The Battles for the Pacific
Japanese Advances
• Within Six months after Pearl Harbor,
Japan dwarfed the German Empire by
taking the following:
Hong Kong
French Indochina
Malaya
Burma
Thailand
Half of China
Formosa
Dutch East Indies
Guam
Wake
Solomon Islands
2 Aleutian Islands
Japan takes the Philippines
• December 1941 to May 1942
• Gen. MacArthur held out for 4 months w/ 31,000 US
troops and 110,000 under-trained and ill-equipped
Filipino troops as 200,000 Japanese troops invaded
• MacArthur abandoned, he and officers escaped to
Australia, as he left he stated:
“I shall return.”
• American and Philippine troops suffered 14,000 KIA,
48,000 wounded, and approx. 80,000 endured cruel
imprisonment or execution at the hands of the Japanese
Battle of Coral Sea
• May 1942
• America/Australia intercepted info that Japan was going
to leave from New Guinea to invade Australia
• Significance:
– First battle where ships never saw each other, airplanes played
large role
– First Halt of Japanese since Pearl Harbor
• Allies lost more ships, but Japan ran out of fuel to
continue to Australia
• 543 American causalities
Battle of Midway
• June 1942
• US intercepted messages of Japanese
naval force (largest assembled in history)
heading toward Midway and were to then
continue to finish off Pearl Harbor
• US Outnumbered 4 to 1 in ships and
planes, but the US commander prepared a
surprise reception
Battle of Midway
• By the end, Japan lost:
– 4 “irreplaceable” aircraft carriers
– A cruiser
– 322 Planes
• American Casualties – 307
• Japanese Casualties
– Several thousand sailors
– 200-300 pilots
US Strategy
• Can go hundreds of miles without seeing land
• Japanese dug in on hundreds of islands scattered
over thousands of miles of ocean
• Too costly to storm each one
• Bypass Japanese strongholds
• Seize well fortified Islands, build airfields, cut off
enemy supply lines
Battle of Guadalcanal
• August 1942
• Significance:
– First US land offensive
– First Japanese defeat on land
• 6 months until Japanese abandoned island,
known as “Island of Death.”
• US had 6,000 casualties, 1600 dead
Battle of Guam
• July 1944 (Mariana Islands – includes Saipan
and Tinian)
• Guam was formerly a US possession until Japan
took it in 1941
• Strategic Importance
– great for Airbases
– Almost can fly from Guam to Tokyo
• Approx. 3,000 Americans killed; 7,122 wounded
Second Battle of the Philippines –
Battle for Leyte Gulf
• October 1944
• Significance:
– MacArthur wanted revenge for 1st battle “People of the
Philippines, I have returned.
– First testing of the Kamikaze (suicide plane), 424 Kamikaze
planes sank 16 ships, damaged 80
• Disaster for Japanese – huge loss of naval force (3
ships, 13 cruisers, 400 planes)
• Arguments over necessity
– cut off Japan from western possessions
– Did not really use it for US military purposes
– cost well over 2,000 American lives
Battle of Iwo Jima
• Iwo Jima was 8 square miles of volcanic rock, 660 miles
from Tokyo
• Purpose: Serve as a refueling stop for the B-29 and B-24s
that would soon be flying out of the fields in the Marianas
to bomb the Japanese mainland.
• Nov. 1944 aerial bombardment of Iwo Jima began, lasted
74 days.
•
The 21,000 Japanese defenders survived this b/c of
underground fortresses connected by 16 miles of tunnels
stocked with food, water, and ammunition. The surface
was covered with concrete pillboxes and blockhouses
housing some 800 gun positions.
Battle of Iwo Jima
• Feb. 19, 1945 the attack began as the landing
ships dropped the Marines on the loose volcanic
sand, which was nearly impossible to get
traction in.
• The island was deemed secure on March 25, 25
days longer than planners had counted on.
• 6821 Americans and 19,000 Japanese died at
Iwo Jima.
Battle of Okinawa
• April 1, 1945 – Battle began
• Okinawa had approx. 120,000 defenders.
• Significance: Really the last major battle in the
Pacific.
• Importance to Strategy: 330 miles from Tokyo,
and was big enough to support 800 heavy
bombers.
• Organized resistance gradually fell apart by
June 22, 1945.
Battle of Okinawa:
Victory at a Price
• Japanese Losses:
– 107,000 killed
– 7,400 taken prisoner
– Possible loss of another 20,000 dead as a result of US
tactics whereby Japanese troops were incinerated where
they fought.
– 16 ships sunk and over 4,000 aircraft were lost.
• Americans Losses:
–
–
–
–
7,373 men killed, 32,056 wounded on land.
5,000 killed, 4,600 wounded at sea.
Lost 36 ships, 368 ships were also damaged.
763 aircraft were destroyed.
The Total Numbers
• 7,000+ — Americans died on Iwo Jima
• 12,000+ — Americans died on Okinawa
• 51,983 — Americans died in the Pacific
• 1,140,429 — members of the Japanese military
died during WWII
• 700,000 to 10,000,000 (variously estimated) —
Japanese civilians died in WWII