Professor Greg Jackson

Pedro Uperio, the 19-year-old Filipino cavalryman riding point on today's mission, looks behind the only stone building in town, the Catholic Church.

Then suddenly, the monotonous sound of horses' hooves is interrupted by an explosion.

Amid a flurry of rifle and machine gun fire, Pedro gallops back, his horse covered in blood.

It's the Japanese army, all right, entering the town from the opposite side.

Startled, Ed looks up to see their far more numerous enemy, the hundreds of Japanese soldiers dressed in drab khaki uniforms, wading their way through the river.

Ed knows he has exactly one chance to stop this.

It's by no means a guarantee, but they have to act now and fast.

Raising his pistol in the air, Ed shouts to his 26 cavalrymen to make a line.

The men snap, too, and with every man and horse formed up, he brings down his arm while shouting the command, Charge!

Bent down over their horses' necks, each man pushes his steed to a hard gallop as they fire pistols at nearly point blank into their foe.

It's a truly terrifying sight, and utterly unexpected.

A cavalry charge.

An actual, old-fashioned, yesteryear, or rather yesterwar, cavalry charge.

A few Japanese soldiers attempt to fire back, but most are so caught off guard, they flee in confusion, running into the river or swamps.

As Ed will later recall, to them, we must have seen a vision from another century.

Wild-eyed horses, pounding headlong, cheering, whooping men, firing from the saddles.

What we just witnessed was the last American cavalry charge, or at least the last of the century.

Yeah, century.

In 2001, U.S.

Army Special Forces will ride with Afghan cavalry against the Taliban.