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  • HISTORIC U.S. PACIFIC VICTORY

    Guadalcanal, Solomon Islands · February 9, 1943 On this date in 1943 Guadalcanal, the largest of the nearly one thou­sand islands in the Solo­mons, was declared secure. U.S. Marines had landed on the pre­viously obscure is­land begin­ning on August 7, 1942, in the first major offen­sive by Allied forces against Japan. Opera­tion Watch­tower, as the air-sea-land…

  • U.S. SEA MINING TARGETS JAPANESE SHIPS

    Honolulu, Hawaii • October 29, 1943 In World War II’s Pacific Theater, sea mines—explosive under­water devices that damaged, sank, or deter­red Japa­nese war­ships, sub­marines, and mari­time com­merce—were wea­pons that had dif­ficulty gaining the same respect as guns, bombs, and tor­pe­does enjoyed in the U.S. ar­senal. Over time, how­ever, a small number of mining advo­cates in…

  • U.S. MORAL EMBARGO ON EXPORTS TO JAPAN

    Washington, D.C. · July 2, 1940 America responded to Japan’s invasion of China in 1937 and to the many news reports of indis­crimi­nate bombing of Chinese civil­ian tar­gets by im­posing trade restric­tions on exports to Japan. Ini­tially a procla­ma­tion by Presi­dent Franklin D. Roose­velt on June 26, 1940, it morphed into an expres­sion of national moral…

  • PACIFIST BECOMES JAPAN PRIME MINISTER

    Tokyo, Japan · October 9, 1945 On this date in 1945 in Tokyo, Baron Kijūrō Shidehara became Prime Minis­ter of Japan at the head of a consti­tu­tional govern­ment com­mitted to pur­suing a peace­ful future. Before the war Shide­hara had been a pro­mi­nent Japa­nese diplo­mat and a leading pro­po­nent of paci­fism in Japan. On the same…

  • MANILA’S LIBERATION AT HAND

    Manila, Philippines · February 3, 1945 On this date in 1945, 35,000 soldiers of the U.S. Sixth Army under Lt. Gen. Walter Krueger, sup­ported by 3,000 Filipino guerril­las, began entering Manila, capital of the Philip­pines, and soon liber­ated nearly 6,000 Allied and Fili­pino pri­soners. Some of them, like the 64 U.S. Army nurses, were taken captive…

  • U.S. SUB WAHOO MISSING ON PATROL

    Honolulu, Hawaii · October 11, 1943 On this date in 1943 the USS Wahoo, a Gato-class (early World War II) sub­ma­rine under Com­mand­er Dudley “Mush” Morton, was sunk in the La Pérouse (Soya) Strait, the chan­nel that sepa­rates the north­ern Japa­nese island of Hokkaidō and the Rus­sian Sakha­lin Penin­sula. Armed with ten tor­pe­do tubes, the…