Chapter Four - World War II

I think most Americans at the time - and I was one of them - saw little likelihood that America would be drawn into the war which was already underway in Europe. I decided to transfer from the Infantry to the Coast Artillery. I don't recall exactly why I did this. I suppose that the Coast Artillery looked like an easier and more interesting life that the Infantry. My application for transfer was approved and I was assigned to duty at Fort Worden on Puget Sound in Washington. I enjoyed the relatively easy life of a Coast Artillery officer for a year or so. But then it became increasingly obvious that the United States would sooner or later become involved in war, and I figured that I had better scamper back to the Infantry where I had more expertise and where I could make a better contribution to the war effort than I could as a Coast Artillery officer. My Commanding General tried to talk me out of going back to the Infantry. In fact, he offered me a very plush job of traveling up and down the West Coast of the United States in a chauffeured official car, inspecting the Western coastal defenses of the U.S. I declined the offer. Many years later I met the officer who took this plush job and held it throughout World War II. He became a Major General without ever having heard a shot fired in anger.

REFLEXION: There is frequently no relationship between effort and ability on the one hand and reward on the other hand, unless one believes the old saying that 'virtue is its own reward.'
I joined the 3rd Infantry Division at Fort Lewis, Washington in 1941. As a young Captain, I was given command of an Infantry company. After a few months, I was promoted to Major and took over the job of Division Provost Marshal (Police Chief). I let it be known that I didn't particularly care for the role of a policeman. Late in 1941, I was sent back to Fort Benning, Georgia to take a course in how to be an Infantry Battalion Commander. A full strength battalion in those days consisted of about 1100 men. I was in the middle of this course on December 7 when the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor and America went to war against the Germans and the Japanese. Upon returning to Fort Lewis, I took command of the 1st Battalion of the 7th Infantry Regiment. We moved from Fort Lewis to Fort Ord, California near Monterey, and I spent the next few months getting my battalion ready for combat. This included a lot of amphibious training. We knew we were going to land on some beach somewhere in the world, but we didn't know where. Finally, in the fall of 1942, we moved the 3rd Infantry Division to an amphibious staging area near Norfolk, Virginia, where we made final preparations for an amphibious operation somewhere across the Atlantic. We were not told where we were going until after we had sailed from Norfolk. The day we sailed I was promoted to Lt. Colonel, which is the proper rank for a Battalion Commander. I learned that my battalion was to be one of the three assault battalions to land at a place called Fedhala near Casablanca, Morocco. In other words, we were to lead the attack ashore of this mighty armada.

I'm not going to bore you with a lot of detailed war stories. I very much dislike and sometimes distrust people who do so. I spent approximately 19 months overseas during World War II, much of it in the most brutal combat. Suffice it to say that the 3rd Infantry Division, of which I was a member, suffered approximately 300% casualties during this war, not because they were inferior in any way to the enemy, but because they were committed to very difficult combat situations for very long periods of time. I haven't checked the records, but I seriously doubt that any other American division, with the possible exception of the 1st Infantry Division, commonly known as the Big Red One, was subjected to such awesome pressures.

I will instead just single out a few situations and incidents which were interesting to me and may be interesting to you.

During the crossing of the Atlantic, I was the commanding officer of troops aboard the flagship of the landing force, the troops being mostly my 1100 man battalion. There were others aboard, however, whom I met during the voyage. One was Colonel Paul Harkins, with whom I sometimes stood at the ship's rail in the evenings and pondered what might lie ahead. It was quite a sight from that rail - some 400 ships in all were in the armada - troopships, battleships, cruisers and destroyers, of which we could see only a fraction. Paul was to be General Patton's Chief of Staff after the landings. Many years later I ran into him again when he was the four-star commander of our forces in Viet-Nam. I also noticed years later that he was the principal technical and historical advisor for the motion picture, "Patton." Another interesting character under my "temporary command," so to speak was a Colonel William H. Wilber, nicknamed Willie class of 1912 from West Point. He came aboard with very impressive credentials. He had just met with President Roosevelt who gave him those credentials. They consisted of documents signed by the President, and an American flag (about which more later).

While we were at sea, I was provided with what the Army calls 'briefing material,' that is to say, the latest aerial photos of the terrain, etc. This information was passed on to all my officers who, in turn, briefed every soldier on what he could expect to encounter when we landed. Included in this briefing material was a rather 'colorful' report on the big black Senegalese troops from French West Africa who were reported to be part of the French forces in the area in which we were to land. Among other things, they were reported to be very fierce soldiers who sometimes tortured their captives by cutting off their ears and other parts of their anatomy.

