over land, Diceworth’s team to take the village of Oe-ri on the south end of the island, and McCoy’s to take Nae-ri on the northern end.
The lifeboat would hold a seven-man team, commanded by Zimmerman, as the reserve.
Taylor, Hart, and Kim would be aboard Wind of Good Fortune, Kim to control the militia, and Hart to operate the radio to report what was going on—especially if something went wrong.
It was a good plan of operation, and it almost worked.
They managed to get past Taebu-do and Taemuui-do without, so far as they could tell, arousing any interest whatever.
But as they approached Oe-ri on the south end of Yonghung-do, hoping to pass there, too, undetected, the junk sailing up the Flying Fish Channel attracted the attention of a North Korean sentry. First, there was a siren, and then the Wind of Good Fortune was in the light of a searchlight, and finally there came machine-gun fire, which, after a moment, walked its way through the water and into the hull of the Wind of Good Fortune.
And a moment after that, two rounds of five-inch naval gunfire landed on the machine-gun position. The searchlight went out, the machine gun stopped firing, and the outer of the two Jamaica boats—which held Lieutenant Diceworth’s team—cut free from the Wind of Good Fortune and headed for the village.
As a Royal Marine handed twenty-round magazines to a U.S. Marine firing his Browning Automatic Rifle from the bow of the boat, two more rounds of five-inch from Charity landed in Oe-ri.
The second boat from HMS Jamaica—carrying Mc-Coy’s team—now started to edge ahead of the Wind of Good Fortune, headed up the Flying Fish Channel for the north end of the island and the village of Nae-ri.
With the loss of the element of surprise, there was no need now to land in the middle of Yonghung-do and go overland.
The distance was a little over three miles, and the boat was making—even against the rapidly receding tide— close to fifteen knots. It took them just over fifteen minutes to reach the end of the island, but that was apparently enough time for the North Koreans on the southern end of the island to notify the North Koreans on the northern end that they were under attack. When McCoy’s boat turned out of the Flying Fish Channel toward the village of Nae-ri, they were immediately brought under rifle fire.
They’ve probably laid a telephone line across the island, McCoy thought, as he watched a Royal Marine sergeant speak into the microphone of his field radio: “Mother, Mother, Baby Two, Baby Two, Sixteen, Sixteen,” he said, lowered the microphone, and turned to McCoy.
“On the way, sir,” he said. “If the captain remembers, Sixteen is four rounds from Charity’s five-incher, sir.”
“Good show, Sergeant!” Captain McCoy said, in the best English accent he could muster.
A few moments later, there was the thruttle-thruttle sound of a large-caliber round moving in the air, and then an enormous explosion in the village of Nae-ri. And then another, and another, and another.
McCoy, who was riding in the bow, gestured to the coxswain to make for the shore, and then to Sergeant Jennings to get on the bow with his Browning Automatic Rifle.
[THREE]
TOP SECRET
0500 GREENWICH 25 AUGUST 1950
FROM OFFICER COMMANDING HMS CHARITY
TO HMS JAMAICA PERSONAL AND IMMEDIATE ATTENTION VICE ADMIRAL SIR WILLIAM MATTHEWS, RN
SIR
I HAVE THE HONOR TO REPORT, BASED ON INFORMATION FURNISHED ME BY CAPTAIN GEORGE F. HART, USMC, THE FOLLOWING:1. THE ISLANDS OF YONGHUNG-DO AND TAEMUUI-DO WERE SUCCESSFULLY INVESTED BY U.S. AND ROYAL MARINE FORCES EARLY THIS MORNING AND ALL RESISTANCE WAS ENDED AT 1500 LOCAL TIME THIS AFTERNOON.
2. U.S. AND BRITISH CASUALTIES ZERO KILLED AND ZERO WOUNDED.
3. ENEMY CASUALTIES SEVEN KILLED SIX WOUNDED NINE PRISONERS.
4. IT IS THE INTENTION OF CAPTAIN K. R. MCCOY, USMC, TO INVADE THE ISLAND OF TAEBU-DO AS SOON AS TIDAL CONDITIONS PERMIT. HE REPORTS WHITE FLAGS HAVE BEEN HOISTED PRESUMABLY INDICATING A DESIRE OF THE ENEMY TO SURRENDER. CAPTAIN MCCOY REQUESTS THAT BRIGADIER GENERAL PICKERING, USMC, BE APPRISED BY YOU OF THESE DEVELOPMENTS.
MOST RESPECTFULLY SUBMITTED
DARWIN JONES-FORTIN, RN COMMANDING HMS CHARITY
TOP SECRET
[FOUR]
THE RESIDENCE OF THE SUPREME COMMANDER UN COMMAND/ALLIED FORCES IN JAPAN THE EMBASSY OF THE UNITED STATES TOKYO, JAPAN 1930 25 AUGUST 1950
“Oh, Fleming,” MacArthur said, rising from an armchair in the upstairs sitting room, “there you are. Thank you for coming.”
“It was good of you to receive me on such short notice,” Pickering said, “and even kinder to ask me to supper. I know I’m intruding . . .”