 The National Broadcasting Company and its affiliated stations present the Pacific Story. In the mounting fury of world conflict, events in the Pacific are taking on ever greater importance. Here is the story of the Pacific and the millions of people who live around this greatest sea. The drama of the people whose destiny is at stake in the Pacific War. Here, as another public service, is the tale of the war in the Pacific and its meaning to us and to the generations to come. The Moros, nemesis to the Japs on Mindanao. Of the Moros, I reiterate to the great American President my people's plates of loyalty to the government of the United States. The Moros, enlisted as bollumens and their my command, will fight to the last and die for America and their country. From out of the hills of Mindanao came this message from Datu Piang as the Japanese swarmed over his island two months after Pearl Harbor. Today, Piang and his Moros are still unconquered. With their razor sharp creases, dreadful knives with wavy blades, they are surprising and slaughtering the Japanese as they have slaughtered invaders of Mindanao for hundreds of years. In the wooded mountains of Mindanao, they await the return of the Americans. Mindanao, home of Piang and his thousands of bollumen, is the southernmost of the Philippine islands. The nearest island of the Philippines to the war operations in the southwest Pacific. With the attacks on Palau Islands, the drive westward, Mindanao bids farewell to be a key to the Philippines and the assault to come on the inner empire of Japan. Driven back into the hills, the Moros among the fiercest fighters on earth are a deadly peril at the back of the invaders. The Moros are Mohammedan. O ye who believe, when ye meet the martial hosts of the Infidel, turn not your backs to them. They quote from the Koran. Whoso shall turn his back to the Infidel unless he turn aside to fight or to rally his forces shall incur the wrath of Allah. Hell shall be his abode and wretched the journey thither. With these words from the Koran, the Moros attack. We live by the cold steel of the crease, the barong and the campilan. These are native knives, short, medium and long. Deadly weapons in the hands of the Moros. An eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth. Two thousand years ago, the Aborigines on the islands of the Sulu Sea looked out from their shores and saw a fleet of bright winged prowls coming in over the horizon. As the boats approached, they saw that they carried a war-like people such as they had never seen before. Those were my people coming to these islands. This is Datu Pyang, leader of the embattled Moros in Mindanao today. My people came dressed in red and orange and yellow with some green and purple and black. They wore their hair tied in a knot and they came with their creases ready. Their prowls plunged through the blue waters of the Sulu Sea, streaming under their brilliant sails as they rode in over the waves. Look, the sea is filled with fish. Yes, look at them flash in the sun as they live out. More fish than we have seen in all our journey. The sea is swarming with them. And look, they are on the surface. Those are sea tortoises, hundreds of them. Fortune is with us. What is that movement assured there in the forest? It has grown thick down to the water's edge. I can hardly see. The people are fleeing into the forest. They are afraid. But there is something else. Animals. I see them now, standing there watching us. Those are deer. Yes, deer. The forest is filled with them. Deer and fish and tortoises. This is a wonderland. This we will make our home. Stand by the land. Stand by the land. The people of the island fought us. And when they could fight no more, they went to the hills. For hundreds of years, we morose fought the tribesmen of these islands. Kingdoms rose and fell. Invaders came from Java. Again and again, for 70 years they came. We fought them with crease and barong and campelon. At last they departed and returned no more. The sea ran red with their blood. 1500 years, the moro people fought to make these islands their home. Invaders came and went. Then came word of a man of a different kind. He is one of the island of Seminole, Your Highness. A prisoner? No, Your Highness. They came upon him on the white beach of Seminole. Did he bear arms? No, Your Highness. Nor was he afraid. He asked only that he be heard. What does he speak of? He tells of the great hereafter for warriors slain on the field of battle and for all who believe. He must have come after gold. No, he wants nothing. What is his name? Who is he? His name, Your Highness, is Makdum. And they say he is a magistrate from far off Arabia. Arabia? A good and wise man. They listen to him in Seminole. And throughout the island, his words are echoing. There is no god but Allah. There is no god but Allah. From this man and from the other Mohammedan missionaries who followed him, the Moro's learned to live by the Koran and to die by it. The Moro's became Mohammedan. Then the Spaniards came with Catholicism. The Moro's withdrew from the Northern Islands to their strongholds in the South. The Spaniards in the North determined to conquer them. It was in the palace at