Introduction to the South Pacific - NEW ARTICLE POSTED

Background to War in the South Pacific, by Reed Fawell III

CLICK TO ENLARGEThe war in the South Pacific began in the spring of 1942 when the Japanese seized footholds in Papua New Guinea.  From there, they captured the Rabaul stronghold on New Britain and nearby points on Bougainville and then struck further south into the Solomon Islands when they seized a seaplane anchorage on Tulagi within the Florida Straights across from Guadalcanal.  Admiral Ernest J. King alone realized the full import of Japan's thrust into the South Pacific.  Namely that rapidly emerging technologies enabled even a tiny seaplane anchorage in this remote backwater of the lower Solomons to threaten strategic US interests.  By 1942 Japan's long range air reconnaissance operating out of Tugali could vector devastating land and carrier air attacks on US fleets transiting sea lanes to New Zealand and Australia.  The admiral's insight changed the course of the War in the Pacific.  Only his determined effort drove America's first land offensive in the Pacific War, amphibious landings by American Marines on Tugali and Guadalcanal.

These August 7, 1942 landings ignited a desperate struggle for control over the lower Solomons after the Marines seized a Japanese airfield under construction on Guadalcanal.  This airfield the Marines named Henderson Field became the subject of a titanic test of wills.  The reason was simple.  Harsh facts confirmed and amplified Admiral King's original insight.  The combination of open water, narrow channels and the paucity of suitable sites for airfields in the neighborhood gave whoever controlled Henderson two game changing ingredients: the ability to defend or destroy the US lines of transit south to Australia and New Zealand and also a launch pad for offensive actions that could turn the tide against their enemy.  Thus, a Japanese Henderson Field ceded most of the South Pacific to Japan and it gave them a platform from which to sever direct US access to Australia and New Zealand.  Conversely an American Henderson Field thwarted such as Japanese offensive.  And it gave the US the strategic base it needed to attack Japan's control of the Solomons all the way north to Rabaul.  In short, THE JAPANESE HAD TO BE STOPPED AT GUADALCANAL.  A rough dirt airstrip, unheard of before, suddenly was the most precious real estate in the South Pacific.  Whoever won control of Henderson Field sat in the Catbird Seat.

So Japan and the US fed ever more men, ships, and planes into the vicious air, land, and sea battles that see-sawed back and forth up and down the Florida Straights until mounting losses finally exhausted the Japanese.  Forced to evacuate Guadalcanal in February of 1943, they left a platform from which US forces launched a series of air and sea attacks and amphibious landings that rolled the Japanese back up the Solomon Islands chain to Bougainville.  Its capture in November of 1943 closed out the first great chapter of the Pacific war.  Why?  The reason is simple.

The US victory in the South Pacific capped a twenty-month campaign that turned the tide against Japan after its incessant combat depleted Japan's war machine beyond the point of replenishment and repair.  Never again could it take the offensive.  Thereafter Japan was rocked back on its heels again and again.  With ever-diminishing resources, it was forced to fight Allied enemies that grew ever stronger as American factories flooded the Pacific Basin with new ships, planes, and amphibious landing craft of revolutionary design and function.  And the Allies, with their powerful new arsenal and greatly improved strategic position on Bougainville, could bypass Japan's stronghold at Rabaul and break out of the South Pacific in a two pronged rampage of historic reach and result.

CLICK TO ENLARGEOne prong of attack leapfrogged amphibious landings up the New Guinea coast to isolate Japanese armies on the southwest flank of the Pacific battlefield, leaving them stranded as if prisoners of war, as the second prong, a sea-borne thrust across the Central Pacific, smashed Japan's outer and inner defenses across 8000 miles of open ocean.  These twin offensives worked in tandem.  Like pincers they ran Japanese forces caught in between ragged.  One pincer isolated whole armies on the east while the other punched across the Central Pacific, chewing up enemy airpower and armies by amphibious assaults on islands like Tarawa, Saipan, and Tinian.  Each conquered island strangled part of Japan's inter dependent defenses, while it also became a US platform from which to launch new attacks until Saipan and Tinian together became launch pads for an altogether new and complimentary third front.  One that took the war directly to Japan's home islands by air with devastating affect until US strategic bombing rendered Japan's further resistance tantamount to suicide.

But first we will set the stage.  We'll discuss how the Japanese arrived at Guadalcanal before they ran head on into Admiral Ernest J. King and his American Marines.  Then we'll detail the huge significance of the South Pacific Campaign on the balance of the war, and the battles King fought not only against Japan, but also against his peers on the Joint Chiefs of Staff to achieve those results.  Then we'll move to the sea, air, and land offensive that carried the American forces across the Central Pacific to the Asian rim before forcing Japan's unconditional surrender.

Onslaught

CLICK TO ENLARGEAfter Japan’s December 7, 1941, surprise attack on Pearl Harbor, its forces swept like a scythe down and around the eastern rim of Asia and through the Southwest Pacific before driving deep into the South Pacific.  Along the way they seized strategic points on the Chinese coast, secured bases in French Indochina, invaded Thailand, tossed the British out of Malaya and the Dutch out the East Indies and booted the US out of the Philippines.  After raids deep into the Indian Ocean, they invaded New Guinea in the Southwest Pacific and the Bismarck Archipelago before slicing deep into the South Pacifc.

Click to Enlarge: Dark Blue pre WW II, Light Blue Conquest

Japan’s strategic plan for this campaign and its tactical execution were brilliant.  Its opening gambit was stunning in its reach and result.  Air attacks along a 7000-mile arc of Pacific sunrises in a morning shifted the balance of strategic power in Far East.  Japan's warplanes in rapid succession crippled the US Pacific surface fleet in Hawaii, the US Far East Air Force in the Philippines, and British air forces in Malaya.  The latter exposed the core of the British Far East Naval Fleet to destruction 36 hours later, clearing the way for amphibious assaults that collapsed empires. 

CLICK TO ENLARGEIt started shortly before Pearl Harbor with a series of Japanese styled blitzkriegs centered on sea-borne shock troops pre-positioned by stealth under the cover of night.  In northern British Malaya three coordinated landings in different locations used surprise amphibious assaults and overwhelming air support to devastating affect.  Stunned defenders fell apart under the shock.  Air forces that escaped annihilation typically fled.  Many defenders surrendered on the spot en masse.  Others in panicky retreat abandoned weapons, supplies, and fully equipped airfields to their relentless attackers who quickly used those assets to transition into light infantry supported by armor and air power.