I have to explain at this point that no one in America from President Roosevelt on down had been able to get an advance indication from the French forces in North Africa as to whether they would resist or accept an American landing on the shores of North Africa. The requirements of secrecy as to the location of the landings made this especially difficult. The night before the landings I was informed that a message had been secretly transmitted to the French that if they agreed to let our landing proceed unopposed, they were to point their antiaircraft searchlights straight upward as a signal to our landing forces that they would not be opposed. As history now records, the searchlights were not pointed upward, but were pointed directly at our landing craft, as were the tracer shells and machine gun bullets of their coastal defenses.

About an hour or two before dawn on that November morning in 1942, I climbed down the rope ladder of my transport into a landing craft and proceeded towards shore. As I indicated earlier, we were the assault battalion and therefore the first to learn that we were to fight the French for perhaps the first time in American history. Along with me in my landing craft was a fellow named Hal Boyle and his jeep and typewriter. Hal was to become one of the best known war correspondents in World War II.
It was pitch dark as we started toward shore. Then the French searchlights and the 50 mm machine gun bullets began to find some of our landing craft, including mine. It was not surprising that the U.S. Navy coxswain who was guiding our landing craft toward shore, went somewhat off course and, instead of landing us on a sandy beach, hit the rocks and sunk the craft including Hal Boyle's jeep and typewriter. I got banged up a bit in the surf and found out later that I had broken three ribs. A couple of hours later, while trying to regroup my battalion I was wounded in the head (not too seriously) by a French artillery shell.

At this point in history, I'm going to refrain from giving you an 'old soldier's' detailed account of the combat which followed from Fedhala onward. Old soldiers' tales may be interesting to other old soldiers, but possibly somewhat boring and perhaps even exaggerated to others. Rather, I'm going to refer you to a book in my library called "From Fedhala to Berchteagaden," which is the WWII history of the 7th U.S. Infantry Regiment. This book will give you a detailed and fairly accurate account of combat operations of this regiment, including my participation therein.
What I propose to do from here on is to set forth a few incidents, here and there throughout the next 19 months which are not included in the "official account." You may find some of them interesting.

On the morning of the third day after the landings, the word went out that the French had surrendered. My battalion was then facing a French stone fort outside Casablanca which would have been extremely difficult to assault. A young French Lieutenant Colonel, who had commanded the opposing French Battalion came out to meet me and to tender his official surrender. He and I took a ride back to my division headquarters in my jeep. During the ride, I got to know him a bit and rather liked him. When I asked him why he and his men had fought so hard against us, he seemed surprised at the question, and replied, "Pour l'honneur de la France." - "For the honor of France."

REFLEXION: I suppose the French Lieutenant Colonel did what he had to do, and to him, the reason was quite obvious. I suppose I would have done the some thing in his place, but in retrospect, I can't help but conclude that our reasons for killing and wounding one another in this crazy world are basically, rather silly.

After the formal surrender was announced and accepted by my adversary, the French Battalion Commander, I was ordered to go to the French Naval Base in Casablanca and ensure its surrender. I took two of my young officers and a driver in my jeep to the main gate of the Naval Base, all of us armed with Tommy guns. There, I met a French Naval officer who seemed to be in command of the base. He said he was not about to surrender, and tried to engage me in a dialogue as to why we Americans - if we wanted to fight Germans, didn't fight Germans instead of Frenchmen. (One must remember that France was occupied at that time, and that French loyalties were confused and divided.) The dialogue didn't work. The French Naval officer had only two choices - open the gate and surrender the base or give the signal for his Naval personnel to resist, in which case he would certainly have been the first to die. He chose very wisely to open the gate.

Many years later, when I was with the Westinghouse Electric Corporation in Europe, I discovered that one of my Westinghouse French "brothers" so to speak, Jacques Mauduit, a member of my own Westinghouse organization, had been a gunnery officer aboard the French battleship, Jean Bart, which had been sunk beside the docks in Casablanca harbor, but whose 16 inch guns had still been able to fire at my battalion during those days and nights when we approached Casablanca from Fedhala.

All this took place in the Fedhala/Casablanca area between November 8th and November 11th, 1942. After a few days in Casablanca, the 3rd Division moved up the coast to Rabat. I particularly remember all of us sitting alongside the road to Rabat on Thanksgiving Day, eating our 'delicious' c-rations from cans. No wine, no candles, no turkey!

