into a chill, despite the sweltering heat of the Australian rainforest. Having grown up in southeast Texas, he was used to humidity, but the steamy air of Australia’s Cape York Peninsula was overwhelming. Sleep had been nearly impossible: drenched sheets, the buzz of mosquitoes outside the netting, his constant tossing and turning, and Wurth’s incessant snoring. When the symphony of equatorial birds began warming up for the coming day, he gave up and hit the showers, hoping for some relief.
The shower felt good, but it did nothing to calm his nerves. His years at Texas A&M had prepared him for the life of a military officer. The bravado and camaraderie of the cadet corps: early fall mornings, marching in time, cadence echoing across the quad, voices in unison extolling the heroic deeds of the Texans who had marched into battle before them – at Belleau Woods, Chateau-Thierry, the Marne, San Juan Hill, and San Jacinto. Mock wars were fought and won on the Brazos Plain by cadets eager to give everything for God and country. But the closer Vega got to the war, the more he worried. Would he betray the legacy of those who had marched before him or would his name be spoken in idolized reverence by those yet to follow the call to arms?
The rest of Vega’s crew began emerging from their tents. They were all rookies, even Ferris, who despite his double silver bars had only seen the cockpit of the Bolo, an obsolete bomber destined never to see combat. Vega glanced at the somber faces of the crew: the officers, Captain Alton Ferris, First Lieutenant Otis Wurth, and Second Lieutenant Horace Boll; and the enlisted men, Staff Sergeant Nick Fassino and Sergeant Vernon Relly. They were a green, wet-behind-the-ears, ferry crew going to war like children on their first day of school.
“Good morning, gentlemen,” Ferris said. “It’s only a short flight to Moresby. I’ll brief everyone once we get to base operations.”
“That’s if we get to base ops, captain,” Fassino said. “I don’t see our ride yet and I’m sure that I’m not walking.”
The deep, throaty sound of aircraft engines roared through the trees, drowning out the captain’s response. A pair of P-38 Lightnings rose into the air and climbed until they disappeared into the hazy sky. A shudder ran through Vega’s body; the war was suddenly very real, close at hand, and unnerving.
A battered troop truck pulled up and the men loaded their bags. They were met at the operations hut by a grizzled, sunburned captain with a wad of tobacco in his mouth. “Howdy, boys. Ready for the big leagues?” he asked before spitting on the ground. He wiped his lip with the back of his hand before continuing. “Don’t worry; you shouldn’t have any problems today. Just stay in the air corridor, and if you’re lucky enough to spot enemy fighters, descend to the lowest possible altitude and turn back toward Australia, unless you can determine that you can safely proceed to Port Moresby.”
“If we had gunners, we wouldn’t have to run,” Fassino said.
“Don’t worry, slugger,” the captain answered. “You’ll have plenty of opportunities to exchange lead with the Japs in the near future. And you’ll be assigned gunners once you reach New Guinea.”
“That won’t help us if the Nips jump us today.”
It was a short ride down the flight line to the Liberator named Divine Vengeance, a four-engine behemoth parked in an earthen revetment among the trees. None of the crew really liked the bomber’s name, but Ferris lost a brother at Hickam Field during the Japanese attack on Hawaii. Ferris felt that God would give him vengeance on behalf of his fallen brother and had named the aircraft accordingly. The crew found it difficult to argue with God and Ferris, although Fassino had tried many times.
Before leaving stateside, Ferris had shown the crew a sketch of the proposed nose art for the aircraft. It depicted a bare-chested archangel leading a heavenly host forth from the pearly gates into battle. Fassino countered with his own quickly drawn image of a nude woman that he called ‘Jersey Girl’, but the devout captain did not want to fly a plane into battle bearing any exposed part of the female anatomy. The crew’s support for Fassino’s Bimbo, as his version was popularly known, rapidly fell apart. In the end, Ferris paid a mechanic $50 to adorn the angelic Armageddon on the nose, and they flew to the war on a solemn crusade to avenge the captain’s dead brother.
The officers unloaded their baggage as Ferris walked over to the aircraft. Vega watched as he touched the side of the aircraft and bowed his head in prayer.
“Not again,” Fassino moaned. “This has got to stop.”
“Let it go, Nick,” Vega said. “It’s over and done with.”
“Don’t give me any of that crap, L. T. If you weren’t such a limp-dick co-pilot, we wouldn’t have a plane with a half-naked man painted on the side of it, for chrissakes.”
“Have some respect, Fassino. It isn’t a man; it’s St. Michael.”
“Why can’t we have a half-naked woman like other planes?”
“Jeez, let it go, Nick. We have a job to do.”
Vega climbed into the aircraft. He was happy to be flying the B-24 Liberator. It wasn’t as glamorous as its popular cousin, the B-17 Flying Fortress, but it could carry a heavier bomb load over a longer distance. The B-24 boasted a top speed over 270 MPH and a maximum ceiling of 27,000 feet. Its range could reach 1,700 miles, making it an ideal bomber for the vast Pacific theater. The aircraft was armed by twin .50 caliber machine guns in a top turret and in the tail, and single .50 caliber guns in two waist positions and in the nose. There was room for a belly turret, but the often-muddy airfield conditions in the Pacific made their use practically impossible.