Manila that Esteban Rodriguez, the figure of Oeya, made his terms to Governor de Sande. I swear that I, at Lantado, Esteban Rodriguez, the figure of Oeya, promised to pacify and colonize the said island of Mindinao at my own expense within a period of three years. Do you think three years is sufficient time, Senor, figure of Oeya? Ample time, Governor de Sande. The country is uncharted, and the peoples have never yet been conquered. No proper attempt has been made. Besides, I have the incentive of becoming Governor of Mindinao for a period of ten years. That means that I shall have the right to exploit it. You have our best wishes and all our help, Senor. Thank you, Governor. I shall organize an expedition at once and prepare to sail home. In 1596, the Adilantado were three priests and a company of soldiers sailed to Mindinao. They went up the Rio Grande River in Cotabato, up into the country of the Moorout Chief, Solangan. And there in the forest, they landed on the shore. Notice how quiet it is in here. Yes, nothing but the wind through the forest. We cannot see ten yards into the forest. You are not afraid of the tribesmen, are you? No, no. We have guns, they have knives. Company, attention. The Adilantado is going to speak. Soldiers, we stand upon the newest soil of Spain. To subdue this dark forest and rid the soil of the Muslim is our aim. They shall submit as vessels and converts or fall before our Spanish blades. Forward to our duty for king and country. Captain Ramírez. You will take your reconnoitering party and proceed as advance patrol. Say, senor. Forward. Adilantado figured away, waited with the main body of his men on the beach. They waited for reports from their advance patrol. When none came, they grew restless. The Adilantado called his men to attention. Soldiers, no report has come back from our patrol. I ask for volunteers to go with me into the forest after them. I will go and put you down here. You, you, you and you, that's all. The rest of you will remain here under Colonel Valdez. Now, you four, attention. Follow me. Forward march. Keep your eyes open. Report anything you see for any movements. Soldiers who were still living dragged him out to the beach. And there, as his life ran out, he said, this was the start of the struggle with the Spaniards that was to go on for 321 years. The Spaniards would have learned the nature of the Moros in the ceaseless bloody warfare. I know that you understand these savages before you start against them. Jaime Alvarez. I assure you, my expedition shall go well prepared, General. This car you see across my face, it is from a crease. Did you account for him who did it, General? Not until after he had cut down three of my officers and gashed me so that I thought I could not live. I shall fight them on their own terms. You can never match their ferocity, Jaime Alvarez. Nor their cunning. They have no laws safe to kill and to torture, even among themselves. Should one of their own be accused of improved an ally, his mouth is slit from ear to ear. It seems right arm is lopped off. The prostitute's nose is split. And yet I am told that they laugh. Yes, they laugh. They laugh with dracus sardonic laugh. I have heard it. And it is frightful. I have much steel with steel before, General. Who can say that the Toledo Blade is not a match for the crease? Beware. I shall ask no quarters and give none. Thank you, my General. Thus, expedition after expedition started against the Moros. In Reprisal, the Moros struck back at the Spaniards with terrible vengeance. The Spaniards have attacked our capital at all. We will sail against the Spaniards at Ilo Ilo with every boat and every man. This was Panglima Abdullah, the head man. Seventy carriages, great outrigger boats with forty oars and with brilliant coloured sails were drawn upon the beach and made ready. The outriggers have been secured, Panglima Abdullah. They are strong and ready. We have rigged new sails. And the oars? One for every oar lock and extra ones for reserve. Good. Hunting, hunting. What of the provisions? The boats are all provisioned. Rice cakes enough for a week and all the bamboo tubes have been filled with water. We must have plenty. Panglima Abdullah. Has every crease been sharpened? Every crease, every brown, every company. The blacksmiths have tempered every blade and made it sharp. The warriors are ready. Everyone. Give the order. We will sail at once. The thousands of morals fighting men every one pushed the heavy boats off the beach into the surf and headed out into the open sea. Wind sang through the rigging as the brilliant sails bellied out. The heavy oars sprained in the waves as the boats plowed through the sea. Seventy boats sailing in a great presence with Abdullah's boat leading the way. Seventy boats bearing eight thousand crease men on a mission of vengeance. There is Ilo Ilo. See through the rain. Oh, Abdullah? Yes. Prepare to land. Yes, my leader. Prepare to land. Those fishermen who saw us at dawn, they have probably landed by now and warned the fort. The rain will cover us until we have landed. Once we scale their walls, they will be lost. Seventy fighting boats moved in like ghosts through the rain and mist. Like a