Podcasts about woodlark

Last time we spoke about the extensive plans involved in Operation Cartwheel. The allies were crossing their T's and dotting their I's. MacArthur was getting closer to unleashing Operation Chronicle, the invasion of Woodlark and Kiriwina islands. MacArthur's Navy, that being the 7th amphibious fleet are now prime and ready to go. Over in the Solomons, Admiral Halsey's Operation Toenails likewise had finalized their plans for a full scale invasion of New Georgia. The invasion would consist of multiple amphibious assaults done by countless units all with important missions. It was to be a extraordinary complex operation that would showcase to the Japanese how far American production had come and just how doomed the empire of the rising sun was. In the words of a great wizard “The board is set, the pieces are moving. We come to it at last, the great battle of our time” This episode is the Invasion of New Georgia 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.    I do want to just start off with a bit of an apology. I am well aware the past few episodes have been extremely heavy on the planning rather than the doing as they say. Again this is the reality of the week by week schedule and this podcast as I hope all of you know follows the Youtube series almost to a T, well almost, I do like to wander off now and then. But today I assure you we are diving into the fray of battle. Ever since the conclusion of operation KE and the allied victory at the Bismarck Sea, the war in the South Pacific had gotten a bit more quiet, but certainly tense. Both sides were looking at another, expecting a major offensive to kick off at any moment. But it would be the allies who would kick off everything by unleashing the start of Operation Cartwheel. The opening shots of Cartwheel would begin with the invasion of Woodlark and Kiriwana islands just off the southeast coast of New Guinea and due south of New Britain. Colonel MacKechnie's 162nd regiment continued to prepare their Nassau bay landings just 11 miles south of Salamaua. Ever since April of that year their 1st battalion had been carrying intensive amphibious training at Morobe Harbor. They were being reinforced with the 532nd engineer shore regiment, 542nd engineer amphibian regiment, the 592nd engineer boat regiment under Brigadier William Heavey and with a Papuan infantry battalion who had marched to Buso by mid june. Under orders not to proceed any further north, the spent their time carrying out long-range patrols, gaining valuable intelligence on the enemy. From their intelligence, MacKechnie believed there were about 75 Japanese near the mouth of the Bitoi river, an outpost or two along the beach at Nassau Bay and about 300 Japanese on Cape Dinga which also held an outpost. MacKechnie decided to use Mageri point as a staging base, which held an excellent beach 12 miles north of Morobe with good cover for their landing crafts.They had with them 2 LCMS, 2 captured Japanese barges and 29 Higgens boats. To further augment them, 4 PT boats were assigned to help transport the men, around 150 of them from Morobe. In the meantime, Brigadier Moten planned to send Captain Dexter's D company who had just achieved an incredible victory at Lababia ridge where they repelled a Japanese force 10 times their size to march to the Bitoi rivers mouth to divert Japanese attention away from Nassau bay. On top of this one of their platoon's led by Lt Dave Burke would guide the Americans to the landing beach. Now operation Chronicle was expected to go unopposed, though Krueger did not tell his men that. The Woodlark group consisted of Colonel Cunningham's 112th cavalry regiment while Kiriwina would receive Colonel Herndon's 158th regiment. Admiral Barbey's 7th Amphibious force with the support of Admiral Carpender's 7th fleet would transport them. On June the 20th, Krueger set up the 6th Army HQ at Milne Bay. The 6th Army was codenamed the Alamo Force as it assumed control of the majority of US Army units involved in operation Cartwheel. General Kruegers command was actually a bit awkward. Instead of operations being conducted directly by the 6th army, the Alamo force, which was purely an operational entity, basically administration, was in charge…and it was directly under the control of Douglas MacArthur. So as you can imagine for Krueger …well it was like having two of the same hat kind of? In his own words "the inherent difficulties faced by my dual headquarters in planning and administration were aggravated by the command setup, which was a novel one to say the least." Thus Alamo force was on New Guinea while the main body of the 6th Army HQ, the real one was in Brisbane until February 1944, when upon they were merged together. Yes this was a sneaky maneuver by MacArthur to seize control. Ever since the Buna campaign, MacArthur was increasingly unhappy with having to depend primarily on Australian troops. Although on the surface he look to be in a great harmonious relationship with Blamey, in truth MacArthur was extremely critical of the man and the Australians in general. Alamo Force was his way of wedging himself into the chief role for planning and conducting the later stages of the war, thus bypassing Blamey as the allied ground force commander.  To kick off the operation, Krueger sent advance parties of the regiment groups to secure beachheads in the two islands. At 4pm on June 22nd an advance party of the 112th cavalry regiment led by Major McMains left Milne Bay aboard the destroyer transports Humphreys and Brooks bound for Woodlark. They arrived in the dead of night at Guasopa and unloaded 200 men using 6 Landing crafts. The destroyer transport departed by 4am for Milne Bay. It turned out a Australian coastwatcher, not having been informed of the landing nearly attacked the force with his locally recruited guerrillas. But upon hearing the accents of the troops he quickly realized them to be friend and not foe. The advance party went to work performing reconnaissance, establishing defenses and facilities for the incoming invasion force and clearly marked the beaches for them to land. The next day the 158th infantry regiments advance party led by Lt COlonel FLoyd Powell departed Milne Bay at 6:10 aboard the two destroyer transports. They were accompanied by a detachment of the 59th combat engineer company. They arrived to Kiriwina around midnight, taking their landing craft through a small channel that passed through a reef to the beach at Losuia, code named Red Beach. Their unloading was quite slow due to lack of experience, bringing them the threat of aerial attack by the enemy. Thus the ships were forced to depart partially loaded.  On June 25th Operation Chronicle officially began. 2600 troops of Colonel Cunninham's Woodlark force departed Townsville Australia aboard 6 Landing ships, a subchaser and the destroyers Bagley and Henley. As the Woodlark Force slowly and stealthily made its way, 2250 troops of Colonel Herndon's Kiriwina Force departed Milne Bay aboard 12 Landing crafts, 2 coastal transports and were escorted by Admiral Brabeys destroyers. They successfully landed at Losuia beach at dawn on June 30th completely unopposed and the unloaded process was quite slow. Around the same time, Colonel Cunninghams force landed at Woodlark, also unopposed, but their unloading went much faster. The problem for the team at Kiriwina was an extremely spiny necklace of coral. The landing craft had grounded several hundred yards short of the beach, with only a single one passing over the sandbar to land offshore. Heavy rain and a low tide were hampering the vehicles and thus making it a nightmare. It was the complete opposite story over at woodlark. Their supplies were already loaded onto trucks which drove straight off the landing crafts allowing for an efficient unloading process so the vessels could depart before enemy air attacks might occur. Meanwhile, B-25's of the US 5th air force bombed Japanese strong points along the Bitoi river as A-20 Bostons hit supply dumps on the southern side of Nassau Bay on June 29th. The amphibious landing force known as MacKechnie Force departed Mort Bay at dusk on the 29th. PT boats of the 7th fleet took around 210 men of Lt Colonel Harold Taylors 1st battalion, 162nd infantry regiment while 29 of the captured Japanese barges took the 770 men of 2nd Engineer special brigade and two mechanized landing craft took the 532nd engineer boat and shore regiment to Mageri point. They landed in 3 waves and just like woodlark and Kiriwina, it went unopposed seeing all 770 safely landed at Nassau bay. The Japanese defending the immediate area were just 6 guys at an observation post, and offered only a few shouts in defiance before they fled into the jungle.  On June 30th the men went to work clearing up the beach to create a defensive perimeter, while some units of C company marched south to link up with the incoming papuan infantry battalion. Some other patrols ran into Japanese and were turned away near the bitcoin river. Upon receiving news of the landing, General Nakano ordered the 3rd regiment of the 66th battalion to march south from Salamaua. However the Australians were also applying pressure near Bobdubi so the 3rd regiment could only carry out limited attacks on the allied forces around Nassau bay, before they would perform delaying actions to allow the Nassau garrison to withdraw towards lake salus. The Papuan battalion began attacking the rear of the Japanese 3rd regiment of the 102nd battalion around Cape Dinga causing some casualties when they stormed a Japanese bunker. Nassau Bay would see some minor Japanese air attacks but for the most part things were going smoothly, allowing the seabees to work on the new facilities and airstrips for Woodlark and Kiriwina. Now thats it for MacArthurs half, time to go over to the Solomons. As you will remember, Admiral Haley's plan for New Georgia consisted of 5 different landings scattered about the island. Four of these landings were to occur on June 30th. These landings were 1) Wickham Anchorage on the southeast coast of Vangunu 2) Segi Point on the southeastern tip of New Georgia 3) Viru harbor on the southwest coast of New Georgia just a few miles up from Segi and 4) Rendova Harbor on Rendova island just across the Blanche channel from Munda. As a preliminary, Halsey sought to land some reconnaissance teams. The first one to arrive was at Segi point on June 14th consisting of units from the 47th seabees tossed over by PBY's. They began constructing landing sites for heavy equipment to come over. The next saw units go over to Viru Harbor, then Oloana Bay on Vangunu just a bit west of Wickham Anchorage, another at Rendava harbor and a last one at Rice anchorage. These teams all prepared the way for the future landing teams. However all did not go smoothly, for on June 16th over at Segi Point a dozen scouts being led by the New Zealand coastwatcher Donald Kennedy unsuccessfully ambushed a Japanese patrol. Kennedy had established a defense zone around the village of Segi used local native forces who were using scavenged weapons and they often tried to ambush and kill small Japanese patrols. This patrol they had stumbled upon was a platoon from the 4th company, 229th regiment operating around Viru harbor. They didnt manage to kill any of the Japanese, but instead alerted Colonel Sasaki of allied activity near Segi point and Viru harbor. Sasaki responded by ordered Major Hara Masao the new commander of the 1st battalion with his 3rd company and a machine gun platoon over to Viru harbor the following night. His orders read “settle things”. Luckily Hara had no idea where exactly Kennedy and his guys were so they would have difficulty finding them, but this did mean Japanese activity in the area increased. On June 20th Kennedy made an inaccurate report indicating the Japanese had landed troops in Nono Lagoon prompting Admiral Turner to react. That night Turner sent Companies O and P of Colonel Currins 4th raiders to occupy Segi Point with companies A and D of the 103rd regiment following them the next day. This meant Kennedy and his men were saved, but it also alerted the Japanese of the incoming offensive as allied destroyer transports were spotted around Wickham. This prompted Admiral Kusaka to put the Southeast Fleet on high alert, but further reconnaissance failed to find anything, thus by the 27th the IJN relaxed. This was also partly due to the fact that the IJN believed no invasions would come until late July or August. It would only be Lt General Sasaki who believed the allies might invade as early as late June, so he had set to work preparing New Georgia's defenses. Sasaki did not have much time, nor much capable labor as there was a large case of malaria going around. Added to this materials and equipment were hard to come by as supply missions were failing to arrive on time. The terrain on the island was quite an obstacle also. The Japanese dug into coral on the south side of their airfield and establishing communication lines towards the east. In the northern sector Sasaki placed 4 Kure 6th 14cm guns at Enogai point, but Bairoko had basically nothing. East of the airfield practically no defense existed. Sasaki managed at the last minute to construct some gun emplacements at Bairoko ingeniously using blocks of coral, something that the Japanese would really build up in later island warfare. To establish a main line east of the airfield he had the men build extremely strong bunkers to face frontal assaults across the Munda Bar. Communications would be a major issue as all they had to work with was a motor vehicle road that ran along the beach to Lambete and 1000 meters of completed road between the southeast Detachment HQ and 229th infantry HQ. Other than that there were no roads, just some trails which Sasaki described “that turned into slush ponds after rain”. To keep in contact with the troops spread everywhere, Sasaki requested they use an underground cable, but it seems he never got it. Sasaki was forced to spread his men in multiple places seeing company sized units in exposed locations at Wickham Anchorage, Viru harbor and Rendova harbor. These units would have been better used at places like ENogai, Bairoko and Ilangana. To help with the landings, General Kenney ordered the 5th air force  to launch a heavy raid against Rabaul while Admiral Merrill's cruisers escorted minelayers up to the Shortland islands to mine the southern entrance to Buin. Merrill's cruisers also took the time to bombard Faisi, Ballale and the Poporang islands while he dispatched some destroyers to hit Vila. Early on june the 30th B-24's and B-17s from AirSols hit Kahili and further raids would be made against Munda and Vila throughout the day.  