Podcasts about Akiyama

In the late 80s, the Soviet Union attempted to dominate the commercial launch market. Their principal success was launching the most miserable salaryman into orbit. Today, we're joined by Josh from The Worst of All Possible Worlds podcast to talk about Glavkosmos, the Soviet private space program. Find Josh and Worst Of All Possible Worlds here Support FTL on Patreon and unlock bonus content! Source: - Soyuz TM-11, Spacefacts.de - Soviet Efforts To Enter the Launch-Services Market, CIA - Akiyama Toyohiro: The Japanese Astronaut Who Hated Space, Unseen Japan Theme song provided by DJ Danarchy.

  Dr. Janet Patterson: Welcome to this Aphasia Access Aphasia Conversations Podcast, a series of conversations about the LPAA model and aphasia programs that follow this model. My name is Janet Patterson, and I am a research speech-language pathologist at the VA Northern California Healthcare System in Martinez, California. Today, I am delighted to be speaking with Dr. Elizabeth Madden, an Assistant Professor at Florida State University in the School of Communication Sciences and Disorders and an affiliate of the Institute for Successful Longevity. Liz also leads the FSU Aphasia Research Laboratory. Liz's research, teaching and clinical interests focus on rehabilitation of aphasia, and specifically on understanding the relationship between spoken and written language abilities in individuals with aphasia and developing behavioral treatments to address reading and writing disorders post stroke. Her work also addresses the impact of aphasia on the friendships and social well-being of people with aphasia and their care partners. These Show Notes accompany the conversation with Liz but are not a verbatim transcript.   In today's episode you will hear about: the power of friendship and what people with aphasia and care partners think about how aphasia can affect the ability to create and sustain friendships, the definition of literacy and its behavioral components, and behavioral treatments for reading comprehension deficit in aphasia.   In 2024, Liz was named a Distinguished Scholar USA by the Tavistock Trust for Aphasia UK. The Tavistock Trust aims to help improve the quality of life for those with aphasia, their families and care partners by addressing research capacity related to quality-of-life issues in aphasia. Congratulations on receiving this honor, Liz. Aphasia Access collaborates with the Tavistock Trust for Aphasia in selecting the awardees and is pleased to have the opportunity to discuss their work and the career influence of the Tavistock Award.   Welcome Liz, to Aphasia Access Conversations.   Dr. Liz Madden: Thank you, Janet. I'm really happy to be here today. I also say thank you to Aphasia Access and to the Tavistock Trust for Aphasia. I'm very grateful for this award and excited to have this conversation.   Janet: I'm excited to be talking to you, my friend and research partner in several endeavors that we've been working on over the last few years.   Liz, as we've said, you were named a Tavistock Trust Distinguished Scholar USA for this year, and you join a talented and dedicated group of individuals. How has receiving the Tavistock Award influenced your clinical and research efforts in aphasia,   Liz: I first wanted to extend that thank you to the Tavistock Trust for Aphasia, and specifically Henrietta, the Duchess of Bedford and the honorable Nicole Campbell, and just a very gracious, sincere thank you for all the time and effort and support they give to aphasia researchers. I would say, I'm just delighted and very humbled to be recognized this year. I would say further that this award motivates my work that is focused on trying to really make an impact on the lives and quality of life and successful living for people who have aphasia and continuing my work. My beginning work was really more impairment focused, which some of that we will talk about, and I really value that. But having this award, and the more I stay in the field, it is extending that and making sure that everything I'm doing always is directly related to helping the lives of people with aphasia.   Janet: That leads right into the question I'd like to begin with Liz, which is about your recent work investigating the role of friendship for persons with aphasia. I believe in the power of friendship and community during joyful times and also during the sad times in one's life. In Aphasia. Access podcast episode number 119, Finding the person in front of aphasia, I talked with your friend and colleague, Dr Lauren Bislick, with whom I believe you collaborate to investigate friendship and aphasia. How did you become interested in this aspect of aphasia, and what can you tell us about your work in this area and your collaboration with Lauren?   Liz: Lauren and I did our Ph.D.'s together. We both were mentored by Diane Kendall at the University of Washington, so Lauren and I are Ph.D. sisters. Also, we were both at Project Bridge, led by Dr. Jackie Hinkley in 2018. That's really where my interest in friendship began. That conference brought together researchers, speech-language pathologists, people with aphasia, and their friends and family. I was the researcher at a table, and we ended up being Team Friendship. Lauren was also at this meeting, but she was at Team Yoga; Lauren does a lot of work with friendship, but also with yoga. My other colleague who does a lot of friendship work with me is Dr. Michelle Therrien here at FSU. She primarily works with children who use AAC, but her main research is friendship. She and I had already had some conversations about the importance of friendship, particularly for people who have communication disorders. The idea was we leave the conference and to take action and carry out some of the goals that were generated from that discussion. So that's when I reached back out to Lauren, because she was at that conference. Then I also reached out to my friend, Michelle Therrien, and other individuals who became part of our Team Friendship, Dr. Sarah Wallace, who's also one of our good friends and collaborators, and Rachel Gough Albritton who is one of Jackie Hinkley's former doc students and here at FSU as well. and the office of research. That is the background of some conversations before Project Bridge, but really for me, coming back and actually starting studies addressing different aspects of friendship, which I know we'll talk more about, was really brought about by the Project Bridge conference.   Janet: That is quite a story, and I can see you sitting around the table and developing Team Friendship - good for you.   We all know, Liz, that one of the unfortunate consequences of aphasia can be the loss of or the diminishing of friendships, or the disruption of the communication skills important to developing and sustaining friendship and community. What have you learned from people with aphasia about their successes and challenges in sustaining and creating new friendships.   Liz: Yes, good question. Well, at that conference that I mentioned, there were five or six people with aphasia, and initially our table was labeled something like, What happens in the long run? and we started having conversations. It was very clear after our initial conversation that the group centered on relationships and friendship, so we shifted to being friendship only. I will say, just at that table, it became very clear to me, that's what rose to the top when the group was thinking about the bigger picture of living life.   In a research project we've done there was a small sample of 15 people with aphasia, and we talked to them over time. I think the timing of a conversation is really something important to keep in mind when we're talking to people with aphasia about any topic, of course, but particularly friendship. From other studies we've noticed that responses are really different. If we're talking during the early days, maybe the acute days, versus the chronic days, we'd get really different responses. Just a quick summary, again, this was 15 people and a unique set. Most people in our study were a part of aphasia groups, and, of course, really motivated to do research. But I will say, when we looked at their responses, when asked to think back to the early days, all different aspects of friendship, how supported they felt, or how they were able to communicate, and we compared it to their responses in the now. Overall, the pattern was less satisfaction, feeling less supported or less able to engage in those earlier days, but more of a recovery pattern over time, but again, not for everybody. There were still a few people in our group that were reporting not having many friends. Our paper had a different light, a positive light about friendships. Some of the other papers out there have a more negative tone. It's a very important area we need to address. I was happy to see this group reporting, now that they had been living with aphasia for several years, their pattern of more negative responses early, and a recovering pattern now. They reported making friends with other people who have aphasia, and finding at this point, who are those good friends.   There's other great work being done by other colleagues, Brent Archer, Jamie Azios and Katie Strong, who are studying the same topic. They had a great paper that describes who stuck around, they were examining the next steps of what it takes to support the positive recovery that we know does happen for some people.   Janet: I like the positive perspective you are taking. Given that one has had a stroke, and given that the this is the situation in life, what is the positive? What can you do? Who are your friends? Look at positive ideas rather than publishing research on all the negative aspects. Kudos to you for doing that.   Liz: Thanks, all of it's important, right? We have to know that. I think we had a special group. I think we had a particularly positive outcome, and it was good to know that friendships don't disappear for everyone. But I think there's something that those people had done and that their friends had done, that we're still trying to learn more about.   Janet: Thank you for that work. Liz. It makes me think about the aphasia journey in that it involves not just the person with aphasia, but also their care partners and all the people around them. In your investigations of friendship, what do the care partners of persons with aphasia tell you about their successes and challenges in sustaining and developing friendships? These friendships could be individual friendships or partner friendships or group friendships through social, religious or professional activities or even community groups.   Liz: Thank you for this question. I think it's sometimes a forgotten group that we overlook, the care partners, and the critical role they play in the recovery of people with aphasia. I always try to have us remember we want the care partners to do well on their own as people, and so we've done a couple projects. We've just finished data collection on a much larger study of 80 aphasia care partners, and I'm just getting into those data. We did a Qualtrics survey and also did experience sampling, where we used a phone app, and four times a day for two weeks, participants got these little pings, and they had to tell us, Where are you? What are you doing? Who are you with? How are you feeling? When was the last time you interacted with a friend? Was it a text? I don't have the amazing outcomes for you yet. This project was a much bigger follow-up to a project a few years ago with 35 care partners. We, of course, wanted to interview them but then COVID was happening, so we settled for a really nice Qualtrics survey.   I will say that these individuals were surprised when we were reaching out to them. They kept trying to schedule their loved one with aphasia, and we said, “No, we want to talk to you about your friendships.” And they were surprised, asking, “You want to talk about me.' I will say they were very excited that we wanted to know about them. Back to the timeline I shared earlier in that very small study, the profile was opposite. We asked them about their friendships before they were caregivers, the early stages of caregiving, and then now, and their comments kind of make sense. Across the group they reported in the early stages, they felt like they had really great friends, support and satisfaction. People were rallying around them, coming to the hospital to support them. Many of them had been caregiving for a very long time when we did a comparison, and their reported friendship satisfaction and support was actually lower now. The questions were not the same and the groups were different, but as I told you a few minutes ago, the people with aphasia were more negative in the acute stage, and our small group were more positive now with how they're feeling about their friendships, and the care partners were the opposite. They were feeling more supported in the beginning, and now as time has gone on, some of them report the friends aren't there as much. Some of them felt like they were a burden, or they didn't know how to engage, being very selfless. They have dropped their own social interests to take care of their loved one. We did see in that project, that the longer, the more months a person had been caregiving, was correlated with poor self-perceived friendships and also how they perceived their loved one's health. That was just their perception. If they perceived their loved one to have more health concerns, not just a feature but overall health, they also tended to rate themselves as not as satisfied with their friendship. Bringing in that piece of information and the caregiving burden into our new projects, we did actually get scales on resilience and caregiving burden depression. In this new project we replicated some of our same questions, and we're now trying to look more at overall well-being, seeing how resilience and purpose in life and caregiving burden might play a role.   Janet: That reminds me of the commercials, when you are taking off in an airplane or when you are thinking about being a care partner, you do have to take care of yourself as the care partner before you can give the best care to the person with aphasia. Anything that we can do to focus on the person the with aphasia, and also focus on the care partner, I think, is good in terms of developing and sustaining friendships,   Liz: Yes. Care partners definitely have a lot more to say, and we haven't actually been able to do face to face interviews yet, but we did have a lot of really rich, open ended responses and surveys that we're still looking through. A piece I'm really interested in, is we have that one-time perception when they did our one-time survey, now we have their responses, we can track how people respond over a two-week period, were they always at home with their loved ones and not responding to friends? I think there's just a lot and again, trying to understand from this group what are the positives. Who are the people that have these positive responses? Then, of course, the next big steps are trying to provide more research resources and interventions for both care partners and people with aphasia. Our group has not yet reached out to friends, so that's a big part to come. I think other researchers have examined friends and a key part intervening with these friends too.   Janet: People with aphasia and care partners have different friendship styles and needs, and when aphasia disrupts communication, it can also affect the way a person approaches friendship. As speech-language pathologists, I believe that we can play a role in guiding a person with aphasia and a care partner to develop communication skills that can support friendship efforts. Liz, what are some ideas or actions that you might think of for speech-language pathologists in a busy clinical practice? What kind of actions can they take to support friendship activities, for a person with aphasia, recognizing, of course, that we are all different in our friendship activities. Also recognizing that you're at the very beginning of some of this work, I'm hoping that you have some ideas you might be able to share with us.   Liz: Yes, actually our very first friendship project addressed this topic. It was led by Michelle Therrien, and we surveyed about 40 speech-language pathologists trying to find out their view of the role that they think they should play. They find friendship to be very important. They find it to be in their scope of practice. But not surprising, were not aware of resources. They felt overwhelmed with how much speech-language pathologists have to cover, right? But it was really good to know that the group we reached out to found it to be a very important part of their practice that they want to address. I think you hit on something really important, that we teach and adopt having a person-centered care model, and we know that it's part of what we ask about. The simplest thing is asking. We don't need tools. We just need to make sure it's part of what we ask, making sure we're talking about relationships, talking about friendships.   There are some really great tools that do exist. There's the Stroke Social Network Scale by Sarah Northcott and Katerina Hillary from the UK. Katie Strong, Brent Archer, Jamie Azios and Natalie Douglas are a wonderful group who have been studying friendship. They've used the Social Convoy Model in some of their papers. It has a great visual that they have used, and therapists can also use. Basically, it is mapping out the social network of who's most important, which could be used one time, or as a pre-post measure. There are different ways, formal or informal, of trying to monitor someone's social network or how they feel supported. I don't think there's a target number of friendships and I don't think more means better, but it could be just making sure we're checking in and that we know that's an important part of therapy. We want them to be able to communicate and interact with friends. Speech-language pathologists are creative in to how to make that happen.   Janet: I agree with that view Liz, and I hope that speech-language pathologists will feel comfortable being creative and asking people about their friendships or what they might need to help maintain or sustain their friendships.   I would like to turn now to the topics of reading and literacy, which I know you have been investigating. While these terms are related, they are not synonymous. Would you please explain the difference between them and how you are investigating both in your research?   Liz: Yes. Thanks. That is a good question. To be honest, the first answer is not very scientific. When I was writing papers it was getting cumbersome to always write reading and spelling/ writing. The term came to be when I wanted to make sure that I was making it clear that I wasn't just focused on reading, but also concerned with the spelling and writing components. With my colleagues, Jessica Obermeier and Aaron Bush, we started using the term literacy for some of our work. People will have different ideas of what literacy might entail. I have been describing treatment as “literacy focused”, working on reading and spelling and writing.   My initial work was very much focused on reading, and over the past several years I became more interested in trying to also add on the spelling component. If we're working on spelling and writing it gives us a chance to inherently work on the reading. If we're only focused on reading, it doesn't bring in the writing. There's a time for them to be separate, I fully agree. There are also times where they can be targeted at the same time.   Janet: That makes perfect sense. When I think about how we discussed in the past, reading for pleasure, or reading to gain knowledge, or reading for information, or reading for safety, so many different aspects of reading, literacy also factors into how you use reading in those situations.   Liz: Yes, and so in a lot of day-to-day communication, you need both, right? It's for text messaging, right? We need to read it and respond in a written way, also emails. There are lots of instances where for the for the interaction to go well, we need to be able to read and respond in writing, such as filling out forms, email, texting, social media. For a lot of interactions we need both for there to be a successful written language exchange.   Janet: Liz, as part of our work with the Academy of Neurologic Communication Disorders and Sciences, Aphasia Writing Group, you and I were part of the team who critically reviewed treatment approaches for reading comprehension deficits in persons with aphasia. You've also investigated, as you mentioned earlier, specific aspects of reading deficits in persons with aphasia. What are some of the insights that you have gained from this work? And by the way, it was such a pleasure doing that critical review of treatment for reading deficits, and there was a lot of interesting information that came to light in that paper.   Liz: Yes, thank you. I was going to comment that I remember we thought we were going to have all these papers to go through and really and that review, we were very much focused on papers where the main outcome was reading comprehension. When we stuck to what our aim was, there really weren't that many papers that that met the aim of that project. So that really brought to light that it really is an area of our field that doesn't have enough attention.   Some of my recent projects, as I mentioned with Aaron Bush and Jessica Obermeier, we've talked to people with aphasia and gotten their perspective of before and early days. I really like doing this research over time. Things change, but we learned just how important reading and writing are to people with aphasia, and that they really want to work on it. I think we've seen when we looked in the literature, there wasn't much there. When we've talked to people with aphasia and speech-language pathologists, they want to work on reading, and they're not sure how. That further motivates me that this is an area to work on.   In some of my beginning work, I was Diane Kendall's research speech language pathologist for a few years before I did my Ph.D., and I exclusively delivered her phono motor treatment. In that research trial, the main outcome was word retrieval, but the therapy that she designed inherently worked a lot on reading and writing. We retrained every phoneme - how to say it, what your mouth is doing, and also the graphemes that go with the phonemes. As her research speech pathologist, that's really when I got very interested in reading. I'd be in these sessions, and we'd finally bring out the graphemes that go with the phonemes. I recall telling people that this is going to get better – and it did not. That connection between the phonemes and the graphemes, for a lot of people, wasn't there. In that clinical experience as her research speech pathologist is when I realized that the treatment improved reading for some people, but not for everyone. So that's my background of really getting focused on reading.   In the last few years, I've been working on adapting that original version of treatment that was for word retrieval. I've added some components to make it more focused on reading. I've been working with Olga Burkina, who's at the Kessler Stroke Foundation, and has an NIH grant where she is pairing exercise with this reading focused phono motor treatment. It's fun to be a part of that group exploring the idea of doing aerobic exercise to improve the brain blood flow, and to see if that's going to help improve reading treatment. Again, the idea being going forward is what the treatment might change.   There are some other projects also. I'm working with Will Graves at Rutgers. He is using computational modeling to have us stop guessing which treatment. We're trying to get a really good baseline assessment, trying to find out about semantic impairment, phonological impairment, and then we're using this reading focused phono motor treatment. We also have a reading focus semantic feature analysis. I really enjoy getting to work with different researchers who have these wonderful, big questions, and that I'm getting to support it as the speech-language pathologist on these projects focused on reading and writing and phono motor treatment. So those are some exciting projects I'm involved in right now.   Janet: That's exciting, because you started out by saying there were only a few papers that we found that really address reading treatment, and you're right.  It's daunting, then how do you select the reading treatment? How do you help this person with aphasia who wants to improve their reading comprehension? I think it's exciting that you've got all these different avenues and are working with a variety of people to investigate treatment.   Liz: Yeah. And the one thing I'll add to that is part of that, that review we did, for some people those treatments are helping reading comprehension. But for some people, I've been trying to work on the next step. I have a very small dataset where I've added a semantic comprehension stage to my adapted photo motor treatment. I'm in the very early stages of this and I'm sure it's fine to say, but I've been having these really exciting conversations with Kelly Knollman-Porter and Sarah Wallace. They're also Tavistock Trust recipients, and they study reading from a different perspective, using text to speech, compensatory and very focused book reading. They're very comprehension focused, so we're at the very early, fun stages of where we are in our thinking. I think there might be a middle step we are missing, but we are talking about taking these impairment focused treatments, which I think have a role, and have a participation, functional part of it. That's another emerging, new collaboration, where we are coming to reading from different perspectives, and we're trying to see where we can get with that goal, back to this comprehension question, improving functional reading, maybe from impairment and compensatory approaches.   Janet: I think that's the right approach to take, and I think it's exciting, because we have to remember that everybody reads differently. Some people like reading, some people don't enjoy reading. They read what they have to, but they don't particularly enjoy it. So, if we all come to it from different perspectives, we all have different strengths that we bring, and different deficits as well, and different needs or designs, just as is so many things with aphasia. Start with the person with aphasia, asking What do you want to read? What problems are you having? Then use that as a guide to selecting an impairment-based treatment or text to speech treatment, or whatever. I think that's exactly the right approach.   Liz: The one thing the treatment we were talking about, phono motor treatment, in general, is a phonology treatment. The good thing is that my focus is asking, is it improving reading? I'm also extending it to writing. We do know at its core, it's a language treatment, so it is nice that it can be tweaked to serve the person's main interests. I think that's important, that we are trying to work on what people want to work on, but we want to make sure we're improving, if we can, not just one language modality, and we know that these abilities are supported by similar brain structures and underling cognitive processes. That's something else we've been trying to work on, being person centered and at the same time trying to maximize generalization - lots of pieces. I am finding now what's most motivating and exciting is trying to make sure that we're doing things that people with aphasia find important, and how also to keep the whole science moving forward in this way that's going to have functional, important outcomes. That people with aphasia are going to be able to do what they want to do to the best that they can.   Janet: Absolutely! But then there's the scientific challenge of how do you collect the data? How to best observe specific outcome data on performance measures, but also collect the person-centered data. How do you collect data that really can speak to whether you're having a success and whether this might be generalizable or transferable to another person?   Liz: I think it's important that we need both. I always say, and some of my collaborators may not like it, but if in the person reported outcome, a person with aphasia is telling us that they feel better and that they are communicating better in life, and those measures should not be optional, those measures to me, a critically important part of seeing this treatment successful. There are different ways to do that and different ways to capture their perspective. For example, if trained reading words moved this much and if the patient reported outcome change is greater, then I find that to be a success. If the reverse happens, I find treatment not successful. If my probes showed gain but the person with aphasia does not see it or feel it, then I don't find treatment to be a success. So, I think it's really important that persons with aphasia tell us different things, and we need to have many assessments in both of those categories. I think, when possible.   Janet: You're absolutely right. When you think about many of the treatments that we're doing, they are not necessarily easy, and they take time, and you have to stay the course. I think you know, I've been interested for a number of years in motivation and engagement, and what keeps people motivated and doing what they're doing. If you've got a treatment that you can see over time, small changes in your specific reading outcomes, but not so much of a change in the person centered outcomes, or person reported outcomes, how do you know the person is still really engaged and motivated and willing to slog through your treatment in order to get to the place that you hope they will? I think you're correct when you're assessing the importance of the person reported outcome.   Liz: Yeah, that's good. And then that's a whole other like measure in itself, right? The key of motivation we've talked about in some of the trials. The one person who didn't do very well, and just in our conversation, sometimes it for different reasons. That wasn't motivating for that person. There's that's a whole very important piece that a lot of us have a lot of room to improve in how we capture that and support that.   Janet: Which is a challenge when we're trying to devise treatments for, say, reading or anything that can be applicable to a wide range of persons with aphasia. Kudos to you for meeting that challenge as best you can.   Liz: We're working on it. But I do really think that it's changing. Sometimes I feel like there are impairment-based people and life participation people, and I don't think it needs to be that way. It's fine if we only study one area. We can't all study everything, but I think as a whole they complement each other very well. And so I'm just excited to see that it seems like things are moving in a really exciting way, where people who study aphasia in various different ways now seem to have the main outcome, asking is this going to help people with aphasia feel better, communicate better, and look forward to something different in life? I think we're all seeing that that's what we're supposed to be doing, and how we do it is going to look really different, and that's great. I think we're moving in the right direction.   Janet: Very well said. I think, and you obviously do as well, that literacy and reading skills are crucially important to individuals with aphasia in so many ways, such as life skills reading or pleasure reading. Acknowledging that we all have different skill levels and preferences, what are some ideas that you might have identified that speech-language pathologists can use to support the literacy and reading desires and activities for a person with aphasia?   Liz: Great question. I think my answer is very similar to the question about what can SLPs do to help support friendship? I think being person centered. You said earlier, right, we all have different interests. Somebody might say it's not one of my goals and I really don't want to spend a lot of time on this. But just having those conversations and person-centered measures and using supported conversation we can easily gather important information. There are some really good patient-reported outcome measures that ask about reading, so maybe use some of those existing tools. The Comprehensive Aphasia Disability Questionnaire has a nice scale that talks about different aspects of reading as well as other aspects of language. But at the minimum, I think finding a way, even just to draw your own scale and then trying to find out in their life, what are different activities where they want to or need to engage, right? Texting, email, restaurant. I mean, we think about it, we're reading all the time throughout life. So, I think finding the reading need is a general interest and then getting really specific is one way to do it. Another thing could be, as I mentioned before, our brain relies on similar structures and language networks when we are engaging in spoken language and written language. So oftentimes improving our reading and writing improves our spoken abilities and vice versa. So even if it's not the main goal in treatment, for example if the main outcome might be word retrieval, I really believe multimodal learning is important. If, after you've gone through what you want to do say writing it, having them repeat it, maybe copy it, even though that's not the main goal, and it's not slowing the therapy, if it's working for you and your client, then I really think, at the minimum, using written language to support spoken language has a good role. I also think the opposite can be true using spoken language to support written language. So I do think that it's important that we know we are addressing all of language, and that that language skills really do usually move up and down together in aphasia.   Janet: Well said, again. Liz, thank you so very much for joining me today in this fascinating look into friendship, literacy, reading and aphasia. And again, hearty congratulations to you on being named Tavistock, Distinguished Scholar. On behalf of Aphasia Access, I wish you well in your research and clinical efforts, and thank you for taking the time to speak with me today. At this point, I'd also like to thank our listeners for supporting Aphasia Access Conversations by listening to our podcast, including this fascinating discussion with Liz Madden.   Liz: Thanks so much, Janet, I feel like you could just chat with you all day. Thank you again for giving me a chance to highlight some of my work. Also I want to thank everyone with aphasia who has participated in my projects, all my students and collaborators, Aphasia Access and the Tavistock Trust for Aphasia. Thanks again.   Janet: For references and resources mentioned in today's podcast, please see our Show Notes. They are available on our website, www.aphasiaaccess.org. There you can also become a member of our organization, browse our growing library of materials, and find out about the Aphasia Access Academy. If you have an idea for a future podcast episode, email us at info@aphasiaaccess.org. For Aphasia Access Conversations, I'm Janet Patterson, thanking you again for your ongoing support of Aphasia Access. References Antonucci, T. C., & Akiyama, H. (1987). Social networks in adult life and a preliminary examination of the convoy model. Journal of Gerontology, 42(5), 519–527. https://doi.org/10.1093/geronj/42.5.519 Archer, B.A., Azios, J.H., Douglas, N.F., Strong, K.A., Worrall, L.D. & Simmons-Mackie, N.F. (2024). “I Could Not Talk . . . She Did Everything . . . She's Now My Sister”: People with Aphasia's Perspectives on Friends Who Stuck Around. American Journal of Speech-Language Pathology, 33, 349–368. https://doi.org/10.1044/2023_AJSLP-23-00205 Azios, J.H., Strong, K.A., Archer, B, Douglas, N.F., Simmons-Mackie, N. & Worrall, L. (2021). Friendship matters: A research agenda for aphasia. Aphasiology, 36(3),317-336. https://10.1080/02687038.2021.1873908   Madden, E.B., Bislick, L., Wallace, S.E., Therrien, M.C.S. & Goff-Albritton, R. (2023). Aphasia and friendship: Stroke survivors' self-reported changes over time. Journal of Communication Disorders, 103, 106330. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jcomdis.2023.106330 Madden, E., Conway, T., Henry, M., Spencer, K., Yorkston, K., & Kendall, D. (2018). The relationship between non-orthographic language abilities and reading performance in chronic aphasia: An exploration of the primary systems hypothesis. Journal of Speech Language Hearing Research, 61, 3038-3054. https://doi.org/10.1044/2018_JSLHR-L-18-0058 Madden, E. B., Torrence, J., & Kendall, D. (2020). Cross-modal generalization of anomia treatment to reading in aphasia. Aphasiology, 35, 875-899. https://doi.org/10.1080/02687038.2020.1734529   Purdy, M., Coppens, P., Madden, E. B., Freed, D., Mozeiko, J., Patterson, J., & Wallace, S. (2018). Reading comprehension treatment in aphasia: A systematic review. Aphasiology, 33(6), 629–651. https://doi.org/10.1080/02687038.2018.1482405 Strong, K.A., Douglas, N.F., Johnson, R., Silverman, M., Azios, J.H. & Archer, B. (2023). Stakeholder-engaged research: What our friendship in aphasia team learned about processes and pitfalls. Topics in Language Disorders, 43(1), 43-56. https://10.1097/TLD.0000000000000302   Therrien, M., Madden, E. B., Bislick, L., & Wallace, S. (2021). Aphasia and Friendship: The Role and Perspectives of Speech-Language Pathologists. American Journal of Speech-Language Pathology, 30(5), 2228-2240.   Resources   Stroke Social Network Scale reference and materials: https://cityaccess.org/tests/ssns/      Aphasia Access Conversations Episode #119 - Finding the person in front of aphasia: A conversation with Lauren Bislick

