Chapter 10: Logistical Support of Combat Operations
The QMC was established and continued in existence for a single reason—to help insure victory in battle by providing American fighting men with essential supplies. If the Corps failed to achieve this objective, it failed in its basic mission. Logistical support thus became the overriding consideration to which all else was sacrificed. Formulation of supply plans for each new operation as it came along was the first step toward providing such support. As soon as the highest headquarters of the armed services in the United States and the Pacific had decided upon the seizure of a Japanese-held area and set the approximate size of the naval, air, and ground forces required for such an enterprise, Pacific headquarters, in cooperation with the combat organizations assigned to the operation, worked out supply plans in general terms.
In the Central Pacific, the J-4 Section of CINCPOA had responsibility for supervising and integrating logistical plans. It maintained direct contact with G-4, Headquarters, U.S. Army Forces in the Central Pacific Area (HUSAFICPA) , which, in turn, kept in close touch with technical service officers of its own headquarters and of participating tactical organizations. A similar system prevailed in the South Pacific.1 In the Southwest Pacific, MacArthur’s headquarters, an inter-Allied, interservice command, had much the same role as did CINCPOA. It coordinated the logistical planning of USASOS and of the operational headquarters—the Allied Air Forces, the Allied Naval Forces, the Allied Land Forces, and the ALAMO Force (U.S. Sixth Army), which, until it was discontinued in September 1944, organized special task forces for ground offensives carried out chiefly by U.S. Army troops.2
In the earliest Pacific campaigns, before the higher headquarters had become well organized, logistical planning was pretty much a hit-and-miss affair, but as experience accumulated it became more and more systematized. At best it was a complex matter involving the onerous task of adjusting
the supporting capabilities of the technical services to the precise needs of future campaigns. Its difficulty was increased by the strategic necessity for offensive operations that followed one another so swiftly as to afford little opportunity for careful preparations or for the assembly of supplies in the desired quantities. Realistic planning was rendered still harder by the practice of not immediately revealing to participating organizations what specific area would be the objective, a procedure that obliged units to carry out their planning with a typical rather than an exact objective in view. Even after the area of attack was identified, logistical planning usually had to be conducted without complete information regarding Japanese strength and the beaches, roads, trails, and other physical features that would be encountered. Absence of definite information about the exact quantity of certain types of equipment to accompany an operational force was still another complication. For example, data as to the quantity and type of vehicles that would have to be supplied with petroleum products seldom became available in early planning stages, and requirements for Class III supplies were of necessity roughly estimated on a gallon “per-man-per-day” basis rather than on the more accurate vehicular factors.3
In Quartermaster planning the first matter studied was the number and types of units necessary to carry out Quartermaster functions. These requirements were based not only upon total troop strength but also upon climatic conditions, the size of the territory to be occupied, and the availability of water and other public utilities. Whatever estimates were submitted, higher headquarters nearly always scaled them down in order to provide as large a proportion of tactical troops as possible. In explanation of its reductions in the estimates of the Quartermaster Section, Sixth Army, General Headquarters, Southwest Pacific Area, pointed out that the War Department assigned a certain number of troops to the area, out of which allotment the area commander was obliged to select the units he considered most vital to the execution of his mission. As Brig. Gen. Charles R. Lehner, Quartermaster of the Sixth Army, noted, this procedure created an unbalanced ratio between combat and supporting units.4 Wherever, according to Col. James C. Longino, assistant quartermaster of this army, the Corps rendered inadequate service, the shortage of supporting units was largely responsible.5
In the Southwest Pacific Area, after the troop basis had been determined, the Quartermaster Section of the Sixth Army selected specific supporting units from Quartermaster organizations assigned to USASOS. Until U.S. troops returned to the Philippines, task forces ordinarily included only from 4,000 to 45,000 men, and the smaller Quartermaster units—squads, sections, and platoons—were often the only ones available for provision of Quartermaster services. In the larger task forces companies furnishing the more important services were at times augmented by one of these smaller units. Units chosen for operational duty continued to engage in base activities until about ten days before the task force was scheduled to sail. They were then officially assigned to the force for the duration of its mission. In the Sixth Army, Quartermaster officers frequently found that USASOS units needed
to be more fully equipped and trained in order to carry out combat duties efficiently. As far as possible in the limited time available, these requisites were provided. When, as often happened, regularly established and trained units were unavailable, provisional units were organized to the extent permitted by the total allotment of troops. If such units could not be formed, task forces were of necessity deprived of some services.
In the Central Pacific, composite detachments often filled the gaps left by the shortage of Quartermaster units. Some of these detachments were made up of men trained for almost every sort of Quartermaster operation; others contained men qualified for only two or three specialties. The composite Quartermaster unit formed by the 7th Garrison Force to serve as part of the base establishment in the Gilberts consisted of 5 officers and 159 enlisted men from service, truck, bakery, laundry, and salvage companies, and it handled all Quartermaster responsibilities except those involving care of the dead. Since there were no available graves registration companies, men from the 27th Division were selected to form a provisional unit.6
In calculating its requirements for food, gasoline, and utility items, the Quartermaster Section, Sixth Army, refused to accept published War Department tables of maintenance requirements as fully applicable to the Southwest Pacific and even questioned War Department estimates of shipping space requirements per man per day for the four classes of supply. On the basis of its own experience the Quartermaster Section developed charts showing the weights and cubes of the different rations, the maintenance needs per man per day for the principal kinds of gasoline, fuel, and grease, the petroleum requirements of tanks, trucks, diesel equipment, field ranges, landing craft, and radar equipment, and the daily demand, expressed in pounds, for each class of supply.7 All these charts underwent constant revision to reflect changing tactical and geographical conditions and the growing accuracy of issue figures.
Development of Special Supply Requirements
Amphibious and island warfare required special as well as standard equipment and forced radical departures from War Department Tables of Equipment. Quartermaster planners indeed found that one of their most important problems was the determination of what articles should accompany assault forces. For example, in August 1943, when plans were being laid for the Gilberts operation, a showdown inspection of the 27th Division, then in Hawaii, revealed grave shortages in equipment which could not be filled from stocks on hand, and much equipment so old and badly worn it could not undergo further usage. Close study of conditions likely to be encountered in the Gilberts disclosed a need for Quartermaster items normally issued only in small quantities or not at all. The scarcity of drinking water caused the hasty requisitioning of 3,000 canvas water buckets, 15,000 5-gallon water cans, and 11,000 additional canteens from San Francisco, and the necessity for some means of quickly cutting paths through tangled undergrowth led to the ordering of 10,000 machetes. Since some soldiers would be out of touch with organization kitchens, the division also
submitted requisitions for 750 cooking outfits, each sufficiently large to provide hot food for 20 men. To furnish troops with a convenient means of washing their mess gear, the Corps of Engineers in Oahu manufactured 300 hot water heaters. From salvaged cots, tents, and tarpaulins the Hawaiian Quartermaster Depot fabricated 2,000 grenade carriers, each capable of holding four missiles. Finally, it bought locally 7,000 half-ounce metal containers to enable troops to carry salt tablets with the least possible danger of deterioration.8
Vital equipment and supplies were not always obtained with as little trouble as the 27th Division encountered, for local manufacture and purchase could rarely be accomplished as satisfactorily as in Hawaii during preparations for the Gilberts offensive. Nor, in general, was there much time for procurement of supplies from the United States. Even when the period of preparation was fairly lengthy, scarcities at home often delayed or prevented shipments. New items in particular were likely to be in poor supply, for several months were necessary to start production and the ETO and MTO usually had first call on available stocks.
