The Project Gutenberg eBook of Breaching the Marianas: The Battle for Saipan, by John C. Chapin.

It was to be a brutal day. At first light on 15 June 1944, the Navy fire support ships of the task force lying off Saipan Island increased their previous days’ preparatory fires involving all calibers of weapons. At 0542, Vice Admiral Richmond Kelly Turner ordered, “Land the landing force.” Around 0700, the landing ships, tank (LSTs) moved to within approximately 1,250 yards behind the line of departure. Troops in the LSTs began debarking from them in landing vehicles, tracked (LVTs). Control vessels containing Navy and Marine personnel with their radio gear took their positions displaying flags indicating which beach approaches they controlled.

Admiral Turner delayed H-hour from 0830 to 0840 to give the “boat waves” additional time to get into position. Then the first wave headed full speed toward the beaches. The Japanese waited patiently, ready to make the assault units pay a heavy price.

The first assault wave contained armored amphibian tractors (LVT[A]s) with their 75mm guns firing rapidly. They were accompanied by light gunboats firing 4.5-inch rockets, 20mm guns, and 40mm guns. The LVTs could negotiate the reef, but the rest could not and were forced to turn back until a passageway through the reef could be discovered.

Earlier, at 0600, further north, a feint landing was conducted off Tanapag harbor by part of the 2d Marines in conjunction with the 1st Battalion, 29th Marines, and the 24th Marines. The Japanese were not really fooled and did not rush reinforcements to that area, but it did tie up at least one enemy regiment.

When the LVT(A)s and troop-carrying LVTs reached the reef, it seemed to explode. In every direction and in the water beyond on the way to the beaches, great geysers of water rose with artillery and mortar shells exploding. Small-arms fire, rifles, and machine guns joined the mounting crescendo. The LVTs ground ashore.

Confusion on the beaches, particularly in the 2d Marine Division area, was compounded by the strength of a northerly current flow which caused the assault battalions of the 6th and 8th Marines to land about 400 yards too far north. This caused a gap to widen between the 2d and 4th Marine Divisions. As Colonel Robert E. Hogaboom, the operations officer of the Expeditionary Troops commented: “The opposition consisted primarily of artillery and mortar fire from weapons placed in well-deployed positions and previously registered to cover the beach areas, as well as fire from small arms, automatic weapons, and anti-boat guns sited to cover the approaches to and the immediate landing beaches.”

As a result, five of the 2d Marine Division assault unit commanders were soon wounded in the two battalions of the 6th Marines (on the far left), and in the two battalions of the 8th Marines. With Afetan Point in the middle spitting deadly enfilade fire to the left and to the right, the next units across the gap were two battalions of the 23d Marines and, finally, on the far right, two battalions of the 25th Marines.

Although the original plan had been for the assault troops to ride their LVTs all the way to the O-1 (first objective) line, the deluge of Japanese fire and natural obstacles prevented this. A few units in the center of the 4th Division made it, but fierce enemy resistance pinned down the right and left flanks. The two divisions were unable to make direct contact.

A first lieutenant in the 3d Battalion, 24th Marines, John C. Chapin, later remembered vividly the extraordinary scene on the beach when he came ashore on D-Day:

When his company moved inland a short distance, it quickly experienced the frightening precision of the pre-registered Japanese artillery fire:

That night the lieutenant and his runner shared a shallow foxhole and split the watches between them. Death came close:

All the assault regiments were taking casualties from the constant shelling that was zeroed in by spotters on the high ground inland. Supplies and reinforcing units piled up in confusion on the landing beaches. Snipers were everywhere. Supporting waves experienced the same deadly enemy fire on their way to the beach. Some LVTs lost their direction, some received direct hits, and others were flipped on their sides by waves or enemy fire spilling their equipment and personnel onto the reef. Casualties in both divisions mounted rapidly.4 Evacuating them to the ships was extremely dangerous and difficult. Medical aid stations set up ashore were under sporadic enemy fire.

As the Marine artillery also landed in the late afternoon of D-Day and began firing in support of the infantry, it received deadly accurate counter-battery fire from the Japanese. The commander of the 4th Division, Major General Harry Schmidt, came ashore at 1930 and later recalled, “Needless to say, the command post during that time did not function very well. It was the hottest spot I was in during the war....”

Major James A. Donovan, executive officer of the 1st Battalion, 6th Marines, endured a mortar barrage that had uncanny timing and precision:

The night of D-Day saw continuous Japanese probing of the Marine positions, fire from by-passed enemy soldiers, and an enemy attack in the 4th Division zone screened by a front of civilians. The main counterattack, however, fell on the 6th Marines on the far left of the Marine lines. About 2,000 Japanese started moving south from Garapan, and by 2200 they were ready to attack. Led by tanks the charge was met by a wall of fire from .30-caliber machine guns, 37mm antitank guns, and M-1 rifles. It was too much and they fell back in disarray. In addition to 700 enemy dead, they left one tank. The body of the bugler who blew the charge was slumped over the open hatch. A bullet had gone straight up his bugle!

One of the crucial assets for the Marine defense that night (and on many subsequent nights) was the illumination provided by star shells fired from Navy ships. Japanese records recovered later from their Thirty-first Army message file revealed, “... as soon as the night attack units go forward, the enemy points out targets by using the large star shells which practically turn night into day. Thus the maneuvering of units is extremely difficult.”