Dear friends in Christ, welcome to this podcast from All Saints Episcopal Church in Portland. All Saints is a loving, welcoming parish serving Southeast Portland for over a century. Our purpose is to celebrate God's love, seek and serve Christ in all persons, and go forth into the world rejoicing in the power of the Spirit!Today, we invite you to join the Rt. Rev. Dr. Diana Akiyama, the Eleventh Bishop of the Diocese of Oregon, as she preaches the gospel, and explores the mysteries of God in our modern world.

In honor of Yoshinari Ogawa's recent retirement from pro wrestling, the Long & Winding Royal Road takes a look at one of his best matches against long-time generational rival, Jun Akiyama from September 11, 1998 at Budokan Hall.Joining WH Park to talk about this match and Ogawa's career is The Eastern Lariat's Dylan Fox.WH and Dylan discuss how Ogawa's technical style, mixed with his American heel mannerisms, made him stand out in the King's Road era of All Japan and a real-life heel to many Western fans.Watch the match on YouTube: https://youtu.be/6gTsAW1CerE?feature=sharedListen to The Eastern Lariat podcast: https://easternlariat.libsyn.com/The Eastern Lariat on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/easternlariat/Support this podcast on Chopped Tees:L&WRR on Chopped TeesPOST Puroresu on Chopped TeesMCU L8R on Chopped TeesWH Park and a special guest look back at the greatest matches of All Japan Pro Wrestling from the 1990s in The Long & Winding Royal Road, a limited-edition podcast from POST Wrestling.Follow WH Park on X: https://www.twitter.com/whpark9Subscribe: https://postwrestling.com/subscribePatreon: http://postwrestlingcafe.comForum: https://forum.postwrestling.comDiscord: https://postwrestling.com/discordMerch: Chopped-Tees.com/POSTwrestlingX/Facebook/Instagram/YouTube: @POSTwrestlingMusic: "Across the Danube, Op. 36" by John Philip Sousa | Performed by United States Marine Band (band) and Jason Fettig (conductor) | The Complete Marches of John Philip Sousa, No.4 | Washington, DC: United States Marine Band, 2015. | Licensed under Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 | Public Domain LetterAdvertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brandsPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

It's the fifth installment of our From the Reviews series! If you give us a 5* review on any platform and shoot us a message with a request, we'll watch whatever match you ask and record ourselves watching it! In this episode we watched:(00:00) Intro(01:58) Go Shiozaki vs Katsuhiko Nakajima (requested by @Manu_Niite on twitter)(36:31) Jamie Hayter vs Roxxy (requested by Chris Gannon)(59:27) Nick Gage vs. Matt Cardona (requested by Eric Sunderman)(1:36:13) Shibata vs Akiyama (requested by @black_urn on twitter)Support this podcast at — https://redcircle.com/social-suplex-podcast-network/donationsAdvertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brandsPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

It's the fifth installment of our From the Reviews series! If you give us a 5* review on any platform and shoot us a message with a request, we'll watch whatever match you ask and record ourselves watching it! In this episode we watched: (00:00) Intro (01:58) Go Shiozaki vs Katsuhiko Nakajima (requested by @Manu_Niite on twitter) (36:31) Jamie Hayter vs Roxxy (requested by Chris Gannon) (59:27) Nick Gage vs. Matt Cardona (requested by Eric Sunderman) (1:36:13) Shibata vs Akiyama (requested by @black_urn on twitter)

Pro Baseball: Hanshin Tigers Pitcher Akiyama to Retire at End of Season

Passenger 36: Former creative director/show producer at Walt Disney Imagineering, Universal Creative, Sony Development, Knott's Berry Farm, and Hildene, who played a primary role on the creation of the Disney-MGM Studios and then oversaw the design, installation, and construction of the original Tower of Terror attraction at the park, Laine Dunham White (former Houser and Akiyama)!   Laine Dunham White has spent over three decades conceiving, designing, and producing world-class theme park attractions and compelling museum exhibits. Known to many as Laine Houser and Laine Aikyama, she is an ArtCenter grad who, since childhood, has excelled at tapping into her skills of observation, communication, composition, and storytelling to paint, draw, and bring immersive environments to life. Now in retirement on Cape Cod, we've lured Laine back into the spotlight for a ride on the time machine! Set your timepiece now to join us for an exciting journey with one of the industry's best and brightest women!

In diesem Podcast spreche ich mit Vanessa Wollek über unsere Reise nach Oberkochen wo wir Katsuhiko Akiyama getroffen haben. Akiyama setzt die OP-Mikroskope nahezu ausschließlich in direkter Sicht ohne Spiegel in der Zahnmedizin ein. Dies ist zwar nicht der ideale Weg, aber man erreicht mit minimalem Aufwand und minimalem Training schnell Erfolge. Hier ist der Link zu seinem Youtube Kanal: https://youtube.com/@katsuhikoakiyama1918?si=7LRAsC7eF847AIpN Wenn Sie zur 125. Jubiläumsfolge mit dabei sein möchten, dann sollten Sie sich zügig anmelden. Diese findet am 23.5.2025 am Schloss Schellenberg in Essen statt. Die Tickes hierfür kosten 100€.  Es gibt hier zusätzlich die Möglichkeit zur Hospitation.   Anmeldungen bitte unter Nennung der Rechnungsadresse unter: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ info@intradental.de⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠  Möchten Sie in unserer endodontischen Spezialpraxis Sirius Endo in Essen hospitieren? Dann informieren Sie sich auf unserer Webseite unter: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ https://www.siriusendo.de/fortbildungen.html⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Folgen Sie uns auf Instagram unter: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://www.instagram.com/siriusendo/⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠   Da hier u.U. auch Firmen, Produkte bzw. meine Kurse genannt werden ist diese gesamte Folge sicher Werbung im juristischen Sinne.

"I think to have faith is to engage a kind of irrationality."  Sermon by the Rt. Rev'd Diana Akiyama, Bishop of the Episcopal Church in Western Oregon, recorded live at the 10:00am service on Trinity Sunday, May 26, 2024.

It was another crazy week in AEW as we are on the Road to AEW Revolution. The Two Dudes With Attitudes (Ryan and Denton) are here to break it all down. They cover AEW Rampage from February 23, AEW Collision from Saturday, February 24 and AEW Dynamite from February 28, 2024.AEW Rampage Highlights:Jake Hager took an L in front of his home crowd in Oklahoma...why? What was the point of the match with Roderick Strong? Saraya pimps out her brother, who is now All Elite?AEW Collision Highlights:Powerhouse Hobbs and Sammy Guevara had a heck of a match, which just proves how good Powerhouse Hobbs really is.What is going on with the Bang Bang Scissor Gang?What was the point of the Bryan Danielson vs. Akiyama match? Malakai Black had his first singles match in a long time against Bryan Keith--AEW needs to utilize Black much moreAEW Dynamite Highlights: Sting's final Dynamite that saw him descend from the rafters to help take out the Young Bucks--if you take out Ric Flair, this was a solid ending Too much Orange Cassidy? Adam Page 'swerves' Swerve and lies to him about his status for Revolution; what was the point of this?To close out the show, The Two Dudes give their Revolution Predictions!Do you agree or disagree with a take? Let us know in the comments below!

The gang is back recapping AEW Collision for February 24, 2024. Wediscuss Danielson vs. Akiyama, Guevara vs. Hobbs, FTR vs. Taylor & Moriarty, Malakai vs. Keith, Billy & Colten & Jay White vs. Iron Savages & more!Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/k100-w-konnan-disco--4672635/support.

Hey everyone!Charlie and Duke here with a fu episode of Eat Sleep Elite. This weeks edition we cover topics such as New Japan Cup Predictions, Analysing the results of NJPW New Beginning. Forbidden door rumors for 2024. ROH, Dynamite, Rampage and Collision Results.

Adam and Michael review AEW Collision and discuss...Bryan Danielson DISRESPECTS Jun Akiyama!HUGE match added to AEW Revolution!Powerhouse Hobbs vs. Sammy Guevara - no DQ!Serena Deeb teases a dream match!Malakai Black in singles action?!ENJOY!Follow us on Twitter:@AdamWilbourn@MSidgwick@WhatCultureWWEFor more awesome content, check out: whatculture.com/wwe Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Bryan Danielson vs. Jun Akiyama told a great story to close Collision, but were the rest of both Collision and SmackDown just as good? Join Tempest and Dan as they review both AEW Collision and WWE SmackDown!Watch the WWE Elimination Chamber 2024 Review: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VhQ0XiestK8&tJoin WrestleLeague today: https://wrestletalk.com/leagueTheme song by TALLBuy our new WrestleTalk merchandise hereWrestleTalk In The Office Spotify Playlist: https://open.spotify.com/playlist/2sprWyZxCcqhtbzUuKfd0U?si=txG3hFYjSNOlGYpcDipx2gWrestleTalk Discover Playlist: https://open.spotify.com/playlist/00I22mwo6wwMKdBh6Y8Gtf?si=geesBbqiSuaNkW6SVdn3eQSubscribe to partsFUNknown hereWatch the video version of the WrestleTalk Podcast hereBecome a Pledge Hammer on Patreon hereFollow Luke Owen @ThisisLukeOwenFollow Oli Davis @OliDavisFollow Pete Quinnell @PeteQuinnellFollow Tempest @TempestWTFollow Laurie Blake @ElFakidor Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Iridian (@Iridian_fierro) and Cresta (@CrestaTHEEStarr) bring you tonight's AEW Collision post show, including:-Bryan Danielson vs. Jun Akiyama-No DQ: Powerhouse Hobbs vs. Sammy Guevara (Don Callis Family & Chris Jericho banned from the building)-FTR (Dax Harwood & Cash Wheeler) vs. Shane Taylor & Lee Moriarty-Malakai Black vs. Bryan Keith-Serena Deeb in action-Thunder Rosa in action-The Bang Bang Scissor Gang's Jay White, Billy Gunn & Austin Gunn in trios actionAll of the odds we speak about on Fightful come from our official partner, BetOnline! Check them out at http://BetOnline.AG for the fastest payouts and earliest lines on sports, wrestling and more!Our Sponsors:* Check out eBay Auto: https://www.ebay.com/Support this podcast at — https://redcircle.com/fightful-pro-wrestling-and-mma-podcast/donationsAdvertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brandsPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

