187th Infantry Regiment (United States)

I do not believe in the airborne division. I believe that airborne troops should be reorganized into self-contained units, comprising infantry, artillery, and special services, all of about the strength of a regimental combat team [...] To employ at any time and place a whole division would require a dropping over such an extended area that I seriously doubt that a division commander could regain control and operate the scattered forces as one unit.

— Lieutenant General Dwight D. Eisenhower at the conclusion of his performance review of the American airborne forces during Operation Husky, 20 September 1943

Within the US Army hierarchy, some senior officers questioned the practicality of airborne forces as a combat entity. The Germans had successfully used airborne forces during the invasions of the Netherlands in May 1940 and Crete in May 1941. Wartime was proving tough for American airborne forces. In November 1942, as part of Operation Torch in the North African campaign, US paratroopers who missed their drop zone (DZ) marched 35 miles (56 km) to capture an airfield already in the hands of friendly forces. During the Allied invasion of Sicily in July 1943, US paratroopers once more landed far from their intended targets. But the real tragedy came when friendly fire brought down 23 aircraft and damaged 37 more; 318 paratroopers and airmen were killed or wounded. The poor performance of American airborne forces in Sicily prompted Lieutenant General Dwight D. Eisenhower to recommend to US Army Chief of Staff General George C. Marshall that division-size airborne units were too difficult to control in combat.

Lieutenant General Lesley J. McNair, the Army Ground Forces commanding general, took General Eisenhower's words seriously and, in the fall of 1943, convened a review board headed by Major General Joseph M. Swing, the 11th Airborne Division commanding general, to examine the doctrine, organization, and training of US Army airborne forces. The "Swing Board," as it was informally known, convened at Camp Mackall in mid-September with experienced parachute and glider unit commanders and staff officers, as well as I Troop Carrier Command veterans and glider pilots as the other board members. The Swing Board reviewed German, British, and American airborne operations, studied the airborne division organization, and analyzed the problems encountered by the United States Army Air Forces (USAAF) troop carrier units during the North African and Sicilian operations. At the end of September, the review was completed with the board recommending the continuation of the airborne division and the publication of War Department (WD) Training Circular 113, Employment of Airborne and Troop Carrier Forces (dated 9 October 1943), formalizing the responsibilities and relationships between the airborne and troop carrier commands. Despite the recommendations, General McNair was still not convinced and decided to test the effectiveness of the airborne division concept before he made his decision. McNair ordered General Swing to plan an airborne operation for December in which the entire 11th Airborne Division would mount up in C-47 transports and CG-4A gliders at multiple Army airfields in North and South Carolina, take off and rendezvous in-flight over the Atlantic coast, fly a circuitous route of approximately 200 miles (320 km), a portion of which would be over open-ocean at night before turning inland toward the drop and landing zones, parachute- and glider-land after dark at precise times and locations, and reinforce, resupply, evacuate, and support itself by air for three or four days. It was obvious that the future of the airborne division depended upon a successful operation. Swing and his staff commenced planning the operation per McNair's order and WD Training Circular 113. All that remained was to write the operations order (OPORD). On 15 November, the 11th Airborne Division received its mission from Headquarters, Airborne Command at Camp Mackall. The 11th Airborne Division, reinforced by the 501st Parachute Infantry Regiment (PIR), was to assault on D-Day, 7 December, capture Knollwood Army Auxiliary Airfield (present-day Moore County Airport), establish an airhead around the airfield, and prevent "enemy" reinforcement. Defending Knollwood and selected critical points was a regimental combat team (RCT) consisting of an infantry battalion, an antitank company, a field artillery battery, and a medical detachment from the 17th Airborne Division combined with a battalion from the 541st PIR.[3]

On 4 December, the 11th Airborne Division, with the 501st PIR attached, staged its parachute and glider units at Pope Army Airfield at Fort Bragg, Mackall Army Airfield at Camp Mackall, Lumberton Army Auxiliary Airfield, and Laurinburg-Maxton Army Airfield in North Carolina, and Florence Army Airfield in South Carolina. The 187th GIR and its direct-support 674th Glider Field Artillery Battalion (GFAB) (75mm pack howitzer) loaded their equipment aboard the gliders and awaited the mount-up order. Foul weather postponed the operation for 24 hours. About midnight on 6 December, 200 C-47s towing 234 CG-4As (100 gliders were double-towed) began taking off from the airfields for the mass airborne assault. Numerous C-47s carried a full load of 18 combat-equipped paratroopers and towed either one or two gliders full of soldiers and equipment. As the C-47s gained altitude, they began forming into tight three-plane Vs, with three groups together forming a V-of-Vs formation, nine aircraft wide. The air armada flew east out over the Atlantic Ocean, turned north, and finally turned back west, heading back toward the drop and landing zones in and around Southern Pines and Pinehurst, North Carolina. The famed golf courses and open fields between 5 miles (8.0 km) and 10 miles (16 km) west and north of Knollwood Airfield were designated as drop and landing zones. The assault began at 02:30 on 7 December with the gliders cutting loose from their C-47 tugs and the parachutes of the first sticks of paratroopers blossoming out the sides of the C-47s almost simultaneously. There were few difficulties. The 11th Airborne Division assembled with speed, attacked the defenders, and seized its Knollwood objectives. The division then set up the airhead around the airfield and resupplied itself by air. In 39 hours, a total of 10,282 troops were delivered by parachute, glider, or airlanded. The tally of equipment and supplies was significant: 1,830 tons of equipment and supplies; 295 jeeps; and 48 1/4-ton trailers. Total maneuver casualties were two dead and 48 minor injuries. After three days, the division returned to Camp Mackall. Afterward, the entire operation was reviewed from start to finish at Camp Mackall by commanders and the division staff. General Swing submitted his final report on the Knollwood Maneuver to General McNair and waited for a War Department decision. On 16 December, McNair's reply message read in part: “…The successful performance of your division has convinced me that we were wrong, and I shall now recommend that we continue our present schedule of activating, training and committing airborne divisions.” The Knollwood Maneuver marked the end of the training period for the 187th GIR.[3]

Source citation: Flanagan (1997). The Rakkasans. pp. 10–12.

On 2 January 1944, the 11th Airborne Division began its move by train to Camp Polk, Louisiana. By 5 February, the 187th GIR was in the field near Hawthorne, Louisiana for two weeks of testing by Army Ground Force teams to determine the regiment's readiness for deployment to a combat zone. The exercises involved approach marches, attacks on an objective, perimeter defenses, and tactical withdrawals. In late February, the 187th returned to Camp Polk for re-equipment, physical examinations, inoculations for a variety of exotic diseases, and processing for overseas deployment. In the interim, General Swing established his first jump school at DeRidder Army Air Base. The 187th and the 674th GFAB provided volunteers who were less than enthused about further glider rides and were eager to collect the extra pay for the privilege of jumping out of airplanes (fifty dollars per month for enlisted men and one hundred dollars for officers). Thus began the first transformation of the 187th and 674th from purely glider outfits to airborne units. The tests at Camp Polk represented the graduation exercises for the 11th Airborne Division; the War Department had issued an alert for the division to be ready to leave Camp Polk and by 15 April, all units were restricted to the post, with commanders readying their units for overseas deployment.[2]^:12–13

On 20 April 1944, the 11th Airborne Division started by train to Camp Stoneman, California, where it would spend six days in final preparation for overseas movement. On 2 May, the first units marched out of Camp Stoneman to nearby Pittsburg and boarded boats for the trip to the San Francisco Port of Embarkation. The boats tied up at the Oakland Mole, near the merchant marine troopships on which the division was to sail, and the troops debarked, marched into a large wharfside shed, and mounted the gangplanks of the troopships for the next phase of their trip to war. They did not know specifically where they were headed, but since they were departing from San Francisco, they reasoned that their destination was the Pacific Theater. Only time would tell; the division staff, even if they knew, would not. After three days in hot, crowded conditions below deck, the division set sail on 6 May 1944.

After about three weeks at sea, what seemed like an eternity to the GIs jammed into the stuffy and airless triple- and quadruple-decked holds of the troopships, land was spotted. The ships sailed up the winding channel of Milne Bay, Australian Papua (modern-day Papua New Guinea), and the men got their first look at the lush, verdant jungles they would come to know and hate. After stopping to take on fresh water, the ships then moved up the east coast to Oro Bay and dropped anchor on 29 May. The troops unloaded into a fleet of DUKW “Duck” amphibious trucks that had pulled up alongside the ships. After a trip to the beach and a ride along dusty roads, the DUKWs halted at a clearing around an abandoned airstrip. The 11th Airborne Division had arrived at their new home for the next six months – the Dobodura Airfield Complex. The troops unloaded, formed up into company units, and marched with their overstuffed barracks bags in the heat and humidity to company areas that had been laid out for them. The 187th GIR's jungle phase of training and acclimation to the tropics was about to begin.

The 187th GIR spent its first month in New Guinea building its area of framed pyramidal tents, mess halls, showers and latrines, dayrooms, and chapels. One notable project was the huge, sloped thatch-roofed, 400-man division chapel built with native labor by hand and without nails, using local vegetation and lumber. Once the regiment was settled, training began again. General Swing's jump school reopened and a majority of the 187th's officers and men qualified as paratroopers. In August and September, the 11th Airborne Division operated a glider school with the USAAF 54th Troop Carrier Wing (TCW) (C-47) at Nadzab. From July to September, the division and the 54th TCW conducted combined airborne-troop carrier training for a different troop carrier squadron each week. In August and September, the 187th underwent amphibious training at Oro Bay with the 4th Engineer Special Brigade. The regiment underwent live-fire training exercises for combined-arms battalion combat teams at the abandoned airstrip at Soputa. The 674th GFAB practiced its artillery skills on the ranges at Embi Lake and Soputa. On 12 October, the 11th Airborne Division received orders for an administrative (not combat-loaded) move to Leyte in the Philippines to prepare for an operation on Luzon. A segment of the division staff flew ahead to Leyte to select and set up a campsite while the rest of the division prepared to move out. The 187th Regimental Headquarters Company and the 1st Battalion (1/187th) loaded aboard the USS Cambria (APA-36) in Oro Bay. The 2nd Battalion (2/187th) flew to Finschhafen and boarded the USS Calvert (APA-32). On 11 November, the Navy, with the 11th Airborne Division loaded on nine ships, pulled out of Oro Bay. For the unknowing men aboard the transports steaming toward Leyte, combat was just a few days away.

Source citation: Flanagan (1997). The Rakkasans. pp. 13–17.

See also: Cannon, M. Hamlin (1993). Leyte: The Return to the Philippines (PDF).

On 18 November 1944, the 11th Airborne Division joined the Battle of Leyte by landing unopposed on Bito Beach, off Bito Lake, Leyte. The advance party from division headquarters had flown up from New Guinea to select an area for the division encampment. Because the more desirable areas along the east coast had already been occupied, Bito Beach became the bivouac area for the division. The 187th GIR set up its first bivouac near the Filipino village of Abuyog. For its first few days on Leyte, the regiment cleared and policed the beach by moving landed supplies to rear-area dumps, built a base camp, and readied itself for its first taste of combat. It would not be long in coming. On 22 November, Lieutenant General Walter Krueger, the US Sixth Army commanding general, formally attached the 11th Airborne Division to Major General John R. Hodge's XXIV Corps, consisting of the 96th and 7th Infantry Divisions. General Hodge directed General Swing to relieve the 7th Infantry Division along the Burauen-La Paz-Bugho line and destroy all Japanese forces in that area, protect and secure all corps and air corps installations in his area of operations (AO), protect the Leyte Gulf supply bases and shipping, and coordinate operations with the 96th Infantry Division on his northern flank, running generally on an east–west line through Dagami. Swing knew that the fighting strength of his division consisted of seven small infantry battalions supported by three field artillery battalions with twenty-four 75mm pack howitzers and 12 sawed-off 105mm howitzers. But he put his division in motion piecemeal as the situation demanded. Overnight, the division went from a theater reserve role to direct combat.[2]^:17–24

By the time the 11th Airborne Division entered the fight, Major General Franklin C. Sibert's X Corps, consisting of the 1st Cavalry and 24th Infantry Divisions, was attacking southward from the Pinamopoan-Carigara area; the 96th and 7th Infantry Divisions were in scattered contact with the Japanese in the Dagami-Burauen foothills. When the 11th Airborne Division relieved the 7th Infantry Division in the Burauen area, the 7th Infantry Division moved south, crossed the mountains via the Abuyog-Baybay Road, and after reaching the west coast, attacked northward, compressing the Japanese between its forces and those of the X Corps attacking southward. The 11th Airborne Division was tasked with attacking across the center of the mountains from Burauen to Albuera on the west coast.

At 07:00 on 21 November, the 511th PIR, the first 11th Airborne Division unit committed to combat, departed Bito Beach by amphibious transport and moved to Dulag, where it loaded into motor transport for its move to Burauen. The 511th's mission was to move westward across the mountains and link up with the 7th Infantry Division on the west coast. A few days later, the 188th GIR moved north from Bito Beach to protect the 511th's southern flank as it moved westward, and clear the Japanese from the area - a sector on which little intelligence had been developed and whose maps and topographical charts were virtually useless. Initially, the 187th GIR remained at Bito Beach, with Colonel Hildebrand in command of all remaining division forces. On 24 November, General Swing moved his division command post (CP) to San Pablo, a barrio outside Burauen, and occupied the former 7th Infantry Division CP. Swing moved the 75mm pack howitzers of the 674th and 675th GFABs from Bito Beach to protect the Fifth Air Force headquarters near Burauen; the glider field artillerymen, armed mainly with folding-stock M1 carbines, became infantrymen overnight. To protect Bito Beach and to provide additional protection to the 511th's pending westward move, Colonel Hildebrand sent 1/187th to the vicinity of Balinsasayao along the Abuyog-Baybay road. From that base, 1/187th sent out patrols to the west and south. Contact patrols continually worked through the Baybay Pass to keep abreast of the 7th Infantry Division, and some of these witnessed their first banzai charge, which the 7th Infantry Division always stopped, sometimes with canister shot fired from 37mm antitank guns. Meanwhile, 2/187th patrols from Bito Beach had no contact with the Japanese. But, for the 187th, these easy days along the Baybay Pass and on the beach would soon be over. Surprisingly, the 187th would have its counterpart, the Japanese Army airborne forces, to thank for its initial entry into combat.

On 27 November, the 511th PIR started its move into the hills to the west of Burauen. To replace 2/511th, 2/187th moved from Bito Beach through Dulag into defensive positions west of Burauen; they did not stay there long. On 2 December, 2/187th was ordered into the hills to follow the 511th. Also on 2 December, 1/187th was brought up from the Balinsasayao area to replace 2/187th around Burauen. The next morning, First Lieutenant Charles Olsen, the Charlie Company (C/187th) commander, met with Lieutenant Colonel George O. Pearson, 1/187th's commanding officer, and General Swing at division headquarters in San Pablo. Swing ordered C/187th sent into the hills behind 2/187th, which had already departed. He also asked for a platoon from C/187th to be detached for a combat parachute jump into Manarawat, a deserted barrio in the central highlands, halfway between Burauen and Albuera. Manarawat was a tabletop clearing in the jungle rising about 150 feet (46 m) above a streambed, surrounded on three sides by sheer, brush-covered cliffs, and on the fourth by a more gradual slope. The clearing was about 600 feet (180 m) long and 200 feet (61 m) wide. Jungle-covered mountains rose across the streambed.

1/511th, less Charlie Company (C/511th), was currently at Manarawat, which was becoming the hub for the 11th Airborne Division's operations along the mountain trails to the west. C/511th was in trouble. A treacherous Filipino guide had led the company and the 511th PIR headquarters group into a Japanese ambush near Lubi on the north trail toward Manarawat. They were surrounded, and their ammunition and rations were running low. After rejecting a Japanese offer to surrender, Colonel Orin D. Haugen, the 511th's commanding officer, and two men managed to crawl through the Japanese encirclement in the darkness and head back to the division headquarters, arriving two days later. When General Swing became aware of the situation, he ordered 1/511th to depart Manarawat and rescue C/511th and the regimental headquarters party. Fortunately, Colonel Haugen had already sent an eight-man patrol to Manarawat to guide 1/511th back to the ambush site. After Swing explained this situation to them, Lieutenant Colonel Pearson and Lieutenant Olsen of 1/187th did not question the jump order. They did not mention that 1/187th was a glider-borne unit, nor ask where the aircraft, parachutes, and drop containers were coming from. They simply said, "Yes, sir," saluted, and left. For the 187th GIR, the Leyte campaign was heating up.

First Lieutenant Chester J. Kozlowski and his 1st Platoon from C/187th made the first unit combat jump of the 11th Airborne Division – one jumper at a time from Piper L-4 Grasshopper and Stinson L-5 Sentinel artillery light observation aircraft – into Manarawat.

Source citation: Flanagan (1997). The Rakkasans. pp. 24–30.

On 2 December, the remnants of the Japanese 16th Division, about 500 men out of the original strength of 8,800, had assembled in the foothills southwest of Dagami and prepared to join Japanese paratroopers in a combined assault on the Buri airstrip on 5 December. On the evening of 4 December, US Sixth Army headquarters alerted General Swing to the possibility of a Japanese airborne assault somewhere on Leyte. It was believed that the Japanese intended to recapture the airfields at Burauen.[Note 1] The only combat unit immediately available at either Bito Beach or Burauen was 1/187th, the 11th Airborne Division reserve. The men of the Japanese 16th Division were unaware that the parachute drop had been postponed for 24 hours until the night of 6 December because of forecast bad weather, and following its original orders, what was left of the division moved out of the hills in the early morning hours of 6 December. US forces at the Buri airstrip consisted of 47 men of the 287th Field Artillery Observation Battalion whose mission was to locate enemy field artillery by the flash and sound of their guns and to survey and make maps to give the enemy artillery coordinates, and 157 miscellaneous troops from various service units attached to the USAAF V Bomber Command. At 06:00, approximately 150 Japanese crossed the main Dagami-Burauen road and headed eastward toward the airstrip. At 06:30, they launched their attack – over 14 hours before the paratroopers were scheduled to land. The Japanese broke into the service units' bivouac area where most of the men were still asleep in their tents, bayoneting some of the sleeping men before they could get to their weapons. Some of the Americans, shoeless and clad only in shorts and undershirts, managed to grab weapons and hold off the Japanese until they could evacuate the area. After the 11th Airborne Division headquarters learned of the attack, it radioed XXIV Corps that the Buri airstrip was under attack. Meanwhile, the Japanese entrenched in the woods to the north of the airstrip.

General Hodge had the 1st Battalion, 382nd Infantry Regiment (1/382nd) turned over to the operational control of General Swing and moved southward down the Dagami-Burauen road; a reinforced 382nd Infantry company was already in the area north of Buri. Swing directed Lieutenant Colonel Pearson to fly a 1/187th rifle platoon from the San Pablo airstrip to the Buri airstrip in the artillery liaison aircraft, with the rest of his battalion to follow on foot. The L-4s made three round trips to ferry the 1/187th platoon to the Buri airstrip, where they were met by a "very excited" group of disorganized service and air corps troops. Pearson arrived with the rest of his battalion at the Buri airstrip around 09:00. He left a rifle squad on the airstrip for security and directed the platoon that had flown into the airstrip to sweep the area west of the main road. Soon, Pearson could hear small-arms fire from the direction in which he had sent the patrols. In about half an hour, the patrols returned and reported that 26 Japanese had been killed. Pearson was convinced that the Japanese attack on the airstrip was more than a small combat patrol and that a larger number of Japanese remained in the area. Even with his entire battalion available, Pearson could only muster 180 men to defeat the remnants of the Japanese 16th Division. He prepared to attack.

1/187th formed into a line of skirmishers, 2 yards (1.8 m) apart, and advanced to the northeast. Not five minutes after they entered the dense jungle, they flushed their quarry and a series of close-quarter gunfights erupted. Occasionally, they would break through the underbrush into the open of flooded rice paddy fields, where they would find Japanese floating face down in the water, apparently dead. Prodded with bayonets, most of them would prove plenty lively until they became "real corpses." For two hours, 1/187th continued to fight its way through the steaming jungle to the north of the Buri airstrip, attacking the Japanese in their defensive positions, often in hand-to-hand combat or at close range where hand grenades and bayonets were the weapons of choice. Finally, Lieutenant Colonel Pearson called a halt to check the status of his battalion. His company commanders reported 85 Japanese killed while suffering only two of their own wounded. This battle was 1/187th's first combat mission.

Source citation: Flanagan (1997). The Rakkasans. pp. 30–36.

General Swing, who never missed a good fight if he could get into it, flew from San Pablo to the Buri airstrip. Swing sent a messenger to Lieutenant Colonel Pearson to tell him to take up positions along the Dagami-Burauen road, keep it open, and to "look to his west, from which he would soon expect a lot of trouble." Pearson deployed 1/187th (less C/187th at Manarawat) along the road and established his CP on a nearby bluff near the northern edge of the airstrip. Pearson had a problem – he had moved to the Buri airstrip under the assumption that his mission would last only a few hours and required speed in getting there; he had left the battalion's heavy equipment, packs, and mess equipment at San Pablo. Thus, 1/187th's mortar platoon had no mortars. The mortar platoon commander took his men down the road to a weapons depot and borrowed two mortars and ammunition; it would turn out to be a fortuitous move. At 15:00, Pearson sent a patrol to contact the 382nd Infantry battalion to the north of Buri. An hour later, a great deal of Japanese activity was observed on a hill to the west. Pearson called for and received artillery support. Unfortunately, the artillery fire was soon lifted because it was landing on the boundary between divisions and there was a probability that the target area was occupied by troops of the 96th Infantry Division. Japanese snipers harassed 1/187th along the Buri-Burauen road all afternoon. By 18:00, 1/187th had driven most of the Japanese back from the Buri airstrip, although a few pockets of resistance remained around its edges. Soon it was dusk and all was quiet. There were no rations and no idea when they would be brought up. 1/187th settled in for the night; its false sense of security and tranquility would soon be shattered.

On the evening of 6 December, the peaceful evening erupted into bedlam when incendiary bombs from Japanese bombers began exploding all around the Bayug airstrip. At the same time at San Pablo, 11th Airborne Division staff members were sitting down to dinner when they heard the drone of aircraft overhead. They looked outside and saw a number of transport aircraft – C-47s, they thought – flying low, almost directly overhead. They also saw that each transport had a man standing in the door. What the officers were witnessing was the beginning of the Japanese airborne assault to recapture the Burauen area airfields. The Japanese transports with fighter escorts were scheduled to be over the airfields at 18:40. The fighters and medium bombers were to strafe and neutralize the defenses around the Buri, San Pablo, and Bayug airstrips. At the same time, light bombers were to hit the US antiaircraft artillery positions between San Pablo and Dulag and points west. Each transport carried 15 to 20 paratroopers. Fifty-one aircraft in all were assigned to the operation. Just before dark, on schedule, the Japanese transports with fighter and bomber escort roared over the Burauen airfields. Several incendiary bombs fell on the San Pablo airstrip, setting a gasoline dump on fire and burning a liaison aircraft. Japanese fighters raced up and down the airstrips with machine guns blazing. US antiaircraft fire knocked down 18 Japanese aircraft.