CLICK TO ENLARGE Left without air cover on December 10, the British Far East Fleet offshore was hollowed out by Japanese torpedo bombers that sank the pride of the British sea-power, The Prince of Wales and its consort, the heavy battle cruiser Repulse.  The newly arrived Far East British Fleet Admiral Tom Philips went down with his Flagship.  The whole of Malaya, now isolated, was left to fend for itself.  There the Japanese used combined arms in rapid maneuver onshore to press their advantage, building momentum from abandoned airfields, supplies, and equipment, and flanking maneuvers offshore by amphibious assaults, to create new waves of power that fueled overland advances down the Malayan Peninsula.  In 60 days they drove 600 miles through "impassible jungle" to seize the fortress at Singapore.  This key unlocked the Indian Ocean to the west and the Dutch East Indies to the east.  So they sailed their fleet into the Bengal Bay and plunged their armies deep into Burma on the West, and they drove far into the Southwest and South Pacific on the east.

Within four months, Japan’s Rising Sun had crushed empires built over centuries by the western colonial powers and yoked the wreckage roughly together under a hegemon's boot.  In one hundred and twenty days Japan had come to dominate more territories, peoples, and cultures in the Orient than controlled by the Roman legions two millennium earlier in Europe and Middle East.  They conquered much with little, using less than 20% of their army (10 divisions) and half of their air forces.  Yet, on land, they lost not a battle, nor ceded an inch, until stopped on August 7, 1942 by a combined force of 15,000 American Marines landing on Tulagi and Guadalcanal.

But how and why?

Debacle at Sunrise

CLICK TO ENLARGEJapan’s dawn attack on Pearl Harbor flared westward like wildfire for good reason.  The US controlled Philippines in late 1941 was pointed like “a knife at the heart of Japan’s home islands.”  The US Forces there were building rapidly to foil Japan’s plans to seize the oil rich Dutch East Indies (whose resources were critical to its survival), and to launch attacks if necessary against Japan.

At Clark Field on Luzon the US was constructing fortified revetments to house a fleet of its newest and most powerful airborne war machine, the B-17 long-range strategic bomber.  The Americans had come to believe that this bomber was an ultimate weapon, an elixir to a long term problem, an easy way to defend their Far East holdings quickly and on the cheap.  Proponents argued that B-17s offered a defensive and offensive Silver Bullet that could defeat an amphibious landing force single handedly and far offshore by dropping bombs from high overhead, sinking such a force in its ships at sea before it landed.  If true, the planes might well deter war.  Or, if necessary, the B-17s on Luzon could sink enemy forces before they reached the Philippines, British Malaya, and Dutch East Indies, and then fly from Clark Air Field north and “light Japan’s paper cities afire.”

CLICK TO ENLARGESo B-17s were flying every week to Clark Field direct from California factories.  36 had arrived by early December.  I65 more would arrive by February 1.  And a total of 280 planes, the world's largest fleet of B-17s, would anchor a powerful US Far East Air Force at Clark Field by April 1, 1942.  Then the US Pearl Harbor Fleet would protect the continental United States and radiate power throughout the Pacific basin, while the Army Air Force on the Philippines would project US power around the Asian rim, defending US interests and attacking Japan if necessary.  That was the plan. 

So, despite the need for more time to build assets on Luzon to defend the B-17s, Secretary of War Stimpson and General George Marshall couldn't resist this quick fix. US interests were severely threatened.  Time was of the essence.  The US oil embargo was bound to force Japan to act one way or another.  It could either capitulate to America's demand that it abandon its ambitions on the Asian continent in return for oil which left it dependent on its enemies, or it could join the German Axis in war and attack those who threatened its survival and Manifest Destiny. There was no middle ground.

That's also how Japan saw its choice.  And its decision for war was easier than we might expect. Indeed it was most likely inevitable.  Capitulation might start the oil flowing again but it would leave resources critical to Japan's survival at the mercy of the US and its Allies in the Pacific.  And it would also expose Japan to its enemies in Asia and the German war machine that would surely arrive in the Far East after it conquered the Soviet Union and Britain.  But Japan’s second choice, if successful, would remove this risk and its attendant humiliation, while it also offered Japan a huge opportunity.  If Japan joined the Axis Powers in war by expanding its war against China to include the western colonial powers in the Far East, it would open the resource rich colonies in Malaya and the Dutch East Indies to conquest by Japan.  This freed Japan from foreign dependence and coercion while it also fulfilled its Manifest Destiny to liberate (ie to take by force) the wreckage left by the defeated colonial powers.  These were precious spoils indeed, the western colonial dominions on the Indian subcontinent, Southeast Asia and the Pacific - plus Russian Siberia and the rest of China whose conquest solidified Japan's hold over Formosa, Manchuria and Korea.  Japan would become the dominant and undisputed power in all Asia.

Click to enlarge: Colonial Empires Coveted by Japan

Surely then the Japanese Empire could defend itself against, and divvy up the globe with, the only two world powers left standing: the German Axis Empire and the US. But time was short.  The French and Dutch hedgemony in the Orient had collapsed.  Germany was at Moscow's gates.  Britain teetered on the brink of historic defeat.  An allied Japan and Germany could defeat the exhausted Russian and British empires and toss them into the bag with the vanished French and Dutch.  But unless Japan acted with dispatch, a huge US bomber force on the Philippines could attack Japan within a few months and a vastly expanded US blue water fleet would come on line in 18 months just as Japan's oil ran out, leaving its armed forces powerless.  Japan's choice was stark, act now or await disaster.

 CLICK TO ENLARGEAnd America must be hit.  Now unprepared for war it was rearming madly and arming the Soviet Union and Britain to fight Germany and China to resist Japan, and it had cut off Japan’s import of US scrap metal, aviation fuel, oil, and most machine tools.  Soon it'd be able to destroy Japan unless its Pacific fleet at Pearl Harbor and growing Far East Air Force on the Philipines were crippled long enough for Japan to conquer its empire and for Germany to defeat the British and Soviets.  Then, with the Axis Powers in the catbird seat, America would have to negotiate.  Then too it could be offered a deal it could not refuse, something like all of North America.  But to win Japan had to act with startling efficiency, speed, surprise and power, before its oil ran out.        

So, in the summer of 1941, an arms race on the US Philippines and Japan’s captive Formosa 250 miles north reached a fevered pitch.  War became inevitable.   In June Germany had invaded the Soviet Union, and Japan with German help forced Vichy France to accept Japanese bases in Indo-China, a platform from which to assault British Malaya and Dutch East Indies.  The US in response had ramped up the Flying Tiger’s Air Force to counter Japan’s war against Nationalist China, and it persuaded the exiled Dutch Government to join with it in cutting off Japan’s oil supply.  By September, the Japanese grand strategic plans of attack were fixed.  By now, too, the US was “reading a good deal of Japan’s mail,” thanks to its Magic cipher intercepts.  So war loomed as the months passed.  And the US arming of China and the Philippines grew furious while its embargo of exports also tightened the noose around Japan's neck, even though these actions might push Japan into a war that the US desperately needed to delay, given its lack of readiness to fight.