Adam and Michael preview this weekend's AEW Collision...Will Danielson use Akiyama to send a message?FTR vs. Shane Taylor & Lee Moriarty!Bang Bang Scissor Gang in trios action!Forbidden Door heading to Arthur Ashe!The Hangman Page injury controversy?!ENJOY!Follow us on Twitter:@AdamWilbourn@MSidgwick@WhatCultureWWEFor more awesome content, check out: whatculture.com/wwe Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Last time we spoke about the fall of Shaggy Ridge, some hardcore patrolling on New Britain and major planning for the invasion of the Marshalls. The Australians seized the Kankeiri saddle, the Prothero's, Crater Hill and countless other features until finally at last the Japanese had been dislodged from the area. Meanwhile over on New Britain, the Americans were expanding their perimeter and unleashing wave after wave of patrols, trying to figure out where the Japanese were concentrating. It was tireless work, without any good maps in a horribly difficult climate with menacing terrain. The commanders of the central, south and southwest pacific all met to finalize big plans, that would now involved the invasion of the Marshall islands. It seems Dougey boy MacArthur was delivered some setbacks for his grand advance to the Philippines, as the Central Pacific was stealing the drivers seat.  This episode is Operation Flintlock: The Invasion of the Marshalls  Welcome to the Pacific War Podcast Week by Week, I am your dutiful host Craig Watson. But, before we start I want to also remind you this podcast is only made possible through the efforts of Kings and Generals over at Youtube. Perhaps you want to learn more about world war two? Kings and Generals have an assortment of episodes on world war two and much more  so go give them a look over on Youtube. So please subscribe to Kings and Generals over at Youtube and to continue helping us produce this content please check out www.patreon.com/kingsandgenerals. If you are still hungry for some more history related content, over on my channel, the Pacific War Channel you can find a few videos all the way from the Opium Wars of the 1800's until the end of the Pacific War in 1945.  In spite of General Douglas MacArthur's attempted hijacking of the strategic control over the Pacific campaign, by trying to have the US Navy's Central Pacific campaign pretty much aborted, it did not pan out. MacArthur had made multiple arguments against their Central plans, stating Nimitz choice of route was “time consuming and expensive in our naval power and shipping” which was really a self-serving argument flying in the face of actual evidence. MacArthur pointed out all the problems faced during the invasion of Tarawa, such as the high casualty rates. The Marines had jumped 2500 miles from New Zealand to hit Tarawa at the cost of 4 days of fighting. Yet Australian soldiers and American GI's would take nearly a year and a half, through nearly continuously fighting to make the 300 mile journey from Port Moresby to Madang. Operation Cartwheel proved to be extremely laborious, time consuming and costly in terms of materials and men. But from MacArthur's point of view the lives lost were largely Australian and perhaps as some Historians might point out “were politically expendable to a person like MacArthur”. Kind of a hit point to make, that one came from Francis Pike's Hirohito's War, go after him not me folks. It was also self evident the supply lines of ships from the west coast of the US to Nimitz Pacific fleet and their Marines, some 5000 or so miles from San Diego to Kwajalein atoll, was shorter than the long route going from the US west coast to Australia then to New Guinea, a colossal 9108 mile trip. By mid 1943 the supply line to MacArthur was nearly double that of Nimitz in distance with increased dangers of IJN submarines prowling about, though as I have said numerous times, the IJN only really figured out the capability of merchant hitting in the late years of the war.  Well in spite of all of that MacArthur gave Brigadier-General Frederick Osborn and MacArthurs trusty lackey Sutherland going to Washington to fight on his behalf against the Joint Chiefs of Staff, they elected to commit themselves to the Central Pacific thrust. It had been a strategic decision based on logistical and strategy…well logic? The 1943 Cairo conference ended just as Tarawa was captured, thus driving the nail in the coffin so to say. The next target on the way to the Marianas was thus the Marshall islands, way back in the old days they were property of the German empire, that Japan had stolen with ease. Ever since 1938, the Japanese banned any non Japanese ships from the region, thus US intelligence was pretty lax on them. MAGIC intercepts began to give clues as to how the Japanese deployed their troops on the Marshall islands however. This led the allied war planners to leave some “to wither on the vine” like Wotje. It was decided the main target would be Kwajalein. The 380 mile lagoon made it one of the largest in the world, quite beautiful also. Some like Rear Admiral Turner, questioned the risks of going straight into the heart of the Marshall islands, calling the move “too aggressive and dangerous and reckless!” But Nimitz and Spruance were adamant, well this was before Tarawa. The bitter lessons learnt on Tarawa prompted Spruance to determine that “Kwajalein would be struck with violent, overwhelming force and swiftly applied”. For the invasion of the Marshalls, codenamed Operation Flintlock, the first phase was to be the capture of Kwajalein, earmarked by General Corlett's 7th division against the southern group of islands in the atoll that included Kawjalein. General Schmidt's 4th marine division would capture Roi-Namur and the northern islands in the atoll. Furthermore prior to these attacks, Colonel Sheldon's Sundance Landing Force would hit Majuro Atoll. Because of the experiences gained during the invasion of the Gilberts, a far greater quantity and variety of amphibious equipment had been made available to the Central Pacific forces. Now the attack force commanders would not have to rely on the faulty communications systems of battleships to maintain proper radio liaison between ship and shore and ship and air. Two newly constructed headquarters ships, each equipped with the latest developments in radio and radar gear and unburdened by gunfire support duties, were provided for the operation. Several improvements were also made in the techniques of softening up the enemy defenses before the first troops touched shore. The US Navy changed their bombardment tactics based on the experience at Tarawa and now used armor piercing shells and fired from closer ranges. These all added would increase the quantity and accuracy of firepower to be delivered before the invasion. To provide a last-minute saturation of the beaches, two new, or rather modified, forms of older types of amphibious equipment were also introduced. The first of these was the amphibian tank LVT-A, which was just the standard amphibian tractor equipped with extra armor plating and mounting a 37-mm gun housed in a turret. The second was the LCI gunboat, an LCI converted into a gunboat by the addition of three 40-mm guns and banks of 4.5-inch rocket launchers.  Admiral Turner's plan called for extensive pre-landing bombardment both from surface ships and from aircraft. Most of the Marshall's airfields had been successfully neutralized by Admiral Hoover's aircraft over the prior months. To complete preliminary operations, Admiral Mitschers Fast Carrier force launched a heavy strike on January 29 and 30th. On the 30th, eight of Mitschers battleships, accompanied by about a dozen destroyers, were to deliver a dawn bombardment against Kwajalein Island and Roi-Namur. The object was to destroy aircraft, coast defense guns, and personnel, and to render the airfields temporarily useless. At the same time, two advance units of cruisers and destroyers from Turner's task force were to bombard the airfields at Wotje and Maloelap. These dawn bombardments were to be followed by air strikes against each of the objectives. After the strikes were completed the surface ships would again take up the bombardment and maintain a steady fire until about noon. Then on the 31st, initial landings would begin against Carlson (Enubuj), lying  northwest of Kwajalein Island; Ivan (Mellu) and Jacob (Ennuebing) Islands, lying southwest of Roi-Namur. For southern Kwajalein, three other small islands in addition to Carlson were to be captured during the preparatory phase of the operation. These were Carlos (Ennylabegan), Carter (Gea), and Cecil (Ninni) Islands, all lying north of Carlson. On some of these islands artillery could be emplaced for the main assault. On February 1st, battleships, cruisers and destroyers would conduct a monster bombardment in support of the main landings and air strikes would begin 45 minutes before the men hit the beaches. There would be a cease to the carnage 25 minutes before to allow the smaller islands to deploy their artillery to help support the main assault. With this tremendous bombardment by aircraft, surface ships, and artillery, all to be executed before the first troops hit the shore line, it was hoped that the bitter experience of Tarawa would not be repeated. For the attack on Kwajalein Island, Corlett decided to land on a narrow front on the beaches at the western extremity, as the reef and surf conditions were more favorable there. He had at his disposal 79 amphibian tanks and 95 amphibian tractors that would transport the first 4 waves to hit the southern beaches. The first with great secrecy would be a pre-dawn landing against Carter and Cecil islands, by one platoon of the 7th Cavalry Reconnaissance Troop. The reconnaissance troop was embarked on two high-speed transports (APD's), along with two platoons of Company B, 111th Infantry. After this the 17th regiment led by Col. Wayne C. Zimmerman would land on Carlos and Carlson islands. The 1st Battalion, 17th Infantry, would hit Carlos while the 2nd Battalion, 17th Infantry, hit Carlson. The 3rd Battalion, 17th Infantry was to be held in reserve, ready to go to the aid of either landing team. While the capture of Carlson Island was in progress, the division artillery, loaded for the most part on amphibious trucks, was to debark and proceed to a rendezvous area offshore. Upon a signal from the commander of the Carlson landing force, the guns were to be moved ashore and into position. This was all done to secure General Arnold's artillery, whom on the night of the D-day along the 145th field artillery battalions would deliver interdictory fire from Carlson on all the principal fortified areas of Kwajalein Island and place counter-battery fire on any enemy artillery that might be emplaced on Burton. They were also to fire general support missions for the infantry. Finally, the 184th on the left and 32nd Regiment on the right would land abreast and advance up the axis of the island. If things looked like they were going well enough and the reserve 17th regiment would not be necessary, they would instead capture the remaining islands of Beverly (South Gugegwe), Berlin (North Gugegwe), Benson, and Bennett (Bigej) Islands in the eastern chain. There was a hell of a lot of fire power they would face as well. On Kwajalein, 4 12.7-cm, dual-purpose twin-mount guns were divided into batteries of 2, one located at each end of the island. Each battery was protected by 7.7-mm. and 13-mm. machine guns along the nearby beaches. Near each gun were 2 150-cm. searchlights. In addition, the northern end of the island was guarded by a twin-mount dual-purpose 13-mm machine gun on the lagoon shore. Several 7.7-mm. machine guns were in position on the western end and other heavy machine guns were scattered about the center of the island, some mounted on wooden sleds for easy movement to critical points. On the ocean shore were 6 8-cm. dual-purpose guns, divided into 2 batteries of 3 guns each. One battery was east of the tank ditch and the other was opposite the center of the airfield. The first had a 360-degree traverse and could fire either to seaward or landward. The other formed the nucleus of a strongpoint composed of a semicircle of rifle pits facing the beach supported by one heavy and one 13-mm. machine gun, and also included an observation tower, a range finder, and a 110-cm. searchlight. 2 other 8-cm. guns were in position on the lagoon shore, and the blockhouse on the main pier (Nob Pier), which jutted out into the lagoon near the northern tip of the island, had a 13-mm. dual-purpose gun on its roof and firing ports on the ground floor allowing machine guns to fire in all directions. For the attack on Roi-Namur, Schmidt's 1st phase was to capture the 5 islets near Roi-Namur. The Ivan Landing Group was commanded by Brig. General James L. Underhill, consisting of the 25th Marines under Col. Samuel C. Cumming; the 14th Marines Artillery and Company D of the 4th Tank Battalion. They would seize Jacon and Ivan islands to allow the 3rd and 4th Battalions of the 14th Marine Regiment artillery to deploy. Then they would hit Albert, Allen and Abraham islands where the 1st and 2nd Battalions of the 14th Marine Regiment artillery would deploy. For the main landings Schmidt chose to perform a orthodox amphibious maneuver, simply landing two regiments abreast on a broad front over the lagoon shore. The 23rd marines would hit Roi's red beach 2 and 3 and the 24th marines would hit Namur's Green beaches 1 and 2. The 3rd and final phase would see the capture of the remaining islands in the northern Kwajaleins.  Now that was all for the Americans, but what about the defenders? Admiral Akiyama had recently been reinforced with a number of IJA units such as the 3rd South Sea Garrison from Wake; the 1st South Seas detachment from Mille and Jaluit and the 1st Amphibious mobile brigade from Eniwetok. The reinforcements were deployed mostly on the periphery, as Kwajalien, Jaluit, Maloelap and Wotje had sizable naval garrisons already. The hub of the Japanese military in the Marshalls was at Kwajalein and its main air base at Roi. If you pull out a map, which I do hope many of you do during this entire podcast series haha, especially for Burma it gets really confusing, trust me I know your pain. You can see Kwajalein lies far to the west, with Jaluit, Mille, Maloelap and Wotje kind of acting as buffers. If you were a Japanese commander you would most likely assume any invasion attempt would hit outer islands first and leave Kwajalein as the last one. A quote from one commander, Chikataka Nakajima makes this point "There was divided opinion as to whether you would land at Jaluit or Mille. Some thought you would land on Wotje but there were few who thought you would go right to the heart of the Marshalls and take Kwajalein.” The three most heavily defended islands were Roi-Namur, Kwajalein and Burton in that order of strength. The defenses of Roi-Namur were organized around a series of seven strong points, 4 on Roi and 3 on Namur, all on the ocean side. Starting from the southwest tip of Roi, the first was located along the southern shore of the west coast. The second and third were to the south and north of the northwest taxi circle. The fourth was on both sides of the wire and stone barriers next to the northeast taxi circle. The fifth, sixth, and seventh were on the northwest, north, and east tips of Namur, respectively. From the lagoon side the approaches were covered mostly by nothing heavier than 7.7-mm. machine guns. Wire entanglements were found at two points—on the beach around the northeast taxi circle on Roi, and on the narrow bit of land connecting Roi with Namur. The beach around the northeast taxi circle also boasted a tank obstacle in the form of large rocks jutting out of a rock wall. Anti-tank ditches had been dug throughout the two islands. On Kwajalein, there was a concrete sea wall along most of the ocean shore and around the northern and western ends of the island. The section at the northern end had posts set into it, probably to act as a tank barricade. East of the area cleared for the airfield was a tank ditch extending halfway across the island, and three smaller tank ditches ran between the ocean shore and the road in the vicinity of the airfield. The lagoon shore was protected by a two-strand barbed-wire fence at the water's edge. The large tank ditch was supported by trenches, rifle pits, and machine guns. At this point in the war, the Japanese tactical doctrine still stressed beach-line defense that would hinder a proper defense in depth. The Japanese doctrine to fortify beaches would gradually change as a result of the Gilbert-Marshall campaign. IJA General HQ research groups abandoned beach defenses for internal defenses to thwart naval and aerial bombardments, but also to favor concealed positions to thwart flamethrower and grenade attacks. Actually to side track just a bit, there is a book I rather like “The Battle for Okinawa” by Colonel Hiromichi Yahara. If you are interested in how some of the Japanese commanders decided to change to defense in depth, Colonel Yahara was a good case study and the book is interesting. Akiyama had roughly 5000 men on Kwajalein. 930 of these were IJA units, the 1st Company, 3rd Mobile Battalion, plus 2nd and 4th Companies of the 2nd Mobile Battalion of the 1st Amphibious Mobile Brigade. The IJA forces were led by Colonel Asu Tarokichi, commander of the 2nd Mobile Battalion. There also was 250 SNLF of the Yokosuka 4th; 1150 naval troops from the 61st Guard Unit and Akiyama's headquarters. The rest were not considered combat effective, mostly comprising laborers and logistical units. Most of these units were at Kwajalein itself, with some 345 troops and over 2000 air personnel of the 24th Air Flotilla at Roi-Namur. Three lookout stations were also established on Bennett, Carter and Carlos Islands while an air unit of the 952nd and 160 men defended Burton. By January 20th, all the preparations were complete in the Hawaiian islands for the grand invasion of the Marshalls. 2 days later, the task forces departed. At dawn on the 29th, the 4 task groups of Task Force 58 and the Neutralization Group arrived to their first assembly positions Aircraft carriers Enterprise, Yorktown, and Belleau Wood successfully neutralized Taroa while while Essex, Intrepid, and Cabot bombed and strafed Roi-Namur. Aircraft from Essex, Intrepid, and Cabot bucked northeasterly winds to bomb and strafe once more the important airfield at that base. Ninety-two enemy planes were based on Roi airfield when the attack developed. Command of the air was seized by American planes at the outset and after 8am, no enemy planes were seen airborne over Roi-Namur. Numerous hits were made on runways, hangars, fuel dumps, and gun positions. Additionally, carriers Saratoga, Princeton, and Langley sent multiple strikes against Wotje, managing to neutralize its airfield. Finally Admiral Sherman's carriers Cowpens, Monterey, and Bunker Hill launched strikes against Kwajalein. Her airfield and buildings were bombed on the first strike, then she was subjected to strafing and bombing. During the evening Admiral Sherman's group moved northwestward toward Eniwetok to be in position to launch an attack at dawn of D minus 1. It was not just the navy that smashed the Marshalls, the Army also got a taste. At Kwajalein one flight of seven B-24s dropped fifteen tons of bombs on Roi-Namur and three more tons on Kwajalein Island during the morning and early afternoon. As the carrier planes retired at dusk another seven heavy bombers arrived for a night attack, dropping twenty tons of bombs on Kwajalein Island. At Wotje, flying through heavy overcast, one flight of three B-24s dropped seven tons of bombs, causing fires and damaging the runways. A few hours later a flight of nine B-25s dropped three tons of bombs on the island in a low-level attack and strafed and sank a small cargo vessel in the lagoon. During this late attack carrier planes from the task force mistakenly intercepted the B-25s and shot down two before it was realized they were American planes. Maloelap, Jaluit, and Mille also received land-based attacks during the day. At Taroa, two and a half tons of bombs were dropped by B-25s, which then joined carrier planes in strafing the island. At Jaluit, attack bombers and fighters dropped seven tons of bombs and afterwards strafed the island. Mille was covered all day by twenty fighters, flying in flights of four. Planes that had been scheduled to strike these targets but that were unable to get through because of weather or mechanical difficulty flew over Mille on the way back to American bases in the Gilberts and dropped their bomb loads on the islands of that atoll.The Neutralization group shelled Wotje and Maloelap, leaving the last operational airfield on Eniwetok. Sherman's fighters and bombers hit the atoll during the morning of the 30th, destroying nearly all its buildings and runways, though a few aircraft managed to escape. The rest of the day would see more carrier strikes and surface bombardments against the Marshalls' atolls while the landing forces made their final approach towards Kwajalein. Meanwhile, Admiral Hill's attack group detached from the main task force, heading for Majuro Atoll. At 11pm 1st Lt. Harvey C. Weeks led a recon platoon on rubber boats to Calalin island, becoming the first Americans to land on any territory the Japanese had possessed prior to WW2. The rest of the recon company led by Captain James Jones landed on Dalap, Uliga and Darrit Islands. Finally, Majuro Island itself. They would find the Japanese had abandoned the atoll perhaps over a year earlier. At the same time Sheldon's landing force occupied Darrit and Dalop without any opposition and the 1st defense battalion soon arrived to take up garrison duties. To the northwest, the Destroyer transports Overton carrying Troop A and Manley carrying Troop B raced past Turners task force to hit Carter and Cecil islands. Troop B successfully landed on Carter at 6:20am, rapidly securing the island after killing her 20 defenders. Troop A accidently landed on Chauncey Islet at 5:45am and upon realizing they had landed on the wrong island, they left a detachment of 61 infantrymen and then re-embarked at 9:29am. Finally, Troop A landed on Cecil at 12:35pm, finding zero opposition there. On Chauncey, however, the Americans discovered a force of over 100 Japanese hidden in the islet's center. Half of the enemy force was killed but the Americans would eventually have to withdraw after losing two men. The desperate Japanese would continue to resist until eventually being annihilated a few days later. With the lagoon's entrance secured, Colonel Zimmerman transferred his two assault battalions to amphibious tractors and sent them towards Carlos and Carlson Islands.  While Kwajalein, Burton and everly islands were under heavy bombardment, the 1st battalion, 17th regiment landed on Carlos unopposed at 9:10am. From there they quickly attacked the 25 man garrison. To their south, the 2nd battalion landed on the northeastern end of Carlson at 9:12am under some heavy artillery fire coming out of Kwajalein that was quickly suppressed by air and naval bombardment. The men expected fierce resistance, but the Japanese fled, leaving 21 Koreans to be taken prisoner. Honestly pretty good outcome for those poor Koreans. Then General Arnold landed his 5 artillery battalions who got their guns ready by nightfall. Further north, Brigadier Generals James Underhill began operations against Ivan and Jacob islands to secure even more artillery positions. After the preparatory bombardment the marines got aboard their amtracs with a lot of difficulty. Before the operation, landing team commanders had estimated that their debarkation interval would be about sixty minutes, but this did not pan out. Once the troops were loaded in their assigned landing craft they had to make their way through choppy seas to the LST area for transfer to amphibian tractors. At this juncture all semblance of control broke down. Landing craft were about two hours late in reaching the LST area. Choppy seas and a headwind were partly responsible for the delays. Boat control officers left the tractors in frantic search for the landing craft and failed to return in time to lead the LVTs to the line of departure. Tractors were damaged or swamped while milling around their mother LSTs waiting for the troops to show up. Radios in LVTs were drowned out. One LST weighed anchor and shifted position before completing the disembarkation of all its tractors. The elevator on another broke down so that those LVTs loaded on the topside deck could not be disembarked on time. In short, almost every conceivable mishap occurred to delay and foul up what, under even the best of circumstances, was a complicated maneuver. Despite the issues, by 9:17 the amtracs were surging forward while LCI gunboats fired rocket barrages. B Company of the 25th marines hit Jacobs at 9:52, easily overrunning the island within 15 minutes. Ivan island had a much rougher surf alongside bad reef conditions that slowed down the amtracs. Company D, 4th light tank battalion managed to land at 9:55am, with Company C of the 25th marines landing on the opposite side of the shore at 10:15am followed by Company A. They linked up and began advancing inland, rapidly destroying a token defense force and securing the entire island by 11:45. During the early afternoon, the 3rd battalion, 14th marines landed at Jacob Island aboard LVT's, while the 4th battalion landed on Ivan aboard LCMs. At this point the lagoon entrance was secured, so the 2nd and 3rd battalions, 25th marines re-embarked to land on Albert and Allen. Rough seas delayed them, but the marines were once again on the move. LCI gunboats performed rocket barrages as the 3rd battalion landed on Albert at 3:12, while the 2nd battalion hit Allen 3 minutes later. Both islets were quickly cleared, while G Company landed on the unoccupied Andrew island. The 3rd battalion then assaulted Abraham island at 6:24, securing it by 7:15. With that, the Americans had secured a chain surrounding Roi-Namur and the first phase of the operation was done. Now the Americans would perform the main landings. Late during the night, Arnolds artillery and Turner's warships bombarded Kwajalein and Burton while 3 destroyers kept up a barrage upon Roi-Namur. Under the cover of darkness, frogmen of Underwater Demolition Team 1 scouted Roi-Namur and UDT 2 scouted Kwajalein's beaches. These men made sure there were no obstacles or mines in the way of their landing objectives. This was the first use of UDT's during the Pacific War. Early on February 1st Kwajalein was hit with an unprecedented bombardment. During one period two shells per second were hitting specific targets or areas in the path of the assault troops. The 14-inch naval shells of the battleships were most effective in piercing and destroying reinforced concrete structures. From the cruisers and destroyers, 8-inch and 5-inch shells ploughed into bunkers and tore up the thick growth of pandanus and palm trees. All together that day, nearly 7,000 14-inch, 8-inch, and 5-inch shells were fired by supporting naval vessels at Kwajalein Island alone, and the bulk of these were expended against the main beaches before the landing. The field artillery on Carlson also joined in the preparatory fire. Its total ammunition expenditure against Kwajalein was about 29,000 rounds. The results of all this expenditure of explosives were devastating. The damage was so intensive that it is impossible to determine the relative effectiveness of the three types of bombardment. The area inland of Red Beaches was reduced almost completely to rubble. Concrete emplacements were shattered, coconut trees smashed and flattened, the ground pock-marked with large craters, coral ripped to splinters. From the carriers Enterprise, Yorktown, Belleau Wood, Manila Bay, Corregidor, and Coral Sea eighteen dive bombers and fifteen torpedo bombers struck the western part of Kwajalein Island while as many fighters strafed the area with machine guns and rockets. All together ninety-six sorties were flown from the carriers in support of the troop landing on Kwajalein Island. As one observer reported, "The entire island looked as if it had been picked up to 20,000 feet and then dropped.” After 36000 rounds of naval gunfire and artillery, along with sizable air attacks, pummeled the island, LCI gunboats were on the move, tossing rockets into the mix. At 9am, Turner unleashing his landing force. Colonel Curtis O'Sullivans 184th regiment headed towards Beach Red 1, while Colonel Marc Logie's 32nd regiment hit Beach Red 2. Each beach was covered by a strongpoint, though these were mostly obliterated, with only a few pillboxes surviving. Both regiments landed at 9:30am, finding weak opposition, allowing their artillery support to start smashing 200 yards ahead of their positions. The americans were met with light mortars and automatic fire from some surviving pillboxes, but many were able to take shelter behind the wrecked ruins of a seawall. Meanwhile as more Amtracs pulled up they were hampered by wreckage and debris, causing a congestion. The reefs also hindered where they could approach, but by 11:22 the first four waves of both battalions were ashore, all with 15 minutes. They then began to advance inland against light resistance. Logie's 1st battalion managed to reach the western edge of the west area by 11:30. Meanwhile O'Sullivan's 3rd Battalion came face to face with a network of several pillboxes still containing live Japanese in spite of the heavy preliminary bombardment. These were silenced in short order in a series of almost simultaneous actions in which many varieties of weapons were used. Two infantrymen of Company K, Pvt. Parvee Rasberry and Pfc. Paul Roper had landed near the left of Red Beach 1 and had run about 25 yards inland when they came under fire from one of the pillboxes in the area. Quickly taking shelter in a shell hole, they started lobbing grenades at the enemy position about fifteen yards ahead. The Japanese merely threw the grenades back and the volley kept up until a flame thrower was brought forward. That, too, proved ineffective; the flames only hit the box and bounced back. Finally, Private Rasberry got out of his foxhole, crawled to within about five yards of the pillbox and threw in a white phosphorus smoke grenade. This flushed several Japanese from their cover into open positions where they could be taken under rifle fire. Those who weren't hit ran back to the pillbox. Rasberry threw white phosphorous grenades until he had none left, by which time about eight of the enemy had been killed. At this juncture, T. Sgt. Graydon Kickul of Company L was able to crawl up to the pillbox and on top of it. He emptied his M1 rifle into it, killing the remainder of the Japanese inside. To make doubly certain that the job was done, an amphibian tank was then brought forward to fire both its flame thrower and its 37-mm. gun into the aperture. Meanwhile Logie's 1st battalion got within 250 yards of Wilma road by 12:20. An hour later they fell upon a network of pillboxes. To the north O'Sullivan's 3rd battalion ran into tough resistance again, but managed to link up with Logie's men at Wilma Road by 2:50pm. Behind the battalions were follow up battalions who mopped up the area and the reserves secured the beachheads. Logie and O'Sullivans men then fought their way to Kwajaleins airfield. Lucky for them the Japanese had not established a defensive line across the width of the island, instead the bulk of them retired eastward, for their commander Admiral Akiyama had run into an early tragedy. Akiyama had left his bunker to observe the front line and was killed by an artillery shell. At 3:25, the 1st battalion was relieved by the 2nd battalion who began attack against the strongpoint at Canary Some of these positions, which extended along each side of Wallace Road, were defended by Japanese who ducked and crawled through rubble heaps and bunkers in such a way that Lt. John L. Young, commanding Company E, became convinced that they were using connecting tunnels. For an hour the fighting persisted, but not more than ten enemy dead could be counted above ground. Company E continued through a litter of small works, moving so slowly that it was necessary to commit Company F, which undertook a flanking movement at the left. The maneuver was intended to cut the strong point off, but the company promptly ran into fire that slowed its advance to about fifty yards in thirty minutes. It then became clear that the whole movement had been stopped. The attack was consequently broken off at 1800 and defensive positions were organized for the night. To the north, O'Sullivan's 3rd Battalion ran into large underground shelters and defenses. Their advance was temporarily blocked by a fuel dump ignited by artillery fire, but they eventually pushed on another 500 yards before halting at 18:00 for the night.  Meanwhile Logie's 2nd battalion broke off their attack halfway up the length of an unfinished runway and dug in for the night.  By the end of February 1st, approximately 450 of the dead Japanese were counted  in the zone of the 184th, and this regiment also was responsible for the capture of ten of the eleven prisoners taken. A large share of the enemy casualties was attributed to the heavy bombardment from ships and aircraft and from artillery based on Carlson. Estimates made by assault troops and by others, including doctors following the assault, indicated that the preparatory bombardment caused from 50 to 75 percent of all Japanese casualties on Kwajalein Island. It truly was a colossal bombardment. The Americans suffered 21 deaths and 87 wounded. Over on Roi-Namur, Admiral Conolly's LSTs entered the lagoon at first light to provide the amtracs an easier ride. Naval ships, artillery and aircraft began smashing the island. The marines saw some delays, but Colonel Colonel Louis Jones' 23rd Marines began their run to Roi at 11:50. Covering them, amphibian tanks sought hull defilade positions and concentrated their 37mm fire on the Wendy Point blockhouse, which could deliver flanking fire on the assault waves. The 1st and 2nd Battalions hit the beaches at 11:57 landed and immediately began to push 300 yards inland. Meanwhile Colonel Franklin Hart's 24th Marines bound for Namur were assigned the tractors of the 10th Amphibian Tractor Battalion that had participated in the preceding day's actions. The troubles that had beset the 10th Amphibian Tractor Battalion on D-Day were titanic. They had been launched too far from the line of departure in the first place. They had to buck adverse winds and unexpectedly choppy seas. Radio failures had tremendously complicated the problem of control, causing still further delay and much unnecessary travel through the water. All of this spelled excessive fuel consumption and many of the tractors ran out of gas before the day was over. For an LVT to run out of fuel in a choppy sea was usually disastrous. This model, the LVT-2, shipped water easily and its bilge pumps could not be manually operated. Thus, when the gasoline supply was gone the vehicle could not be pumped out and usually sank. In addition, many of the tractors of the 10th Battalion had not been released from their duties on D-Day until after dark, were unable to get back to their mother LSTs for refueling, and had spent the night on various outlying islands. Thus, as the hour for descending on Namur approached, the 24th Marines could muster only 62 of the 110 tractors that had been assigned to them and a hurried call was sent out for LCVPs to make up the difference. After some scrambling, the 2nd and 3rd battalions were reorganized and on their way to Namur. Hart's 2nd battalion hit Beach Green 2 at 11:55. They faced anti-tank ditches across the narrow beach, causing a large congestion. Hart's 3rd battalion made it to Green 1 at 12 and his K and I companies immediately advanced north. Meanwhile Jone's battalions secured Wendy Point facing no opposition. Encourage by the lack of resistance, the Marines began a rather disordered dash across the island. The stormed across the runway without orders and all guns blazing. Tanks and infantry hastily charged in the disorder, successfully driving the surviving and terrified Japanese north. Jones managed to gain control over his units and brought them back to assembly points to coordinate further attacks. The “re-assault” of Roi kicked off at 3:30 against a dazed enemy still trying to recover from the first attack. The 2nd battalion pushed north towards Estelle point while the 3rd battalion hit Nancy point. Enemy resistance was being rapidly annihilated, Estelle point was secure by 5pm, while Nancy Point would be taken by 6pm. After Nancy point was secured, Jones declared Roi secure. Meanwhile Harts F company unknowingly breached a torpedo warhead bunker and began throwing satchel charges into the hole. The structure was obliterated by a massive explosion that would detonate two other ammunition bunkers nearby. Blocks of concrete, palm trees, wood, torpedo warheads, and other debris rained down over the island, covering most of the island with smoke and dust. 20 Marines were killed and 100 were wounded. The enormous explosion disrupted the 2nd battalions assault, causing a delay. Hart's 3rd battalion enjoyed more success, but heavier resistance as the Japanese defenders took advantage of all the rubble and dense brush tossed around to hide behind. By 7:30pm, Hart ordered his men to dig in and during the night the Japanese began their classic infiltration tactics. The green troops amongst the men began indiscriminately firing throughout the night. The next morning, light tanks broke a Japanese counter attack, as the Marines advanced 50 yards. Hart then launched his main attack at 9am,with the 3rd Battalion rapidly securing Nora Point by 11:00am. Tank support for the 2nd Battalion arrived an hour late, but they still managed to push towards Natalie Point by 12:15, where the two battalions linked up. Mop up operations continued in the rear, but the island was declared secure at 2:18. For their first operation, Schmidt's 4th Marine Division suffered 206 killed, 617 wounded and 181 missing. 3472 Japanese would be found dead, with 51 captured and 40 Korean laborers surrendered.  To the south, after aerial, artillery and naval bombardment, Corlett launched a tank supported attack at 7:15am. O'Sullivans 2nd battalion advanced north against weak resistance while Logie's 2nd Battalion continued to fight through the Canary strongpoint. Advancing through destroyed pillboxes with tanks at the forefront, O'Sullivans men were able to reach Carl Road on the eastern end of the airfield by 10:40am. Meanwhile Logie's men reduced the Canary and advanced rapidly until they reached the deadly Cat strongpoint. Here they faced tiers of well-concealed defensive works, taking many lives until they also reached Carl Road at 10:40. The Americans were now facing the main defensive system of the island. In front of it lay a deep tank trap, connected to long rifle trenches. Beyond this was anti-tank ditches and an elaborate organized set of defensive positions called Corn strongpoint. They were in for a hell of a time. I would like to take this time to remind you all that this podcast is only made possible through the efforts of Kings and Generals over at Youtube. Please go subscribe to Kings and Generals over at Youtube and to continue helping us produce this content please check out www.patreon.com/kingsandgenerals. If you are still hungry after that, give my personal channel a look over at The Pacific War Channel at Youtube, it would mean a lot to me. Operation Flintlock went off with a terrifying bang seeing the combined firepower of land, air and sea tossed against the Marshall islands. The Americans had made easy and quick work of the smaller islands, but now we're face to face with a truly formidable defensive position that was sure to cause them real headaches. 