Japanese paratroopers then began to descend from the transports. Between 250 and 300 paratroopers landed on or near the San Pablo airstrip. Once on the ground, the Japanese used a system of bells, whistles, horns, and even songs for assembling their units. They talked in loud tones and allegedly called out in English, "Hello, where are your machine guns?" Most of the Japanese assembled on the north side of the airstrip. They burned three or four more L-4 liaison aircraft, a jeep, several tents, and another gasoline dump. During the night of 6–7 December, a platoon from the 127th Airborne Engineer Battalion (AEB), armed with three machine guns, succeeded in scattering a group of Japanese before digging in on the southwest corner of the airstrip. Three times during the night, the Japanese charged the engineers' position; three times the Japanese were thrown back with heavy losses. The Japanese who landed west of the airstrip were between San Pablo and Bayug. They spread out with some moving down the sides of the San Pablo airstrip and others moving off to the west toward the Bayug airstrip, where they set fire to several L-4s by tossing hand grenades into the cockpits. The Japanese then moved into the Bayug bivouac area and destroyed the camp. Seventy-five American officers and men were at the Bayug airstrip; most of them dug in and defended the south side of the airstrip until the morning of 7 December. At dawn, perhaps according to the overall Japanese OPORD, after most of the Japanese paratroopers had assembled on the San Pablo runway, they moved north and west to the northern edge of the Buri airstrip and joined elements of the Japanese 16th Division.

It became clear to General Swing when he returned to San Pablo overnight that the Japanese airborne assault and air attacks were something more than a reconnaissance-in-force or a rather elaborate suicidal demolition mission. But, his seven small infantry battalions were all committed either in the hills beyond Burauen or deployed near the Buri airstrip. Accordingly, he diverted his other troops from their primary missions to acting infantry. Lieutenant Colonel Lucas E. Hoska, the 674th GFAB's commanding officer, whose battalion was at the mouth of the Bito River, north of Abuyog, was directed to leave his pack howitzers and move his battalion as rapidly as possible to San Pablo. Swing charged the 152nd Airborne Anti-Aircraft Battalion (AAAB) to use what men it had left to defend the division CP. He directed the 127th AEB to defend the airstrip.

At daylight on 7 December, a diverse group of soldiers from the 127th AEB and other division service units prepared to attack across the San Pablo airstrip to clear the Japanese and relieve some beleaguered division troops, including some of the 127th's own. Just as they were about to launch their frontal attack, the carbine-wielding artillerymen from the 674th GFAB arrived in DUKWs, dismounted, and swung into line on the right wing of the 127th AEB's composite unit. The two battalions then prepared to move out as a provisional infantry regiment under the command of Lieutenant Colonel Douglas C. Davis, the 127th's commanding officer. Just then, General Swing arrived. The similarity between the battle at the San Pablo airstrip and most Civil War battles became apparent with the engineers on the left, the artillerymen on the right, and both battalions drawn up in a line across the southern edge of the airstrip. In the center, between the two outfits, was the General, shouting as he directed Lieutenant Colonels Davis and Hoska in the attack. They in turn bellowed at their units, and the line stepped off. The Japanese were holed up all around the airstrip. Initially, the strongest resistance was met in front of the engineers to the west. By maneuvering his companies, Davis succeeded in pushing across 300 yards (270 m) to the north of the airstrip. After advancing across the runway, the engineers ran out of ammunition. The artillerymen went forward to a coconut grove, also to the north of the airstrip. The gap between the two units was closed by a strong patrol. That evening, the composite force set up in a tight defensive perimeter in that area where it remained for the next few days in defense of the San Pablo airstrip.

Meanwhile, 60 Japanese paratroopers had jumped onto the Buri airstrip. By the middle of the morning of 7 December, the Japanese had completely occupied the undefended airstrip. On the night of 6–7 December, the USAAF service personnel had abruptly fled the airstrip, leaving behind their weapons; the Japanese made "best use" of them. Late on the night of 6 December, General Swing had sent word to Lieutenant Colonel Pearson that he wanted 1/187th to clear the Buri airstrip as soon as possible. During the morning of 7 December, 1/187th was deployed along the Buri-Burauen road, taking machine-gun fire from the Japanese west of the road. Pearson directed elements of his battalion to hold this force in place while he organized his attack on the Buri airstrip to the east. At about 09:30, 1/382nd Infantry arrived from the north. At 09:45, both battalions advanced toward the Buri airstrip. Twice, 1/187th fought its way onto the northwest corner of the airstrip; twice, it was blasted off by heavy Japanese fire. 1/382nd Infantry also advanced aggressively but faltered when one of its company commanders was hit. Pearson decided to withdraw both battalions to the north and consider another way to attack the airstrip. He made a personal reconnaissance around the west end of the airstrip and decided to move a couple rifle platoons to the west and then south to the south side of the airstrip. In this position, machine guns and mortars could bring in supporting fire. 1/187th moved out at 14:00 to the west as planned, but ran into Japanese booby traps. Pearson directed the battalion's lead elements to turn southward while the machine guns were set up close to the edge of the landing strip. In less than a minute, their crews had the machine guns firing at a group of Japanese hurrying across the airstrip. In about 15 minutes, the machine-gun crews ran out of ammunition. Two men crawled to the rear to get more ammunition and returned with orders to withdraw. 1/187th and 1/382nd Infantry regrouped at the west of the airstrip. A/187th and B/187th attacked abreast to the northeast and A/382nd Infantry attacked due east. The three rifle companies ran into heavy Japanese fire but continued their advance. By 16:00, the "dog-tired" Americans were holding the southwest corner of the airstrip with their ammunition running low.

XXIV Corps headquarters had released the 1st and 2nd Battalions of the 149th Infantry Regiment (1/149th and 2/149th Infantry) to General Swing's operational control for employment against the Japanese in the Burauen area. The two infantry battalions had been alerted at 02:00 on 7 December for movement to San Pablo. 1/149th Infantry arrived at the San Pablo airstrip at 14:00 and was directed to attack and secure the Buri airstrip. A/149th and C/149th Infantry deployed abreast on a frontage of 200 yards (180 m) for each company. A heavy machine-gun section was attached to each company and a D/149th Infantry mortar platoon was to support the attack from positions on the San Pablo airstrip. Moving out at 14:30, the infantrymen covered the first 400 yards (370 m) without incident but were stopped by a rain-swollen swamp. Attempts to bypass the swamp were fruitless and they were forced to wade through the sometimes shoulder-high water. The 149th Infantry companies lost contact with each other during the crossing. A/149th Infantry arrived at the Buri airstrip and made contact with 1/187th about 16:30. C/149th Infantry, delayed by a skirmish with the Japanese, did not arrive until about 18:00. Because of the lateness of the hour and the fact that observation had shown there were "many more Japanese" on the north of the airstrip than had been estimated, it was decided to establish defensive perimeters for the night. At 20:00, the sector was reported quiet.

With the arrival of the 149th and 382nd Infantry battalions in his area, Lieutenant Colonel Pearson felt that he could now attack and secure the length of the Buri airstrip. But that was not yet to be. Late in the afternoon of 7 December, General Swing sent word to Pearson to move 1/187th from the Buri airstrip area to defend the Fifth Air Force headquarters at Burauen along the Burauen-Dulag road. It was an inviting target for the Japanese 26th Division descending out of the hills to the west of Burauen. By midnight, 1/187th was at the Fifth Air Force headquarters area. 1/187th then moved into the defensive positions previously occupied by 2/187th, about 800 yards (730 m) west of Burauen on a rise in the foothills of the mountains. From the heights, they could see the battle for control of the Buri airstrip. They were also in a position to block the Japanese from attacking eastward toward Burauen.

On 10 December, after a half-hour artillery concentration, 1/149th Infantry attacked north across the Buri airstrip. In their advance, 1/149th Infantry cleared the airstrip area of individual Japanese paratroopers and destroyed the remaining pockets of resistance. 1/149th Infantry went into a perimeter defense at 17:00. The Buri airstrip was finally clear.

At 19:30, a battalion-sized force from the Japanese 26th Division launched an attack out of the hills to the west of Burauen against the various US installations in and around Burauen. The Japanese were four days late in arriving at their line of departure for the planned combined assault on the Burauen airfields, primarily because they were trying to move eastward along the same mountain trails that the 511th PIR was using to move westward. Only a little more than a battalion of the Japanese division, which was to have assisted the Japanese 16th Division, managed to arrive in a very disorganized condition. The Japanese began firing at the Fifth Air Force administration buildings. The Fifth Air Force personnel were pushed back until they reached the hospital. First Lieutenant John G. Hurster, the 1/187th mess officer, had set up his field kitchen near the hospital from where he could carry hot meals to the troops dug in the foothills to the west. The hospital's commanding officer, concerned about the safety of his staff and patients, had earlier asked Hurster to set up a perimeter around the hospital. Hurster had complied, using his cooks, supply troops, and drivers to man the perimeter. During the Japanese attack, Hurster and his assortment of converted infantrymen held their position. On the morning of 11 December, they found 19 dead Japanese. That same morning, 1/187th patrols were sent out into the foothills and killed an additional 17 Japanese. This small battle marked the end of the attack by the remnants of the Japanese 26th Division and was the last major effort by the Japanese to regain control of the Burauen airfields.

The 11th Airborne Division and the 187th GIR had their baptism of fire. The 187th had landed on Leyte not expecting to be committed to combat. Under those circumstances, coupled with the surprise Japanese assault on thinly defended installations, the 187th, committed to combat unexpectedly and in haste, performed superbly. Further tests of their fighting skill were in the immediate offing.

Source citation: Flanagan (1997). The Rakkasans. pp. 36–49.

While the battle for the Burauen airstrips was underway, the 511th PIR was making its way over the mountains, looking for the long-sought Japanese main supply route (MSR), with 2/187th following up behind. The mission of the 11th Airborne Division was now to fight its way over the mountains to the west coast and link up with the US Sixth Army, which was fighting its way up the west coast, north of Albuera. 2/187th, like the 511th that was ahead of it, had the terrain to fight in its march to Anonang; there was just one trail after the battalion left the relatively flat terrain west of Burauen. Late on the afternoon of 3 December, 2/187th reached Anonang, which was nothing more than a jungle clearing with an abandoned shack. Lieutenant Colonel Wilson sent Captain George Ori's F/187th to occupy an observation post (OP) on a hill to the northwest of the Anonang perimeter. Once there, Ori discovered that the OP commanded a view of a strong Japanese position on a plateau beneath it. That night, the Japanese hit Ori's position. Ori called in mortar fire from Anonang that drove off the Japanese attack. The next day, Ori sent a platoon down from the OP to probe the Japanese position. The Japanese opened up with machine guns, wounding the platoon leader and two of his men. Ori ordered a withdrawal. F/187th had run up against a Japanese force on a hill that, sometime later, would become known as "Purple Heart Hill."

The 11th Airborne Division's G-2 (intelligence) had determined the locations of the main Japanese forces remaining within the division's AO. One force that F/187th had just found was at Anonang; the other was west of Mahonag; more Japanese were retreating westward after they failed to seize the Burauen airfields. From 4 December until 11 December, 2/187th had several encounters with the Japanese around Anonang while the 511th PIR was fighting its way westward toward Mahonag. On 11 December, Brigadier General Albert Pierson, the assistant division commanding general, arrived at Anonang. After reviewing the situation, Pierson ordered an attack on the Japanese position below Ori Hill, the hill from which Captain Ori and F/187th had been repulsed earlier. On 12 December, F/187th and G/187th launched the attack with G/187th moving up a riverbed to strike the Japanese from the north and F/187th moving to hit it from the southwest – a small pincer movement. A Battery, 457th PFAB, the unit that had parachuted into Manarawat, provided artillery support. By 13:00, F/187th had cleared Ori Hill and was working down the slope toward the main Japanese position. Presently, F/187th became impeded by friendly artillery rounds that were bursting in the trees above and behind it. The artillery's forward observers with the rifle companies could hardly find their spotting rounds through the thick jungle overhang that limited visibility to a few yards. They had reverted to adjustment by sound – which proved not entirely accurate. The attack was called off.

Late on the afternoon of 13 December, Lieutenant Colonel Pearson and 1/187th arrived at Anonang with orders to relieve 2/187th. On 14 December, 2/187th was directed by division headquarters to move west to Mahonag to protect the DZ. Mahonag was nothing more than a field on a hillside, about 300 yards (270 m) long by 200 yards (180 m) wide, studded with stumps and fallen trees, and packed with hundreds of slit trenches deep enough for a soldier to stand in. The DZ was littered with boxes, cans, and debris from spent airdropped ration packs. The air was filled with the odor of unburied, decomposing Japanese bodies and a large, prosperous swarm of flies. The real estate blossomed with green, yellow, and white cargo parachutes that the men of 2/187th set up as tents for shelter. For the next few days, 2/187th dug a perimeter, incorporating some of the foxholes left by the 511th PIR.

In the middle of December, General Swing relocated his infantry battalions. The 188th GIR moved to a location near Manarawat. Colonel Hildebrand and several members of the 187th GIR headquarters staff moved to Anonang by way of Manarawat to take over command of the central mountains from Anonang to Mahonag. On 20 December, F/188th relieved 2/187th of its security mission at Mahonag, and 2/187th was ordered to move west. On 21 December, General Swing flew into Manarawat and hiked up to Mahonag, arriving late in the afternoon. At 04:00 on 23 December, Swing, Lieutenant Colonel Wilson and 2/187th with First Lieutenant Joseph B. Giordano's 2nd Platoon, G/187th leading off, departed Mahonag for a two-hour march to make contact with the 511th PIR on Rock Hill, near Anas, and aid in the breakthrough to the west coast. The 11th Airborne Division commander wanted to personally direct the breakthrough and the 511th was pushing forward along the Japanese MSR that ran along a ridge in the direction of Ormoc. The column passed through a canyon reeking with the smell of decomposing bodies, the remnants of the Japanese 26th Division that once had planned to overrun Burauen. At about 06:00, the column reached the approach to Rock Hill. At the same time, the 511th on Rock Hill launched its attack on a Japanese-occupied ridge to clear the last known Japanese position blocking the advance. The 511th attack cracked the Japanese defenses with demolition charges, flamethrowers, bazookas, and hand grenades in the final assault to annihilate the deeply entrenched Japanese. By 08:30, the ridge, lined with Japanese dead, was firmly in the 511th's possession. Word came down for 2/187th to move forward and pass through the 511th. At noon, 2/187th with Giordano's platoon on the point passed through the 511th and took over the lead in the march to the west. After putting a three-man Japanese machine gun position out of action and clearing out several weak Japanese pockets of resistance, Giordano and his platoon reached a point high on the western slope of a mountain from where they could see their goal: the west coast of Leyte. The battalion halted and popped a purple smoke grenade, the signal for friendly forces intended to attract elements of the 77th Infantry Division that might be in the vicinity. On a ridgeline to the west, purple smoke was observed. 2/187th had made visual contact with US forces on the west coast. However, the appearance of the rugged terrain between the two US forces promised that more fighting would take place before physical contact was made.

The column pushed on, continuing to follow the Japanese MSR, and soon reached the approaches to a "dangerous looking position to the front." Giordano stopped the column, put out security, and sent out a patrol to reconnoiter the position. As the column closed up, all the command hierarchy came forward to learn the reason for the halt. The patrol soon returned and reported that the ridgeline to the front was honeycombed with caves and deeply dug-in foxholes, that it appeared to have been heavily shelled and recently abandoned, and that the area was littered with dead Japanese. Giordano led his platoon to the top of the ridge and found the position well laid out, camouflaged, and dug into almost solid rock. Battered trees and the number of Japanese dead served as mute evidence of heavy fighting. Among the dead were two American soldiers who appeared to have been killed less than 24 hours before. When he reached the west end of the ridge, Giordano could see Ormoc and the seacoast. To his front, about 200 yards (180 m) away, he saw more dug-in emplacements that were soon alive with members of the US 32nd Infantry Regiment. They were amazed to see fellow Americans coming over the same Japanese positions that had given them so much trouble earlier. "Oh, yes," said one of the 32nd's infantrymen, "we expected you. We saw the purple smoke, but we didn't think that you were coming over that hill. Last night it was solid with Japanese. We lost two of our boys on it." Thus, physical contact was made with the Ormoc Corridor, the road was opened between Burauen and Anas, and the area west of Mahonag was cleared. That night, 2/187th spread out beside the Talisayan River headwaters near Albuera.

General Swing ordered the 511th PIR to secure the route from Mahonag to the coast. By Christmas Day, the 511th had cleared the mountains and was ordered back to its base camp at Bito Beach. From its base at the head of the Talisayan River, 2/187th was ordered to secure the western end of the Japanese MSR. The Japanese pocket at Anonang had still not been wiped out. The 511th and 2/187th had both butted up against this formidable Japanese position. Early on in his mountain clearing campaign, Swing realized that the Japanese position at Anonang was substantial and that it would take a well-coordinated multi-battalion effort to knock it out. He decided not to attack it in strength while the major portion of his infantry assets were fighting across the mountains to the west, which was his major mission ordered by General Krueger at Sixth Army headquarters. Now that he had linked up with the 77th Infantry Division, he felt that he could deal with the final Japanese redoubt in his AO.

The Japanese defenses at Anonang were on two parallel ridges. On the first ridge, the Japanese had dug spider holes, each between 8 feet (2.4 m) and 10 feet (3.0 m) deep, for individual riflemen. They had also dug in machine guns with overhead cover and interlocking fields of fire on both ridges. All slope faces were studded with caves that overlooked and controlled the narrow trails. In the rear of the defensive position was a bivouac area, cached with ammunition, rations, and other supplies, large enough to accommodate a regiment. The position was a concentration point for the Japanese troops in the area and it was estimated that at least 1,000 Japaneses were dug in along the ridges and gorges. The second ridge, where the Japanese had concentrated the bulk of their defenses and their manpower, became known among the 11th Airborne troops as Purple Heart Hill.

On 18 December, First Lieutenant Charles Olsen and C/187th moved from Manarawat and rejoined 1/187th at Anonang. Lieutenant Colonel Thomas L. Mann's 2/188th had been probing the Japanese-held ridges for three days, searching for an undefended or weakly held approach into the position – there were none. In the meantime, Lieutenant Colonel Pearson had pulled 1/187th back from Anonang and circled the Japanese stronghold in a wide arc, moving to the north, above the Japanese defenses. To the west of 1/187th was the Division Reconnaissance (Recon) Platoon that had traveled along the slopes of Mount Lobi to determine how far to the north that the Japanese stronghold extended; the Recon Platoon found instead that the position extended westward. Consequently, the Recon Platoon dug in on the northwest corner of the Japanese defensive network. Colonel Robert H. Soule, the 188th GIR's commanding officer, was in overall command of the assault on Purple Heart Hill. he planned his attack for the morning of 26 December. For the assault, he had 2/188th, 1/187th, and the Recon Platoon under his command. First, he moved F/188th from Mahonag down the trail to the east to set up an ambush. He then used the rest of 2/188th, located on a hill position southwest and across a gorge from the objective, first as a ploy, and then as part of the attack. Soule directed 2/188th to move southwest, away from the Japanese hill, leading the Japanese to believe that, like the four other infantry battalions that had moved out of the area, 2/188th was also moving out. Instead, 2/188th moved into a narrow, steep-sided riverbed that hid it from view, then doubled back and climbed a rock gully onto the southern slope of Purple Heart Hill. Then 2/188th turned left and moved up on the Japanese flank. As soon as they were within range and sight, the Japanese took them under heavy fire from deep entrenchments.

The Japanese on Purple Heart Hill were so well entrenched and so numerous that Colonel Soule decided to blast them with as much artillery fire as he could muster before ordering any ground attacks. During most of the night of 26 December, artillery from A Battery, 457th PFAB (which had earlier parachuted into Manarawat), Burauen, and 2/188th's mortars pounded the Japanese. Finally, after strong artillery preparation, 2/188th stormed Purple Heart Hill on the morning of 27 December and, after intense, close-in firefights and hand-to-hand combat, struggled to the top of the hill and held it. The entire battalion closed in at dusk but had no time to dig in; they just moved into the old foxholes and revetments from which they had blasted the Japanese. Those Japanese that had not been killed in the assault scattered to the north and west. Those moving northward ran into 1/187th, which was attacking southward along the gorge and up the other ridge. The Japanese fleeing westward ran into the Recon Platoon and the F/188th ambush along the Japanese MSR. The battle for Purple Heart Hill was over after almost five weeks of containment followed by the final attack. A search of the area found 238 dead Japanese. How many were buried in the subterranean galleries was unknown. It was also discovered that the elusive Japanese MSR, which wound from Ormoc Bay, ended at Anonang. Division intelligence reasoned that, because of its extensive defenses, the fact that Purple Heart Hill was the MSR's eastern terminal, Anonang was probably the Japanese 26th Division's CP.

After the success at Purple Heart Hill and the juncture of the 511th PIR and 1/187th with the other US forces on the west coast, the main battles of the 11th Airborne Division on Leyte were finished. Most of the division withdrew to the Bito Beach base camp. The 674th and 675th GFABs, still bereft of their artillery pieces and acting as infantry, remained in the hills outside Burauen, scouting and patrolling the eastern approaches to the Leyte hills. By 15 January 1945, all division units had returned to Bito Beach. On 21 January, after a division parade and awards ceremony, reviewed by Lieutenant General Robert L. Eichelberger, commanding general of the newly formed US Eighth Army, General Eichelberger told General Swing that he was "elated" that General Douglas MacArthur, Supreme Commander of Allied Forces in the Southwest Pacific Area, had given him the "go-ahead" to invade Luzon with the 11th Airborne Division. He also assigned Swing a top priority: get to Manila, the major prize of the Pacific War to date, ahead of his competition, General Krueger's US Sixth Army.

The Battle of Leyte was over. The Americans had established a base of operations from which USAAF bombers could strike Luzon, the heart of the Philippine archipelago. Ahead was more intense fighting for the Allies. In the tents on Bito Beach, in the mess lines, and wherever the GIs gathered, the main topic of conversation centered on the location of their next fight. They knew that the US Sixth Army had invaded northern Luzon at Lingayen Gulf on 9 January. They had heard rumors that the paratroopers of the 11th Airborne Division had been alerted for a jump ahead of the Sixth Army at Nichols Field outside Manila. But toward the end of the month, unit commanders received a supply of handbooks describing the terrain and geography of southern Luzon. Division staff studied the area from Nasugbu east to Batangas City and north to Manila. Rumor became reality when the division received orders for an operation in southern Luzon.