CLICK TO ENLARGEJapan was racing the oil clock to strike first.  On 10 November its army and navy commanders began ironing out the final tactical details of their grand plan.  Ten days later its Southern Army of 10 Divisions published its final orders leaving only its D-day blank.  By early December its forces were moving into position.  A carrier fleet moved across the Pacific to attack Pearl Harbor.  Land based air power on Formosa readied to destroy the US B-17 fleet at Clark Field and its Asiatic Naval Fleet anchored in Manila Bay, clearing the way for landings on the Philippines, Malaya and the Dutch East Indies.  Indeed on Formosa, its 300 veteran pilots had trained seven days a week since September, refining tactics and developing radically new ones to reach Central Luzon, destroy American air power there and return home safely. To gain this advantage, Japan's fighter pilots had stripped all excess weight off their Zero fighters then flew at different altitudes and speeds, tinkering with prop revolutions and fuel mixtures, until they found the formulas that doubled the Zeros' range to an unheard of 1200 miles. This married the world's best long range fighter pilots to the world's best long range fighter planes.  Combat loaded Zeros could fly in formation 540 miles to the Manila then fight, kill and survive aerial dog fights over their targets, protecting bombers as they destroyed America's Far Eastern Air Force, then escape with enough fuel to fly home to Formosa. A Mission Impossible months before, was cocked and loaded to fly at dawn 8 December 1941.

 

The Plan of Attack

300 planes in five prongs would strike 5 widely disbursed targets simultaneously.  3 prongs would bomb collateral targets.  27 bombers would hit Tuguegarao Field to gain air control over an amphibious landing on Luzon's north coast.  A 2nd prong would target the vacation residences of MacArthur and Philippine President in Baguio northeast of Manila to behead or panic enemy leaders.  Far to the south, a carrier air strike on Davao's seaplane anchorage would blind long range US air recon in the South China Sea where Japan's ships were moving to attack Malaya.

As these attacks flared around the country, the main force of 192 planes would fly south to strike at the heart of US power in the Philippines.  One prong would hit Nichols Field outside Manila to strip the fighter air cover off the US Navy Base at Cavite.  The other would strike Clark Field 65 miles north of Manila to destroy the US bomber force on the ground, clearing the way for later strikes against the US Asiatic Fleet at Cavite and remnants of the US Air Force.  Thereafter, amphibious landings would smash the “captive” US and Philippine ground forces at Japan's convenience. 

As Imperial Navy flattop swung into position to hit Pearl Harbor and warplanes on Formosa and in South China Sea waited to launch against the US Far East Air Force, General Marshall in Washington DC also waited on a razor's edge.  On November 24 his War Department, citing Japanese troop movements, had warned of "a surprise aggressive movement in any direction, including attack on Philippines...". Three days later his War Department issued MacArthur a "final alert", saying "hostile action possible at any time."  Now the Magic intercepts were lighting up the Pacific Rim like a Christmas tree.   Japanese ships loaded with troops were moving south along China's coast and toward the Gulf of Siam, a trip wire into Malaya.  War also hung in the air in Washington DC as well.  US Japanese oil and China negotiations had collapsed.  Japan's ambassador had effectively ended talks with Secretary of State Cordell Hull, and his diplomatic mission there was destroying its cipher machines.  So it was no coincidence that only an hour before Japan started World War II in the Pacific, Marshall sent MacArthur a radiogram: Japan had issued “what amounts to an ultimatum … be on alert accordingly.”  

Marshall knew the US was unprepared for war, but had cause for optimism regarding the Philippines.  In reply to earlier warnings, General Douglas MacArthur assured the US War Department “that everything was in place, including long range reconnaissance, for a successful defense of the Philippines.”  A relieved Marshall expressed his deepest gratitude to MacArthur.  Marshall was not alone.  Days later on November 26 MacArthur told Philippine President Quezon that a Japanese attack before April was impossible.  On December 5 he advised Vice Admiral Tom Phillips, the newly arrived Commander of the British Far Eastern Fleet, that the: “inability of the enemy to launch his air attacks on these islands is our greatest security … (and his) inability to bring not only air, but mechanized and motorized elements, leaves me with a complete sense of security.” 

Indeed MacArthur's apparent sense of security was so great he had earlier forbid US air reconnaissance over Formosa, deeming such flights an unnecessary provocation despite regular Japanese air probes of his defenses, and his contrary assurances to General Marshall.  Yet, despite MacArthur's assurances to outsiders in high places, those in his command considered war eminent.  His Air Command and the US Navy at Cavite Naval Base were on high alert.  His prohibition against air recognisance remained in effect despite his Air Commander's assertion that such flights were critically necessary given the eminent threat, and the US Asiatic Fleet Admiral Hart telling his subordinates to expect an attack "within a matter of days, if not hours."

CLICK TO ENLARGEIn fact, the moment Marshall sent his urgent radiogram, US P-40 fighters were flying to intercept two Japanese planes probing weather conditions and US defenses for their sunrise attack. These intruders, who narrowly escaped, uncovered valuable intelligence for Japan: their strikes had little chance of catching the Americans by surprise.  US forces on Iba Field had detected their midnight probe early enough to scramble fighters and challenge it offshore, using a whole new capability that tracked intruders across the night sky while it vectored in the US fighters to intercept their targets.  Now with US airfields on high alert, Clark Field would have sufficient warning to get its B-17s airborne in time to escape their destruction on the ground.

To counter this newly discovered capability, the Japanese shifted their attack plan away from Nichols Field on Manila Bay, moving it 85 miles north to Iba Field.  This targeted the new US warning system and shortened their flight over enemy airspace, reducing the defenders reaction time.  It also allowed one flight to hit Iba first then fly another 20 miles to join the other's attack on Clark, concentrating two prongs of attack on the B-17 bombers.  So, Japan's commanders were nimble indeed, as MacArthur slept.