The night of June 29th was a very stormy one hindering the AirSols and 5th air forces abilities and even Merrill's ships had difficulty carrying out their tasks. Admirals Turner and Fort departed from Guadalcanal, Tulagi and the Russels to land the forces. Two groups of infantry units code named“barracudas”; 2 companies of the 172nd regiment enroute for Rendova and Companies A and B of the 169th regiment and 1st Commando Fiji Guerillas enroute for Honiavasa went ahead of Turner aboard the faster transports Ward, Lang, Talbot and Zane. They were going to seize Rendova Harbor's beaches and the Honiavasa passage. The convoys continued their voyage to New Georgia in the early hours of the 30th facing no difficulties and would reach their jump off points in the early morning. The Barracuda groups arrived at 2:25an, successfully landing the first infantry group at Baraulu, Honiavasa and the Sasevele islands securing their staging base. The Rendova group however got a bit lost, leading to a bit of disorder, but they landed nonetheless.  By 6am the 43rd division begun its landing which was described by the US Marine corps official history as “hurried and having the appearance of a regatta rather than a coordinated landing, it was chaotic in the extreme”. Troops from the 103rd field artillery battalion, Marines from the 9th defense battalion and Seabees from the 24th naval construction battalion secured the beach even though Japanese sniper of the 1st rifle company, Kure 6th and 7th company, 229th regiment were making pot shots at them. There was also the appearance of Japanese Betty's overhead who circled the landing zone, but did not attack. The Japanese reported back to their commanders “that due to the tenacious interference by enemy fighter planes, a decisive blow could not be struck against the enemy landing convoy. And that the landings were an absolutely miraculous and speedy disembarkation of the enemy”. I believe this showcases another major disparity between the allies and the Japanese, that of amphibious assaults. The allies and Japanese were on par at the beginning of the conflict, neither side understood the science per say, but particularly the American began to really study how it to do it, designing and employing multiple different vehicles to help in its efforts. Meanwhile the Japanese would do little to improve their methodology, thus from their perspective to see how the allies were doing it in mid to late 1943 probably looked like magic. General Hesters 2nd battalion, 172nd regiment quickly established a defensive perimeter around the beachhead. His men had a rough time of digging in due to the ground being heavily waterlogged, nothing like a wet foxhole eh? Outnumbered and taken by surprise, the Japanese were gradually pushed into the interior suffering heavy casualties in the process. They initially assembled in a coconut plantation behind the initial landing beach known as the Levers plantation. They took up a position hoping to launch a counter attack on the American perimeter. However a week of heavy rain left them fighting miserably in knee deep water and eventually they could not bare it any longer so they withdrew further into the hinterland. Troops of the 172nd regiment pursued many of them shooting down several snipers and machine gun positions as they advanced towards the Pengui river. Near the river the Japanese tried to remain firm meeting the Americans with all they had, but the US mortars rained hell upon them eventually forcing them into a rout. The Japanese would scatter, many aboard makeshift rafts trying to head for the mainland. These efforts would be in vain however as American patrol vessels caught many of them. Over on Baanga island and around Munda Japanese artillery began opening up on 4 US destroyers sailing through the Blanche channel. The USS Gwin was hit, killing 3 and wounded 7 before the USS Farenholt and Buchanan began to return fire upon the batteries neutralizing them. Just before noon a force of 27 Zeros of the 11th air fleet performed a fighter sweep over the beachhead, but it resulted in nothing more than a few delays and the loss of 4 Zeros to allied fighters. 6000 Americans were soon landed on Rendova. It was grueling work to create the beach head, in the words of the Seabees leader, Commander Roy Whittaker about the conditions his men had to work in “They ceased to look like men; they looked like slimy frogs working in some prehistoric ooze. As they sank to their knees they discarded their clothes. They slung water out of their eyes, cussed their mud-slickened hands, and somehow kept the stuff rolling ashore.” Indeed it was a hell of a time. Tons of bulky B rations, hundreds of barrels of petroleum, thousands of barrack bags filled with personnel items were piled all over the beach. People don't often ever think about the logistics of war, its usually seen as the unsexy stuff, but it was of critical importance as we have seen countless times in this series. The Seabees were missing heavy bulldozers, army engineers, adequate medical personnel, military police, because yes boys will be boys and a lot of men were stealing stuff. It turned out the reason for a lot of the lack was because Turner loaded the operation for an unopposed landing rather than an offensive one. As reported by Lt COlonel McNenny “equipment and stores carried in the New Georgia operation were excessive. It appears the forward base must be considered as an assembly area for launching the assault.” Colonel George W. McHenry wrote in his notes, “Believe too much gear for initial landing. Stress what [is] necessary to fight and eat. Bring other up after secure.” By 3pm, most of Turners stuff was unloaded and his vessels were preparing their withdrawal. Admiral Kusaka and General Imamura had already been alarmed by the landings at Nassau Bay, and were shocked to find out at 6:50 Rendova was seeing landings. In response they unleashed an air strike at around 3:45pm. Led by Lt Commander Nakamura Genzo, 26 Betty's and 24 Zeros came in to attack the departing convoy. they were intercepted by 48 allied aircraft made up of F4U Corsairs and F6F Hellcats and were met with heavy anti aircraft fire. The Japanese lost a 10 Zeros and 19th Bettys in the mayhem. However a single Betty was able to release a torpedo which struck Turners flagship McCawley, killing 15 sailors and wounding 8 others. Turner luckily survived the hit and transferred his flag to Farenholt. Rear Admiral Theodore Wilkinson remained aboard the McCawley as she began being towed by the cargo ship Libra. Later in the afternoon, another Japanese wave of 21 Zeros, 9 Vals and 13 F1M Floatplanes showed up attacking the convoy. The McCawley was strafed, but managed to fight back with their anti aircraft guns shooting 3 planes down. By 6:60pm it seemed the McCawley was going to sink so Admiral Wilkinson ordered her abandoned. Later on at 8:22 a PT boat would actually misidentify the doomed McCawley as an enemy ship and torpedoed her twice, sinking her. The poor fleet tug Pawnee who was tugging her at the time narrowly was hit as well. At 5:20, 21 Zeros and 9 Vals would launch their last attack, but it was extremely disorderly and amounted to nothing. By the end of the day, AirSols had destroyed nearly a quarter of Kusaka's air strength while only losing 17 fighters in the process. The losses were so grave, Kusaka was forced to ask Imamura to commit the 6th air division to help out in the future. When the IJN is asking the IJA for help, you know the shit has really hit the fan. Now over to the east, Admiral Fort was performing his 3 simultaneous landings. At Wickham Anchorage, Fort was going to land Companies N and Q of the 4th raiders along with Lt Colonel Lester Browns 2nd battalion, 103rd regiment. They would touch down on a 500 yard strip of beach at Olona Bay. The 4th raiders would lead the charge heading their in the first destroyer transports, but mother nature was cruel that day leading to 6 Higgins boats getting wrecked and seeing Raiders scattered all over the area. One platoon got stranded on a reef 7 miles west of the landing point, not fun at all. Brown's landing craft infantry meanwhile had no difficulty in landing on the marked beach. After reuniting with the scattered Raiders, Brown learnt there were enemy bases at Kearuku Village and Vuru. In response to this he sent Company E of the Raiders to hit Vuru while the bulk of his forces would capture Kearuku. The advance was slowed by rain, allowing Colonel Sasaki to send word to his men over at Wickham to withdraw to the northern coast of New Georgia as they were outnumbered and outgunned. However there was no way for them to do this as their barges were scattered in the Marovo Lagoon. Thus the Japanese found themselves under fire from the north side of the Kairuku river and by nightfall were being pushed towards Segi Point where their artillery was set up. The men defending Vuru had it worse and were easily scattered by E Company. The next day the Japanese began unleashing their artillery, prompting Brown to request air and naval support to allow his men to hit Segi. However the support would only be able to come on July 3rd and by that time the Japanese had managed to escape. When July 3rd came, some US destroyers and 18 Dauntless dive bombers bombed Segi point. When Browns troops went in they killed 7 dazed Japanese and captured one. Because of the preemptive capture of Segi, the plans had to change in regards to Viru harbor. On the morning of june 28th, Colonel Curren ordered a single company to use rubber boats and go up the Choi river all the way to the western end of Nono Lagoon. From there the Raiders would march overland to hit the Japanese bivouacs at Tombe and Tetemara, hoping to link up with B company of the 103rd regiment. But now with Segi point taken, Currin instead left with his two companies to land at a village just a bit west of Nono Lagoon. However along the Choi river they would run into Japanese patrols, delaying them heavily. By june 30th, some of Forts destroyers would enter Viru Harbor expecting to find Currins Raiders, only to be met with 3 inch field gun fire from the Japanese at Tetemara. The destroyers left in haste and landed a company at Segi point to help the Raiders out. Currin that morning split his forces, sending P company to attack Tombe while the rest would circle west of the harbor, cross the mango river and attack Tetemara. After marching through endless swamps, by July 1st Currin and his men were prepared to attack, but Sasaki had also decided to order the withdrawal of forces at Viru who were now marching overland towards Munda. At 8:45 the Raiders stormed Tombe, overwhelming the few defenders there. 15 minutes later, 17 Dauntless began bombing Tetemara disrupting Japanese artillery crews. An hour later the Japanese artillery opened fire against the raiders, but they fought through the rain of shells and machine gun bullets. Taking the Japanese machine gun nests caused heavy casualties. At 4pm Currin ordered a final push, seeing Tetemara taken after 30 minutes. Major Hara alongside 160 Japanese would manage to escape into the jungle, heading for Munda. Though the eastern landings saw some heavy resistance, all of the objectives were met.  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 allies' successful amphibious assaults proved how far they had come and the Japanese could only look on in wonder at the marvel it was. Now the allies would keep pressing further and further north, one island at a time until the Solomons and New Guinea were liberated. 

