The Pacific War - week by week

Last time we spoke about the offensive against the Gifu. The estimation of the Gifu defenses proved to be greatly underestimated and it was only after the Sea Horse was taken and the Gifu was severely isolated that its defenders began to crumble. At the last minute 100 Japanese came out screaming, tossing grenades and bullets, but ultimately the Gifu was taken and now the American forces on Guadal...

Last time we spoke about the crazy scramble between the Japanese and Americans as a result of preparation for Operation KE. The American intelligence network was working overtime trying to figure out what the Japanese were cooking up, while the Japanese did their best to feint and hide their intentions. Then we spoke about the enormous offensive performed by the US Army and 2nd Marine division on...

Today, another chapter opens up in Guadalcanal: it is to be the final chapter of the campaign, the last American offensive, the final Japanese defeat. As we saw previously, the Japanese had approved plans for the evacuation of this Island of Death, but it would take time to prepare for such an operation. In the meantime, the Japanese forces on Guadalcanal were starving, their strength waning with...

Last time we spoke about the secretive discussions amongst the top ranking Japanese military leaders that lead to the creation of operation KE. Both the IJA and IJN were grasping at straws trying to figure out a way to save face and get their boys off Guadalcanal. The Guadalcanal campaign had to be abandoned and now the IJA and IJN would share the responsibility of holding a new defensive line in...

Last time we spoke about the First Arakan Campaign. General Slim and Lt General Irwin Noel were beginning to have a budding bromance, but Noel simply wanted to see other people and it led to disaster. All jokes aside, Noels attempts to keep Slim away from military campaign seems to have really hurt the war effort in the CBI theater. Slims men and the Chinese forces who came to India received terri...

Last time we spoke about the grueling battle for Buna-Gona. The villages of Buna and Gona had been captured, but the Americans and Australians had a lot more ground to take before their job was done. By Christmas day American companies were marching upon the Buna government station while the Australians were marching in the direction of Giruwa. Then over on starvation island the situation was so d...

Last time we spoke about the grueling fall of the villages of Buna and Gona during the Buna-Gona offensive. The Americans, Australians and Japanese had been at it for weeks in a battle of attrition for the Buna-Gona area, a battle General Douglas MacArthur was impatient to draw out. Because of the drive to speed up the seizing of the territory, every day became a groundhog day of morning bombardme...

Last time we spoke about the battle of Tassafaronga. It was a defeat, but also a major humiliation for the American navy. A American Cruiser-Destroyer group lost to an inferior destroyer-transport group that they had managed to surprise. The issue of the mark XV torpedoes were still plaguing the Americans and would continue to do so well into 1943. Admiral Tanaka managed to perform his new drum te...

Last time we spoke about the long and bloody patrol of Carlson’s raiders. Shoji and his men were in for a nasty surprise when they disappeared into the jungle for a long march back to the 17th Army, for they were not alone. Carlson’s raiders hunted them down for over a month killing 488 Japanese at the cost of 16 marine lives. Shoji’s main body had been reduced to just 800 men when he finally rejo...

Last time we spoke about the battle for Buna and Gona. The American and Australians forces pushed the Japanese towards the Buna-Gona area and with their backs against the wall and nowhere to retreat, the defenders began fighting to the bitter end. Wave after wave of american ground assaults were met by concealed bunkers holding machine guns and treetop snipers. The New Guinea offensive was going t...

Today, the sun begins to set on the Empire of the Rising Sun. The decisive battle to destroy the American Navy had failed; their overland offensive through the Kokoda Track had failed; their attempts to recapture Guadalcanal and its important airfield had failed. Meanwhile, the Americans had successfully launched their counteroffensive on the Southern Solomons and the Australians had managed to co...

After many weeks of seeing the brutal fighting that was unfolding in the Southwest Pacific, we are finally reaching the apex of the Guadalcanal Campaign. With three failed attempts to recapture the infamous Island of Death and with their latest victory on the Santa Cruz Islands giving them the illusion that they had achieved naval supremacy over their enemies, the Japanese again prepared for a pla...

