Victory ! Mabuhay!

Last week, with MacArthur's recapture of Manila, the U.S. passed a great milestone in World War II. In the final, dark hours of the week, as U.S. mechanized cavalrymen battered through a Japanese road barrier and roared into Manila from the east, the event was more than the attaining of a great objective: it was a high-water mark in the inexorable rising tide of the American war effort. No one doubted that there would be hard fighting aplenty before the Philippines were entirely redeemed; but Manila was the crown and symbol of the entire Southwest Pacific campaign. The war that had begun in defeat and humiliation had yielded a great victory: clear-cut, renowned--and semifinal.

Neither Manila nor her liberators were garbed for a gala. The city was drab and dirty after the Jap occupation. The incoming soldiers were dust-caked and sweat-streaked. But next morning, as the sun mounted, the miracle of freedom restored called forth a rush of popular emotion that was louder than the music of bands, gayer than whipping banners.

Suddenly Manila's unkempt streets swarmed with men, women & children, shouting "Veektory!" and "Mabuhay!" --the Tagalog "Hurrah!" From the little the Japs had left them, from the fullness of their hearts, the Filipinos pressed gifts on their deliverers. A small boy darted out to hand a precious egg to one startled American. Other Manilans broke into a Jap-operated brewery, lavished bottles of beer on their liberators. One gaunt, toothless, ragged woman had nothing to give. But she hobbled out to catch and kiss the hand of an embarrassed colonel. She sobbed: "God bless you, sir! God bless the Americans! God bless all the Americans!"

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