I guess the ultimate irony, if that is the right term, was that the French father of the French Lieutenant Colonel who surrendered to me was the principal forester in the Rabat area. He and his family invited me to their home on Christmas Day. There were presents under the tree for me and a lovely Christmas dinner. It was delightful, but I couldn't help but think, all during the day - here is this man and I, who were trying to kill each other and each other's troops a little more that a month previously, and now, look at us, celebrating together with his family the birthday of "The Prince of Peace."

REFLEXION: War between nations, basically speaking, is usually cruel, unnecessary, and pointless. The "impossible dream" would be, in the case of international conflict, to let only the politicians and the industrialists risk their lives for "the honor of their respective countries," while youth looks on and contemplates what they would like to do when they become congressmen, Parliamentarians, Politburo members or industrialists.

The 3rd Infantry Division settled into its camp in the "corktree forest" outside Rabat and began training for the next combat operation, wherever that might be. Life was rather placid there, but up in Tunisia, the First Infantry Division (known as the Big Red One) was fighting for its life against the Germans. So, one fine day, General Truscott, the 3rd Division Commander, called three of us battalion commanders into his tent (Ash Manhart, my friend and classmate, Lionel Bernard, West Point 1933, and myself) and said, "Life is a bit too easy for you guys. Go on up to Tunisia. Attach yourselves to the First Infantry Division and get yourselves shot at. It will be a good experience for you. Here are your orders. They know you are coming."

We did just that. I joined a regiment of the First Division commanded by my classmate, John Bowen, and believe me, I got myself shot at (involuntarily) by the Germans on a number of occasions.

When the fighting ended in Tunisia with the defeat of Field Marshal Rommel and his "Africa Corps," the 3rd Division moved on up to Tunisia, and I rejoined my old outfit. We then started training in earnest for the amphibious assault on Sicily.

I was given up to date aerial photos of the beach area near Licata Sicily on which my battalion was scheduled to land. It looked very forbidding - a narrow sandy beach, backed by a 50 foot vertical clay cliff. We figured that the beach might be mined, in which case the casualties would be very high on our side. As for the cliff, we obtained lots of rope and metal hooks, and found an area near Tunis where we could practice getting up such an obstacle. Regarding the countryside beyond the cliff, I built a sandtable exactly to scale showing every farm house, road, ditch, field, etc. I put the sandtable in a large tent with benches and tables along one side of the tent. I then had each of my officers and non-commissioned officers go into the tent every day. They would first memorize the terrain on the sandtable and then, with their backs to the table, sit down at the benches and sketch what they had memorized. They became progressively better at remembering every detail of the terrain before the actual landing. The reason for this exercise was that we would be landing in complete darkness and, in order to effect surprise on the defenders, every leader had to know exactly where he was from the moment he stepped ashore until daylight and of course, thereafter. All I can say is that it worked beautifully. The area was only lightly defended, but in the darkness it was the defenders who were surprised, not us.

After the conquest of Sicily which ended at Messina, the 3rd Infantry Division was moved back to the western part of Sicily for rest and recuperation before being committed to further combat. The central town in this area was Marsala, which is a lovely little place, famed for its Marsala wine - a quite sweet after dinner drink.
I suppose the thing that still sticks in my mind about our short stay in Marsala is the fact that there we had some 16,000 to 18,000 young soldiers, just released from the tensions of combat, searching for various forms of relaxation, including of course, sex.

It was not any secret that in this area of the world sex might be a bit dangerous from the standpoint of venereal diseases. So, the Division Commander, in all his wisdom (and I think he was very wise) established a system wherein certain places would be authorized for soldiers to visit, but these places would be administered by U.S. Army medical personnel who would periodically check the "health" of the "ladies of the evening."

The system worked very well for a very short period of time. The reason for the shortness of time was that it didn't take very long for the various church groups and other protectors of morality in the United States to find out that the 3rd Infantry Division was 'sanctifying' whore houses in Sicily. I suppose that all it took to bring this pressure to bear was one letter from one G.I. to his folks or to his pastor in the United States.

In any case, the 'system' was immediately stopped. I have no statistics, nor, I suppose does anyone else, but I can reasonably presume that the result of this 'moralistic action' resulted in a significant rise in venereal diseases among U.S. service men.