swarm, they all touched the shore at Ilo Ilo on the Isle of Panay at the same time. The eight thousand warriors with their creases poised, stepped up to the Spanish fort. But there was no time to reload, cutting the Spaniards down like weeds. The Spaniards retreated and the morrow swarmed through the city and massacred them whenever they caught them. The governor tried to rally his troops. Do not let them into government peace. The males were put to the crease. The women were rounded up and taken back to the harems or to slavery in Sulu. And when the town was sacked, Bangladesh Abdullah spoke. Sixteen times. They captured it five times. But the morrow's held holo for two hundred ninety years and the Spaniards held it for only thirty one years. The young's people never bowed to the Spaniards. They never paid tribute to any man. They went to the United States and turned the morrow lands. The morrow swept down upon the Spanish garrisons in Mindanao and Sulu. The posts that were not abandoned were destroyed and the Spaniards slaughtered to a man. Then the Americans came. The problem of handling the morrow's is different from handling the other people to the Philippines. This is the American General's staff in Manila. The morrow's have a different religion and they're different racially from the peoples of the north. Yes, they are Mohammedans while the Filipinos are Christians. Well as I see it, special arrangements will have to be made for the morrow's. Captain Pershing and his troops are now in the middle of the morrow country in Mindanao. He's made excellent progress. He's assured the morrow's that there will be no interference with their religion. That has gone far to bring understanding between us. The civil government that is being set up is also helping to reach the gap. I have a report here on the payment arrangement for the morrow's rulers. The Sultan of Sulu and his retinue are to receive $6,750 annually. This is proving a big factor in bringing about cooperation with the morrow's. But will the minor doubt to submit to American authority? Yeah, that we shall have to see. We know from the experience of the Spaniards that tolerance and understanding ended the armed rebellion of the Sultan of Sulu, but not of the minor chiefs. They and their people waged bloody war against the Americans. Zealous morrow's dedicated themselves to kill as many Christians as possible before they themselves were slain. With elaborate ceremony, they prepared themselves to run the huramantado. This young man has received his parents' permission to run the huramantado. And now he has come here to the mosque to receive instruction from the Imam. The young candidate for martyrdom places his hand upon the Quran. I covenant with God that I will wage this holy war for it is of God. Now he is being washed. His teeth are being cleaned and his nails are trimmed. Now his father is shaving off his eyebrows. It is done, my son. Your eyebrows look like a moon two days old. Yes, father. Now his hair is being cut short. A tight band is wound around the waist of the young man. And now his father helps him put on a white robe and a white turban. I swear to pursue the road to paradise with valor and devotion until I endure the pangs of death. You are ready, son. Yes, I am ready, father. I am ready. With fanatical zeal, the young morrow goes out to kill and be killed. He suddenly approaches a group of American soldiers and sweeps down upon them, waving his razor sharp crease and shouting huramantado. Huramantado. Look out, look out, look out. John's dead, Bert. You're bleeding, Bert. Let me see. I'm all... He slashed your neck, open Bert. We've got to get you to the hospital right away. Lucky you got that morrow when you did, or you... Huramantados appeared as if out of nowhere. Americans were slashed and stabbed to death in the streets, on the plantations, on the beaches, and even in the army camps. The fighting went on year after year until 1913. General Pershing would have been promoted to Brigadier General from the rank of captain and closed in on the morrows. His staff surveyed the situation. The outlaw element of the morrows is now in this stronghold here on Mount Bagsack. We know that when the morrow makes his last stand, he wants his women and children with him. Now our job is to get the women and children off Mount Bagsack before we storm it. That's going to be difficult. Women and the children work in the fields below the hill while we're not around. As soon as we approach with troops, the women and the children go back up the hill. This was the situation, and the morrows kept close watch on the general staff. Then General Pershing announced that he would visit his family in Mindanao. He sailed from Zamboanga. When the transport was out of sight of land, the captain of the ship received an order from General Pershing. You will change your course and proceed to Basilan. There you will embark the 51st Scouts. You will then proceed to Seasi and embark the 52nd Scouts. With these missions accomplished, the transport with General Pershing and the two companies of Scouts put into Holo Harbor late at night. The American troops in Holo were joined with the Scouts and the advance was started