The Wilmington morning star., 1945-10-09
Gen: Wainwright Tells
OF Unpreparedness OF
Forces On North I,,,zon
Continued from Pare One,

Continued from Page One)
the organization and training q
Philippine Army units, in which
work l had been helping since the
Philippine Army had begun mobi,
hzation. I got over my old point
again, about the continuation Of
training in offensive combat anc
the need of doing it as fast as pos.
sible.
Jonathan" he said, .vou,11
probably have until about April to
train those troops" l knew Mac.
Arthur was talking about war.
Looking back on the prediction.
and remembering hind-sightedly
that the Japs were even at that
hour massing to hit us, I'd like to
stress this thought: Macarthur be-
lieved that nothing was going to
happen before April of 1912. He be.
lieved it because he had no official
information which would have led
hun to believe otherwise. He was.
I'm sure, completely in the dark
about the gravity Of diplomatic
messages then being exchanged. If
Macarthur had known anything, he
would have given me - certain
10 be hit first - what he knew.
His April, 1912, prediction was a
fair one, I thought.
l drove back to Fort Mckinley
for the night and on the morning.
of November % went on up to
Stotsenburg, which lies IS miles
above Manila.
thought lot about MacArthur's
April guess. But I knew that even
if the Japs held off that long it
would still be a tight squeeze. It
takes time to turn a mass of con-
scripts into the kind division in one
Of army we would need. The mini
mum time in our army for train
ing division in one year, and that
presupposes good training condi-
tons and all the necessary gear
and able instructors.
On my arrival at Fort Stotsen-
burg that afternoon to take over
my duties, I discovered that Gen
eral King had been able only to
scratch the surface of organizing
things for me. The headquarters of
the North LuZon force was jIG
about nil. All I had to start with
were Kings post adjutant, to serve
as adjutant genral of the new field
force, a supply man and a sur
geon.
NAMES MAHER
I dipped into my old Philippine
Division and brought out Col. Will
liam P. Maher as my chief of staff
got the old division quartermaster,
1t. Col. Alfred Balsam, the COM
snanding officer of the Fourteenth
Engineers, 1t. Col. Harry Skerry,
and the divisions signal officer. 1t.
Col. Josh Stansell.
And went to work. Col. Maher re.
ported promptly and was of inesti-
mable value in the organization of
such a headquarters as we were
able to scrape together before the
war began. In the last days of No
vember, while Col. Maher en-
deavored to get equipment, I paid
quick visits to the four divisions
assigned to me.
They were the Eleventh Division,
then mobilizing in the Lingayen
Gulf area; the Twenty-First Divi-
sion, modelling just north of Tar
lac; the Seventy-First Division,
modifying at Camp O'Connen -
later place of unspeakable horror
- and the Thirty-First Division,
forming itself on the coastal plain
west of the Zambalies Mountains
Just north of subic Bay. The Nine
ty-Flrst Division, then mobilizing
at Cabanatuan, was attached to my
command for training and admin
stratlon, but actually belonged to
MacArthur's strategic reserve.
Let my give you a sample of the
training status Of those divisions on
the eve of the attack. Nearly a
year later, when Brig. Gen. Cliff
ford Bluemel and I were sitting in
rags IN a Jap prison camp near
Iarlac-Where I had futilely plan
ned to stage my December, 1941,
maneuvers - he told me the con-
d4tlons under which his Thirty-Fir
Division was formed.
1t began mobilization on Septem-
Der l, little over three months
before it was thrown into tremen-
dous action. The Thirty-First's En-
gmeer Battalion was modified on
October i. Its Second Infantry
Regiment was modified November
l; the Third Infantry Regiment on
November Is. Some Of this artil-
lery came into being the same day.
The majority of its artillery - two
oattallons of IS nm. guns - was
modified after December 8.
Bluemeps infantrymen trained on
an average of three or four weeks
before being forced to fight. His
engineers got no training at all.
as artillery never fired practice
@'sst; indeed, its first shot was
aimed in the general direction of
the aDproa chino enernv
His infantry had no combat prac-