Page 186.

Ibid, W.L. White:

"The second day we heard planes at dawn and all scrambled back out of sight in the hut -- peering up through the palms. It was three bombers in formation at about fifteen hundred feet.

Somebody said, pointing, 'Why look -- they're ours!' But I could hardly believe it -- even when I saw the stars on their wings, even when I heard the faraway rumble of their bombs dropping on the Japs in Cebu. They were the first American bombers we had seen since before the start of the war. Then we heard more planes -- looked up and again they were American, a new type with a split tail I'd never seen before but which I learned later were B-25's, and now I realized that here was our big American offensive -- the one which we though had pooped out on us the morning after we sunk the cruiser. Here it was at last -- three days too late! Because in the meantime, Bataan had fallen, and Cebu, and all they could do now was pester the Japs and sink a few empty transports. I was sore as hell.

"Because we little guys -- the ones who are expended -- never get to see the broad picture of the war, never find out the reasons back of the moves or failures to move. We only see our part -- look up through the palm trees at the seamy side of it. So when something poops out, and help doesn't come, and everything goes to hell, we can only hope help didn't come in time for some sensible reason like bad weather conditions in Australia. We hope, but at the time we can't be sure, and we get mad.

Expect to hear that in President Obama's Tuesday address to the nation: Blaming the weather conditions in Australia Asia, in part...