Who Fought

When the medals were handed out last week the U.S. for the first time learned who had been doing the fighting in New Guinea.

U.S. units in the joint U.S.-Australian force under General Douglas MacArthur were the 32nd (Iron Jaw or Red Arrow) and 41st (Sunset) divisions, and the Fifth Air Force. General MacArthur cited them for skill and courage that "defeated a bold and aggressive enemy."

Their commander, Lieut. General Robert Lawrence Eichelberger, and eleven other U.S. and Australian officers were awarded the D.S.C. for "marked efficiency and precise execution of operations during the Papuan campaign." General Eichelberger, Far Eastern expert and onetime Superintendent of West Point, had last been heard of in October when he was upped to one of the Army's 20 lieutenant generals and sent on a secret assignment. His D.S.C. was the second he had won. The first had been pinned on his blouse in Siberia in 1919, not long before the Japanese Government awarded him the Imperial Order of Meiji, the Order of the Sacred Treasure and the Order of the Rising Sun.

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