With the Old Breed

Once he is out on the beach, the magnitude of being in war fully dawns on Sledge. He worries about being sick with fear and refuses the whisky the men begin passing around. The soldiers immediately come under heavy fire. Sledge witnesses death close at hand for the first time and also sees men get “million dollar wounds,” ones that will get them sent back home to the States. As Sledge and Company K Division gradually move inland, they encounter many Japanese corpses, which they promptly strip of rifles. The weather is oppressively hot and the men are told to take only small sips of the little tepid water they have at the ready. They endure with the help of salt tablets.

Snafu and Sledge set up their 60mm mortar and participate in heavy fire. The constant shelling rattles the nerves of all of the men who wait out each explosion. The Division is then ordered to Bloody Nose Ridge, where they participate in open fire with the enemy. As Sledge operates his weapon, he repeats The Lord’s Prayer to himself, feeling unsure if he will survive each moment. Snafu is hit but not seriously wounded and the two men dig a foxhole, preparing for the next phase of battle. During a long and terrifying night, in which Sledge expects to be hit with a grenade, he nearly shoots a fellow Marine who forgets to give the password when prowling past their foxhole in the dark.

As the Division moves further up Bloody Nose Ridge, Sledge is aware of his bodily filth, as well as his exhaustion and hunger. Though casualties mount, the troops continue to try and joke, even singing with gallows humor. The surprise of hot chow (pork chops) offers a temporary positive diversion. Reaching an old abandoned Japanese machine gun bunker built of coconut logs and coral rocks, the men prepare for further attack. One Marine suffers from a complete nervous breakdown and when unable to calm him or quiet him down, the other men hit him over the head with a shovel and kill him before his rantings can give away their location. Shortly afterwards, Sledge and his battered Division are relieved by an Army regiment. 

Further horrors befall the troops. Sledge witnesses one Marine mistakenly kill a comrade, a man named Bill, when Bill fails to alert others that he is leaving his foxhole. Another Marine, Sam, falls asleep during his assigned time to be on watch. Sledge also describes a foxhole struggle in which a Marine is forced to kill a Japanese soldier by jamming his forefinger into the enemy’s eye socket. Sledge and company are nearly hit by grenade when they come upon a pillbox encampment full of Japanese soldiers. Sledge and fellow Marines kill the enemy and escape from the scene. Sledge also observes and almost participates in the souvenir hunting that the men do when they come upon Japanese dead. Though he is at first horrified when he sees fellow Marines remove gold teeth from Japanese corpses, he himself almost does this later. Doc Caswell, a Navy corpsman, stops him, telling him, “You don’t want to do that sort of thing. What would your folks think if they knew?” (123).

Sledge’s division is next moved to the only territory still held by the Japanese on the Palauan island of Peleliu: Umurbrogol Pocket. The terrain is difficult and confusing. They are under constant fire and often have to risk being hit in order to carry a wounded man on a stretcher to safety, or to the designated burying ground. The Marines are stunned and horrified to learn that their commanding officer, Haldane, better known as Ack Ack, has been killed. In sorrow, they proceed without him.

As they move further into the pocket of intense fighting, the stench of death is everywhere. The air is heavy and muggy. Establishing a stable rifle position is difficult as it is impossible for the men to dig into the coral. Large land crabs are drawn to the corpses that litter the field of battle. The men suffer from diarrhea and nightly enemy infiltrations keep the men from sleeping. Passing one defilade (a type of concealed position), Sledge and a friend notice two dead Marines who have been mutilated by the Japanese. Both Marines are decapitated, their hands cut off, and their penises severed and stuffed in their mouths.

High command declares the “assault phase” at an end and the battalion is told they will be relieved. The men are given rations, and a chance to change clothes, shave and rest. Sledge talks a friend out of taking a severed Japanese hand home with him as a souvenir. Leaving Peleliu, Sledge reflects that he was as well prepared as he could be for the experience, thanks to expert boot camp and weapon training. He concedes that the Japanese fought as hard as the Americans and were as dedicated to military excellence as the Marines.