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Episode #632 of Hometown Heroes, airing June 11-15, 2020, focuses on a secret unit operating in the China Burma India Theater during World War II, the Sino American Cooperative Organization, or SACO for short.
You’ll hear from one of the Navy’s pioneering “frogmen” who trained in underwater demolition in Ft. Pierce, FL before the advent of the Navy SEAL program. You can learn more about the history of Navy special warfare at the National Navy UDT-SEAL Museum. Of the 2,964 Americans who served behind enemy lines with SACO during World War II, only five were killed, and only three captured. On this episode, you’ll hear from one of the last surviving SACO veterans, Don Hardenbrook of Weiser, ID. The path Hardenbrook followed to his SACO duties was nowhere near a direct one. After convincing his father to sign for his early enlistment into the Navy at age 17, Don went through boot camp in Farragut, ID. Just before the end of his quartermaster training, he was chosen for the V-12 program and sent to Colgate University in Central New York, where he competed on the Raiders’ swim team. After one quarter, an eye test revealed colorblindness, and he was disqualified from becoming an officer. Listen to Hometown Heroes to find out how his softball prowess kept him from being sent to Europe in 1944, and how he ended up instead heading to Florida for training in underwater demolition. Out of 150 men in his 16-week training cohort, Don was one of only 28 to make it through the final cuts.
“We had wool Navy regulation swimming trunks, no flippers, no oxygen,” you’ll hear Hardenbrook explain of their spartan equipment. “We tied nuts and bolts around our waist when we dove.”
Each frogman had to be able to hold his breath for at least two minutes and thirty seconds, and training also included planting explosives underwater. One drill in which they detonated a floating explosive called a “ready fox” resulted in Don and other frogmen being propelled 20 to 30 feet into the air. When his training concluded in Fort Pierce, Don hitchhiked to California, where a ship would take him and other SACO troops from Long Beach to Calcutta, India, then making their way into China.
“We had one thing to do and that was to harass the Japanese,” you’ll hear him say of the effort to keep Japanese forces from controlling Kunming and other SACO outposts. “And we had to train Chinese so they knew how to fight with arms.”
Nearly 100,000 Chinese guerrillas were trained by the SACO units in an effort that reversed military momentum in much of China and produced remarkable results. The joint American/Chinese effort resulted in the destruction of 209 bridges, 84 locomotives, and 141 ships, not to mention tens of thousands of Japanese casualties.
You’ll hear Hardenbrook describe how they would take out enemy railroad installations and neutralize enemy patrols, intentionally leaving large geographical separations between clashes with Japanese forces in order to create the illusion of a greater number of troops.
“We did everything on foot,” you’ll hear him explain. “If you finished up and you were 90 or 150 miles away, well then you had to walk night and day until you get back to the base.”
Don and his fellow Americans had to overcome language barriers, working with Chinese combatants who spoke several different Chinese languages. He came away impressed with their courage and the pride they took in defending their homeland. You’ll hear him describe a mission he carried out to completion, only to find out afterwards that Imperial Japan had surrendered two days earlier. A long journey back to Shanghai afterwards included a lengthy stretch in a stolen Japanese ambulance. When the ambulance could take them no further, they had to cover the rest of the distance on foot, arriving in Shanghai for a party attended by Generalissimo Chiang Kai-Shek and his wife.
“I got to dance with Madame Chiang,” you’ll hear Don remember. “I remembered it for the rest of my life, and she probably forgot it as quickly as she could.”
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