 

Meanwhile, 5,300 miles to the East, World War II started for America when Japanese warplanes came out of the sunrise to cripple to US Pacific Surface Fleet and Air Force at Pearl Harbor. Marshall, expecting a strike on the Philippines next, immediately cabled MacArthur at 3 a.m. Philippine time “with priority over all others . . . (and stated) Hostilities between Japan and the United States, British Commonwealth, and Dutch have commenced.  Japanese made air raid on Pearl Harbor this morning December seventh.  Carry out tasks assigned in Rainbow Five so far as they pertain to Japan … Report daily major Dispositions and all operations you have …

Dec. 7, 1941 Sunrise at Pearl Harbor

 

The US Navy Asiatic Fleet at Cavite learned of the Pearl Harbor attack at 0257. Alerts and instructions were going out to all ships and stations fifteen minutes later.  The newly arrived Marine Regiment was arming its fighting men by 0400, handing out ammo to the Marines who'd fire it.

MacArthur received Marshall message via phone call from his Chief of Staff Sutherland around 0315 at home but made no apparent effort to contact anyone.  He read his bible awhile, had his usual breakfast, dressed, called his driver, and was transported to his nearby office, arriving around 0500.  Later, he would only admit to receiving Marshall's cablegrams around 0400.  Either way he was bound by clear and unequivocal orders.  Marshall's cable and Pearl Harbor attack triggered the US Rainbow Plan Five that required his immediate defense of the Philippines by striking any pending threat at its most likely point of origin.  Absent an enemy fleet known to be offshore, the most obvious threat lay coiled on Japan’s airfields 540 miles north on Formosa.  Despite Rainbow and Marshall's direct order, MacArthur took no concrete action to implement either.  Indeed he acted to thwart the efforts of others under his command to carry out those orders.

Gen. Lewis BreretonHis air commander, Major General Brereton, totally on his own initiative at 4 a.m. when told of the Pearl Harbor attack, ordered his B-17s at Clark Field to prepare for action per Rainbow Plan Five then rushed to MacArthur’s headquarters for authority to hit Formosa.  The need was compelling.  Enemy air forces there would likely strike Clark Field at dawn, just as they'd struck Pearl Harbor hours before, unless the US bombers destroyed the enemy air bases first.  Yet, MacArthur in his Headquarters refused to meet Brereton on his arrival at 0500.  Too busy, said Sutherland, despite MacArthur being steps away behind his closed office door.  Brereton was told to return to his Neilson Field HQ to await instructions.

Luckily for MacArthur, nature intervened on Formosa.  Fog unexpectedly socked in the Japanese airfields, delaying the attackers scheduled lift off.  Far to the south, however, in clear weather off the island of Mindanao, the light carrier Ryujo launched its aircraft at 0400, in time for a dawn strike at Davao in the Southern Philippines.  And as fog lifted on Formosa’s west coast 75 minutes later, two flights of Japanese bombers headed south, one for Tuguegarao Airfield, the other to strike Baguio.  But the main attack force against Iba and Clark remained socked in by fog on the east coast at Tainan Naval Air Base.

PBY -CLICK TO ENLARGEThe grounded pilots there knew the risks of their exposure as dawn approached. For years they’d dominated China’s skies, but once, caught by surprise on the ground, disaster ensued. It was 3 October 1939, when twelve SB twin-engine Russian built bombers surprised their 200 warplanes on the tarmac at Nankow.  Most were destroyed.  Their pilots had learned their lesson well: never get caught on the ground.  So now fog, rare on Formosa in December, had turned these hunters into knowing prey.  Surely the Americans, after the Pearl Harbor attack hours before, were on their way seeking retribution.  Why not?  The Americans knew where to find them. For weeks Japanese fighters had been chasing US photo recon planes around the southern tip of Formosa.  Zeros scrambled every time the big twin-engine PBY flying boats came lumbering in out of the clouds, flying slow and low at 1,500 feet, taking pictures. But the US Navy flyers were clever at hide and seek, ducking in and out of clouds, to escape with photographs showing Japan's growing array of war machines poised to strike.  So surely the Americans also knew now how their enemy sat grounded in the fog, ripe for killing before they could rise up and kill Americans first.  Japan's pilots rightfully waited in dread.  But while Admiral Hart's US Navy flyers, and the Army Air Force commander Brereton, knew the threat was imminent and where to destroy it, only MacArthur had the authority to launch the attack.  But he refused even to meet his Air Commander.  

Meanwhile the news of war electrified Luzon.  Manila's public radio station had been broadcasting the "Bombing of Pearl Harbor" since before dawn.  The feared day of reckoning had arrived.  People had taken to the streets.  Hundreds of sky watchers and thousands of ordinary civilians scanned the sky, awaiting the inevitable attack.  Far to the south, at 0600, the Ryujo’s warplanes hit the US Navy installation at Davao, strafing seaplanes and a seaplane tender.  MacArthur, informed of the attack minutes later, remained holed up in his splendid isolation, mum, as General Marshall, learning of attacks against Singapore, Thailand, and Northern Malaya, grew ever more frustrated by MacArthur's silence.  So Marshall sent a 3rd cable, demanding MacArthur's reply, and waited. So did US fighter pilots on high alert, sitting on the tarmac awaiting orders.  But they heard nothing, and waited some more.

CLICK TO ENLARGEAt 0630, if the US radar had been working at Burgos in Northern Luzon, its operators would have detected 27 Japanese bombers 150 miles offshore, headed their way.   But they couldn't get their newly arrived gear up and running, so the bombers kept coming south undetected.  General Brereton was also unaware of the bombers flying at him from up north, but expected the worse after Davao, so he returned to MacArthur's headquarters at 0715.  Again Sutherland blocked MacArthur's office door.  When Brereton protested, again arguing for a strike on Formosa, the chief of staff ducked into the inner sanctum then returned adamant moments later.  “The General says no.  Don’t make the first overt act.”

CLICK TO ENLARGEBrereton is said to have asked "Overt act!  What's bombing Pearl Harbor and Davao!"  Sutherland replied, "What's up in Formosa?  You don't have the photo intelligence for an effective attack."  Perhaps Brereton couldn’t admit to his photos, whether shared by the Navy or otherwise, given MacArthur's prohibition against air recon flights.  So as American generals argued and MacArthur refused to meet his own Air Commander charged to protect the Philippines against air attack, a man who stood only steps away his office door, 27 Japanese bombers crossed into Luzon at 0730.  Amid the engines roar, frustrated radar operators at Burgos ran outside to discover enemy planes directly overhead.  Radar had failed the US operators an hour before.  Now, with a visual sighting, they couldn't get their radio to work.  Or at least it no longer reached Brereton’s headquarters.  Enemy action didn't knock out the radio.  A covert operation did.  MacArthur's headquarters had filched Breteton's radio receiver that very morning, and replaced the filched set with one tuned to the wrong frequency, all without Bereton's knowledge. 