Logistical Planning for Operations Against Yap, Leyte, and Okinawa
The manner in which supply requirements and other aspects of detailed Quartermaster logistical planning were ordinarily developed in the last two years of the war is illustrated by the preparations made by the 7th Division for the operation which was first planned against the island of Yap, one of the Caroline group, but which finally emerged as the assault on Leyte, the opening phase of the reconquest of the Philippines. In getting ready for this enterprise, the division, then on Oahu, worked under the general direction of Headquarters, USAFICPA. Its technical service sections began determining their logistical requirements in April 1944. The G-4 Section coordinated this project. To ascertain his needs, the division quartermaster established a special planning section, composed of a captain, a second lieutenant, and a sergeant, which acted under his direct supervision. As these, like other divisional planners were uninformed as to the precise objective, they assumed an amphibious landing on a medium-sized island. They determined the requirements for such an attack partly by studying shortages and partly by analyzing supply operations on Kwajalein two months before, paying particular attention to what items had proved satisfactory, what could be eliminated, and what new items were needed. Though higher headquarters set the total quantity of each general class of Quartermaster supply that could be transported, the 7th Division quartermaster planning group had considerable leeway in selecting the items and determining the quantities of each it wanted.9
Its recommendations, along with those of other technical services, were cleared through the 7th Division G-4 Section, which submitted them to Headquarters, XXIV Corps, for approval and consolidation with recommendations of the 96th Division, the other major combat unit of the corps, and for submission to still higher headquarters. Much discussion ensued between the various bodies of planners, but by late June tentative decisions had been reached. During the next few weeks changes
in tactical plans necessitated minor revisions of supply lists, but in early August, when Yap was finally announced as the operational objective, clothing and equipment lists were ready for publication. Shipping shortages obliged the task force to limit trucks to half the number authorized in tables of equipment. Once this decision had been made, the office of the division quartermaster easily calculated gasoline and other petroleum requirements by simply taking the estimated average consumption of each type of vehicle under combat conditions and multiplying that figure by the number of vehicles.10
Meanwhile practically all Quartermaster elements in the 7th Division had become engaged in logistical preparations. The Operations Section in the office of the division quartermaster made preliminary plans for storing items sent direct to Hawaii from the United States, and other sections of the office attended to procurement of supplies and formulation of loading plans. The arrival of large cargoes from the United States inaugurated a period of intense activity for the 7th Quartermaster Company, the divisional Quartermaster unit, at Fort Kamehameha. Besides performing normal garrison duties, it issued equipment to bring stocks up to authorized levels, received, stored, and recorded incoming Quartermaster cargoes, and attended to the “palletized unit loading” of part of these shipments. For several weeks the latter task, carried out on the parade ground of the fort, almost monopolized its energies.11
Palletized unit loading, virtually unknown even in commercial circles before the war, was a novel method of speeding up the handling of cargo by assault forces. Unitized loads, commonly termed “sleds” in the Central Pacific, consisted of a number of containers strapped to pallets, that is, wooden floorings resting on stringers so as to permit the entry of the fork of a lift truck. Such loads made it possible to handle scores of containers as a unit and to utilize ship’s gear, cranes, fork-lift trucks, and other mechanical aids in raising, lowering, moving, and stacking supplies.12 Use of sleds did away with time-consuming manual loading of thousands of containers one by one. Palletized cargoes were quickly discharged into landing craft, dragged off on shore, and towed, two or three at a time, by tractors over the beach and, if necessary, some distance inland. Palletization, in the words of one observer, eliminated the “bucket brigade practices” inseparable from hand-carrying. The saving in manpower reached large proportions. It was claimed, for instance, that unitization made unnecessary the employment of the 36 men required to deliver the 432 K rations that constituted a single sled load.13
All this did not mean that the new method of shipment had no drawbacks. The process of palletization itself demanded considerable time and labor, and the loaded sleds occupied more cargo and storage space than did supplies shipped in the ordinary way. In being towed to dumps, sleds damaged uncompleted . roads. Moreover, their handling demanded much mechanical equipment—a factor that, in view of the scarcity of this equipment, confined their use to amphibious landings where the savings they effected were most marked. Even in such operations they diverted so many tractors from other essential activities that
their value was materially diminished!14 Nonetheless they were widely utilized by Central Pacific forces from the Gilberts to Okinawa. In the Southwest Pacific they found no favor until 1944 and then were employed but slightly. Palletization, according to the quartermaster of the Central Pacific Area, “should be limited to highly emergency supplies associated with the assault operation.” Loss of shipping space, he added, barred use of the novel method after an area had been fully occupied and the saving of time had become less significant.15
When the 7th Quartermaster Company, along with other technical service units, participated in palletization of assault cargo for the projected attack on Yap, it became part of an enterprise in whose development the QMC had played an important role. In collaboration with Central Pacific Engineers that service had designed the sled and the method of loading applied in the Kwajalein and subsequent Central Pacific Area operations. This sled had proved the most suitable kind of pallet, for it had runners that slid easily over the coral of Pacific atolls and required less lumber and less time for construction than did the toboggan type of pallet. These were both important features since supplies coming from the United States were not unitized, and sleds for each new operation had to be hurriedly built in Hawaii.16
Petroleum products, combat rations, and other items packed in strong containers of uniform size and shape, were the Quartermaster supplies most successfully palletized. They were strapped together in the rectangular, flat-topped loads essential to solid stacking and efficient handling by mechanical equipment. No effort was made to palletize clothing and general supplies. Quartermaster loads, each weighing about 1,500 pounds, generally constituted from 20 to 25 percent of all unit loads.17 In preparation for the projected Yap campaign the 7th Quartermaster Company palletized about half the combat rations and 5-gallon cans scheduled for shipment with the landing force.18
While the company was performing this task, the office of the division quartermaster drew up elaborate loading plans indicating the kind and amount of assault supplies, whether palletized or not, to be carried on landing craft. To prevent total loss of an item through the sinking of a single vessel, all ships in the same group were to carry the same items in the same proportions. In addition to combat rations, gasoline, and lubricants, cargoes would include bread components, salt tablets, atabrine, and one extra work suit for each man. Except for small replacement stocks of the most needed garments, no maintenance stores were to be carried; they would be provided by block vessels coming direct from the West Coast. As the date for the departure of the 7th Division approached, assault supplies were taken to the piers where the Quartermaster company made
Palletized supplies at a supply dump on Kwajalein.
sure that they came in the prescribed quantities and were then placed aboard ship in line with the loading plan. Quartermaster troops also participated in simulated landings and distribution of items to troops on shore.19
In mid-September 1944, after the division was at sea, word suddenly came that its objective had been shifted from Yap to Leyte. This change intensified logistical difficulties. Supplies and equipment, ample for a short operation on a small island like Yap, were inadequate for a prolonged battle on sizable, stoutly held Leyte. In particular, more rations, insect repellents, salt tablets, and atabrine were needed, not to mention such items as PX supplies and laundry soap for individual washing, stocks of all of which, because of the additional time required to reach the new and more remote objective, were quickly depleted. On arriving at Eniwetok, the assistant division quartermaster flew to Finschhafen to obtain more of these items—a venture that achieved partial success. The additional supplies were moved to Manus Island in the Admiralties, where the division put them on whatever vessels could be made available. Troops on Leyte nevertheless were not supported as well as they would have been had that island been the announced objective from the beginning.20
The battle for Leyte had not yet reached its final stage when the 7th Division quartermaster began preparation of supply plans for the coming Okinawa campaign. Not-
withstanding that the 7th Quartermaster Company was still busily supporting combat activities, part of its members were diverted from this task to help man huge Quartermaster dumps being established on Leyte to supply the division in the new offensive. More than 7,000 tons of materials had been assembled by the beginning of March 1945. On the 4th, shipments to “loading out” points started, and by the 25th all supplies for the opening phases of the new operation had been placed aboard ship. Meanwhile the troops and trucks of the company had been loaded on twenty-two vessels. During the voyage the elements of the unit were assigned to larger groups to hear lectures about what might be expected on Okinawa. These lectures, supplemented by maps, plaster reliefs, and photographs, conveyed information that was later to prove helpful in truck operations and in the establishment of dumps. On L Day, 1 April, most of the company landed and began to carry out the combat aspects of its logistical plan.21
Quartermaster Units in Combat Operations
Preliminary preparations for operational supply were only a single phase of logistical activities. Much more important was the adequacy of the support actually rendered to tactical soldiers in battle. This was a matter that depended upon the number of Quartermaster troops, the terrain of the combat zone, the availability of roads, trails, trucks, and human carriers, and the amount of Quartermaster cargo actually discharged on the beaches. These conditions, which varied from operation to operation, largely determined how well Quartermaster troop units carried out their duties.
