Page:Papuan Campaign; The Buna-Sanananda Operation - Armed Forces in Action (1944).djvu/67

 but it proved to be too short to span the gap. Enemy fire from the west bank on both sides of the bridge still raked the crossing, and the attack failed. Our forces were now facing along the creek from its mouth to the bridge, with the exception of a small tip of jungle at the very end of the nose. The 1st Battalion attacked the bridge again at midnight, B Company going single-file into the creek to the south of the bridge, but the leading platoon found the water too deep for wading and the enemy opposition as stiff as ever. Action was finally called off for the night, and Brigade Headquarters decided to outflank the bridge positions from the north.

On the 21st the Australian 2/10 Battalion, under Col. James G. Dobbs, which had come up by boat on the 19th, was put in the line along the creek north of the bridge. During the day some of its men worked their way across the swampy creek at the big bend due north of the bridge. More got across during the following day, and by the 23d the entire 2/10 Battalion commanded the bridge area from the north. Enemy defenders of the bridge area were now threatened with complete encirclement but put up determined opposition when the 1st Battalion, 126th Infantry, at last succeeded in pushing across the bridge immediately after noon and moved up the southern edge of the Old Strip. The 1st Battalion was now moving parallel with the 2/10 Battalion, which was advancing in skirmisher formation along the northern edge. Later in the afternoon the 1st Battalion, 128th Infantry, crossed the bridge and moved along the jungle south of the Old Strip as a left-flank guard. By nightfall our forward elements had advanced 800 yards from the bridge up the Old Strip, and the 3d Platoon of C Company, 114th Engineers, had completely repaired the bridge. It was now capable of carrying our light tanks. The 2/9 Battalion and the 3d Battalion, 128th Infantry, remained in the area between Simemi Creek and Cape Endaiadere to guard the coast.

The three battalions west of the creek spent the next 5 days in fighting their way up the Old Strip. Until the very end of the campaign our troops always found that the Japanese, when pried out of one position, fell back into another just as strong or even stronger. The entire area of the Old Strip was commanded by a group of enemy 50