|
|
This book looks at the long and brutal battle for Peleliu, a small but mountainous island attacked by the Americans because its airfield posed a potential threat to the forces about to invade the Philippines. The battle wasn’t expected to last for long, but the Americans had poor intelligence on the geography of the island, and also faced a new Japanese defensive strategy.
Peleliu was significant for the Japanese because it was the first time they attempted a new defensive strategy of attrition. During previous island battles they had attempted to defend the beaches, been forced back by the overwhelming firepower of the US Fleet, fought stubbornly for a time, but once it was clear that the Americans couldn’t be forced off the island had ended their defence with a series of suicidal ‘banzai’ charges. The defence of Saipan had ended after an attack by 4,000 men on 7 July 1944, and Guam was secured a month later, in both cases after battles that lasted about three weeks. On Peleliu they went for a different approach. The beach defences were only meant to slow down the Americans. The main defences were built inland, taking as much advantage as possible of the terrain. Peleliu was dominated by a chaotic area of limestone ridges, filled with natural caves. The Japanese built a complex series of bunkers into the hills and crags, some of which were spread over several floors and had multiple entrances. The interlocking fields of fire from these bunkers meant that if the Americans attacked one, they would come under fire from several sides. The aim was to inflict such heavy losses on the Americans in a series of similar battles that they would start to consider a negotiated peace, or in the most wildly over optimistic version even abandon some of the attacks. As a result the battle for Peleliu lasted for much longer, well over two months
General Rupertus, the commander of the Marines on Peleliu, doesn’t emerge well. It’s understandable that he was caught out by the new Japanese tactics, but he never seems to have accepted that a new approach was needed to deal with them, so kept on insisting on ‘momentum’ and costly frontal assaults when it was clear that a far more methodical and careful approach was needed. He was also obsessed with the idea that the Marines should complete the conquest of the island without help from the US Army. Between them these two attitudes meant that the First and Fifth Marine Regiments had to stay in combat for much longer than they should have done and suffered far more casualties than they should have done. His performance was clearly seen as being poor at the time, and he was recalled to the US, where he became Commandant of the Marine Corps Schools at Quantico, potentially ending any chance of his becoming Commandant of the Marine Corps (although he died four months after taking up the post).
This is one of those books that successfully merges a clear over-view of a campaign with detailed accounts of individual parts of the fighting. We thus get good material on the reason for the invasion, the pre-invasion doubts amongst some senior American commanders, the new Japanese defensive plans and how that was helped by the unusual geography of the island, but at the same time we follow individual Marine companies into battle amongst the shattered ridges of Peleliu. The text is supported by good material from both sides – including diaries recovered from the Japanese positions and messages sent to and from the senior commanders. As a result we both get a clear account of the fighting and an atmospheric account of the brutal fighting.
Chapters
1 – The ‘Old Breed’
2 – Second Thoughts, a Brash Prediction
3 – The Japanese
4 – The Bloody Beaches
5 – The Point, The Airfield
6 – Into the Ridges
7 – Combat on Anguar and Peleliu
8 – The Destruction of the First Marines
9 – Isolating the Pocket
10 – The Fifth Marines Take Over
11 – The Army’s Turn
12 – The End
13 – Aftermath
Author: Joseph Wheelan
Edition: Hardcover
Pages: 336
Publisher: Osprey
Year: 2022