Perhaps that's why MacArthur refused to allow Brereton into his office or speak with him.  He was too busy listening to Breteton's radio receiver.  In any case, five hours after Pearl Harbor, an hour after the Davao attack, Brereton returned to his HQ empty handed.  Unable to strike back, his pilots were dumbfounded.  All they could do was wait for Japan's "overt action!"  Translated: get strafed and bombed.  General Marshall also waited, ignorant from MacArthur silence, despite three cablegrams to his Far East Commander.  At 0755 Philippine Time, a frustrated General of the Army George C. Marshall ordered General Gerow (his chief planner) to call MacArthur directly.

“Have you been attacked?” asked General Gerow. 

“No attack at all,” said MacArthur, flatly.

CLICK TO ENLARGEYet, at that very moment sky watchers and the frustrated radar operators up in Burgos were phoning and telegraphing in reports of incoming enemy aircraft.  Likely too, while speaking with Gerow, MacArthur was also listening to Brereton's radio receiver and reports from Iba Field's radar because, after he admitted to Gerow that intruders had approached the Philippines around midnight, he also mentioned a flight "detected within the half hour some 30 miles off the coast. We've taken off to meet it.  So assure General Marshall that our tails are up in the air." The chat concluded with Gerow's admonition to put this news and all future news in writing and keep Washington informed by radiogram of events as they unfolded.  MacArthur offered no explanation for failing to follow these same orders from Marshall delivered nearly five hour earlier. 

CLICK to enlarge Nichols FieldBrereton, back at Neilson, was also now receiving phone and teletype reports of incoming flights.  One was headed south down Luzon's central valley, the other coming in from the east over Lingayen Bay.  Both appeared headed for Clark Field.  So Colonel George, V Interceptor Group commander at Neilson Field, ordered his 24th Pursuit Group to intercept.  His call went to Major Glover who commanded the 24th from Clark, although its five squadrons were each stationed at a different field.  One was at Nielson just outside Manila.  The others were clustered north of Manila at Nichols, Del Carmen, Clark, and Iba (the latter furthest north on the coast 85 miles from Manila).  To protect Clark, Grover sent 18 P-40s from Clark to a point 40 miles north to intercept the flight over the Central Valley.  He sent another 18 P-40s out of Nichols to fly on the Clark squadron's right flank.  He ordered the squadron at Del Carmen to circle Clark Field, a flying ramart flung up against intruders coming from the northeast over Lingayen Bay.  (And, although Glover forgot to notify the B-17s to take flight, their crews were alerted by an base officer on his own initiative after learning of the threat from a random phone call.)

Unknown to the defenders, these counter measures were futile.  The 27 enemy bombers that came in over Burgos stopped far short of Clark, striking Tuguegarao airfield 60 miles south of the north coast, instead.  The Lingayen Bay flight veered north of Clark then south to strike Baguio.  Obviously, however, MacArthur still had his ear to his filched receiver.  The Bagio attack at 8:22 jolted him into instant, yet unexpected, action.  Instead of alerting and then riding herd on his air command, MacArthur hurriedly alerted the one command unable to thwart the attack, the one he'd stiff armed all morning - General Marshall back in Washington.  (Apparently he felt a compelling need to let Marshall know that he, MacArthur, was personally under attack.)  So, as the strike continued, MacArthur dictated his Marshall radiogram which, in his excitement, also spilled the beans about the Davao attack, and claimed erroneously that his fighter planes were in aerial combat north of Clark Field at that very moment, while he ignored Brereton who was trying to get through by phone yet again for permission to launch a counterstroke.  But now even Sutherland didn't take Brereton's call.  It was 0850 before Sutherland returned the call only to rebuff Brereton's latest plea then add insult to injury, ordering Brereton "to stop pestering the General."

As MacArthur dithered and his Chief of Staff insulted his Air Commander, the 48 airborne US fighter pilots that rose to defend Clark circled, waiting to shoot down attacking bombers that had come and gone by 0835 after hitting undefended targets.  The 19 airborne American bombers also circled, trying to stay out of harm's way for hours.  Meanwhile two other Pursuit squadrons remained on highest alert, on the ground. A few of those pilots who'd taxied out onto the tarmac and waited, cramped in their cockpits, fiddling through different radio frequencies at random, heard the Japanese chatter during their attacks on Baguio and Tuguegarao, but couldn't move without orders to fly.  The rest flew circles or sat grounded, ignorant, and unemployed.

Meanwhile, on Formosa the weather had cleared and the knockout punch was coming MacArthur's way.  At 0850 slow G3M twin engine bombers lumbered off, aimed to destroy Iba and Clark.  Fast bombers left next followed by long range Zero fighters. All the warplanes were winging their way south by 1000, aiming to rip the heart out of America's strategic air power in the Far East starting at 1230.

Although still ignorant of this latest threat, Brereton's rising anxiety and frustration overpowered his orders "not the pester the General."  He phoned Sutherland again at 1000, only to be rejected yet again.  This time, however, Brereton had his aide on the line recording the conversation when he emphatically stated that any strike that put Clark Field out of action would cripple his B-17's strategic offensive capability.  Only Clark could launch B-17 attacks within range of Formosa.  It's likely that Sutherland sensed that the recorded call could shift responsibility for any debacle directly onto Sutherland and his boss.  Why?  Because Brereton's phone was ringing 15 minutes later.  And this time MacArthur's voice came over the line.

The discovery dropped Brereton into subservience, reporting his preparations for a photo recon mission over Formosa as Sutherland had earlier suggested.  This may well have been the last thing MacArthur wanted to hear.  Brushing the air recon aside, MacArthur told Brereton he could attack at any time and place, at his sole discretion. That was it!  No discussion or analysis. No weighing of options.  No consideration of timing, forces, targets, risks, or rewards.  No thoughtful exchange of tactics, or strategic alternatives at all.  Just: do it as and when you want.

Brereton must have felt the sting of a hot potato fall into his lap.  Then rising fears and suspicions.  In the terrible game of airborne attack it's all about who hits first, when, and how, with what results. Thousands of lives, your's and the enemy's, as well as the laurels of glorious victory or the shame of humiliating defeat, ride on such decisions. So they're the jealous preserve, the grand job and crushing responsibility, of great commanders.  But Macarthur who had failed to act for hours (thus greatly reducing chances for success while imposing ever graver risks) abruptly drops the Grand Critical Decision, the very essence of his command responsibility, in the lap of a subordinate.  One he's refused to speak with during the last six critical hours that screamed for a command decision.  Then MacArthur hangs up, leaving no record of the decision or conversation, as if to flee its consequences, leaving a very prime potential scapegoat behind.  Instead of an inspired Air Commander.