REFLEXION: The professional 'do-gooders' in the U.S. and elsewhere seldom realize that their very sincere and will intentioned efforts often do more harm than good. Young soldiers the world over, deprived of feminine 'companionship' for extended periods of time will inevitably seek whatever is available when they are freed from constraints. This is, according to my reading of history, a centuries old "truth." Why then, do our modern-day 'religious saviors' turn a deaf ear to human history and human nature by forbidding a 'controlled' sex environment, thus exposing these young men to various sexual disasters? This ultra-religiosity is a somewhat peculiar phenomenon of our American culture. Can you imagine, for example, if you know anything at all about the good and religious people of our allies in World War II -- France, Britain, Belgium, Denmark, Australia, etc., or even our enemies - Germany and Italy, forbidding their military authorities from providing reasonable safe sexual outlets for their combat soldiers?

There was one other occasion in Sicily that remains in my mind. I don't recall exactly when it took place, but on one nice day when the 3rd Infantry Division was out of combat, we were all ordered to march to a nearby area - a sort of amphitheater - where we would be addressed by General Patton. If any of you have seen the motion picture, "Patton," you will recognize that this was the famous "apology speech" ordered by General Eisenhower for Patton's having slapped a young soldier's face in an Army hospital. As we took our places in front of the speaker's platform, we hardly knew what to expect. But as General Patton spoke to us, we could hardly believe our ears. He used what can only be described as "latrine language," and one of his final comments was almost exactly as follows: "I really do love all you soldiers - in fact, I love every bone in you God damned heads." Translated, I and others around me took this to mean, "You soldiers are a bunch of God damned boneheads." Obviously, this was not the way it was portrayed in the movie. I think General Patton possibly on that particular morning, reverted to the memories of the 'old Army' when latrine language was the order of the day among G.I.s and their NCOs and he tried to be 'one of the boys.' The person next to me on that occasion was our regimental Sergeant Major, Sergeant (later promoted to officer rank) Fred Taylor. He was every bit as rough and tough as any of the old timers, but he was one of the 'new breed' of NCOs. He was educated, highly intelligent, sophisticated, and proud of his professional capabilities. As we marched back to our bivouac, he expressed to me his thorough disgust at what we had just heard, namely the now famous "apology" speech.

REFLEXION: If the public were given all the facts about their public heroes, from George Washington on down through U.S. history, their heroes would probably look somewhat more human and possibly a little less heroic.

I won't go into detail about the terribly difficult and bloody fight up the Italian peninsula. Suffice it to say that it was tough and we lost a lot of people, including two of my original company commanders, Hugh Carico and LeRoy Hazelwood. Both were outstanding young officers with all the qualities of leadership that one could ask for. LeRoy Hazelwood had been a college professor at a midwestern university. (I think it might have been Wisconsin, but I'm not sure.) In any case, he had eyeglasses so thick that I could not see much of anything through them. In other words, he could easily have escaped the hazards of combat, had he wished to do so. When I think of the thousands who did escape those hazards for sometimes questionable reasons, I wonder what is fair and who is fair in this fair land of ours. Both LeRoy and Hugh gave their lives for the America we now enjoy.

Besides the terribly costly combat in terms of lost lives and maimed young soldiers, there are other memories that linger with me.

One memory is of the little Italian town that sent word to the American forces that its people were starving and that there was simply no food available to feed them. I recall that General Truscott ordered up some large lorries loaded with cases of staple foods and had them trucked to the town in question. A few of us were witnesses to what happened when they arrived. The lorries were met by catholic clergymen and directed to the local church. This seemed to us to be a logical idea for distribution to the needy. But, to our utter amazement and disgust, the foodstuffs were unloaded into the church and then sold at auction to those who had the funds to purchase them from the church.

REFLEXION: Corruption in this world of ours is not limited to the Mafia and greedy politicians. It sometimes occurs in the most unlikely places. We like to pretend that this is not true, but it is true. Some of us take longer than others to overcome our naiveté in this regard.

Another Italian memory is somewhat similar in that it also involved the church, but was more humorous than revolting. There was a relatively small town whose name I have now forgotten, whose town fathers sent word to the Fifth Army Headquarters that, although the fighting had passed them by, they would still like the honor of being 'liberated' by the American forces.

By order of the Army commander, a small task force was formed and I was designated to lead it to the town which had requested it. The 'task force' was composed of one or two companies of Infantry, two or three tanks and some artillery. I led the procession in my jeep and beside me was International News Service (INS) correspondent Mike Cinego. Mike was a very personable young guy and we had become pretty good friends. He spoke Italian as fluently as he spoke English.

