“Yes, sir! Sure! You know it, sir!” came in a chorus.
“He’s in that city, a thousand brown boy Joes and their families waiting deliverance from the Jap. When our troops swarm ashore they’ll be there waiting to give the soldiers a hand.
“Here,” he pointed to a spot away from the city, “is the prison camp. There, housed in huts, poorly fed and in rags, are hundreds of the boys who fought so bravely at Bataan and at Corregidor. Each dawn they face the sun and pray for deliverance. Shall their prayer be answered?”
An uproarious affirmative came from the men.
“Are there big Jap battle wagons, aircraft carriers, and supply ships in that harbor?” the Commander asked. “This we cannot know. It’s up to the scouts to tell us about that. And if they’re there—” he paused.
“We’ll take ’em!” came in a big, hard voice. “They got my pal at Pearl Harbor. Nothing’s too bad for them!” There came a roar of approval.
“We’ll have more of this as we approach the target,” the Commander promised. “You will be given smaller copies of this chart. I suggest that you memorize it in detail. Much depends on this undertaking. It may even be spoken of in the future as the turning point of the war, for after Mindanao comes Manila. From Manila we go to the China coast.”
“And then Tokyo!” the big voice roared.
“Yea! Yea! Yea! Tokyo! Tokyo!” came like a college football yell.
“That’s the spirit, and that, for the present, is all I have to say,” the Commander concluded.