Meanwhile the decisive battle for the Philippines and American power in the Far East is coming at MacArthur's command at 150 miles an hour.  Had Burgos's radar been fixed on Luzon's northern coast, it would have detected the leading flight of the Knockout Punch 150 miles offshore at around 0940.  But without radar, all of Luzon is left in the dark until 1045 when the first bomber flight crossed the Philippine coast, headed for Clark.

The US Army Air Force at Clark Airfield, however, is headed in an altogether different direction.  It issues an all clear signal and orders the long circling US warplanes home to roost.  The returning pilots, some up since midnight, most unfed since the night before, are shocked to learn that two enemy air attacks occurred while they patrolled empty skies.  Anger, frustration, disbelief, and adrenaline collapse, compounds their exhaustion.  Most stagger off to eat, drink, and try to relax, as their planes are refueled.  Brereton's order to load 3 B-17 with cameras for a recon mission to Formosa adds further confusion.  Why take more photos? wonder the Intelligence people, passing out photos to B-17 pilots whose crews have begun racking bombs aboard B-17s to strike Formosa, bombs that will incinerate their patrons on the ground less than 90 minutes later.

CLICK to Enlarge SCR-270 radarShortly before 1100 disturbing reports of altogether new flights of bombers over Luzon's north coast begin to trickle into Neilson and Clark Fields by phone.  Then at 1120 Iba radar detects incoming bogies 130 miles out over the South China Sea.  Minutes later, the flight that first crossed Luzon's north coast enters into the 150 mile range of Iba's radar, coming fast down Central Luzon.  Iba tracks both prongs now and thereafter it reports each 20 miles of their progress to Brereton's HQ at Neilson.  So Colonel George, receiving these reports roughly every 6 minutes, plots the intruders direction and speed, trying to get a fix on their intended targets before he orders Glover's 24th Pursuit Group at Clark to mount a new defense. 

By 1130 Brereton has joined Colonel George at the V Interceptor Group Command Center at Neilson when, based on Iba reports, he teletypes Grover at Clark that the South China Sea flight, now 60 miles out from Lingayen Bay, is headed for Iba.  But Glover, who's getting visual phone reports doubts the teletype's veracity, believing that the Lingayen flight is headed south for Manila.  So, despite Neilson's message, he sends up the Iba squadron with orders to circle the airstrip to intercept the Lingayen flight before it reaches Manila.  And, to further buttress Manila's defense, he orders his Del Carmen squadron to Manila.  15 minute later at 1145, Nielson reaffirms the Lingayen Bay flight's heading for Iba, and tells Glover that the Central Luzon flight is aimed at Clark.  In response Glover sends his Nichols squadron to Clark's defense, yet fails to order his B-17's at Clark airborne.  So as he plots Clark's defense, B-17s outside his window continue to be loaded with bombs that soon will insure their own destruction.  

In Iba's radar shack at noon, clusters on the lit screen look like an on-coming train wreck.  The operators there, staring at quivering blobs, report enemy bombers 47 miles from Iba and headed their way while the Central Luzon flight is closing in on Clark from 60 miles off.  But Grover at Clark is living in an alogether different world.  Neilson has gone silent.  So Glover hears nothing about what Iba is seeing.  Instead he occupies a command hanger flooded with phone reports of visual sightings of enemy aircraft overhead, flying toward Manila.  To Glover those sighting make perfect sense.  The Japs must be going after MacArthur and the President Quezon again, this time at Manila, just like they tried to hit them at Baguio hours ago, plus now they can also hit the US Cavite Navy Base at Manila too.  Plus Iba's radar has already burned Glover once that morning, causing him to defend the wrong targets when the real ones were MacArthur and Quezon at Bagio.  Why should he play the fool again? 

P-40s at Clark FieldSo, at noon, having already sent the Nichols squadron north to defend Clark, Grover shifts the squadron circling Iba to Manila to join the squadron he sent there 20 minutes before.  And soon the chatter pointing to an attack on Manila increases.  So Grover turns around the Nichols squadron headed north for Clark, sending it south to Manila.  Now three US squadrons are flying to Manila.  And the visual reports of Jap planes headed for Manila only grows louder in Grover's ears.  So at 1210 he orders up one of his last two Squadrons on the ground at Clark, sending it to Manila too.  Now four US squadrons are circling or rushing to defend Manila.  And 19 B-17s and Glovers last fighter squadron are parked wing tip to wing tip outside his hanger, defenseless against 190 Japan's warplanes that are 15 minutes away, coming directly at them at 150 miles an hour to destroy Clark and Iba Fields, its precious radar, and America's capacity to wage an offensive strategic air war in the Far East.

CLICK TO ENLARGEDespite Neilson's silence, this disaster has loomed in Iba's radar shack for the past 45 minutes, growing ever closer as the radar operators there have been updating Neilson every few minutes. First Iba reported enemy bogies 150 miles off and most recently that they're closing to 87 miles off, 67 miles off, 47 miles off, 27 miles off, coming at Iba and Clark.  Yet Nielson failed to pass these reports on to Glover at Clark after 1145.  Why?  All we know is that Brereton left the Neilson Plotting Room at 1145, returning to his office to take a call from Sutherland.  MacArthur wants to know what's going on. Why?  Likely he getting the visual reports that Glover is getting, a rising chorus saying he's a target?  Does Sutherland remind Brereton his radar earlier that morning sent interceptors to the wrong place with the result that MacArthur and Quezon's vacation homes got bombed without an air defense?  Brereton later said he and Sutherland discussed reports of Jap warplanes headed for Manila (where MacArthur sits) then discussed Brereton's plans to strike Formosa at dusk that evening!  Why?  Who can say, except only that MacArthur's Manila's HQs has Bereton in its grip and won't let go.  As disaster looms in plain view, America's Far East Command freezes as if deer in headlights.

And Glover is left holding the bag.  But at least Glover acts.  However uncertain, he acts based on changing information however unreliable it later proves to be.  Talk about being dealt a losing hand.  Each time he sends a flight of US warplanes to defend Manila, the sky watchers flood his air control hanger with reports of enemy planes overhead, winging toward Manila.  What's happening?  Most likely this: Between 11:30 and 12:15, the four flights of 16 US fighters that travel 60 to 80 miles south to defend Manila morph into hundreds of visual sightings of ever more Japanese squadrons overhead, headed south to bomb Manila.  The warning system Glover inherited from MacArthur's Command was that flawed.  And he's left to sort it all out as minutes flash by, his commanders and their radar go silent, and erronuous reports keep flooding his Command Post.  Meanwhile nobody alerts the remaining fighters and B-17 crews at Clark to get airborne, out of harm's way. Instead, they keep loading bombs into B-17s that will trigger their own Armageddon, outside Glover's window.     