Source citation: Flanagan (1997). The Rakkasans. pp. 49–65.

General Krueger's US Sixth Army invaded Luzon at 09:30 on 9 January 1945 with two field corps, comprising a force of some 68,000 men. Japanese General Tomoyuki Yamashita's poorly equipped Japanese Fourteenth Area Army defenders numbered about 275,000 men. To defend the largest island in the Philippines, Yamashita withdrew most of his troops from the coastal regions and prepared for a lengthy delaying action in the island's interior. His objective was to hold Luzon as long as possible to prevent the Allies from using it as a base of operations against the Japanese homeland. He deployed his main force of about 152,000 men in several mountain strongholds in the north; he sent another 50,000 men to defend southern Luzon and the hills east of Manila; he stationed a third group of 30,000 men west of the Luzon Plain in the hills dominating the huge Clark Field complex.

Back on Bito Beach, Leyte, General Swing's 11th Airborne Division headquarters received US Eighth Army Field Order No. 17 on 22 January that alerted the division for a two-pronged operation on Luzon. The division would prepare to amphibiously land a regimental combat team in the Nasugbu area on Luzon's southwest corner, seize and defend the beachhead; an airborne RCT would prepare to move by air from Leyte and Mindoro bases, land by parachute on Tagaytay Ridge, about 20 miles (32 km) to the east of the Nasugbu landing zone, and effect a juncture with the RCT moving inland from Nasugbu. The division, reinforced after assembling on Tagaytay Ridge, would prepare for further action to the north and east as directed by the Eighth Army.[Note 2]

On 24 January, General Swing issued his Field Order No. 10 for Operation Mike VI that outlined in detail the division's operation plan (OPLAN) for executing the Eighth Army field order. The 188th Glider Infantry RCT would lead the amphibious assault on the beach at Nasugbu, followed by the 187th Glider Infantry RCT with the mission of protecting the southern flank and blocking the approaches from the Balayan Bay-Calatagan Peninsula area. The 511th Parachute Infantry RCT, with the 457th PFAB attached, would drop onto Tagaytay Ridge when Swing could assure General Eichelberger, the Eighth Army's commanding general, that the amphibious force could link up with the airborne force within 24 hours. The United States Seventh Fleet would shell the beaches for one hour before the landing and the Thirteenth and Fifteenth Air Forces would provide assault and close air support. The Eighth Army designated D-Day as 31 January. The field order also ordered an amphibious dry run for the 187th and 188th glider units that were more prepared to enter combat by landing in a field than they were in wading ashore from a Navy landing craft. On 26 January, as directed, the first three waves loaded, pushed out into Leyte Bay, and then came churning back to "assault" Bito Beach. General Swing deemed the dry run a success and ordered the division's amphibious elements to embark aboard their ships for the cruise to Nasugbu. The 187th, glider and parachute trained, was now going to emulate the Marines – storm across the beaches from the sea.

The catch to the loading out of the division's amphibious elements was what ships the Navy would send, and this was not definite until the ships arrived at approximately 20:00 on 25 January. Most of the supply ships were completely loaded within 24 hours, except for the great bulk of engineer supplies, ammunition, and gasoline. The landing craft for the troops arrived at 07:00 on 27 January, and soon thereafter, the troops went aboard. The assault convoy of over 100 ships and landing craft of all types weighed anchor and steamed out to sea from Leyte that afternoon. An additional eight landing craft carried the 511th RCT to Mindoro.

Many 11th Airborne Division units went through staff and command changes. In the 187th GIR, Lieutenant Colonel George O. Pearson, 1/187th's commanding officer, took over as the 187th's executive officer; Lieutenant Colonel Arthur H. Wilson, 2/187th's commanding officer, replaced Pearson as 1/187th's commander; and Lieutenant Colonel Norman D. Tipton returned from the 511th PIR to take over his old battalion, 2/187th.

Source citation: Flanagan (1997). The Rakkasans. pp. 65–68.

At dawn on 31 January 1945, the convoy arrived off Nasugbu, Luzon in clear skies and calm seas. On their landing craft, the men of the 187th and 188th RCTs could see the white landing beaches, the town of Nasugbu, and the green mountains of southern Luzon beyond. The Wednesday morning quietude was broken at 07:00 when USAAF A-20s and P-38s appeared overhead, dropped down on the deck, and strafed the beaches. At 07:15, the Navy began shelling and rocketing Red Beach, the designated landing area. An hour later, the shelling stopped and the beachmaster landing party headed for shore. At 08:22, Generals Eichelberger and Swing received word aboard the Navy task force command ship USCGC Spencer (WPG-36) that the landing was unopposed. At 08:25, the first wave of eight LCVP landing craft motored ashore, ran up on the beach, dropped their ramps, and the 188th RCT's glider riders turned amphibians waded ashore through surf sometimes up to their chests. The first assault troops, a reconnaissance-in-force from Lieutenant Colonel Ernest H. LaFlamme's 1/188th GIR, headed for their first objective, the town of Nasugbu 1,500 yards (1,400 m) away. Some Japanese, in caves on Nasugbu Point to the north and San Diego Point on the south flank of the beachhead, fired machine guns sporadically and dropped a few artillery rounds along the beach until LaFlamme sent off patrols to silence the opposition. General Swing and the 11th Airborne Division staff transferred to LCVPs and reached the beach just behind the 188th's second wave. By 09:45, the 188th had moved through Wawa, Nasugbu, and its airstrip. At 10:00, General Eichelberger ordered the landing of the remainder of the amphibious force. At 10:30, Lieutenant Colonel "Harry" Wilson led the 187th RCT ashore. His 1/187th GIR, part of the division's floating reserve, would attach to the 188th RCT on landing. Wilson's battalion moved up behind the beach to assemble and reorganize.

After 2/188th took Lian and the Japanese had been driven back into the hills, 1/187th was attached to the 188th RCT for the march inland and up the hill on the road to Tagaytay Ridge. The remainder of the 187th RCT followed 1/187th ashore, relieved the 188th RCT on flanking missions, and assumed responsibility for the Nasugbu beachhead. One battery of the 674th GFAB remained behind on the beach to support the 187th's defense of the port. By 13:00, all combat elements of the two glider RCTs were moving inland. General Eichelberger and his small Eighth Army command group had landed and joined General Swing near the head of the column marching up Highway 17 to link up with the 511th RCT.

Source citation: Flanagan (1997). The Rakkasans. pp. 68–76.

By 31 January 1945, General MacArthur had become frustrated with the US Sixth Army's slow advance on Manila from the north. MacArthur's primary concern was the capture of Manila and the airbase at Clark Field, which were required to support future operations. "Get to Manila," he ordered his two field commanders. General Eichelberger reasoned that if he could make the Japanese think that his small force moving up Highway 17 across Tagaytay Ridge and heading for Manila from the south was a larger force, he would have a tactical advantage and a relatively unopposed run-up to the capital. He directed General Swing to move the 188th RCT forward as rapidly as possible. Colonel Soule led his 188th RCT, reinforced with 1/187th, inland at a rapid pace. By 14:30, the lead unit had reached the Palico River Bridge that spanned a gorge 85 feet (26 m) deep and 250 feet (76 m) wide. Soule had moved inland so rapidly that he caught the Japanese sappers preparing to blow the bridge by surprise. The lead elements dashed across the bridge and routed the Japanese. The 127th AEB inactivated the demolition charges and reinforced the bridge sections that the Japanese had weakened. By 15:30, the bridge and surrounding area were secured.

At 18:00, Colonel Soule and his reinforced 188th RCT were in the vicinity of Tumalim, about eight miles inland from the beachhead. Beyond Tumalim, the highway rose more sharply and the advance slowed as the 188th found itself moving cautiously through narrow passes, bordered by steep wooded banks, ideal for ambushes. The normal tactic of fighting the Japanese in the Pacific was to halt just before dark and set a perimeter defense before eating whatever rations were on hand and bedding down for the night. General Eichelberger discerned that if the 188th kept moving at night, the Japanese might be thrown off balance and would not be able to practice their customary night probes of the American defenses. Eichelberger felt that he had the momentum and told General Swing to push on by the light of the full moon. At midnight, Lieutenant Colonel Wilson's 1/187th passed through the 188th and took up the lead. At 04:00 on 1 February, Wilson halted the march. Almost 20 hours after wading ashore at Nasugbu, the men slept for two hours and were up and off again up the road at 06:00.

At daybreak, 1/187th advance elements approached the Mount Cariliao-Mount Batulao pass. At the foot of Mount Cariliao was Mount Aiming. The three peaks gave the Japanese a perfect defensive position that dominated the highway. When they saw the 1/187th point advancing toward them, the Japanese opened up with artillery, mortars, and machine guns, the heaviest barrages that the 11th Airborne Division had encountered since its amphibious landing. The first fire from the heights around the road that slowed the division's advance appeared to be from a Japanese outpost. As 1/187th advanced, they ran up against the Japanese main line of resistance (MLR) across Highway 17, hinged on Mount Aiming and anchored on Mounts Cariliao and Batulao. The MLR was a string of caves, dugouts, and tank traps, all interconnected by a zigzag line of trenches, backed up with various artillery pieces manned by some 250 artillerymen emplaced to the north and east of Mount Aiming. Artillery rounds from these guns bracketed the highway. There were about 400 infantrymen in caves and trenches on Mount Aiming and across the highway. The defenses into which 1/187th had now run appeared to be the line to which the Japanese had been falling back; the Japanese were now ready to fight.

General Swing gave Colonel Soule the mission of reducing the Japanese stronghold on Mount Aiming. Soule in turn directed Lieutenant Colonel Wilson's 1/187th to lead the attack up the highway. He sent Lieutenant Colonel La Flamme's 1/188th to the left and north of the highway and Lieutenant Colonel Mann's 2/188th to the right and south. Lieutenant Colonels Hoska and Massad brought their 674th and 675th GFAB howitzers forward to support the infantry attack. The 188th's forward air control observer laid on close air support. The attack got underway at 09:00 when USAAF fighters and medium bombers strafed and bombed the Japanese positions. The artillery echelon fired concentrations on Japanese defensive positions and counter-battery fire on the artillery positions. At about noon, Captain Raymond F. Lee's A/188th charged up the hill, using rifles, bayonets, and hand grenades, and broke through the Japanese on Mount Aiming. The rifle company became separated from the rest of 1/188th and was forced to dig in. The Japanese counterattacked Lee's position all afternoon but failed to dislodge the Americans. Seizing Mount Aiming pierced and split the Japanese defenses in the area. While 1/188th held its position on the north flank, 2/188th moved south of the road and attacked the Japanese strongpoint between Mount Batulao and the highway. Meanwhile, 1/187th moved in between 1/188th and 2/188th and, as the center of the line, attacked eastward astride the highway. On the morning of 2 February, the 188th RCT launched an all-out attack to the east. At 08:30, the USAAF and the two artillery battalions hit the main Japanese positions between the two mountains. 1/187th and 2/188th continued the assault to the east, passing through 1/188th on Mount Aiming, protecting the 188th's left flank. The pace up the highway was slow initially but quickened as the Japanese were forced to withdraw with the capture of a regimental CP at Aga at 13:00, which showed the haste in which they departed. In the Aga-Caylaway area, the 188th RCT found between 75 and 100 tons of ammunition. In the defense of their CP, the Japanese had built three tank traps across the highway 20 feet (6.1 m) wide across the top, 4 feet (1.2 m) wide across the bottom, and 25 feet (7.6 m) deep, which the 127th AEB bridged. While 1/188th moved north, 2/188th continued to attack the Japanese in the northern foothills of Mount Batulao. So far, the division had lost six KIA and 41 WIA, and had killed about 90 Japanese. By dusk, the division butted up against the third and strongest position of the Japanese MLR across Highway 17. Throughout the night, the Japanese harassed the forward American units with artillery, mortar, and small-arms fire. The Japanese located the 675th GFAB's firing position and forced it to displace its guns.

The fight at the Mount Cariliao-Mount Batulao pass had slowed the division's advance up the Tagaytay Ridge and had prevented General Eichelberger from bringing in the 511th RCT a day early, on 2 February, instead of the originally planned 3 February. Eichelberger was under orders from General MacArthur not to bring in the 511th until he was certain that the division's amphibious units could link up with the paratroopers in less than 24 hours. Because of the delay at the Aga pass, Eichelberger reluctantly directed General Swing to bring in the 511th on 3 February. Eichelberger also ordered the US 24th Infantry Division to move a second battalion from the 19th Infantry Regiment from Leyte to Nasugbu to operate and protect the port and the MSR up Highway 17. This would free up 2/187th to join the rest of the 187th RCT on its march to Manila.

At 07:30 on the morning of 3 February, the 188th RCT, with 1/187th attached, attacked the third and final Japanese position in the stubbornly defended Mount Cariliao-Mount Batulao pass. The three battalions advanced rapidly against little resistance until 11:00. The lead 1/188th company rounded a bare ridge-nose on the north side of a sharp bend in Highway 17 on the western edge of Tagaytay Ridge and halted after observing Japanese activity on another bare ridge-nose south of the bend. General Pierson arrived and Lieutenant Colonel LaFlamme told him that his point men could see Japanese on the high ground to the south. Colonel Soule drove up and was discussing the situation with Pierson when all hell broke loose. The Japanese opened up with artillery, machine-gun, and small-arms fire. Pierson jumped into a roadside ditch and Soule jumped in on top of him. Soule received a shell fragment in his buttocks and commented to Pierson that he had been hit. Not only were Pierson and Soule pinned down by the artillery fire, but so were many other high-ranking officers, including General Eichelberger, General Francis W. Farrell (11th Airborne Division Artillery commander), and several colonels and lieutenant colonels on their staffs. In one of the barrages, 1/187th's Lieutenant Colonel Wilson was wounded. In all, the barrage resulted in eight KIA and 21 WIA. The artillery barrages forced everyone to take cover. Colonel Soule removed himself from the ditch and immediately assumed control of the attack on the Japanese position. He sent orders to bring up Wilson's 1/187th. Wilson ordered his lead company to swing around behind the Japanese position and take it from the rear. Lieutenant Colonel Mann led his 2/188th off the road to the south and onto the Japanese-held ridge. By 13:00, the troops of the 187th and 188th, using flamethrowers and hand grenades, supported by the guns of the 674th and 675th GFABs, wrestled control of the ridge from the Japanese, killing over 300 in the battle. The position was obviously an important one in the Japanese defensive plan; it was honeycombed with enormous supply tunnels, reinforced-concrete caves, and strong artillery and individual firing positions. With the reduction of Shorty Ridge, named after Colonel “Shorty” Soule, the amphibious units of the 11th Airborne Division that had landed and fought their way up a difficult route of attack were ready to make contact with the paratroopers of the 511th PIR.

The march to Manila continued.

Source citation: Flanagan (1997). The Rakkasans. pp. 76–84.

At 08:15 on 3 February 1945, while the 188th RCT was reducing the Japanese resistance on Shorty Ridge, the paratroopers of the 511th RCT (less the 457th PFAB), began dropping from forty-eight C-47s onto the Tagaytay Ridge DZ. Because of a shortage of transport aircraft, only about one-third of the 511th RCT could be airdropped in one lift; the jump was planned for three waves delivered across two days. The first elements to be dropped consisted of Colonel Haugen and his regimental command group, Lieutenant Colonel Frank S. Holcomb's 2/511th PIR, and one-half of Lieutenant Colonel Edward H. Lahti's 3/511th PIR – about 915 officers and men overall. Tagaytay Ridge made an excellent DZ for a mass parachute drop. The area selected for the DZ was flat, over 4,000 yards (3,700 m) long and about 2,000 yards (1,800 m) wide. The only dangerous feature was the possibility of being blown off the ridge and down into Taal Lake. But that did not happen to any of the paratroopers. What did happen was that the first 18 planeloads of paratroopers landed right on DZs marked by smoke pots set out by advanced scouts. The second serial of thirty C-47s carrying 570 paratroopers dropped 6 miles (9.7 km) short of the drop point when its lead plane accidentally released a drop bundle and all paratroopers immediately "hit the silk." The second wave, under explicit orders to ignore the scattered parachutes on the ground persisted in jumping short.[4]^:135 At about 12:10, when the rest of the regiment, the other half of 3/511th PIR and Major Henry A. Burgess' 1/511th PIR, came in over the ridge, some of the C-47s dropped their paratroopers on the parachutes from the premature airdrop. Only 425 men dropped onto the proper drop point; 1,325 landed between 4 miles (6.4 km) and 6 miles (9.7 km) to the east and northeast. Despite the scattered landings, the 511th RCT reassembled in about five hours, and by 13:00, made contact with the lead elements of the 188th RCT moving up Tagaytay Ridge.

Both Generals Eichelberger and Swing were with the 188th RCT's forward elements and contacted Colonel Haugen near the Manila Hotel Annex atop the ridge overlooking Taal Lake. That afternoon, 2/511th secured the DZ, and after 3/511th assumed DZ security, moved to the junction of Highways 17 and 25B to await further orders. The 11th Airborne Division CP moved into the Manila Hotel Annex, which was in a central position on the ridge and made a convenient control point for the troops moving east and north. Generals Eichelberger and Swing had hoped that the 511th RCT could move to the north and on to Manila in the afternoon, but there was not enough motor transport or gasoline available to permit it. Later in the afternoon, seventeen 2 1⁄2-ton cargo trucks were unloaded from landing craft at Nasugbu and sent forward. By 4 February, ten C-47s landed at Nasugbu's dirt airstrip, widened and cleared by the 127th AEB, with a cargo of gasoline that was immediately sent forward.

After dark on 3 February, anxious to start the movement toward Manila, General Swing sent First Lieutenant George Skau and 21 men from the Division Recon Platoon, mounted in jeeps, up Highway 17 to reconnoiter the road to Manila. Swing cautioned Skau that he was driving into unknown territory and to radio back as soon as he encountered Japanese defenses. At 04:00 on 4 February, Skau reported back that the road was secure as far as Imus, where the Japanese had blown the bridge and set up a defensive position, but he had found a dirt road that bypassed the bridge. It, too, had a bridge ready to be blown but the recon patrol had removed the charges. At 05:30, the 2/511th point moved out in two jeeps. Two hours later, the rest of 2/511th moved out. Lieutenant Colonel Holcomb and 2/511th secured the Imus River Bridge and moved over the Zapote River Bridge to the Las Pinas River Bridge. The Japanese had prepared to demolish the bridge but Holcomb's men caught them by surprise and took the bridge intact after a hard fight. The 511th RCT, by truck and on foot, moved forward and was now pushing against the southern Japanese defenses of Manila. At 08:15, the third serial of the 511th RCT airdrop, the 457th PFAB, dropped onto Tagaytay Ridge opposite the division CP. Meanwhile, back on Tagaytay Ridge, the 188th RCT with 1/187th attached, having cleaned out the Japanese on Shorty Ridge, left a company to secure the area and Colonel Soule led the rest of his command on foot toward Manila.

With his division on a new mission and his MSR strung out over 70 miles, General Swing gave Colonel Hildebrand's 187th RCT (less 1/187th) the mission of securing the MSR. To assist Hildebrand in the vast task of covering the large area that the 11th Airborne Division had liberated, General Eichelberger brought ashore the US 19th Infantry Regiment (less one battalion). Hildebrand accomplished his mission by patrolling the area and establishing outposts along the entire MSR. His force was not large enough to take on large Japanese concentrations, but active patrols were able to drive the Japanese farther into the surrounding hills. One Japanese concentration was around Mount Pico de Loro; another was on Mount Sungay. In the future, the entire division would return to wipe out the pockets, but first, it had to assist in the subjugation of Manila. In a few days, both 187th RCT infantry battalions would move to the area south of Manila to join the 511th RCT in what would prove to be one of the 11th Airborne Division's bloodiest fights.

Source citation: Flanagan (1997). The Rakkasans. pp. 84–89.

By 21:30 on the night of 4 February 1945, the 511th RCT had advanced as far as the Paranaque River Bridge, the southern boundary of metropolitan Manila. It was here that the 11th Airborne Division ran into well-planned and heavily manned Japanese defenses that the division could not bypass; they had found the Japanese right anchor of the Genko Line.

The Genko Line consisted of a series of mutually supporting concrete pillboxes extending eastward across Nichols Field and anchored at Mabato Point along Laguna de Bay (Laguna Lake). The rear of the Genko Line was based on the high ground of Fort William McKinley. Five- and six-inch naval guns salvaged from damaged or sunken ships were set in concrete emplacements, and antiaircraft artillery sited to fire horizontally were tactically located to assist in the defense. Many of the concrete pillboxes were two and three stories deep. The Genko Line held some 6,000 Japanese in over 1,200 pillboxes supported by 44 heavy artillery pieces, 164 antiaircraft artillery weapons that could fire vertically at aircraft or horizontally at ground troops. and over 500 machine guns; 100-pound bombs and antisubmarine depth charges were rigged as land mines. All roads leading to the Genko Line were heavily mined with 500-pound bombs armed with low-pressure detonators.

The blocking force that halted the 511th RCT at the Paranaque River Bridge was part of the Japanese 3rd Naval Battalion, reinforced by part of the 1st Naval Battalion. Imperial Japanese Navy Land Forces were ground combat units consisting of navy personnel organized for offensive operations and the defense of Japanese naval facilities. North of Paranaque was Nichols Field, the Imperial Japanese Navy Air Service base of operations, also defended by part of the Japanese 3rd Naval Battalion with antiaircraft artillery. On 4 February, the Japanese had few troops at Nielson Field, 2 miles (3.2 km) north-northeast of Nichols Field, but the Japanese 4th Naval Battalion held Fort McKinley, which was just 2 miles (3.2 km) from Nielson Field. Other Japanese units manned antiaircraft artillery midway between Fort McKinley and Nichols Field in support of the Japanese 3rd Naval Battalion. These defenses also formed part of the Genko Line. Rear Admiral Sanji Iwabuchi commanded the Manila defenses. He had 20,000 men under his command, consisting of 16,000 naval troops and 4,000 army troops who had been trapped by the American pincers movement on Manila from the north and south. Before General Krueger's US Sixth Army invasion from Lingayen, Admiral Iwabuchi believed that the main American effort would come from the south, and prepared his strongest defenses accordingly.