Division Quartermaster Company
These units were the agencies through which the QMC gave direct support to tactical organizations. In general the most important supporting unit was the Quartermaster company that formed an organic part of the infantry division and had as its primary mission the supply of Quartermaster items. In many Pacific operations this company indeed provided all or nearly all the Quartermaster troops. Composed of a small administrative staff, one service platoon, and three truck platoons, it had about 10 officers and 183 enlisted men. The service platoon was set up to furnish the labor for receiving and checking incoming food shipments and for breaking them down, that is, dividing a score or more of items into lots proportionate to the strength of the fifteen or so divisional units. This platoon also had responsibility for handling clothing and equipment and for checking gasoline and oil receipts to determine if they met the needs of the 1,000 to 2,000 vehicles belonging to divisional units. The three truck platoons had as their chief function the transportation of troops, ammunition, rations, water cans, captured materials, and enemy dead—indeed, almost anything that had to be transported. The Quartermaster company was charged with guarding Quartermaster installations, particularly supply dumps, and was therefore designated a combatant unit and provided with rifles, machine guns, grenade launchers, and in-trenching tools. The division quartermaster, operating under the supervision of G-4, coordinated company operations. His office received and processed requisitions for QM
items from divisional units, arranged for the time and place of deliveries, and in close collaboration with G-4 allocated trucks among divisional activities. Normally, G-4 controlled all vehicles used for tactical purposes.22
The tasks actually performed by a divisional Quartermaster company in the Pacific varied markedly from those prescribed when this type of unit was established, primarily with continental warfare in mind. In that sort of warfare the service platoon would have received supplies at distribution dumps maintained by army or corps troops, but in island warfare—before the Philippines were reached—a division, or a reinforced division, usually operated alone, and the company itself had to set up and maintain distribution centers.23 Another difference between island and continental warfare was the persistently amphibious character of supply even when conventional land fighting followed the seizure of a beachhead. Supply depended upon ships which arrived only at irregular intervals. To insure the availability of ample stocks, the company had to store if possible a 10- to 30-day supply of vital articles instead of the 1- or 2-day supply common in continental areas with good railroad and highway systems capable of delivering freight daily.24 Maintenance of such high stock levels placed a heavier burden on troops and equipment than the War Department had foreseen when it set up the divisional company. The difficulty of attaching extra units to a division for protracted periods of time to help the Quartermaster company perform these added tasks further complicated the problem. While such units could be and indeed often were attached to divisions, the general shortage of service troops ordinarily forced their quick detachment and assignment to base installations. Had Pacific operational forces been able to follow the ETO practice of shifting attached service units about from division to division as need arose, the problem would have been considerably less serious, but the necessity of using separate beaches normally prevented employment of such units for supply of several organizations.25
Truck platoons, too, performed functions somewhat different from those envisioned when the divisional company was established. A platoon leader, for example, was supposed to accompany his unit on convoy and supervise the maintenance of vehicles. Actually, the dangers encountered in the early stages of combat operations usually prevented the convoying of trucks. It was faster and safer to dispatch them singly or in groups of two at more or less regular intervals. Platoon leaders were in consequence utilized largely for other activities. During the operations of the 7th Division, for example, these leaders usually supervised Class I, II, and III supply dumps.26 Summing up his wartime impressions of the transportation requirements of a division in the Pacific, an Army Ground Forces observer declared :
Normal transportation assigned a Division is inadequate in quantity and type. Age of vehicles is a positive factor of reduction. No cargo vehicle (2½ ton 6x6) should be retained
by a unit when the mileage thereon exceeds 25,000 miles as the combat performance thereafter normally expected must be reduced by half. The present fifty-one 2½-ton cargo trucks authorized a Division Quartermaster should be increased to ninety-nine, providing six truck platoons of sixteen vehicles each, with provisions for army or corps replacement of a portion thereof, during combat at least, by DUKWs, Amtracs, 1½-ton cargo or ¾-ton vehicles as the terrain may demand.27
Owing to the operating problems encountered by divisional Quartermaster companies, numerous recommendations were made for increasing their equipment and troop strength. In May 1945 Lt. Gen. Walter Krueger, commanding general of the Sixth Army, requested USAFFE to authorize the addition of eighteen men to the truck platoon “to provide sufficient drivers for 24-hour operation.” The service platoon, he continued, needed twelve more men “to increase the labor personnel.”28 After the New Georgia operation the XIV Corps suggested that an entire service company be assigned to the division quartermaster. In fact, since divisions often operated alone, without benefit of the laundry, salvage repair, bakery, bath, and graves registration elements, normally available from units attached to army or corps, Pacific quartermasters and OQMG observers often recommended that a full Quartermaster battalion, capable of providing not only more laborers and truck drivers but also other Quartermaster services, be substituted for the Quartermaster company.29 Headquarters, Army Ground Forces, in Washington refused to consider these suggestions on the ground they lacked theater approval and did not “originate in a theater where the bulk of the Quartermaster Companies, Infantry Division ... are operating.” In any event, that headquarters added, “tables of organization must be applicable to all theaters.30
Unable to obtain an increase in their regular allotment of troops and equipment, divisional Quartermaster companies tried to carry out their combat functions by working on a 24-hour schedule. At times they supplemented their normal strength by the formation of provisional units. At Bougainville, for example, the Quartermaster company of the Americal Division used vehicles assigned to artillery battalions and troops assigned to infantry regiments to make up a provisional truck company. This special unit employed altogether ninety-six 2½-ton cargo trucks. For weeks these vehicles worked on the beaches in volcanic sand and salt water. The combination of these two elements wore out brake shoes in less than ten days, and wheels had to be changed about once a week. The shortage of mechanics and spare parts hampered repair work, and about a fifth of the trucks were usually unserviceable.31 If troops could have been made available, Quartermaster companies might have formed all sorts of provisional units, but in actuality they were normally able to organize only salvage and graves registration units. After landing at Cape Sansapor in Dutch New Guinea, the 6th Quartermaster Company established a provisional salvage platoon, which included twenty-eight men by the end of the campaign. This platoon was divided into four teams, each composed of five men, who
Trucks operating from the beaches rapidly became unserviceable owing to the action of salt water and sand on the moving parts.
collected salvaged supplies from battalion and regimental collecting points, and a group of eight men, who assembled all supplies by item. Graves registration provisional units were usually considerably smaller.32
Division Quartermaster Company in Combat in New Guinea
The operations of the 41st Quartermaster Company in the Hollandia region of Dutch New Guinea illustrate the sort of tasks performed by Quartermaster troops in supporting combat operations in New Guinea. The Hollandia campaign, beset by serious logistical problems stemming from rain, mud, coastal mangrove swamps, steep rugged hills, long narrow passes, jungle terrain, and roads little better than foot trails, represented fairly well the conditions under which the QMC carried out its activities. The operations of the 41st Division began on D Day, 22 April 1944, when it landed on White Beaches 1-4 along the shores of Humboldt Bay. As soon as the first assault waves had gone ashore on White Beach 1, a reconnaissance party, including two Quartermaster officers and two Quartermaster enlisted men examined dump sites and bivouac areas near Pancake Hill, about 600 feet from the narrow, sandy beach. The party selected sites for the ration dumps, the first Quartermaster dumps to be set up, but found that burning Japanese supplies and the swampiness of the area prevented quick construction of a road and made necessary the retention of most trucks and rations on White
Beaches 1 and 2. On D plus 1 a Quartermaster detachment of one officer and seventeen enlisted men went to Pim, a village just south of White Beach 4 and at the terminus of the road running inland. This unit was to receive supplies shipped in small boats from the other beaches and issue them to the 186th Infantry fighting its way toward the main objectives, the three Japanese airfields along the shores of Lake Sentani. Other Quartermaster troops on the beaches to the north supplied the 162nd Infantry at and about Hollandia by water until engineers could build a road to Pancake Hill, more than 3 miles south of the town.33
As in most of the amphibious operations of the 41st Quartermaster Company, lack of sufficient labor to handle cargo delivered to its beach dumps complicated supply activities. This difficulty arose because no assault troops could be spared from tactical operations and all service troops were turned over to the beachmaster unloading cargo in the limited time available for this essential task. Normally, landing craft were discharged only between 0900 and 1700, when naval safety regulations required such vessels to pull away from shore. Under these circumstances supplies of all sorts were jumbled together and hastily shoved on DUKWs or roller conveyors. This meant that Quartermaster dumps received large quantities of non-Quartermaster cargo that held up the issue of rations and other items.34
At Pim the narrow beach and steep terrain forced the Quartermaster detachment for two or three days to maintain dumps on hillsides, where heavy rains soaked supplies and equipment. As soon as the beachhead was widened sufficiently, the detachment moved the Class I and III dumps to much better locations in a coconut grove two miles from the village. By this time the arrival of more Quartermaster troops permitted the assignment of three officers and thirty-seven enlisted men to the new dumps.35 During the following days most of the Quartermaster company was concentrated in the Pim area, for there was located the 41st Division’s chief supply line—the road to Lake Sentani. Arrival of these reinforcements and of service units from the organizations that had landed on Tanahmerah Bay furnished an abundance of manual labor for Quartermaster operations.
Transportation problems were not so easily solved. As was generally true in Pacific operations, the principal sources of trouble were the shortage of trucks and the inadequacy of the road system. The Quartermaster detachment temporarily met the first difficulty by repairing and using five captured Japanese vehicles, but the poor trail to the Lake Sentani plain continued to retard deliveries. Moreover, gauged by jungle standards, this eighteen-mile trail was a long one.36 Washouts occurred frequently. On one occasion trucks bound for the lake region with rations for the 186th Infantry were stalled from early morning to late afternoon. Not until vehicles were brought to the other side of the impassable section and the rations carried across it by hand and reloaded could the food move forward again. Worst of all, the road deteriorated rapidly under heavy trucking and frequent rains,
and from time to time stretches of this vital supply link had to be closed for repairs. Transportation difficulties indeed delayed for some days the removal of the dumps from Pim to the Lake Sentani region, where they could have more easily supplied tactical elements. Finally, the I Corps intensified the transportation woes of the Quartermaster detachment by taking over the captured vehicles, leaving it again short of vital trucks.37
On White Beach 1 there meanwhile occurred a conspicuous example of how completely battle hazards might disrupt logistical plans. On the second evening after the landing a Japanese plane scored a direct hit on an ammunition dump, setting off a series of violent explosions that ignited gasoline stores. For two days the conflagration raged virtually unchecked among supplies and equipment massed on White Beaches 1 and 2, destroying 60 percent of the rations, estimated at more than 400,000 in number. The 41st Division was left with scarcely any food except that on White Beach 3. This disaster made it necessary to put the advancing 186th Infantry on half rations, employ captured Japanese subsistence, and transfer subsistence from the forces that had landed at Tanahmerah Bay.38 Even when ration cargoes could be assembled at Pim, they could not always be moved over the inadequate roads: In this emergency air supply, too, was ineffective. While the Japanese airfields at Lake Sentani fell into American hands on 26 April, they were so heavily damaged as to be temporarily almost valueless for supply of inland forces. The combination of ration scarcities and transportation difficulties indeed compelled the 186th Infantry to live for three or four days mainly on rice and canned fish from seized Japanese stores.39 At Pim the ration stock steadily dwindled and by 1 May was down to 300 cases. Luckily for hungry troops, large quantities of subsistence arrived in Humboldt Bay two days later.