"This complex, layered meaning is how we can understand joy." Sermon by Diana Akiyama, Bishop of the Episcopal Diocese of Oregon, recorded live at the 8:00pm Christmas Eve service on Sunday, December 24, 2023.

Last time we spoke about the battle of Nanshan. After their loss at the battle of Yalu, the Russians began a withdrawal while trying to delay the Japanese advance upon Port Arthur. The 2nd IJA of General Oku landed at Pitzuwo along the Liaodong peninsula. To open the path to Port Arthur and cut her off from reinforcements from the rest of Manchuria. General Oku first had the 4th IJA division seize Chinchou before bombarding Nanshan both from land and sea. The Russian defenders led by Colonel Tretyakov fought like lions exacting a terrible price upon the Japanese, but ultimately it was the foolish General Fok who made a blunder of things resulting in a chaotic withdrawal. Nanshan was seized and General Nogi with the 3rd IJA began to land at Takushan ready to pounce on the prize of Dalny. Dalny was seized without a fight and now Nogi's men prepared to besiege Port Arthur.    #77 The Russo-Japanese War part 4: The Russian counter offensive at Telissu   Welcome to the Fall and Rise of China Podcast, I am your dutiful host Craig Watson. But, before we start I want to also remind you this podcast is only made possible through the efforts of Kings and Generals over at Youtube. Perhaps you want to learn more about the history of Asia? Kings and Generals have an assortment of episodes on history of asia and much more  so go give them a look over on Youtube. So please subscribe to Kings and Generals over at Youtube and to continue helping us produce this content please check out www.patreon.com/kingsandgenerals. If you are still hungry for some more history related content, over on my channel, the Pacific War Channel where I cover the history of China and Japan from the 19th century until the end of the Pacific War. As we have seen with the battles of Yalu and Nanshan, the Russians seemed to have an enormous strategic problem. The core of the problem was the fact that the Tsar appointed General Kuropatkin to lead the war, but left the real power in the hands of Admiral Alexeiev. There were clear philosophical differences between the two men, hell one was an admiral trying to lead land battles. Kuropatkin understood logistics better, he knew they needed to bide time so more men could travel abroad the trans Siberian over to the far east so a proper offensive could be made. But Alexeiev and his financial friends in the Royal Timber company feared losing their investments in Manchuria. As I mentioned in an earlier episode Alexeiev's position and appointment of Viceroyalty was actually the brainchild of Aleksandr Bezobrazov who recommended it to the Tsar. In many ways the Russo-Japanese war was fought for the financial benefit of some elites in Russia and this would help stoke revolutionary fever back home. Kuropatkin was not 100% sure of the Japanese disposition and intentions. The 1st IJA beat them at the Yalu and seemed to be heading northwest towards Liaoyang. The 2nd IJA landed at Pitzuwo, defeated them at Nanshan and now held Dalny. The 10th division, the nucleus of the soon to be created 4th IJA had landed at Takushan while the 3rd IJA seemed to still be in Japan. Kuropatkin wrote in his memoirs “it was incumbent on us, therefore to exercise great caution and to keep our forces as far as possible concentrated, so as to be ready to meet the attack of two or even three armies”. The slow pass of the trans Siberian railway to reinforce him by May was causing Kuropatkin to seriously consider withdrawing from Liaoyang to Harbin. But the Tsar and court demanded he go on the offensive to try and rescue Port Arthur. Alexeiev's chief of staff Jalinski sent to Kuropatkin basically two options. Number 1, contain the 2nd IJA and attack the 1st IJA and 4th IJA in the direction of Yalu. Number 2 perform an offensive against the 2nd IJA to the north of Port Arthur while blocking the 1st IJA. Neither option was good, but Kuropatkin chose the 2nd one. Kuropatkin believed an attack from the direction of Liaoyang would leave the Russian right flank and rear exposed to a possible landing of the 3rd IJA. Kuropatkins staff believed such a landing might occur at Yingkou. Having to allocate troops to protect his right flank and rear, Kuropatkin only had 60-70 of his 94 battalions in mid may. The railway did not run towards Yalu, therefore his logistical lines would be terrible, feeding such an immense army was not easy.  On the other side, General Nogi who had commanded the 1st IJA brigade that took Port Arthur in 1894 was given initially the 1st and 11th divisions for the same task in 1904. It soon became very apparent he required at minimum 4 divisions for the job. His force began a siege against Port Arthur and this in turn affected Kuropatkin's situation. Port Arthur had been provisioned to sustain 12 battalions for 12 months. But now it held 27 battalions and an enormous amount of refugees from places like Dalny, it was theorized to only be able to hold out for 6 months. On May 23rd Jalinski arrived to Kuropatkins HQ at Liaoyang whereupon he gave him the two options. Kuropatkin thought both options were idiotic and screamed at Jalinski, unwilling to comply. Alexeiev proposed sending the case to the Tsar for adjudication, thus both Kuropatkin and Alexeiev sent reports to the Tsar. Alexeievs case report drew attention to losing the navy and Port Arthur would lose the war based on a loss of morale. Kuropatkin explained going on an offensive southwards would simply expose his army to a devastating attack and it was better to hold up at Liaoyang and build up strength. He also advised that Port Arthur held no tactical significance anymore. The Tsar convened a council of war and they all agreed if Port Arthur fell the incoming baltic fleet would have nowhere to turn to. Thus Kuropatkin was instructed to rescue Port Arthur. In June of 1904, General Kuroki's 1st IJA was due north of Yalu heading for Liaoyang. To confront them was Lt General Keller and Major General Rennenkampf, yes that crazy badass from the last war. They had roughly 23,000 infantry, 3600 cavalry and over 90 guns of various caliber. General Oku's 2nd IJA meanwhile were going to be confronted by the 1st Siberian corps of Lt General Stakelberg who had 30,000 infantry, 3000 cavalry and over 100 guns. Within the 2nd IJA's center was Geneal Nozu's 10th IJA division who would be confronted by Major General Mishchenko's Cossack brigade. To the rear at Liaoyang and Mukden was General Kuropatkin with his growing force of 36,000 infantry, 6000 cavalry and 120 guns. The European 21st division had just arrived, and the 10th army corps + two cavalry divisions were en route. As you can see, the Russians were being forced to separate their forces by the Japanese. If they consolidated the Russians would be a force to be reckoned with. The Russians strategic lifeline, their greatest advantage was the railway, any threat to it would crush the Russian war effort. This was something that deeply troubled Kuropatkin at all times, he would have 55,000 men deployed just to defend the line between the Ural Mountains and the Manchurian frontier. Within Manchuria a force of 25,000 men were assigned to protect the lines there. Meanwhile every strategic point such as railway bridges were being attacked by Honghuzi forces under the direct guidance of Japanese officers. The Qing officially told the Russians they were doing everything they could to thwart the Honghuzi menace, but in reality they were doing pretty much nothing at all. In a single month over 90 major attempts to disrupt the railway would occur between Mukden and Tiehling. On June 7th, Kuropatkin visited Stakelberg at his HQ to give him verbal orders to accompany the written ones he received “Your Excellency's Army Corps is detailed with the object of drawing upon itself the greatest possible number of the enemy's forces and thereby weakening his army operating in the Kwantung Peninsula. Your advance, therefore, against the enemy's covering troops must be rapid and energetic, in the hope of crushing his advanced detachments should they prove to be weak in numbers. In the event of your encountering superior strength decisive action will be avoided and in no case will you allow the whole of your reserves to become engaged until the conditions are entirely clear. The object of our southerly movement is the capture of the Chinchou (Nanshan) position, and thereafter an advance on Port Arthur.” By late May, General Oku began to hear rumors the Russians were performing an advance so he dispatched the 1st Cavalry Brigade of Major General Akiyama to investigate the area of Telissu. The Japanese war plan at this moment was to gradually bring 3 of their armies together to confront the Manchurian army. The first target would be Liaoyang, but to advance to Liaoyang there were some large mountain ranges in the way. These were the Hsiungyaoshan and Fenshuling. The 1st and 4th IJA would have to pass through the passes of each mountain, those being the Motien and Fenshui passes. The Russians had fortified positions in both passes. Meanwhile, Akiyama's cavalry reached Telissu on May 30th and ran into a Russian cavalry brigade led by General Samsonov. This began a small scale battle where both sides were attacking another while simultaneously trying to reinforce their position. The 2nd squadron of the 13th IJA cavalry regiment were charged upon their left flank by two squadrons of the 8th Siberian cossacks to shocking effect. The Japanese would note the Cossacks used their lances to excellent effect. Casualties were not heavy, but the Japanese understood in the realm of cavalry they were simply outmatched. Thus the Japanese cavalry soon took up a position on along the mountains where they could dismount and fight like dragoons.  On June 3rd General Akiyama reported back to Oku that elements of the 1st Siberian army corps were entering Telissu. Oku ordered Akiyama to pull out swiftly. On the 5th, Stakelberg arrived to Telissu as the main body of the 1st Siberian corps were getting off trains. Stakelberg ordered Samsonov to take his cavalry and fortify a position 5 miles to the south. Basically Stakelberg was leapfrogging towards Port Arthur, using the railway as a general path of advance. On the 6th Oku received a report of the cavalry advance and now the Japanese were beginning to see the Russians were trying to rescue Port Arthur. IJA general HQ sent orders to ramp up activity to weaken Stakelberg's advance. Until this point the 1st and 4th IJA had been generally performing an offensive, however the 1st IJA were not exactly in a position to do so. The 10th division were still unloading at Takushan, to compensate General Kuroki was given a Guards brigade and ordered to seize Hsiuyen. Kuroki attacked Hsiuyen easily dislodging a force led by Mishchenko there by June 8th. Now back at Telissu, Stakelberg received reports on June 13th that over 20,000 Japanese were advancing north from Pulantien. He believed this to be an exaggeration so he sent three Cossack squadrons to investigate. On the same day, Oku's supplies had finally arrived and his 2nd IJA were able to begin their advance towards Liaoyang. The Cossacks saw the movement and came back to report it to Stakelberg who quickly abandoned his offensive to instead await the enemy at their prepared defensive positions south of Telissu. By the early morning of the 14th, the Japanese were 14 miles away from the forward Russian trenches. If you pull out a map of Telissu, there is a river, the Fuchou that heads in its direction. South and parallel to this is the railway going directly through Wafangtien then through Telissu. General Stakelberg deployed his troops astride the railway. To the west of the railway were the under strengthened 9th East Siberian rifle division, 5 battalions and two batteries. East of the railway was the bulk of his forces; the 1st East siberian rifle division of 12 battalions and 4 batteries. Lt General Simonov arrived to the scene to take command of the 19 cavalry squadrons previously under Samsonov, his position would be right of the Russian line. Two regiment of the 9th east siberian division and a regiment of the 3rd siberian infantry division were enroute by rail. The Japanese as usual enjoyed exact details on the Russian order of battle via their spy network. Oku had his 3rd and 5th divisions perform a frontal attack with the railway being a divisional boundary line. His 4th division was to perform a sweep going around the Fuchou valley from the west to hit the Russians right flank. So if you were looking at this on a map basically the east had a Russian division with 4 batteries facing a Japanese division with a cavalry brigade and in the west the Russians had a brigade with two batteries, 19 cavalry squadrons to face against two full Japanese divisions.  The Russians defenses were lines of trenches running for 8.5 miles. The shelter trenches were 9 inches deep with 15 inches of parapet. Riflement would be crouched shoulder to shoulder with no overhead cover. Below the Russians the valley afforded the attacker decent covered approaches, thus poor fields of fire for the defender. To the south there were some hills that provided a screen the Japanese could use to conceal their movements. As was the case with most of the battles in this war, it was to be won and lost by artillery. The Russian senior artillery officers insisted their guns could only be effective firing upon stationary targets from covered positions. The junior officers thought this was folly, but were obliged to do as they were told. The brand new Russian quick firing gun would appear for the first time in this battle, but would not be used effectively. The major problem was that of training. The Russian artillery crews had only had these guns for 4 months and as one military observer noted ‘in many, if not in most, cases, had not carried out any practice with them; the supply of ammunition was no doubt a factor'. The men simply did not really understand the enormous capability the new weapon held, because if used effectively the Japanese really had no way to counter it. On the morning of the 14th, the 3 Japanese divisions advanced. The 3rd and 5th kept in visual contact along the railway as the 4th moved further northwest to perform their hook attack. The 6th division was just beginning to land and Oku ordered them to immediately come over to build up his reserve, by the day of the battle, two battalions would make up that reserve. The advance of the Japanese had been quite fast taking the Russians off guard. The Russians were unable to lay out their telephone lines in time and would be at the mercy of runners. The Russian screening forces were gradually brushed aside until at 2pm the Japanese ran into Russian artillery fire in the center. The Japanese artillery of the 3rd division responded trying to tease out the Russian artillery positions. By 3pm a fuel artillery duel was raging. Oku's scouts re-estimated the Russians to be 3 divisions strong. Oku was well aware every hour that passed was an hour more Russian reinforcements were traveling to them via the railway. On the 15th 3000 infantry and two more artillery pieces would arrive. While the artillery duel raged, probing attacks were launched by the 34th IJA regiment against the left part of the Russian line. The 1st and 2nd East Siberian regiments had to consolidate to repel the attack, but in doing so the 2nd east siberian regiment took heavy casualties. By midday the 4th IJA division arrived to the scene and took up a position on the left bank of the Fuchou river. Their commander General Baron Ogawa read his orders at 5am on June 15th from Oku “As no danger is to be anticipated from the direction of the valley of the Fuchou river, you will detach a force of at least one brigade of infantry which will attack the enemy's right flank and help the advance of the other divisions.” Ogawa ordered his men to clear the town of Fuchou, the Russians would have been able to see this action using heliographs, but there was a large fog concealing them. Now Stakelberg did not like his subordinate Samsonov, he had very little confidence in the mans ability and that of his Cossack cavalry. In fact when a British military observer was walking touring the defensive lines with Stakelberg he pointed out how vulnerable his right flank looked. Stakelberg remarked ‘I have a (cavalry) squadron or so near Fuchou, but, if three Japanese squadrons advance, mine will retire without finding out the Japanese strength.' During the night of the 14th, said cavalry had actually discovered the Japanese advance upon their right flank and sent word of this to Stakelbergs chief of staff. The exact same British military observer happened to be present in the HQ and recalled “the chief of staff was told it was a report from Samsonov. It spoke of the Japanese advancing against their right flank. I thought to myself“that his chief had mentioned the possibility to me and would be glad to hear the news. My companion replied that Samsonov's cavalry were completely useless and that he did not intend to worry Stakelberg about the message”. At 3:30pm, Oku established his new HQ at Wafangtian. By 11pm he ordered his two divisions on the left to perform an attack on the Russian left and center up to the line of the railway set for dawn on the 15th. While the Russians would be concentrating upon their left, the 5th division supported by elements of the 4th would turn their right flank. Stakelberg seeing the pressure on his left, ordered the commander of the reserves, Major General Flasko to move from the center to the left. Glasko arrived at 6pm and placed himself under the command of Major General Gerngross who was commanding the 1st division. Thus three quarters of the Russian strength was now focused in the east, no reserves were available to support the west until the anticipated reinforcements arrived by rail that very night. Both Oku and Stakelberg were seeking to perform counterstrokes at dawn on the 15th. A counterstroke is not a counter attack by the way, it differs as it is aimed generally at the destruction of enemy forces rather than the seizure of territory. Thus you seek to block the enemy advance with a strong defensive line and then hit the enemy flank with a hammer to cause as many casualties as possible. Counter strokes are quite difficult to pull off, they heavily depend on opportunism and quite honestly the boldness of commanders. Frequently in history you see counter strokes occur just when some fresh reinforcements arrive to the scene of battle. Now its not like General Stakelberg issued some operation order for a counter stroke, what he did was sent various commanders separate memoranda. Thus one commander did not know what the other was to do. The memoranda stated that the operation would begin between 1 and 2 am on the 15th, but in an event before daybreak. The exact timing was left to the mutual agreement of commanders like Glasko and Gerngross who were commanding over 16 battalions, half the infantry on the Russian side. The orders were passed down through the night. Men savored their rolled cigarettes, those in the front trenches ate a black bread around dusk. The Russians in the forward positions could hear the Japanese preparing themselves, everyone was anxious. At 2am some shots were fired from nervous Russian positions, starting a fusillade along the entire line. The Japanese advanced during the night closer to the Russian lines as Russian officers barked at their men to restore order. No one got any sleep that night. At 4am the battlefield had a large mist hit. General Gerngross decided his counter stroke would begin at 4am, he sent word to Stakelberg of his decision and awaited his commanders approval. So to reiterate…Gerngross sent word of his decision, its not like he asked “do you approve?”, he simply expected Stakelberg to reply “I approve”. To complicate things further, Glasko sent a runner to Gerngross asking what his orders were, since Gerngross was his superior, but Gerngross had not received a reply from Stakelberg. Stakelberg, probably a bit confused, did not want to intervene in his subordinates operation, the man probably assumed as any of us would that Gerngross was going through with what he said. It was then 6:40am, nothing had been done. Glasko spoke with his staff and they decided they had to take matters into their own hands, they would start an attack. It was at that moment orders arrived from Gerngross confirming the attack and that he promised support. As the troops set off suddenly another runner showed up with new orders for Glasko from Stakelberg reading “If the Japanese advance with superior force against our centre or in any other direction, the Corps will fall back slowly to Wauchialing. In this case, Major General Glasko will hold the line Kouchiatun–Tsuichiatun as long as possible, in order to give the troops falling back by Telissu time to traverse the defile north of Tsuichiatun. Should the Japanese retire, the troops will halt, and await further order.”  Needless to say, its never a great thing when a commander is about to begin an attack and his superior is advising easing on the gas pedal and potentially withdrawing. The situation became confused very quickly. Glasko frantically called back his troops and ordered them to occupy the Kouchiatun-Tsuichitun line. Meanwhile Gerngross completely unaware of any changes in orders ordered his men to attack at 7am expected and depending on Glasko's men for support. Gerngross's 3 infantry regiments advance over a 1500 yard front in three echelons. This resulted in only a third of his force being able to fire at any one time. The 3rd IJA division within their trenches were surprised by the attack. Now General Glasko received orders yet again to go forward, but the Russian artillery was petering out and the Japanese were growing stronger.  General Ueda leading the 5th IJA division heard news of the Russian attacks and determined to take matters into his own hands. He had his artillery cross the river at 7am and began smashing Simonov's cavalry. Simonov believing he was only to perform delaying actions, pulled back northwest, thereby exposing the right flank of the Russian infantry lines. As the 5th division were battering the Russian forces, the 4th division arrived to the scene to add their weight against the thinly held Russian position. Soon the Russian right flank was being overwhelmed. At 11am Stakelberg received a distressing message that had originated back at 6am from his so called useless cavalry. It stated a strong force of Japanese were advancing southwest of Telissu. At that moment Stakelberg had a reserve of two battalions and another two battalions detraining at Telissu station. In a courageous manner, Stakelberg gathered the four battalions and personally launched an attack against the forward elements attacking his right flank. As brave as he was, he was too late to stop the inevitable. Stakelberg had two horses shot from under him before he issued orders to retreat at 11:30am.  West of the railway line, the Russian artillery was improving and the infantry lines were holding firm. The fighting became so fierce in the west, the lines converged and the men began to run out of ammunition and reportedly began tossing rocks at each other. General Oku was forced to toss half his reserve to assist the western front. Meanwhile Glasko's advance had been delayed because his artillery crews were having trouble with the terrain. Glasko had given them orders to advance against the Japanese right flank to support Gerngross's 1st east Siberian rifle division. For most of the morning, Gerngross's attention was fixated at the developing threat west of the railway. Gradually Gerngross's artillery became exposed and systematically annihilated. Gerngross's right flank were then subjugated to enfilade artillery and rifle fire from the 5th IJA division causing tremendous casualties. Glasko's forces failed to arrive to save Gerngross, thus on his own initiative by midday he ordered his division to withdraw. This order coincided with Glasko's delayed advance which ran directly into the 1st Japanese cavalry brigade advancing to the right of the 3rd IJA division. The fierce Japanese advance was far too much for his force, so he also began withdrawing. At around 2pm General Oku received word more forces were reaching the battlefield so he finally tossed his last reserve battalion to help the 3rd division pressing home the attack. Four batteries passed through the railway gap at 2pm taking a position at Lungwangmiao which was the initial forward Russian line of defense. The artillery crews found abandoned Russian guns there. Below them heading north were four regiments of the 1st east siberian rifle division. The Japanese batteries unleashed shrapnel upon them in revenge for the hours it was tossed at them. To the east and west the Russians were contracting to the center.  Stakelberg was personally directing the withdrawal from the west, but around Telissu the bulk of his corps were being hit with artillery without mercy. The acting rearguard, the 9th east siberian rifle division, courageously held the heights west of the Telissu railway to give the men a chance at evacuating the carnage. At 2pm the whistling of a steam locomotive announced the arrival of the two remaining battalions of the 9th east siberian infantry regiment coming from Kaiping. As the men jumped off the train carts they were hit with artillery and soon the Japanese were surrounding the position, talk about entering a battlefield. The transport corps blocked the route at Panlashan and trying to exit north was impossible. The 1st east siberian division were fleeing for their lives under Japanese artillery heading east, for many days they would be hunted down, to be killed or captured. By 3pm the battle had become a catastrophe for the Russians. Like a miracle, torrential rain began. Visibility fell dramatically, Stakelberg managed to salvage what remained of his army and marched them over to Kaiping. Ultimately the battle was lost because Stakelberg was unaware of the Japanese build up against his right flank. With the loss at Telissu, the Russian attempt to relieve Port Arthur had failed. The Japanese had 217 deaths, 946 wounded, for the Russians it was 477 dead, 2240 wounded and 754 missing. Russian morale was falling apart while the Japanese felt like superhumans. When the news reached St Petersburg the government and people were becoming immune to the terrible news from the east. Things were a disaster in the east, but back home in Russia, discontent was turning into a hateful fever amongst the common people who would eventually rise up.  I would like to take this time to remind you all that this podcast is only made possible through the efforts of Kings and Generals over at Youtube. Please go subscribe to Kings and Generals over at Youtube and to continue helping us produce this content please check out www.patreon.com/kingsandgenerals. If you are still hungry after that, give my personal channel a look over at The Pacific War Channel at Youtube, it would mean a lot to me. Kuropatkin never wanted to go on the offensive and when forced to do so, everything turned to ruin. Stakelberg and his men fought bravely, but one major oversight cost them the battle at Telissu and thus Port Arthur was now on her own.   