Lieutenant Colonel Hoska's 674th GFAB had by this time moved up into positions from which it could support the 511th RCT's advance. General Swing had set up his CP in a cathedral near Paranaque. Hoska told Swing that he believed that his pack 75s could neutralize the heavy Japanese fire coming from across the Paranaque River Bridge. Swing permitted him to try. Hoska crawled to the riverbank and between midnight and 05:00 on 5 February, directed 700 rounds from a single gun in a precision attack on the Japanese defensive positions, knocking out five machine-gun emplacements and two 20mm high-velocity antiaircraft guns embedded in the concrete breakwater wall 30 yards (27 m) across the river.

Admiral Iwabuchi ordered his men to blow up all of Manila's military installations and the port area, the bridges, and the municipal water and electrical power installations. On 5 February, the Japanese dynamited the northern port area and fled southward across the Pasig River, blowing all the bridges behind them. The blasts ignited fires that quickly engulfed a section of bamboo houses near the port. Shortly, much of the northern half of Manila was in flames.

From 4 February to 6 February, the 511th RCT fought its way north about 2,000 yards (1,800 m) in house-to-house and pillbox-to-pillbox fighting, losing six KIA and 35 WIA, and killing about 200 Japanese. On 6 February, General Swing called a halt to the 511th's advance. That afternoon, the 188th RCT and Lieutenant Colonel Tipton's 2/187th arrived. Swing proposed sending the 188th and 2/187th against Nichols Field while the 511th continued its drive into Manila in the west, on the division's left flank. On the night of 6–7 February, the 188th and 2/187th moved up to their line of departure southeast of Nichols Field, ready to launch its attack at daybreak. The attack, across fairly open terrain, gained little ground in the face of heavy, concentrated, and accurate Japanese artillery, mortar, and machine-gun fire.

By 11 February, the 11th Airborne Division had consolidated its gains. It had established a solid line from the northwest to the southeast corners of Nichols Field and had eliminated the Japanese from the west end of the airfield. The division had been unable to substantially reduce the volume of Japanese artillery fire from the Nichols Field defensive complex. Airstrikes from Mindoro and the division's artillery had failed to knock out enough of the Japanese guns at the airfield to permit the infantry to advance without severe losses. Nichols Field was the center of the Genko Line and contained an interconnecting network of concrete pillboxes and gun emplacements linked by underground tunnels. The terrain around the airfield was open, providing the Japanese with excellent fields of fire for their flat-trajectory dual-purpose antiaircraft weapons. The Japanese had embedded several five-inch naval guns on the airfield's outer rim. On 11 February, General Swing, Colonel Haugen, the 511th RCT's commanding officer, and Lieutenant Colonel Tipton, 2/187th's commanding officer, were in conference in the 2/187th CP when a 20mm shell penetrated a window and exploded in the room, wounding "Hard Rock" Haugen in the chest. He died on 22 February during an air evacuation flight from Mindoro to New Guinea. Lieutenant Colonel Lahti, 3/511th's commanding officer, assumed command of the 511th. On 12 February, General Swing ordered a full-scale assault on Nichols Field. After airstrikes and artillery preparation softened some of the Japanese defenses, 2/187th attacked generally eastward from the northwest corner of the airfield; the 188th and 1/187th drove in from the south and southeast. Under cover of continuing artillery barrages, the infantry rushed forward to attack pillboxes and gun emplacements. In the afternoon, the Japanese counterattacked and were beaten back. By dusk, the 188th and 1/187th had cleared most of Nichols Field.

The 11th Airborne Division continued its advance on 13 February. The 511th RCT advanced eastward astride the Manila-Fort McKinley road. The 187th and 188th RCTs continued their attack across Nichols Field. On the morning of 15 February, the division continued its attack across Nichols Field and toward Fort McKinley. The division plan called for the 188th RCT, with 2/187th attached, to pivot and strike toward Fort McKinley and for the 511th RCT to continue its attack eastward, with all six battalions converging at Fort McKinley. At 12:15 on 15 February, following an airstrike coupled with an artillery and mortar barrage, G/187th lead off in the attack. G/187th's 1st Platoon started moving forward; there was no Japanese reaction. The platoon crossed a dry streambed and started up the barren slope of the other side – first 100 yards (91 m), then 200 yards (180 m) – and still no Japanese reaction. Suddenly, Japanese machine guns located in the streambed that 1st Platoon had just crossed opened up on the platoon's rear. Fortunately, the platoon was well dispersed. Before any return fire could be brought to bear on the machine gun locations, a shouting, screaming mass of Japanese climbed out of the streambed and charged 1st Platoon. The platoon's machine-gun crews had their weapons mounted and firing within seconds. Their fire, combined with that of the BARs began knocking the Japanese down. They still came on in a seemingly endless stream. The leading Japanese closed with 1st Platoon and all semblance of organization vanished as it became every man for himself. The G/187th company commander committed his 2nd Platoon to the fight. They knocked out several Japanese machine guns in the streambed that had ceased firing because their fire was masked by their own troops. Leaving a squad to continue up the streambed, the remainder of 2nd Platoon crossed the streambed and entered the melee. For some unknown reason, the Japanese chose not to fight it out but attempted to pass through 1st Platoon to reach the shelter of their bunkers and pillboxes. Realizing that the Japanese in the bunkers and pillboxes would soon start firing even if it meant killing their own men, G/187th consolidated its two platoons (less one squad in the streambed) and started up the hill. Help arrived when F/187th, on the left of G/187th, had swung to their right and reached the top of the hill first, putting the remaining Japanese between the two American infantry companies and cut off from their positions. Within minutes, all firing ceased and G/187th moved to the hillcrest to join F/187th. Suddenly, without warning, a muffled explosion shook the area and the earth on top of the hill rose and settled, knocking most of the men to the ground. Preferring death to the disgrace of capture, the Japanese had blown the position while the Americans were on top of it, expecting the whole hill to be destroyed and killing everyone on it. Fortunately, the demolition charge was too small.

The 11th Airborne Division had now seized two-thirds of the Genko Line. The 511th RCT, with 2/187th attached, had pushed through the left end of the line, then turned eastward to join the attack on Nichols Field. The 188th RCT, with 1/187th attached, had swung northward across Nichols Field and linked up with the 511th and 2/187th. With the seizure of Nichols Field, the division, for the most part, had completed its objective in the battle for Manila. Since its amphibious landing at Nasugbu, the division had suffered 900 casualties. Of this number, the 511th RCT lost 70 KIA and 240 WIA; the 187th and 188th RCTs together lost 100 KIA and 510 WIA. The division had killed about 3,000 Japanese in metropolitan Manila. Following the fall of Nichols Field, the division regrouped for the assault on the last two bastions in the Genko Line: Fort McKinley and Mabato Point, the high ground on Laguna Lake about 2,000 yards (1,800 m) south of Fort McKinley. General Swing's plan was simple: blast the Japanese defenses with airstrikes and artillery, attack the blind sides and vulnerable points, squeeze the Japanese tighter, and, if they tried to escape, hit the escape routes with air and artillery, or previously set ambush sites.

On 14 February, General Swing assigned the mission of reducing Mabato Point and attacking Fort McKinley from the south to a special task force (TF) under the command of General Pierson, the assistant division commander. TF Pierson was composed of 1/187th, 3/19th Infantry, a company of M4 Sherman tanks from the 44th Tank Battalion, and a platoon of combat engineers from C/127th AEB. The next day, TF Pierson advanced northward toward Fort McKinley. At the same time, the 188th RCT, with 2/187th attached, and the 511th RCT attacked in line eastward on TF Pierson's left flank in the face of heavy Japanese artillery and automatic-weapons fire from the fort. Between 15 and 17 February, the division consolidated its gains. On 16 February, during a reconnaissance of the eastern approaches to Fort McKinley, there was an enormous explosion that demolished the side of a hill. The concussion knocked some of the men flat. One explosion followed another as the Japanese destroyed their ammunition dumps. On 17 February, Swing received the go-ahead to launch his attack on Fort McKinley. Major Burgess' 1/511th led the attack from the west with Lieutenant Colonel Tipton's 2/187th on their right flank. As they closed on the fort, the artillery, antiaircraft, mortar, and small-arms fire from emplacements and pillboxes increased. Japanese suicide squads fought desperate delaying actions, but American casualties were comparatively light. Just inside the Carabao Gate, the main entrance to Fort McKinley, the attack was halted by division order; elements of the 1st Cavalry Division had crossed the Pasig River and were working toward the division from the northeast corner of the post. Aside from local patrolling, the Nichols Field-Fort McKinley fight was over. The Japanese had withdrawn to a new concentration area in the vicinity of Mabato Point and they were disposed to be very stubborn indeed.

Source citation: Flanagan (1997). The Rakkasans. pp. 90–101.

On 15 February 1945, Lieutenant Colonel Pearson, the 187th's executive officer, took over the mission of reducing Mabato Point, which was on high ground on the western shore of Laguna de Bay or Laguna Lake, the largest lake in the Philippines. From their well-fortified strongpoint on top of Mabato Point, an estimated 800 Japanese had perfect observation and wide, grazing fields of artillery, mortar, and machine-gun fire over open and rolling terrain. Tunnels were burrowed through the hill, opening into large rooms containing headquarters, communications centers, hospitals, supply rooms, kitchens, and living quarters. A Japanese soldier could move between positions without surfacing. Pearson deployed his forces in an arc surrounding Mabato Point. He held 3/19th Infantry on the heights south of Fort McKinley, sent Lieutenant Colonel John Strong's 3/511th to control the southern exits from the area, and put Lieutenant Colonel Wilson's 1/187th to the west along the Manila Railroad track that ran northwest–southeast across the area and close to Mabato Point; the 457th PFAB was prepared to support the ground attack with its pack 75s.

Colonel Pearson launched his attack at midmorning on 18 February. A/187th and B/187th struck due east, advancing partially up the hill, but the Japanese mortar fire forced both companies to withdraw off the hill. After reassessing the situation, Pearson decided to call in airstrikes and all the indirect artillery fire he could bring to bear on the targets. In the afternoon, USAAF P-38s and P-51s and Marine SBDs blasted and strafed the area, along with hundreds of rounds of artillery and tank fire. The ground around the Japanese defensive positions was so hard that the aerial bombs merely chipped off pieces of the fortification; the artillery and tank fire was even less effective. Pearson then called for napalm airstrikes. The napalm did two things: it burned off the camouflage covering the cave and tunnel entrances, and when landing near a tunnel opening, burned up so much oxygen so rapidly that many Japanese suffocated inside the tunnels. Mabato Point was attacked again on the morning of 19 February. C/187th led the assault with armor support. The rifle company made its way partially up the hill and, again, was blasted off the hill by huge 150mm mortars. For days, 1/187th had been trying to locate the Japanese observers who were directing the mortar fire so accurately. Finally, several Japanese were spotted in trees. Sharpshooters were brought up and knocked the Japanese out of the trees. The mortar fire subsequently abated.

By 21 February, the Japanese on Mabato Point were surrounded and cut off from all their escape routes. Patrol boats were sent out on Laguna Lake to block the Japanese escape by water. That morning, a group of Filipino guerrillas and a young Filipino girl were escorted to Colonel Pearson's CP west of Mabato Point. The girl asked Pearson if a Japanese medical officer could surrender. When asked for the whereabouts of the Japanese officer, she pointed to one of the "guerillas," a nondescript little individual who promptly surrendered. Through an interpreter, the Japanese officer stated that there were perhaps 400 more Japanese in the Mabato Point area that would surrender unconditionally if given the chance. Pearson ordered a ceasefire and sent a Filipino messenger under a white flag of truce to the Japanese commander on Mabato Point. At noon, all fire would be halted for a half hour and any Japanese defenders who wished to surrender should walk out with their hands over their heads and move down the hill toward the American lines. The Japanese commander rejected the offer out of hand. Pearson resumed the attack at 12:30 with airstrikes, artillery concentrations, and tank fire. C/187th again led the attack up the hill. The Japanese attempted to repel the assault, but finally, the ground forces who were advancing along the arc of the attack assaulted the position with rifles, grenades, flamethrowers, and fixed bayonets. That night, the 15 surviving Japanese officers marched on their commander's order to Mabato Point and committed harakiri. Later that night, a group of Japanese tried to escape down a road to the south, unaware that 3/511th and a group of Filipino guerrillas had set up ambushes along the road; the result was a slaughter of the Japanese troops.

On 21 February, the Americans moved without opposition to Mabato Point. All organized resistance in the area of Nichols Field, Fort McKinley, and Mabato Point had ceased. By 25 February, both 1/187th and 2/187th had moved back to Tagaytay Ridge for a brief respite from battle. The tranquility would be short-lived. The Japanese were far from defeated in the Philippines.

Source citation: Flanagan (1997). The Rakkasans. pp. 101–104.

On 10 February 1945, the 11th Airborne Division had passed from General Eichelberger's Eighth Army to General Krueger's Sixth Army control and, consequently, to Lieutenant General Oscar W. Griswold's XIV Corps. On 23 February, General Griswold gave General Swing the broadly defined mission of destroying all Japanese forces in Luzon south of Manila. More specifically, this meant the reduction of the Japanese defenses at Mount Macolod on the southeastern shore of Taal Lake, the seizure of Lipa, and the clearance of Highway 19, the main route through the Lipa Corridor, for 5 miles (8.0 km) north of Lipa. It was clear to Swing that the Japanese were far from defeated in this area. One Japanese force formed a well-dug-in line from Laguna Lake to Taal Lake along Mount Bijiang, Mount Makiling, and Mount Sungay. Another force occupied the Ternate-Mount Pico de Loro sector, driven there during the division's initial drive from Nasugbu. The Japanese also manned a strong defensive position along the Mount Macolod-Lipa Hill-Mount Malepunyo hill masses. A large number of Japanese were holed up on the Bicol Peninsula north of Legaspi.

To assist the replacement-deficient 11th Airborne Division, General Griswold attached the 158th RCT. He told General Swing to open the Manila-Santo Tomas-Lipa-Batangas City highway so that the port at Batangas City on the southern shore of Luzon could be used to mount further amphibious operations. The Manila-Batangas City highway ran in a north–south line along the western shore of Laguna Lake and then to the east of Taal Lake. Griswold also told Swing to open Manila Harbor by clearing out the Japanese in Ternate, on the southern shore of Manila Bay, southeast of Corregidor Island. Swing knew that his new missions would require the total commitment of his seven-infantry-battalion division. At no time since the division entered combat did he ever have the luxury of units in reserve. Some of his battalions, through combat losses, were at a present-for-duty strength of just over 200 effectives. But Swing knew his division and his subordinate commanders, and he knew how to employ them effectively.

The 187th GIR had not yet operated as a regiment on Luzon; its two infantry battalions were usually attached to one of the other regiments, proving the need for a triangular regimental organization in which the regiment's main body was composed of three maneuver battalions (as the 511th PIR), rather than a square regimental organization with two battalions. In March, the 187th fought as a stand-alone regiment. General Swing planned for the 187th and the 511th to attack abreast, with the 187th on the right, eastward through the narrow neck of land between Taal and Laguna lakes. He sent the 158th RCT along two routes, Balayan-Lemery-Bauan-Cuenca and Batangas City-Lipa, the two prongs to join at Lipa; he assigned 1/188th to attack the Japanese entrenched in Ternate and the Pico de Loro hills on the southern shores of Manila Bay.

The 187th RCT was in a bivouac area to the west of Mount Sungay on the north shore of Taal Lake. The regiment sent out recon patrols to gather intelligence on the Japanese defensive positions dug in on Mount Sungay to its east. Lieutenant Colonel Massad's 675th GFAB, the 187th RCT's attached artillery unit, harassed the Japanese covering force on Mount Sungay with constant artillery barrages. While the infantrymen and artillerymen were fighting the ground battles, the combat engineers were carving out roads along the cliffs and defiles in the rugged mountainous terrain around Taal Lake with their small glider-borne bulldozers. One of the roads that they constructed was along a steep, sheer cliff on the north side of the lake. General Swing reasoned that if the 187th moved down this cliff and took up position on the 511th's right flank, it would gain much terrain for which the regiment would otherwise have had to fight by moving overland above it.

The northern arm of the pincers in southern Luzon began to move on 7 March when the 187th RCT descended the steep southern slopes of Tagaytay Ridge to the northern shore of Taal Lake. Turning eastward, the 187th met no opposition until, on the afternoon of 8 March, the lead elements came under extremely heavy mortar and automatic-weapons fire from Japanese defenses about 300 yards (270 m) west of a hill two miles west of Tanauan. With 1/187th on the left and 2/187th on the right, the regiment deployed to double-envelop the hill. With the aid of close air and artillery support, it took three days of heavy fighting on the north side of the hill for the 187th to overrun these defenses on 11 March. This key Japanese position consisted of a fortress of pillboxes surrounding a concrete water tank. On top of the hill, the 187th routed the Japanese out of an underground garrison of large, interconnected caves in which many Japanese were sealed when the exits collapsed. After subduing the Japanese, the 187th RCT moved east to Tanauan and halted pending the outcome of the 511th RCT's attack south through the Lipa Corridor toward Santo Tomas.

The 511th RCT had assembled at a barrio 7 miles (11 km) north of Santo Tomas. Here Route 1, which ran from Manila to Tanauan and then eastward through the Lipa Corridor between Mounts Makiling and Malepunyo, joined Route 21, leading eastward, through Los Banos, along the south shore of Laguna Lake. The 511th' s first task was to reduce the Japanese defenses on Mount Bijiang, a rough peak located at the northwestern corner of the Mount Makiling hill mass and controlling Routes 1 and 21 for about 5 miles (8.0 km) south and southeast of the 511th's location. The 511th launched unsuccessful frontal attacks against Mount Bijiang from 10 March through 13 March. Thereafter, supporting air and artillery reduced the defenses, which Filipino guerrillas finally overran on 19 March. Without waiting for this inevitable outcome, elements of the 511th had pushed down Route 1 to within a mile of Santo Tomas. Meanwhile, other elements of the 511th had moved eastward along Route 21 to a point about 3 miles (4.8 km) short of Los Banos, where the Japanese had reorganized their defenses.

Neither the 511th RCT nor the 187th RCT, nor even both operating in concert, had the strength required to overrun the strong Japanese positions in the Santo Tomas-Tanauan region. Therefore, until 23 March, the two regiments mopped up in the areas they already held, warded off numerous small-scale Japanese counterattacks, patrolled to locate Japanese defenses, and directed air and artillery bombardments on Japanese positions Elements of the 1st Cavalry Division relieved both units on 23 March. The 187th moved by motor transport from Tanauan over and around Tagaytay Ridge, south to Lemery, and north to Cuenca, at the southern base of Mount Macolod.

The 158th RCT made somewhat better progress. Striking from the vicinity of Nasugbu on 4 March, the 158th secured Balayan, at the northwestern corner of Balayan Bay, on the same day. The 158th then drove eastward against negligible opposition, cleared the northern shores of Balayan and Batangas Bays, and, on 11 March, reached Batangas City, on the northeastern shore of Batangas Bay. On its way eastward, the 158th had bypassed strong Japanese elements on the Calumpang Peninsula that separates Balayan and Batangas Bays. The 158th had to clear the peninsula to assure the security of the northern side of the Verde Island Passage and to make the shores of Balayan and Batangas Bays safe for base development. In an operation marked by minor shore-to-shore operations by both Japanese and American units, the Americans cleared the peninsula by 16 March. Most of the Japanese garrison escaped to islands in the Verde Island Passage or the Lubang Islands. Meanwhile, other elements of the 158th RCT had made contact with strong Japanese defenses blocking the Batangas-Lipa road at Mount Macolod. Numbering some 1,250 men in all, the Japanese had the support of a 300mm artillery howitzer, two 70mm guns, ten or more 81mm mortars, a few lighter mortars, and a wealth of machine guns and automatic cannons, including many removed from disabled Japanese aircraft at the Lipa airstrips. The 158th, launching an attack at Mount Macolod on 19 March, had the support of two 105mm and two 155mm artillery battalions. From 19 through 23 March, the 158th overran the Japanese outer defenses east of the road and southeast of Mount Macolod, which lay west of the road. The 158th captured two small satellites, the hill masses of San Jose and Santa Rosa. Additionally, the 158th captured Cuenca. But the 158th made little progress at Mount Macolod proper and, by 23 March, when General Krueger detached the 158th from General Swing's command to prepare for the Bicol Peninsula landing at Legaspi, the Japanese still had a firm hold on the mountain.

Thus, by 23 March, the 11th Airborne Division and the 158th RCT had closed with the Japanese MLR at the northern and southern entrances to the Lipa Corridor, had cleared the shores of Balayan and Batangas Bays, and had secured the northern side of the Verde Island Passage. Simultaneously, division elements had considerably reduced the threat to its line of communication (LOC) posed by the Japanese units isolated west of Taal Lake, although it was 1 April before the 188th RCT overcame the last organized resistance in the rough hills south of Ternate. Total casualties for the period from 4 March through 23 March were 75 KIA and 255 WIA, against almost 1,500 Japanese killed.

Command of the 187th RCT passed from Colonel Hildebrand to Colonel Pearson. Lieutenant Colonel Wilson departed 1/187th and became the 187th executive officer. Major David Carnahan replaced Wilson. When Colonel Tipton departed 2/187th and became the 188th commanding officer, he was replaced by Major James D. Loewus. Pearson was assuming command of the 187th just as it was about to fight its bloodiest and, unfortunately, deadliest battle in its history – the reduction of Mount Macolod.

Source citations: Flanagan (1997). The Rakkasans. pp. 105–107.; Smith (1993). Triumph in the Philippines. pp. 428–429.

Mount Macolod

Mount Macolod, about 60 miles (97 km) south of Manila, rises to 3,107 feet (947 m) on the southeastern shore of Taal Lake. The mountain's northern and western slopes rise nearly vertically from the water. On the eastern and southern slopes, the drop is also vertical from about 1,200 feet (370 m); then three ridges descend gradually to the base of the mountain. Two of these ridges lead into the highway that passes through Cuenca and the barrio of Dita. The north–south (Cuenca) ridge became known as Brownie Ridge and the east–west (Dita) ridge was known as Bashore Ridge, named after the 187th infantry company commanders that assaulted them. Brownie Ridge was the strongest Japanese position on the mountain and was honeycombed with tunnels and caves. The third ridge connected Mount Macolod to Bukel Hill, a lesser projection about 500 yards (460 m) east of the mountain. In the saddle between Mount Macolod and Bukel Hill, on the northeastern side of the mountain, the Japanese had constructed another defensive position. Beneath the camouflage and foliage, the area bristled with artillery and automatic weapons carefully aimed and emplaced to cover all approaches with interlocking fields of fire.

