An interchange between Bullseye and Stock exposes the depth of the men's mental and physical exhaustion.  Stock starts giving the men assignments.   He tells Bullseye to pick up eight cases of ammo for the platoon.  Bullseye asks what Merrill has volunteered them for now.  He says in a despairing voice, that he doesn't need any more ammo.  "Dammit, I'm not fighting anybody."  When he leaps up and says to tell Merrill to pick it up himself because he's through taking orders from "that butcher," Stock punches him.  Bullseye ends up apologizing, but the outburst is so out of character, especially in light of the friendship and trust we saw between them earlier, that it confirms the doctor's advice to Merrill, that the men are coming apart.  The Sarge expresses the hope that Merrill doesn't plan to send "what's left of us" anywhere else.

But of course, he does.  And when Stock protests and tries to resign his commission, Merrill rejects the resignation.

The men then set on a fearsome trek through horrible terrain.  The footing is so treacherous, a misstep can and does send men to their deaths.  And to give Merrill credit, he takes every step the men do.  And we know what the men don't.  He's had a heart attack prior to the Burma campaign and is suffering symptoms that indicate he's at great risk for another one.  During the trek Eleanor the mule collapses under her heavy load.  Muley stops them from shooting her by taking on her pack himself.  At the top of a steep mountainous trail, Muley himself collapses and dies.

On the way to Mitchina, they come up against a major Japanese force.  The night is a psychological nightmare with bombing and Japanese sneaking up to kill them silently.  Bullseye falls apart, a man of courage with absolutely no reserves of strength to keep that courage alive.

The Sarge saves him from being taken out by a Japanese soldier.

The next morning's battle is worse.  They are badly outnumbered but somehow manage to hold  the Japanese back.  But the losses are horrendous.

In he end, Merrill must get the men moving to Mitchina.  He is unsuccessful in getting anyone to move until he collapses with a heart attack.  At that point Stock manages to get up and encourage others to follow.

A voice-over says that Merrill's men do the impossible.  They take Mitchina.  In the end, of the 3000 volunteers who started in the provisional unit, less than a hundred remained in active service.  The composite picture with which the movie ended isn't very clear but it did show us Bullseye survived Mitchina.

NiteOwl Review:  We have to be careful about reviewing Peter in this movie because this site has a gush filter and we wouldn't want to set off that gush alert.  But everyone agreed this was an exceptional part for him.  Not all of us even like war movies the way we like Westerns (and the split isn't by gender either - the NiteOwls include some rabid female Rat Patrol fans) but watching Peter taking his character from the cocky, self-assured sharpshooter to an exhausted, soldier on the edge of hysteria made us appreciate this particular movie.  In effect, Bullseye Wheeler was the barometer for the condition of the troops.  As he deteriorated, so did everyone else.  Cast Notes:  When someone mentioned to Peter that Ty [Bronco Layne] Hardin gave a pretty one-note, handsome, brave, concerned officer performance, he reminded us that the part was written that way -- wasn't Ty's fault.    Will [Sugarfoot] Hutchins noted that true to Warners then parsimonious practice, they were paid weekly.  So when his character was killed off midway through the film, his paycheck stopped.  Although he made it back to the States, Jeff Chandler died as the result of an injury suffered during the shooting which was severely exacerbated because he didn't return to the states immediately after the injury occurred.  According to Peter, Chandler, who had a pre-existing back problem, was in great pain after he tweaked his back  playing softball on Clark Air Force Base in the Philippines.  At that point Chandler had shot all scenes involving close-ups and dialogue, and could have gone home without harming the film.  All that was left was a couple of weeks of trudging through the jungles and swamps with a full pack, things that could have been done without Chandler.  However, the director, Sam Fuller, well known as a macho type, insisted that he be there.  So Chandler worked all day and spent the night in traction.  Chandler subsequently died when he hemorrhaged after back surgery.

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