SPYING ON THE JAPANESE

Press, 1 July 1978, Page 15

SPYING ON THE JAPANESE

one, y Vigil: Coastwatchers of the Solomons. By Walter Lord. Viking Press. 322 pp. $11.95.

(Reviewed by Michael Pugh)

l , he Allied seizure of Guadacanal tn August. 1942. Japanese hahed S1 ° n m Ihe South Pac if>c was Waher 1°°!! tO be turned back. As ach m» L ° rd P a,nsta kingly shows, this achtevemeni was due in no small war h Ure ,o a handfld "f CoastHnec ’’pefa'mg behind Japanese resrL i f P rr>d uced intelligence, refugees. P ° tS ’ and helped

At times Lord's attention to detail ™’ rs a deeper understanding of the thsv2 C a n r e !h ' even,s - The "what "J t . f° r breakfast” approach is no •h*’ stl ' ute u for penetrating analysis, ’hough here, perhaps, it has ' the ’unction of reflecting the actual contusion which reigned in the oolomon Islands. But one wonders. K » historical consequence that a res cued by submarine . difficulty performing their abmtions on ’ board thanks to the complicated system (we are given a diagram) for operating the heads? To

do the author justice he does pose important questions of his material in the conclusion. He leaves us asking many more. How many of the Coastwatchers were imbued with the same sort of ideological spirit which affected resisters in Europe? Servicemen, administrators and missionaries did their duty. But beachcombers, golddiggers, planters, rascals and traders were anxious for the most part to hold on to their own private patch of South Sea paradise. With one or two exceptions, they expressed little of the moral, humanitarian sentiment of their counterparts in Europe. A couple became tin-pot dictators themselves, disciplining their Solomon Island helpers with a brutality which would have done credit to the Japanese. Not surprisingly, where the Japanese managed to establish a presence for a few months, as in Bougainville, the Solomon islanders drifted into cooperation with the new masters and forced the Coastwatchers out of business.

For while Coastwatchers functioned as long-distance spies, transmitting information by teleradio, friendly

Solomon Islanders did much of the hard work — carrying supplies and messages, infiltrating Japanese camps, ambushing Japanese patrols, paddling canoes vast distances. The colonial relationship did not end just because a war was on. Indeed the author employs the term “native” which no self-respecting historian wmuld use now' becuase of its derogatory connotations. It says a lot about the perspective from which the book is written.

Having said that, Lord should be congratulated for compiling a splendid account of coastwatching achievements. More than a hundred pilots were rescued, and a similar number saved from the torpedoed cruiser “Helena.” Perhaps the most useful contribution was to notify the Americans of impending raids against Henderson Field on Guadacanal. This enabled fighters to intercept the enemy in time. As Admiral Halsey later remarked: “The Coastwatchers saved Guadacanal, and Guadacanal saved the Pacific.” It is a fine subject, accompanied here by superb maps, not to mention the valuable tips on using the lavatory in vintage submarines.