Leyte Island, the Philippines • October 20, 1944 On the same day (Japanese time) the forces of Imperial Japan struck Pearl Harbor, Hawaii, in a surprise assault on U.S. military installations, they struck the American territory of the Philippines. On May 6, 1942, Japan swept the last American garrison from the archipelago by capturing Corregidor Island,…
Off the Mariana Islands, Central Pacific • June 12, 1944 On this date in 1944 in the Marianas, U.S. carrier aircraft began attacking Japanese defenses on Saipan, Tinian, and Guam in preparation for the 3‑week battle for the archipelago’s administrative center, Saipan. Eight hundred U.S. warships carrying 162,000 fighting men were set to smash into the…
Washington, D.C. • April 3, 1945 On this date in 1945 the Roosevelt administration appointed Gen. Douglas MacArthur Commander-in-Chief U.S. Army Forces Pacific (AFPAC), responsible for all Army and Army Air Forces units in the Pacific Theater excepting Maj. Gen. Curtis LeMay’s Twentieth Air Force based in the Marianas. At the same time Adm. Chester…
Off the Coast of Leyte Island, the Philippines • October 23, 1944 Allied campaigns from August 1942 to early 1944 had driven Japanese forces from many of their South and Central Pacific island bases, while isolating many of their other bases in the same area. The Allies bypassed a few Japanese bases like Rota in the…
Aboard USS Shangri-La • July 28, 1945 In December 1941 the Imperial Japanese Navy had the second most powerful navy in the Pacific Theater in World War II and the third largest navy in the world after the U.S. and Royal navies. During the first years of the war the Japanese Combined Fleet (Rengō Kantai), the IJN’s…
Leyte, Philippines · October 20, 1944 In October 1944 Lt. Gen. Tomoyuki Yamashita commanded 225,000 Japanese soldiers in the Philippines. On this date in 1944, on a 25‑mile stretch of Leyte Island in the Philippines, an Allied fleet of more than 730 transport and escort vessels, supported by aircraft carriers and 100 warships, put 160,000 U.S. troops…
Aboard the USS Shangri-La · July 28, 1945 The Imperial Japanese Navy had the second most powerful navy in the Pacific Theater in World War II and the third largest navy in the world after the U.S. and Royal navies. During the first years of the war the Japanese Combined Fleet, the IJN’s main ocean-going component,…
Off the Mariana Islands, Central Pacific · June 12, 1944 On this date in 1944 in the Marianas, U.S. carrier aircraft began attacking Japanese defenses on Saipan, Tinian, and Guam in preparation for the 3‑week battle for the archipelago’s administrative center, Saipan. Eight hundred U.S. warships carrying 162,000 fighting men were set to smash into…
Washington, D.C. · April 3, 1945 On this date in 1945 the Roosevelt administration appointed Gen. Douglas MacArthur Commander-in-Chief U.S. Army Forces Pacific (AFPAC), responsible for all Army and Army Air Forces units in the Pacific Theater excepting Maj. Gen. Curtis LeMay’s Twentieth Air Force based in the Marianas. At the same time Adm. Chester…
Leyte, Philippines · October 20, 1944 In October 1944 Lt. Gen. Tomoyuki Yamashita commanded 225,000 Japanese soldiers in the Philippines. On this date in 1944, on a 25‑mile stretch of Leyte Island in the Philippines, an Allied fleet of more than 730 transport and escort vessels, supported by aircraft carriers and 100 warships, put 160,000 U.S. troops ashore under…