Word: patroller
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From the sky to the well-tuned ears on Wake came the rumble of engines. But this time Wake's men did not have to worry. For the first time since Dec. 8, a U.S. Navy patrol plane was coming in to see how things were going. The big boat thundered across the island, wheeled, landed in the lagoon. Out crawled her crew...
...time for the patrol boat to leave. The props were ticking over. The boat thundered across the lagoon, took the air, melted into the clouds. Wake's men knew the next face they would see would be the face of the Jap. Two days later when the Jap had landed and the last struggle was going, their commander radioed a last gallant message: "The issue is in doubt." But from the hour when the patrol plane left, every man on the island must have been quite sure that the issue was not in doubt-it was inevitable...
Since that morning's news, VMF-211 had been on patrol, and the Jap struck when eight planes had returned to refuel -destroying seven of them on the ground. He was back again next morning, 27 planes. He bombed the hospital, killed several patients. One enemy plane was shot down. The Jap hit again the following morning with 27 planes. The Marines knew what to look for next. The Jap was softening them up for a landing party...
Letter for a Great Library. Between raids, 38-year-old Major Putnam penciled a report in his notebook, tore it out, sent it along in the patrol boat as his last report. As a Marine of 18 years' service, afloat and ashore, he must have been aware that he was adding another classic to the library of impersonal letters written by leatherneck officers since the first of the Corps sailed with John Paul Jones...
Working with the same cold precision that has marked Commando successes in France and Libya (see p. 25), the raiders took over in 15 minutes flat, destroyed a radio mast and transmitter, shot down a lone plane offering resistance, sank a German patrol boat, took several prisoners including six quislings. The Commandos did not lose a man. Simultaneously another Commando unit made successful raids on Vaagsoy and Maaloy, islands several hundred miles south of Lofoten...