What areas in your life are stealing your peace? We continued "Advent" with a message about finding peace in the midst of life's chaos. Stephanie Akiyama shared a real-life story about navigating a storm and how encountering the Prince of Peace transformed everything. Whether it's a tough relationship, money stress, or the daily grind, we all need that exchange of worry for peace. Let's name it, bring it, and trade it at the feet of the One who offers an unshakable peace.

Episode 103 Crosscurrents in Early Electronic Music: Japan Playlist Experimental Music of Japan (1968 Victor) Album produced and recorded at the NHK Electronic Studio and supervised by K. Akiyama and W. Uenami. The tracks have been slightly reordered to represent the correct chronology of the works. Toshiro Mayuzumi and Makoto Moroi, “Variations Sur” (1956) from (1968 Victor). On this album, this piece was called the first work of electronic tape music produced in Japan. Not so. I know of five earlier works (by the NHK Studio engineers, Mayuzumi, and Shibata) dating back to 1954-1956. This work is also known as “Variations on the Numerical Principle of Seven” and actually dates to 1956, unlike what the liner notes tell us. I have two of those works in the archive and will feature them in a future episode. 14:54 Toru Takemitsu, “Sky, Horse And Death (Concrete-Music)” (1958) from Experimental Music Of Japan (1968 Victor). 3:22 Joji Yuasa, “Projection Esemplastic (For White-Noise)” (1964) from Experimental Music Of Japan (1968 Victor). 7:40 Maki Ishii, “Hamon-Ripples (For Chamber Ensemble, Violin And Taped Music)” (1965) from Experimental Music Of Japan (1968 Victor). 9:53 Toshi Ichiyanagi, “Situation (For Biwa, Koto, Violin, Double Bass, Piano and Multiplier)” (1966) from Experimental Music Of Japan (1968 Victor). 6:31 Toshiro Mayuzumi, “Campanology (For Multi-Piano)” (1967) from Experimental Music Of Japan (1968 Victor). 8:01   Group Ongaku (2011 Seer Sound Archive) Remastered at Inoue Onkyo Kikaku by Kazuya Sakagami, Yukio Fujimoto. Group Ongaku, “Automatism” (1960) from Music of Group Ongaku (2011 Seer Sound Archive). Japanese pressing, includes English language insert, edition of 300. Recorded on May 8, 1960 at Mizuno's house. This is the recording of a live performance for which the players used a piano, a pedal organ, a cello, alto saxophone and various everyday objects such as a vacuum cleaner, radio, an oil drum, dolls, and a set of dishes. The music was spontaneously created and recorded in real-time. Performers were Chieko Shiomi, Mikio Tojima, Shukou Mizuno, Takehisa Kosugi, Yasunao Tone, and Yumiko Tanno. 26:20 Group Ongaku, “Object” (1960) from Music of Group Ongaku (2011 Seer Sound Archive). Japanese pressing, includes English language insert, edition of 300. Recorded on May 8, 1960 at Mizuno's house. Performers were Chieko Shiomi, Mikio Tojima, Shukou Mizuno, Takehisa Kosugi, Yasunao Tone, and Yumiko Tanno. 7:34 Group Ongaku, “Metaplasm 9-15” Parts 1 and 2 (1961) from Music of Group Ongaku (2011 Seer Sound Archive). Japanese pressing, includes English language insert, edition of 300. Recorded on September 15, 1961, at Sogetsu Kaikan Hall, Tokyo. Performers: Cello, Mikio Tojima; Cello, Drums, Tape, Shukou Mizuno; Guitar, Genichi Tsuge; Piano, Chieko Shiomi; Saxophone, Tape, Yasunao Tone; Violin, Saxophone, Tape, Takehisa Kosugi. Part 1, 14:16; Part 2, 11:26. Opening background music, Makoto Moroi, “Shōsanke” for electronic sounds and Japanese traditional instruments (1968) from Experimental Music Of Japan '69 (no. 2) (1969 Victor). Issued also as part of the Prospective 21e siècle series, both Electronic Panorama: Paris, Tokyo, Utrecht, Warszawa Box-Set and self-contained Japanese Electronic Music LP. 13:20. Opening and closing sequences voiced by Anne Benkovitz. Additional opening, closing, and other incidental music by Thom Holmes. See my companion blog that I write for the Bob Moog Foundation. For additional notes, please see my blog, Noise and Notations.