By 22 March 1945, the 187th RCT had completed its move from Tanauan to Cuenca and had occupied the positions of the departing 158th RCT. For its assault on Mount Macolod, General Swing assigned the 756th and 760th FABs (155mm), the 472nd GFAB (105mm), the 675th GFAB (sawed-off 105mm), a 4.2-inch mortar company from the 85th Chemical Mortar Battalion, a platoon of Sherman tanks from the 44th Tank Battalion, and B/127th AEB.

On the night of 23 March, a Filipino guerrilla patrol had probed a Japanese position east of Dita and lost six men in a firefight. The next morning, Colonel Pearson sent the armor-reinforced F/187th and G/187th to clear out the area. The tanks leveled the houses in the area and the combat engineers deactivated land mines as the two infantry companies swept the outskirts of Dita. Northwest of the barrio, the Japanese, hidden in concealed caves, stopped the attack with heavy fire. The two companies withdrew after dark with one KIA and seven WIA to a defensive perimeter 200 yards (180 m) south of Dita and the Japanese moved into the village. Colonel Pearson understood that patrolling alone was not going to get the job done. He was opposed by a strong, well-armed, and well-concealed force, and that he needed airstrikes and massive artillery preparation to pound the Japanese before he sent his infantrymen in again. At 09:00 on 24 March, the four artillery battalions supporting the 187th concentrated on the area and Bukel Hill. A squadron of USAAF P-47s bombed and strafed Dita and the surrounding area. F/187th and G/187th again tried to clear the Japanese out of Dita in house-to-house fighting. Intense Japanese defensive machine-gun fire again halted the attack. The 2/187th suffered four KIA and a number of WIA before falling back to their defensive position near Dita; an estimated 30 Japanese were killed. It was apparent that the Japanese were retreating into their underground tunnels during the USAAF bombing and strafing runs. On 27 March, using airstrikes with napalm and chemical mortar and artillery barrages,1/187th circled Dita to positions north of the village, seized and dug in on Bukel Hill.

For his attack on 28 March, Colonel Pearson sent both 1/187th and 2/187th in a frontal assault between the Cuenca and Dita ridges into the Mount Macolod area. G/187th attacked with flamethrowers and burned out three bunkers. Shortly, the company came under heavy machine-gun fire that slowed its advance. E/187th fanned out to the west of G/187th. Both companies fought their way to the top of a hillcrest, even though E/187th was pinned down by heavy machine-gun fire from ravines to the west. Major Loewus, 2/187th's commanding officer, was wounded in the shoulder by a Japanese sniper. Loewus was evacuated and replaced by Major Nat Ewing. Predictably, the Japanese started dropping mortar rounds. In an orderly fighting withdrawal, Ewing saved his command to fight another day. E/187th came off the mountain with 11 WIA but no KIA. Both battalions were forced to withdraw. Their new positions now encircled the landward sides of Mount Macolod. During the period of 29 March to 1 April, 2/187th held position near Dita and 1/187th was dug in on Bukel Hill. The Japanese performed early-morning banzai attacks that were costly for both battalions. On 2 April, 1/187th and 2/187th attacked with all companies in line, and this time were able to clear the Dita area as far as the base of Mount Macolod, although they were unable to gain the ridges.

On 4 April, the 187th's S-2 (Intelligence) and two others were killed in a Japanese ambush along the highway near Talisay, a barrio about 3.5 miles (5.6 km) northeast of Lipa at the western base of Mount Malepunyo. It was obvious to Colonel Pearson that the Japanese held Talisay with a sizeable force. At 07:00 on 5 April, F/187th and G/187th started a cross-country move to Talisay. Simultaneously, Japanese artillery rounds landed in Pearson's CP area near Munting, a barrio midway between Lipa and Talisay. About 1,500 yards (1,400 m) from the barrio, F/187th and G/187th were hit by the same Japanese guns that hit the 187th CP. They did not have a chance to dig in but took cover in nearby ravines. The 674th GFAB was also caught on the move by the Japanese artillery fire. They moved into positions along the highway to open counter-battery fire. While the Japanese guns were pounding 2/187th, an aerial artillery observer spotted a muzzle flash in dense growth and directed the 674th to pour in heavy counter-battery fire on the position; this sharp artillery action silenced the Japanese guns to the east before they could completely decimate 2/187th. When 2/187th reached the area, they found that the Japanese artillery commander, apparently unaware of the need to spread out his guns, had massed all of his artillery pieces in one position. The 674th's counter-battery fire had effectively knocked out the bulk of the Japanese guns.

During the period of 3 April to 17 April, 1/187th probed the ravines and gullies that wrinkled Mount Macolod. On 17 April, they launched an all-out attack to throw the Japanese off the mountain. Preceded by heavy artillery fire, A/187th attacked along the north-south Brownie Ridge with C/187th moving up the north side of Cuenca Ravine and B/187th on C/187th's right flank. Major Carnahan's plan was to have all companies converge at the head of the ravine. During the advance up the hill, there was little opposition. When the three companies converged, the Japanese hit them with mortar, machine-gun, and sniper fire from camouflaged positions, killing Captain Paul G. Bashore, B/187th's commanding officer, and two others in the hail of fire; several 1/187th men were wounded. An estimated force of a few more than 100 Japanese concentrated in an area of 500 square yards (420 m²) had stopped 1/187th at every turn, despite the concentrations of four artillery battalions and continuous airstrikes. The operation to date had cost the battalion six officers, seven squad or platoon leaders, and a disquieting number of privates.

Colonel Pearson prepared a task force for an all-out assault on Mount Macolod. He placed M18 Hellcat tank destroyers along the highway west of Dita and moved 155mm artillery howitzers up to the front lines where they could fire directly into cave mouths on the side of the mountain. For three days, a campaign was waged against the Japanese on the mountain. Every second of the day and night, some type of round landed among the Japanese positions – a burst of heavy machine-gun fire, a mortar round, or an artillery round. On 18 April, Pearson launched a coordinated attack with 1/187th and 2/187th abreast in a semicircle around the southern and eastern slopes. 1/187th used Bukel Hill as its point of departure. The advance was slow and rough, especially across the bare face of Brownie Ridge, where the troops had to run and crouch through machine-gun and mortar fire. On the afternoon of 19 April, G/187th moved up the south ridge without opposition. They arrived at the summit of Mount Macolod at about 15:00 and attacked down the western slope. Hand grenades were thrown down the slopes and into the caves. The Japanese ran down the slope as soon as they realized the Americans were above them and many ran out of the caves after a grenade was thrown in. Each cave was blown shut by the engineers. Constant radio contact was maintained to keep the platoons and squads abreast and to keep from allowing the Japanese to criss-cross the American rear. 1/187th also sealed all the caves in its area; C/187th rolled drums of gasoline into the caves near Cuenca Ravine and ignited them with grenades. The resultant fires killed many Japanese, burned off the vegetation, and prevented the Japanese from infiltrating between companies.

By 20 April, the battle for Mount Macolod was over. That day, the 187th lost 13 KIA and 11 WIA.

Source citation: Flanagan (1997). The Rakkasans. pp. 108–116.

After Mount Macolod fell, the last remaining Japanese stronghold in the 11th Airborne Division's AO in southern Luzon was Mount Malepunyo, a hill complex covered with tangled rainforest and bamboo thickets, surrounded by precipitous slopes and interlaced with sharp ridges. The highest peak stood at 3,287 feet (1,002 m) above the plains. There were no roads and only poorly-maintained jungle trails within the 30 square miles (78 km²) area of the mountain, which required the troops to hand-carry small loads, use Filipino bearers for resupply and casualty evacuation, and two-seater artillery light observation aircraft to airdrop emergency supplies.

General Griswold felt that Mount Malepunyo was such a formidable Japanese position that he had originally planned to reduce the mountain with two divisions, the 1st Cavalry and the 11th Airborne. At this time, General Swing had his CP in Lipa. Late on the night of 22 April 1945, Swing received a call from XIV Corps headquarters, informing him that, instead of getting the whole 1st Cavalry Division, he would only have one regiment, the 8th Cavalry, attached for the operation. Swing's assault plan called for the 187th to move to Tiaong to relieve the 188th and block any Japanese withdrawal eastward off Mount Malepunyo. He moved the 188th to Alaminos, north of the mountain, for an attack southward. He held the 8th Cavalry in position at the mouth of the "Grand Canyon," a gorge on the northeastern slope of the mountain. Swing assigned the main effort to the 511th, on the 8th Cavalry's right flank, which was to attack eastward along the Malaraya Hill canyon and then turn northward to join the 188th. Seven artillery battalions, some organic to the division and some attached, were spread out around the base of the mountain. Supplementing the artillery were a company of Hellcat tank destroyers, a company of Sherman tanks, and a 4.2-inch mortar company. The artillerymen of D Battery, 457th PFAB, broke down their pack 75s and lugged them up the side of the mountain to fire at the caves.

The 187th's area of responsibility was a large arc around the northern shore of Taal Lake. Colonel Pearson located his CP and 2/187th at Tanauan. 1/187th, directly under General Swing's control, was at Tiaong, tasked with cutting off the Japanese retreating from Mount Malepunyo.

At dawn on 27 April, General Swing launched his attack. The artillery, located around the base and sides of the mountain, fired some 5,000 mixed-caliber rounds in front of the infantry. USAAF fighter-bombers pounded the Japanese positions. The 511th's paratroopers positioned themselves close to the airstrike impact points because they observed that the Japanese scampered to their caves when they heard the approaching planes and, immediately after the bombing runs, moved out of their caves to man their fighting positions. Being so near, the 511th killed many Japanese as they left their caves and bunkers. On 30 April, after more air and artillery strikes, and after a bloody fight, the 511th was on Mount Malepunyo's high ground. Colonel Lahti directed his battalions to sweep the slopes to flush out the last Japanese remnants. The patrols found large caves interconnected by wire communications and stocked with large ammunition and supply stores. Captured documents confirmed that the mountain fortress was the last stronghold of the Japanese southern Luzon defense force.

Colonel Pearson deployed the 187th's battalions along the likely Japanese escape routes. 1/187th laid ambushes up and down the Malaking Tubig River, east of Mount Malepunyo, for a distance of some 10 miles (16 km), endeavoring to cover every possible crossing; they accounted for about 400 Japanese killed or captured. On 1 May, the Division Recon Platoon reported contact with a Japanese company-sized force in the vicinity of Aya along Tagaytay Ridge. Since the contact was in the 187th's sector, Major Ewing assigned F/187th, reinforced with a mortar section and a light machine-gun section, to clear out the Japanese unit. F/187th moved out at dawn on 2 May and found the Japanese stronghold in short order. F/187th attacked the position from three sides, pouring in a heavy volume of fire. The total kill for F/187th that day was 92 Japanese. One of the squads was led by PFC Joe R. Siedenberg, a veteran of Leyte and Luzon. On 3 May, Siedenberg's squad was pinned down by heavy Japanese automatic-weapons fire. One of his men was wounded in the opening burst and fell, exposed to more Japanese fire. Siedenberg was hit in the chest as he crawled across the open ground to the wounded man, but he crawled on, gathered up the wounded man, and turned back to cover with the rest of his squad. On the way back, he was hit twice more but continued to crawl and carry the wounded man to safety. Back with his squad, Siedenberg died of his wounds. He was later awarded the Distinguished Service Cross for his gallantry. After the war and during the Occupation of Japan, the 11th Airborne Division's first post on Hokkaido was named Camp Siedenberg in his honor.

The German act of military surrender to the Allies was signed on 7 May. The War Department and the Joint Chiefs of Staff (JCS) expected that, despite Germany's unconditional surrender, an invasion of Japan was required for total victory. Thirty divisions from the European Theater of Operations (ETO) were on their way to the Far East. General MacArthur's headquarters staff had the plans ready for Operation Downfall, the Allied invasion of the Japanese Home Islands. The operation had two parts: Operation Olympic and Operation Coronet. Set to begin on 1 November 1945, Operation Olympic was the invasion of Kyushu, the southernmost main Japanese island. On 1 March 1946 would come Operation Coronet, the planned invasion of Honshu, the largest and most populous main Japanese island. Airfields on Kyushu captured in Operation Olympic would allow land-based air support for Operation Coronet. MacArthur had the troops. At the time, there were 1.4 million men in the Philippines; in December, there would be an additional million. The 11th Airborne Division had a part to play in both operations – in Olympic, a floating reserve; in Coronet, they would be the lead division of the XVIII Airborne Corps under Major General Matthew B. Ridgway to jump onto the Boso Peninsula forming the eastern side of Tokyo Bay and establish a beachhead for the amphibious landing of several armored divisions.

By 10 May, the 11th Airborne division had regrouped and established a base camp on the outskirts of Lipa. During May, replacements began to arrive. The 11th Airborne Division shifted to a new Table of Organization and Equipment (TO&E) that added a battalion to each of the 187th and 188th GIRs, made the 188th GIR and the 674th GFAB parachute units, and added the 472nd GFAB to Division Artillery. The 187th GIR became a Para-Glider Infantry Regiment. The division's strength increased from 8,600 to more than 12,000. With the new TO&E, all the men could now become parachute qualified. General Swing established his third jump school at the Lipa airstrip. In about two months, the jump school would turn out over 1,000 newly qualified paratroopers, including most of the 187th glider riders. He also set up a glider school. The Lipa airstrip had been used by the Japanese to launch the parachute assault on the 11th Airborne Division CP at San Pablo, Leyte.

On 29 May, the 187th took over the garrisoning of Manila and came under the direct command of the Sixth Army provost marshal. Among other tasks, the 187th rooted out surviving Japanese soldiers, directed traffic, and guarded port areas. In general, the 187th helped control a city whose police force had not yet been reestablished. When the 187th returned to Lipa, it reorganized under its new TO&E. 1/187th and 2/187th provided officers and non-commissioned officers (NCOs) for the new 3/187th. The plan moved a third of the veterans from each old battalion to the new battalion and filled out the ranks with replacements.

By mid-June, the Japanese had been pushed back into the northwestern corner of Luzon. American forces were pushing northward up the Cagayan River Valley. At the northern end of Luzon was the port of Aparri. General Krueger decided to send an airborne task force to seal off that port. General Swing formed TF Gypsy, under the command of Lieutenant Colonel Burgess, 1/511th's commanding officer, consisting of 1,030 men of the reinforced 1/511th, Battery C, 457th PFAB, a platoon from the 127th AEB, and two platoons from B/187th. For the first time in the history of the Pacific Theater, gliders were used in combat. Six CG-4As and one CG-13 were assembled. The 317th Troop Carrier Group supplied fifty-four C-47s and fourteen C-46s for the paratroopers. TF Gypsy began loading out at 04:30 on 23 June. The first aircraft off the Lipa airstrip was a C-47. The rest of the aircraft followed with the towed gliders bring up the rear. At 09:00, TF Gypsy dropped onto the DZ at Camalaniugan Airfield, a few miles south of Aparri on the western side of the Cagayan River. The paratroopers landed in the proper DZ but casualties were high: two men were killed by parachute malfunction and 70 were injured. High winds and rough terrain on the DZ contributed to a high casualty rate of about seven percent. Once the paratroopers were down, the gliders brought in the artillery and other heavy equipment. Burgess assembled his task force and headed south to meet the US 37th Infantry Division moving north. The two forces linked up on 23 June near the Pared River, 35 miles (56 km) south of the DZ. The airborne operation had proved both useless and unnecessary. For the Sixth Army, the meeting of the 11th Airborne and 37th Infantry Divisions marked the strategic end of the campaign in northern Luzon.[5]^:570–571

During June and July, the 11th Airborne Division was involved in training and reorganization. The 187th had no idea of what was going to happen next. By the beginning of August, there were the usual rumors making the rounds. It was said that the division was supposed to jump ahead of the forces making the amphibious landings in Japan. At other times, they were scheduled to land in China. In August, the war in the Pacific took a dramatic turn. On 6 August, Enola Gay, a B-29 dropped an atomic bomb over Hiroshima. On 9 August, Bockscar dropped a second atomic bomb on Nagasaki. On 9 August, the Soviet Union declared war on Japan. On 10 August, the Japanese government communicated its intention to surrender.

Source citation: Flanagan (1997). The Rakkasans. pp. 116–125.

At 04:30 on 11 August 1945, the 11th Airborne Division duty officer woke General Swing with a top-secret message that alerted the division to be prepared to move all combat elements and equipment by air on 48 hours' notice to a staging area in Okinawa for the eventual occupation of Japan. In short, the message meant that General MacArthur, recently appointed Supreme Commander for the Allied Powers (SCAP), had selected the division to lead the Allies in occupying Japan. By 05:30, Major Edward M. Flanagan, Jr., the division G-3 (Operations) for air operations, was on a flight to Far East Air Forces (FEAF) headquarters at Brisbane, Australia. Upon arrival, he was informed by the FEAF operations officer that transport aircraft would start arriving at Lipa in 48 hours. A few minutes later, the situation changed dramatically when Major Flanagan was told to immediately fly back to Lipa because the transports were already in the air and would be arriving in the afternoon.

Back at Lipa, Colonel Pearson received a call from the division G-3, alerting the 187th to be ready to move out by air in 48 hours. Pearson immediately met with his battalion commanders, repeated the warning order, and sent them back to their bivouac areas to direct their company commanders to have their troops standing by in their company areas. Units were sorted as to which men and equipment would fly to Okinawa and which would follow by sea. Men and equipment were inspected to ensure that each man had the proper military and personal gear for the trip. The lead elements of the 11th Airborne Division departed Luzon on 11 August. At 23:00 on 12 August, Pearson was notified that, at 06:30 on 13 August, vehicles would arrive to transport the 187th to Nichols and Nielson Fields in Manila for air movement to Okinawa; once there, Pearson would set up a temporary encampment and await the final peace terms settlement and the details of the division's air movement to spearhead the occupation of Japan. Shortly before 11:00 on 13 August, aircraft from the 54th TCW took off from Nichols Field carrying the 187th's lead elements to Okinawa. They landed at 16:45 that afternoon.

On 15 August, Emperor Hirohito of Japan took the unprecedented step of addressing the nation to inform his people that Japan had accepted the Allied surrender terms.

The bulk of the 11th Airborne Division had closed on Okinawa by 15 August. The 54th TCW rounded up C-46s, C-47s, and B-24s (with troops crammed into the bomb bays) to airlift the division to Naha, Kadena, and Yotan Airfields on Okinawa. The rest of the 187th departed for Okinawa as transport aircraft were made available, and was consolidated by 18 August. A rear echelon stayed at Lipa long enough to bring up the regiment's heavy equipment by ship. For the next two weeks, the division was stuck on Okinawa, waiting for the details of the final Japanese surrender negotiations. The division had expected to remain on Okinawa for a week at the most, and all heavy equipment, including the mess kitchens, were moving up by sea. Consequently, the men lived in pup tents and ate 10-in-1 rations, C-rations, or K-rations cooked on squad cookers. The GIs listened to lectures and orientations on the Japanese people, their customs, and their country. They were warned that no one knew how the Japanese would react to the occupation; for this reason, the division would arrive in Japan loaded out for combat. General Swing still thought that he might be given the mission of airdropping a major portion of his division onto Japan. That mission never materialized, even though paratroopers tried jumping from a B-24 because the C-46 could not make the round trip between Okinawa and Japan; the B-24 was most inappropriate for dropping paratroopers.

The final leg of the trip to Atsugi Airdrome in Japan was run by Major General William O. Ryan, commanding general of the Air Transport Command's Pacific Division. By 28 August, General Ryan's command had crammed the departure airfields on Okinawa with C-54s from all over the world, enough so that C-54s, larger than the C-46s or C-47s, were the only transport aircraft that made the flight from Okinawa to Japan. The airlift plan called for both personnel and cargo aircraft to depart Okinawa at a rate of 15 planes per hour, 11 hours a day. On 28 August, an advance detail from General Ryan's headquarters and the 11th Airborne Division flew to Atsugi Airdrome to set up equipment for the main landings, including radio equipment to set up an air traffic control tower. A typhoon over Okinawa caused a 48-hour delay. At 01:00 on 30 August, the first C-54 in the division's lead echelon took off from Kadena Airfield. Aboard were General Swing and the principal division staff officers. On the second C-54 were General Pierson, the alternate division staff, and a detachment with communications equipment capable of reaching back to Okinawa. Five hours later, General Swing's aircraft touched down at Atsugi Airdrome, followed by a steady stream of C-54s. General Swing was the first man off his plane. The occupation of Japan was underway.

The 11th Airborne Division had been directed to provide an honor guard for General MacArthur's arrival on Japanese soil. MacArthur refused to meet with the Japanese until the moment of final surrender. Each division infantry regiment was to furnish a platoon for the honor guard. Captain Glenn Carter, 1/187th's executive officer, was to be the honor guard commander. The honor guard was attached to Major Thomas Mesereau's 3/188th. Early in the airlift were 3/188th, the attached honor guard, and the division band to be on hand when Macarthur arrived. Colonel Pearson and an initial planeload of the 187th landed early in the flight pattern with the mission of remaining in the Atsugi Airdrome area and guarding the airfield.

Arrival of General Douglas MacArthur (second from right) at Atsugi, 30 August 1945

General Eichelberger and part of his Eighth Army staff landed at around noon. At 14:00, General of the Army Douglas Macarthur, SCAP, arrived in his personal C-54, aptly named Bataan. He paused at the top of the ramp dressed in his signature khakis, with his corncob pipe in his mouth, and his gold-braided uniform hat firmly in place. As he proceeded down the ramp, the 11th Airborne Division band played Ruffles and Flourishes followed by the "General's March," the musical honors appropriate to a five-star Army general. General Eichelberger stepped forward to meet MacArthur, saluted, and they shook hands. MacArthur and his staff then climbed into vehicles to move from Atsugi Airdrome to the Hotel New Grand in Yokohama, the site of MacArthur's headquarters for the next few days, where the motorcade was greeted by Major Mesereau, his 3/188th battalion, and Captain Carter's 11th Airborne Division honor guard.

By the end of the day, 123 C-54s had landed at Atsugi Airdrome, bringing in 4,200 troops of the 11th Airborne Division and other support units. The first serials brought in no large vehicles or heavy equipment because General Swing wanted the maximum number of men, lightly equipped, to land initially, given the unknown situation at and near the Atsugi Airdrome. What equipment came in was essential: two jeeps and one water trailer per regiment and a five-day supply of 10-in-1 rations. The 188th landed first with 1,096 men; then came the 187th with 1,257 men. The 511th landed next with 1,165 men. By evening, the regiments had fanned out to accomplish their assigned missions: Colonel Lahti's 511th moved to Yokohama and posted the Yokohama-Tokyo road for about 8 miles (13 km) beyond Yokohama; Colonel Tipton's 188th fanned out from Atsugi toward Fujisawa; Colonel Pearson's 187th remained at Atsugi Airdrome.