Except for a few odds and ends of clothing and general supplies, the only Class II and IV items available for issue during the Hollandia operation were those brought in with the assault force. The Quartermaster company on 30 April received a small shipment of blankets and hammocks from Finschhafen and on 10 May an emergency air shipment of some urgently needed articles of clothing and general utility, but aside from these relatively unimportant receipts the troops at Hollandia had to get along with what they had brought with them. A sizable cargo of these classes of supply did arrive in Humboldt Bay on 15 May, it is true, but it was intended for use by the 41st Division in its next operation—that against Biak Island, for which Z Day was 27 May.40
Special Problems of Logistical Support
It is not too much to say that in the Pacific there were no really typical Quartermaster operations in combat. Though these operations were all similar in that they involved amphibious campaigns, each new campaign presented details that distinguished it from others. These differences as well as the similarities deserve consideration.
Remote Supply Bases
The campaign for the recovery of Buna, Gona, and Sanananda, which began with
Small boats operating close to shore were invaluable in the shallow coastal waters surrounding New Guinea.
a combined Australian—United States assault on 19 November 1942, presented serious logistical problems. These problems sprang largely from lack of complete tactical and logistical preparedness for the campaign which the still weak American forces hastily undertook in order to regain points that in hostile hands would be standing threats to the safety of the Australian mainland. Throughout the operation the main supply bases, Port Moresby and Milne Bay, were remote from the scene of fighting—respectively, more than 300 and 200 miles by water. Not until almost the very end of the campaign could a reasonably satisfactory intermediate base be set up at Oro Bay, and even then the new establishment could not be stocked adequately. In the beginning, moreover, supply over the long water route was a perilous undertaking. Few planes could be spared to protect the landing of cargo, and naval support, too, was limited. Shallow coastal water, coral reefs extending out from shore as much as 20 miles, and lack of docking facilities for nearly 200 miles south of Buna, further handicapped sea-borne traffic. Because of these difficulties only small boats—unhappily, few in number—could be employed.41
Cargo, brought in freighters from Port Moresby to the newly established base at Milne Bay, was unloaded onto smaller
vessels with a capacity of 50 to 500 tons and shipped to the intermediate bases at Pongani or Oro Bay, respectively, about 35 and 15 miles below Buna. Here supplies were again transshipped, this time to still smaller vessels, usually fishing trawlers, carrying only 10 to 30 tons. These boats then sailed for one of the receiving points set up at coastal villages close to the combat zone.42
As these boats sneaked up the coast, high waves occasionally broke over them, damaging or carrying overboard considerable amounts of cargo. But the most ominous peril in the opening phases of the campaign came from hostile planes, which often came and went at will, compelling boats to travel under cover of darkness. When the vessels arrived at their destination, they anchored several hundred yards offshore. Since Transportation Corps troops were not available, Quartermaster troops became mainly responsible for discharging cargoes. “Stark naked, with waves pounding over their heads, they pushed rowboats and native canoes out through the breakers, transferred them back to the beach, making dozens of exhausting trips without rest in order to get the vulnerable trawlers on their way again before daylight.”43
The Papuan campaign demonstrated that, while remote bases might serve satisfactorily as sources of supply for forces operating in continental areas with suitable means of transportation, in amphibious warfare such bases resulted in supply lines that were too long and tenuous. This was true not only of operations on small islands but also in New Guinea. Though that island was large in area, its transportation problems somewhat resembled those of the smaller islands. Few military groups—and those usually small ones supplied by air—operated deep in the pervasive New Guinea jungle. Areas under attack, which were always located along the coast, became, in effect, islands. In the Papuan campaign reliance upon distant Port Moresby and Milne Bay for currently needed supplies, though unavoidable under prevailing conditions, had thus put the assaulting forces too much at the mercy of disrupted transportation channels.
In subsequent offensives, therefore, the increasing number of specially constructed landing vessels, a new type of small craft capable of discharging supplies directly onto beaches, became a major determinant of the pattern of logistical support. In accordance with this pattern, supplies for the opening stages of an offensive were shipped with the task force and landed during the first few days. Unless these supplies were destroyed in combat or otherwise lost, the assault waves were thus freed of dependence on far-off installations during the opening phases of an operation. The pattern for landing craft in the Biak operation of May—June 1944 was typical of those generally employed. Landing schedules, covering the first few days of the attack and listing the kind and number of vessels .and the supplies each would carry, were prepared well ahead of the assault and carried out to the extent that unloading and tactical conditions allowed. In the last year and a half of the conflict block vessels achieved a comparable result insofar as replacement supplies needed in the latter stages of an offensive were concerned.44
Use of Landing Craft in Assault Supply
Ordinarily, tactical successes permitted landing craft to beach and start unloading their cargoes within a few hours after the assault waves went ashore. But even such swift discharge of supplies and equipment did not always insure the availability of items needed by combat troops. The better part of a day—usually longer—elapsed before all cargoes could be discharged and prepared for issue. Meanwhile tactical units had often exhausted the stocks of ammunition, gasoline, rations, or other indispensable items they had taken with them. To hasten the provision of such articles during the assault phase of an operation, an LST-DUKW system of supply was developed in the Central Pacific and employed, apparently for the first time in the Pacific, by the 7th Division at Kwajalein.45 As this system operated in the initial resupply of this division’s infantry regiments at Leyte, it furnished what was in effect a motor pool on water. It was based upon 40 DUKWs, or 2½-ton amphibian trucks, each of which was variously loaded with items recorded as to kind and quantity by an Army control officer stationed on a naval ship. The DUKWs were brought to the assault area by LSTs (landing ships, tank). As infantry regiments on land required supplies, they radioed their requests to the control officer, who had kept track of their location as they progressed inland. He ordered the appropriate DUKW to proceed to a specified beach, where a regimental officer met and directed it to the proper location, always as near as possible to the front. After delivering the items, the empty DUKW reported back to the control officer, who ordered it either to await instructions or to pick up specific items from one of eight LSTs loaded in “drug store” fashion with a mixed cargo of supplies likely to be in demand. If a DUKW was assigned the latter task, it discharged its load at the beach designated by the control officer. Operations of this sort caused the LST-DUKW system of initial supply to be called the “drug store” system.46
Distribution Points
This system was utilized for supply of the 7th Division only during the first six hours after the assault waves had swarmed ashore at Leyte. Quick tactical success thereafter permitted LSTs to begin discharging their cargoes in bulk on the beach, and the job was rushed to swift completion in order to permit prompt withdrawal of naval ships from their exposed position. Dumps were, in fact, established so rapidly that they could not be properly dispersed and revetted. Within sixty-five hours—substantially ahead of schedule—unloading operations had been completed. By that time Quartermaster distribution points had large stores of Class I and III items, but the incessant inflow of supplies had congested the dumps so much that segregation of stocks by item became a time-consuming task.47 Trucks of the 7th Quartermaster nevertheless began delivery of combat rations to supply points of the forward regiments the day after the landing.