Perhaps because Bereton is at last off the phone with Sutherland, at 12:15 Colonel George, Commander of V Interceptor Command, broke his long silence.  He sends Glover a teletype ordering all fighters in the 24 Pursuit Group to intercept Japanese attackers over Clark Field.  Glover's powerful SCR transmitters flash the news:

"Tally Ho, Clark Field!  Tally Ho, Clark Field."  Translated: turn Glover's entire defense posture around on a dime!

Of course, it was too late.  By shortly after 1 pm, the Japanese had effectively destroyed the US Far East Air Force in the Philippines along with Clark and Iba Fields, including the latter's Radar.  The campaign was lost and the door to the Dutch East Indies and points south was smashed open.

What explains the conduct of General Douglas MacArthur on the morning of Dec. 8?  In truth, we'll never know.  It's that inexplicable.  But here are some broad possibilities.  Ones that in this writer's view might best explain his inexplicable actions.  Consider what MacArthur knew and didn't know that morning.  He knew Japan had reached as if by magic four thousand miles across the Pacific, using carrier air power, to strike a heavy blow against "our strongest point", Pearl Harbor.  He knew that the same enemy had more than a dozen air bases on Formosa only 540 miles away.  He knew his command was totally unprepared, despite all his assurances to Marshall, Quezon, and many others to the contrary.  He knew his life and illusions were coming unravelled, soon to be exposed.

He also knew, given Pearl Harbor, that Japan could attack him from any direction and hit any target within the Philippines without warning, using land and carrier based warplanes followed by amphibious landings anywhere along thousands of miles of coastline?  So the prime threat to the Philippines that morning most likely lurked right off its coasts, poised to strike.  To counter it, he needed his B-17s to find that threat then hit it, and destroy its amphibious landing force at its weakest point, when launching an amphibious landing from a few miles offshore.

Thus, to send his biggest offensive and defensive weapons, B-17 bombers, willy-nilly far to the north without US fighter support to attack little known (but heavily defended) targets on Formosa might well be a Fool's Errand.  One that could leave his command naked against an altogether different threat from different forces coming from a different direction.  But where was that threat exactly?  What were its capabilities?  MacArthur didn't know.  He was desperately short of intelligence (and a plan to take advantage of it).  And things easily could spin out of his control.  Hence the filched radio receiver.  Hence also his first guest that Dec. 8 morning behind closed doors.  Why?  Maybe Admiral Hart, the US Asiatic Fleet Commander, knew what was going to happen next.  Hart had picket ships offshore in the South China Sea.  Hart had PBY spy planes flying the ocean.  Hart had the only other radar operating in the Phillipines, just south of Manila.  For months MacArthur had been ignoring, insulting, and stiff-arming the more senior Admiral Hart.  You do your Navy thing with "your little fleet", I'll take care of my business, so butt out was MacArthur's attitude save for those minutes before dawn when suddenly he realized that Hart might have what he needed most.

Admiral HartSo MacArthur met Hart first thing, at 5 am, behind his closed doors.  Most likely, given the Admiral's statements to others, Hart told MacArthur to expect a dawn air attack launched from Formosa, and perhaps from other directions, given the sea-borne nature of the Pearl Harbor attacks, and the movement of Japanese ships throughout the South China Sea.  He may have also predicted an Amphibious Landing as early as that morning, given that one enemy amphibious force was already at sea.  Its target was a small Philippine island off the north coast.  And he was aware of the massive buildup of amphibious forces at the southeast tip of Formosa.  Was the admiral also aware of the fog over Formosa?  This writer does not know.

But what happened next confirmed MacArthur's wildest fears.  All of the Philippines seemed to be within enemy range.  Japan's carrier aircraft stuck far to the south at Davado at 0600, then hit North and Central Luzon 1100 miles away at 0830.  After Pearl Harbor, given the distances between targets, it was as if Japan had hit Los Angeles then struck Boston and Atlanta three hours later.  MacArthur's head must have been spinning.  Given the man's temperament and insecurities, the fact he'd been caught by total surprise, proven a fool, and simply did not know what to do, may well have triggered feelings of terrible helplessness and desperate anxieties in the face of exposure and lose of control.  If so he would have gone to great lengths to hide these new realities, his mistakes and their consequences, from his superiors (George Marshall), subordinates (Bereton), and those he felt beholden to (President Quezon).  His world and its illusions had begun to come apart.  This, and more, may explain his inability to act.      

Conflicting obligations may also have fed into MacArthur's dithering.  His historic attachment to, and affection for, the Philippines is well known.  He'd also been on the Philippine President's payroll for years, working on behalf of Quezon's government to build its defenses with US help and to facilitate the scheduled Philippine independence from the US.  That work and pay arrangement continued after MacArthur returned to active duty in the US Army in the late summer of 1941, at a time when Quezon was seeking ways to play both sides of the fence, working hard to expand US aid while also trying to slip its noose, and gain the Philippines' neutralty if war broke out between Japan and America.  Thus any unilateral US strike on Formosa from the Philippines would surely destroy Quezon's dream of neutrality.  Thus, to attack Formosa from Luzon without a very substantial overt Japanese act of aggression against the Philippines first, might well also threaten MacArthur's pocketbook.  Less than a month later, MacArthur received $500,000 in cash from President Quezon for services rendered, a huge sum in 1940.  Thus, on Dec. 8, MacArthur had a great deal riding on keeping Quezon happy, including matters of his personal self interest.

CLICK TO ENLARGESo, it's reasonable to suspect that MacArthur was returning every phone call from a frantic President Quezon that hectic morning of Dec.8.  Indeed, it's quite likely that his time was dominated by the volatile and loquacious Quezon whose sole interest was doing what was best for the Philippines, namely gaining its independence and avoiding turning his country into a battlefield, if at all possible.  This may explain the great mystery of what Macarthur was doing that fateful morning, seemingly alone, holed up in his office.  With one eye on his now shaky $500,000 payment, and the other on keeping an America ally happy, he had to a least pretend to serve (and perhaps was serving) Quezon's interests ahead of his own country's.  And such activity during those critical hours had to be held far away from prying eyes and ears.  Most particularly those of his air commander Brereton and his boss George Marshall until he figured out what he was going to do, and how he was going to do it.  In short, it's quite possible that MacArthur was playing a high stakes game on many different and conflicting fronts and levels during the morning of December 8.