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.

Last time we spoke about operation Cartwheel, developments in Green hell and some new adventures in Burma. General Douglas MacArthur had his work cut out for him as he developed his original Elkton plan into what would become Operation Cartwheel. Alongside the US Navy, MacArthur set out the blueprints for seizing parts of New Guinea and the Solomons before taking the ultimate prize that was Rabaul. The Japanese meanwhile extended their efforts to hammer allied airbases in the south pacific with lackluster results. Over on New Guinea the allied forces were drawing closer to seizing Lau, by using Salamaua as a distraction. Over in the Burma front, the disastrous Arakan campaign had resulted in some shuffling of leadership and now the Auk was working with General Slim to see if they could prepare the Indian Army for another go at the Japanese. And today we are going to be venturing back into all of these stories.  This episode is Battle of Lababia Ridge 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.    Last time we were speaking about Operation Cartwheel and part of phase one for Admiral Halsey in the Solomons was to move north from Guadalcanal to hit New Georgia code named Operation Toenails. Halsey planned to perform four simultaneous landings. One was directed at Wickham Anchorage by the 2nd battalion, 103rd regiment plus two companies from the 4th raider battalion to be led by Lt Colonel Lester Brown. Wickham would become a new landing craft layover base. A second landing would be made at Segi Point by Companies O and P of the 4th Raider battalion and Companies A and D of the 103rd regiment would garrison Segi point and its airfield afterwards. Another landing would be made at Viru Harbor by Company B of the 103rd regiment for its small craft base. And a final landing would be made at Rendova Harbor by the 172nd regiment and 24th naval construction battalion Seabees which would become a stage for further troops coming over to New Georgia before an assault on Munda was made. The 43rd infantry division led by Major General John Hester were going to take the lead against Munda. The 43rd were actually a national guard division from Connecticut, Maine, Rhode island and Vermont who were mobilized and reorganized as a “triangular” division. This meant they were going to be 3 regiments rather than 4. They would be brought up to strength, but in reality the only real experience they by this point was some unopposed landings on the Russell islands early in 1943. They had several months to prepare for the campaign. Hester got the men to construct pill boxes modeled after the Japanese one's found on Guadalcanal for training exercises. However the terrain found on Guadalcanal or on the Russell Islands did not really bear much resemblance to that of New Georgia. In April 1943, the 14th corps arranged for the 147th regiment, veterans of the Guadalcanal campaign who had chased the Japanese west during Operation KE to conduct several training exercises with the 43rd division. However as noted by many of the men in the regiment the terrain was not very similar to what was expected on New Georgia hampering the training. By mid june the 103rd infantry and the 169th infantry also began training exercises on Guadalcanal using landing craft. Now you probably noticed in my listening there was mention of the 4th raiders. Two new Raider battalions were entering the fray; the 3rd Raiders led by Lt Colonel Harry Liversedge were coming over fresh from Samoa; and the 4th Raiders led by Lt Colonel James Roosevelt from Camp Pendleton of California. And yes you are probably wondering, James Roosevelt II was the eldest son of FDR. Since 1936 he had been serving as his fathers military aide, under the commission of a captain in the Marine Corps Reserve. When the war broke out in 1939 he entered active duty and starting in April of 1941 FDR sent him on a secret mission. James traveled around the world on a diplomatic mission to assure other governments that the US would soon join the war despite the official neutrality stance. He met with Chiang Kai-shek in China, King Farouk of Egypt, King George of Greece, Sir Winston CHurchill of Britain and such. After the attack on Pearl Harbor he sat right beside his father as he gave the legendary Day of Infamy speech, and soon he requested an active combat assignment. He was transferred to the Marine Raiders by January of 1942 and became the 2nd in command of the 2nd Raiders under Carlson. He took part in the Makin Island Raid in August of 1942 where he earned a Navy Cross. He had some health issues, such as flat feet, and got the special privilege of being allowed to wear sneakers while the other Marines wore boots. On March 15th the 4 Raider battalions were reorganized as the 1st Raider regiment, stationed at Espiritu Santo with Liversedge as their commander and Carlson executive officer. Carlson infused his fire team and squad models into the raiders, while Edson molded them into a highly trained, lightly equipped force who could accomplish special missions or fill a line battalion on the fly. The 1st Raider Regiment was no guerilla outfit, though it felt like that initially. For Operation Toenails, Halsey assigned both the 1st Raiders led by Colonel Griffith and the 4th Raiders led by Lt Colonel Michael Currin, supported by the 9th defense battalion which was carrying a 155mm gun units and light tank platoon. The Navy was also sending the legendary Seabees; Acorn 7, the 24th and a single section of the 20th naval construction battalions. It can't be said enough how much the Seabee's brought to the table in the Pacific. During the war theSeabee's would receive 5 Navy Crosses, 33 Silver Stars and over 2000 Purple Hearts alongside numerous citations and commendations. They performed legendary deeds in the Atlantic and Pacific creating over 400 advanced bases along the 5 figurative roads to victory.   Lastly and quite interesting to note, the Americans would have a unique commando units of 130 Fijians known as the 1st Commando Fiji Guerillas. When the Pacific War broke out, Japan had seized numerous territory going as far south as the Solomon islands getting just 8 hours flight time away from places like Fiji. At this time Britain was too preoccupied with the Atlantic and America was scrambling to recover from Pearl Harbor. Fiji was in a critical position and for several months while the US was organizing her forces so was Fiji. Fiji possessed 2 good harbors and 2 airfields and her position on earth put her smack dab on the way between America and Australia / New Zealand. The allies knew the Japanese would love to take such a territory and thus she needed defense. Small numbers of troops were garrisoning Fiji, many from New Zealand, but she had little to spare as she became heavily committed to Africa and the Middle East. Thus the Americans came to Fiji to relieve the New Zealanders and they helped expand Fiji's forces. The result were commando units who proved themselves uniquely equipped for combat on pacific islands like the solomons. For New Georgia the Fiji guerillas were tasked with locating enemy soldiers scattered about the island. The eastern landing force consisted of the 1st and 2nd battalions of the 103rd regiment alongside the 4 raider battalion to be led by Colonel Daniel Hundley. Their job was to secure the lines of communication to Rendova directly across from Munda. The Western Landing Force consisted of the 172nd and 169th Regiments; 3rd Battalion, 103rd Regiment; 9th Marine Defense Battalion; 24th Naval Construction Battalion (Seabees) and 1st Commando Fiji Guerrillas, to be led by General Hester. They had the initial mission of securing the island of Rendova and afterwards the 3 islets in the Blanche Channel opposite of Munda. For the islets it would be the job of Companies A and B, 169th Regiment; and 1st Commando Fiji Guerillas. Once all of that was done, the 172nd and 169th regiments led by Brigadier General Leonard Wing would advance to Zanana through the Honiavasa passage, then take a overland route over the Barike River for the final drive upon Munda supported by destroyer bombardment. Hester also planned to use the 3rd battalion, 103rd regiment to hook around Munda's from the west coast. For all of these amphibious landings, Admiral Turner was in charge with his task force 31. He divided his forces into two groups; the Western Force under his personal command which would make the Rendova landings; and the Eastern Force led by Rear Admiral George Fort would perform the landings at Wickham, Segi Point and Viru Harbor. For the Rendova harbor landing, Turner employed 4 Attack transports and 2 Aka's; during WW2 Aka's referred to merchant ships that were modified for combat use. These took the 172nd regiment and 24th seabees over on June 30th, while Turners larger landing craft, LST's (landing ship tank), LCT's (Landing craft tank) and LCI's (landing craft infantry) would move Hesters initial units over the next few days. The Amphibious forces would be covered by Halsey's Task Force 36 constituting of forces that had previously been under the command of Admirals Ainsworth and Merrill, destroyers, cruisers, some battleships and a few carriers. Merrill would help the landings by performing a bombardment of the Shortland islands as minelayers created minefields across the southern entrance to Bougainville, and a smaller detachment of destroyers hit Vila as a diversion. Ainsworth would get himself into position in the seas around Rendova while Admiral Fitch would grant the operation a total of 1182 aircraft, including 626 from Admiral Mitschers Airsols as cover. To gain air supremacy, 17 air missions were assigned such as PBY crews for rescue operations and last minute supply drops over New Georgia. AirSols aircraft would be assigned to New Georgia missions with a few SBDS set aside for Russell operations. Fitch also went ahead and created the New Georgia Air force commanded by General Mulcahy who would direct missions from the ground. Closing in on Operation Toenails, Halsey and Turner also decided to add a last minute landing directed at Rice Anchorage on the Kula Gulf. Designated Northern Landing Group, the landing was to be performed by the 3rd battalions, of the 145th and 148th regiments alongside the 1st raider battalion led by Colonel Harry Liversedge. This would occur on July the 4th to create a base from which the allies could launch an attack against the Enogai inlet and Bairoko harbor. By seizing these the allies could interdict Japanese supply lines and prevent reinforcement efforts for Munda. Now that is all for the plans for the Solomons, but Operation Cartwheel had other plans over on New Guinea being handled by General Douglas MacArthur and Kreuger, code named Operation Chronicle, the invasion of the Woodlark and Kiriwina islands. The two Trobriand islands held airfields and were only 125 miles from New Britain and 200 miles from Bougainville. Capturing them would allow the allies to launch bombers with fighter escort to hit Rabaul, Kavieng and the northern solomons. It was also a great opportunity to test what was colloquially known as “MacArthur's Navy”, officially known as the 7th amphibious force. Now Lt General Krueger had sent reconnaissance missions to the islands which indicated there were no Japanese present on them in May. Nonetheless he instructed the men to prepare for a fight and at the least to expect aerial attacks when they approached them. Kruegers plan of attack was simplistic, Colonel Julian Cunningham would lead the Woodlark force. This consisted of the 112th Cavalry Regiment; 134th Field Artillery Battalion; and 12th Defense Battalion. Also, the 20th and 60th Naval Construction Battalions and ARGUS 1. They would depart Townsville Australia on June 25th and land on Woodlark by June 30th. The Kiriwina Force would be led by Colonel Prugh Herndon consisting of the  158th Regiment; and 148th Field Artillery Battalion. They would depart from Milne Bay on June 30th and quickly land at Kiriwina that same day. To get them to the beaches, Admiral Barbey would have 4 destroyer transports, the Gilmber, Sands, Humphrey and Brooks alongside 6 LSTS, a subchaser 7 mechanized landing craft, 2 small coastal transports and a survey ship, a real hodge podge. Escorting them would be Barbey's task force 76 consisting of the destroyers Mugford, Bagley, Conyngham, Henley and helm along with Carpenders task force 74 consisting of cruisers Australia and Jobart with destroyers Arunta and Warramunga. For aerial support they had multiple squadrons from Australian Wing 73 operating off Goodenough island. Now on the grounds of New Guinea in mid June, Generals Savige, Herring, Berryman and Colonels Archibald MacKechnie met with Brigadier Moten to hear about his plans for the 17th brigade's salamaua offensive. Moten laid out a 5 phase plan, phase 1 consisted of the 1st Battalion, 162nd Regiment creating a beach head at Nassau Bay, with the support of a company from the 2/6th battalion. Phase 2 would see the 2/6th reinforced by a company of the 2/5th who would capture Observation Hill and a ridge between Bui Savella and Kitchen Creeks. From there they would be able to move through Mubo Valley to Archway while American forces captured Bitoi ridge. Phase 3 would see the capture of Green Hill and the Pimple by American forces and some of the 2/6th. From there they could advance towards Komaitum and Lokanu. Phase 4 would see the 2/5th advance from Mubo through the 2/6th position to occupy Mount Tambu, linking up with the 15th brigade at Komiatum. Lastly Phase 5 would see the capture of Lokanu and Boisi, clearing the enemy away from the Francisco river area. The plan looked good to all present. But nothing was mentioned about the capture of Lae, nor the critical fact, that Salamaua needed to fall prior to Lae, lest they all lose the element of surprise for Operation Postern. This was done for security reasons, it all had to be held under wraps, but despite this General Savige remained convinced he had to capture Salamaua as soon as possible. His subordinate, Brigadier Moten was aware of the grand plan created by Blamey. Yet while all of these allied commanders were planning, a war was still afoot and the Japanese tossed a counter offensive on the night of June 20th. The Japanese commanders had determined in late May that they needed to dislodge the Australians from Lababia Ridge. General Nakano had brought forward the 1500 men of 1st and 2nd Battalions of the 66th regiment. He concealed their movements by ordered heavy airstrikes and ordered the men to make no fires. This also allowed the exhausted 102nd infantry regiment to rotate back a bit as they had been fighting the Australians ever since the battle of Wau. On the 20th, Nakano began sending patrols made up of the 66th with a few guides from the 102nd who probed the Australian position on Lababia ridge, at that time being held by just 80 men. The Japanese patrols defused many booby traps the Australians laid out for them, made up of piano wire attached to hand grenades. However the Japanese were not too familiar with the Australian hand grenade, so instead of pocketing them to use against the enemy they simply left them. Some sporadic skirmishes occurred that day alongside some bombing missions aimed at Guadagasal, Mat Mat and the Mubo Valley. 83 Japanese aircraft caused some casualties and damage against the 2/6th and spooked a ton of native carriers. The next day the Australians would be searching for native carriers who fled, losing around 578 of them for over 3 days. This greatly delayed the movement of rations, ammunition and other supplies. On the morning of June 21st, the 1st battalion of Araki, guided by some men of the 102nd regiment, began advancing around the eastern flank of the Australian position on Lababia, getting into position for a dawn attack set for the following day. Behind them was the 2nd battalion who were doing a similar maneuver but on the Australians left flank. The Japanese were extremely careful as they advanced having learnt bitter lessons throughout the war about how much the Australians liked to hang grenades attached to piano wire just about anywhere one would think to walk. Oh and it was not limited to fragment grenades, they hooked up thermite grenades, cans of petrol and other goodies. Now they were going to be attacking 80 men as I said, which were being led by Captain Walter Dexter's D company. He had two platoons in a forward position on the Jap track and two others to the back guarding his HQ. Further north he set up listening posts to watch for enemy activity around the Pimple. Dexter figured he was holding a decent enough position going on to say ”if you've got to fight them you've got to see them'. Around noon Australian patrols began to notice signs of Japanese activity along the track towards the observation post just a bit due east along the ridge. At 7:30 the telephone line to that observation post was suddenly cut and the Japanese could be seen approaching. The Australians went to work setting off booby traps that had been rigged up as early warning devices and a small firefight emerged. Then at 2pm the Japanese launched an assault from the north and north east of the Australian position, firing off mortars. The Japanese were repelled, but they came right back later in the afternoon screaming into a bayonet charge. Over the course of the afternoon 3 major attacks were made to the sound of Japanese bugles. This was a classic Japanese strategy to intimidate the enemy, but it actually aided the Australians as it warned them of the incoming attack each time. The attacks were turned back and during the night the Australians were reinforced by another platoon,  70 men of C company led by Corporal Keith Mew. As the night wore on, the Australians sent out some patrols to try and make contact with their forward positions only to find out they had been wiped out in the attacks. Meanwhile under heavy rain, the Japanese were recovering their wounded and trying to get rid of more pesky booby traps in front of the Australian positions.    The next morning came screams and charging Japanese setting off booby traps all morning long. Dexter responded by ordered the men to shoot mortars and rifle grenades at anything that looked like a Japanese position. At 2pm on the 21st, the Japanese began a heavy attack on one of the forward positions held by Sergeant John Hedderman lying between the Jap track and Lababia track. The attack spread to Roach's and Lt Edward Exton's front sending a rain of automatic and mortar fire into the two forward platoons. A bayonet charge along the Jap track was halted within just 10 yards of the forward positions and another one to the right flank got within 20 yards before being stopped. The Australians tossed lead in all forms into the banzai charges, but no matter how much mortar, bullets and grenades were tossed, the Japanese were closing in. Sensing a breakthrough, Moten ordered forward more men from the 2/5th battalion allowing Dexter to reinforce his left flank using a small reserve he had at his HQ. They arrived at the flank just in time to repel another banzai charge. By the late afternoon the Australians had 12 dead men and 10 wounded, they were down to just 55 abled bodies, but the brunt of the Japanese attack was done. The arrival of C company allowed Dexter to reinforce his forward positions, now bolstered to 150 men.    The Japanese did not give up however and continued their attack during the late afternoon. Suffering so many casualties, it looked like the Japanese might break through Exton's position. Exton and Corporal Martine charged forward to rally their men, getting them through the brunt of another assault. By dusk the attacks began to decrease until the gradually stopped. The night saw a ton of rain, making it miserable for the Japanese who were dragging their wounded and dead comrades through booby trapped jungle. On the morning of the 22nd, Araki sent some patrols to probe Dexter's left flank who were met by Australian sniper fire. An attack was launched against Dexter's rear, held by Smiths platoon who overwhelmed the Japanese causing them to give up after 5 minutes. Frustrated by the lack of progress, Araki ordered his two mountain guns from the 14th artillery regiment to start shelling Lababia. However the foliage was too much and only two shells actually landed within Dexters perimeter. Thus when the Japanese recommenced their attacks they were met by the full brunt of the defenders. By night, Araki was forced to toss in the towel and he ordered the men to begin a withdrawal. To cover the retreat, Araki ordered his men to fire heavy automatic guns and motors into Dexter's position on the morning of the 23rd. The Australians responded the same way, but then Dexter unleashed a nasty surprise. He ordered his units to mark the forward lines with smoke. Soon the RAAF send Bristol Beaufighters in who strafed the Japanese up and down the Jap Track.  It was an incredible defense, the defenders had been outnumbered 10-1. The Japanese had received 42 dead, 131 wounded while killing 11 and wounded 12 Australians. As Moten would go on to say ‘the engagement is noteworthy and is a classic example of how well-dug-in determined troops can resist heavy attacks from a numerically superior enemy”. Dexter had been pretty much left to his own to defend Lababia and for his excellent leadership he was later awarded the Distinguished service order while some of his platoon commanders; Lt edward Exton, Laurence and Roach received Military crosses and Sergeant John Hedderman received a military medal. Dexter was praised by Moten for “taking every trick during the battle” and one of his colleagues, Captain Jo Gullet described him as“he was too exacting to be popular, although he was a thorough soldier, a good trainer of men and a painstaking tactician”. Lababia was secured, and in the next week major operations were about to begin. 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 Cartwheel was getting its ducks all in order for a major push set on June 30th. The boys down unda fought like lions to protect Lababia ridge. Outnumbered 10-1 they proved, well dug-in positions sometimes made all the difference. 