In order to handle better the huge accumulation of materials, troops of the 7th Quartermaster Company had to bivouac in the dump area. At nightfall on A plus 5—October 25—a Japanese plane dropped
incendiary bombs. One fell in the 7th Quartermaster Company motor pool, a second near the office of the division quartermaster, and a third in an ammunition dump, which “exploded continually for 9 hours and intermittently after that until about 1430 on the 26th.” An OQMG observer, who stood only about 200 feet from the ammunition dump, reported that he “jumped into a Jap foxhole which was deeper than my own and dug into the bank with my hands for about 4 hours.” Though his foxhole had five large shell fragments in it, he escaped with only a blister on a finger “from a piece of hot shrapnel” which missed his hand “by a hair, a few shrapnel holes” in his coat, and “minor scratches.”48 Many members of the 7th Quartermaster Company were not so fortunate. Thirteen lost their lives, and fifty were wounded.49
This disaster interrupted but did not stop Quartermaster activities. As the task force widened the beachhead, the distribution points of the company were advanced in order to keep as close as possible to forward elements. By A plus 6 the unit had set up two advance points near San Pablo airstrip to maintain a 5-day supply of food and gasoline. Soon afterward it established a similar distribution point, maintaining a 2-day supply, at Dulag airstrip, still nearer the front. These three installations drew food and gasoline from Quartermaster beach dumps, which, after A plus 7, were turned over to the XXIV Corps Quartermaster. That officer then assumed the responsibility of keeping forward distribution points well stocked. Units submitted requisitions for clothing and general supplies to the division quartermaster. To prevent creation of immobile stocks of these items, sparingly issued in combat, he approved for presentation to the corps quartermaster only such requisitions as were vital to continued support of tactical forces. Throughout the Leyte operation the division quartermaster followed a basic pattern of setting up Class I and III distribution points in the wake of advancing troops. When an established point was no longer needed, its stocks were promptly issued. After USASOS Base K began operations, unit requisitions for Class II items were submitted to it every ten days and filled from its stocks.50
The X Corps had the rare advantage of being able to store many of its supplies in warehouses at Tacloban, but the XXIV Corps, of which the 7th Division was part, was obliged to follow the normal Pacific pattern of setting up dumps in the open. All the disadvantages associated with such exposed storage areas were intensified by their hasty establishment under circumstances that allowed little choice of location. The principal considerations governing the se lection of sites were accessibility to roads, if any existed, and proximity to the elements to be supplied. Even firm, dry areas, usable in all sorts of weather, could not be picked unless they met these requisites. If the division advanced rapidly, supply dumps kept pace with it. The nearer a dump was to the front, the smaller its stockage. Ordinarily, a forward distribution point contained a 2-day supply of Class I and III items, while a rear one contained a 5-day supply. Stocks were replenished from army or corps supply points set up at comparatively safe sites some distance behind the divisional dumps.
In mid-November, after elements of the 7th Division had moved rapidly down the east coast from Dulag, seized the important
town of Abuyog a dozen miles directly south, and struck across the waistline of Leyte to Baybay on the west coast, most of the division was concentrated in that region. Rear dumps were maintained at Dulag and intermediate installations at Abuyog; meanwhile large stocks were built up at Class I and III dumps on the west coast in preparation for a powerful movement northward against the stronghold of Ormoc, where the Japanese were gathering reinforcements from the whole northern part of the island for a determined stand. Ten days after the offensive was launched, these dumps were closed and new ones established seven miles up the coast. On 7 December, the 77th Division landed just south of the Japanese citadel and joined in the attack. Ormoc fell on the 10th. For some days the distribution points, carrying a 1- to 6-day supply level, cared for 77th as well as 7th Division troops.51
Land Transportation
The 7th Division used all sorts of transportation methods to keep front-line troops on the west coast of Leyte adequately supplied. The G-4 operations report noted that it had been necessary to employ trucks, large and small landing craft, DUKWs, amphibious trailers, caterpillar tractors, planes, and even carabaos, native canoes, and hand carriage. All these methods had to be used not only because of the normal obstacles to smooth transportation—heavy rainfall, almost impassable terrain, poor roads and trails, lack of bridges, and truck shortages stemming from insufficient shipping space—but also because of the extensive territory that had to be covered. From the rear dumps at Dulag to Ormoc the supply line traversed more than eighty miles. Landing craft ferried supplies down the east coast to Abuyog, where they were transferred to trucks and hauled over mountainous roads to Baybay. Here they were transferred to DUKWs or LCMs (landing craft, mechanized) and carried to truckheads located at various points along the west coast north to Ormoc.52
Throughout the northward drive of the 7th Division all trucks of the Quartermaster company and most of its trailers operated continuously as part of the motor pool controlled by the divisional G-4. So treacherous was the road leading from Abuyog to Baybay that the single Quartermaster truck platoon had to be strengthened by the addition of two truck companies from the Fifth Air Force. On one occasion when the road became impassable, the division called for an airdrop of motor gasoline. In answer to this request planes successfully dropped thirty-seven 55-gallon drums on the beach at Baybay. Two truck platoons of the Quartermaster Company received supplies brought to truckheads south of Ormoc and transported them to divisional distributing points or, if conditions permitted, to using units. When the 7th Division shouldered the added burden of supplying the 77th Division, it became obvious that there were not enough trucks to haul the supplies of both organizations. The system of distribution was therefore modified by utilizing LSMs for moving part of the supplies from Dulag around the island to Ormoc, where six vessels were scheduled to arrive every three days. The direct shipment by water reduced the pressure on trucks along the west coast, but supplies meanwhile continued to pour into Abuyog for overland movement. All three truck platoons of the Quartermaster
company were therefore concentrated on this run.53
Air Transportation
From the very beginning of combat operations in 1942, air transportation had been used as an emergency supplement to other methods of moving supplies during combat operations. Since this practice was new to both airmen and infantrymen, satisfactory equipment was not at first available. Cargo parachutes were so scarce that they could be employed only for the most essential or most fragile items—small arms, ammunition, medical supplies, and bottled liquids. Rations, clothing, and personal equipment other than arms were merely rolled in bags or blankets, wired, and “free dropped,” that is, dropped without parachute. During the Papuan operations Quartermaster troops, aided at times by men from other services, wrapped the supplies of all Army components and, when parachutes were used, attached the packages to these contrivances. Several Quartermaster troops accompanied the planes and at the proper moment expelled the cargo. Receiving areas on the ground were indicated by panels, smoke signals, and white streamers, but complete accuracy in identifying and hitting these areas from a fast-moving plane proved an almost impossible feat. More than half the cargo dropped without parachute was irrevocably lost, smashing to bits on striking the ground or else falling not on designated targets but deep in the jungle or on inaccessible mountain slopes. Owing to these mishaps, the troops struggling along on land repeatedly went hungry and ill-clad.54
During the fighting in the Nassau Bay—Salamaua region of northern New Guinea in the summer of 1943, cargo parachutes of good quality were still scarce, and methods of bundling rations and attaching the packages to the rim of a parachute clearly needed substantial improvement. In mountainous and heavily forested regions, according to Col. Archibald R. MacKechnie, commander of the 162nd Regiment, air dropping without parachutes proved “costly, undependable and wasteful of both supplies and manpower,” only 40 to 75 percent of the cargoes ever being recovered.55
In the New Georgia campaign, conducted at approximately the same period as the Nassau Bay–Salamaua operations, rugged mountains and rain forests at times halted transportation by land and forced resort to paradrops. Of the 118 tons of supplies dropped to field units, more than 59 tons consisted of rations; of 18 air supply missions, 16 involved the delivery of food. On only one mission were Quartermaster items other than subsistence carried. The methods of air supply represented a marked advance over those employed in the Salamaua operations. Three kinds of containers were utilized. The most common type held 192 rations and loose cigarettes. A smaller type carried 80 rations, and a third, still smaller, held three 50-pound bags of rice.56 C-47 transport planes—usually four to a mission—carried the rations. Occasionally, flights could not start for some hours after the scheduled time. In such cases, cargoes were often dropped after infantry units had moved out of the target areas. As in Papua,
pilots found it hard to locate these areas. In densely wooded terrain supplies fell more frequently in towering trees, 100 to 150 feet high, than they did on the indicated targets, making “discovery of the parachutes hard and their recovery harder.”57 Retrieval of cargoes was further complicated by lack of troops for protracted searches and by heavy losses incurred in detaching packs from parachutes caught in tall trees. Such packs could be recovered only by shooting in two the shroud lines, which ran from the rim of the parachute to the main cord supporting the pack, thus permitting it to fall. The long drop often split food containers and scattered their contents over the ground. In mountainous and heavy jungle areas of New Georgia, as in the Salamaua region, only about 50 percent of rations were recovered in usable form, but in fairly open country, such as coconut plantations, where parachutes rarely became ensnared in tall trees, losses ran much lower, averaging, it was reported, only about 10 percent.58