Last time we spoke about the amphibious assaults in New Georgia, New Guinea and the naval battle of Kula Gulf. The boys on New Guinea were edging ever closer to their objective of Lae while drawing the Japanese attention elsewhere. In the Solomons, Admiral Kusaka tossed as many aircraft as he could to thwart the multiple allied landings, but it was to no avail. Having depleted his airpower, now he turned to the navy to see if they could reinforce New Georgia before another Guadalcanal situation occurred. Rear Admiral Teruo Akiyama was given the task of launching a Tokyo Express to New Georgia while also trying to give some fight to the enemy. Aboard his flagship the Niizuka, Akiyama did indeed give a fight to the Americans, showcasing a brand new type of radar and the ever trusty type 93 long lance torpedoes. The Japanese landed a few of their boys and now the real fight for New Georgia would begin.  This episode is the Fall of Mubo & battle of Kolombangara  Welcome to the Pacific War Podcast Week by Week, I am your dutiful host Craig Watson. But, before we start I want to also remind you this podcast is only made possible through the efforts of Kings and Generals over at Youtube. Perhaps you want to learn more about world war two? Kings and Generals have an assortment of episodes on world war two and much more  so go give them a look over on Youtube. So please subscribe to Kings and Generals over at Youtube and to continue helping us produce this content please check out www.patreon.com/kingsandgenerals. If you are still hungry for some more history related content, over on my channel, the Pacific War Channel you can find a few videos all the way from the Opium Wars of the 1800's until the end of the Pacific War in 1945.  So the past few weeks we have been chaotically juggling multiple events across the Solomons and New Guinea and this week it shall be no different. So let's first jump into New Guinea. General MacArthur's forces managed to pull off the Nassau Bay landing, getting General Savige some much needed reinforcements on his eastern flank and a new supply route. Now the landing at Nassau Bay was part of an ongoing operation codenamed Doublet, aimed at dislodging the Japanese from Bobdubi and Mubo. Taking these were necessary for the future push against Lae and Salamaua. Mubo held an airfield and its capture would greatly facilitate troop movements towards Salamaua. The movement in the interior towards Mubo was complicated by rough terrain. There were a series of ridges that could be defended sternly by the Japanese. As we have seen for weeks, Roosevelt ridge, the pimple, Green Hill, Observation hill, Lababia ridge and Bitoi ridge proved to be very heavily defended. For the Japanese headquarters, all of the allied offensives were confusing as to where exactly the main target was to be. General Nakano remained confident, Salamaua was the main target and he acted accordingly by beefing up the defense there. He ordered Major General Chuichi Muroya, the commander of the 51st infantry division to fortify and defend Salamaua. As part of this, he also ordered Muroya to dispatch around 1000 men to halt American forces trying to move up the coast towards Lake Salus. Now by July 2nd Brigadier Moten's plan was for the 2/6th and 2/5th battalions to take Mubo and Observation hill. While the new Taylor Force would capture Bitoi ridge and then the ridge between Bui Alang and Bui Kumbul Creeks. After this the forces would link up and the Japanese lines of communications along the Buigap Creek would be severed. While this was going on the 15th brigade who was working in conjunction with the newly landed troops, were performing an offensive directed at reducing the Japanese presence around Lae and Salamaua. Part of this offensive involved the inexperienced 58th/59th battalion who had a hell of a time facing the Japanese at Bobdubi ridge. The 58th/59th battalion were two previous militia battalions from Victoria. Initially they were a defensive force in Australia, not meant to go to places like New Guinea, but as they say times were tough. They got a taste of hand to hand combat in late june and while they did not make much progress, they still impacted the campaign, forcing General Muroya to request reinforcements so he could maintain a firm defense for the approaches to Salamaua. Nakano made it clear Bobdubi was of grave importance stating “this location is the last key point in the defense of Salamaua”. Muroya received Major Otoichi Jinno's 1st and 3rd companies of the 80th battalion. They marched through the Coconuts area to Bobdubi bringing with them 2 mountain guns of the 26th field artillery regiment. Meanwhile Colonel Araki his 1st battalion over to the Old Vickers position. By early July Muroya now held 5 infantry companies, around 500 men strong in all. But with all the activity hitting the north, Araki became worried and ultimately decided to move his regimental HQ and 1st battalion to Komiatum, leaving only his 2nd battalion to hold Mubo.  On July 4th, Brigadier Heathcote Hammer took command of the 15th brigade. He was a veteran of the second battle of El Alamein, one of the most iconic battles of WW2, yours truly actually wrote quite a large episode for Kings and Generals on that one, and I think by the time this podcast comes out it should as well. Anyways Hammer had taken a German bullet right through both of his cheeks, but he did not lose a single tooth in the process, I guess lucky on that count. He earned a distinguished service order for his time in the middle east and in june of 1943 was promoted to Brigadier and given command of the 15th brigade. He was considered one of the most original and magnetic leaders of the Australian Infantry. “Hard as Nails” was said to be his motto, and “as you train, so you fight” his creed. When the 58/59th battalion stalled, he was tossed into the thick of it. Now do remember he was coming directly off the victory at Alamein, so he was I guess you can call it “desert minded” when he was tossed into the unforgivable jungles of New Guinea. He would have to deal with completely different terrain, different types of troops and a different enemy than the Italians and Germans. Another result of the delays at Bobdubi saw General Saviege dispatched Major Warfe's commands over to stop the Japanese from escaping Mubo. On July the 5th, General Savige ordered Hammer to send the company towards Tambu Saddle and Goodview Junction where they could cut off the Komiatum Track, thus preventing the Japanese from escaping Mubo to the north. Meanwhile B Company were on the Bench Cut Track carrying out ambush attacks. The two mountain guns brought up to the old vickers position were sporadically hitting Australian positions to their misery. C Company was performing a diversionary attack, while D Company was trying to capture the Coconuts and were successful at taking its northern region by nightfall on July 6th. The next day, the 80th regiment were pushing the 58/59th battalion back as air attacks from 6 Bostens hit the Old vickers allowing C Company to charge in with further support from D Company's mortars. The men charged up the steep ridge into Japanese machine gun nets and pillboxes. Likewise the 1st company of the 80th regiment with support of the 1st battalion, 66th regiment were launching counterattacks out of Komiatum. The Japanese managed to ambush some Australian supply lines inflicting casualties. On July 9th, the Australians tried to charge again into the Old Vickers, through a Sugarcane Knoll, but it went the exact same as last time, the machine gun nests and pillboxes were simply too much. Bobdubi ridge proved a tough nut to crack, but all of the activity was causing more and more Japanese units to move away from Mubo. By this point Mubo was being defended by 950 men and of those 770 were front line soldiers of the 66th regiment and the 14th field artillery regiment. And so the time was ripe to hit Mubo. Moten tossed Companies A and B from the 2/6th and C Company from the 2/5th towards Buiapal Creek; C Company of the 2/6th at Lababia ridge; D company of the 2/6th at the Saddle and the remainder of the 2/5th battalion into reserve. Warfe's commands went to work cutting off the escape route along the Komiatum track at Goodview Junction, but his forward units were spotted by Japanese patrols. As the commandos approached the area the Japanese came down from Orodubi ambushing them at Ambush Knoll…because of course its named that, silly Aussies, and this resulted in some lost supplies. Hammer was determined not to be thwarted by any delays so he ordered Warfe to launch a counterattack immediately. The Commandos were able to push the enemy back and reclaim their lost supplies, some of which were mortars and machine guns. On the night of the 6th, Warfe was ordered to leave a force to secure Wells junction while the rest of his men would proceed to cut off the escape route. During the morning of July 7ty, Moten's leading companies were wading through waste deep water in the Buiapal Creek due south of Observation Hill. The allied assault against Mubo was set to begin at 9:30am on the 7th, with Mitchell bombers coming in to strafe Kitchen Creek, Woody Island and Observation Hill. After this some Botsons and liberators would likewise bomb and strafe the same targets. The view from the ground was quite the spectacle for Moten's men. It looked like the entirety of the Mubo valley was being enveloped in thick black smoke and flames as the bombers dropped their payloads. Over 159 bombers and fighters dropped 109 tons of bombs over the Mubo area. Even if the bombs did not directly cause casualties among the Japanese in the area, it still caused chaos. Once the air attacks dissipated, the ground forces opened up their artillery and charged. A company of the 2/5th advanced without encountered any opposition, successfully climbing the northern slopes of Observation Hill. The southern slopes proved much more difficult with the Japanese putting up a fight against B company. B Company were forced to take a defensive position in a Kunai patch southwest of the slopes of Observation Hill. During this time, the Artillery over at the beaches of Nassau Bay were being moved further inland and would arrive at Napier by July 8th. This allowed Taylor Force to have the guns necessary to launch an assault of Bitoi ridge. Taylors men managed to get to the southern slopes of the ridge by 3pm while A Company touching its forward crest. B Company likewise broke through to the north and got to a point between Kitchen and Bui Savella Creek. A Company attempted another assault against Observation Hill but was repelled again, prompting Captain Dexter's D company to be sent to reinforce them. July 9th saw numerous patrol clashes as the Australians prodded deeper and deeper into the area. In the afternoon the Japanese sent a strong counterattack against the 2/5th companies seeing fierce fighting. As noted by Arthur Pearson of D company “In most cases we were firing blind, but sometimes we were abl to pick up the smoke from their rifles”. Pearson  at one point jumped into a weapon pit, trying to draw the Japanese fire his way. A bullet came at him, piercing the stock butt of his rifle, before slamming into one of the soldiers beside him killing the man. Pearson had no idea where the bullet had come from and frantically fired into the jungle hoping to hit the Japanese sniper. The next day saw a lot of the same, more patrol clashed. On the 10th, B Company engaged the enemy around Kitchen Creek. Meanwhile US infantry had cut the main track north of Bui Alang Creek on the 9th. The Americans began advancing down to Buigap Creek, then south to the Komiatum Track by July 10th, before hitting Buigap where they drove off a bunch of Japanese. The Americans now guessed the Japanese on Mubo were using a route north east along the Buikumbul to withdraw to Mount Tambu. With the Australian and now Americans infiltrating the sector, General Nakano ordered the Mubo garrison to pull out on the 11th, back over to Komiatum. To mask their withdrawal the Japanese planned to begin moving after sundown. By July 13th, they made their way along the Saddle to Mount Tambu, but the Americans had spotted them and gave them hell using artillery. The Japanese got out, but suffered many casualties doing so. On July the 12th, with the Japanese leaving the area, the Australians seized the Pimple, Green Hill and Observation hill with little opposition. Thus the allies had finally driven the Japanese out of their positions near Mubo, but they had also allowed them to escape. It turned out to be quite the fiasco with General Savige and Herring both believing they controlled the US troops of the 162nd, but in truth General Fuller refused to relinquish command to either. This confusion helped the Japanese squeeze out, though they did suffer 313 deaths and 981 casualties. The Australians received around 300 casualties. Mubo had fallen, its airfield was captured, mop up operations would go on for sometime, but most of the Japanese outposts were cleared. The path to Salamaua and Lae was ever closer. But now we are heading east over to the Solomons. General Wing's 172nd and 169th regiments were assembling at Zanana by July 6th. Their task now was to advance along the Barike River towards Munda. Meanwhile on the northern coast of New Georgia Colonel Liversedge's men successfully landed at Rice Anchorage by July 5th. His force was the 1st Marine Raider battalion, the 3rd battalion, 148th infantry and Companies K and L from the 145th infantry. His men began their advance south towards what is known as the Dragons peninsula. At the same time, as a result of the battle of Kula Gulf, the Japanese were able to land some men of the 13th regiment over at Vila. Defending Vila were forces led by Colonel Tomonari Satoshi. With more men on hand, General Sasaki intended to move the troops via barge through Bairoko so they could reinforce Munda. Sasaki had already brought his 3rd battalion, 229th regiment from Vila using barges. He was lucky the first time but now he felt the Americans would try to attack the airfield directly, perhaps by setting up artillery on the nearby Hopei island. Roviana island likewise could be used as a staging area for amphibious tanks to charge over. Thus Sasaki brought over some 8cm dual purpose guns and 13mm anti aircraft machine guns to try and defend the beaches. He also ordered Major Sato's 2nd battalion of the 229th regiment to dig some anti-tank ditches along the beach with the intent to smash any enemy tanks at the waters edge. He received word of the landings made at Zanana on July 3rd, prompting him to quickly reinforce his eastern line that ran north from Ilangana point. By July 6th, he had the 3rd battalion, 229th regiment and Sato's 2nd battalion holding positions along the the Ilangana line with a roadblock position held by a company who were using felled trees and barbed wire in front of Barike. Sasaki also had at his disposal a company of the Kure 6th SNLF led by Commander Okumura Saburo at Bairoko with a small detachment of the 2nd battalion, 13th infantry led by Major Obashi Takeo.  Meanwhile General Wing managed to get most of his 172nd regiment to the mouth of the Barike, but the 2nd battalion of the 169th remained on Rendova and the 1st and 3rd battalions were moving inland towards the Japanese roadblock. Unfortunately for the 3rd battalion, they had not found the roadblock by the night of july 6th and dug in just a bit east of it. They did not establish a good perimeter for their fox holes, there were no trip wires or barbed wires anywhere. Thus when the darkness came, so did the Japanese from the roadblock. The Japanese performed their classic infiltration tactics. The men in the foxholes began to hear random screaming, the odd firing of rifles all around them. The Japanese began to infiltrate their perimeter with one soldier reported that Japanese troops were approaching while calling out company code names in English. It was a brutal night to be sure. The shaken men of the 3rd battalion advanced with I company leading the way. They found themselves running into Japanese machine gun positions by 10:55pm around the Munda trail. They retaliated with mortars and machine guns, but could not properly see where the enemy was. Luckily B company from the 172nd showed up attacking the roadblock from the rear. In the carnage 3 platoon leaders were wounded, K Companies commander was killed, no progress was being made. Firing lanes were drawn out, the Americans were trying to find the enemy but their muzzle blasts were tiny. Some of the Americans tossed grenades, but they could not get close enough to effectively do it. By 3:30 the 3rd battalion withdrew from what they called “blood hill” to dig in for the night, but the Japanese continued to harass them. According to the 169th infantry “it was a sleepless night spend under continued harassment from enemy patrols speaking English, making horror noises, firing weapons, throwing hand grenades, swinging machetes and jumping into foxholes with knives”  On the 8th, the roadblock was overrun costing the 3rd battalion, 169th regiment and B company of the 172nd 6 deaths and 13 wounded. The next day the 169th finally got to their assembly point at the Barike line, while Colonel Liversedge and his men were crossing the Tamaku river. Colonel Liversedge planned to send Colonel Griffiths 1st Raiders with 2 companies of the 145th regiment to swing around the west shore of the Enogai Inlet prior to assaulting Bairoko while the 3rd battalion, 148th regiment would advance over to the Munda-Bairoko trail to cut off Munda from reinforcements. Liversedge estimated taking the Enogai Inlet and cutting off the trail would be done by July 8th, and it was critical it was done speedily as his men only had 3 days rations on hand. In the late afternoon of the 7th, the 148th managed to reach the trail and created a roadblock the following day. Griffiths team and secured the villages of Triri and Maranusa, clashing with a few Japanese patrols along the way. After capturing the villages the men came across some Japanese documents showcasing the defense plan for Enogai. On the 8th, the Raiders moved out of Triri enroute to Enogai only to run into an impassable mangrove swamp. Meanwhile Major Obashi launched a counterattack against Triri which would be eventually repelled. Griffith got the men to resume the advance using another trail west of the swamp and found themselves around Leland Lagoon where they clashed with some Japanese.  The morning of the 9th, saw General Wings main advance began. At 5am General Barkers 3 battalions of artillery positioned on both shores of the Honiavasa passage and some 155mms on Rendova opened fire on Munda. The artillery put several thousand rounds of 105mm and 155mm high explosives upon Munda. This was followed up by a naval bombardment by the USS Farenholt, Buchanan, McCalla and Ralph Talbot who were firing from the Blanche Channel, showering Munda with over 2000 5 inch shells. Then on top of all that 107 Dauntless and Avengers dropped 79 tons of bombs over Munda, Enogai and Bairoko harbor beginning at 8:30am. The Japanese recorded that the area was lit up as if it were daytime. The 172nd regiment forded the Barike, the 169th was unable to move because of the battle against the Japanese roadblock. On the night of July 6th, Admiral Samejima sent the rest of the troops that were supposed to be transported during the battle of Kula Gulf, the 2nd battalion of the 13th regiment, some 1200 men. They were aboard 4 destroyers, the Matsukaze, Yunagi, Mikazuki and Satsuki escorted by the cruisers Sendai and Chokai and 4 other destroyers the Yukikaze, Hamakaze, Tanikaze and Yugure. They only saw some harassment from a small strike force consisting of 5 PBY's as they made their way to Vila and safely returned. Admiral Kusaka requested some naval reinforcements from the Combined Fleet, so Admiral Kogo send Admiral Nishimura's Cruiser division 7, arriving on the 11th. Alongside this, Rear Admiral Izaki Shunji came over with light cruiser Jintsu and destroyer Kiyonami, taking command of the reinforcement unit. Back on land, the Kure 6th's batteries were firing upon Rice Anchorage prompting Griffith to begin the assault of the Enogai Inlet. Supported by mortars, B Company stormed the village of Baekineru. The Japanese began withdrawing from Enogai allowing the Americans to seize it by the 11th. This came just in time as the Raiders had run out of food and water. The raiders had paid heavily, suffering 47 deaths, 80 wounded and 4 men missing. The Kure 6th SNLF would report 81 deaths and a platoon of 50 men lost. The heavy losses forced Liversedge to request the 4th raiders be landed for the capture of Bairoko, but they would only arrive on the 18th. Meanwhile Colonel Tomonari brought forward his 1st and 3rd battalion to Bairoko to help reinforce Munda. At around 4pm, the 3rd battalion led by Colonel Takabayashi attacked the American roadblock, nearly dislodging them. By nightfall the Japanese took up a position on a ridge to the 148th's northern flank. There was a series of counterattacks until the next day saw a bit of a stalemate, then the morning after that the Japanese backed off. The 148th regiment would hold onto the roadblock for more than a week, but would quickly run low on food. It mattered not however as the Japanese just advanced along another trail further west, prompting Liversedge to order the roadblock abandoned on July 17th. Now Admiral Kusaka wanted to reinforce the important volcanic island of Kolombangara. Kolombangara was a perfectly round stratovolcanic cone soaring out of the sea to an altitude of 5800 feet. The Japanese had a garrison at Vila airfield on the islands southern shore. The island was often to put men and supplies upon barges that would make nighttime transits across the straits to Munda point. Kusaka sought to toss another 1200 troops, Major Yamada Tadaichi's 2nd battalion, 45th regiment and the 8th battery, 6th field artillery. Transporting them would be Matsukaze, Yunagi, Minazuki and Satsuki coming from Buin, escorted by Admiral Izaki's aboard the Jintsu alongside 5 destroyers Mikazuki, Yukikaze, Hamakaze, Kiyonami and Yugure coming from Rubaul. Unfortunately for the IJN, allied coastwatchers saw reported their movement and Admiral Halsey responded by ordered Admiral Ainsworth and task force 18 to intercept them. Ainsworth had light cruisers USS Honolulu, St Louis, the Royal New Zealand light cruisers HMNZS Leander; destroyers USS Nicholas, O'Bannon, Taylor, Jenkins, Radford, Ralph Talbot, Buchanan, Maury, Woodworth and Gwin. Half of Ainsworth's forces came from Captain Ryan's Destroyer squadron 12 who were quite inexperienced. Ainsworths set up his force making his vanguard the Nicholas followed by O'Bannon, Taylor, Jenkins and Radford. Honolulu, Leander and St Louis followed in the center. Ainsworth specifically placed Leander in the middle because she held inferior radar, he preferred St Louis to take the lead out of the Cruisers. Ryan's destroyers would take up the rear with Ralph Talbot, followed by Buchanen, Maury, Woodworth and Gwin. By 5pm task force 18 was sailing once again for the Kula Gulf. Task Force 18 had left Tulagi at 5pm on July 12th under clear skies and calm seas. As they passed Savo Island, Ainsworth took a course along the west coast of Santa Isabel island hoping to use it to hide his force from Japan reconnaissance aircraft. At 12:35am a PBY reported the course and composition of Izaki's force, and Ainsworth heading in for the intercept. As the two forces were converging, Izaki dispatched his Destroyer transport through Vella Gulf to unload the troops but at 1am he was alerted of the approaching enemy. It was actually the Americans who established radar content first, but the Japanese gained visual contact by 1:08am As the two forces converged, Izaki sent his destroyer transports through Vella Gulf; yet by 01:00, the Americans detected his force. However it was actually the Japanese who detected the Americans first for almost 2 hours or so because of the electromagnetic impulses the American radar systems emitted. The Japanese crews had managed to gain a fairly accurate picture of Ainsworths disposition. At 1:08 the Japanese made visual contact and were the first to attack, launching 29 torpedoes by 1:14am. Ainsworth's vanguard increased speed to engage the Japanese with their torpedoes while the cruisers turned to deploy their main batters and engage to starboard. Ainsworth yet again ignorant of the type 93 long lance capabilities had no idea the fish were already in the water coming towards his force as they watched the Japanese destroyers turn away. The American destroyers tossed 19 Mark 15 torpedoes, but the Japanese were over 10,000 yards away and turning north thus completely wasted the volley. When the Japanese were 10,000 yards or so Ainsworth cruisers began opening fire, concentrating on the Jintsu. When the Japanese column closed to 10,000 yards at 01:12, Ainsworth ordered his cruisers to open fire, concentrating on the Jintsu which was leading. Honolulu and St Louis fired an incredible amount of shells for 18 minutes at 1100 and 1360 6 inch rounds joined by 350 5in rounds. The Leander fired 160 6 inch rounds. The Jintsu was hit first to her rudder, then her bridge killing Izaki, followed by 10 or more shells to her engineering spaces. She was a doomed burning ship, that came to a dead drift quickly. The Americans then launched another volley of torpedoes, 21 in all, but they would all fail to hit a mark. By this time, the Japanese torpedoes were finally arriving. Leander was hit at 1:22 forcing Ainsworth to detach Radford and Jenkins to help her limp away. The rest of Ainsworth forces managed to avoid the torpedoes. While this was occurring the destroyer transports had successfully unloaded the 1200 troops and were moving north to withdraw with Izaki's other destroyers. The Japanese were not running away however, they were getting to a safe position to reload torpedoes and re-engage. After finishing off the Jintsu at 1:45, Ainsworth ordered the force to pursue the enemy going northwest. They made radar contact again at 1:56, but Ainsworth doubted the blips to be the enemy, but rather his vanguard ships. Instead of opening fire, Ainsworth attempted making contact with the vanguard force and began firing starshells, this would prove to be a fatal error. The Japanese launched another volley of 31 torpedoes. At 2:08 the first to be hit was St Louis, it opened her bow, next Gwin was hit near her No 2 engine room; Honolulu was third receiving a hit to her starboard bow at 2:11, with another hitting her stern without exploding. Honolulu's rudder jammed and she nearly smashed into Gwin coming within 50 yards of her. That effectively ended the battle as Ainsworth ordered the task force to withdraw back to Tulagi. The Gwin had lost 61 men and was forced to be scuttled, Leander lost 28, the Jintsu 482 and another Japanese Admiral was dead. 21 survivors of the Jintsu were rescued later on by the I-180, a few others were picked up by American ships. The Japanese had won a tactical victory and demonstrated yet again their superior night fighting techniques. But it was a pyrrhic victory in many ways as well, the Americans could afford to lose ships, the Japanese could not.   After the defeat, Admiral Nimitz decided to change tactics and not confine anymore cruisers to the Solomons as they could not hope to chase the IJN destroyers and their troublesome torpedoes were a major threat. Nimitz wrote a letter to Halsey suggesting that a well trained squadron of 2100 ton Fletcher class destroyers would be better suited to such waters rather than cruises. Halsey argued despite the Japanese having superior torpedoes, he believed Ainsworth's night battle plan A, that had employed SG radar with radar directed gunnery were still superior to anything the IJN had. He thought the solution “appears to be the greatest volume and weight of gunfire that can be incorporated into a highly maneuverable unit–and a unit that is certainly not appreciably weaker than the enemy unit.” Regardless Halsey went to work designating two squadrons of 2100 ton destroyers to take over New Georgia operations and would not risk anymore of his cruisers going up the Slot on any more missions. I would like to take this time to remind you all that this podcast is only made possible through the efforts of Kings and Generals over at Youtube. Please go subscribe to Kings and Generals over at Youtube and to continue helping us produce this content please check out www.patreon.com/kingsandgenerals. If you are still hungry after that, give my personal channel a look over at The Pacific War Channel at Youtube, it would mean a lot to me. The New Guinea and New Georgia campaigns were seeing gradual progress for the allies, but the naval battles were much less to be desired. While the Japanese were earning some victories, they were rather pyrrhic in nature as American production was winning the day.

