My Most Dangerous Patrol

MY MOST DANGEROUS PATROL - Written by Whayland Greene in 1999

I was in the 1st Platoon, stationed on Luzon Island, in the Philippines.  I was 19 or 20 years old and a PFC.  I was not assigned to a particular squad and could be used with any that needed an extra man.  This happened often.

Sergeant Harold Sullivan was a squad leader at this time and thought to be one of the best.  Our lieutenant assigned Sullivan to a patrol that was being sent through enemy held ground.  Sgt. Sullivan told me to ‘get ready.  We are going to travel light and quiet, and to keep that in mind at all times.’  I notice he did not use all men from his squad but that he had chosen a man named Brinner from the 4th platoon, which was a machine gun and mortar platoon.  Besides me, there were two others chosen.  I do not remember their names.  

We had travelled into enemy held ground and the first thing we knew, we had Japanese on three sides of us.  I do not know how many were in each group, but each was larger than ours, and you can be sure there were more around than we could see!  We did not have friendly troops within a mile or two of us.  They did not know we were there and that they had us almost surrounded. 

If one shot had been fired, there was no way any of our five could have come back alive.  The Japanese did not spot us until we were out of range to be hit by their small arms fire.  After they spotted us they threw some artillery shells at us, but no one was hit.  My backpack, which I had place on a log I had been resting on, was hit by one of the shells, and my poncho, which was inside of it, looked like a jigsaw puzzle.  My can of c-rations had two holes in it!  I had gotten into a small foxhole that the Japanese had dug some days earlier.  I'm so glad I did!  

I am sure, since we had the element of surprise, we could have killed six or eight of them before they could have killed all of us.  I am very thankful that no one got trigger happy, as we often did.  I had been on patrols when men were killed or wounded, but this patrol would have been wiped out if one shot had been fire.  After we all got back alive, this scared 19 or 20 year old kid has always been proud of the fact that he was handpicked, but also that he survived. Not long after this platoon, Sergeant Johnson chose James Valentine and me to become squad leaders, even though neither of us had even been assistant squad leaders.  I was a platoon runner and Valentine was rifleman, both PFCs and only 20 years old.  Later we were made staff sergeants. 

When the war was over we went to Japan.  Valentine was made acting platoon sergeant of the 1st platoon, and I was made acting platoon sergeant of the 2nd platoon.  We both had received enough points to go home before we had time to get another stripe.  We were both discharged from the Army before we were 21 years old.