Meanwhile the significance of air transportation as a vital supplement to slower or temporarily unusable means of operational supply became better recognized, and higher headquarters tried to organize the new method of logistical support in a systematic fashion. General Headquarters, Southwest Pacific Area, at intervals designated certain USASOS bases as stocking points for items that were to be released solely for aerial movement to combat areas, and the ALAMO Force formed an air supply company, whose members were trained in the specialized methods of packing cargo and handling it aboard planes.59 In the Central Pacific Area the Army Air Forces set up similar organizations.60
Air supply equipment and handling procedures, though still crude, were nevertheless steadily improved as the war progressed. Cargo parachutes were better made and obtainable in larger numbers, and identification of dropping areas was rendered easier by aerial photography and radar beams. “Free dropping” gradually declined as more parachutes became available, and losses of supplies, though still heavy, decreased correspondingly. If a limited quantity of parachutes necessitated “free dropping,” rations packed in cartons were employed in preference to those packed in metal, for the latter broke open much more frequently.61
During the Luzon campaign USASOS bases on Leyte kept constantly on hand for air shipment a ten-day reserve of combat rations for 20,000 men. Actually, no calls for any of this emergency reserve came, for stocks on Luzon met all requirements. But this did not mean that air supply was not extensively utilized. On the contrary, para-drops of regular supplies alone kept many guerrillas in active operation against the Japanese. The Sixth Army reported that 1,319 planeloads, totaling 5,020,000 pounds, were dropped to isolated units between 19 January and 30 June 1945. Of this amount, perhaps 40 percent was Quartermaster in origin. Recoveries varied from 65 to 90 percent, depending upon the terrain and the proximity of the Japanese. The
over-all proportion of recoveries amounted to about 87 percent, a figure that indicated a notable advance in retrieval techniques. Supplies were not only dropped but were also landed in substantial quantities on airstrips.62
Although the emergency food reserve set up on Leyte for the Luzon campaign went untapped, a similar ten-day reserve for 5,000 men served as a main source of replenishment for the forces fighting on Mindanao. Withdrawals were indeed so heavy that prescribed levels could scarcely be maintained. The heavy demand originated partly in the inability of Base K at Tacloban to make timely deliveries by the long water route to Parang, but an even more important factor was the lack of roads in the rugged interior of Mindanao, an island nearly as large as Luzon. Rations were flown to coastal airfields in the southern island and then flown inland and dropped to forward units. During one period of eight days, 179,000 pounds of rations and 55,000 pounds of other Quartermaster items, chiefly Class II and IV supplies, were brought in from Leyte.63
Another unusual feature of logistical support in the southern Philippines was the large-scale utilization of air movements for interisland distribution of perishable food, a development that reflected the swiftly increasing number of planes and the still acute shortage of refrigerated vessels. For several weeks reefers could not be obtained for transportation of fresh foods to Panay, Palawan, and parts of Mindanao, and perishables were delivered to these areas by air. Between 13 and 27 April plane shipments reached the substantial total of 390,000 pounds, not much below normal requirements of 510,000 pounds.64
Supply Operations on Luzon
After the return to the Philippines, conditions governing Quartermaster support of combat operations became in many ways better than in earlier campaigns. Service units had become more experienced, and hostile interference with supply activities less significant. These favorable factors, together with the greater quantity of replacement items provided by increased employment of block ships, all made logistical support in some respects an easier task than it had been in New Guinea and the Solomons. But a shortage of service units continued to plague such support. When, for instance, the troop basis for the invasion of Luzon was established, the Sixth Army Quartermaster received 40 to 50 percent fewer units than he had requested. He was denied some kinds of units altogether and was further handicapped by severe reductions in the equipment of others. Under these circumstances the amount and quality of Quartermaster service inevitably suffered.
In populous and fairly well-developed Luzon, Quartermaster activities took on some characteristics of operations in continental areas. Roads, though rarely good by American standards, were at least usable; in some districts there was even limited railway service on hastily repaired lines. Transportation by land thus proved moderately satisfactory, but as was the case during tactical operations on extensive land masses, rapid advances often suddenly lengthened supply routes. Food and gasoline dumps had to be
moved quickly in order to keep pace with combat divisions swiftly pursuing retreating Japanese. In the twenty-two days after the landing at Lingayen Gulf the Class I and III dumps of the 6th Division were pushed ahead three times; the last shift moved them forward about sixty miles from their first location. In the next eighteen days four moves, covering about 100 miles, were carried out. The fourth shift required a fifty-mile haul of a ten-day store of food and gasoline. To supply his dumps, the 6th Division Quartermaster drew needed items from Base M or Sixth Army supply installations, which, though not fully stocked and occasionally situated far to the rear, provided the only sources of large-scale replenishment. The Quartermaster Section of the Sixth Army tried to place its supply points within twenty-five miles of the divisional dumps, but because of transportation difficulties and the wide area over which troops were scattered, this was not always feasible. In a few instances 6th Division quartermasters made round trips of 150 miles or more to replenish their Class I and III stores and obtain Class II and IV items requisitioned by combat elements.65 During the rapid advance across the central Luzon plain to Manila, army and corps as well as divisional quartermasters met difficulties similar to the 6th Division’s. For example, the 37th Quartermaster Company, which cared for 32,000 troops, not only maintained regular day-by-day supply but also several times moved up a 30-day reserve stock. “No sooner,” declared its commander, “would the dumps be established than the QM’s would be far behind the lines.”66
During the precipitate dash of the 37th Division through the Cagayan Valley of northern Luzon in June 1945 the QMC pushed its dumps ahead almost daily, occasionally “as far as the front lines, only to be fifteen or twenty miles behind in twenty-four hours.”67 The chief obstacle to adequate supply, however, was not the distance of divisional distribution points from the front but their remoteness from the main supply depots. The route from these installations, moreover, crossed mountains so rugged in places that deliveries were sometimes considerably delayed. Scarcities at the front could not be alleviated until air transportation came into use on a large scale during the last six days of June. In that short period planes landed 1,070,000 pounds of cargo at the airfield in Tuguegarao, a Japanese stronghold captured on the 24th.68 Airdrops supplied scattered tactical units in the northern Cagayan Valley until mid-July, when the port of Aparri at the mouth of the Cagayan River was opened to shipping, and provisions, ammunition, clothing, and equipment that had been assembled at nearby Abulug were brought in to meet American needs.69
Long-distance hauling in Luzon put a severe strain on truck transportation, which was relieved but not wholly solved by Engineers’ prompt rehabilitation of railways and by utilization of vehicles for twenty-four hours every day. Unluckily, there were too few wheeled conveyances, for shipping shortages, as previously noted, allowed truck units coming to Luzon only half the vehicles called for by their Tables of Equipment. Some Quartermaster truck companies had
indeed arrived with less than twenty cargo vehicles. Far-flung supply lines forced the employment of all available trucks for protracted periods without needed repairs and maintenance, a practice that in the long run seriously reduced the number of usable vehicles. In mid-February the demand for more conveyances became so insistent that combat units loaned some of theirs to Base M so that it could carry out its logistical responsibilities. In referring to the scarcity of equipment in truck companies, the Sixth Army Quartermaster recommended that, if shipping shortages in future operations forced reductions in the number of vehicles, whole units be eliminated rather than most of the vehicles in each of several companies.70
Fighting in the mountainous terrain of Luzon at times involved slow progress that posed logistical problems quite different from those of rapid advances. Frequently, Quartermaster units resorted to hand carrying, an expedient earlier employed in the Papuan, Hollandia, and Leyte campaigns.71 When infantrymen of the 32nd Division in north-central Luzon were conducting a bitter struggle against Japanese powerfully entrenched in steep ranges above San Jose, rations could be carried forward only on fifteen-mile-long Villa Verde Trail, a narrow, winding track just wide enough for small vehicles. Owing to the negligible amount of wheeled traffic that could be accommodated, Quartermaster dumps were established at several points along its treacherous course. Since fighting was conducted largely by small groups of men, transportation of supplies presented unusual difficulties, which were met by the employment of about 1,000 natives as hand carriers—many of them Igorot inhabitants of this wild region. Teams, composed of thirty to seventy men, each bearing seventy-five pounds on specially designed packboards, were formed, and for some days these men bore on their backs ammunition, rations, and other vital supplies for the front. The teams made such tortuous progress that Lt. Col. Lawrence E. Swope of the Sixth Army Quartermaster Section asserted that a single carrier could normally supply only three soldiers.72 In the stubbornly contested advance from Lingayen Gulf over mountainous country to Baguio, formerly the summer capital of the Philippines, supply units also relied heavily upon human carriers. The service company of the 129th Infantry alone employed approximately 1,000 Filipinos.
Among other unusual logistical expedients of the Luzon campaign was the use of pack animals, once indispensable components of every army and still on the outbreak of war part of the U.S. military organization in the Philippines. In anticipation of future calls for animals from the field forces, the QMC in Australia had early procured hundreds of horses and mules and established a remount depot for breaking them in. Actually, combat organizations, intent on the utmost mechanization, put in no requests for these beasts of burden, procurement ceased, and the depot closed.73 On rare occasions when pack animals were employed in the Pacific, it was only to meet exceptional needs. The few
Quartermaster pack train moving toward the front on Luzon.
beasts required in these emergencies were obtained from local sources and used on a purely provisional basis.