Last time we spoke about the aftermath of the battle for Attu. The American victory over Attu meant the end of the Aleutian campaign for the Japanese, Tokyo decided to pull everyone out. Over 6000 Japanese needed evacuation from Kiska and it would be very tricky for the Japanese to get past Admiral Kinkaids blockade. Then we finished up the West Hubei offensive, with a part of it being known colloquially as the Rice Bowl Campaign. The Japanese had brutalized the Chinese, but we're stopped short of invading Chongqing or Sichuan. Thus for the Chinese it was a victory, but at the same time the Japanese had secured exactly what they wanted, stealing vast amounts of property, notably rice. Vessels left Yichang and sailed further west through the riverways acquiring large sums of goods to help the China war cause. Today we are diving back into the south Pacific. This episode is Operation Cartwheel starts rolling 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 honestly for awhile now we have been hitting the North Pacific and China theaters, which certainly was a change of pace, but as you can imagine these events do not simply move along in a vacuum. Yes a lot was going on in the other theaters and this episode is going to be tackling a lot of different events so buckle up buckos. First we are going to talk about Operation Cartwheel. The ULTRA intelligence that brought Yamamoto's death was not the only information the Americans received in April. A lifeboat bearing a list of the names of 40,000 active Japanese officers washed ashore after the battle of the Bismarck Sea. Using this Cryptographers were able to match each name to radio signals from Japanese army units, ensuring General MacArthurs intelligence remained as operationally up to date as it could be. At the same time William Bull Hasley showed to on April 15th to Brisbane to meet with MacArthur and the two hit it off. Halsey would later write this about their first encounter. “Five minutes after I reported, I felt as if we were lifelong friends. I have seldom seen a man who makes a quicker, stronger, more favorable impression. He was then sixty-three, but he could have passed as fifty. His hair was jet black; his eyes were clear; his carriage erect….My mental picture poses him against the background of these discussions; he is pacing his office, almost wearing a groove between his large, bare desk and the portrait of George Washington that faced it; his corncob pipe is in his hand (I rarely saw him smoke it): and he is making his points in a diction I have never heard surpassed. “ Both men would hammer out a plan on April 26th, it was a revision to MacArthur's Elkton plan, this one would be known as Elkton III, but it was soon to be coded as Operation Cartwheel.  The plan consisted of 13 amphibious landings in just 6 months with MacArthur and Halsey providing maximum support to each others efforts. The first phase of the plan would see MacArthur seizing Woodlark and the Kirwina islands while Hasley invaded New Georgia. Phase 2 would commence 2 months after the start of the offensive where MacArthur would capture Lae, Salamaua and Finschhafen. Phase 3 would be the seizure of the Shortland islands and Bougainville in the south pacific. In December MacArthur would seize Cape Gloucester in Western New Britain and shortly after that they would seize Rabaul. Halsey's forces would knock out Japanese air bases on Buka, allowing MacArthurs men to clear the northwestern half of New Guinea. By January of 1944, MacArthur and Halsey figured they would be ready for the final assault on Rabaul which was their ultimate objective for victory. MacArthur resisted sending details of their joint plan to Washington, probably fearing the Europe first obsessed chiefs of staff would veto their ambitious thrust. He told them only that he anticipated that the first move toward Woodlark and Kirwina would start in June. However this was too slow for Admiral King. King wanted his protege Admiral Nimitz to begin a thrust into the central pacific, heading through the Marshalls in November and proposed shifting the Marine 1st and 2nd divisions, the ones that fell under MacArthurs and Halsey's command to help with the Marshalls offensive, this alongside two bomber groups promised to General Kenney. MacArthur was very pissed off and he sent a distressed message to George Marshall damning the entire central Pacific strategy as a quote “unnecessary and even wasteful diversion from what should be the main pacific strategy”,  that being MacArthur's own.”. He added in “from a broad strategic viewpoint, I am convinced that the best course of offensive action in the Pacific is a movement from Australia through New Guinea to Mindanao. Air supremacy is essential to success, for the southwestern strategy where large numbers of land-based aircraft are utterly essential and will immediately cut the enemy lines from japan to his conquered territory to the southward. Pulling any additional heavy bombers groups would in my opinion, collapse the offensive effort in the southwest pacific area…in my judgment the offensive against Rabaul should be considered the main effort, and it should not be nullified or weakened ”. But King was adamant. There would indeed be a thrust through the central pacific led by the navy with its main axis passing through the Marshalls and Marianas towards Japan,which might I remind you listening, bypasses the Philippines. It of course was a strategy completely at odds with MacArthurs. Marshall supported King, as did the other Joint Chiefs. But in the end MacArthurs whining forced King to relent on the transfer of the two marine divisions and the bomber groups, thus MacArthur revealed his timetable for operation Cartwheel. He told them he planned to take Kiriwna and Woodlark in the Trobriand Island around June 30th. The advance on New Georgia would start on the same date, and in September the First Cavalry and 3 Australian divisions would begin operations against the Madang-Salamaua area. Meanwhile MacArthur's 43rd division would invade southern Bougainville on October 15th, while the 1st Marines and 32nd division would invade Cape Gloucester on December 1st.  For all of these amphibious landings, there were no serious problems when it came to shipping and landing craft….that is for Nimitz designated areas. However at the beginning of 1943, MacArthur had practically no amphibious equipment nor experts in these types of operations. The only units available to him were the Army's engineering special boat brigade which had very few small craft. The man who would be responsible for the amphibious assaults during much of the coming campaigns was to be Rear Admiral Daniel Barbey. On January 10th, 1943 he took command of the forces that would later be designated the 7th Amphibious force. Barbey from the offset established good relations with MacArthur…because well anyone who worked with MacArthur had to. He had nearly nothing to work with in the beginning, but started with establishing bases at Toobul Bay, near the mouth of the Brisbane river and Point Stephens. MacArthur had requested more small craft and transports as early as mid 1942, but because of the European and central pacific being a priority, little had come his way. Before the equipment came, MacArthur was receiving American and Australian troops, so he got Barbey's team to improvise. They began training the troops in debarking from larger ships down cargo nets to smaller landing craft. However Barbey had no attack transports (APA), which was the key to this kind of operation. To solve this they rigged nets from cliffs, boy that must have been fun. The first Landing ship tanks LSTs and Landing craft tanks LCTs would not arrive until mid january, and on Easter Sunday 13 Landing craft infantry's LCI's were delivered, giving them very little time before the first operations were to begin to train the crews on how to use them.  Now on the other side Halsey had his own three phase operation. Part 1 saw the invasion of New Georgia, part 2 was the seizure of Buin and Rekata Bay if possible and last 3 was the seizure of Kieta and the neutralization of Buka. Phase 1 was codenamed Operation Toenails. Halsey described the operation to Nimitz as “a infiltration and staging operation”. The operation would see simultaneous landings at Wickham Anchorage to hit its landing craft base; Segi point for its airfield site; Viru Harbor for its small craft base and Rendova Harbor which would serve as a new base to stage troops for a future attack upon Munda. This would all occur on June 30th. The main force assigned to Operation Toenails was General Hester's 43rd division. Admiral Turner and his Task Force 31 were in charge of the amphibious landings while Admiral Fitch would toss 1182 aircraft to give them aircower and Admiral's Ainsworth and Merrill's Task force 36 would provide further naval support. On the other side, interservice coordination between the Japanese Generals and Admirals remained intermittent and largely ad hoc, when it was not hostile. General Imamura's 8th area army HQ at Rabaul stood above Hyakutake's 17th Army, comprising 3 divisions spread over the SOlomons and New Britain, and General Hatazo Adachi's 8th Army had 3 divisions on New Guinea. Troop reinforcements were arriving in Rabaul bolstering the garrison at one point to 90,000 men. Vice Admiral Jinichi Kusaka remained in command of navy forces at Rabaul and held responsibility for the defense of the central solomons. Admiral Mineichi Koga had succeeded the slain Yamamoto as commander in chief of the combined fleet, based at Truk. Nowhere in the theater was there a blended command, the army and navy had to coordinate their operations through a meticulous process of “nemawashi / digging around the roots” for a consensus. The Japanese moved new air units into the theater, including more of the elite carrier aircrews that had trained and honed their skills prior to the war, but the loss ratios in air combat was ruining them.  As a result of the devastating loss during the battle of the Bismarck Sea, the Japanese were forced to change plans. USAAF and RAAF aircraft based at Port Moresby and Milne Bay had slaughtered an entire convoy of Japanese transports attempting to land troops in the Lae-Slaamaua area using a new technique called “skip bombing”. Imperial General HQ set up a joint Army/Navy investigation board to study the disaster, seeing the IJA accused the IJN of being too focused on the Solomons rather than on New Guinea. The Army argued New Guinea was vital for the national defenses and proposed that if a retreat became necessary, it would be as a direct result of the navy's lack of support. If this were to happen they would have to pull back and create a defensive line from northwest New Guinea to Timor. The Navy's representatives argued that the Huon Peninsula must be held or its loss would swing open the western gate to Rabaul, forcing the combined fleet to withdraw from Truk. Well the fighting eventually resulted in an ultimatum with both sides agreeing the army/navy operations should focus on eastern New Guinea. It was decided that both the army and navy would literally operate as one unit, because that would go well. The Central solomons were still under the overall responsibility of the 8th fleet, now commanded by Vice Admiral Baron Samejima Tomoshige with some IJA units placed under naval command according to agreements made between General Imamura and Admiral Kusaka. It seems the Japanese could get along once and awhile, as just like Halsey and MacArthur, Imamura and Kusaka developed a deep friendship. Both of their staffs ate lunch together once or twice a week, where southeast area affairs were discussed informally and their respective staffs got to know another personally. Kusaka went on the record to say Imamura was a very great person. Many army units would be sent to reinforce the New Georgia defenses and by late May the bulk of the 229th regiment arrived to Munda, and the 13th regiment went to Vila by late June. Imamura placed both regiments under the command of Major General Sasaki Noboru's southeast detachment who responded directly to Samejima. Samejima's first orders were to arrange the responsibilities between General Sasaki's southeast detachment and Admiral Ota's 8th combined SNLF, seeing Sasaki in charge of Munda and Ota in charge of the Enogai and Bairoko area's. If the situation arose, command would be unified under the senior officer on New Georgia, General Sasaki. Ota would also have responsibility for coastal artillery defense, radio communications, and barge operations. Admiral Koga in his new role as commander of the combined fleet, preemptively sent move of his forces back to the home islands in preparation to reinforce Attu. But as the fate of the Aleutians became sealed by late May, Koga decided to concentrate the combined Fleet at Truk, so it would be primed and ready for a decisive naval battle with the Americans. Without the aid of Koga's carriers, Kusaka had launched another air counteroffensive after I-Go, this one taking place in June. The aim was yet again to prevent the Americans from invading the central solomons . Kusaka began tossing waves of Bety's against American shipping east of San Cristobal and night raids over guadalcanal. Simultaneously he also unleashed Operation SO; a major offensive to smash allied air power in the Solomon islands; and operation SE: which targeted airfields and shipping. He sent 105 Zeros to sweep and bomb the enemy airfields with a new type of gasoline bomb. Operation SE began with 25 Val dive bombers attacking US shipping in the Guadalcanal-Tulagi area and Operation SO began on June 7th with 81 Zeros led by Lt Commander Shindo Saburo assaulting the Russels. However the Russel group ran right into 104 allied fighters who shot down 9 Zeros. A follow up attack was made on the 12th with 74 Zeros led by Lt Miyano Zenjiro, this time the Japanese lost 7 fighters but took down 6 American. As usual the Japanese pilots made wild claims, stating the first attack saw 41 American fights shot down and the second attack 24.  Kusaka launched the main attack of Operation SE on June 16th led by Lt commander Saburo consisting of 24 Vals and 70 Zero escorts who swung south of the Russells, turning at Beaufort Bay. Yet again they were intercepted, this time by 74 allied fighters over BEaufort Bay and the ensuing ari battle rolled over the mountainous spine of guadalcanal. This time the Japanese lost 15 Zeros and 13 Vals while only shooting down 6 allied fighters. The Japanese lost first rate pilots such as Lt Miyano who had scored a total of 16 kills during the war. Again Japanese veteran pilots were being bled dry severely affecting the nation's airpower. Despite their waves being intercepted nearly every time, the Vals were able to press through with their attacks and managed to hit the cargo ships Caleno and LST-340. But such results were hardly worth the cost, so Kusaka began to urgently request reinforcements. The carrier Ryhuo would lend her bombers to replace the lost ones, arriving on the 2nd of July. The losses taught the Japanese pilots some bitter lessons and never again would the fly over guadalcanal during daylight as the American CAP was far to powerful. Over in New Guinea, General Blamey was laying out his plan for the capture of Lae, codenamed Operation Postern which was approved by MacArthurs headquarters. Before the allies would invade Woodlark and Kiriwana, MacArthur proscribed the seizure of Lae and the Markham and Ramu valley. The Markham operations were to be based on Port Moresby while the north coast operations would be staged from Buna and Milne Bay. The invasion of Woodlark and Kiriwana islands codenamed Operation Chronicle would be entrusted to Lt General Walter Kruegers 6th army. The islands northeast of the Papuan coast would allow the allies to have air bases closer to Japanese targets in the Solomons and around Rabaul, thus Blamey had devised his plan to secure the northeastern part of New Guinea. The first phase of his plan was Lae and the Markham and Ramu Valleys; the 2nd phase was to seize a shore base within 60 miles of Lae, he chose Nassau Bay. Nassau Bay would help with the supply problems in the Wau-Mubo-Bobdubi area, as all the supplies were being flown in from Port Moresby. The mountains were serious obstacles for transport aircraft, not to mention the Japanese fighters that could spring out of nearby Lae. Taking Nassau Bay would greatly shorting supply lines for allied troops fighting in the Salamaua region and also allow a junction to be made with General Saviges forces operating at Mubo The 162nd American Regiment led by Colonel Archibald MacKechnie would help hit Nassau Bay, they would be known as the MacKechnie force. They would seize the high ground around Goodiew Junction and Mount Tambu and the ridges running down therefrom to the sea, allowing the Australians to link up with the 15th brigade at Bobdubi and the American landing force at Nassau. D-day for the Nassau Landing was set for June 30th and it was all going to act as a feint, hoping to lure Japanese forces from Lae to Salamaua.  Now the last time we left off in New Guinea, General Savige had launched a limited offensive against the Japanese at Mubo and Bobdubi ridge. General Nakano was certain Salamaua was the main allied target and this prompting him on the 29th to order Major General Chuichi Muroya to lead the 51st division to fortify it. In the process Muroya's men expelled Warfe's commandos from the northern ridge. To the east of Mubo, Brigadier Moten was trying to take the Pimple, but his 17th brigade would be performing more patrolling than actual attacks throughout the later half of May. Eventually Savige would relieve the exhausted 2/7th battalion with the 2/6th battalion led by Lt Colonel Frederick Wood who would begin an advance on May the 27th. Meanwhile Nakano had brought more reinforcements to defend Mubo and launched a strong counterattack in early May, nearly breaking through towards the main Australian camp at Lababia ridge. On May 23rd Nakano received two battalions of the 66th regiment and began to work out a plan for assembling supplies and ammunition in the Mubo area to prepare for an offensive. Men would move at night in a single file along the narrow jungle trails carrying the materials by hand, through mud and rain. The main train was a slope on Komiatum ridge known to the Japanese as Regret Hill as the hard working soldiers became more exhausted with each passing day marching along it. The Japanese sought to clear out Lababia ridge as far as Guadagasal, thus securing Mubo. On June 3rd, allied patrols discovered Nakano had reoccupied Markham point which forced Savige to keep the bulk of the 24th away from the action at Bobdubi and Mubo. From their camp at the bank of the Markham Savige ordered patrols to investigate the Nadzab area. On June 14th, a 3 man patrol came across friendly natives at the village of Gabsonkek who informed them of the Japanese activity in the area. They said "that the Japs come to the village every day between 10:00 and 12:00 hours taking everything in sight—pigs, fowls, fruit, etc., without paying; they take native girls back to Lae if they can catch them. The guides would not proceed farther to Ngasawapum because Japan man come up Big Road, cut us off", and they would not go to Narakapor because they claimed there were too many Japs and two big guns". The patrol went back to camp by the 18th informing command. A second patrol was made, led by Lt Dave Burke who forded the Tabali River to get to Nassau Bay. Their report indicated the area was suitable for landing and road construction. To further prepare for the American landings, the Australians began building a footbridge over the Bitoi River and blazed a track up to Bitoi Ridge. On Lababia Ridge the main defensive position withdrew to a junction on the Jap Tracks where it would be easier to counter enemy encirclement attempts. Reports came in from forward platoons that there was considerable enemy activity along the Komiatum-Mubo track. This was Nakano's 66th regiment carrying the food and ammunition in preparation for the upcoming offensive. In response to this, Savige ordered Brigadier Frank Hosking of the 15th brigade to assume command of the Bobdubi ridge area and to begin harassing the Japanese supply route. Meanwhile the 58th/59th battalion relieved the 2/3rd independent company at Hote and a party of Warfe's commando's were sent to attack the Komiatum-Mubo track. However disaster struck as the Australians ran into their own booby-traps on June 16th suffering a number of casualties. By June 20th, the commando's established ambush positions along a ridge near the junction of Stephens Track and the Komiatum Track. They successfully ambushed some Japanese later that day, killing a few men and capturing valuable documents about the arrival of Nakano's 66th regiment. However by this point Nakano's units were already assembling in front of Lababia ridge and the offensive was about to begin. Now we gotta finish up the episode talking about some developments in India. After the disastrous first Arakan Campaign, Marshal Wavell was to receive a promotion, and by promotion I mean he was kicked upstairs as they say, succeeded Lord Linlithgow as the new Viceroy of India. But until then he began looking into training his forces in jungle warfare as the bitter lessons learned at Arakan proved the men were very unprepared. Wavell also wanted to investigate what the hell had happened during the disaster, so he sent Major General Roland Richardson in late May to head a infantry committee at New Delhi for the task. The committee's report about the Arakan campaign found the troops fighting spirit was fundamentally sound, but the major problems that affected their combat performance were more about the over expansion of the army in India. The army mobilization had been rushed, they barely met basic training and the supplying of their sheer numbers was a catastrophe. There were also issues regarding their low status, inferior pay for the infantry, which further deprived them of skilled and well educated recruits.  Yet above all else the Infantry committee found their lack of jungle training to be the most egregious issue. As observed “This is the most urgent problem facing us, and one which requires prompt and energetic action if results are to be produced in time for the winter campaigning season.” The lack of jungle training severely undermined their ability to fight efficiently and ultimately led to the breakdown of infantry battalions in the Arakan. And of course there was the ever present unseen enemy, that of malaria, alongside an assortment of other ailments that were wreaking havoc on the men. But many of these problems could not be tackled until June 20th, when General Claude Auchinleck was officially appointed as the new Commander in Chief in India. For General Slim this was excellent news and certainly worked in his favor alongside the sacking of Irwin. The “Auk” as he was called, had always been a Slim supporter and was the one who recommended him to Wavell for advancement when Wavell was Commander in Chief of the middle east back in 1941. The Auk had wanted to retain Slim in the middle east and fought hard to dissuade Wavell from taking him over to Burma. Churchill never held Wavell ever in high regard and was tired of his quasi-academic effusions and preferred a “fighting general” in Burma. Alongside the Auk, Irwin was replaced with General George Giffard, and Slim had this to say of the replacement.  “The new Army Commander had a great effect on me. A tall, goodlooking man in the late fifties, who had obviously kept himself physically and mentally in first-class condition, there was nothing dramatic about him in either appearance or speech. He abhorred the theatrical, and was one of the very few generals, indeed men in any position, I have known who really disliked publicity . . . But there was much more to General Giffard than good taste, good manners and unselfishness. He understood the fundamentals of war – that soldiers must be trained before they can fight, fed before they can march, and relieved before they are worn out. He understood that front-line commanders should be spared responsibilities in the rear, and that soundness of organization and administration is worth more than specious short-cuts to victory” Auckinleck went to work from the offset of his new command by improving the welfare, health and feeding of the Indian army to foster improved morale. General Giffard as the new commander of the Eastern Army had Major General Temple Gurdon to oversee some reforms for training and the development of new doctrines. A lot of effort was made to conduct intensive collective training under jungle conditions. The men would train near Nasik, Ranchi, Dehradun and in the Jhansi-Nowgong-lalitpur region. Commanders low to high were given a chance at handling units to improve standards of staff work, practice combined army tactics and build team spirit. Auchinleck also initiated a policy of active patrolling at Assam and Arakan to gather intelligence and maintain touch with the Japanese as to destroy the feeling that they were super soldiers.    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. A lot of chess pieces were moved around the board this week. Bitter lessons had been learnt in multiple theaters of the war and now it came time to reorganize and try new things to ultimately bring the war against Japan to a closer end. 

