The rescue attack started at 1600. The two-pronged American attack had Troops A and B, with a platoon of Troop E in support, attacking to the east, while the 2d Battalion, 127th Infantry, attacked from the west. About an hour later, the cavalrymen had reached about 185 meters from Troop C, but were meeting increased Japanese resistance.

The two advance American platoons deployed and built a firing line. Orders were for Lieutenant Boyce and his platoon to attack the Japanese left flank. They attacked, but could gain only a few meters before heavy Japanese small arms and mortar fire forced the men to crawl to cover. Boyce saw a slough that seemed to offer an avenue of approach against the enemy position. He led his squad into it in column formation. Japanese soldiers defending the shallow depression heaved several hand grenades from above onto the advancing Americans. One grenade landed between the lieutenant and his men. Boyce threw himself on the grenade and smothered the blast with his own body.*

*His actions earned Lieutenant Boyce a posthumously awarded Medal of Honor.

That heroic action ended the 112th's attack for the day. A corporal threw a smoke grenade to mark the area for 60-mm mortar fire to cover their withdrawal. They had lost, besides Boyce, one NCO killed and six wounded. The 2d Battalion's attack also had pushed westward, and they were fighting for control of a ridge just west of and overlooking Troop C's positions. As both American units were advancing toward each other, the 112th troops were ordered to withdraw to Afua to preclude the distinct possibility of mistakenly firing on each other. The day's fighting had partially lifted the siege by rooting out Japanese of the 79th Infantry from their roadblocks, thus allowing 2d Battalion to reach Troop C's perimeter just before darkness.

Although the Japanese trail blocks had been broken, small bands of Japanese soldiers continued to fight near Troop C's positions. Even with the added strength of the 2d Battalion, the Japanese refused to release their grip on Troop C. That afternoon, for instance, Troop C tried to break out, carrying its litter cases, but Japanese small arms fire drove the men back. Nevertheless, the cumulative effects of a prolonged battle of attrition were grinding down the Japanese defenders, and Troop C would be able to reach the 112th Headquarters command post by 1000 on 25 July.

Instead of the expected mopping up exercise, bitter fighting characterized the day. Cavalrymen fought brief skirmishes with Japanese patrols, probably the screens for 20th Division Headquarters, then moving south of Afua. The day's fighting left commanders on both sides dissatisfied.

Major General Gill, Persecution Covering Force commander, expressed to General Cunningham his "inability to understand slowness in the clearing situation." [72] Gill believed that the 112th was fighting only the Japanese 78th Infantry, but General Cunningham insisted that at least two Japanese regiments, the 78th and 80th, were pressing his troops. Both men were wrong, but they could not know it. The entire 20th Division had arrayed itself against Afua, and according to Japanese sources, by midnight of 25 July at least 2,000 Japanese were to the right (south) and rear (west) of South Force. [73]

General Adachi at Headquarters, 41st Division, learned that the Americans were continuing to strengthen their Driniumor defenses, that the 20th Division's attack against Afua apparently had not gone well, and that the 41st Division was preparing its assault near Kawanakajima for 27 JUly. [74]

Morale, he found, was excellent in the 41st Division-junior officers were encouraging each other as they were briefed on the plan of attack.

Then the division commander, Lt. Gen. Mano Goro, summoned the small unit leaders to assemble before him. He abruptly announced to his collected officers that the 27 July attack had been canceled and that the division instead would move immediately to Afua. Nothing more was said as the general walked out.

After ten days of planning for the 27 July operation, the subalterns wondered aloud why the attack suddenly had been canceled. A persistent speculation was that the 20th Division had lost the "guts" to cross the Driniumor and that the 41st Division was being sent to Afua to do its dirty work. [75]

The officers of the 41st Division dismissed the enemy at Afua as decidedly inferior to the Americans they had been fighting near Kawanakajima and so convinced themselves that a frontal attack, brutally delivered, would smash the U.S. units near Afua once and for all. Such contempt for, and underestimation of, their enemies at Afua ultimately would destroy the 41st Division.

Despite the emotional outbursts by 41st Division officers, General Adachi had ordered General Mano to cancel the attack for several reasons. First, the 20th Division was nearly worn out from continual jungle combat, and Adachi realized the Japanese could not turn the Americans' flank without reinforcements. Second, even the strongest Japanese unit, the 237th Infantry, 41st Division, was unable to crack the strong American defenses near Kawanakajima. The solution was to combine the 41st and 20th divisions for a concerted attack on Afua. This concentration of Japanese forces would thereby improve chances of defeating the Americans in detail. Once again Japanese troops swung south towards Afua, though this time they approached on the Driniumor's east bank.

For the cavalrymen around Afua, 25 July just brought more heavy showers. The rain had begun about dusk the previous evening and had poured uninterrupted throughout the night. Soaked and shivering, the men huddled in their holes until the first gray light. They ate in the pouring rain. Patrols departed, but soon reported back that high water in previously near-dry streams made crossing impossible. About mid-morning the storm passed, and the sun appeared as if to greet the men of Troop C, who were just then making their way into the regimental command post area. There was little time for congratulations, because the fighting in the steamy jungle mist near Afua continued on and off throughout the day.

General Cunningham ordered his troopers to push south and west to dislodge Japanese infantrymen who he assumed were holding the high ground southwest of Afua. General Adachi ordered his infantrymen to attack north and west to wrest Afua from the Americans and to seize Hill 56. Thus the 112th Cavalry and the 79th Infantry both believed that they were attacking the other's defensive positions.

In fact, they were attacking the same ridgeline. The close vegetation, deep jungle, and broken terrain limited visibility, so neither side knew the other's precise location until someone blundered into an opposing unit. A typical example of a firefight characteristic of the next three days might be as follows:

A Japanese advance patrol, usually four or five riflemen and a light machine gun team, picked its way single file through the undergrowth. When they encountered an American patrol, gunfire might be exchanged, but more likely both patrols would scatter into the thick, tangled vegetation and redeploy in its cover. The Japanese riflemen would disperse to cover the flanks of their machine gunner. The Americans would bring forward automatic weapons to build up their firing line as they called for artillery or tried to outflank the Japanese. If the American artillery fire and movement were successful, the Japanese would flee, and the cavalrymen would move cautiously to finish off wounded Japanese. If the Japanese infantry proved too strong to expel, the Americans would withdraw, carrying their wounded and dragging their dead. As often as not, on first sight of each other, both sides would flee into the safety of the jungle.