“How’s it going?” Ferris asked as he climbed into his seat. “Pre-flight done?”
“Yep, we’re just about ready.”
“OK then, let’s get everybody on headset. Times a wasting. Intercom check.”
“Nav checking in,” Wurth said.
“Bombardier checking in,” Boll said.
“Radio Operator checking in,” Relly said.
“Engineer checking in,” Fassino said.
“All positions accounted for,” Vega reported.
“Let’s go with engine start,” Ferris ordered.
Vega keyed his radio. “Ground control, Condor 47 requests engine start and clearance, over.”
“Roger, Condor 47, engine start approved. Clearance on request. Altimeter two nine eight one.”
Vega adjusted the altimeter setting while Fassino rotated the propellers by hand to lubricate the bearings. After Fassino cleared the last engine, Ferris began the steps to bring the bomber to life. The first engine started with a bang, sending a shudder through the aircraft. Vega confirmed hydraulic pressure as Ferris continued with the other engines. They completed the remaining checklists before calling for permission to taxi.
“Roger, Condor 47. Taxi to runway 29 right.”
After receiving their takeoff clearance and lining up on the runway, Ferris pushed the throttles forward while applying the brakes to hold the aircraft in position. The powerful engines vibrated through the airframe, shaking and rattling every fiber of Vega’s body. The noise was simply deafening.
“Four good engines,” Vega reported.
“Roger,” Ferris replied and released the brakes. With a lurch, the Liberator groaned forward, rapidly gaining speed.
Vega felt a heady rush as the plane charged down the runway, a blur of trees passing on both sides. Past the point of no return now, Vega noted, as the end of the runway grew ever closer. Ferris muscled the control wheel into his gut and held it until they were airborne. Divine Vengeance slowly, yet gracefully, climbed into the sky. The eucalyptus, paperbarks, and kurrajongs gave way to the sparkling Coral Sea as the aircraft continued its climb. A line of thunderstorms languished offshore, trailing dreary shafts of rainfall over phosphorescent submerged islands of coral amid a boundless sea of darkening blue. The intercom was silent as the men admired the unfolding scenery. Or perhaps, it was something more; like Vega, they were facing the gravity of their situation. They were going to war.
He wondered what the war would be like. He had learned what little he knew from cinema newsreels and intelligence reports, yet they told nothing of the sweat and toil of men in foxholes and bunkers scattered across the Pacific. The Japanese were seemingly inhuman, uncaring, unyielding children of Mars. They came to foreign shores and conquered, taking no quarter.
But the juggernaut had awakened. America struck back with a daring low-level raid that left Tokyo ablaze. Although the damage was minimal at best, a patriotic fervor swept America, and the government eagerly cashed in with war bond drives in every city and town nationwide. Scarcely did the tickertape settle before the Coral Sea became the next stage in the war’s spotlight. Despite the loss of two carriers, the Navy handed the Japanese its first major defeat, saving Australia in the process.
New Guinea became the key to Japan knocking Australia out of the war. But the Aussies rose to the challenge and stood their ground, holding the last foothold in New Guinea. The fighting on the outskirts of Port Moresby had been brutal, but the Aussies prevailed. By the time America came to their relief, the mopping up was nearly complete. With the threat to Port Moresby removed, an armed camp arose, allowing heavy bombers like the Liberator to conduct combat operations closer to the action.
Most of what Vega had learned about New Guinea came from the army’s Serviceman’s Guide to New Guinea. It described the shape of the island as an ungainly bird of prey, stretching along the equator from the Dutch East Indies to the Solomons. Covering an area as large as California, New Guinea was a mysterious land of dense jungles, broad highland plains, and great mangrove swamps. Jagged mountains, usually enshrouded in a persistent veil of clouds, extended like a backbone along the entire length of the island. Throughout the monsoon season, the island was subject to sudden downpours, followed by periods of intense sunshine that turned the jungle into a greenhouse. The native people were primitive and had little contact with the outside world, except through missionaries, government patrol officers, gold miners, and plantation workers. Now New Guinea had the attention of the world, with all its planes, bombs, guns, and tanks. Of all the places to pick for a war.
“Engineer to pilot,” Fassino interrupted in an agitated voice. “I have one, possibly two bogies, ten o’clock high, seven miles and closing.”
“Damn!” the bombardier said. “I knew we’d need gunners!”
“Hold on Boll, nobody said they were bandits,” Vega calmly said despite the freefall in his stomach. It surprised him that the words were actually his own; they felt alien, as if somebody else had formed the words and placed them in his mouth.
It was as if nobody heard him. Anxious voices filled the intercom, until the captain’s stern voice silenced them all. “Well, boys. It looks like the war has come for us before we were ready for it. Now let’s do what we were trained to do.”
No comments:
Post a Comment