Last time we spoke about the amphibious assaults for Operations Chronicle and Toenails. General Douglas MacArthur finally performed his landings at Nassau Bay, Woodlark and Kiriwina islands. Woodlark and Kiriwina proved to be cake walks, while Nassau Bay proved a tougher nut to crack. Then over in the Solomons, Admiral Halsey unleashed his landings at Wickham Anchorage, Segi Point, Viru Harbor and Rendova. Now the Japanese were more alert to the invasions and offered some resistance, although ultimately Sasaki would order many forces to simply withdraw from the invaders. Admiral Kusaka tossed a ton of airpower at the incoming allies only to lose a disastrous quarter of his air fleet, forcing him to ask his Army colleague Immamura for additional support. However with all of these landings came a large amount of allied warships to bring them, and such actions could only bring about one conclusion, another naval battle for the pacific war. This episode is the Battle of Kula Gulf  Welcome to the Pacific War Podcast Week by Week, I am your dutiful host Craig Watson. But, before we start I want to also remind you this podcast is only made possible through the efforts of Kings and Generals over at Youtube. Perhaps you want to learn more about world war two? Kings and Generals have an assortment of episodes on world war two and much more  so go give them a look over on Youtube. So please subscribe to Kings and Generals over at Youtube and to continue helping us produce this content please check out www.patreon.com/kingsandgenerals. If you are still hungry for some more history related content, over on my channel, the Pacific War Channel you can find a few videos all the way from the Opium Wars of the 1800's until the end of the Pacific War in 1945.    Before we jump into the naval battle of Kula Gulf a lot was occurring in New Guinea and the Solomons. Over in the Bobdubi front, the Australian 15th brigade under the temporary command of Colonel Guinn were preparing for the main offensive, hoping to trap the Japanese defending Mubo. To support the Nassau Bay landing, Colonel Guinn ordered the untested 58/59th battalion to advance upon the Japanese high ground position at the Old Vicker's, Coconuts and Bobdubi area. They would be marching from Orodubi to the Coconuts while Major Warfe's commandos would raid Malolo and Kela. Company A and C of the 58/59th would make the initial attack seeing A attacking Gwaibolom and C the Old Vicker's position. Following close behind them was B company who were to advance across the ridge to gain control over the Bench Cut Track. D Company were to be held in reserve at the Kunda-vine. On June 26th, A company set off from Missim heading towards their forming up point at Namling. On the 28th, the other remaining companies made departed Meares Camp heading for the New Bobdubi kunda bridge. The next day 17 of Warfe's commandos were ambushed by 30 Japanese. They managed to escape, but were forced to abandon a Bren gun. By the night of June 29th, the 58th/59th crossed the Francisco River and began preparations for the launch of the main attack which would occur the next morning. The next morning saw lackluster allied air strikes against Gwaibolom, Salamua, Old Vickers and the Coconut area. Companies B and C left their start up point of Uliap Creek, seeing C attack Buggert village, just a bit south of the Old Vickers position being held at this time by a company of the 115th regiment led by Lt Ogawa Takeshi. They successfully outlanked the Japanese and captured the village, suffering only 2 casualties for their efforts. From there the Australians assaulted the Old Vickers position, but the Japanese defenders repealed them right back to Buggert village. The Japanese defenders had well established positions, hiding in dugouts 40 feet down from the top. The failure to seize the Old Vickers position, prevented B Company from reaching their objective, the Bench Cut Track and now they were being met with Mortar fire as they crossed the ridge. Meanwhile A Company began their assault on Orodubi, but anticipating booby-traps the men had left on the Bench Cut Track around 70 yards south of Orodubi, they chose to climb a 40 foot kunai slope to join the main track just 10 yards within the enemy. Around 80 men of Company 10 led by Lt Gunji Toshio saw the Australians doing this and promptly began tossing grenades at close range and fired down upon them. The Australians were forced to flee back to Namling as a result. The next day it was decided they would use a platoon to contain Orodubi while the others bypassed it to go onwards and capture Gwaibolom and Erskine Creek, which they managed to do by July 2nd. While this was occurring, B Company was trying to find another way across the ridge, but were failing to do so. So on July 2nd, they were ordered to move across the ridge via the newly established positions at Gwaibolom and Erskine Creek, and would reach the Komiatum Track / bench track junction where they would prepare an ambush by the 3rd. At around 5pm on the 3rd, B company managed to ambush a party of 20 Japanese trying to move towards Old Vickers and this quickly fell into hand to hand combat killing half the Japanese and one of their officers. Meanwhile Colonel MacKechnie's men were fighting to keep their beachhead alive at Nassau Bay. AA and C Companies had fought through the night against Japanese until their 300 yard perimeter was secured. At dawn on June 30th, C company began advancing south to find the Papuan infantry battalion who were around Cape Dinga. C Company made their way to a place just due west of Cape Dinga, following the Tabali River, while A Company was patrolling north and south of an arm of the Bitoi river where they ran into the 3rd battalion, 102nd regiment. A Company backed by some other units attempted to hit the Japanese western flank, but they were overwhelmed and forced to turn back. It would actually be Amphibian engineers who would save the day, who came in at the last minute to help A company out just as the Japanese tossed a banzai charge at them. Upon receiving word of the Japanese attacks, C company rushed over to join A by 3pm. Yet unbeknownst to them, the Japanese were not actually trying to break through, they were trying to withdraw by crossing the Tabali river. General Nakano had ordered them to withdraw to a new position at Lake Salus when he heard word over 1000 men had landed at Nassau Bay. Nakano also had ordered the 3rd battalion of the 66th regiment to send 150 men to march south from Salamua to help out in the Nassau Bay area. These men were tasked with carrying out only limited attacks against the allied forces around Nassau Bay, such as delaying actions to help the Nassau Bay garrison withdraw towards Lake Salus. Nakano was also coordinating with Colonel Araki who was now operating out of an HQ in Mubo, he had likewise brought forces over to Mubo from Salamua.  As for the Papuan infantry, they were marching north and they ran into the 3rd battalion, 102nd regiment around Cape Dinga as well. They managed to attack their rear killing at least 26 Japanese who were holding out in a bunker. After this they continued their march to the Nassau Bay beachhead. At around 4:30pm C company began sending reports that they were seeing some Japanese crossing over the Tabali River just south of their position. They were ordered to return to the beachhead perimeter to take the southern flank, but before they were able the Japanese attacked their rear taking 5 men and a platoon commander. Around the beachhead a hastily prepared defensive line was established by an ad hoc force of Engineers, Australian infantry and Headquarters personnel. As the night fell on, C company reached the southern part of the perimeter, quickly taking up positions. The Japanese began a series of attacks throughout the entire night from all sides using machine guns, grenades, mortar and rifle fire. Smaller parties of Japanese were trying to infiltrate positions. It was a terrifying experience for the defenders who would dub it “guy fawkes night”. Many of the men had itchy fingers which led to tragic accidental casualties throughout the night. It was a pitch black night and the noises of the jungle and Japanese screaming stuff in english unnerved the allied forces. The Japanese had tossed a ton of stuff into the perimeter trying to get the allies to use up their own munitions in response. As a result the allied forces had 18 deaths and 27 wounded several of which were the result of friendly fire. The Japanese it seems to have around 50 deaths during the night. Back over in the north, on June 30th, Captain Dexter was leading forward a number of patrols in preparation for an assault upon Duali. However as they advanced they ran into a Japanese ambush along the Bitoi track, thus canceling their planned assault. The next day, Brigadier Moten ordered Dexter's exhausted men to move forward regardless. With some support of Beaufighters strafing the Japanese positions, the Australians charged straight through the enemy positions, and to their shock they found them abandoned. As Dexter recalled ‘We advanced through the Japanese position with fixed bayonets and searched the scrub on each side. Everywhere was evidence of a hasty evacuation, dropped equipment and personal rice bags, and evidence of extensive bomb damage. But of the Japs, no sign.' Thus Dexter and his men captured the mouth of the Bitoi by early afternoon. Shortly after the capture, Dexter made contact with MacKechnie who was busy expanding his perimeter northwards. By nightfall, PT boats led by Lt Commander Barry Atkins covered the landing of 11 landing craft full of reinforcements. The PT boats staffed nearby villages to cause a lot of ruckus, hoping to dissuade nearby Japanese from firing on the vulnerable landing craft. The reinforcements were mostly from B company who had failed to land during the third wave. On July 2nd, Moten began to pressure MacKechnie, stating he had to get his troops moving inland at once. Thus MacKechnie decided to leave C company to defend the perimeter while Lt Colonel Harold Taylor would lead the rest of the men towards Napier. Luckily for the men, 4 75mm pack howitzer m1 artillery guns had been unloaded that night with the reinforcements giving them ample firepower. The gun were positioned on the beach and immediately went to work shelling targets at the mouth of the Tabali River, Cape Dinga and the area between Duali and the Bito River's southern arm. On July the 3rd, the men now designated the Taylor Force accompanied by Dexter's company were marching for Napier, but their march was a slow one as the jungles were thick and they were carrying heavy equipment. While this was occurring the 3rd battalions of the 102nd and 66th regiments were consolidating around Lake Salus looking to create a defensive position. The coastal area however proved to be too difficult to fortify, so they moved over the Tambu where they joined a SNLF platoon of the 5th Sasebo to make a position there. At this point General Savige decided to send the Papuans north along the coast to keep pressuring the enemy's retreat. By the 4th, Taylor Force had taken a position at Napier and were now under the direct command of Moten's 17th brigade. Back over on the beaches at Nassau Bay a total of 1477 troops had been landed, thus securing the beachhead. Dexters company marched back over to Guadagasal taking a coastal route, getting themselves ready for a future assault against Mubo slated for July 7th. MacKechnie believed the loss of some of his landing craft had greatly delayed the entire operation, perhaps up to 3 weeks. He did not think he would be able to move artillery or large quantities of supplies further inland. He also did not think it was tactically sound to leave his base, as the Japanese proved to be quite a nuisance in the area. Orders from the top were demanding a artillery road be built, but his troops at the assembly area would probably run out of rations in a day or two and he had no native carriers on hand. In his words "To be very frank we have been in a very precarious position down here for several days and my sending the rifle troops inland was contrary to my own best judgment. Troops had gone inland stripped to the bone. Without heavy weapons and mortar and machine-gun ammunition. "Therefore, these troops who are up there now are in no position to embark upon an offensive mission until we are able to get food, ammunition and additional weapons up to them." In response to the situation, on July 6th, Moten ordered 1000 rations and 100 boy loads of ammunition…god you have to love the australians, boy-loads haha. Anyways this was to be dropped over Napier. Moving over to the Solomons, Admiral Halsey had successfully occupied Rendova, Segi point, Viru Harbor and Wickham anchorage forcing the smaller number of Japanese to withdraw to their main base at Munda. Admiral Kusaka tossed a series of air strikes against the invaders, suffering horrible losses whereupon he had to request General Immamura reinforce him with the 21st air flotilla at Saipan and from the 6th air division. For the battle of Munda, Admiral Halsey had assembled the largest air force ever assembled in the Solomon islands campaign. It was a force that was needed as the Japanese in Rabaul tossed every bomber that was available to try and thwart the US amphibious invasion. The June air battles had greatly depleted the Japanese air power, but they were not done. On July 1st the Japanese hit Kahili using 6 Vals and 34 Zeros. They were trying to knock out the 3rd battalion, 103rd infantry who were unloading at Poko plantation on the west coast of Rendova. However they were met by 20 P-40's and F4Fs that ripped them to pieces taking down 3 Vals, 5 Zeros and losing 5 P-40's in the process. Although the allies were scoring massively high success against the Japanese in ratios, by this point it reached 7 to 1, they were still unable to sustain round the clock 32 fighter or more CAP. To do this required a total of 96 operational aircraft and after 10 days of fighting in the skies over New Georgia the pilots were also becoming increasingly exhausted. Colonel Merrill Twining requested more P-38 Lightnings, the aircraft that had become the most comfortable fighter to those in the south pacific by this point. But Hap's Arnold over in Washington was heavily committing forces for General Patton and Montgomery's invasion of Sicily at the time so he had to deny this request. As Arnold stated back “every trained unit must be thrown against the German until he is beaten”.  Regardless, with Rendova secured, General Hester was landing the bulk of his forces for the final push against Munda. The unloading process had been heavily hampered by poor planning and a failure to allocate adequate personnel for beach control and unloading duties however. To clear the new beachhead and distribute the combat stores, infantrymen were detailed to carry out the work. When transports carrying the next echelon arrived, many of the boats grounded offshore and had to be unloaded manually by troops wading ashore. On July 2nd, Admiral Kusaka coordinating with General Itahana formed a combined strike led by Major Endo Misao consisting of 18 Ki-21 bombers, 23 Ki-43's and Ki-61s with 29 Zero escort. Unfortunately for the allies, Admiral Mitscher had recalled the Rendova patrol due to bad weather, so a total of 18 Ki-21 bombers came to the scene unmolested and hit the congested area around the harbor. The strike caused 200 or so casualties, mostly upon the 2nd battalion, 172nd, the 24th seabees, the 9th defense battalion and staff officers of various headquarters. The strike also knocked out a lot of equipment and supplies. With the failure of the June air battles to hold back the allied invasion, Admiral Koga turned to the Navy for the task of providing new supplies to the defenders at Munda Point. The Tokyo Express was back in business, a convoy of 10 destroyers were sent to New Gerogia led by Rear Teruo Akiyama aboard his flagship Niizuki. His force was ordered to attack Rendova and he had with him the old Yubari, Yunagi, Mikazuki who would operate south of the Treasuries as a diversion, while Niizuki, Amagiri, Hatsuyuki, Nagatsuki, Satsuki, Mikazuki and Mochizuki would hit the allied shipping and shell the harbor. The Japanese destroyers were spotted right away, but bad weather prevented 3 American strike forces consisting of PBY's and B-25's from hitting the incoming enemy. In the meantime, Akiyama closed in on the southern tip of Rendova. She circled the island and opened fire on a point due west of the harbor. The bombardment was quite ineffective, but some allied PT boats rushed in to attack her which caused a wild 10 minute mini battle seeing 2 of them running aground. On the ground, General Hester ordered the 1st battalion, 172nd regiment and A company of the 169th regiment now designated Southern Landing Group to land at Zanana beach. Led by General Wing on the afternoon of the 2nd they made a crossing over Blanche Channel using 16 landing crafts. With the support of Brigadier General Harold Barkers artillery they successfully formed a perimeter. Now the Japanese air and naval attacks were worrying Halsey. He expected the Japanese to launch a major counterlanding with substantial forces perhaps on the 3rd. Therefore he ordered Admiral Ainsworth to lay in wait off the west coast of Rendova for the enemy. However July the 3rd would not bring an enemy, this was because General Imamura and Admiral Kusaka agreed with the lack of air and naval forces on hand at this time they could not perform such a feat, to the disgust of General Sasaki who had assumed command over the defense for Munda on the 2nd. Sasaki was so adamant about landing reinforcements at around midnight on July 3rd he proposed violating orders to simply make a counter landing using the 13th regiment and Ota's barges. He had a crazy idea to simply bring the vessels in and mix them with the American landing craft who were making rountrips to the mainland through the Honiavasa passage. He thought even if half his forces perished, the attack would be worth it. Ota objected to this on the grounds the barges would be needed for other transports scheduled for July 4th and 5th, apparently this made Sasaki visibly upset, who adjourned the meeting and left the room. Ota pushed Sasaki to write his plans down and submit them to Rabaul, which he did, and Rabaul squashed it immediately.  On July 3rd the Japanese performed an unsuccessful fighter sweep over Rendova and the next day reconnaissance reported the island was secured by the Americans who had heavily reinforced it with anti aircraft guns and radar. They also reported landings on Zanana and that it looked like Rice Anchorage would be next, thus cutting off Japanese reinforcements from coming down the Munda trail from Bairoko. Imamura and Kusaka had to wait for an accumulation of forces to bring reinforcements to New Georgia; they had no intention of losing it like Guadalcanal. 4000 soldiers of the 13th and 45th regiments were earmarked for departure. Kusaka ordered Itahana to launch another combined strike, this time aimed at Roviana island. However the Japanese were intercepted by 32 F4F's causing the loss of 6 Ki-21s, 3 Ki-43's and a zero without a single loss for the Americans. This would be the fateful end of the joint air operations as Itahana needed to take his forces to help the Salamaua area. Luckily for Kusaka he received reinforcements in the form of the 201st Kokutai from the 25th flotilla which would allow him to gradually rebuild his air strength by mid july. Meanwhile Admiral Turner had assigned 7 destroyer transports, 2 fast minesweepers and 4 Destroyers to carry the 1st raider battalion, the 3rd battalion, 145th infantry regiment and the 3rd battalion, 148th infantry regiment of the 37th division led by Colonel Liversedge into the Kula Gulf. Their escort cover was Ainsworth task group 36.1 consisting of the Cruisers Honolulu, St Louis, Helena and destroyers Nicholas, O'Bannon, Strong and Chevalier. They were also tasked with bombarding Vila and Bairoko. On July 4th, Ainsworth led the group up the slot while the Rear Admiral Teruo Akiyama's Tokyo Express were on their way to Vila carrying 1300 troops of the 13th regiment towards Vila. At around midnight Ainsworth entered Kula Gulf carefully avoiding the mindfield laid back in May. His force proceeded to shell Vila, but they failed to detect the Japanese who were heading south. The Japanese detected the Americans at 12:15 thanks to their brand new radar system; the 1-shiki 2-go radar which was outfitted on the Niizuki. The IJN were eager to test out the radar so they fastened it to the flagship of Destroyer squadron 3. Oh how the turn tables as they say. The radar indicated they were heavily outnumbered, so Akiyama decided to abort the mission, but before doing so he ordered 14 torpedoes to be launched at a range of 10 miles. The type 93 long lance torpedo remained the best weapons of the kind in the Pacific theater and one his destroyer Strong at 12:43 practically cutting her in two. Can't stress it enough what an immense advantage Japan had over the Americans in terms of torpedo power during the first half of the war, hell if any of you play World of Warships, you know Japanese DD is base as hell.  When the torpedo hit, the Japanese were already heading back up the Slot and Ainsworth thought he was being attacked by IJN submarines. Thus while Liversedge's men were landing on the southside of the Pundokono River, Ainsworth dispatched destroyers O'Bannon and Chevalier to rescue the survivors of Strong. The Strong was settling fast off the Enogai inlet. When Chevalier and O'Bannon came to the scene picking up survivors a gun duel emerged between them and some batteries on Enogai. By 1:22am Chevalier had 239 men come aboard before her commander said it was time to go. His ship was getting battered by the batteries and he unfortunately was forced to ram the Strong to keep it from capsizing which ripped a 10 foot fash in Chevaliers bow. A near miss from one of Enogai's guns had opened her seams aft and another shell knocked out her NO 3 gun mount. When Chevalier was pulling away from the Strong, breaking her in two in the process, 3 of Strong's depth charges went off under Chevalier lifted the entire boat out of the water causing her to flood in forward sections, talk about bad luck. Over in Rice Anchorage, despite the terrible stormy weather and some gunfire from Enogai, Turner ordered the transport group to clear the Gulf by 7am so they could quickly unload their cargo. 300 men of the 148th regiment landed further north at Kobukobu inlet because of the terrible weather. It would take them until July 7th to meet up with the main body. Though the USS Strong had been sunk, the Tokyo Express failed her run, thus Akiyama elected to bring the bulk of his shipment to Vila the following night, but this time he brought 10 destroyers; Niizuki, Suzukaze, Tanikaze, Mocizuki, Mikazuki, Hamakaze, Amagiri, Hacujuki, Nagacuki and Sacuki. Halsey got advance word of this and ordered Ainsworth to return to Kula Gulf to wait for the Japanese to show up. Halsey also reinforced him with destroyers Jenkins and Radford. Ainsworth went into this with a simple but ultimately flawed plan. He overestimated the capabilities of radar guided 6 inch guns against fast moving targets. On top of that he seemed to be totally ignorant of the IJN's Type 93 Long Lance torpedo's capabilities. His plan was to wait passively until radar detected the enemy than he would toss his cruisers at the enemy using their 6 inch guns, hoping to fire over 8,000 yards or so. He believed that was the effective Japanese torpedo range, why he believed this I do not know. For his destroyers, they would launch torpedoes at the enemy.   Akiyama's Tokyo Express departed Buin after sundown divided into a covering force of 3 destroyers in the front and the main bulk behind them. Around midnight on July 6th, Ainsworth's force were just northwest off New Georgia, entering the mouth of the Kula Gulf. The Japanese were also arriving to the Kula Gulf whereupon they detached the first transport unit to land 1600 troops. By 1:06am, Niizuki's radar detected Ainsworth's force, but this time Akiyama was prepared for a fight. Akiyama detached his second transport unit at 1:43am and 7 minutes later American radar picked up the Japanese. Ainsworth took his force in closer until the enemy was 7000 yards away. Then at 1:56am at around a range of 6800 yards the Americans Cruisers began to open fire. Akiyama quickly recalled the second transport unit before he engaged the enemy. Unluckily for Akiyama the Americans concentrated their fire upon the Niizuki which was pulverized quickly. She became a burning wreck before she was sunk by 6 inch shell fire taking Rear Admiral Akiyama's life alongside 300 sailors. Within 20 minutes the Americans would fire 612 shells, 6 of which smashed the Niizuki.   Despite the loss of of their commander, the well drilled torpedo crews pulled off a salvo of 16 torpedoes at the American gun flashes. Ainsworth ignorant of the long lance range could do little to avoid it. The light cruiser USS Helena was the first to be struck, her bow was blown off virtually up to the number 2 turret, nearly cracking her in two as she sank taking 190 of her 1177 crew with her. St Louis was hit by a torpedo that fortunately did not detonate and another nearly missed Honolulu. The Japanese fled as fast as they could for Buin as Ainsworth directed his two remaining cruisers to shell the second transport unit. Of the four destroyers in this group, Amagiri escaped with minor damage, while Hatsuyuki was hit by 2 6inch shells, but luckily for her they were duds and she limped away. Nagatsuki was hit by a single 6 inch shell to her rear ship which would force her to run aground near Bambari Harbor. The next morning she would be destroyed by American aircraft. At 3:30am, Ainsworth ordered his forces to return to Tulagi as he dispatched the Radford and O'Bannon to pick up survivors while Nicholas chased the fleeing Japanese. The Japanese dispatched Amagiri to pick up their survivors and she would be intercepted by Nicholas taking 4 hits before she made her retreat. While this was going on the First transport unit completed unloading its 1600 troops and bolted through the Blackett Strait and Kula Gulf. The Japanese had managed to land their reinforcements and sunk the USS Strong and Helena, so they considered it a tactical victory, though the loss of the Niizuki and her commander was terrible. The battle for New Georgia was nowhere near done. I would like to take this time to remind you all that this podcast is only made possible through the efforts of Kings and Generals over at Youtube. Please go subscribe to Kings and Generals over at Youtube and to continue helping us produce this content please check out www.patreon.com/kingsandgenerals. If you are still hungry after that, give my personal channel a look over at The Pacific War Channel at Youtube, it would mean a lot to me. The landings and early offensives were well on their way on New Georgia and the drive upon Lae was closing in. The Battle of Kula Gulf gave the Americans a bloody nose and now the Japanese had more forces at their disposal to try and dislodge the Americans from New Georgia.

On this episode of What Happened When, we are treated with special guest Eddie Kingston! Eddie, Tony and Conrad watch an All Japan Pro Wrestling classic bout between the legendary Kobashi facing off against the incredible Akiyama. Eddie shares his love for Japanese wrestling as he explains the special nuances in the match. BLUECHEW - Try BlueChew FREE when you use our promo code WHW at checkout--just pay $5 shipping. That's BlueChew.com, promo code WHW to receive your first month FREE ATHLETIC GREENS - Try AG1 and get a FREE 1-year supply of Vitamin D AND 5 free AG1 Travel Packs with your first purchase. Go to drinkAG1.com/WHW. That's drinkAG1.com/WHW. FACTOR - Head to FACTORMEALS.com/WHW50 and use code WHW50 to get 50% off your first box KEVIN VON ERICH -Iconic wrestler Kevin Von Erich has just announced his first public tour.   The show titled “AN EVENING WITH KEVIN VON ERICH: Stories From the Top Rope” will feature Von Erich sharing insight into his career, personal triumphs and tragedies. Tickets will go on sale Friday, June 2nd at EmporiumPresents.com or Ticketmaster and will offer a very limited number of VIP tickets which include a meet & greet/photo op. The tour kicks off in Dallas on September 1st which will be hosted by sports reporter Dale Hansen and the following cities - September 2nd in San Antonio, September 3rd in Corpus Christi, September 5thin Houston, September 6th in Shreveport, September 8th in Oklahoma City, September 9th in Amarillo, and September 10th in Midland, all hosted by David Manning. Von Erich, now 65, will be the subject of a major motion picture, “Iron Claw”, which stars Zac Effron and is slated for release in late 2023.   SAVE WITH CONRAD - Stop throwing your money on rent! Get into a house with NO MONEY DOWN and roughly the same monthly payment at SaveWithConrad.com ADVERTISE WITH WHW - If your business targets 25-54 year old men, there's no better place to advertise than right here with us on What Happened When. You've heard us do ads for some of the same companies for years...why? Because it works! And with our super targeted audience, there's very little waste. Go to AdvertiseWithWHW.com now and find out more about advertising with What Happened When. FOLLOW ALL OF OUR SOCIAL MEDIA at https://whwmonday.com/ Get all of your What Happened When merchandise at https://boxofgimmicks.com/collections/whwmonday On AdFreeShows.com, you get early, ad-free access to more than a dozen of your favorite wrestling podcasts, starting at just $9! And now, you can enjoy the first week...completely FREE! Sign up for a free trial - and get a taste of what Ad Free Shows is all about. Start your free trial today at AdFreeShows.com. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

On this episode of What Happened When, we are treated with special guest Eddie Kingston! Eddie, Tony and Conrad watch an All Japan Pro Wrestling classic bout between the legendary Kobashi facing off against the incredible Akiyama. Eddie shares his love for Japanese wrestling as he explains the special nuances in the match. BLUECHEW - Try BlueChew FREE when you use our promo code WHW at checkout--just pay $5 shipping. That's BlueChew.com, promo code WHW to receive your first month FREE ATHLETIC GREENS - Try AG1 and get a FREE 1-year supply of Vitamin D AND 5 free AG1 Travel Packs with your first purchase. Go to drinkAG1.com/WHW. That's drinkAG1.com/WHW. FACTOR - Head to FACTORMEALS.com/WHW50 and use code WHW50 to get 50% off your first box KEVIN VON ERICH -Iconic wrestler Kevin Von Erich has just announced his first public tour.   The show titled “AN EVENING WITH KEVIN VON ERICH: Stories From the Top Rope” will feature Von Erich sharing insight into his career, personal triumphs and tragedies. Tickets will go on sale Friday, June 2nd at EmporiumPresents.com or Ticketmaster and will offer a very limited number of VIP tickets which include a meet & greet/photo op. The tour kicks off in Dallas on September 1st which will be hosted by sports reporter Dale Hansen and the following cities - September 2nd in San Antonio, September 3rd in Corpus Christi, September 5thin Houston, September 6th in Shreveport, September 8th in Oklahoma City, September 9th in Amarillo, and September 10th in Midland, all hosted by David Manning. Von Erich, now 65, will be the subject of a major motion picture, “Iron Claw”, which stars Zac Effron and is slated for release in late 2023.   SAVE WITH CONRAD - Stop throwing your money on rent! Get into a house with NO MONEY DOWN and roughly the same monthly payment at SaveWithConrad.com ADVERTISE WITH WHW - If your business targets 25-54 year old men, there's no better place to advertise than right here with us on What Happened When. You've heard us do ads for some of the same companies for years...why? Because it works! And with our super targeted audience, there's very little waste. Go to AdvertiseWithWHW.com now and find out more about advertising with What Happened When. FOLLOW ALL OF OUR SOCIAL MEDIA at https://whwmonday.com/ Get all of your What Happened When merchandise at https://boxofgimmicks.com/collections/whwmonday On AdFreeShows.com, you get early, ad-free access to more than a dozen of your favorite wrestling podcasts, starting at just $9! And now, you can enjoy the first week...completely FREE! Sign up for a free trial - and get a taste of what Ad Free Shows is all about. Start your free trial today at AdFreeShows.com. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

"God is compassionate connectedness." Sermon by Bishop Diana Akiyama, recorded live at the 10:00am service on Sunday, June 4, 2023.

