Troops of the 37th
Infantry Division carried weapons in Manila until 17 March. Since the
end of the fighting on 3 March, things had been done on a more relaxed
basis. New movies were brought to the units every other night.
Seats for the troops were placed in open air, and the block of seats then
roped off because of the crowds of civilians who also came and watched.
Most of the units began holding dances weekly, attended by Filipinas and
expatriate women. The Division Special Service Band sometimes played
for these events, though the 2d Battalion of 129th Infantry Regiment
had its own orchestra. Troops had fresh food every day, and there were
no epidemics. Unit staffs also caught up on paperwork, replenished
supplies, and began training the hundreds of arriving replacements.
This respite was short-lived, however. 37th Infantry
Division marched out of Manila on 29 March to begin its next campaign. [xlvi]
The Japanese defense of Manila had
failed. Nevertheless, there are some remarkable features of the
Japanese effort. On the one hand, Japanese operations show the
shortcomings of trying to fight without training, doctrine, or equipment,
and without significant joint support. On the other hand, the Japanese
showed how much could be done in defense of a city with nothing to work with
but resolute personnel and the resources of a great metropolis.
Japanese tactics were simple but
effective. Troops fought in small units that tenaciously defended
particular assigned positions. They conducted a static defense with
almost no maneuver or coordinated action between positions. On the
streets north of the Pasig they set up minefields and obstacles covered by
interlocking machine gun fires. The mines were often made of artillery
shells, depth charges, or aerial bombs, and the machine guns were often
dismounted naval aviation machine guns. In strongpoints
south of the Pasig, the Japanese set up positions in sturdy
reinforced-concrete buildings and sometimes put foxholes outside.
Typically they swept the approaches with automatic fires sighted through
windows or loopholes. They put sandbagged machine gun nests throughout
these buildings, sometimes fortified cellars and roofs, and sometimes fired
through holes cut in walls, ceilings and floors. In most cases, they
chose neither to surrender nor retreat, but instead died in place.
U.S. infantry who faced these
positions perceived them as formidable. Nonetheless, it is remarkable
what these positions lacked. They had little artillery, no armor, no
air support, and few suppressive fire weapons for the close fight.
They had almost no field radios allowing communication between units, and
almost no trenches or tunnels connecting units. They had almost no
underground positions except cellars in buildings. There were limited
numbers of Japanese to man these positions: Iwabuchi had only 5,000 troops
in the central Manila force. There was also limited time to prepare:
the Japanese army had decided to leave Manila in December 1944.
The Japanese had few artillery
pieces compared to the Americans, most of them converted naval guns.
They fired isolated rounds randomly or against preregistered junctions
or bridges. Apparently, they had no forward observers with radios to
direct fires, and perhaps also had comparatively limited ammunition.
The Japanese appeared to be short on close-range suppressive fire weapons
also. There is no report of their using flamethrowers or submachine
guns. They had grenades, but sometimes used Molotov cocktails,
suggesting local shortages. Most but not all had rifles. Some of
the rifles were U.S. makes captured in 1942. In place of rifles, some
carried jury-rigged spears made of bayonets on poles. In other words,
the Japanese were woefully lacking in both heavy weapons and light weapons.
All they really had in abundance were machine guns and automatic cannon.
They were fighting the Battle of Manila with naval aviation equipment, not
ground warfare equipment. [xlvii]
The Japanese naval defenders in Manila
had military discipline and dedication. But they had no doctrine, no
training, no armor, no air, little artillery, no communication between
positions, no maneuver, no coordination and no reinforcements.
Nonetheless, they held the Americans at bay for four weeks. They
showed what could be done by defenders who had nothing to work with but
their own resoluteness, urban terrain, and the abundant resources of a great
city. The Battle of Manila shows that urban warfare significantly
favors the defender.
Although the Japanese navy conducted a
remarkable ad hoc defense in Manila, U.S. forces ground their way steadily
through the Japanese positions. American tactics were decisively more
effective. What were the Americans doing that allowed them to advance?
