New Order in Manila

Manila was a dead city. The people wandered dully through the streets, prodded on by the bayonets of Jap sentries in civilian clothes. Food and money were scarce. The only stores still open were Japanese bazaars. A package of rice which once cost a nickel now cost 25-c-. A single match sold for 15 centavos (7 1/2-c-). Trolleys and a single bus line were still running. But except for these and the dozen arrogant, sleek cars of Japanese officials and their friends, the streets were bare of traffic.

At 6 p.m. people of Manila went home to their dark lodgings and locked the doors--although the curfew is not until ten. There they thought of things they had seen:

P:Filipinos who once worked for the U.S. Army & Navy were lashed to telephone poles along the boulevards. Hatless under the blazing sun of the tropics, they were held for three days at a time, kicked and cuffed by passing Japanese soldiers. After a while (if "guilty") they were shot.

P:Two judges of the Philippine Supreme Court--Arsenio Locson, Gregorio Narvasa--were so treated. Then they were released, while Japanese officers hissed politely: "So sorry--mistake."

P:A Filipino who told the Japs where to find 5,000 gallons of gasoline was shot because he failed to find more.

P:Some ten to 20 Filipinos were executed at Fort Santiago, Douglas MacArthur's old headquarters, their bodies dumped into Manila Bay.

P:A seven-year-old Filipino boy made the mistake of walking behind a sentry instead of in front. The sentry ran him through with a bayonet. The boy's father tried to retrieve his body, was bayoneted too.

The Japs had learned much, or nothing, in a decade in China, about the treatment of conquered people. The citizens of Manila prepared grimly to endure. They listened to the defiant rumble of MacArthur's cannon, echoing across the Bay. Their spirits quickened. Over the dead city went a whispered defiance: "MacArthur will have dinner in a Manila hotel before the end of the month."

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