The 187th quickly took over its sector of responsibility. The regiment CP was set up at the Japanese Naval School. Motorized and foot patrols were maintained throughout the area. All Japanese installations containing military arms and equipment were seized. The 187th was given the mission of caring for the Allied prisoners of war (POWs) who began to leave the Japanese POW camps as soon as the Americans began to land and were streaming into Atsugi Airdrome for transportation out of Japan.

The morning of 2 September (3 September in Japan) 1945 was a singular moment in the annals of world history when the formal Japanese surrender occurred aboard the USS Missouri (BB-63), anchored in Tokyo Bay.

On 7 September, the 11th Airborne Division CP closed at Atsugi Airdrome. General Ryan's Air Transport Command had moved the division's 11,708 men, 640 tons of supplies, and more than 600 jeeps and trailers. At 1,600 miles (2,600 km), it was the longest and largest air-transported troop movement ever attempted and completed. The division and the 187th were now ready to begin the final occupation of Japan.

Source citation: Flanagan (1997). The Rakkasans. pp. 126–134.

On 14 September 1945, the Americal Division relieved the 11th Airborne Division of its responsibilities in the Tokyo-Yokohama area. The next day, the 11th Airborne Division began its move by highway and rail to assigned sectors in northern Honshu. For its move, the 187th moved from Atsugi Airdrome to Sendai, where the regiment was housed in a Japanese Army arsenal that would later be named Camp Schimmelpfennig, after the 11th Airborne Division's chief of staff who was killed in action near Manila.

Once the 187th had closed into its new area, its first mission was to make the barracks and other buildings habitable. The Japanese barracks buildings were primitive, the plumbing antiquated. Sewage was deposited in reservoirs and collected in carts by the Japanese for use as fertilizer on their farms and gardens. The barracks heating system was also crude and consisted primarily of potbelly stoves, at a rate of one per barracks. Many barracks burned when the temperatures dropped.

General Swing set up the Myagi Task Force, composed of the 187th and 188th and commanded by General Pierson, the assistant division commander. In addition to carrying out General MacArthur's edicts, the principal mission was to collect and destroy all Japanese arms, ammunition, and armament factories. The 187th spent most of its time improving its accommodations and patrolling its assigned sector.

By early fall, many of the 187th's combat troops had returned stateside for discharge, the dates based on the number of "points" accumulated in combat and overseas service. Replacements, officer and enlisted alike, were arriving by the hundreds to the units scattered over northern Honshu. Many were not parachute qualified. General Swing, for the fourth time, established another jump school at the former Yanome Airfield, about 15 miles (24 km) from Sendai. From March through June 1946, 3,376 men were graduated from the Yanome jump school, about 75 percent of those who started the two-week course. With over 18,066 jumps during that period, the injury rate was less than one percent. By this time, the 187th was almost completely manned with paratroopers, in keeping with Swing's 1943 requirement that 11th Airborne Division soldiers be both parachute and glider qualified. During the summer of 1946, Swing started a glider school at Yamoto Airfield, renamed Carolus Field in honor of Corporal Charles H. Carolus, killed in a glider crash near Manila on 22 July 1945. In October 1945, the division initiated a flying school using the division's liaison pilots and the L-4 and L-5 artillery spotter aircraft. By the end of the six-week course, the student had accumulated 15 hours of dual and 15 hours of solo flying time. By June 1946, 25 officers and 75 enlisted men had completed the course.

In January 1946, Colonel Pearson was replaced by Colonel Wilson as the 187th's new commanding officer.

In the months after the Japanese surrender, the 11th Airborne Division moved its major elements several times. In February 1946, General Eichelberger, still the Eighth Army's commanding general, assigned the area of northern Honshu and all of Hokkaido to the division. Division headquarters moved into a bank building in downtown Sapporo, a city never bombed during the war. The Sapporo Grand Hotel became the bachelor officer quarters and officers club. Headquarters for the 187th and 2/187th were set up in an old Japanese military barracks outside Sapporo; 1/187th moved to the port city of Hakodate; 3/187th went to Asahikawa. In March 1946, 3/187th moved to Bihoro. In the spring of 1946, General Swing built a pentagonal headquarters building at Camp Crawford in the Makomanai area outside Sapporo and surrounded it with platoon-sized barracks for the men of the 187th who had been living in winterized pyramidal tents.

On 24 June 1946, military dependents of the men interested in staying in Japan for a year or more began to arrive in ships that docked in Yokohama. In Sapporo, the 11th Airborne Division headquarters and the 187th troops used, as temporary quarters, Japanese houses that were remodeled according to American standards and filled with furniture built by the Japanese under American guidance. Later, Japanese construction companies built homes on the various military posts.

In June 1947, Colonel Pearson assumed command of the 187th once again.

"Patrol jumps" became routine for the 187th's paratroopers. Ten paratroopers would board a C-47 and drop onto little Japanese towns throughout Hokkaido. There was no such thing as a regular DZ. The paratroopers would fly around, looking for a field, then out the door they would go. Once on the ground, the NCO in charge would set up a mission, such as checking a bridge and generally making a show of strength. Very few Japanese had seen an American before and none of them had ever seen a paratrooper until he jumped in on top of them. The Japanese would dash out to the DZ and the children would help the GIs roll up their parachutes and carry their gear to a local inn. On some occasions, the whole population would come out to the edge of town to meet the paratroopers after they landed.

On 2 February 1948, Major General William M. Miley assumed command of the 11th Airborne Division when General Swing left to take command of I Corps in Kyoto, Japan.

In June 1948, Colonel Pearson was reassigned to the Research and Development Board on Aeronautics, Office of the Secretary of Defense. Lieutenant Colonel Harvey J. Jablonsky, the 11th Airborne Division chief of staff, was promoted to command of the 187th.

For the 11th Airborne Division and the 187th Para-Glider Infantry Regiment, the days of occupation duty in Japan were coming to a close. In January 1949, the 31st Infantry Regiment arrived at Sapporo to take over the 187th's occupation duties. On 19 January, the first echelon of the 187th left Sapporo for Camp Campbell, Kentucky, the new home of the division. The main body of the 187th set sail aboard the USS General M. L. Hersey (AP-148) on 19 February and docked in New Orleans on 17 March. The 187th moved by rail to Camp Campbell and the regimental headquarters opened at 08:00 on 24 March.

Source citation: Flanagan (1997). The Rakkasans. pp. 134–140.

In March 1949, several changes faced Colonel Jablonsky's 187th when it arrived and settled into life at Camp Campbell. The Pentagon had wisely decided after some disastrous glider operations in World War II that the flimsy crash-prone gliders were no longer feasible aircraft for transporting men and equipment onto battlefields. The US Air Force (USAF), the newest element of the US Armed Forces created with the passing of the National Security Act of 1947, had transport aircraft that could parachute heavier loads into combat than had formerly been landed in gliders.

On 25 June 1949, the 187th Para-Glider Infantry Regiment was reorganized and officially redesignated as the 187th Airborne Infantry Regiment (AIR). The reorganization assigned new support units to the 187th, along with some that had formerly been attached. Able Company, 127th Airborne Engineer Battalion (A/127th AEB), the engineer battalion organic to the 11th Airborne Division, became the 187th AIR Engineer Company; the division's antitank company became the 187th AIR Support Company; the 11the Airborne Medical Detachment became the 187th AIR Medical Company.

One of the highlights of the 11th Airborne Division's tour at Camp Campbell was Exercise SWARMER. During the fall of 1949, the division intensified its airborne training in preparation for the exercise, which was designed by USAF Lieutenant General Lauris Norstad to determine the feasibility of the Air Force and Army to establish and operate an airhead, a base secured in enemy-held territory where personnel and supplies could be received and evacuated completely by air, including all resupply by airlanded transport aircraft, under simulated combat conditions. During its occupation period in Japan and because of the wide dispersion of its assets over Honshu and Hokkaido, the division never had the opportunity to conduct a full-scale, division-sized airborne operation. SWARMER would provide the opportunity. The exercise planning staff set up a special headquarters at Camp Mackall, North Carolina, the division's birthplace. There, Air Force and Army planners worked out the details of the largest peacetime airborne operation ever attempted.

In April 1950, Camp Campbell became a permanent military installation and was re-designated Fort Campbell.

In early April 1950, to start the exercise, an aggressor force landed on the North Carolina coast. A second aggressor force, operating out of Florida, attacked northward. It was ironic that the 11th Airborne Division would fight over the same terrain where it had fought the 1943 Knollwood Maneuver, the airborne operation that proved that airborne divisions were practical and feasible. On 18 April, the 187th left Fort Campbell for Donaldson Air Force Base in Greenville, South Carolina, to stage for the large-scale airborne operation. On the morning of 28 April, D-Day, the 187th dropped onto the DZ adjacent to Mackall Army Airfield, the same drop and landing zone used for parachute and glider training in 1943. That afternoon, after the airfield had been secured to allow transport aircraft to land, the 511th was airlifted in from Cambell Air Force Base, the military airport at Fort Campbell. The 82nd Airborne Division from Fort Bragg, North Carolina airdropped two airborne infantry regiments and airlanded a third airborne infantry regiment during SWARMER. In all, 60,000 paratroopers were involved in the operation. Overhead, fighters from the USAF Tactical Air Command provided air cover, and USAF transports, landing at a rate of one every three minutes, brought supplies onto the airfields captured by the paratroopers. The "battle" lasted 10 days.

Colonel Jablonsky, determined to make the 187th the best regiment in the division, had instituted a tough airborne physical-training program. Jablonsky's demand for perfection in physical and tactical training paid off. The Exercise SWARMER umpires awarded the 187th the highest Operational Readiness Test score of any of the five airborne infantry regiments in the exercise. The 187th's high scores and combat readiness were instrumental in the regiment's being selected for battle in Korea two months later.

On 5 June, Colonel Jablonsky was temporarily succeeded by Lieutenant Colonel Wilson, the man who commanded the 187th between Colonel Pearson's command tours in Japan. Wilson was replaced on 21 June when Colonel Frank S. Bowen, who had been a brigadier general during World War II, took command of the 187th. Colonel Bowen could not know that he was about to lead the 187th into one of the most famous and notable chapters in its history. In a very short time, the training at Fort Campbell would be over. The officers and men of the 187th would say good-bye again to families and friends as they went to war once more.

Source citation: Flanagan (1997). The Rakkasans. pp. 140–143.

On 4 July, a team of USAF officers dispatched by General Hoyt S. Vandenberg, the US Air Force Chief of Staff, arrived in Japan to discuss the differences between Lieutenant General George E. Stratemeyer's requests for additional units to bring his FEAF command up to war strength and existing USAF capabilities. One of General Stratemeyer’s requests was for an additional troop carrier wing. Discussions of air transport requirements led to a resolution whereby FEAF would be augmented with a temporary-duty stateside troop carrier group if US Army airborne units were deployed to the Far East.[6]^:69–70 Later that month, General MacArthur requested the 187th AIR as an essential element of the amphibious operation that he was preparing for Inchon. Operating from Japan, the paratroopers would be airdropped shortly after D-day to seize a “key communication center” ahead of the advancing US forces, thus facilitating the breakout from the Inchon beachhead.[7]^:81 With JCS approval, the 314th Troop Carrier Group (TCG) at Sewart Air Force Base (AFB), Tennessee, consisting of the 50th Troop Carrier Squadron (TCS), 61st TCS, and 62nd TCS, flying the Fairchild C-119 Flying Boxcar, the newest USAF troop carrier aircraft, that had trained with the Rakkasans during Exercise SWARMER, received a warning order on 13 July to begin preparations for a stint of temporary duty in Japan.[6]^:69–70 [4]^:196 The 314th TCG was almost doubled in size, with additional aircraft added from the 37th TCS and part of the 36th TCS of the 316th TCG, and personnel from the 314th Troop Carrier Wing (TCW) and 314th Maintenance and Supply Group, also at Sewart AFB.[8]^:107

The difficulty lay in meeting General MacArthur’s specified deadline of 10 September. The Army could not ship the 187th AIR until October and the 314th TCW, which had just received its warning order on 13 July to prepare for the deployment of its four squadrons, could only manage to send a token force of C-119s to Japan.[7]^:81 [4]^:196 On 26 July, four C-119s from Sewart AFB departed for Japan, ahead of the 314th TCG’s deployment. The C-119s made intermediate stops at McClellan AFB, California, Hickam AFB, Hawaii, Johnston Island, Kwajalein Island, and Andersen AFB, Guam, arriving at Tachikawa Air Base, Japan on 2 August.[Note 3] As FEAF continued planning the airborne phase of the Inchon operation, both the Army paratroopers and the USAF troop carrier units were still in the United States; the 187th AIR was still being organized at Fort Campbell, and except for the four C-119s that had arrived on 2 August, the 314th TCG was still at Sewart AFB. The 314th TCG would be available to FEAF any time after 15 August with 64 C-119s, a number sufficient to airlift 2,700 paratroopers. The Army notified the Air Force that the 187th AIR would require a simultaneous airlift for 3,500 paratroopers and their heavy equipment. This would require 140 C-119s or their equivalents. The Air Force had augmented the strength of the 314th TCG to 96 C-119s with the addition of the 316th TCG's C-119s and stated that FEAF would have to meet the remainder of the requirement. Earlier in July, the 374th TCG’s 21st TCS at Tachikawa Air Base had converted from C-54s to C-47s, and these planes could be used by the paratroopers. To get the remainder of the needed airlift, Fifth Air Force drew personnel from the 374th TCW, including pilots from desk jobs and C-46s from all over the FEAF theater of operations, and organized the 47th TCS (Provisional) and 48th TCS (Provisional) at Tachikawa Air Base on 26 August. Fifth Air Force was notified that the 187th AIR liaison officers were “most unhappy over plans to use C-46 aircraft and...do not want to use C-47 aircraft." MacArthur was briefed that the 187th AIR would not reach Japan before 21 September. He announced that he would proceed with the amphibious invasion anyway, but asked that the airborne units proceed to the theater as soon as possible and be prepared for either an airlanding or parachute assault in Korea.[6]^:154

On 1 August, Colonel Bowen assembled his troops in Theater No. 3 at Fort Campbell and announced that the 187th AIR was alerted for overseas movement. On 27 August, the regiment officially became the 187th Airborne Regimental Combat Team (187th ARCT) when supporting units were added for the deployment to Japan.[2]^:153

The 187th ARCT consisted of:[9]^:41–42

• Regimental Headquarters and Headquarters Company
• Regimental Service Company
• Regimental Medical Company
• Regimental Support Company
• lst Airborne Infantry Battalion (1/187th) – "Able" Company (A/187th), "Baker" Company (B/187th), "Charlie" Company (C/187th), "Dog" Company (D/187th)
• 2nd Airborne Infantry Battalion (2/187th ) – "Easy" Company (E/187th), "Fox" Company (F/187th), "George" Company (G/187th), "How" Company (H/187th)
• 3rd Airborne Infantry Battalion (3/187th) – "Item" Company (I/187th), "Jig" Company (J/187th), "King" Company (K/187th), "Love" Company (L/187th)
• 674th Airborne Field Artillery Battalion (105mm) (674th AFAB)
• Battery "A," 88th Airborne Antiaircraft Artillery Battalion (90mm) (88th AAAB)
• "Able" Company, 127th Airborne Engineer Battalion (A/127th AEB)

The following units were assigned to the 187th ARCT by General Order 34 (Confidential) from Headquarters, 11th Airborne Division:

• 187th Airborne Infantry Regiment
• 674th Airborne Field Artillery Battalion
• Battery "A," 88th Airborne Antiaircraft Artillery Battalion
• "Able" Company, 127th Airborne Engineer Battalion

The following units were added on 23 August by General Order 41 from Headquarters, 11th Airborne Division, dated 22 August 1950:

• Detachment, 11th Airborne Military Police Company
• Detachment, 11th Airborne Quartermaster Company
• Parachute Maintenance Company
• Pathfinders from the 11th Airborne Division

The following units were attached on 26 August by General Order 42 from Headquarters, 11th Airborne Division, dated 25 August 1950:

• Platoon, Ambulance Company, 11th Airborne Medical Battalion
• Platoon, Clearing Company, 11th Airborne Medical Battalion

On 28 August, IX Corps OPORD Number 1 attached the 2348th Quartermaster Air Packaging and Resupply Company to Colonel Bowen's command.

Attached units

• 2nd and 4th Ranger Infantry Companies (Airborne) (3 March 1951 – 4 April 1951)
• Tactical Liaison Office Team, 8177th Army Unit (Tactical Intelligence)

From the date of its organization as a regimental combat team until it departed for Camp Stoneman, California on 1 September, the 187th AIR received personnel from the 511th PIR,[10] the 82nd Airborne Division at Fort Bragg, and the Airborne Training Battalion, Infantry School, Fort Benning, Georgia, to bring it up to full strength for overseas deployment. On 31 August, the day before leaving Fort Campbell, the 187th ARCT's aggregate strength was 222 officers, 11 warrant officers, and 4,177 enlisted men.[9]^:42

The 50th TCS, 61st TCS, and 62nd TCS departed from Sewart AFB on 27 August and arrived at Ashiya Air Base on 4 September. The 314th TCG was re-formed when the 37th TCS departed from Sewart AFB on 4 September and arrived at Ashiya on 11 September.

The 187th ARCT departed from Fort Campbell aboard 14 trains. The first train, carrying Colonel Bowen and his advance party, departed at midnight on 1 September, headed for Fort Lawton, Washington. Upon arrival, they boarded transport aircraft and flew to Japan. The remaining 13 trains transported the main body of troops to Camp Stoneman, where they boarded the USS General Stuart Heintzelman (AP-159) and the USS General A. E. Anderson (AP-111) for the voyage to Sasebo, Japan, departing on 6–7 September. When the advance party arrived in Tokyo, Bowen and his staff reported to Far East Command (FEC) General Headquarters (GHQ) where they learned that the 187th ARCT was scheduled for immediate deployment to Korea to guard X Corps’ northern flank as soon as the remainder of the 187th ARCT arrived.[9]^:42 The remainder of the advance party flew on to Ashiya Air Base and then moved by ground transport to Camp Hakata, set up a temporary CP, and arranged for quarters for the 187th ARCT at Camp Wood. Camp Wood was 60 miles (97 km) from Camp Hakata, so Bowen requested that the ships carrying the main body dock at Moji, a short distance from Ashiya Air Base, instead of Sasebo. Ashiya Air Base was the home of the 314th TCG's C-119 troop carriers and the departure base for the 187th ARCT's move to Korea. The 187th ARCT reconstituted in Japan on 20 September. The main body had moved by truck from Moji to Ashiya Air Base and then almost immediately by air to Korea.[2]^:154

Paratroopers from the 187th Airborne Regimental Combat Team prepare to board a C-119 for a flight from Japan to Korea.

Lieutenant Colonel Delbert E. Munson's 3/187th was the first to arrive in Korea, arriving at Kimpo Airfield on 22 September, a week after General MacArthur's amphibious landing at Inchon. Lieutenant Colonel Munson took command of Kimpo Airfield from the Marines. Lieutenant Colonel Arthur H. Wilson's 1/187th landed next, followed by Lieutenant Colonel William J. Boyle's 2/187th. By 26 September, the entire 187th ARCT was at Kimpo Airfield (less a small detachment at Ashiya Air Base, and the Parachute Maintenance Company and regimental personnel section at Camp Kashii).[2]^:154–155

On 24, 26, and 30 September, C-119s and C-54s made 440 trips moving the 187th ARCT from Japan to Korea.[4]^:196

After the 187th ARCT had landed in Korea, it was given the mission of clearing the Kimpo Peninsula between the Han River and the Yellow Sea. By 2 October, the 187th ARCT was reassembled at Kimpo Airfield.[2]^:155–156

From the time it had arrived in Korea, FEC GHQ had held the 187th ARCT in theater reserve at Kimpo Airfield, under its direct control, waiting to use the 187th ARCT in an airborne operation. On 16 October, while Lieutenant General Walton H. Walker's Eighth US Army in Korea (EUSAK) and the Republic of Korea Army (ROKA) were advancing on Pyongyang, General MacArthur issued orders for an airborne operation north of Pyongyang to seize critical road junctions and block the main escape routes in an attempt to cut off the North Korean People's Army (NKPA) before it reached the Yalu River and sanctuary and to capture important Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (DPRK) government officials and senior NKPA officers evacuating Pyongyang ahead of the EUSAK–ROKA spearheads. Planners also hoped that a trainload of US POWs, who it was assumed would be moved northward when the fall of Pyongyang seemed imminent, might be intercepted.[11]^:654 On 17 October, Colonel Bowen called a staff meeting and announced that the 187th ARCT had been alerted for an airborne operation north of Pyongyang on 21 October. Two objectives were possible, Anju on the south bank of the Chongchon River and Sukchon–Sunchon. On 18 October, Bowen was told to report to X Corps headquarters at Inchon with maps and plans to brief the FEC Operations general staff. Bowen returned with the news that due to the rapid EUSAK advance, already on the outskirts of Pyongyang, the objective was Anju, with the mission of intercepting DPRK government officials fleeing Pyongyang. D-day was set for 20 October, one day earlier than had been anticipated.[9]^:56 On 19 October, when it became apparent that EUSAK was making slower progress than anticipated on the previous day, the 187th ARCT's mission objective was changed to Sukchon–Sunchon. Briefings were held for the USAF troop carrier pilots and US Army jumpmasters. Separate briefings were held for DZ EASY (Sunchon) and DZ WILLIAM (Sukchon). It was announced that in the event of bad weather, the jump would be delayed by three-hour increments. If the jump was postponed for two successive periods and the weather was still bad, the operation would be cancelled for the day. Bowen announced that P-hour (Parachute-hour) over the DZs was set for 11:00.[9]^:57–58

The 187th ARCT's mission was divided into six parts:[9]^:21

1. Land by parachute at P-hour on D-day, seize, occupy, and defend the Sukchon–Sunchon area
2. Disrupt the MSR and LOC to prevent enemy withdrawal to the north and passage of reinforcement and supply to the south in sector
3. Capture important North Korean military and civilian officials
4. Facilitate advance of friendly units
5. Perform such POW liberation raids as can be accomplished without jeopardizing primary missions of (1), (2), and (3)
6. When contact is established, report to Commanding General, EUSAK

187th Airborne Regimental Combat Team Airborne Attack on Sukchon and Sunchon, 20 October 1950

The 187th ARCT’s DZs at Sukchon and Sunchon were up the arms of a "V" formed by the main highway and railway routes that converged at Pyongyang. Sukchon and Sunchon commanded the approaches to the Chongchon River, 30 miles (48 km) to the north.The main highway from Pyongyang to the Yalu River and the Manchurian border at Sinuiju formed the lefthand side of the "V." Sukchon was located on this highway in a wide valley surrounded by low hills. The righthand road passed through rougher terrain to Sunchon on the west bank of the Taedong River.[11]^:654

