Two highways crossed the main portion of the island of Mindanao, both running north-south, one to the west of the mountains, the other to the east.
There was no highway running east-west through the mountains. The terrain was difficult, construction would be practically impossible, and there was no economic justification to build such highways.
The place Fertig picked for the attack on the convoy was almost exactly equidistant between Maylaybalay and Kibawe on the highway that crossed Mindanao to the west of the mountains. The nearest Japanese reinforcements would be twenty-three miles north in Maylaybalay, or twenty-one miles south in Kibawe. In one possible scenario–where one of the trucks would escape the ambush and run for help–it would be anywhere from an hour and a half to two hours before Japanese reinforcements could reach the ambush location.
In another–and much worse–possible scenario, they would not be able to totally overwhelm the Japanese in twenty minutes. In that scenario, the Japanese troops would be equipped with both machine guns and mortars. If they were not able to knock out the mortars and machine guns in the first minute or two of the ambush, overwhelming the Japanese would be difficult and time-consuming.
And overwhelming the Japanese quickly was absolutely necessary. The initial attack would consume a great percentage of available ammunition, including their entire stock of fourteen fragmentation hand grenades. Fertig’s only possible source of resupply was from the bodies of vanquished Japanese.
There would be no question of breaking off the attack and making for the mountains. And the longer it took to overwhelm the Japanese, the more time they would have to defend themselves, which meant the more ammunition they would expend, and the less there would be for the guerrillas to capture.
There were other problems, of course. For one thing, statistically–and this was not a reflection on the Filipinos’ loyalty generally–he had to assume that several of his troops were in Japanese service. A father, or a wife, or a child was in Japanese “protection,” with the understanding that as soon as proof came of the “loyalty” of the guerrilla the father or wife or child would be released. Loyalty could be proved by getting word to the Japanese of where and when there would be an ambush of Japanese forces, or where and when Fertig or one of his senior officers could be found.
It was not black and white. The same guerrilla who would decide that his greater loyalty lay to his family, and that therefore he should let the Japanese know where they could find Fertig, could more often than not be counted upon to be willing to lay his life on the line sniping at a Japanese patrol.
What this situation required was keeping secret the actual place and time of the planned attack until virtually the last minute, so that the guerrilla with a member of his family in Japanese “protection” would not have the opportunity to communicate with the Japanese.
To assemble the 120-150-man force he considered the optimum for the ambush of the propaganda detachment, therefore, Fertig had to pick several sites within two hours’ march of the ambush site. In the event, he picked five different sites, then sent word by runner to various guerrilla cells–numbering in the aggregate just over two hundred men–to assemble into five larger groups at the designated sites.
His experience had taught him that about sixty percent of the guerrillas summoned would appear at the designated site at the proper time.
Five hours before the propaganda detachment and its company of guards was scheduled to reach the ambush site, a second group of runners was sent to the five assembly areas, bearing orders for the men to come to the final assembly point. From the moment the runners reached the five sites, it was presumed that anyone leaving intended to betray the troops to the Japanese. If someone ran and it was impossible to capture him, the operation would be called off, and the guerrillas would disperse. If someone ran and was caught, he would be beheaded. Beheading with a heavy, razor-sharp machete was supposed to be more or less painless, and it did not expend ammunition.