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Zusatztext “No one does oral history better than Gerald Astor.” — Stephen E. Ambrose “Astor has produced a fine work that will take its place in the long line of oral histories to be read by future generations.” — Library Journal Also by Gerald Astor: Battling Buzzards The Odyssey of the 517th Parachute Regimental Combat Team 1943-1945 The Mighty Eighth The Air War in Europe as Told by the Men Who Fought It A Blood-Dimmed Tide The Battle of the Bulge by the Men Who Fought It Operation Iceberg The Invasion and Conquest of Okinawa in World War II Available From Dell Informationen zum Autor Gerald Astor is a World War II veteran and award-winning journalist and historian whose articles have appeared in the New York Times , Playboy , and Esquire. He is also the author of A Blood-Dimmed Tide: The Battle of the Bulge by the Men Who Fought It and Operation Iceberg: The Invasion and Conquest of Okinawa in World War II. He makes his home in Scarsdale, New York. Klappentext From the depths of defeat... On December 8, 1941, one day after the bombing of Pearl Harbor, the Japanese Air Force struck the Philippines in the first blow of a devastating invasion. With an undersupplied patchwork army at his command, General Douglas MacArthur led a valiant defense of the Philippines. When defeat came, MacArthur swore he would return, while thousands of POWs fell into Japanese hands — and faced a living hell that many would not survive. To the dawn of victory... In this gripping oral history, Gerald Astor brings to life the struggle to recapture the Philippines: the men who did the fighting, the battles that set the stage for an Allied invasion, and the acts of astounding courage and desperation that marked the campaign on both sides. From Corregidor to the Battle for Manila, from horrifying jungle warfare to cataclysmic clashes at sea, on beachheads and in the air, Crisis in the Pacific draws on the words of the men who were there — capturing this crucial heroic struggle for victory against Japan. Chapter 1 First Strikes On Sunday night, December 7, 1941, in the Philippine Islands — because of the international date line, five thousand miles away it was Saturday, December 6, 1941, in Hawaii and Washington, D.C. — the 27th Bombardment Group tossed a bash at the Manila Hotel in honor of their Army Air Force commander, Gen. Lewis Brereton. Amid a raunchy affair that featured the “best entertainment this side of Minsky’s” (a reference to a chain of burlesque houses in the States), General Brereton chatted with Rear Adm. William R. Purnell, chief of staff for the top Navy officer in the Far East, Adm. Thomas C. Hart, and Brig. Gen. Richard K. Sutherland, his opposite number for the supreme commander of all the American and Philippine military, Gen. Douglas MacArthur. According to Brereton, Admiral Purnell remarked that it was only a question of days or perhaps hours until the shooting started. Sutherland agreed, adding that the War and Navy Departments in Washington expected hostilities might erupt at any moment. Brereton immediately instructed his chief of staff to place all air units on “combat alert” as of Monday morning, December 8. The party at the Manila Hotel wound down sometime after midnight. The airmen straggled back to their quarters in the darkest hours of the morning. They had only themselves for company; months before, as relations between Japan and the United States deteriorated and Nazi Germany overran much of Europe, wives and children had been ordered to the United States as a precaution. Shortly before eight that morning, the first gales of Japanese planes swept down from the north to blast Hawaii’s huge naval base at Pearl Harbor. Within two hours phalanxes of aircraft methodicall...