This sort of improvisation was resorted to during the protracted fighting for Baguio in the spring of 1945. The mountainous terrain of that region could be traversed only over steep trails generally impassable to vehicles. Since the 33rd Division could obtain few Filipino carriers, searchers scoured the countryside for horses and finally collected a group of forty-eight animals, which they divided into four sections, each composed of twelve beasts. Captured Japanese horseshoes, pack saddles, and halters furnished the means of shoeing and equipping the animals. To each pack section were assigned three soldiers experienced in handling horses. Igorots, familiar with the dangerous trails, served as guides.74 On missions during April and May 1945 each horse carried a load of about 200 pounds, consisting in the main of ammunition, water, food, and other supplies front-line troops needed most.
Filipino Labor
Throughout the operations in the Philippines infantry divisions employed Filipinos as laborers as well as hand carriers. On Leyte the 24th Division began to hire them as early as A plus 3, when its Civil Affairs Officer and Commonwealth officials set up an employment office in Palo. During the following week they hired an average of 450 civilians a day. The division
quartermaster used about 300 of these workers in handling supplies on the beach and the remaining 150 in burying battle casualties. As the division advanced inland, the employment office moved with it, but in the interior fewer Filipinos could be hired. Luckily, need for them temporarily slackened. From A plus 10 to A plus 23 the division obtained a daily average of only 125 laborers, who were employed mainly in the construction of roads. During a rapid advance between A plus 24 and A plus 31, about 300 Filipinos carried rations and ammunition to forward units.75 To a greater or smaller extent most divisions in the Philippines shared the experience of the 24th. After the 7th Division reached the west coast of Leyte, it employed women to wash and mend salvaged garments. These workers made considerable quantities of clothing and equipment available for reissue. The women received no monetary wages but accepted in payment bits of unreclaimed cloth.76
With the reconquest of the Philippines the QMC shouldered a fresh responsibility, that of outfitting from head to foot Filipino guerrillas, who for almost three years had resisted the Japanese invaders and were now attached to the U.S. forces. In early May 1945 there were nearly 51,000 guerrillas on Luzon alone. The task of clothing and equipping these new soldiers entailed the filling of heavy demands, which exceeded by a large margin prelanding estimates of probable needs. Protracted delays in the arrival of shipments scheduled against these inadequate estimates made the task especially hard. Replacement stocks and captured enemy equipment of necessity largely served as the source of initial issues. Since Filipinos were mostly of slight physique, small-sized shoes and work suits were in particularly big demand. On Leyte such items of issue were completely exhausted for several weeks, and everywhere in the archipelago the chronic size problem was intensified.77
Supply Operations on Okinawa
The Okinawa offensive illustrated the logistical problems encountered by unexpected failure to capture promptly modern ports vital to speedy discharge of cargoes. For nearly a month after it had been hoped that the docks of Naha, Yonabaru, and Baten would be receiving incoming cargoes, these ports remained in Japanese hands or under fire, forcing service and combat troops to carry out unloading activities over reefs and beaches. Logistical difficulties were worsened by torrential rains, violent wind storms, destructive air raids, and a demand for supplies—ammunition in particular—substantially higher than had been foreseen. Adherence to preinvasion resupply schedules became impossible, and ships were called up for discharge, not according to plan, but in response to the most urgent needs of combat elements at the moment.78
In the very beginning, failure of tactical units to take ashore the prescribed quantity of supplies necessitated hurried issues from partly discharged B rations. These issues unbalanced subsistence stocks, disrupted other Quartermaster activities, and retarded
the establishment of efficient supporting operations. Frequent interruptions in the unloading of rations further unbalanced food stores. Such stoppages were caused mostly by the higher priority assigned to ammunition, which was consumed in prodigious quantities. The discharge of a single ship with a cargo consisting mostly of rations occasionally took days. The subsistence supply on shore became so limited for a time that quartermasters could establish no reserve and had to issue food on a day-by-day basis. Class I dumps in general contained few B ration components; the remaining components lay aboard ship. In some sectors the QMC had few even of the incomplete B rations. For several weeks Headquarters, Tenth Army, and Island Command lived on emergency rations so that front-line troops could have B rations.79
Within a few weeks discharge conditions improved, and a fifteen-day stock of field rations became available. But at the same time American penetration to the southern end of Okinawa put several divisions twenty-five to thirty miles from Class I dumps. Since tactical units in this area employed their organic trucks exclusively for carrying ammunition, Quartermaster vehicles hauled all the food they could direct to fighting troops; occasionally, rains and impassable roads necessitated distribution by air. Emergency dumps, established close to the front and supplied by boat, eventually eased the situation.80
Class III items, which in general had a higher unloading priority than did rations, flowed smoothly to using organizations. By L plus 15 ample stocks had been landed; beach dumps were operating satisfactorily; and forward supply points had been set up to support both Marine Corps operations in the north and Army operations in the south. Because of expected delays in constructing bulk storage tanks, the first three block shipments of petroleum products as well as the initial 30-day supply brought in by newly arriving units consisted wholly of packaged items, 65 percent of which came in 55-gallon drums. The remaining 35 percent had been placed in 5-gallon cans to facilitate handling if trucks should be unavailable. Scarcity of service troops was the major Class III problem. The QMC had requested four gasoline supply companies, but only two were furnished. They worked on a twenty-four hour schedule and eventually employed forty-eight more tank trucks than were normally provided. Deep mud occasionally prevented the trucks from entering Class III dumps, and drivers at times came under fire. Petroleum issues nevertheless usually matched requirements.81
Other Problems of Logistical Support
Consumption Rates
In all combat operations the amount of Quartermaster supplies actually received by tactical troops hinged upon the quantity transported by assault units and resupply vessels and upon discharge, storage, and distribution conditions. These determinants never proved to be the same for any two offensives. Even had they been, a precise statement of consumption rates under operational conditions could not ordinarily be made, for such a statement depended on complete records of stocks received and issued, and the necessarily incomplete organization of Quartermaster activities in com-
Class III supply dump at Red Beach, Leyte, P. I.
bat zones seldom permitted such recording. In December 1943 the XIV Corps tried to determine what had been the consumption of the four classes of Quartermaster supply in the New Georgia campaign. The table below shows the estimated number of pounds in each class consumed daily by corps troops alone and by two divisions composing part of the corps:82
| QM Supply Class | 25th Division | 43rd Division | XIV Corps |
| Class I | 4.0 | 5.7 | 6.98 |
| Class II | 0.3 | 0.5 | 4.86 |
| Class III | 3.8 | 4.0 | 5.70 |
| Class IV | 0.0 | 0.0 | 0.14 |
The larger figures for the XIV Corps probably reflected the greater ease of supplying corps troops who, much more than divisional troops, were likely to be stationed in rear areas where distribution ran into the fewest difficulties. Corps soldiers in general received ordinary field rations at an earlier date than did divisional units, which, for days, often had nothing better to eat than packaged combat rations. The disproportionate consumption of Class II items by troops attached to the XIV Corps, ten- to sixteenfold greater than that of other units, reflected the differing availability of these articles. In rear areas stocks of this class were kept at about normal levels, whereas units going into combat carried only scanty quantities. Most startling of all was the absence of any issue of Class IV supplies to front-line soldiers. The table indeed gives much justification for the constant
complaint that “Them bastards in the back areas get all the good stuff.”
Class II and IV Problems
Extremely restricted issues of Class II items—and even more of Class IV items—generally characterized operational supply. This situation was caused partly by the shipping shortage, which limited both initial and maintenance provision of articles having little direct relation to tactical activities and partly by low priorities assigned to delivery of clothing, equipment, and general supplies in combat zones. On Leyte, belated receipt of these items created so tight a supply condition on A plus 4 that their issue was completely halted in a few rear areas in order to provide supplies at the front. Only the opportune arrival of the first block ship carrying Quartermaster clothing and equipment prevented an acute shortage.83 During active fighting the higher priorities given to other items often reduced the flow of most Quartermaster Class II and IV supplies to forward units to a mere trickle or stopped it entirely. At such times only articles directly related to tactical activities or to the soldier’s health, such as canteens, intrenching shovels, and ammunition bags, were delivered promptly.
Another cause of unsatisfactory Class II and IV distribution was the inadequacy of the replacement factors applied in determining resupply needs. Often they were too low to match combat losses. Partly because of this deficiency, Class II and IV stock levels during the three months of fighting on Leyte “gradually dropped farther and farther” behind requirements.84 The commanding general of the XXIV Corps declared that the resultant scarcities hampered both combat efficiency and post-operational replenishment. Among the replacement factors enumerated by him as most markedly too low was that for the BAR (Browning automatic rifle) magazine belt, issued and resupplied in accordance with War Department T/O and E’s at a rate only half that of the rifle itself. As this efficient firearm was being utilized more and more, the disparity in issues was swiftly reflected in a disturbing shortage of belts. In July 1945 an OQMG observer’s report from Okinawa revealed that BAR belts were almost as scarce there as they had been on Leyte.85 Other important items for which existing factors proved inadequate were rubber boots, tarpaulins, tents, portable typewriters, field ranges, and cooking outfits for small groups.