Mother's Day

If your a photographer looking to delve into the music industry and understand leveraging those key opportunities that many of us miss then listen to Ron and myself  as we discusses those serendipitous moments of his 40+ years capturing some of the music industry's most iconic Rockstars.  What started as a hobby turned into a passion thanks to the inspiration from his father to start recording his epic music ventures on film. Ron and I share the same brain on morals, artist privacy and just simply being nice which many have forgotten is the key ingredient to sustaining some of the most powerful relationships as can be seen by his stories shared in this episode. Whether you're an image maker, visual entrepreneur, graphic designer or anything in between them this is a must listen for you.  

In the fourth episode of Japan Memo season 3, Koshino Yuka hosts Professor Akiyama Nobumasa, Dean of the School of International and Public Policy and Professor at the Graduate School of Law at Hitotsubashi University, and William Alberque, Director of Strategy, Technology and Arms Control at the IISS.Yuka, Akiyama-sensei and William unpack the dynamics of nuclear issues in the region, examine the Kishida government's responses to the nuclear security flashpoints surrounding Japan, and analyse Japan's approaches towards reinvigorating the stalled process of nuclear arms control and disarmament. Topics discussed include:The dynamics of nuclear weapons development surrounding Japan;The credibility of US extended deterrence, debates on nuclear sharing and nuclear proliferation in the region;Japan's policy tools and approaches to nuclear non-proliferation, arms control and disarmament;A ‘grand strategy' for deterrence, nuclear non-proliferation, arms control and disarmament; and The significance of the 2023 Shangri-la Dialogue for addressing nuclear issues in the region. The following literature is recommended by our guests to gain a clearer picture of the topics discussed:Mark Fitzpatrick, Asia's Latent Nuclear Powers: Japan, South Korea and Taiwan (London: IISS, 2016).Nobumasa Akiyama, ‘Genshi ryoku/ kaku mondai' [Atomic Power and Nuclear Issue], in Syowa ship kogi [Lectures on History of Showa era], ed. Kiyotada Tsutsui (Tokyo: Chikuma Shobo, 2020), 245-267.Haruki Murakami, Underground: The Tokyo Gas Attack and the Japanese Psyche (New York: Vintage International, 2003).Shin Godzilla, directed by Hideaki Anno, Shinji Higuchi (Tokyo: Toho, 2016).We hope you enjoy the episode and please follow, rate, and subscribe to Japan Memo on the podcast platform of your choice.Date of recording: 11 April 2023Japan Memo is recorded and produced at the IISS in London. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

"To be truly liberated is to be returned to community." Easter sermon by The Rt. Rev'd Bishop Diana Akiyama, recorded live at the 10:00am service on Sunday, April 9, 2023. View the video archive of this sermon on our YouTube channel's Sermon Playlist. Like us on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter & TikTok, and learn more about this open & welcoming community, including upcoming events, at trinity-episcopal.org.

How GOOD was Yoshihiro Akiyama Actually? If you liked this video, please give it a thumbs up and subscribe to my channel for more MMA videos like this! Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/kiiyon.ig TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@kiiyonkimura Website: https://www.kiiyonkimura.com/ Join me on Patreon! (ALL Money Goes to Charity) https://www.patreon.com/kiiyonkimura Kiiyon Kimura Podcast Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/ca/podcast/kiiyon-kimura/id1518270429 Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/2hSIoydlGWuROWBdM8VaXn?si=STBgvDmPSZK3SkAXMNJX8Q&nd=1 SoundCloud: https://soundcloud.com/kiiyon-kimura

Remember how two months ago we said the next episode would be about Akiyama's side content? No you don't! Anyways it's finally time for us to talk about the biggest largest man in all of Japan, Taiga Saejima, and figure out just what he's gonna do with all those guns he's holding. Playing: Chapter 5 (or Part 2 Chapter 1) of Yakuza 4 Music (in order of appearance): GET TO THE TOP! - Remix OF THE END, Yakuza: Dead Souls OST Massive Fire, Yakuza 4 OST Material Delights, Yakuza 4 OST Kokyou ni Nishiki wo Kazarubeshi, Ryū ga Gotoku Ishin! OST Argyle | Jordan Twitter | Discord A Noise Space Podcast

Join the boys this month as they cover everything AEW that has happened in the past month. We are joined as always by Uncle Bobby B of MLW Rewind where he gives us his hits and s**ts of the month. You can catch him on Straight Talk Wrestling at https://www.youtube.com/c/StraightTalkWrestling And a very special interview guest, We also discuss: MJF's new title and subsequent heel turn. The Elite's Best of 7 series with Death Triangle. Shibata, Akiyama, Takeshita and Ibushi in the future? Our review of Full Gear. Plus Randy's ongoing dislike of Sammy G. And our special segment this month, Pretty Ricky's Famous Internet Show!! If you would like to support our guests, Check out Pretty Ricky Willdy at Instagram: @prowilldy Twitter: @ProWilldy Youtube: https://youtube.com/@rickywilldy230 Pro Wrestling Tees: https://www.prowrestlingtees.com/prowilldy And special thank you again to THT who you can find on: Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/handshakingteam Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/tht420 Or check out their podcast the Skelecast on Spotify at: Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/6L9PkVhjSxNsHynRVc0X7D?si=d1f1e603a477446b Be sure to follow us on Twitter and Instagram where we will post new episode details Instagram: @aewtf Twitter: @aewtf4

Kate (@MissKatefabe) and Alexis (@_AlexisCardoza) discuss tonight's episodes of WWE Smackdown and AEW Rampage, including:WWE-World Cup Qualifier: Ricochet vs. Mustafa Ali-New Day Interview-Madcap Moss vs. Karrion Kross-Bray Wyatt appears-Shotzi vs. Shayna Baszler-Imperium vs. New Day & Braun Strowman-World Cup Qualifier: Butch vs. Sami ZaynAEW-Eddie Kingston and Ortiz vs. Akiyama and Takeshita-World Title Eliminator Tournament: Lance Archer vs. Ricky Starts -Athena vs. Madison Rayne-Hook (c) vs. Lee Moriarty for the FTW Championship__________________________________________________Make sure your performance is up to par by using http://Bluechew.com and the code FIGHTFULExclusive! Grab the NordVPN deal ➼ https://nordvpn.com/fightful TSupport this podcast at — https://redcircle.com/fightful-pro-wrestling-and-mma-podcast/donationsAdvertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brandsPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

Adam and Michael preview tonight's AEW Rampage and discuss...Full Gear go-home show!FTW Championship on the line!Kingston & Ortiz vs. Akiyama & Takeshita!Athena faces Madison Rayne!Could Ricky Starks go all the way?!ENJOY!Follow us on Twitter:@AdamWilbourn@MSidgwick@WhatCultureWWEFor more awesome content, check out: whatculture.com/wwe Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

This week, friend of the show and GameFAQs guide creator CyricZ joins as we untangle the final leg of Akiyama's storyline. This is where we reaaaaaally begin to run into some pacing issues with this game. Playing: Chapter 4 of Yakuza 4 Music: GET TO THE TOP! - Remix OF THE END, Yakuza: Dead Souls OST Pure Love in Kamurocho (Akiyama/Hana), Yakuza 4 OST Argyle | Jordan | CyricZ Twitter | Discord A Noise Space Podcast

Adam & Jeremy review an episode of All Japan TV from July 19th, 1982.  This show featured:- Tag Team Championship, Akira Taue & Toshiaki Kawada vs Gary Albright & Yoshihiro Takayama- Hiroshi Hase & Jun Akiyama vs Kenta Kobashi & Maunakea Mossman- The build to Akiyama vs Kobashi, & More!For Exclusive Bonus Episodes, subscribe via out Patreon - https://www.patreon.com/wrestlingatrandomOr subscribe directly in Apple Podcasts  Every week we will fire up the randomizer, & will review a classic wrestling event from a streaming service.   Follow us on Twitter & Instagram for the reveal of what show will be reviewed each week.Music by Devin Davis, download his album at http://devindavis.bandcamp.com/

This week on Under The Ring, we're joined by Eddie Kingston of All Elite Wrestling. He discusses his fantastic run in AEW after a long career on the independent circuit, the piece he wrote for the Player's Tribune where he spoke about his mental health and being interested in "manifesting" a match at Arthur Ashe Stadium between he and All Japan legend Jun Akiyama.

A new season means a new topic and now Tim and Marcus revisit Dave Meltzer's 5+ Star Matches! We take four of Dave's matches and put them in either the Good Place or the Bad Place.Episode 2 has Tim picking the Holy Demon Army vs. MItsuharu Misawa & Jun Akiyama from December 5, 1997 and Marcus learns there's wrestling in Japan! How does this match stack up against the scale of red points and green points? Plus, Marcus goes to Wildwood and Tim's paying the birthday tax! It's FWP!Final Wrestling Place is a proud member of the Soon To Be Named Network! Follow along on Twitter!If you want to help the show, be sure to subscribe on Apple Podcasts, Google Play, Stitcher, Spotify, Player FM, TuneIn, Castbox, Amazon Music or Podchaser and leave a comment.Get your Soon To Be Named Network merch thanks to TeePublic! Check out our designs at here!Check out all the podcasts featuring Tim and/or Marcus here!Get your tickets for LVAC SteelStacks SmackDown on 08/28 here.Want to know where you can follow the show? We've got you! This was episode #166 of Final Wrestling Place

Uh-oh! Despite his initial suave and cool appearance, Akiyama spends this whole chapter getting cancelled for being a creep! Oh well, I'm sure nothing like this will happen again in this game, now time to take a big sip of coffee... Playing: Chapter 3 of Yakuza 4 Music: GET TO THE TOP! - Remix OF THE END, Yakuza: Dead Souls OST Pure Love in Kamurocho (Akiyama/Hana), Yakuza 4 OST Argyle | Jordan Twitter | Discord A Noise Space Podcast

Ryan McBroom of the Carp is the guest, we look at Shogo Akiyama joining Hiroshima, Mini Trax power rankings segment, top June performers, we go Rockin with Roki & discuss Koji Chikamoto hitting safely in 29 consecutive games.

"The dynamic Trinity." Sermon by Bishop Diana Akiyama, recorded live at 10:00am on Sunday June 12, 2022. View the video archive of this sermon on our YouTube channel's Sermon Playlist. Be sure to like us on Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter, and learn more about this open & welcoming community, including upcoming events, at trinity-episcopal.org.

Paul Heyman around (16:44) discusses life not being by Brock Lesnar's side anymore, the new version of Brock Lesnar for the WWE audience, Roman Reigns, AEW's MJF, his old promos, WrestleMania 38, and more. Yoshihiro Akiyama around (43:40) discusses his recent big win over Shinya Aoki at ONE X, how he bounced back, what division he plans on fighting in the future, how his wife feels about his nickname, and more. Matt Brown around (1:05:52) discusses his performance at UFC Columbus, if he thought he won the decision, what he could have done differently, his thoughts on open scoring, fighter pay, and more. In the latest On the Nose around (1:35:07), the fighter who he would pick to be face of new promotion, inspirational fighter quotes, Nate Diaz vs. Khamzat Chimaev, the biggest fight for you at UFC 273, who would win 1:1 battle with GC, his response to Graham Boylan, and more. Aljamain Sterling around (2:29:02) discusses his upcoming title defense at UFC 273, his preparation, why Petr Yan is upset, his issue with refs, his training camp, the odds for the fight, if Matt Serra is back in his corner, if he's Team Will Smith, and more. Kai Kara-France around (3:05:21) discusses his UFC Columbus win, his current contract situation with the UFC, why he wants to fight for Deiveson Figureido, Joe Burrow, a recent meeting with one of his childhood bullies, and more. GC and Helwani around (3:44:47) look at GC's best bets at WrestleMania 38. If you or someone you know has a gambling problem, crisis counseling and referral services can be accessed by calling 1-800-GAMBLER (1-800-426-2537) (IL/IN/MI/NJ/PA/WV/WY), 1-800-NEXT STEP (AZ), 1-800-522-4700 (CO/NH), 888-789-7777/visit http://ccpg.org/chat (CT), 1-800-BETS OFF (IA), 1-877-770-STOP (7867) (LA), 877-8-HOPENY/text HOPENY (467369) (NY), visit OPGR.org (OR), call/text TN REDLINE 1-800-889-9789 (TN), or 1-888-532-3500 (VA). 21+ (18+ NH/WY). Physically present in AZ/CO/CT/IL/IN/IA/LA/MI/NH/NJ/NY/OR/ PA/TN/VA/WV/WY only. New customers only. Min. $5 deposit required. Eligibility restrictions apply. See http://draftkings.com/sportsbook for details. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

First time guest, Robert McCauley (a contributor to the EASTERN LARIAT podcast) joins the Long & Winding Royal Road with WH Park to talk about a World Tag Team Title match between champions, Burning (Kenta Kobashi & Jun Akiyama) and challengers, NO FEAR (Takao Omori & Yoshihiro Takayama) from October 30, 1999 at Budokan Hall.Through the course of the episode, they fill you in on the interesting career of Takao Omori and the benefits of under-20-minute matches.Click here to watch the match on YouTube. For added context, I recommend watching this match from October at Korakuen Hall.WH Park and a special guest look back at the greatest matches of All Japan Pro Wrestling from the 1990s in the Long & Winding Royal Road, a limited-edition podcast from POST Wrestling.Support this podcast by picking up a L&WRR t-shirt in either black or white: https://store.postwrestling.com/search?q=long+%26+winding+royal+roadWH Park on Twitter: @whpark9Subscribe: https://postwrestling.com/subscribeForum: https://forum.postwrestling.comMerch: https://store.postwrestling.comTwitter/Facebook/Instagram/YouTube: @postwrestlingMusic: "Across the Danube, Op. 36" by John Philip Sousa | Performed by United States Marine Band (band) and Jason Fettig (conductor) | The Complete Marches of John Philip Sousa, No.4 | Washington, DC: United States Marine Band, 2015. | Licensed under Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 | Public Domain LetterAdvertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brandsPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

Episode #20 of the Long & Winding Royal Road brings us another biography, this time with the person referred to as the “Fifth Pillar” in Jun Akiyama.WH Park is joined by former podcasting partner JoJo Remy, who is a long-time fan of Akiyama's.WH and JoJo look at Akiyama's university wrestling days and how they led to him being scouted by Giant Baba. From there, they discuss his alliances and rivalries with Mitsuharu Misawa, Kenta Kobashi, Takao Omori and others.This episode covers Akiyama's entire initial run in All Japan, his peak in Pro Wrestling NOAH, his return to AJPW and his current time in DDT. A very fun conversation between two friends who are big fans of this incredible wrestler.Support this podcast by picking up a Long & Winding Royal Road t-shirt:https://store.postwrestling.com/collections/featured-items/products/the-long-winding-royal-road-t-shirt-blackWH Park and a special guest look back at the greatest matches of All Japan Pro Wrestling from the 1990s in The Long & Winding Royal Road, a limited-edition podcast from POST Wrestling.Music: "Across the Danube, Op. 36" by John Philip Sousa | Performed by United States Marine Band (band) and Jason Fettig (conductor) | The Complete Marches of John Philip Sousa, No.4 | Washington, DC: United States Marine Band, 2015. | Licensed under Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 | Public Domain LetterWH Park on Twitter: @whpark9Subscribe: https://postwrestling.com/subscribeForum: https://forum.postwrestling.comMerch: https://store.postwrestling.comTwitter/Facebook/Instagram/YouTube: @postwrestlingAdvertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brandsPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

In this podcast episode, we are continuing our series on "Women of First." Tune in to meet  The Rt. Rev. Diana D. Akiyama. The Rt. Rev. Diana D. Akiyama was the first Japanese-American woman ordained to the Episcopal priesthood, and she is the first Asian-American woman consecrated bishop in The Episcopal Church. Additionally, she is the first bishop to be consecrated at Trinity Episcopal Cathedral in over a century. A trailblazer for sure. Join the conversation with Dr. Meeks and host, Chelsi Glascoe, as we learn and glean from Rev. Diana's brave journey. 

Walking along the Long & Winding Royal Road with WH Park this month is POST Wrestling show reviewer, Mark Buckeldee. Mark has chosen a match from October 23, 1999 as Mitsuharu Misawa & Yoshinari Ogawa (The Untouchables) defend their AJPW World Tag Team Titles against challengers, Kenta Kobashi & Jun Akiyama (Burning). Support this podcast by picking up the brand new Long & Winding Royal Road t-shirt commemorating the Four Pillars of Heaven: https://store.postwrestling.com/ Mark and WH discuss the credentials of Yoshinari Ogawa, how important it was for him to be chosen as Misawa's tag partner, how well the World Tag Team Titles were booked by All Japan in this period, plus THE BURNING HAMMER!!!! Watch the match: https://www.dailymotion.com/video/x7ddz8a WH Park and a special guest look back at the greatest matches of All Japan Pro Wrestling from the 1990s in The Long & Winding Royal Road, a limited-edition podcast from POST Wrestling. Music: "Across the Danube, Op. 36" by John Philip Sousa | Performed by United States Marine Band (band) and Jason Fettig (conductor) | The Complete Marches of John Philip Sousa, No.4 | Washington, DC: United States Marine Band, 2015. | Licensed under Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 | Public Domain Letter Mark Buckeldee on Twitter: @Monkey_Buckles WH Park on Twitter: @whpark9 Subscribe: https://postwrestling.com/subscribe Forum: https://forum.postwrestling.com Merch: https://store.postwrestling.com Twitter/Facebook/Instagram/YouTube: @postwrestlingAdvertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brandsPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

Brandon Thurston from Wrestlenomics Radio joins WH Park on the Long & Winding Royal Road to talk about one of the greatest tag matches of all time: Mitsuharu Misawa & Jun Akiyama vs. Toshiaki Kawada & Akira Taue from the finals of the 1996 Real World Tag League. Brandon is the driving force of the Wrestlenomics website/radio show and is the leading expert in analyzing the business side of professional wrestling. He is also a Buffalo, NY-based independent wrestler and a huge fan of 1990s All Japan Pro Wrestling. They go through the match at hand with great detail while also discussing Sabu and various All Japan wrestler nicknames. Watch the match on YouTube (starts 10min): https://youtu.be/HVO1j9KvbiY?t=598 This week – Patrons receive 20% off our POST Puroresu Tee: https://www.patreon.com/posts/48522423 WH Park and a special guest look back at the greatest matches of All Japan Pro Wrestling from the 1990s in The Long & Winding Royal Road, a limited-edition podcast from POST Wrestling. Music: "Across the Danube, Op. 36" by John Philip Sousa | Performed by United States Marine Band (band) and Jason Fettig (conductor) | The Complete Marches of John Philip Sousa, No.4 | Washington, DC: United States Marine Band, 2015. | Licensed under Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 | Public Domain Letter WH Park on Twitter: @whpark9 Subscribe: https://postwrestling.com/subscribe Forum: https://forum.postwrestling.com Merch: https://store.postwrestling.com Twitter/Facebook/Instagram/YouTube: @postwrestlingAdvertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brandsPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

WH Park walks down the Long & Winding Royal Road with Ed Kody from the Pod Van Dam podcast. Ed and WH skirt along the parameters of the show's boundaries to the year 2000, discussing a very important match for Jun Akiyama as he takes on former mentor and now rival, Mitsuharu Misawa from February 27 of that year. WH and Ed discuss their mutual appreciation for Akiyama, the background between him and Misawa going into this match, and the ramifications of the outcome.  Watch the match for free on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=swLzXN_lle4 Support this podcast by picking up a POST PURORESU t-shirt:https://store.postwrestling.com/products/post-puroresu-t-shirt WH Park and a special guest look back at the greatest matches of All Japan Pro Wrestling from the 1990s in The Long & Winding Royal Road, a limited-edition podcast from POST Wrestling. Music: "Across the Danube, Op. 36" by John Philip Sousa | Performed by United States Marine Band (band) and Jason Fettig (conductor) | The Complete Marches of John Philip Sousa, No.4 | Washington, DC: United States Marine Band, 2015. | Licensed under Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 | Public Domain Letter WH Park on Twitter: @whpark9 Subscribe: https://postwrestling.com/subscribe Forum: https://forum.postwrestling.com Merch: https://store.postwrestling.com Twitter/Facebook/Instagram/YouTube: @postwrestlingAdvertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brandsPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy