Aleutians, Gilberts and Marshalls

This is another book in the History of United States Naval Operations in World War II and covers the time period of June 1942 through April 1944.

Part 1 is about the recovery of the western Aleutians; part 2 is about the Gilbert Islands, and part 3 is about the Marshall Islands. As is usual with this series of books, there is a wealth of information about all three areas.

A few highlights from the book:

The book starts off talking about how things changed in the war technologically, noting that the Japanese planes never really changed much during the actual war, but that the U.S. planes evolved considerably to the point where they were better than the Japanese planes.

The Aleutian operations involved mainly the islands of Attu and Kiska, both of which were taken by the Japanese and retaken by the Americans. The bad weather in the area was what really kept offensive operations by either side to a minimum.

A banzai charge is discussed in which the Japanese overran a first aid station and stabbed wounded soldiers and the chaplain. They were driven back and some 500 of them committed suicide using their own hand grenades.

There's a section on logistics, how supplies were gotten to where they were needed in the Pacific.

Examples are given on how Japanese successes were tremendously inflated in Japan, often with totally fictitious numbers of American ships and planes being destroyed in battles in which the Japanese actually lost.

The importance of control of the air is discussed, as are examples of Japanese boasts that the Americans would never take this-or-that island in a million years.

Over and over again we read of how the Japanese used banzai charges which did damage, but invariably ended up in the destruction of the entire charging group. The Japanese were supposed to kill as many Americans as they could, but, often, they choose the banzai charge in which some Americans would be killed, but no Japanese would be left to keep on killing.



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