Fifty weeks have passed since that infamous day in which the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor, setting in motion the Pacific War that we have been covering in this series. For many months, we’ve seen the relentless Japanese forces achieve tremendous feats of conquest but also commit horrendous war crimes against innocent people; we’ve seen the tenacious Allied defenders suffer defeat after defeat on...

Last week, we covered the failed third Japanese attempt at retaking the important island of Guadalcanal. The unmitigated disaster that was the Battle for Henderson Field would prove to be the last attempt of the invaders to contest the Americans in what they believed to be the most decisive campaign of the war. Yet at the same time, two American carriers would take on four Japanese carriers in a b...

After the recent defeat at the Bloody Ridge, the Japanese Empire knew for the first time in the Pacific War that they were finally losing the initiative. The US Marines had proven to be resilient foes, and their invasion of Guadalcanal was looking like it could become the most decisive battle of the war. If the Americans could be defeated, then their offensive ambitions could be checked and the Ja...

After so many delaying actions and rearguard engagements, after seeing so many of their comrades die at the hands of the enemy, after enduring months of almost no provisions; the time has finally come in the Kokoda Track. The recent failures in Guadalcanal, coupled with the Japanese inability to adequately create a supply line, has finally forced General Horii and his relentless South Seas Detachm...

In our last episode, we covered the direct aftermath of the key Battle of Edson’s Ridge, the second Japanese offensive in Guadalcanal that caused so many losses for the invaders that it’s today remembered as the Battle of the Bloody Ridge. Because of this major defeat and because they started to feel like they were losing the initiative against their enemies, the Japanese then began to prioritize...

With the withdrawal on the Kokoda Track and the recent defeat at the Battle of Edson’s Ridge, the Japanese high command was now beginning to understand that they were losing the initiative against the resilient American and Australian forces in the Pacific. In that regard, more resources began to be allocated for the Guadalcanal Campaign, in a build-up that would lead to one of the bloodiest engag...

As we saw in our last episode, we are amidst one of the key points of the Pacific War. With the disastrous defeat on the bloody slopes of Edson’s Ridge, the Japanese high command started to comprehend that they were losing the initiative against the tenacious and resilient American forces in the Pacific. Now, General Horii continues his difficult and harsh advance along the Kokoda Track, not knowi...

Ten months after the start of the Pacific War, we are reaching one of the high points of the conflict. In the Kokoda Track, General Horii’s South Seas Detachment relentlessly continues its advance towards Port Moresby, and unbeknownst to him, he’s marching to his final doom; and in Guadalcanal, the Japanese forces of General Kawaguchi are preparing for their second major offensive of the campaign,...

Back on August 24, the Japanese had commenced their amphibious invasion of Milne Bay, aiming to occupy the airstrip at Rabi to employ it for the overland drive against Port Moresby. Believing it to be held by few enemy soldiers, Admiral Mikawa only sent forward a small force of SNLF marines, which would be vastly outnumbered by the Milne Force of General Clowes; but despite their numerical inferio...

In our last episode, we covered the carrier Battle of the Eastern Solomons, as the Japanese attempted to land reinforcements on Guadalcanal, and we’ve also covered the start of the Battle of Milne Bay, in which a numerically-inferior Japanese force managed to push back the defenders towards the airfield at Rabi. Yet during this period, new developments were also unfolding in the Kokoda Track. With...

During the last year, the Japanese Army proved to its adversaries that it was an unstoppable behemoth, defeating the British, American, Dutch, Indian and Australian forces at every place they managed to advance on. But in the last week, their so-called invincibility was finally debunked with the defeat of the Ichiki Detachment at Alligator Creek; yet the conclusion of the Battle of the Tenaru also...

Guadalcanal was one of the most brutal campaigns of the Pacific War, as the US Marines not only had to fight the relentless assaults of the enemy in that jungle hell, they also had to fight malnutrition, lack of supplies and tropical diseases that would eventually disable nearly two-thirds of General Vandegrift’s force. Yet after the Battle of Savo Island, these problems were only starting to emer...

The disastrous Battle of Midway is remembered nowadays as one of the major turning points of the Pacific War, leaving the IJN significantly weakened. The Japanese would still continue to secure more territory, but it was now the allies who held the strategic initiative, and the Americans would then go on to execute Operation Watchtower, the first Allied offensive of the Pacific War; and as we’ve s...