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In the Pacific Theater of World War II, the Gilbert and Marshall Islands campaigns, from November 1943 through February 1944, were the first offensive operations of the United States Navy and Marine Corps in the Central Pacific. The campaign was preceded by a raid on Makin Island by U.S. Marines in August, 1942.
Japanese bases in the Gilbert and Marshall Islands were the outer perimeter of eastern defenses for the Japanese Empire.
The Marianas campaign followed the following summer.
Background
The Japanese forces occupied the Gilbert Islands three days after the attack on Pearl Harbor, Hawaii. As a provided token defense of Tarawa, they build a seaplane base on Makin and dispersed troops along the coastlines of the atolls to monitor the Allied forces movement in South Pacific.1 It was only after Carlson's Raiders attacked Makin in August 1942 that the Japanese began to fortify and reinforce the Gilberts.2 The largest and most strategically important islands of the Gilberts was Tarawa. Fortifications were quickly built up by the Japanese starting in March 1943 with nearly 5,000 troops stationed abroad. 3,000 Special Naval Landing Force and base force troops and 940 naval construction units increased by 1,247 laborers. In divergence, Makin only a total of 798 combat troops, including some 100 isolated Japanese aviation personnel.3 General Holland M. Smith, Commanding General of V Amphibious Corps blamed the Carlson raid for the rapid build-up of Japanese forces and staunchly felt, even long after his retirement, that Tarawa should had been bypassed, instead of incurring heavy Marine casualties during the seizure.14 Admirals Chester W. Nimitz, Ernest King and Raymond A. Spruance believed that retaking the Gilberts was a essentially and strategically important for continued movement toward the Marshall Islands. The code name for the capture of the Gilberts was Galvanic,34 which called for the seizures of Tarawa, Makin and Apamama.
References
- ^ a b Samuel Eliot Morison, History of United States Naval Operations in World War II, Vol. 7; Aleutians, Gilberts and Marshalls: June 1942-April 1944, (Edison, NJ: Castle Books, 2001).
- ^ Bruce F. Meyers, Swift, Silent, and Deadly: Marine Amphibious Reconnaissance in the Pacific, 1942-1945, (Annapolis, MD: Naval Institute Press, 2004).
- ^ a b Benis M. Frank and Henry I. Shaw, Jr., History of U.S. Marine Corps Operations in World War II, Vol. 5; Victory and Occupation, (New York, NY: Penguin Books, 1990).
- ^ a b Gen. Holland M. Smith and Perry Finch, Coral and Brass, (New York: Viking, 1974, 1976).
- Drea, Edward J. (1998). "An Allied Interpretation of the Pacific War", In the Service of the Emperor: Essays on the Imperial Japanese Army. Nebraska: University of Nebraska Press. ISBN 0-8032-1708-0.
- Dyer, George Carroll. "The Amphibians Came to Conquer: The Story of Admiral Richmond Kelly Turner". United States Government Printing Office. Retrieved on October 20, 2006.
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