Last time we spoke about actions in New Guinea and the Japanese counteroffensive in Arakan. The good ol boys down unda were getting ready to launch a major offensive aimed to seize Lae and Salamaua. The Australian and American forces gradually built up enough strength to commence the offensive and high command decided to launch some feints, such as at Mubo to distract the Japanese from their real intentions. Over in Arakan, Irwins disaster was still paying dividends to the Japanese as General Koga launched a massive counterattack. Things were continuing to get worse for the British in Burma, though General Slim was beginning to make improvements. Lastly the British began a propaganda campaign to boost morale in the far east using the mad onion man Wingates recent adventure with the Chindits. Things were looking rough in the CBI theater.  This episode is the Operation Postern, the drive to Salamaua 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.    I just want to say before we begin, this episode will feel a bit like one of those old tv episodes that rehashes what happened during that season. You've heard me say it a few times, but because we do this series in the week by week format sometimes we get into these messy weeks where either not much occurs or too much occurs. Regardless this episode is about multiple ongoing operations that culminate into the drive upon Salamaua and for the sake of coherency I am going to have to summarize a lot of what occurred in the south west pacific area for early 1943.  General Blamey devised a plan to capture Lae, codenamed Operation Postern. General MacArthur approved of the plan, which was quite complex and reflected the growing power of the allied forces in the southwest pacific. Blamey moved to New Guinea to take overall charge, reverting Herring to commander of the 1st corps, responsible for tactical operations. The key to quick success lay in convincing General Adachi, that Salamaua was the primary target for any major offensive. To accomplish this, it was necessary for the Australian and American forces to press upon the Japanese around the Salamaua area, but not Salamaua.  Operation Postern was preceded by three simultaneous operations occurring in the South west pacific area and the south pacific area. Together the three operations helped set up the conditions necessary to allow for an amphibious landing at Lae, by tying up the Japanese ground, naval and airpower in the region alongside creating important feints. The invasion of New Georgia was the first of these operations carried out by Admiral Bull Halsey and the 1st raider battalion. That offensive codenamed operation Toenails took up a lot of the Japanese ground, sea and air forces and would gradually see the allies capturing Munda. The 2nd was operation Chronicle, the seizure of Kiriwina and Woodlark islands located just northeast of Milne Bay. With their seizure, the allies were able to create new forward airfields from which to launch air strikes against Rabaul and provide air cover for multiple other operations in the region. Lastly the third operation was to be an assault on Nassau Bay, which we will talk about a bit later. Now back to the ground forces.   The 8th Area Army at Rabaul sent General Adachi and the 18th army to secure important areas west of Lae and Salamaua and to do so an offensive was launched against Wau. This prompted the Australian high command to send Brigadier Moten and the 17th brigade over to defend Wau in January of 1943. The battle to defend was tough, but the allies were able to prolong the Japanese advance long enough to transport enough troops to save Wau. The Japanese were sent retreating over to the Mubo area, but instead of pursuing the enemy, Moten limited his men's actions to patrols. The New Guinea force wished to pursue the Japanese, but was prevented by logistical difficulties. As the Australians gathered more strength, the Japanese prepared a second attempt to capture Way. This time the Japanese planned to approach Wau from the north, building a road from Markham point into the snake river valley. From there the Japanese advance would hit Wau. The 51st division was earmarked for the task, but the battle of the Bismarck sea had caused devastating losses to the convoy bringing them over in March of 1943.  The battle of the Bismarck sea had pressed upon the Japanese high command the increasing allied airpower, leading them to reformulate their plans. The Japanese began to construct a road to compensate for their inability to transport men and materials to New Guinea via the sea. As the Japanese did this, on the other side, the allies now felt very secure at Wau and were willing to perform some offensives. General Savige's 3rd division was given command of the Wau-Bulolo area. For this task he had the 17th brigade, the 2/3rd, 25th and 2/7th independent companies. It was believed the Japanese had around 5500 men around Lae and Salamaua with around 6-8 thousand at Madang and 9- 11 thousand at Wewak. Savige was ordered not to attack Salamaua directly, so he decided to establish firm bases as far forward as possible to harass the Japanese, basically you can see this as forward offensive patrol actions. Now the Japanese had dug in some defensive positions in places called the Pimple, Green Hill and Observation Hill which were along the main track from Wau to Mubo. On April 24th, the 2/7th independent company were given a new mission; to clear the Japanese from the vicinity of Mubo. Moten approved a plan for the seizure of the Pimple and Green Hill, ordering Major Warfe and his 2/3rd company to harass the Japanese logistical routes in Mubo as a distraction as the 2/7th hit the Pimple. The Japanese had made the Pimple a nightmare for the allied forces. They had taken defensive positions on commanding ground allowing for concealed ambushes. They cleared firing lanes to enable their machine guns to gundown anyone who took a forward approach. By holding the high grounds they also thwarted the allies from utilizing grenades effectively.   On the morning of April 24, after 20 minutes of air attacks by Boston aircraft against Green Hill, Stony Creek, Observation Hill and Kitchen Creek, the offensive kicked off with a two pronged attack. The 2/7th would start from the Vicker's ridge track, moving in two columns: one going along the Jap track towards the Pimple; the other would move north along the Laws track, a very difficult and quite unknown trail to try an encircle the Pimple from the west. When the two columns got within 100 yards of the pimple, they were met with light machine gun fire and snipers. The Australians attempted an all out assault in the late afternoon, but were unable to gain any ground. The next morning 3 Bostons came roaring in to strafe and bomb Green Hill while allied artillery began to bombard the Pimple. Despite the increased firepower the Australians still were unable to dislodge the enemy with their proceeding assaults. It turns out the Australians had greatly underestimate the defensive capabilities of the Pimple position. Reconnaissance had failed to pinpoint the enemy positions prior to the offensive. A major lack of communication between the two columns because they had no telephone lines or wireless communications led to a lack of coordination, neither allied column knew the plight of the other. Runners were used, but they were too slow and extremely vulnerable to Japanese snipers. The offensive was quickly falling apart as the Japanese continued to reinforce their lines. Meanwhile Warfe's men conducted a number of raids and ambushes in the Missim area, Komiatum Hill and Bobdubi Ridge. Warfe then sent a patrol from Namling along the Bench Cut track to ambush the Japanese at the junction between the Francisco river and the Buirali Creek. The ambush was a large success leading to the deaths of 18 Japanese. Warfe tried to perform an identical operation on April 28th, but this time his men were ambushed by the Japanese at Goodview junctions suffering considerable casualties. As a result of the forward patrolling of Warfe's men, the allies had learned the Dobdubi ridge area was defended quite lightly. Having learnt this, Ware decided to order a second platoon to capture the northern part of the ridge on April 27th. By the end of the month Warfe had two platoons spread over the Bobdubi ridge area, with a 3rd platoon held in reserve at Missim.  Over in his headquarters, Moten now realized the offensive against the Pimple was far too costly and he decided the men should simply bypass it. However the commander in the field, General Savige continued to launch attacks. The reason why Savige pressed on was because on April 28th, one of his reconnaissance patrols found a position on Pimple unoccupied and kicked seized it before the Japanese could return to man it. Colonel Guinn on the ground there deduced the Japanese must have been expecting an airstrike and momentarily left their positions. He therefore elected to order another company led by Captain Leslie Tatterson brought forward to assault the pimple. This time however, the allies used deception. Instead of launching an airstrike and artillery against the Pimple they passed over it and bombarded Green Hill. The deception did not work as planned and Saviges men yet again were unable to make any ground against the pimple. By early May the 2/7th battalion had lost 12 men dead with 25 wounded against the pimple with no end in sight. Meanwhile on May 3rd, an offensive was launched against the northern part of the Bobdubi ridge. The Australians were able to  fight their way close to the mouth of the Francisco river, prompting the Japanese to pull up reinforcements in the form of 70 SNLF marines from Salamua. A battle was fought in a place called the South Coconuts on May 5th. The Australians performed encircling maneuvers, managing to surround large pockets of the Japanese whom they smashed with artillery. The Australians were met with 3 major counter attacks but held their ground successfully occupying another place called the Center Coconuts by May 7th. However the Japanese then performed another counterattack, utilizing mortars to great effect, pushing the Australians back. The Japanese further reinforced the area with 60 additional men coming up from Salamaua, but they were ambushed by the Australians at the North Coconuts location suffering 20 casualties.     On May 9th, Captain Tattersons men were struck a lethal blow when they ran into a Japanese booby trap along the Jap Track. The Japanese opened fire upon the Australians on the track and began to encircle them. Colonel Guinn led a small force along the track to break the encirclement while Tatterson's men resisted tenaciously against the Japanese. Tatterson's force had been completely surrounded by the afternoon of May 9th and were in a state of desperation. The Australians utilized booby-traps, fire control and mass grenade attacks to force the Japanese to give them breathing room. The next day the Japanese launched a fierce attack against Tatterson's rear. The Australians could hear Japanese officers screaming orders as their riflemen poured lead upon them. As the Japanese pressed upon them they were receiving 500 additional reinforcements from the 102nd and 115th regiments. Meanwhile the 3rd battalion of the 102nd regiment in Nassau bay received orders “to capture the high area on the right bank of the Buyawim River fork” to be done in coordination with the May 9th attacks. This action would have endangered the allied positions at Lababia camp, but luckily the Japanese commander decided instead to hold a defensive positions at the bank of the Bitoi mouth. This allowed Colonel Guinn to concentrate some of his forces at Lababia camp. By May 11th, a company of 60 men managed to break the Japanese encirclement of Tatterson's men. According to Tatterson, by 7am on the 11th, the Japanese had continued to fire heavily upon his force, but made no further attempts to advance. It seemed to him the Japanese were actually withdrawing and the increased rifle fire and mortars was a cover. Tattersons men had been battered, he himself was wounded. His force received 12 casualties and estimated they had inflicted 100 casualties upon the enemy with possibly 50 deaths. Having saved Tatterson, Guinn reorganized his forward units and began to dig in along the Jap track and Lababia camp. From May 15th onwards the 17th brigade focused on aggressive patrolling in all sectors. Aggressive patrols each day harassed the Japanese around the Pimple and Observation Hill. The Australians set up booby-traps, practically paralyzing the Japanese troop movements outside their trenches. General Okabe received some much needed reinforcements over the course of the week and began to launch some limited attacks against the south, central and north Coconut areas. Okabe's forces were repelled on the 12th and 13th, but things would greatly change on the 14th.  The 14th saw a heavy shelling of the Bobdubi ridge area before Okabe launched a full scale attack that overwhelmed the Australian defenders forcing them to make a fighting withdrawal from the north and central area further down in the south coconut area. General Nakano was displeased with his troops and issued an address of instruction of May 17th, it is as follows  "In the attack at Bobdubi, although a certain group was advancing on a height on the enemy's flank, instead of really carrying out the attack in such a way as to prepare the way for an assault by our main force, they went no further than a vain firing at the enemy with their weapons. The spiritual and physical strength which was worn down in the Wau campaign is at the present time still lower, but I believe it can easily be restored if the officers will take the initiative, set an example and command as leaders of their men." Despite Nakano's criticism, his men would take a lot of ground forcing the Australians further south, dangerously close to Warfe's headquarters. Warfe realized maintaining the position would lead to heavy casualties, so he pulled his force out and took up a position at Namling.  