Whatever the cause of MacArthurs' conduct on the morning of May 8, it surely had a devastating impact on his chain of command, and its ability to defend Luzon.  His actions undermined his commanders ability to act, their confidence and morale, and their standing to lead in the eyes of the men they were charged to lead.  Another myriad of obstacles also thwarted his subordinate commanders.  General Brereton, for example, was brand new to the Philippines, having arrived on Nov. 4 to build a whole new command essentially from the ground up, given that the readiness and capacity of the existing air command was woefully inadequate to the challenges that faced it.  Despite these urgent needs in the Philippines, MacArthur on Nov. 14th sent his newly arrived air commander out of the country on a 10 day "planning mission" to Australia.  On Bereton's return, MacArthur instructed him to immediately depart yet again on another lengthy planning mission, this time to the Dutch East Indies and Singapore.  Bereton pleaded successfully for an 11 day delay.  On the night of Dec. 7, the officers under his command gave Bereton A Welcome Aboard Bash that was still going at 2:30 am the next morning when Japan struck Pearl Harbor.

Col. George and Major Glover faced equally daunting obstacles.  An effective early warning system within their command against air attack required not less than ten interactive radar sets linked into highly efficient communication and plotting systems manned by highly experienced personnel.  Glover had one set installed days before, operated by novices.  The rest of his radar system sat in shipping crates, save for the one inoperable set just arrived in Burgos.  His 'backup" visual sighting reporting system of volunteers was designed not only to fail, but to provide inaccurate information.  In sum, neither Col. George nor Major Glover had a chance.

CLICK TO ENLARGENor did the pilots under their command.  The older US fighter planes on the Philippines were hopelessly obsolete, the brand new ones tottered on the edge of obsolescence.  The newly arrived P-40s took more than 30 minute to climb high enough to effectively attack Japanese bombers.  (Zeros got there in 11 minutes)  And the P-40 were so slow on ascent that Zeros easily send them flaming to earth.  Nor did the US pilots know how to fly their new planes in combat.  (Gunfire drills, for example, had been curtailed for lack of 50 cal. ammo!)  US ground crews lacked the facilities, spare parts, maintenance manuals, and expertise to properly maintain the new planes.  The B-17 pilots and crews had not a chance either.  They were totally inexperienced for the job at hand and their new edition B-17s bomber had so many flaws the British had relegated them to sea patrol duty.  New and complex weapons and the men who man them require months of training, testing and refinement in combat before they become fully combat effective.  The American air command on the Philippines had not a chance against the battle hardened, combat tested, determined and well led Japanese who flew their war machines like wizards.

The deplorable state of MacArthur's command on the Philippines serves as a metaphor for US readiness on the opening day of the War in the Pacific.  Everyone and no one was at fault.  The blame rested within American society and its institutions.  From years of neglect, failures of imagination, will, and character.  And from a failure of an American democratic process long paralyzed by politics.  Our government failed the nation.  The remarkable truth, however, is that 36 months later America returned to the Philippines with the most powerful armada of land, sea, and air power ever assembled in the history of war to defeat the Japanese who were hopelessly out gunned, out equipped, out maneuvered, and out led.  How did this incredible turn of the tables happen at all, much less in 36 months.  At first glance, it appears a paradox.  But hidden within America's great weaknesses is America's great strength.  It lies dormant until ignited by crisis and those who rise to meet it, citizens molded by America.  A place whose system and ethic builds the flexibility, character, and independence of thought to quickly accomplish prodigious change of near miraculous proportions.  This is the essential truth of America's 1940's War in the Pacific.  It's a great story.  One that is worthy of telling and retelling throughout the ages.  This website will endeavor to try.

By Reed Fawell

For further fact, insights, and contrary opinions, concerning what happened in the Philippines on Dec. 8, 1944, see the following recommended reading:

1. The following books provide highly focused and detailed accounts of events relevant to above article and so are highly recommended: Doomed at the Start, by William H. Bartsch; Samurai!, by Saburo Sakai; December 8, 1941, MacArthur's Pearl Harbor, by William H. Barsch.  All these books are published by Naval Institute Press.

2. United States Army in World War II in War in the Pacific Strategy and Command: the first two years, by Louis Morton, 1993

3. The Fall of the Philippines, by Louis Morton, 2008

The following more general readings are also recommended:

1. A Different Kind of Victory (Bio of Admiral Thomas C. Hart), by James Leutze, 1981, Naval Institute Press

2. MacArthur and Defeat in the Philippines, by Ricard Connaughton, Overlook Press, 2002

3. Fortress Against the Sun (the B-17 Flying Fortress in the Pacific), by Gene Eric Salecker, DeCapo Press, 2001

4. But Not in Shame, by John Toland, Random House, 1961,

5. Flying Tigers, by Daniel Ford, Smithsonian Institute Press

6. Buffaloes Over Singapore, by Brian Cull, Grup Street. 2003

7. The Battle for Singapore, by Peter Thomson, Portrait , 2005

8. Britain's Greatest Defeat, by Allan Warren, hambleton continuum, 2002

9. The Most Dangerous Enemy, by Stephen Bungay, Aurum Press, 2009

10. MacArthur 1941-1951, by Gen. Charles Willoughby, McGraw-Hill, 1945

11. Inferno, the World at War, 1939 -1945, by Max Hastings, Knoph, 2011

12. MacArthur, by Richard B. Frank, palgrave macmillan, 2007

13. Old Solders Never Die, by Geoffrey Perret, Random House, 1996

14.  American Caesar, by William Manchester, Little Brown, 1978

15. A Summer Bright and Terrible, by David Fisher, Shoemaker and Hoard, 2005,

16. The Untold Story of Douglas MacArthur, by Frazer Hunt, Devin Adair Company, 1954

17. The Years of MacArthur, Vol. II, by D. Clayton James, 1975

copyright (C) 2011 by Reed Fawell, all rights reserved

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A new article dealing with the battle on the US Join Chiefs of Staff over Guadalcanal versus a 1942 cross channel invasion of France will be published soon.

MEANWHILE SEE ALSO: 2ndarmoredamphibianbattalion.com

Note - Photo Credits under construction

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copyright (C) 2011 by Reed Fawell, all rights reserved -

Aug. 1942: U.S. Marines approach the Japanese occupied Guadalcanal in the Solomon Islands during World War II. (AP Photo)

 December 26, 1943, Marines wade into Cape Gloucester beach, New Britain, Papua, New Guinea. (AP Photo)January 1944: U.S. Marines come ashore from the mouth of a Coast Guard manned LST, during the invasion of New Britain Island, at Cape Gloucester. (AP Photo)

March 22, 1943, Marine and his Grumman Wildcat fighter of Guadalcanal Cactus Air Force (AP Photo)