In amphibious operations the heavier, less used items of individual equipment, such as blankets, ponchos, and shelter halves, were packed in interchangeable pouches, which base installations did not ship for some days after initial supply vessels had departed. Lighter personal equipment, such as extra garments, shoes, and toilet articles carried into combat, was normally packed in soldiers’ individual duffel bags before departure for the assault area, taken aboard ship, and left there temporarily when the troops landed. Neither time nor men could be spared to separate these
bags by unit, and in an unsegregated state they were dumped on the beaches.86
During the New Georgia operation, the after action report of the 43rd Division declared, so many bags were discharged not long after the assault waves had landed that the beaches became badly congested and the handling of other supplies was slowed. In practically all campaigns substantial losses of luggage occurred on the beaches because there was no covered storage to protect it from pilferers and unfavorable weather, too few men to handle the bags, and there were too few trucks to forward them to the appropriate units. As days—perhaps weeks—elapsed before the interchangeable pouches left at rear bases were forwarded, they, too, were often rifled.87
Other areas had similar difficulties. Col. Archibald R. MacKechnie, commander of the 162nd Infantry in New Guinea, declared that the storage of clothing and equipment in duffel bags and interchangeable pouches generally meant “the complete loss” of these materials.88 The 7th Division noted that on Leyte its regiments were “utterly incapable of removing all their baggage, and the Division Quartermaster lacked transportation and personnel to accomplish the task.” For days the bags remained in open storage, and in consequence “losses by mildew and rotting amounted to as much as 75%.”89 The 96th Division had a similarly disheartening experience in this offensive. Its 1st and 2nd Battalions did not receive any substantial part of their duffel bags for four weeks, and even then only half of them were forwarded to the units at the front. Generally, even the bags that were delivered had previously been “pilfered by troops on the shore” who ripped open padlocked pouches with a knife and removed scarce articles.90 Losses did not always cease with the receipt of luggage by the appropriate units. Soldiers engaging the enemy of necessity left their bags in unit dumps where they underwent further pilferage. Lacking adequate means of transporting and guarding such impedimenta, tactical units sometimes simply discarded them.
All these losses combined with combat wear and tear to create large shortages in clothing and individual equipment. On Leyte, though 75 percent of the men in the 383rd Infantry had received their duffel bags and interchangeable pouches by the end of the first month, lost and stolen articles were so numerous that the regiment encountered considerable trouble in supplying shoes, 400 men lacked ponchos, and a quarter of the unit had no socks. Yet it was regarded as better off than units which had received a smaller proportion of their bags.91
In the belief that a ready supply of clothing could be secured only by moving extra garments in bulk lots, several divisions in the Okinawa campaign abandoned the use of individual duffel bags for each man. The 7th Division was one of those which adopted the new method. When it embarked, each man took with him only clothing that he might need aboard ship. On landing he put these garments and a few other personal possessions in a small bag. These bags were then collected from each squad and stuffed into two larger bags. Sufficient duffel bags to carry extra clothing required in the
postoperational period were also placed in the squad bags. By doing away with the use of interchangeable pouches and individual duffel bags, the number of bags needed by a division of 20,000 men was reduced to 3,000, a quantity that obviously could be handled and guarded more easily than could 20,000. Yet even this compromise did not correct all faults of the older system.92 Pilferage and unexplained losses, though on a smaller scale, continued. While the new method did not completely fulfill the hopes of its originators, Captain Orr, Quartermaster observer, thought that it had proved successful enough to justify employment in future operations. Actually, the problem of the disappearing bags was probably not much nearer ‘a fully satisfactory solution than it had been in France in 1918 or in Europe in 1945.
In other respects, also, the Okinawa operation reflected an improvement in Quartermaster Class II and IV supply. New types of articles, some of which had been standardized as long as two years before, were for the first time available in the Pacific in reasonably adequate quantities. Moreover, the replacement factors used in determining the thirty-day maintenance allowances were somewhat more realistic than those previously employed.93 Though the quantities of many items carried on block vessels still proved insufficient, unloading difficulties handicapped distribution activities much more than did inadequate cargoes. As in the case of rations, hard fighting ashore precluded prompt discharge of Class II and IV items. Supply vessels, carrying all kinds of maintenance shipments, instead of being discharged simultaneously, as had been planned, were discharged selectively according to priorities that held up the delivery of clothing and equipment. The delays, together with pilferage, caused acute shortages in some essentials like cots and tents. These scarcities imperiled the proper care of the ill and wounded, but prompt establishment of priorities favoring medical installations alleviated this disturbing situation.94
Class I Supply
Special problems arose in the supply of Class I as well as Class II and IV items. Probably the most exasperating problem was the failure of many assault organizations to take with them the prescribed number of rations. As has already been noted, this failure caused much difficulty at the beginning of the Okinawa operation, and it was also a common source of trouble in other offensives. Nondivisional units in particular often neglected to take the stipulated rations with them. Commenting on this deficiency, Colonel Longino wrote:
... More rigorous inspection of task forces before embarkation, closer supervision of the staging and loading of units, and more effective safeguarding of stocks by commanders while en route would eliminate this trouble and greatly improve the fare of combat troops during the early stages of an operation. It would also greatly reduce the problems of resupply.95
Pilferage also contributed importantly to Class I scarcities. In referring to this widespread evil, Colonel Longino made the following sharp observations:
... While perhaps only a small fox nibbling at the edges of supplies as they left the United States, after depredations by ships’ crews, leakages at intermediate bases, predatory incursions by the black marketeer, and the
reckless prodigality of combat troops themselves, pilferage assumed the proportions of a devouring wolf pack in the wake of which ran the spectre of insufficiency at the front. It seems incredible that commanders, usually so watchful against waste of food in mess kits, were not more concerned about the far more serious losses elsewhere. This applies to Class II supplies as well. Austerity at the front could be accounted for partially, at least, by overstocked foot lockers of personnel at every stopping point along the pipe line of supply.96
Combatant Activities of Quartermaster Units
While Quartermaster troops suffered far fewer casualties than did infantrymen, they were not entirely immune from the dangers of combat. Like other troops landed during early phases of amphibious operations, they normally underwent some artillery fire and bombing and strafing attacks, and during the course of an operation they underwent further air raids and artillery fire. Nor was their equipment safe. At Hollandia ovens of the 109th Quartermaster Bakery Company sustained serious damage. Even after bakers had patched up this equipment, raiding bombers often interrupted bread-making and forced the unit to set up .50-caliber machine guns in order to protect their ovens. During the Hollandia operation part of the 41st Quartermaster Company, as has already been mentioned, went through a destructive Japanese air raid on White Beach 1, which caused several casualties among unit members. This company encountered other hazards at Hollandia. Artillery fire imperiled its truck drivers and strafing attacks its service troops. When the campaign ended, ten members of the units, including the assistant division quartermaster, had suffered wounds. During the Biak operation, which followed immediately after the Hollandia operation, wounds were inflicted on five more enlisted men. The sixty-three casualties sustained by the 7th Quartermaster Company at Leyte was even more telling testimony of the perils that occasionally befell quartermasters.97
At times the possibility of Japanese attack forced units to set up perimeter defenses for their installations. In February 1944, when intelligence officers at Bougainville warned that desperately hungry Japanese, seeking an honorable death, might attempt a headlong attack, Quartermaster troops of the Americal Division protected their entire area by building pillboxes and machine gun positions and putting up a barbed wire fence on which were hung noise devices made of M1 clips with a .30-caliber shell as a pendulum. All machine gun positions and entrances to the area were kept under constant guard, and men from five truck platoons were assigned the defense of specific sectors of the perimeter line. Detailed plans were made for the destruction of dumps and vehicles if that should prove necessary. While the expected Japanese attack did not materialize, the Quartermaster area underwent heavy artillery fire, and the first-aid station in the center of the perimeter at one time was filled to capacity.98
Incidents that compelled QMC troops to engage in combat activities scarcely ever arose, but they occurred often enough to render almost pointless the venerable witticism that “The only quartermasters killed in the last war were one who was hit in the
head by a case of beans and another who was killed in a rush to a chow line.”99
Emergency digressions into tactical tasks may have made the Corps seem a bit less “safe” than tradition pictured it, but only by satisfactory performance of the logistical responsibilities that ordinarily took up all its time and energy could the Corps truly fulfill its mission. The effective manner in which its supporting activities were usually conducted shows that it admirably met that test. The Corps provided in sufficient—often in more than sufficient—quantities the materials and services individual soldiers most needed to meet everyday necessities. Despite supply and manpower shortages, low priorities, mud, rain, rough terrain, and a general lack of the buildings, highways, railroads, and other commercial facilities available in economically well-developed lands, the Corps surmounted all obstacles. After the fall of the Philippines, the American advance nowhere wavered because Quartermaster supplies were not on hand. Though forward elements at times suffered temporary discomfort, enough food, clothing, gasoline, and equipment were always furnished to sustain American operations. The QMC could be justly proud of its achievements.