It was quite fortunate as the day after he made this decision, 20 Japanese dive bombers strafed and bombed the village of Bobdubi. This was part of a Japanese heavy air raid that began on May 15th, culminating in over 100 Japanese aircraft hitting multiple Australian positions over the course of a few days. Three heavy raids were performed, but these air attacks focused general far into the Australian rear, leaving the forward positions rather untouched. On may 17th and 18th large formations of Japanese aircraft performed a raid against Wau's airfield. Although the Australians ultimately were forced to withdraw from many forward positions, such as Warfe's units, they managed the ultimate objective of operation Postern, to take Japanese resources away from Mubo and Lae. They had inflicted numerous casualties upon the Japanese including against Major General Okabe who had stepped on a booby trap that put a bullet through his right foot. Okabe had to be evacuated on the night of may 16th as a result, flown back over to Rabaul. Command was handed over to Major General Muroya Chuichi of the 51st division. The battle for Dobdubi was nowhere near done. General Nakano sent 170 soldiers of the 115th regiment on May 17th to attack Hote via the Malolo track. Nakano estimated the Australians had around 50 men defending Hote. The Japanese force ran into 25 Australians at Cissembob along the way and the defenders inflicted 50 casualties upon the Japanese before withdrawing towards Ohibe. One Australian commander at Cissembob had this to say about the engagement  "During this running fight, all men were under very heavy fire, but once again it was brought out what rotten shots the Japanese were. Not one of our boys were hit, and believe me things were hot." The Australians would return to the Hote area on the 22nd to find it completely deserted, so they simply reoccupied their lost positions. That is it for the New Guinea campaign, but other significant events unfolded for the Pacific War during this time period. On April 21st, with a heavy heart President Roosevelt announced to the American people the Japanese had executed several airmen from the famous Doolittle raid. To refresh your memories, 8 of the Doolittle pilots had been captured in Jiangsu province and put on military trial within China and sentenced to death “because of their act against humanity”. They were then transported to Tokyo where the Army ministry reviewed their case. Hideki Tojo initially opposed the death sentences for fearing the Americans would retaliate against Japanese living in America, he would be right about this. Sugiyama and the rest of the Army general staff however insisted on executing all 8 of the pilots who had contributed to the deaths of around 50 civilians and thwart possible future air raids against Japan. The executions would be authorized by an ex post facto military regulation specifically drafted by the army ministry. What is interesting to note, is Emperor Hirohito chose to intervene and commuted the punishment of 5 out of the 8 pilots. Why he allowed the other 3 to die in violation of international law is unknown as the Japanese destroyed nearly all documentation pertaining to prisoners of war by the end of the war. Some historians theorize Hirohito wished to demonstrate his benevolence. Yet again, this is one of those moments that showcases Hirohito was a very active participant, despite the claims made for decades after the war that he was merely a powerless hostage. The 3 men were executed via firing squad at a cemetery outside Shanghai in China on October 14th of 1942. It was not until april of 1943 that the Doolittle Raid operation was fully disclosed to the American public. The US war department said the chief reason for not explaining the full details of the Doolittle raid sooner was the need to bring the Doolittle pilots safely home and to prevent reprisals against their Chinese allies who aided the pilots. In April of 1943 the 5 surviving pilots were moved to Nanjing and in December of 1943 Pilot Robert Meder died of beri beri. He had been starving for months and rejected medical assistance. His death would result in improvements of conditions for the remaining 4 pilots. A truly tragic part of this war and to add to this I would like to read a short piece written by one of the pilots who survived the captivity and became a Christian missionary in Japan after the war.   I Was a Prisoner of Japan   By Jacob DeShazer   I was a prisoner of war for 40 long months, 34 of them in solitary confinement.   When I flew as a member of a bombing squadron on a raid over enemy territory on April 18, 1942, my heart was filled with bitter hatred for the people of that nation. When our plane ran out of petrol and the members of the crew of my plane had to parachute down into enemy-held territory and were captured by the enemy, the bitterness of my heart against my captors seemed more than I could bear.   Taken to prison with the survivors of another of our planes, we were imprisoned and beaten, half-starved, terribly tortured, and denied by solitary confinement even the comfort of association with one another. Three of my buddies were executed by a firing squad about six months after our capture and 14 months later, another one of them died of slow starvation. My hatred for the enemy nearly drove me crazy.   It was soon after the latter's death that I began to ponder the cause of such hatred between members of the human race. I wondered what it was that made one people hate another people and what made me hate them.   My thoughts turned toward what I heard about Christianity changing hatred between human beings into real brotherly love and I was gripped with a strange longing to examine the Christian's Bible to see if I could find the secret.   I begged my captors to get a Bible for me. At last, in the month of May, 1944, a guard brought me the book, but told me I could have it only for three weeks.   I eagerly began to read its pages. Chapter after chapter gripped my heart. In due time I came to the books of the prophets and found that their every writing seemed focused on a divine Redeemer from sin, One who was to be sent from heaven to be born in the form of a human babe. Their writings so fascinated me that I read them again and again until I had earnestly studied them through six times. Then I went on into the New Testament and there read of the birth of Jesus Christ, the One who actually fulfilled the very prophecies of Isaiah, Jeremiah, Micah, and the other Old Testament writers.   My heart rejoiced as I found confirmed in Acts 10:43, "To Him give all the prophets witness, that through His Name, whosoever believeth on Him shall receive remission of sins." After I carefully read this book of the Acts, I continued on into the study of the epistle Paul wrote to the Christians at Rome.   On June 8, 1944 the words in Romans 10:9 stood out boldly before my eyes: "If thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus and shalt believe in thine heart that God hath raised Him from the dead, thou shalt be saved."   That very moment, God gave me grace to confess my sins to Him and He forgave me all my sins and saved me for Jesus' sake. I later found that His Word again promises this so clearly in 1 John 1:9, "If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness."   How my heart rejoiced in my newness of spiritual life, even though my body was suffering so terribly from the physical beatings and lack of food! But suddenly I discovered that God had given me new spiritual eyes and that when I looked at the enemy officers and guards who had starved and beaten my companions and me so cruelly, I found my bitter hatred for them changed to loving pity.   I realized that these people did not know anything about my Savior and that if Christ is not in a heart, it is natural to be cruel. I read in my Bible that while those who crucified Jesus had beaten Him and spit upon Him before He was nailed to the cross, on the cross He tenderly prayed in His moment of excruciating suffering, "Father, forgive them for they know not what they do."   And now, from the depths of my heart, I too prayed for God to forgive my torturers, and I determined by the aid of Christ to do my best to acquaint these people with the message of salvation that they might become as other believing Christians.   With His love controlling my heart, the 13th chapter of 1 Corinthians took on a living meaning: "Love suffereth long, and is kind; love envieth not; love vaunteth not itself, is not puffed up, doth not behave itself unseemly, seeketh not her own, is not easily provoked, thinketh no evil, rejoiceth not in iniquity but rejoiceth in truth; beareth all things, believeth all things. Love never faileth."   A year passed by and during that year the memories of the weeks I had been permitted to spend with my Bible grew sweeter and sweeter day by day. Then, one day as I was sitting in my solitary confinement cell I became very sick. My heart was paining me, even as my fellow prisoner had told me his was paining him just before he died of starvation.   I slid down onto my knees and began to pray. The guards rushed in and began to punish me, but I kept right on praying. Finally they let me alone. God, in that hour, revealed unto me how to endure suffering.   At last freedom came. On August 20, 1945 parachutists dropped onto the prison grounds and released us from our cells. We were flown back to our own country and placed in hospitals where we slowly regained our physical strength.   I have completed my training in a Christian college, God having clearly commanded me: "Go, teach those people who held you prisoner, the way of salvation through the blood of Jesus Christ," and am now back in that land as a missionary, with one single purpose--to make Christ known.   I am sending this testimony to people everywhere, with the earnest prayer that a great host of people may confess Jesus Christ as their personal Savior.   Alongside the unfortunate news for the Americans on May 14th a major tragedy occurred for the Australians. At 4:10am on the 14th, the Australian Hospital Ship Centaur was on a run from Sydney to Port Moresby when she was torpedoed by a Japanese submarine. The torpedo struck her portside oil fuel tank below the waterline, creating a 10 meter hole, igniting fuel and setting the ship ablaze. The ship was luckily not carrying patients, but held her normal crew staff, around 332 personnel on board. Many of those on board were killed instantly from the concussion blast, others from the blazing inferno. Centaur quickly took on water from her breach, rolled to port and sank bow-first, submerging within 3 minutes. Her rapid sinking prevented the deployment of lifeboats, though two would break off as she went down. According to Centaurs second officer Gordon Rippon, she was hit 44km northeast of Point Lookout. Of the 332 people onboard, only 64 would survive, most of the crew had been asleep when she was hit, giving barely a chance to react. It is estimated that 200 people may have been alive inside Centaur as she sank. Several who escaped the ship would die of shrapnel wounds or drown having found nothing to support them in the water. The survivors spent 36 hours in the water clinging to barrels, wreckage and two damaged lifeboats. The survivors drifted around 36 kms in the water going further north east. On the morning of May 15th, the destroyer USS Mugford departed Brisbane, escorted the New Zealand freighter Sussex when she saw some of the shipwrecked survivors. Sailors aboard the Mugford took up positions with rifles fending off sharks from the survivors. It took an hour and 20 minutes to rescue all 64 people. One of the survivors was sister Ellen Savage, the only surviving nurse from 12 aboard the Centaur. In 1944 Ellen Savage was presented the George Medal for providing medical care, boosting morale and displaying courage during the time they waited for rescue. The identity of the attacker was suspected to be a Japanese submarine. At the time of the attack three KD7 Kaidai class submarines were operating off Australians east coast; The I-177 commanded by Hajime Nakagawa, the I-178 commanded by Hidejiro Utsuki and the I-180 commanded by Toshio Kusaka. None of these submarines survived the Pacific War; the I-177 was sunk by the USS Samual S Miles on october 3rd of 1944; the I-178 was sunk by the USS Patterson on august 25th of 1943 and the i-180 was sunk by the USS Gilmore on april 26th of 1944. In December of 1943 following protests, the Japanese government issued an official statement denying any responsibility for the sinking of the Centaur. The sinking of a hospital ship was a war crime, and investigations were conducted between 1944-1948. The conclusion of the investigate suspected the I-177 of Nakagawa to be the most likely culprit, but there was not enough evidence, thus the case was closed on december 14th of 1948. Nakagawa survived the war and until his death in 1991 refused to speak about the suspected attack on the Centaur. 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 Australian and American forces in New Guinea were fighting tooth and nail towards their ultimate goal of Salamaua, trying to deceive the Japanese the whole while. Soon battles for Lae and Salamaua will be fought to rid New Guinea of the Japanese menace. 