The plan called for Colonel Bowen, his command group, and the Rakkasans' 1/187th and 3/187th to be dropped on to DZ WILLIAM, southeast of Sukchon, about 25 miles (40 km) north of Pyongyang. 1/187th was to clear Sukchon and secure the high ground to the north. 3/187th was to block the highway and rail line south of Sukchon, cutting off the MSR and LOC that led north from Pyongyang. 2/187th would come down on DZ EASY, near Sunchon, about 30 miles (48 km) northeast of Pyongyang and 17 miles (27 km) east of Sukchon. Its mission was to clear Sunchon, block another highway and rail line, and capture the POW train.[9]^:1 The paratroopers would hold their positions until relieved by EUSAK's push northward from Pyongyang. A linkup of EUSAK with the 187th ARCT was expected within two days.[12]^:8 The 27th British Commonwealth Brigade , leading the US 24th Infantry Division northward from Pyongyang, would link up with 1/187th and 3/187th at Sukchon; the US 70th Tank Battalion would advance from Pyongyang to link up with 2/187th at Sunchon.[2]^:157–158

To support the airlift requirements, FEC GHQ tasked Major General William H. Tunner's FEAF Combat Cargo Command with airlifting the 187th ARCT from Kimpo Airfield to the DZs and conducting aerial resupply as required. All equipment necessary for the immediate accomplishment of the mission was to be airdropped with the assault and follow-up echelons. All critical equipment not airdropped into the airhead but essential for sustained operations, would be transported forward in the land echelon, which was attached to EUSAK until the linkup.[9]^:22 On 18 October, General Tunner had canceled all commitments of the 314th TCG and 21st TCS from their routine shuttle and airlift missions to stage at Kimpo Airfield and prepare for the airborne assault.[6]^:208 A total of 80 C-119s (57 for paratrooper airdrop; 23 for heavy equipment airdrop) of the 314th TCG and 40 C-47s (for paratrooper airdrop) of the 21st TCS were planned for D-day; 57 C-119s (21 paratrooper, 36 heavy equipment) for D plus 1, and 15 C-119s (heavy equipment) on D plus 2.[9]^:29 The "Dollar Nineteen" could carry 46 paratroopers in two sticks of 23 each, 20 overhead monorail cargo drop bundles weighing 500 pounds each that could be salvoed in 7–8 seconds,[13] and four door drop bundles, two for each jump door; the smaller C-47 could carry one stick of 18 paratroopers and two drop bundles.[12]^:8 [Note 4] The paratroopers would jump from an altitude of 700 feet (210 m); heavy equipment would be dropped from 1,500 feet (460 m).[12]^:8 The aircraft arrived at Kimpo Airfield from Ashiya Air Base (C-119s) and Brady Air Base (C-47s) in Japan with 20 hours remaining for marshaling and loading.[9]^:29

Scheduled to depart from Kimpo Airfield at 06:00 on 20 October, "Reveille" was held at 02:00 in heavy rain. The paratroopers turned out in the post-midnight darkness, ate breakfast, and were shuttled to the airfield. At 04:00, word was received that the jump would be postponed for three hours. At 07:00, the drop was delayed another three hours. The weather cleared at 11:00. Finally, 73 C-119s (seven had been scratched from the operation) and 40 C-47s, with Colonel Bowen’s aircraft in the lead, took off at noon, gained altitude, and formed into groups of tight three-plane Vs, with three groups together forming a V-of-Vs formation. When all the aircraft had assembled over the Han River estuary, they turned northward along the west coast of Korea in waves of 15 and 30 aircraft spaced about 15 minutes apart. General Tunner, piloting a C-54 and serving as the airborne commander, would personally supervise the drop, which would occur under the watchful eyes of Generals MacArthur and Stratemeyer, flying in Bataan, MacArthur’s new VC-121A Constellation that he had received in September.[12]^:8–9 [9]^:58 [11]^:654–655 [6]^:209

As its contribution to the operation, the Fifth Air Force scheduled softening-up attacks in the DZs, fighter escort for the troop carriers, and forward air control procedures for handling close air support, once the paratroopers were on the ground.[6]^:208

At 13:55, the airborne armada turned east on the base leg approach to DZ WILLIAM. At 13:57, eight minutes out, the side jump doors of the lead formation of seventeen C-119s were opened. Four minutes out, a red lamp by each jump door illuminated and the command "Stand up and hook up!" was given by the jumpmasters at the front of each stick. The paratroopers stood and hooked their main parachute static lines that would deploy their parachutes to an overhead anchor cable. "Check static lines!" Each paratrooper double-checked his static line and made sure it was properly clipped onto the anchor cable. "Check equipment!" Every paratrooper, besides his main parachute and a reserve, carried a pack, a water canteen, rations, ammunition, a .45 caliber pistol, and a .30 caliber M1 rifle or M1 carbine. They checked their own equipment to make sure it was properly secured, and that the equipment for the man in front of him was also secure. There was a pause until the one-minute warning was given. "Stand in the door!" With 10 seconds to go, door bundles were pushed out into the slipstream and held in place as the first paratrooper in each stick took his position at the jump door.[9]^:59

The show began just after 14:00 when the green lamp turned on, the jumpmasters gave the command to "GO!" and the parachutes from the lead C-119 carrying Colonel Bowen, pathfinders, unit guides, riflemen, and part of the 187th ARCT command group blossomed over the rice paddies of DZ WILLIAM. The airdrop put Lieutenant Colonel Wilson's 1/187th, the Regimental Headquarters and Headquarters Company, the 1st Platoon, Able Company, 127th AEB, Medical, Service, and Support Companies, a Pathfinder Team, and a Forward Air Control Party on the ground. The maneuver apparently caught the NKPA by surprise as attested to by the lack of antiaircraft or ground fire. Upon landing, individual paratroopers quickly formed up into small units of squad and platoon size; these elements then headed for the high ground overlooking and controlling the DZ. Seventy-four tons of equipment were airdropped with the 1,470 paratroopers from the first two serials that delivered designated packages of men and equipment to the DZ.[9]^:59

After assembling, A/187th and B/187th moved northwest to take Hill 104 to the north of Sukchon. C/187th captured Hill 97 east of Sukchon. C/187th then reverted to regimental reserve and remained on Hill 97. Meanwhile, Colonel Bowen established his CP at the base of Hill 97, along the dikes of the Choeryong River; the 187th ARCT CP was dug-in by 16:00.[2]^:161 [9]^:60

After the paratrooper drop came that of the heavy equipment organic to an airborne infantry regiment, including jeeps, 3/4-ton weapons carriers, 90mm towed antitank guns, and 105mm artillery howitzers. At 14:15, the fourth C-119 serial dropped seven 105mm artillery howitzers, seven jeeps, and 1,125 rounds of ammunition for Batteries A and C of Lieutenant Colonel Harry F. Lambert's 674th AFAB. Of these, six guns and six jeeps were in usable condition.[11]^:656 The ammunition delivered by the heavy drop was on pallets of 24 rounds per pallet. By 15:00, Battery C had two guns in position on the DZ, ready to fire. At 15:40, Battery A had four guns in position and had completed target registrations. Six missions were fired on D-day by these two batteries, using about 60 rounds of ammunition.[9]^:60–61

Lieutenant Colonel Munson's 3/187th dropped on to DZ WILLIAM in serials 6 and 7. Upon landing, 3/187th headed 2 miles (3.2 km) south of Sukchon where they took up defensive positions on the low hills and established roadblocks across the highway and rail line. By 17:00, 3/187th had secured its objectives and was prepared to resume the attack south along the highway and rail line toward Pyongyang. The battalion was disposed 3,000 yards (2,700 m) south of Sukchon. I/187th was on the left half of the defensive position, K/187th was on the right half, and had established a roadblock on the Sukchon–Pyongyang highway. L/187th was in battalion reserve with the 3/187th CP. During their initial action, five KPA were killed and 42 captured. 3rd Platoon, Able Company, 127th AEB, attached to 3/187th, was further attached to K/187th and placed on the railroad tracks south of Sukchon where it ambushed 80 NKPA, killing six.[2]^:161 [9]^:61 [11]^:656–657

Casualties at DZ WILLIAM included 35 men injured in the jump.[9]^:52 One group landed 1.5 miles (2.4 km) east of the DZ and lost a man killed in his parachute after being attacked by the NKPA.[11]^:656

In the second airdrop at 14:20, Lieutenant Colonel Boyle's 2/187th jumped into DZ EASY, 2 miles (3.2 km) southwest of Sunchon, suffering 20 men injured in the jump.[9]^:52 Battery B, 674th AFAB, the 2nd Platoon, Able Company, 127th AEB, a Support Company 4.2-inch mortar platoon, a 90mm antitank gun section, a Pathfinder Team, and a Forward Air Control Party were also dropped in support.[2]^:161 [9]^:62 Battery B had two 105mm artillery howitzers and two jeeps dropped from the heavy drop serial. One vehicle had a broken drive shaft (later repaired) and the other had a bent wheel. One gun became detached from its parachutes and was a complete loss; the other had its right shield sheared off, but was otherwise operable. The operative gun was in position and ready to fire in 50 minutes from the time it was dropped. Six hundred rounds of 105mm ammunition were recovered from the DZ in useable condition and the battery fired two missions the first day.[9]^:62 D/187th and E/187th established roadblocks to the south and west of Sunchon, while F/187th was ordered to advance to the town. Meanwhile, the combat engineers were unable to prepare a bridge across the Kumchon River for demolition because it was under hostile fire. The engineers were then ordered to accompany F/187th to the outskirts of Sunchon and reconnoiter a railroad bridge. On the way into Sunchon, the engineers received friendly fire from elements of the ROK 6th Infantry Division that had reached Sunchon from the southeast in its push toward the Chongchon River. Once contact was established, the firing ceased.[9]^:60–61 [11]^:657

Except for intermittent shelling observed to the far south, east, and west of Hill 97, the night of 20 October found the187th ARCT on the strategic offensive and the tactical defensive.[9]^:63 Colonel Bowen was restored to his World War II rank of brigadier general on this date but did not learn of his promotion until the next day.[9]^:61 General Bowen retained command of the 187th ARCT and Colonel George H. Gerhart, the 187th executive officer, was promoted to regimental command.[2]^:170

This was the first time that C-119s were used in a combat parachute operation and the first airdrop of personnel during the war. It was also the first time that heavy equipment, such as the 105mm artillery howitzer and 3/4-ton weapons carrier had ever been airdropped in combat.[9]^:77 In all, 2,860 paratroopers jumped into the Sukchon–Suchon area with only a single fatality. Many of the paratroopers landed on or near a high-tension power line that had not been spotted in aerial reconnaissance photographs.[6]^:209 In addition, 300 tons of cargo were parachuted to earth. Most of the heavy equipment survived the airdrop. Statistics on equipment serviceability after the drop were good. The aircraft encountered only light ground fire during the operation; one C–119 suffered minor damage.[6]^:209 [12]^:9 [11]^:655–656

After General MacArthur observed the airborne assault, he flew to the recently captured Pyongyang airfield to hold a press conference. There he commented to several war correspondents that the airborne operation was a brilliant tactical maneuver that seemed to have been a complete surprise to the North Koreans. Estimating that 30,000 NKPA, perhaps half of those remaining in North Korea, had been caught between the 187th ARCT to the north and the US 1st Cavalry and ROK 1st Infantry Divisions at Pyongyang to the south, he predicted that they would soon be destroyed or captured. He termed the airdrop an “expert performance” and said, “This closes the trap on the enemy.”[11]^:658 MacArthur's optimism would not be supported by events. Anxious not to expose the lightly-armed and lightly-equipped paratroopers by projecting them too far forward of the EUSAK advance, FEC GHQ had kept them back too long. The operation came too late to intercept any significant NKPA elements. Most of the NKPA remnants had already succeeded in withdrawing north, and had crossed the Chongchon River, or were in the process of doing so, while Premier Kim Il-sung's government and most important officials had moved to Kanggye in the mountains 20 miles (32 km) southeast of Manpojin on the Yalu River. Through no fault of their own, the paratroopers were less successful on one other score, that of rescuing POWs who were being moved northward from Pyongyang; most of the American POWs had been moved to more remote parts of North Korea and were unable to be rescued.[11]^:658

Only the NKPA 239th Regiment remained, having been ordered to delay the UNC forces as they attempted to follow. With a strength of 2,500 men, the regiment occupied positions on the high ground astride the road and rail lines east of Yongyu, about 7 miles (11 km) south of the Sukchon DZ.

At 07:00 on 21 October, 1/187th and 3/187th assumed the tactical offensive.[9]^:63

1/187th continued its mission to seize the high ground north of Sukchon. A/187th and B/187th captured the line of hills immediately north of Sukchon, encountering only light resistance. The advance was stopped by a strong NKPA rearguard holding the next line of hills northward. At 12:30, an airstrike was conducted on the NKPA-held ridgeline. Lieutenant Colonel Wilson then directed A/187th and B/187th to hold their position and dig in. More than 75 NKPA, armed with small arms and light machine guns were dug in on the ridgeline. To the rear of the ridgeline, NKPA mortar fire harassed the 1/187th front line positions. Further, a high-velocity SU-76 self-propelled gun supported the NKPA. During this time, C/187th remained in regimental reserve; one of its platoons was sent out to establish contact with 2/187th at Sunchon. The platoon followed the road east to Sunchon; contact was established at 18:30 on DZ EASY.[11]^:657 [9]^:63–64

At 10:00, 24 C-119s dropped 1,093 additional paratroopers and 106.8 tons of supplies on the Sukchon DZ. Also at 10:00, 40 C-119s carried 220 tons of vehicles, rations, ammunition, water, and lubricants, as well as 774 paratroopers, to the DZ.[9]^:52 Battery A, 88th AAAB was among the reinforcements. They assembled on the DZ and set up a perimeter for the night. Between 20:00 and midnight, 43 NKPA were killed by the battery at a roadblock on the railroad bridge south of Sukchon, using ground-mounted .50 caliber machine guns.[9]^:66

On the same day as the airborne operation, a task force composed of the 1st Battalion, 8th Cavalry Regiment, 1st Cavalry Division, reinforced with a company of tanks from the 70th Tank Battalion, designated TF Rogers for the 70th Tank Battalion's commander, Lieutenant Colonel William M. Rogers, started from Pyongyang under orders to link up with 2/187th at Sunchon. TF Rogers arrived at Sunchon at 09:00 on 21 October, having picked up five American POWs on the way who had recently escaped from their North Korean captors. General Gay and his assistant division commander, Brigadier General Frank A. Allen, Jr., had observed TF Rodgers successfully establish contact with 2/187th from overhead in a Stinson L-5 Sentinel liaison aircraft. Upon returning to Pyongyang, General Allen climbed into his jeep and, accompanied by his aide, his driver, and two war correspondents, started back for Sunchon, arriving there about noon.[11]^:661 Allen was in 2/187th's CP only a short time when a North Korean civilian was brought in to relate an account of North Koreans murdering 200 Americans the previous night in a railroad tunnel northwest of the town. Allen made the determination to run down the veracity of this story at once. His group set out with the North Korean civilian in tow and, on the way, stopped at the ROK 6th Infantry Division's CP in Sunchon and picked up a ROKA colonel, an interpreter, and a driver in a second jeep.

The party drove to a railroad tunnel just beyond the village of Myongucham, five miles northwest of Sunchon, arriving there at 15:00. The railroad track ran along a hillside cut and entered the tunnel some distance above the level of the dirt road that the jeeps had followed. While the rest waited in the jeeps on the road, the ROKA officer climbed the hillside and entered the tunnel. He returned shortly and said that he had found seven dead Americans inside. Allen and the others then climbed up to the tunnel where they found the emaciated bodies on straw mats beside the railroad track. These men had either starved to death or died from disease; some had old battle wounds.[11]^:661–662 Meanwhile, the ROKA colonel had walked on through the tunnel. He reappeared at the end and called out that he could see more American bodies. Everyone hurried outside and started down the railroad track. A little distance beyond the tunnel, a thin, wounded American soldier staggered from the brush. He was 19-year-old PFC Valdor W. John who had been held as a POW since he was captured on 20 July after the fall of Taejon in South Korea.[14] General Allen placed his coat around the shivering boy who broke into tears and protested that he was too dirty to wear it. He then stammered out, "They're over there," and pointed into the brush. Seventeen slain Americans, all shot, lay in a gulley. Allen started climbing the ridge to the Americans who could be seen on top. Don Whitehead, an Associated Press war correspondent, accidentally stumbled upon a semicircle of 15 more dead Americans. They had been shot as they sat on the ground with rice bowls in hand. Whitehead turned back to report his discovery to Allen; on his way back, three more American survivors came out from among some bushes. Allen brought six more Americans with him who had escaped down off the ridge.[11]^:662–663 These survivors told the story of what had happened. Two trains, each carrying about 150 American POWs, had left Pyongyang on the night of 17 October, making frequent stops to repair the railroad track, and crawling north at a snail's pace. Each day, five or six Americans died of dysentery, starvation, or exposure, and their bodies were removed from the train. A few prisoners escaped as the train traveled north. On the afternoon of 20 October, while the 187th ARCT's parachute jump was in progress, the second of the two trains stayed in the railroad tunnel to escape the Fifth Air Force air activity in the vicinity. The group of prisoners on this train, crowded into open coal gondolas and boxcars, was the remnant of 370 whom the NKPA had marched north from Seoul more than a month earlier. That evening, the prisoners had been taken from the train in three groups to receive their evening meal.[11]^:663 PFC John detailed being taken to a field with a small group of prisoners. He portrayed the group being shot and bayoneted, but he successfully feigned death, listening to other groups of prisoners being executed, and crawling into the woods with another survivor.[14] The train and the North Korean guards left that night.[11]^:663

From this story, it appeared that there was another group of murdered prisoners yet to be found. A search revealed a fresh gravesite, and upon removal of a thin covering of earth, 34 more bodies were discovered. Altogether, there were 66 dead Americans (exclusive of the seven found in the tunnel) and 23 survivors, some of the latter critically wounded. Two of these died overnight, leaving 21 who survived. Later, a ROKA detachment convoyed the rescued survivors and the bodies of the dead Americans to Pyongyang. The next day, these casualties were flown to Ashiya Air Base in Japan aboard Combat Cargo Command C-54s that were now landing at the newly captured Pyongyang airfields.[11]^:663 [6]^:211

Ironically, if the weather had not delayed the 187th ARCT's jump, all might have been saved.

The most important action growing out of the 187th ARCT airdrop occurred in the 3/187th sector, about 8 miles (13 km) south of Sukchon in the vicinity of Op'a-ri and Yongyu. At 02:30, the K/187th roadblock on the Sukchon–Pyongyang highway was attacked by an estimated company-sized NKPA 239th Regiment force that attempted to break through and open up an escape route to the north. The attack was repulsed with the NKPA sustaining five killed and 17 captured.[9]^:64 At 09:00, Lieutenant Colonel Munson started two combat teams from the roadblock position in a reconnaissance-in-force to clear the Sukchon–Yongyu road towards Pyongyang and establish contact with the 27th British Commonwealth Brigade that was leading the 24th Infantry Division northward from Pyongyang.[2]^:163 I/187th was assigned the mission of clearing the rail line and K/187th was given the mission of clearing the highway.