on Bagsack. Lay down the barrage on the fortress on the summit and on all five of the ports below all at the same time. Yes. We'll have to shell the morrows out of the outer trenches before we advance. For two hours, the American heavy artillery shelled the ports and the trenches. American riflemen picked off the morrows as they fled from the trenches. Then came the order. Pin down the Americans. Hours of fighting and the Americans advanced to the 45 feet of the fortress. Look at those morrows standing right up on top of the walls. They know the jigs up. Look out, look out, they're throwing their creases. Look out for those. Flying creases cut down the Americans and then the order came for the final assault. All of Bagsack organized resistance to the morrows ended with the American tolerance of their religion. The morrows would have fought to the last man. The Americans and Pyeong's people learned to understand each other and as the years passed, they saw another people coming in. Finally, in spite of laws and restrictions, these people came to Mindanao and Sulu. A fifth column destined one day to join the invaders of their own race, the Japanese. 136, the Japanese had come in great numbers to Davao in Mindanao and slyly they said, Davao is our most important colony outside of Asia. American observers took note of the Japanese craft in Davao Bay. You know, it's strange how these big Japanese ships from Osaka can make Davao here a port of call. You mean because they happen to be operating at a loss? Yes, you can't go on carrying passengers and freight forever at a loss, you know. You can if you're subsidized? Well, certainly Japan doesn't subsidize these big ships just to stop here going to and from the Carolin Islands. No, not only for that. The Japanese are smart enough to know that they couldn't be that brazen now. The Japanese realize what a lot of us don't realize that Davao Bay here is three times bigger than Manila Bay. Look at those Japanese boats out there. Those fishing boats? Yeah, that's what they call them. And there's a law against Japanese operating fishing boats of more than three tons too. Most of those are more than three tons. They've worked out a slick little system of dummy ownership. If you were to check on it, you'd find that those boats have all Filipinos as registered owners. And here's a strange coincidence. Those boats are always around when there are American warships and naval planes around. And the Japanese operated islands are always near military installations. Yes, I've noticed that the Japanese are making the same sort of penetration here as they made in French into China. You mean plugging the Orient for the Orientals? That's right. The campaign to sell these peoples on Japan and they're spending a lot of money on it. Yeah, they know what they're doing. Make no bones about it. What about the Mindenau? Yes, and you can be pretty sure they know all about Mindenau's possibilities for pineapples, rubber, hardwood and minerals. Hey, look, there goes that big white Japanese ship back to Osaka. Yeah, and it'll be back again. And one of these times it may be bringing soldiers in here. Those watch the infiltration of the Japanese. They watch them spread through Davao up through the highlands of the province of Lannau, out into the coastal misamis provinces. And into the Battle Province where his people had resisted invaders for 2,000 years. Harbour, Davao was bombed. The Japanese forces began to land at Davao. Our greatest danger is the Japanese fifth column. There are 20,000 of them around us here. Yes, sir. And 10,000 of them have already been organized into military units. 10,000? But heavens, they know every foot of Mindenau. Our east-wild friend. Yeah, the farmers in fishing are maneuvering for a foothold on the morows, but Japanese reinforcements are landing. And when they widen the beach head through the hills and the lowlands the tangled brush and the forests once again flashed the crease, the barong, the compilin and through the woods rang the morrow battle cry. Under the sheer weight of the Japanese numbers pouring ashore from their big transports the morows are falling back into their wooded strongholds cutting down the japs, ambushing them, and for 2,000 years the morows refused to yield. Today, Piyang and his thousands of bolemen are still holding out. A deadly peril at the back of the invaders, a powerful force to aid the Americans when they return to Mindenau and the reconquest of the Philippine islands. You have been listening to the Pacific Story presented by the National Broadcasting Company and its affiliated independent stations of the public service to clarify events in the Pacific across currents of life in the Pacific Basin. For a reprint of this Pacific Story program send 10 cents in stamps or coin to University of California Press Berkeley, California. We repeat for a reprint of this Pacific Story program send 10 cents in stamps or coin to University of California Press Berkeley, California directed by Arnold Marquess. The original musical score was composed and conducted by Thomas Paluso. Your narrator, Gaine Whitman. This program came to you from Hollywood. This is the National Broadcasting Company.