As we approached the town, we were halted by some officials for a few moments until all was in readiness, and then we proceeded on into town, flanked by hundreds of small children dressed in their best 'Sunday' clothes, strewing flowers in our path. When we arrived in the town, we proceeded through a large public square, in which there were literally thousands of people, to the cathedral at the end of the square. There was a balcony in front of the cathedral facing the square. My 'task force' halted in front of the cathedral with Mike Cinego in the front row. I was led up to the balcony by the mayor and all the church dignitaries. I think the top man was a bishop. In any case, they pushed me to the forefront facing the crowd-packed square and the 'bishop' made a speech. I couldn't understand what he was saying in Italian, except the often repeated phrase, "il Colonelo, il dice," - The Colonel says, " and of course, I hadn't said a word except perhaps about the weather. I looked at Mike Cinego and he was laughing like hell and giving me the "V" for victory sign. The crowd cheered and I was both puzzled and embarrassed.
Finally, a clergyman started to lead me back into the cathedral (presumably for prayer) when one of them said to me, "Of course you are Catholic?" When I said, "No," there was lots of loud Italian conversation among the clerics, and a sort of crestfallen look on most of their faces. We proceeded on into the cathedral where, actually, nothing much happened. I said to myself that someone in Fifth Army Headquarters or perhaps Third Division Headquarters really screwed this one up by sending a non-Catholic on a Catholic mission.

Shortly thereafter, the mayor and the clerics took me and my officers and Mike Cinego to the mayor's home for a reception. It was there that I learned essentially what the crowd had been given to understand that the "Colonel had said."

As soon as we were comfortably seated in the mayor's home, the mayor told us what was on everyone's mind. Some if the conversation was in English, but it was mostly in translated Italian. The mayor said that the Fascists still controlled the town and he was appealing to the U.S. Military forces to kick them out, and he had assumed that the "Colonel" would agree to this request. At this point Mike Cinego interrupted and asked me if he could take over the dialogue with the town fathers on my behalf. I, of course, was more than happy to have him do so. Mike translated for my benefit as he went along. First, he asked how many Fascists controlled the town. The answer was "about a dozen." Next, he asked what the population of the town was. I've forgotten the exact answer, but it was several thousand. Then Mike looked the mayor in the eye and asked, "Isn't the answer to your problem obvious?" The mayor pretended not to understand, whereupon Mike gave them all what can only be described as a good tongue lashing, the gist of which was that if they couldn't see that it was up to them to clean up their own town, they deserved whatever fate might befall them.

The meeting broke up immediately. Needless to say, there were no flowers strewn in our path as we left town. I felt that we were lucky that our hosts didn't throw rocks at us instead of flowers.

REFLEXION: Many communities in modern day USA expect "the government" to take care of community problems which the community itself could just as well or perhaps better take care of. This is not a phenomenon exclusive to modern times or to the United States. I suspect that it is as old as organized society, and rather universal in application.

As I indicated earlier, you can read about my remaining service with the 7th Infantry Regiment in the book "Fedhala to Berchtesgaden."

So let's jump ahead to the Anzio beachhead in Italy. During the amphibious landings at Anzio, I was still the regimental executive officer of the 7th Infantry Regiment. But, after a week or so ashore, General Truscott, the 3rd Division Commanding General, called me to his headquarters one evening. When I arrived, he walked me to a large wall map which showed the whole beachhead and all the American and German positions thereon. He specifically showed me the position of the 15th Infantry Regiment and asked me what I would do if I were in command of it. I asked him for a few minutes to consider his question, to which he agreed.

I knew that General Truscott had been an instructor at the Command & General Staff College at Fort Leavenworth, Kansas (which I was also to be some years later), and I suspected that he would judge my answer on the "traditional school solution," namely always to keep about one-third of you defensive force in reserve for the purpose of counter-attack.

I instinctively knew that the Anzio beachhead did not fit any terrain that the Command & General Staff College would consider in its student problems. What we had at Anzio, at least in my sector, was an almost billiard table flat plateau where the 15 Infantry was deployed, faced by German forces on high ground where they could easily see and bring artillery fire on almost any move that we might make on our "plateau." I decided that the traditional reserves in this situation would be virtually useless, and that the only hope of survival was to dig-in in depth and hold at all costs.

When I presented this plan to General Truscott, I was fully prepared for him to say that I showed a complete lack of military education. Instead, he said, "O.K., you are to take command of the 15th Infantry Regiment under the plan that you have just outlined to me. If you do so successfully, I will personally come down and pin a pair of eagles on your shoulders. If you don't, I will personally come down and relieve you of command."

