“I’ll issue the necessary orders tomorrow, as my first order of business. Or maybe even tonight. I thought I would drop by there tonight, unannounced, just to see what I could see. How soon do you want Banning in Tokyo?”
“As soon as possible, sir.”
[THREE]
OFFICE OF THE CHIEF OF STAFF HEADQUARTERS X U.S. CORPS SEOUL, SOUTH KOREA 0825 11 OCTOBER 1950
There were three full colonels sitting on folding chairs facing the folding desk of the chief of staff, who was also a full colonel.
A somewhat irreverent thought occurred to Colonel T. Howard Kennedy, the X Corps Transportation Officer: It’s like Orwell said. Some pigs are more equal than other pigs.
“The general does not want any delays when we go aboard the ships,” the chief of staff—the most equal of all the pigs—said. “Comments, please.”
T. Howard Kennedy had another irreverent thought: That’s a nice thought, but it’s like hoping for a white Christmas. Nice if you can get it, but unlikely.
There were going to be delays in loading X Corps aboard the ships that would constitute the invasion fleet for the Wonsan landing. That was a given. There were always delays.
This maneuver was probably going to have more delays than the general was going to like, which was going to be a problem for everybody in the chief of staff’s office. Major General Edward M. Almond expected his orders to be obeyed as he wanted them to be obeyed, which was sometimes impossible to accomplish, and when that happened, Almond’s temper was legendary.
The chief of staff was looking at Colonel Kennedy, which told Kennedy that the chief of staff considered this meeting a conference, which was different from just being summoned by the chief of staff to receive orders. In a conference, comments were solicited before orders were issued. And conferees presented their comments in reverse order of rank, most junior first. This ensured that whatever the junior officer had to say was not influenced by the comments of the officers senior to him.
The pecking order here placed Kennedy at the bottom. The Transportation Office wasn’t even a G-Section, but rather a subsection of the Office of the Assistant Chief of Staff for Plans and Operations, G-3. The G-3 and the G-4 (Supply) were supposed to be more or less equal, but the G-3 called the shots.
“There are six truck companies available,” Kennedy said. “Four—two with the Marines and two with the 25th Division—are operational, and will of course be available to move people and gear to Inchon when the orders are issued. Two are in reserve, and I have given operational control of one of them to the G-4 so that he can start moving whatever he wants to move to Inchon whenever he wants to move it. Similarly, I have given operational control of half of the remaining truck company to the Headquarters Commandant here for the same purpose. The other half remains in reserve.
“The only unit over which I exercise staff control is the vehicle exchange company, the 8023d. Five days ago, I started to move it to the wharfs in Inchon for on-loading.”
“Howard,” the G-4 said, “I hope you’re not going to tell me they’re already on-loaded?”
“No. They are probably in the process by now, but, no, they’re not on-loaded. I was going to go down there this morning and see how things are going.”
“I’m a little confused,” the G-3 said. “You said you told them to move five days ago. And they’re only ‘probably’ in the process of on-loading? How long does it take them to move from one side of Inchon to the other?”
The chief of staff snorted.
“Bob, there are almost six hundred vehicles in the 8023d—” Kennedy started to reply.
“I sent you a report, Gerry,” Kennedy said. “There are five hundred seventy-nine ready for issue, plus seven beyond the company’s ability to repair. They have exchanged far fewer vehicles than was anticipated, somewhere around twenty, mostly jeeps and six-by-sixes.”
“I must not have gotten your report,” the G-4 said, and wrote in a wire-bound notebook.
“Okay,” the G-3 said. “Six hundred, give or take, vehicles. And it’s taken this long to move from one side of Inchon to the other?”
“They were set up for exchange, Bob,” Kennedy explained patiently. “The CO did a very good job. But we’re talking here about (a) on-loading all the vehicles, and (b) doing so according to that loading sequence schedule you sent me. That takes time.”