The one thing that this nation can NEVER afford to do it forget the heroes who made the continuation of America possible. Once we forget, we start to die as a nation.

   How many able-bodied U.S. Marines does it take to hold a hill against 2,000 desperate and motivated attackers? How many Navy ships does it take to hold off experienced attackers versed in night warfare? The Gunny will answer that in a minute. The anniversary of this battle is fast approaching so take a moment out of your busy day to reflect on their efforts and sacrifices.

   On 7 Aug, 1942, the US Navy, still very weak after Peart Harbor dumped a few thousands Devil Dogs on a beach at a place called Guadalcanal and skedaddled away with most of the Marine's supplies. In typical Marine-style, they simply used the Japanese stuff they'd captured. The Leathernecks were on their own. If you're reading this in English, you know the outcome BUT! there is more. This is the story of TWO types of sacrifices.

   On Nov. 13/14, 1942, tough guy Adm Bull Halsey violated War College doctrine against committing capital ships in restricted waters and instead dispatching into the Slot, his last two remaining fast battleships, the South Dakota and the Washington, escorted by the only four destroyers. SIX ships against the juggernaut called the Tokyo Express. It became a Japanese shooting gallery by 2300, with the 18 Japanese ships, with night-fighting their specialty, setting every one of those four American destroyers aflame. The South Dakota broke off the action, after damaging a few small Japanese ships, with electrical and fire control problems. Naval historian David Lippman writes: "Washington was now the only intact ship left in the force." In fact, at that moment Washington WAS the entire U.S. Pacific Fleet. She was the only barrier between (Admiral) Kondo's ships and Guadalcanal. If this one ship did not stop 14 Japanese ships right then and there, America might lose the war."

   On Washington's bridge, Lieutenant Ray Hunter had the conn. Did you get that? A LIEUTENANT had the conn of a BATTLESHIP! The DD's Walke and Preston were destroyed right before his eyes and dead ahead lay their burning wreckage. Their crews now swam in dangerous and shark-infested waters. What this Navy Lieutenant did next changed the course of the war in the Pacific. "Come left," he ordered. The rudder change put the burning destroyers between her and the enemy, preventing her from being silhouetted by their fires, but also putting their crews in the line of fire. The Japanese did not have radar, and ceased firing, since they could not spot Washington behind the fires.

   David Lippman writes: "Washington raced through burning seas. Dozens of destroyer men were in the water clinging to floating wreckage. "Get after them, Washington!" one shouted. Think about those words. Here is an American sailor SWIMMING in shark-infested waters, with a battle raging around him, and he defiantly yells for the USS Washington to kick the enemy's a**! That we can produce such warriors says it all. They had sacrificed their ships by maneuvering into the path of torpedoes intended for the Washington, to give her a fighting chance. The result came fast. The Japanese battleship Kirishima turned on her searchlights, illuminating the helpless South Dakota, and opened fire. The gutsy
USS Washington opened fire on the Kirshma at 0000 14 Nov. By 0007 the LAST capital ship in the Pacific fired 75 of her 16-inch shells at the battleship Kirishima where it began raining steel! By 3:25 a.m., her burning hulk officially became the first enemy sunk by an American battleship since the Spanish-American War. Stunned, the Japanese withdrew. Within days, Japanese Commander Isoroku Yamamoto recommended the unthinkable to the emperor, withdrawal from Guadalcanal. However, the above battle was still weeks away for the Devil Dogs on "starvation island."

   The Marines were a speed bump at the end of the long blue-water slot between New Guinea and the Bismarck Archipelago, straddling the route that Yamamoto would have to take to reach Australia. The Marines struggled to complete Henderson Field and Yamamoto knew what that meant. We could control the area for a thousand miles in every direction. Thus, no effort would be spared to dislodge these stubborn Devil Dogs, from a position that could endanger his ships.

   Slip back to 25 Oct, 1942, when Plt Sgt. Mitchell Paige and his 33 riflemen set about carefully emplacing their four .30-caliber Browning machine-guns defending Henderson Field. How many able-bodied U.S. Marines does it take to hold a hill against 2,000 desperate and motivated attackers? They would soon find out. Don't forget, the Japanese Army had swept all before them since invading Korea in the early 1930's! They fully expected to blast through the Marine's ranks with ease. By the dawn, however, the 29th Infantry Regiment had 553 KIA/MIA and 479 WIA out of  2,554 men. The 16th Regiment's losses are unknown but they buried 975 Japanese bodies.

   The Marine Corps lost 90 Marines (KIA/WIA) and many of them had come from Mitchell Paige's platoon, the point of the Japanese attack. The entire night was one battle after another, As the night of endless attacks wore on, Paige moved up and down his line, pulling his dead and wounded comrades back into cover and firing a few bursts from each of the four Brownings in turn, convincing the Japanese forces down the hill that the positions were still manned.

Paige's Medal of Honor Citation reads: "When the enemy broke through the line directly in front of his position, P/Sgt. Paige, commanding a machinegun section with fearless determination, continued to direct the fire of his gunners until all his men were either killed or wounded. Alone, against the deadly hail of Japanese shells, he fought with his gun and when it was destroyed, took over another, moving from gun to gun, never ceasing his withering fire."

   Shortly before dawn, PltSgt Paige snatched up the last operational Browning and did something for which the weapon was never designed, he
walked down the hill toward the place where he could hear the last Japanese survivors rallying to move around his flank, the FORTY POUND belt-fed gun cradled under his arm, firing as he went. At dawn, Battalion XO Major Conoley saw how many Marines it takes to hold the line against two regiments of motivated, combat-hardened infantrymen who have never known defeat? With bodies piled like cordwood around him, Mitchell Paige sat upright behind his 30-caliber Browning. Answer to the question? One hill needs one Marine.

   Mission of the Marine Rifle Squad: "To locate, close with, and destroy the enemy by fire and manuever and repel the enemy's assault by fire and close combat." Thus, Major Conoley decided to finish the Japanese gathered together in the jungle nearby and formed an ad hoc assault group of: three enlisted comm personnel, several riflemen, a few company runners who were at the point, a cook, and a few messmen who had brought food to the position the evening before. Paige joined them and 17 Marines counterattacked at 0540. They cleared the ridge. Thus ended a string of Japanese victories starting in the 1930's. In an unnamed jungle clearing, on an island no one had ever heard of, called Guadalcanal, a very close run battle over a ridge, held by a single Marine, was won by Devil Dogs who refused to be beaten.

   On Nov. 15, 2003, an 85-year-old retired Marine Corps colonel died of congestive heart failure at his home in La Quinta, Calif., southeast of Palm Springs. He was a combat veteran of World War II. His name was Mitchell Paige. On November 1st, take a moment to hoist one for Mitchell and the Leathernecks who seized and held Guadalcanal as an advanced naval base, in accordance with the Marine Corps' mission! RIP brother.