Last time we spoke about the battle of Komandorski islands. Admirals Kinkaid and McMorris began a naval blockade of Attu and Kiska putting the IJN in a terrible bind. They could either give up the Aleutians, or they would have to reinforce them, either of which came at huge costs. Admiral Hosogaya had no choice but to try and breach the allied blockade to get the much needed reinforcements to the frozen islands. Hosogaya's fleet was superior in numbers and firepower to that of McMorris when they fatefully met in the frigid northern seas. Yet by a stroke of luck, a single man fired a High Explosive shell during the heat of battle causing Hosogaya to make a terrible blunder. Under the impression allied airpower was about to attack them, Hosogaya backed off, losing the chance to claim a major victory. And today we are going to venture, behind the desk so to speak.  This episode is the Pacific Military Conference: MacArthur vs King 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.  Now before we jump into the real war of the Pacific, General Douglas MacArthur vs Admiral Ernest King, I first want to jump over the good old CBI theater. Interesting to mention I recently did a livestream, gaming with a friend of mine, answering some audience questions from you dear old audience members and others from my Youtube channel and Fall and Rise of China Podcast. One guy asked me “how important was the CBI theater?” and it really got me thinking on the spot. Honestly when Americans talk about the Pacific War, two things immediately come to mind, naval battles and island warfare. China gets overshadowed despite literally being the lionshare of fighting against the Japanese, I mean hell they kept like 30+ divisions in China out of 50 or so. But even more than that you hardly hear about Burma or India, they are always the quote en quote benchwarmers compared to lets say your Guadalcanal's or Iwo Jima's. As I said to the audience member on the livestream, its hard to quantify something, but honestly tossing %'s around you could argue the CBI was a hard 50-60% of the war effort, because it did the most important thing necessary to win a way, it drained Japan of men/resources. So lets jump into it a bit shall we? So the last time we were talking about the disastrous First Arakan Campaign. The British launched their offensive and saw heavy resistance at Rathedaung and Donbaik. General Irwin continuously made blunders. When Wavell made an inspection of the battlefields later on he commented how Irwin's forces had “fought in penny packets”. Basically what he was getting out with this little jab, was unlike conventional battles, take for example the famous battle of Alamein. Instead this offensive consisted of hundreds of chance encounters, dozens of disparate set piece clashes, hand-to-hand conflicts, frontal attacks, ambushes, desperate defenses, bombing raids, all of which had been minutely chronicled, but the details of them were quite the mystery. General Slim when asked described it all ‘as an epic that ran across great stretches of wild country; one day its focal point was a hill named on no map; next a miserable unpronounceable village a hundred miles away. Columns, brigades, divisions, marched and counter-marched, met in bloody clashes and reeled apart, weaving a confused pattern hard to unreal”.  Now the beginning of the first arakan offensive seemed to go well. Despite the logistical nightmares, Lloyd enjoyed the advantages of both air superiority and numerical superiority. But the Japanese built their defenses knowing full well what was coming to hit them. The Japanese made no attempt to hold onto the lines between Maungdaw and Buthidaung, nor resist the British forces at Kyauktaw. Lloyd began sending optimistic reports, such as on Christmas Day when the enemy pulled out of Ratheduang. And so the British continued along the peninsula until they came a few miles north of a point of Donbaik, sitting on the coast of the Bay of Bengal. It was here, General Koga had dug in and waited for his enemy. It was to be here, after showcasing the Japanese superior jungle fighting tactics, their roadblocks and amphibious hooks, that they would unleash a new unsuspecting weapon, that of the bunker. General Slim described it as such “‘For the first time we had come up against the Japanese “bunkers” – from now on to be so familiar to us. This was a small strong-point made usually of heavy logs with four to five feet of earth, and so camouflaged in the jungle that it could not be picked out at even fifty yards without prolonged searching. These bunkers held garrisons varying from five to twenty men, plentifully supplied with medium and light machine guns.' The bunkers were impervious to field guns and medium bombs. They also had crossing fire lanes, thus for one force to attack a bunker they would be fired upon by 2 more. The redoubt at Donbaik was situated alongside a “chaung”, which was a natural anti-tank position, having steep sides up to 9 feet high up on the bunkers. On January 7th of 1943, the forces got their first taste of these defenses and were tossed back with heavy casualties. For days a pattern emerged of men throwing themselves at the bunkers, only to be butchered. It was so bad, both Wavell and Irwin were forced to come visit Llyod on the 10th, just to tell him “you must take Donbaik at all cost”. And so Llyod asked for tanks, and he was given them. But to Slims horror the man only asked for one troop of them, prompting Slim to object stating “the more you use the fewer you lose”. His argument was sound and simple, if you were going to utilize tanks, you tried to do so en masse to overwhelm, otherwise the resources would be vulnerable and most likely lost. His objections were tossed aside, and half a squadron of tanks, merely 8 hit the bunkers. The british attacks were beaten off all he same. Now Koga knew he had to fight off the enemy until at least the end of march to receive some decent reinforcements. Thus he determined to hold out; he needed to perform a counterattack. Meanwhile his counterpart Irwin was determined that overwhelming infantry numbers on narrow fronts could achieve victory. And as one contemporary analysis called it “an idea rich in casualties”. Koga brought up the bulk of his 55th division to Akyab and on March 7th the 213th regiment attacked the Kaladan Valley, driving away the V force. Then the 112th regiment attacked the 123rd and 55th Indian brigades north of Rathedaung who were forced to pull back to Zedidaung. This left the 47 indian brigade trapped at the Hwitze bridgehead and the Japanese carried out wide outflanking maneuvers and infiltration attacks against the British lines. In response Irwin tried to toss another assault against Donbaik, which had just been further reinforced by Koga. On March 18th, the 6th brigade of Brigadier Ronald Cavendish launched a front attack on a very narrow front, despite multiple advice given by other commanders stating he should try to outflank the Japanese along the mountain crest. His force made little progress and suffered heavy casualties for their efforts. Meanwhile the 213th regiment secured the eastern side of the Mayu river and the 112th regiment was preparing to cross it. In early March Irwin was doing something aside from tossing his men into a meatgrinder, he began covering his ass. Sensing defeat was staring him in the face, in his desperation he tried to coopt his hated rival, General Slim into sharing some of his blame to come. He sent Slim to Maungdaw to see Lloyd and report on the situation there. When Slim asked him if this meant he was now in operational control, Irwin said absolutely not, he just wanted Slim's assessment of the situation over there. Irwin did however add in, that Slim might gain operational control in the future, but only when Irwin said so and even in that case, Irwin would be retaining administrative control. Well Slim found the Lloyds men's morale was at an all time low. He advised Lloyd to abandon the idiotic frontal assaults and instead to try and flank the enemy through the jungles. Lloyd argued that was too unfeasible and because of Irwins ordered overruled Slim. Thus Slim returned to Irwin with a useless report. Up until this point Wavell pretty much had no idea what was going on. He continued to urge action from Irwin, so Irwin ordered action from Lloyd and the result was just more disaster. By March 20th Wavell, Irwin and Lloyd all accepted they would have to withdraw the forces to the Maundaw-Buthidaung line. Wavell was livid at his subordinates writing “It seemed to me to show a complete lack of imagination, and was neither one thing nor the other. An attack in real depth with determined soldiers like the 6th Brigade would, I am sure, have accomplished something, though it has cost us casualties. But to use one battalion at a time, and that usually only deploying one company, seems to me to be poor tactics. With the Japanese in a pocket like that, I cannot believe that a plan could not have been made to eat them up; it looked to me like practically ideal for covering machine gun and mortar fire from a flank.” On the night of the 24th, the 112th regiment crossed the Mayu river, marched along narrows paths and jungle to get to the crest of the supposedly impassable Mayu range. The following days say lines of communications to Kyaukpandu severed, the enemy captured the mountain crest near Atet Nanra on the 39th and in response to this Lloyd sent the 47th and 6th brigades to retreat west before they were encircled. This of course was in contradiction to direct ordered he had received to wait until the monsoon season had broke before pulling out. Thus Irwin was forced to countermand Lloyd's order. Wavell was livid over his insubordination blundering of things and sought to toss Lloyd under the bus. Thus Irwin was discreetly told to sack Lloyd, and before doing so he took direct command of the 14th indian division.  Lloyd was replaced by Major General C.E.N Lomax who was promptly ordered to carrying on doing the exact same things Lloyd had done. The 26th Indian division and Lomax were sent to bolster the peninsula, Lomax was going to assume command of all the Arakan forces when he got there, but until then Irwin had to run the show. Koga was not letting up of course and the 112th regiment managed to build a roadblock north of Indian village b April 3rd, successfully cutting the lines of communication of the 47th and 6th brigades. Simultaneously the 143rd regiment burst into the area advancing northwards up the Mayu River valley. The Japanese were soon infiltrating British positions at Indin village and overran the HQ of the 6th brigade capturing its commander, Cavendish in the process. However one of Cavendishes last orders before being grabbed was for the British artillery to open fire on Indian, which they did, taking the Japanese completely by surprise. It caused significant casualties on the Japanese, but also the British, killing Cavendish in the end. With the 47th brigade practically annihilated by Koga's forces, Irwin began to launch himself into a frenzy of blame-shifting. He argued the brigade, not his own tactical ideas, was alone to blame and yet again he tried to drag Slim into the mess. This time he told Slim to hold himself in readiness to take over operational control and to move his HQ to Chittagong. But again Irwin reminded him he would not have administrative control of operations nor operational direction until Irwin said so. Slim met with Irwin in Calcutta on April 5th, having been recalled from leave in the small hours, something Irwin did often to him. That evening he dined with Lloyd at the Bengal Club and heard his side of the story, which the man remarkably told without any bitterness of his shabby treatment. After this Slim had a meeting with Lomax at Chittagong. The 6th brigade narrowly escaped annihilation by retreating along a beach road and the 47th brigade avoided the same by destroying their own heavy equipment, broke out into small parties and ran for their lives cross-country to the beach, thus ceasing to be a fighting force.   Following that initial catastrophe, Lomax and Slim devised a stratagem for catching Koga's men in a box along the Mayu peninsula. The box would involve 6 battalion, 2 on the ridges of the Mayu hills, 2 along the mayu river and 2 on the hills due south of the Maungdaw-Buthidaung road. The idea was that the Japanese would be bound to utilize the tunnels on a disused railway track, dismantled for years. They would be led into a box on their way to the tunnels and then the lid of the box would be shut by a force of brigade strength. It was in many ways an attempt to replicate Hannibals famous victory at the battle of Cannae, every generals dream since ancient times. Lomax and Slim were going to used their tired and greatly demoralized men to carry out a scheme of geometrical perfection. But that is all for this week at the CBI theater.   Now as we all know, during the Pacific War General MacArthur and Admiral King both laid out their own plans for the drive towards Japan. This led to a compromise plan that held 3 phases: Phase 1 was to seize Guadalcanal; phase 2 was to drive up the central solomons and New Guinea; lastly phase 3 was to neutralize Rabaul. Now as much as MacArthur and King hated another, they both understood Rabaul was a crucial lynchpin for both their plans. Working together did not always go so well as you might imagine. Take for example Admiral Halsey who continuously found himself in the middle. At one point in early February  he was forced to go meet MacArthur to request reinforcements, because Operation KE made the allies think a major offensive was on its way. MacArthur argued that his heavy bombers were too few and that he could not promise much support as he believed an impending offensive was about to be launched in his own area. Now Halsey was one of the few men, a Navy man no less, that MacArthur did not hate, so if he was going to jerk him around, you can tell he was being difficult to work with. All of these difficulties emphasized the two services and two area commands needed to better coordinate. And thus a conference was called to hammer out the fine details of how they would all play nice together.   Now meeting all in person was not feasible so the commanders sent their representatives to Washington to present their plans. On March 12th, the Pacific Military conference was held with representatives from each Pacific area command: Lt-General George Kenney, Major General Richard Sutherland and Brigadier-General Stephen Chamberlin represented MacArthurs Southwest command; Lt-General Millard Harmon, Major-General Nathan Twining, Captain Miles Browning and Brigadier-Genreal De Witt Peck represented Halsey's south pacific command; Lt-General Delos Emmons, Rear-admiral Raymond Spruance, Brigader-General Leonard Boyd and Captain Forrest Sherman represented Nimitz Central Pacific command.   Now small side note here, since MacArthur could not make this conference I still wanted to toss my good old 2 cents at the man. While all of this was going on, Richard Sutherland had been sent on another mission to Washington by MacArthur. Richard sutherland was sent to meet Arthur Vandenburg, a senior Republican senator. They met informally at the home of Clare Booth Luce, a strongly anti-Roosevelt republican. She was also the wife of Henry Luce, the man in control of the Time-Life media conglomerate. The purpose of the meeting was to discern how much republican support MacArthur could expect if he ran for President in 1944. Vandenburg was onboard for it and a month later MacArthur would send another aid over bearing a note to the senator stating “I am most grateful to you for your complete attitude of friendship. I can only hope that I can someday reciprocate”.   Vandenburg and his allies  drafted MacArthur for the republican nomination as MacArthur met with his public relations staff, better called his court. One of his court members, Colonel Lloyd Lehrbas was disgusted by open discussions of MacArthur winning the presidency and running the war from washington. Lehrbas was a former newspaper editor who now reviewed press releases in MacArthur's name. MacArthur kept the man on his staff specifically because of his media connections. Vandenburg found strong support for MacArthur amongst the arch-conservatives. The republican party was going to nominate two candidates: Wendell Wilkie and Thomas Dewey, but Vandenburg was trying to sneak MacArthur in as a third. However there was a specific group of republicans who adamantly opposed MacArthur's nomination, veterans who had served under him during the Pacific War and before. Vandenburg tried to get a better picture by sending representatives to canvas the troops in the Pacific theater for their thoughts. The consistent response was overly negative about MacArthur.   In early 1944, a private conversation between MacArthur and Congressman Arthur Miller of Nebraska was leaked to the public. It revealed MacArthurs plot behind the scenes to run for presidency and this forced MacArthur to back pedal heavily. On April 30th of 1944 his staff released a statement from MacArthur stating  “I request that no action be taken that would link my name in any way with the nomination. I do not covet it nor would I accept it”. Yeah, MacArthur would try two more times to run. But anyways now that you know that little tid bit information on my favorite figure lets carry on.   The Pacific Military conference lasted until march 28th, conducted under the supervision of the joint staff planners, headed by Rear-Admiral Charles Cooke and Major-General Albert Wedemeyer. Now MacArthur's team came to the conference with a plan in hand, codenamed Elkon. Elkon was a town in Maryland, a famous destination for quick marriages, and the operation was to be a two-pronged offensive. It called for the seizure of the New Britain, New Ireland and New Guinea area which would be based on phase 2 and 3 of the July 2 directive. That being the two approaches heading for Rabaul: one proceeding along the northern coast of New Guinea and the other through the Solomons. This ambitious plan called for first seizing airfields on the Huon Peninsula and New Georgia, then air bases on New Britain and Bougainville, then the seizure of Kavieng and finally Rabaul would be isolated enough to be invaded.   The first week of the conference became a arm-wrestling match between Sutherland and the other join chiefs, especially General Marshall who squabled over the details of Elkton. Admiral King and the navy were quite hostile to the plan, but rather shocking to some, William Bull Halsey was a large supporter of MacArthurs plan. Halsey's team argued the plan did not overstretch their resources and in fact Halsey was finding working with MacArthur was enormously benefiting the Pacific War effort. Halsye and MacArthur were a lethal combo, but King was hard pressed because the truth was they simply did not have the necessary resources for MacArthur's plan. So as you can imagine compromises were made. Macarthurs initial calculations for the plan to work required 12 and ⅔ divisions and 30 air groups for the southwest pacific area, while 10 divisions and 15 air groups were needed in Hasleys south area.    The joint chiefs responded by asking what the pacific representatives thought they could accomplish in 1943 with the best reinforcements washington could deliver. Sutherland and Halsey's team agreed task two: taking northeastern New Guinea, Madang-Salamua-Huon gulf triangle, Bougainville, New Georgia, Cape Gloucester and New Britain could be taken, but they would probably run out of resources to take Rabaul. The joint chiefs said to forget about Rabaul for the time being and focus on taking the Bismarck Archipelago. MacArthur began writing from Brisbane he thought this idea to be a huge mistake “We are already committed to the campaign in New Guinea….If at the same time we enter upon a convergent attack on the New Georgia group, we have committed our entire strength without assurance of accomplishment of either objective.” This led Hasley to agree to wait for his attack on New Georgia until MacArthur had achieved his objectives of taking the islands of Kiriwina, Woodlark and the Trobriand islands. When proposed back to the joint chiefs, to everyone's amazement King accepted the revised Elkon plan with little compliant. The final directive went out on March 28th, officially canceling the 3 stage drive to rabaul. Instead the objectives for 1943 would be first Woodlark and Kiriwina, then the Madang-Salamaua-Finschhafen triangle and New Britain, and finally the Solomons + southern Bougainville. For the first time in the Pacific war, there was an agreed-to strategy for winning in the southwest pacific. In the mind of MacArthur, who you can imagine was only thinking about the Philippines, he had achieved his plan to direct the war where he wanted it and he had a surprising naval ally in Bull Halsey. The Elkon plan would eventually be called operation Cartwheel   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 Cartwheel was greenlit and it showcased MacArthur could under extremely rare circumstances, make peace with his true enemy during the Pacific War, the United States Navy. Yes MacArthur would be able to direct the war, at least for a bit, to where he wanted it, the Philippines.