U.S. forces in Manila were practicing modern combined arms warfare against a
static defense. They were trained ground forces with abundant troops,
equipment, and service assets. They were experienced in fighting in
restrictive jungle terrain. To their credit, they used all the assets
available to them, except for some capabilities of airpower.
Corps and division staffs made
sure that regiments and battalions were operationally and tactically
coordinated. Tanks were used to the maximum for direct fires and
suppressive fires from the time they became available to 37th
Infantry Division on 14 February, and by 1st Cavalry Division
throughout. Airpower, however, was never used to bomb or strafe
Japanese positions in the city of Manila, as MacArthur repeatedly denied
requests from subordinate units for air bombardment. This was a major
departure from U.S. combined arms doctrine, justified by MacArthur’s desire
to spare Philippine civilians in the city. Airpower was used in other
ways, however. Cub planes were used continuously for artillery
spotting. The 1st Cavalry Division used airpower, indeed
joint airpower, for close air support and scouting in the division’s sweep
around the outer edge of the city. Marine Air Groups 24 and 32, flying
from an airstrip near Lingayen Gulf, kept nine SBDs over 1st
Cavalry Division’s leading elements, and P-40s from the 5th Air
Force flew reconnaissance missions to 1st Cavalry’s left and
front. Moreover, U.S. airpower closed the skies completely to Japanese
aircraft. [xlviii]
The restrictions on air
bombardment within the city may have mattered little, however, because the
enemy was contained within a confined space easily within artillery range.
U.S. forces had abundant artillery assets and could get effects similar to
those of air bombardment by employing massed artillery. Initially,
artillery fires were also limited by MacArthur to “observed fire on known
targets.” These restrictions were abandoned on 10 February because of
mounting U.S. casualties. This was shortly after the 37th
Infantry Division had crossed the Pasig and encountered developed Japanese
strongpoints. Permission was obtained for “area artillery fire in
front of advancing lines.”
[xlix]
The American method, once area
artillery fires and tanks became available, was to pulverize the building
they faced and then to assault into the remains. They used bazookas
and flamethrowers against machine gun nests. They used abundant light
suppressive fire weapons, grenades, and mortars, as well as small arms.
Sometimes U.S. assaults failed because of withering fire or counterattacks,
in which case troops would pull back and repeat the process. Tanks and
tank destroyers were used in a direct-fire role for the artillery
preparation. Their use beyond that was evidently limited by mines,
rubble and the heavy concrete walls of the buildings themselves. Tanks
could not follow infantry into the cellars and onto the roofs.
Americans in Manila evidently learned to use their assets as they went along
and used them to full advantage. Casualties suffered by the 37th
Infantry Division when artillery restrictions were first lifted from 10-12
February averaged twenty-six KIA per day. By the period 21-23 February
when the division was fighting at City Hall and assaulting Intramuros,
casualties were down to six KIA per day on average. [l]
The Americans at Manila learned fast.
They used artillery and tanks to the fullest to achieve their objectives
with minimal loss of friendly troops’ lives. The falling friendly
casualty rates suggest that American troops between 3 February and 23
February had refined all manner of urban warfare methods, at all operational
levels, that allowed them to advance more efficiently at the end than at the
beginning. American troops had superior assets from the start; by the
end, they knew how to use them. Americans won at Manila because they
applied a full range of combined arms methods against a static defense.
They got better at it as they went along.
The Battle of Manila offers many
lessons and insights that may be applicable to future instances of urban
warfare. Some of these insights are tactical in nature. They
show how to cope with the enemy force. Others are civil in nature.
They show how to cope with the civilian population and with objectives
relating to the civilian population. Many of the tactical lessons of
Manila we have already explored in examining the methods of Japanese and
U.S. forces. Some of these lessons are applicable to combined arms
warfare in general, not exclusively to urban warfare. Some of the
tactical features of Manila, however, are peculiar to cities and likely to
recur in operations in other cities.
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