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3 US War Vets Return to Relive Top-Secret Run
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By DJ Yap, Philippine Daily Inquirer, 04/29/2007
MANILA, Philippines -- Their hair have gone gray and creases now line their faces but these old soldiers smile the smile of the young for they have returned to the place where they became men.
Three United States war veterans with compelling memories of a forgotten episode of World War II in the Philippines quietly slipped into the country last week on what may well be their last mission here—to tell their story.
 In 1944, before Gen. Douglas MacArthur’s celebrated return, three young soldiers took part in a series of top-secret submarine missions to provide food, arms and supplies to Filipino guerrillas fighting the Japanese.
More than 60 years later, Albert Montague and Basil Wentworth, crew members of the USS Stingray, and Al McCown, who worked aboard the USS Blackfin, are back to commemorate their little place in the nation’s history.
“I always think that our run here in your country is one of the better things we’ve done,” said Wentworth.
“I tend to deal with levity a little bit but I’m really humbled by this. I don’t cry easy but I could,” said Wentworth as he, Montague and McCown sat for the interview at the Philippine Veterans Bank.
On April 21, the three veterans were guests at a simple ceremony in Caunayan Bay, Pagudpud, Ilocos Norte, the site of the last of the submarine missions.
Chick Parsons
With surviving Filipino war veterans, they unveiled a memorial marker just a few hundred yards away from the exact spot where the Stingray had dropped anchor, according to PVB corporate communications chief Mike Villa-Real.
Unknown to many Filipinos, the United States Navy in 1944 deployed top-secret submarine missions to the Philippines to deliver arms, ammunitions, medicines and radio gear to Filipino guerrillas.
These missions were conceived, organized and directed by Commodore Chick Parsons from Australia, on orders of MacArthur, the commander of the US forces in the Pacific who had retreated to Australia after the fall of Corregidor and Bataan.
One of the last major secret submarine landings was on Aug. 27, 1944 by the USS Stingray at Caunayan Bay, Pagudpud, Ilocos Norte, just six weeks before the Leyte Landing which brought back to the Philippines the US forces under MacArthur to begin the liberation of the country.
The USS Stingray off-loaded more than six tons of armaments and supplies for the Filipino guerrillas, including 15 Filipino-American commandos led by Capt. Joe Valera.
Top-secret run
The missions, which numbered 49, covered several islands from Luzon to Mindanao, mostly under cover of night, to avoid being detected by Japanese escort vessels, according to Montague.
“This run that we made [in the Philippines] was probably the most top-secret patrol run of any sub in WWII. It was so top-secret that it was not declassified until 1992,” Montague said.
For many years after they completed their missions, Montague, 85, Wentworth, 83, and McCown, 82, were of the mistaken belief that their run was unsuccessful, and even tragic.
“The Army told us two or three months later that all these people on the beach were killed by small arms fire,” said Wentworth, who feels very emotional about it to this day.
“I only learned in the year 2000 that nobody was killed. A pilot returned to the area and talked to an old guy who said, no, nobody was killed. It was a successful mission,” he said.
After several decades, “there was elation that our run meant something, that it was important,” Wentworth said.
“The reason they told us that all the guerrillas were killed was because they didn’t want us to talk about it. And we didn’t,” he added.
Continued 3 US War Vets Return
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