Following the railroad track without opposition, I/187th reached Op'a-ri at 13:00, where it was ambushed by an NKPA 239th Regiment force of estimated battalion strength, equipped with heavy mortars and automatic antiaircraft guns. After a two-and-a-half-hour firefight, I/187th, with two rifle platoons overrun by the KPA and 90 men MIA, was forced to withdraw west of the rail line to Hill 281. Failing to exploit their advantage, the NKPA 239th Regiment withdrew to its defensive positions on the high ground around Op'a-ri.[11]^:658 [9]^:64–65 [2]^:163 PFC Richard G. Wilson, 187th Medical Company, was attached to I/187th as a Medical Aidman. During the shootout, Wilson moved among the wounded men and administered aid to them, oblivious to the danger to himself, and constantly exposing himself to hostile fire. As the company withdrew, Wilson assisted the wounded men to safety and made sure that none were left behind. After the company had pulled back, Wilson learned that one of the men, previously presumed to be dead, had been seen moving and attempting to crawl to safety. Although his comrades protested it, Wilson returned, unarmed, to search for the wounded man who had been left behind. Two days later, a 3/187th patrol moved back into the area to search for survivors. They found several wounded paratroopers and PFC Wilson lying beside the man he had returned to aid. He had been shot several times while trying to shield and administer aid to the wounded man. For his supreme self sacrifice, he was posthumously awarded the Medal of Honor.[9]^:54 That same day, 15 NKPA were captured wearing the pile jackets and jump boots taken from I/187th's dead; one of them was wearing Wilson's clothing.[2]^:166

Meanwhile, K/187th, receiving NKPA harassing fire during its advance along the highway, proceeded to a point about 1 mile (1.6 km) north of Yongyu, where it encountered an NKPA 239th Regiment force of about three companies. After a heavy firefight, the Americans forced the NKPA to withdraw. K/187th continued into Yongyu, taking up positions in the town and on Hill 163 to the north of the town.[2]^:163 [11]^:658–659 [9]^:65

I/187th and K/187th now occupied defensive positions roughly opposite each other—at Op'a-ri (Hill 281) overlooking the rail line and at Yongyu (Hill 163) overlooking the highway—yet these positions were now almost 3 miles (4.8 km) apart and unable to mutually support each other. The gap separating the rail line at Op'a-ri and highway at Yongyu was greater at that point than anywhere else between Sukchon and Pyongyang. Extending on a southwest–northeast axis, and cutting across both the highway and rail line at Yongyu and Op'a-ri, is a line of high hills offering the best defensible ground between Pyongyang and the Chongchon River. Here, the NKPA 239th Regiment had taken up defensive positions, deploying a battalion in each locality. The last organized NKPA unit to leave Pyongyang, its mission was to fight a delaying action against the expected United Nations Command advance from Pyongyang. Now, as a result of the unexpected US airborne operation, it was encircled and found itself attacked from two separate points in its rear.[11]^:659 The NKPA 239th Regiment, by this time convinced that both routes to the north had been blocked by the US airborne forces, would attempt one last push to regain contact with the other NKPA forces that had infiltrated northward.[9]^:65

Following the capture of Pyongyang, EUSAK's I Corps had been ordered to continue northward to a line roughly 35 miles (56 km) south of the Yalu River. The US 24th Infantry Division was selected to lead this attack. Now the vanguard of the 24th Infantry Division, the 27th British Commonwealth Brigade had crossed the Taedong River at Pyongyang at noon with the 1st Battalion, Argyll and Sutherland Highland Regiment (1 ASHR) taking the point, moving north on the main highway to Sukchon, tasked with linking up with the 187th ARCT at Sukchon before advancing to the Chongchon River. Approaching Yongyu, Brigadier Basil A.Coad decided to halt his brigade for the night.[11]^:659–660 The Argylls sent a patrol into Yongyu, establishing initial contact with K/187th at 18:45. Contact with the British brigade was expected since General Bowen had notified Lieutenant Colonel Munson at 3/187th's CP that elements of the brigade were on the other side of Yongyu.[9]^:65

At 00:15 on 22 October, the NKPA 239th Regiment attempted a breakout to the north, launching multiple attacks against K/187th at Yongyu. During the first attack, K/187th's positions in the town and at its roadblock on the northern outskirts of town were assaulted by a large NKPA force estimated at two battalions. During the attack, a small NKPA force infiltrated K/187th's CP, where an NKPA soldier began spraying the area with automatic-weapons fire, wounding the company commander and First Lieutenant Claude K. Josey. The NKPA soldier then swung his weapon around to fire on other members in the CP group, but Josey, though seriously wounded, placed his body directly in the line of fire, shielding his comrades. He was again wounded as he leaped at the NKPA soldier, wrestling the weapon from him, and was attempting to fire it when he collapsed due to the seriousness of his wounds. The extraordinary display of heroism earned Josey the Distinguished Service Cross for his actions. As the fighting continued, K/187th's executive officer was also wounded. The Americans eventually drove off the NKPA, many of whom were killed.[11]^:659 [9]^:67

After reorganizing at the base of Hill 163, the NKPA 239th Regiment attacked the roadblock again at 01:15; this attack was repulsed. At 02:30, the NKPA suffered severe losses during a third attack. After the third attack, the officer in charge of the roadblock notified the battalion CP that his men had depleted their ammunition. They were ordered to abandon the roadblock and withdraw to the north.[9]^:67 Detecting the withdrawal, the NKPA 239th Regiment attacked again at 04:00, leaving a small blocking force to hold K/187th in place in Yongyu, and concentrated the majority of its forces on the road to Sukchon. A short time after the main body of the NKPA regiment passed through, the remaining elements withdrew from Yongyu and moved north to join the main body. The NKPA 239th Regiment moved north along the road, arriving at a point 1,000 yards (910 m) south of 3/187th's CP at around 05:00. The NKPA stopped to reform, not realizing that 3/187th's Headquarters and Headquarters Company (HHC) and L/187th were dug in along the road.[11]^:659 [9]^:67–68

At 05:45, the NKPA 239th Regiment started moving north again and ran blindly into 3/187th's HHC and the perimeter elements of L/187th. They were immediately engaged with heavy losses, not only by direct fire from the HHC but also by enfilading fire from L/187th. Stunned by the volume and severity of the fire, it took the NKPA 239th Regiment about an hour to reorganize and deliver an attack. A group of about 300-350 KPA engaged L/187th and attempted to flank and envelop its positions. Another group of about 450 NKPA engaged the HHC. The NKPA fire became exceedingly accurate as the firefight progressed. At this point, the 3/187th CP radioed the 187th ARCT CP at Sukchon describing the situation and requesting reinforcement. The 187th ARCT's request for armored reinforcement was received by the headquarters of the 24th Infantry Division in Pyongyang. Yet, with the US division still well to the rear, the Sherman tanks of the US 89th Tank Battalion encamped with the 27th British Commonwealth Brigade on the Pyongyang-Sukchon road just south of Yongyu was the closest formation, and they were ordered forward to assist 3/187th.[9]^:68

See also: Kirkland, Frederick; Pears, Maurice B. (1996). "Battle of the Apple Orchard". Korea Remembered. Wancliff Pty Ltd. ISBN 0-958-65891-9.

Overnight, Brigadier Coad had directed Lieutenant Colonel Charles H. Green's 3rd Battalion, Royal Australian Regiment (3 RAR) to take the lead when the brigade moved out the following morning. Captain Archer P. Denness' Charlie Company was selected to lead the Australian advance. Charlie Company, with elements mounted on the tanks of D Company, US 89th Tank Battalion, and the rest of the company following in motorized transport, was to pass through Yongyu as rapidly as possible and effect a relief of 3/187th to the north. At first light, 1 ASHR advanced into Yongyu to clear the town of any remaining NKPA. At 07:00, 3 RAR, with Charlie Company on point, passed through 1 ASHR and moved through Yongyu, headed north on the Yongyu–Sukchon road.[11]^:660

At 09:00, the Australian column was stopped by hostile fire from a hillside apple orchard about 1 mile (1.6 km) north of Yongyu. Lieutenant Colonel Green, traveling with the 3 RAR headquarters group, proceeded forward to Captain Denness' location. Charlie Company had driven into the rearguard of the NKPA 239th Regiment as it was forming up for a final assault on 3/187th. Denness did not have a lot of information; there had been no contact with the Americans who were believed to be located nearby and the NKPA-held apple orchard lay between the advancing Australians and 3/187th, blocking any relief attempt. Brigadier Coad's order citing the urgent need to link up with the Americans dictated Green's decision. He chose to push Charlie Company through to continue the advance. Preparing for the assault, Green informed brigade headquarters of his plan and was advised that 3/187th was believed to be about 1,600 yards (1,500 m) further north; however, as the exact location of the Americans was unclear, the US tanks were under orders not to fire for fear of hitting their own men, and the indirect fire available to support the attack would be limited.[11]^:660

At 09:30, Captain Denness dismounted 7 Platoon and 8 Platoon and aggressively counterattacked off the line of march into the apple orchard as the tanks opened up with their main guns and coaxial machine guns. The Australians pushed uphill through the apple trees and routed the NKPA defenders. The speed and ferocity of Charlie Company's attack caught the NKPA 239th Regiment by surprise, with all its attention directed north in a final effort to break out past 3/187th. As the NKPA broke, Lieutenant Colonel Green added Able and Baker Companies, 3 RAR, to the fight. Thereafter, the NKPA 239th Regiment was no longer capable of organized resistance to the Australian thrust from the south. Nonetheless, there were still enough determined NKPA who opposed the Australians, so much so that Green was forced to commit Dog Company, 3 RAR, to clear the area to the west of the road. After committing all his rifle companies, Green's tactical headquarters group was forced to fight off an NKPA attack on their own, killing 34 with the loss of three of their own wounded.[11]^:660.

As soon as 7 and 8 Platoon's success was assured, Captain Denness advanced 9 Platoon northward along the Yongyu-Sukchon road. The road led out of the heavily-treed orchard area and into an expansive open area of paddy fields that was the disputed area between the NKPA 239th Regiment and 3/187th. The Australians pressed the attack but were unable to effectively suppress the NKPA's long-range fire. At this point, Captain Denness sent the US tanks forward. The appearance of the tanks tilted the balance in favor of the Australians. Unable to move north and caught on the road between the advancing Australians and the American paratroopers, the NKPA 239th Regiment attempted to escape westward across the paddy fields, through the gap between 3 RAR and 3/187th. The NKPA again suffered heavy casualties, with many cut down by tank and rifle fire. Others fled east, escaping to the high ground where they dispersed into the hills.

At 10:30, the leading elements of the 27th British Commonwealth Brigade, consisting of 9 Platoon, Charlie Company, 3 RAR, and a company of US Sherman tanks were sighted by 3/187th. Within a half-hour, Captain Denness was able to advance and relieve the 3/187th CP. 3 RAR then continued its pursuit of the disorganized and retreating NKPA 239th Regiment.[9]^:68

The Battle of Yongyu, or the Battle of the Apple Orchard as it became known to the Australians who fought in it, was over by midday for the most part. It was brought to a conclusion as 9 Platoon was directed to clear the paddy fields west of the road. Many of the NKPA that had been unable to escape westward continued to refuse to surrender, hiding in rice stooks and fighting it out or feigning death until individually flushed out and captured or killed. The platoon deployed in an extended line and, in a scene that Brigadier Coad later likened to driving snipe, the Australians proceeded to sweep the area, kicking over the stacks of straw.[11]^:660

With the link up with 3/187th complete, redeployment for the continuation of the 27th British Commonwealth Brigade's advance commenced. Within the brigade, the 1st Battalion, Middlesex Regiment (1 MR) took the lead. 3/187th returned to Sukchon with 1 MR following. There the British relieved the 187th ARCT in its positions by nightfall, occupying a defensive position 1 mile (1.6 km) north.[11]^:660–661

The land echelon's convoy departed at 09:00 on 22 October from Kimpo Airfield and established initial contact with the 187th ARCT at 23:00. The 142 miles (229 km) convoy distance required 14 hours for the lead elements to establish contact with the airborne forces; the convoy averaged 10 miles per hour, indicating the lack of suitable road networks to affect rapid resupply exploitation by ground maneuver.[9]^:38

While the Yongyu fighting was in progress, 2/187th remained out of contact and relatively inactive in its DZ at Sunchon. The ROK 6th Infantry Division performed most of the work in clearing the town and its vicinity of NKPA stragglers.[11]^:661

The morning of 23 October saw the 187th ARCT remaining in defensive positions and preparing to move to the vicinity of Pyongyang. 1/187th remained in its same location without coming into further contact with the NKPA. 2/187th moved at 07:00, marching from its bivouac area at Sunchon to Sukchon. Approximately 6 miles (9.7 km) from Sukchon, 2/187th was alerted for motor transport to Pyongyang. At 17:00, the truck convoy departed; 2/187th arrived in the new area at midnight. On 24 October, the 187th ARCT's headquarters was still located at Hill 97 overlooking DZ WILLIAM. At 07:30, the regimental CP was alerted to move to Pyongyang. 1/187th departed in trucks from Sukchon to Pyongyang via Sunchon. This left the main highway free for the movement of the 27th British Commonwealth Brigade and the 24th Infantry Division. After departing from the old area at 15:00, 3/187th arrived in the new bivouac area at 21:00. The 674th AFAB departed Sukchon at 11:00 and arrived in Pyongyang at approximately 16:00. Shortly afterward, the 187th ARCT went back into theater reserve.[9]^:70 [11]^:661 In three days of operations, the 187th ARCT had seized the key communication centers of Sukchon and Sunchon, cut the main highways and rail lines to Sinanju, Anju, and Kunu-ri, and trapped the NKPA 239th Regiment defending Pyongyang. The 187th ARCT engaged approximately 6,000 NKPA, killed an estimated 2,764, captured some 3,000 prisoners, and liberated 15 POWs.[9]^:71

Airdrop over Sunchon, 20 October 1950

In total, during the 187th ARCT operations at Sukchon and Sunchon, 3,344 men and more than 600 tons of equipment and supplies were airdropped on 20 October and the days that followed, including 15 (12 recovered/serviceable) 105mm artillery howitzers, 18 (15 recovered/serviceable) jeeps, 4 (2 recovered/serviceable) 90mm antitank guns, 4 (3 recovered/serviceable) 3/4-ton trucks, 30 1/4-ton trailers, as well as 147 tons (141 tons recovered/serviceable) of ammunition, 28 55-gallon barrels of fuel, 26 55-gallon barrels of water, 77 tons (70 tons recovered/serviceable) of rations, and other supplies.[9]^:31 This operation was the first combat airdrop of troops since World War II, with resupply solely dependent upon airdrop.[9]^:21–22 The doctrine for airdrop of troops, and particularly supplies, had been neither significantly developed nor improved after World War II. This particular operation became the basis for lessons learned to conduct future parachute operations involving both troops and logistical support.[9]^:22

Much of the success of this operation can be attributed to a long-standing relationship between the 314th TCG and the 187th ARCT. The 314th TCG had been stationed at Sewart Air Force Base, Tennessee, 50 miles from Fort Campbell, and had regularly supported and trained with the 11th Airborne Division.[9]^:77

The command of 2/187th passed from Lieutenant Colonel Boyle to Lieutenant Colonel John P. Connor. Lieutenant Colonels Wilson and Munson retained command of 1/187th and 3/187th, respectively.[2]^:170

Shortly after its operations ar Sukchon and Sunchon, the 187th ARCT took up positions in an area around Sinmak and was assigned the mission of providing security for Pyongyang and guarding the Pyongyang Airfield, Chinnampo, and the MSR.[2]^:170

During 25–26 November, Chinese People’s Volunteer Army (CPVA) forces launched a series of surprise attacks across EUSAK's front in the Chongchon River valley; the CPVA concentrated on the ROKA troops, fully aware that they were the weakest elements. On 28 November, General Walker began a fighting retreat down the Korean peninsula toward Pyongyang. The 187th ARCT, EUSAK's reserve now augmented by the ROK 5th Infantry Division, the British 29th Independent Infantry Brigade, the Philippine 10th Battalion Combat Team, and the Royal Thai Expeditionary Force, moved northward through Pyongyang to the Sukchon area to set up blocking positions to keep the highway through Pyongyang open.[2]^:170–171 General Walker underwent a sudden change of opinion between 28 November, when he felt that EUSAK could hold Pyongyang, and 3 December, when he predicted that EUSAK would be forced to withdraw to Seoul; on 5 December, UNC forces abandoned Pyongyang, which they hade held since 19 October.[6]^:240 General Walker's new order was to withdraw south of the 38th Parallel to the Imjin River, fight a delaying action on the way, destroying highway and railroad bridges and culverts behind the retreat, and destroying all US supplies that had been accumulated in Pyongyang.[2]^:171

The 187th ARCT led the second and last parachute assault in Korea on 23 March 1951 as part of Operation Tomahawk.

Under Brigadier General Thomas J. H. Trapnell, it redeployed to Japan on 26 June 1951 where it became a strategic reserve but returned to Korea on 24 May 1952 to assist in the suppression of the prisoner rebellion at the Geoje POW Camp (aka Koje Pow Camp during the Korean War) where prisoners had forcibly seized and held Brigadier General Francis Dodd, camp commandant, hostage for four days from 7 May 1952 (Koje Island Incident). After this, it once more returned to Japan on 18 October 1952 and made its final return to Korea on 22 June 1953. From late 1952 to 1953 the 187th ARCT was commanded by Brigadier General (later General) William Westmoreland. The unit returned to the United States in July 1955 and, the following year, became part of the newly reactivated 101st Airborne Division, Fort Campbell, KY.

403rd TCW C-119s drop the 187th Airborne Regimental Combat Team over Korea, 1952.

Shoulder patch for the 187th Regimental Combat Team (Airborne)

During the Korean War, three members of the regiment were awarded the Medal of Honor: Lester Hammond, Jr., Rodolfo P. Hernandez and Richard G. Wilson.

The 1950s and early 1960s were a turbulent time for the Rakkasans, they returned to the US in 1955, this time to Fort Bragg, North Carolina.[2]^:255 As part of a larger realignment of the army, under the Pentomic Division concept, the Rakkasans road marched to Fort Campbell in February 1956 to serve as the nucleus of the newly reactivated 101st Airborne Division.[2]^:256–261

• Shield: Azure on a pale nebuly Argent a double handed sword erect Gules.
• Crest: On a wreath Argent and Azure between a Japanese city symbol Gules and a mullet of seven points per fess wavy of the last and of the second, a sea lion Or charged on the shoulder with a heart Purpure and holding in his dexter paw a sword bendwise of the first with hilt and pommel of the fourth the blade notched three times to base of the third.
• Motto: Ne Desit Virtus (Let Valor Not Fail).

The symbolism includes: Slang term : Angels From Hell, For retired insignia.

• Shield:
  • Blue is for the Infantry.
  • The partition line of the pale heraldically representing clouds and the doubled-handed sword, an ancient infantry weapon, symbolizes the character of the organization as an Airborne Infantry unit.
• Crest: The golden seal lion, adapted from the seal of the President of the Philippines, represents the award of the Philippine Presidential Unit Streamer for the campaign on Manarawat, scene of the first combat jump of the 187th.
  • The heart on the lion's shoulder points out the action on Purple Heart Hill.
  • The winged sword with three notches in the blade signifies the unit's score of three combat jumps, one in the Philippines and two in Korea.
  • The red diamond shape is the insignia of the city of Yokohama, Japan, where the 187th landed as the first American combat troops and began four years of occupation duty.
  • The seven-pointed star, divided in the manner of the Korean Taeguk stands for the unit's seven campaigns in that country.

The coat of arms was originally approved on 15 December 1952 for the 187th Airborne Infantry Regiment. It was redesignated for the 187th Infantry Regiment on 7 February 1958.

• Regiment Constituted 12 November 1942 in the Army of the United States as the 187th Glider Infantry Regiment.
• Assigned 25 February 1943 to the 11th Airborne Division and activated at Camp Mackall, North Carolina.
• Allotted 15 November 1948 to the Regular Army.
• Reorganized and redesignated 30 June 1949 as the 187th Airborne Infantry Regiment
• Reorganized as the 187th Airborne Regimental Combat Team on 1 August 1950 and posted to Japan where it served in the Korean War[24]
• Relieved 1 February 1951 from assignment to the 11th Airborne Division.
• Regiment assigned 1 July 1956 to the 101st Airborne Division.
• Company A reorganized and redesignated 1 March 1957 as Headquarters and Headquarters Company, 1st Airborne Battle Group, 187th Infantry, relieved from assignment to the 101st Airborne Division, and assigned to the 11th Airborne Division (organic elements concurrently constituted and activated).[25]
• On 25 April 1957, the following actions took place:

1. Regimental Headquarters relieved from assignment to the 101st Airborne Division; concurrently reorganized and redesignated as the 187th Infantry, a parent regiment under the Combat Arms Regimental System.[26]
2. Company B reorganized and redesignated Headquarters and Headquarters Company, 2d Airborne Battle Group, 187th Infantry, and remained assigned to the 101st Airborne Division (organic elements concurrently constituted and activated)[27]
3. Company C inactivated at Fort Campbell, Kentucky, and relieved from assignment to the 101st Airborne Division; concurrently redesignated as Headquarters and Headquarters Company, 3d Airborne Battle Group, 187th Infantry[28]

• 1st Airborne Battle Group relieved 1 July 1958 from assignment to the 11th Airborne Division and assigned to the 24th Infantry Division.
• 1st Airborne Battle Group relieved 8 February 1959 from assignment to the 24th Infantry Division, and assigned to the 82d Airborne Division.
• HHC 3d Airborne Battle Group redesignated 1 February 1963 as Headquarters and Headquarters Company, 3d Battalion, 187th Infantry, and assigned to the 11th Air Assault Division (organic elements concurrently constituted)
• 3d Battalion activated 7 February 1963 at Fort Benning, Georgia.
• The following actions took place on 1 February 1964:

1. 1st Battalion, 187th Infantry Regiment constituted and activated at Fort Benning, Georgia, as an element of the 11th Air Assault Division.
2. 2d Airborne Battle Group relieved from assignment to the 101st Airborne Division.
3. 3d Battalion relieved from assignment to the 11th Air Assault Division and assigned to the 101st Airborne Division.

• 2d Airborne Battle Group inactivated 3 February 1964 at Fort Campbell, Kentucky.
• 1st Airborne Battle Group inactivated 25 May 1964 at Fort Bragg, North Carolina; concurrently consolidated with the 1st Battalion, 187th Infantry, and consolidated unit designated as the 1st Battalion, 187th Infantry, an element of the 11th Air Assault Division (later redesignated as the 11th Airborne Division)
• On 1 October 1983, the following actions took place:

1. 187th Infantry Regiment Regiment withdrawn from the Combat Arms Regimental System and reorganized under the United States Army Regimental System
2. HHC 1st Battalion relieved from assignment to the 11th Airborne Division, assigned to the 193rd Infantry Brigade, and activated in Panama.
3. HHC 2d Airborne Battle Group redesignated as HHC 2d Battalion, 187th Infantry, assigned to the 193rd Infantry Brigade, and activated in Panama

• 1st Battalion inactivated 1 May 1987 in Panama and relieved from assignment to the 193d Infantry Brigade.
• 2d Battalion inactivated 10 July 1987 in Panama and relieved from assignment to the 193d Infantry Brigade.
• On 16 September 1987, the following actions took place:

1. 1st Battalion activated at Fort Campbell, Kentucky and assigned to 101st Airborne Division.
2. 2d Battalion activated at Fort Campbell, Kentucky and assigned to 101st Airborne Division.

• On 16 September 2004, 1st Battalion and 3d Battalion were relieved from assignment to the 101st Airborne Division and assigned to the 3d Brigade Combat Team, 101st Airborne Division[28][25]
• On 1 October 2005, the following actions took place:

1. 1st Battalion, 187th Infantry redesignated as the 1st Battalion, 187th Infantry Regiment
2. 3d Battalion, 187th Infantry redesignated as the 3d Battalion, 187th Infantry Regiment

• World War II:

1. New Guinea;
2. Leyte;
3. Luzon (with arrowhead)

• Korean War:

1. UN Offensive (with arrowhead);
2. CCF Intervention;
3. First UN Counteroffensive (with arrowhead);
4. CCF Spring Offensive;
5. Korea, Summer-Fall 1952;
6. Korea, Summer 1953

• Vietnam War:

1. Counteroffensive, Phase III;
2. Tet Counteroffensive;
3. Counteroffensive, Phase IV;
4. Counteroffensive, Phase V;
5. Counteroffensive, Phase VI;
6. Tet 69/Counteroffensive;
7. Summer-Fall 1969;
8. Winter-Spring 1970;
9. Sanctuary Counteroffensive;
10. Counteroffensive, Phase VII;
11. Consolidation I;
12. Consolidation II

• Southwest Asia War:

1. Defense of Saudi Arabia;
2. Liberation and Defense of Kuwait

The 187th is one the most highly decorated units in the United States Army. Its unit awards include the following:

• Presidential Unit Citation (Army) for:

1. TAGAYTAY RIDGE
2. SUKCHON
3. TRANG BANG
4. DONG AP BIA MOUNTAIN
5. OIF 1

• Presidential Unit Citation (Navy) for:

1. INCHON

• Valorous Unit Award for:

1. BINH DUONG PROVINCE
2. THUA THIEN PROVINCE
3. OPERATION ANACONDA (OEF 1)
4. GHAZNI, PAKTYA, PAKTIKA, AND KHOWST PROVINCE (OEF 4)
5. PAKTYA, PAKTIKA, AND KHOST PROVINCE (OEF 10/11)

• Meritorious Unit Commendation (Army) for:

1. VIETNAM 1968
2. SOUTHWEST ASIA
3. OIF 1

• Army Superior Unit Award for 1995–1996
• Philippine Presidential Unit Citation for 17 October 1944 to 4 July 1945.
• Republic of Korea Presidential Unit Citation for:

1. KOREA 1950–1952
2. KOREA 1952–1953