Marines in the Marianas: Volume 1 - Saipan

By Eric Hammel

The American mid-1944 campaign in the Mariana Islands was an important strategic step that placed Tokyo and the rest of Japan’s industrial heartland within range of the new U.S. Army Air Forces B-29 very-long-range bombers. Once the islands were secured and the airfields were built, the army air forces in the Pacific could do to Japanese industry what their counterparts in Europe had been doing to German industry since mid-1943.
Even though these important objectives in the Marianas had been accorded an early place in prewar strategic planning, the shape of the Pacific War had left them alone for two and a half years of hard battles in the Solomon Islands and at the far eastern periphery of Japanese central Pacific holdings: first Tarawa in November 1943, then the Marshall Islands in January and February 1944.
The first and most difficult objective in the Marianas was Saipan, a former German colony that had been in Japanese hands since the end of World War I but had not been fortified in any meaningful way until the spring of 1944. By early June, despite effective interference from U.S. Navy submarines, the island was defended by approximately thirty-one thousand combat troops of varying quality and in various states of readiness. Squaring off against the defenders were two battle-hardened Marine divisions, each numbering about twenty thousand troops and supported by an array of twelve combat, combat support, and service battalions, not to mention ample carrier air support and U.S. Navy warships.
Relying mainly on 290 gripping photos gleaned from government archives, many with extended captions, veteran military history author Eric Hammel has created a stunning and coherent battle history dedicated to the memory of the United States Marines who endured the bloody campaign to secure Saipan from its stubborn defenders.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Pacifica Military History
• Release date: Jun 6, 2013
• ISBN: 9781890988623

Eric Hammel

The late Eric Hammel was one of America's leading military historians with more than 40 well-received books published over a 50-year career. His previous books on the Solomons campaign, Carrier Clash, Carrier Strike, Decision at Sea, and Starvation Island, are among the leading authoritative sources on the subject due to their extensive use of first-person testimony.

Book preview

Marines in the Marianas

Volume 1: Saipan

A Pictorial Record

Eric Hammel

290 Photos

The American mid-1944 campaign in the Mariana Islands was an important strategic step that placed Tokyo and the rest of Japan’s industrial heartland within range of the new U.S. Army Air Forces B-29 very-long-range bombers. Once the islands were secured and the airfields were built, the army air forces in the Pacific could do to Japanese industry what their counterparts in Europe had been doing to German industry since mid-1943.

Even though these important objectives in the Marianas had been accorded an early place in prewar strategic planning, the shape of the Pacific War had left them alone for two and a half years of hard battles in the Solomon Islands and at the far eastern periphery of Japanese central Pacific holdings: first Tarawa in November 1943, then the Marshall Islands in January and February 1944.

The first and most difficult objective in the Marianas was Saipan, a former German colony that had been in Japanese hands since the end of World War I but had not been fortified in any meaningful way until the spring of 1944. By early June, despite effective interference from U.S. Navy submarines, the island was defended by approximately thirty-one thousand combat troops of varying quality and in various states of readiness. Squaring off against the defenders were two battle-hardened Marine divisions, each numbering about twenty thousand troops and supported by an array of twelve combat, combat support,and service battalions, not to mention ample carrier air support and U.S. Navy warships.

Relying mainly on 290 gripping photos gleaned from government archives, many with extended captions, veteran military history author Eric Hammel has created a stunning and coherent battle history dedicated to the memory of the United States Marines who endured the bloody campaign to secure Saipan from its stubborn defenders.

Books by Eric Hammel

76 Hours: The Invasion of Tarawa (with John E. Lane)

Chosin: Heroic Ordeal of the Korean War

The Root: The Marines in Beirut

Ace!: A Marine Night-Fighter Pilot in World War II (with R. Bruce Porter)

Duel for the Golan (with Jerry Asher)

Guadalcanal: Starvation Island

Guadalcanal: The Carrier Battles

Guadalcanal: Decision at Sea

Munda Trail: The New Georgia Campaign

The Jolly Rogers (with Tom Blackburn)

Khe Sanh: Siege in the Clouds

First Across the Rhine (with David E. Pergrin)

Lima-6: A Marine Company Commander in Vietnam (with Richard D. Camp)

Ambush Valley

Fire in the Streets

Aces Against Japan

Aces Against Japan II

Aces Against Germany

Air War Europa: Chronology

Carrier Clash

Aces at War

Air War Pacific: Chronology

Aces in Combat

Bloody Tarawa

Marines at War

Carrier Strike

Pacific Warriors: The U.S. Marines in World War II

Iwo Jima: Portrait of a Battle

Marines in Hue City: Portrait of an Urban Battle

The U.S. Marines in World War II: Guadalcanal

The U.S. Marines in World War II: New Georgia, Bougainville, and Cape Gloucester

The U.S. Marines in World War II: Tarawa and the Marshalls

The Forge

Coral and Blood

The Road to Big Week

Islands of Hell

Always Faithful

The Steel Wedge

Marines On Okinawa

Marines In the Marshalls

Marines On Peleliu

Marines On Guadalcanal

Marines In the Solomons

Marines On New Britain

Text Copyright ©2012 by Eric Hammel

Book Design and Layout Copyright ©2012 by Words To Go, Inc.

All Maps Copyright ©Meridian Mapping

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopy, recording, or any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher.

Requests for permission to make copies of any part of the work should be mailed to: Permissions, Pacifica Military History, 1149 Grand Teton Drive, Pacifica, California 94044.

ISBN-10: 1-890988-62-6

ISBN-13: 978-1-890988-62-3

Book Design and Type by Words To Go, Inc., Pacifica, California

Cover Design by Tom Heffron, Hudson, Wisconsin

Maps by Meridian Mapping, Minneapolis, Minnesota

***

For a complete listing of all the military history books written by Eric Hammel and currently available in print or as ebooks, visit: http://www.EricHammelBooks.com A free sample chapter from each book is available in the site’s Free section.

Please also visit http://www.PacificaMilitary.com

This book is respectfully dedicated to the gallant American soldiers, sailors, airmen, and Marines who stood their ground and achieved the stunning victory in the Pacific

Contents

Author’s Note

Glossary and Guide to Abbreviations

Introduction

Saipan

Author’s Note

On August 7, 1942, eight months to the day following the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, the United States struck back against the empire’s Pacific juggernaut with an ill-planned amphibious assault at Guadalcanal by the undertrained 1st Marine Division. Although the Anglo-American war plan called for the defeat of Germany foremost, news that a Japanese airfield was under construction in the Eastern Solomon Islands was too provocative to ignore; aircraft that would soon operate from the new airfield would threaten the vital sea lanes connecting the U.S. mainland to the principal Allied Pacific base and war depot in Australia. The stakes were high for the first major Allied offensive in the Pacific, and the 1st Marine Division’s four-and-a-half-month stand on Guadalcanal was a cliffhanger, but the Marines defeated the Japanese army in one close-run action after another.

The American victory at Guadalcanal was followed by the commitment of several Marine battalions to the U.S. Army-run New Georgia campaign, and Marine Corps aviation came into its own during the year-long Allied advance from Guadalcnal through the Central Solomon Islands. The 3d Marine Division invaded Bougainville on November 1, 1943, and the 1st Marine Division went into action again in western New Britain in late December 1943. Also by late December, Marine Air had become