As it turned out, he did neither. Shortly thereafter, he was promoted to Lieutenant General and given command of the Corps at Anzio. His deputy, "Iron Mike" O'Daniels was promoted to Major General and took over command of the 3rd Infantry Division. For the next several weeks I did my job most successfully. The 15th Infantry held the center of the Anzio beachhead against the severest attacks the Germans could throw at it, day after day, night after night, week after week, but we held our position. I learned several years later from a German Colonel and a German Lieutenant General who became my friends in NATO, Paris, that the German history of the Anzio beachhead credits the 15th Infantry with a key role and perhaps the key role in holding the U.S. beachhead against the Germans during the time I commanded the 15th Infantry Regiment.

We had landed at Anzio in February 1944, and towards the end of April of 1944, a colonel from the West Point class of 1924 was assigned to the Mediterranean theater by the Department of the Army with instructions that he was to be given command of a regiment. He had no combat experience whatsoever, but the Fifth Army Commander sent him to Anzio. Since I was the youngest and most junior regimental commander at Anzio, there was no question but that he would take over command of my regiment, which he did.

I remember that on the first night after the new Colonel took command, "Iron Mike" came down to our headquarters in his jeep and said he would like to make a night reconnaissance of the beachhead with me. When we were in the jeep alone (except for his driver) he told me that, although the Colonel (whose name shall remain undisclosed here) was officially in command of the regiment, "Iron Mike" would hold me personally responsible for its performance. Although I did not say so, I felt that this was inherently wrong.

A few days later, the 15th Infantry was taken out of the front line position and placed in reserves.

After some days of what one might call real soul searching, I make a decision. I was, to say the least, tee'd off at what happened to me regarding command of and responsibility for the 15th Infantry Regiment. In addition, I had some domestic difficulties back in the United States. I was also well qualified for rotation to the United States after approximately 19 months of combat. (This was far in excess of the combat time of all those who subsequently landed on D-Day in Normandy.) I asked "Iron Mike" to let me exercise my right of rotation. He tried very hard to talk me out of it, but finally agreed. The Adjutant of the 3rd Division came to me on the eve of my departure and told me that, of the 1,000 men of my battalion who had landed with me at Fedhala in Morocco, North Africa, all but eleven had been killed, wounded, evacuated or rotated. I know now that I should have been the last to leave rather than the 10th from the last. From a career standpoint, it was a bad decision on my part.

Within a few days, I was enroute to the United States. Another young Lieutenant Colonel - Jack Toffee, took my position as executive officer of the 15 Infantry. He was killed in action a few days after taking over his new job. As for the Colonel who took over the regiment from me, I later learned that he died of a heart attack sometime later while climbing a hill.
The night before I boarded a ship from Naples to Norfolk, I was handed a brown envelope and asked to deliver it to the Department of the Army in Washington. It contained by efficiency report. It was one of the worst I had ever had. After reading it, I gave the messenger a note to be delivered personally to "Iron Mike" at Anzio. When I arrived in Norfolk, the first person aboard was an Army messenger who gave me another brown envelope. It contained another efficiency report - one of the best I had ever had - together with instructions to destroy the first one. It was obvious to me then that one of the division staff officers in the smug, gossip-ridden, safety of his position as a staff officer, had decided to evaluate something he knew relatively nothing about, namely the performance of a combat leader. How he got the original efficiency report signed, I will never know, but he was a very clever fellow, and many years later, he wore several stars on his shoulders.

REFLEXION "A": The art (if one can call it that) of politics is practiced not only by state and national political aspirants. It is also practiced in the military field and, as I was later to learn, in the field of industry. It is what one might call a universal practice, sometimes for the common good, and sometimes for personal gain and/or vindictiveness.

REFLEXION "B": I am not a religious person in the orthodox sense, but I am inclined to believe in fate and whatever controls it, if anything. The fact that John Williams, my predecessor in the 7th Infantry Regiment, was killed, rather than I, was somehow related to fate. I was much more exposed to death on a daily basis then he. The fact that Jack Toffee, my successor at Anzio was killed doing the same job I would have done, had I been there, seems also related to fate. Perhaps, in the broadest possible religious sense, something - a force or a being, if you choose, does control our fate. Perhaps, for example, the reason I was spared instead of John Williams or Jack Toffee may have something to do with what I do or do not do in my life, or may possibly have something to with what my then unborn descendants may do. This is not a scholarly observation such as those of religious orthodoxy claim to make, but it is nevertheless a thoughtful observation of one human being, and may therefore have some plausibility.