Conor and John once again meet in a local park as the Woodlark sings. This week it's 12th to 1st in the Irish League chat. Conor chats to a very special guest. The bomb squad drive past.

Matt and Graeme discuss how this year's poinsettia market is shaping up and Graeme explains why poinsettias have retained their traditional popularity and why he thinks Stars for Europe poinsettias offer good value as the quintessential Christmas plant. He offers insight into the challenges of growing the plant and looks at the prospects for 2021.

Woodlarks are birds of the rolling heathlands and forest glades of southern England, as well as other parts of Europe. Like most kinds of larks, Woodlarks are all but impossible to spot on the ground.

Recorded before the current lockdowns due to Coronavirus, this podcast allows you to take a wild wander across the heathland of Chobham Common in Surrey to hear the fabulous song of the woodlark in all its glory. Welcome in the first songs of spring in the last in the current season of the Countryfile Magazine podcast. We will be back soon to bring a bit of countryside joy to everyone who needs it. Please share See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

Maya Dlugolecki is a graphic designer turned painter after a major heart break. She turned to painting as a way to cope with her loss, which in turn launched her painting career with her signature piece, “ Loving you, out loud” Maja’s work has allowed her to travel the world, painting and working with clients such as square space, Field notes, Serra Cannabis, Woodlark hotel. https://www.instagram.com/maijkah/?hl=en http://maja-dlugolecki.com/ PATREON https://www.patreon.com/planetdosed VENMO @planetdosed INSTAGRAM https://www.instagram.com/planetdosed/ GMAIL planetdoesed@gmail.com

Powerhouse Portland food & beverage/hospitality industry veteran Jen Quist talks about her years of moving around the country during childhood for her father's work (7 homes by the time she was 5!) including a few years in Sydney, Australia before settling in the SF Bay Area, her early desire to attend University of Washington in Seattle (her father's alma mater) and why the Pacific Northwest has always felt like home, how strong her father's example as a businessman and entrepreneur was on her over the years, especially working with him directly back in the Bay Area after college, how years in commercial, and later residential, real estate taught and helped her develop a huge array of skills that she uses today, her move to NYC for culinary school and how the unexpected dream job of catering on site events and parties (3,000 in a year!) for a major department store really got things rolling, her journey to Portland, Ripple NW and why risk-taking, failing, and self-reflection is necessary, the major work she's doing now with Doug Adams at the Woodlark, and much more! Follow along: @jenquisty @bullardpdx @abigailhallpdx hollerhospitality.com Brought to you by the Aimsir Distilling Company, a new distillery focused on great flavors and a warm environment. They love the way spirits taste, but more importantly, they love that they bring people together to make memories, build bridges, and crystalize the moment. Opening in Spring 2020 in NE Portland. Follow @aimsirdistilling

Theatre maker Tom Bailey returns to host this edition of Tweet of the Week, and divulges his influences and inspirations for the making of his performance "Zugunruhe". This omnibus edition contains the following repeated episodes; Woodlark - presented by Joe Harkness Red-billed Quelea - presented by Miranda Krestovnikoff Woodcock - presented by Tony Juniper Spotted Flycatcher - presented by Penny Anderson Wood Warbler - presented by Mark Cocker You can read more about Zugunruhe and Tom's other projects on the website: http://www.mechanimal.co.uk/

How does one translate sounds of the forest to the manuscript page, or even describe a natural sound in language? Do Messiaen’s transcriptions succeed? Guests: Mark Berres, ornithologist, and Steve Dembski, composer. Musical performance: “L’alouette Lulu” (Song of the Woodlark) from the Catalog. Transcript & Citations  

When wildlife sound recordist Gary Moore put on his headphones to capture the sound of a woodlark his recording revealed some unusual behaviour that was snapped up by the Springwatch TV team. Producer: Tom Bonnett Photograph: Ian Redman.

After a bad day at work, Joe Harkness recalls an encounter with a woodlark on Buxton Heath in Norfolk for Tweet of the Day. Tweet of the Day has captivated the Radio 4 audience with its daily 90 seconds of birdsong. But what of the listener to this avian chorus? In this new series of Tweet of the Day, we bring to the airwaves the conversational voices of those who listen to and are inspired by birds. Building on the previous series, a more informal approach to learning alongside a renewed emphasis on encounter with nature and reflection in our relationship with the natural world. Producer Maggie Ayre.

David Salmon of the Slimbridge Wetland Centre on the song of the woodlark. Tweet of the Day has captivated the Radio 4 audience with its daily 90 seconds of birdsong. But what of the listener to this avian chorus? In this new series of Tweet of the Day, we bring to the airwaves the conversational voices of those who listen to and are inspired by birds. Building on the previous series, a more informal approach to learning alongside a renewed emphasis on encounter with nature and reflection in our relationship with the natural world. Producer Miles Warde.

@PaulDeach and James Herd capture the song of a Woodlark and James talks about this rare bird. #RangerRadio