As the weary Marines finally tried to get some sleep, all along their irregular line of foxholes, two things were very clear to them: they had forced a precarious beachhead in the teeth of bitter enemy fire, and a long, tough battle obviously lay ahead.

While the thoughts of the riflemen focused on survival and the immediate ground in front of them, the senior command echelons saw the initial success of the landings as a culmination of months of planning, training, and organization for a strategic strike on a crucial Japanese stronghold. The opportunity for this sprang from earlier Central Pacific victories.

The Marine conquest of Tarawa in the Gilbert Islands in November 1943, followed by the joint Marine-Army capture of Kwajalein and Eniwetok atolls in the Marshall Islands in January-February 1944, had broken the outer ring of Japanese defenses and set the stage for succeeding operations.

These earlier victories had moved up the entire American operational timetable for the Central Pacific by three valuable months. After discussions of various alternatives (such as an attack on the vast Japanese base at Truk), the Joint Chiefs of Staff had settled on the next objective: the Mariana Islands. There were to be three principal targets: Saipan, Tinian, and Guam. It was a daring decision, for Saipan was 1,344 miles from the Marshalls and 3,226 miles from Hawaii, but only 1,250 miles from Japan. Furthermore, the islands were linchpins in the revised inner defense line which the6 Japanese felt they absolutely had to hold after their previous losses in the Central and Southwest Pacific.

Saipan represented a whole new kind of prickly problem for an American assault. Instead of a small, flat coral islet in an atoll, it was a large island target of some 72 square miles, with terrain varying from flat cane fields to swamps to precipitous cliffs to the commanding 1,554-foot-high Mount Tapotchau. Moreover, the Japanese considered it “their own territory,” in spite of the fact that it was legally only a mandate provided by the terms of the Versailles Treaty following World War I. The fact that Japan held the islands led it to install a policy of exclusion of all outsiders and the start of military construction, forbidden by the treaty, as early as 1934.

Attacking a formidable objective such as Saipan called for complex planning and much greater force than had previously been needed in the Central Pacific. An elaborate organization was therefore assembled. Admiral Raymond A. Spruance was in overall command of the force detailed to invade the Marianas as well as the naval units needed to protect them. Admiral Turner was in command over the amphibious task force, while Marine Lieutenant General Holland M. Smith was to direct the landing forces on Saipan and then on the neighboring island of Tinian. (A similar command structure, but with different combat units, was set up for the attack on Guam to the south.)

The operation plan for Saipan, code-named Forager, called for an assault on the western side of the island, with the 2d Marine Division on the left and the 4th Marine Division on the right. The Army’s 27th Infantry Division was in reserve, ready to be fed into the battle if needed. While each of the two Marine divisions had previously fought as a complete unit, the 27th had experienced only two minor landings (at Makin and Eniwetok islets) for some of its regiments and battalions.

The intensive training for these three divisions took place in the Hawaiian Islands with Major General Harry Schmidt’s 4th Marine Division on Maui, Major General Thomas E. Watson’s 2d Marine Division on the “Big Island” of Hawaii, and Army Major General Ralph C. Smith’s 27th Infantry Division on Oahu. As Lieutenant Chapin described it:

The month of May 1944 brought final maneuvers and practice landings for all three divisions. The operation plan looked neatly and efficiently organized on paper. In practice it looked different to that lieutenant:

The vast attack force now gathered at Pearl Harbor. Although there were unfortunate accidents to some of the landing craft, over 800 ships set out in the naval component, some for direct fire support of the troops, some for transport, and some (the fast carrier task force) to make advance air strikes and then to deal with the attack which the landing probably would incite from the Japanese Navy. Holland Smith’s V Amphibious Corps, totalling 71,034 Marine and Army troops, sailed with some slow elements starting on 25 May. The specialized craft for the ground forces ran the gamut of acronym varieties. After staging through the Marshalls, the armada headed for the target: Saipan.

At sea the troops got their final briefings: maps of the island (based on recent American aerial and submarine photographs of a hitherto “secret island”), estimates of 15,000 enemy troops (which turned out in the end to be 30,000 under the command of Lieutenant General Yoshitsugu Saito and Vice Admiral Chiuchi Nagumo), and detailed attack plans for two Marine divisions.

8 Simultaneously, the American fast carriers’ planes began, on 11 June, their softening-up bombing, combined with attacks on Japanese land-based air. Two days later, the main enemy fleet headed for the Marianas for a decisive battle. Then, on 14 June, the “old battleships” of the U.S. Navy, reborn from the Pearl Harbor disaster, moved in close to Saipan to pound the Japanese defenses with their heavy guns. That night underwater demolition teams made their dangerous swim in close to the assault beaches to check on reefs, channels, mines, and beach defenses. All was now in readiness for the landings.

The bloody business of D-Day was, as the troops well realized, only a beginning, for the long, gruelling fight which began the next morning.

D+1–D+2, 16–17 June

The next two days saw the Marine attack resumed all along the irregular front. The 2d Division, after reorganizing, pushed its 6th Marines northeast toward Mount Tipo Pali, its 2d Marines north towards Garapan, and its 8th Marines east into the swamps around Lake Susupe. Direct contact with the 4th Division was finally established.

Close combat was the norm. There were no exceptions for battalion commanders. Lieutenant Colonel Justice M. Chambers, commanding the 3d Battalion, 25th Marines in the 4th Division later described two of his experiences on D+1:

On the night of D+1, the Japanese again launched a major attack on the 6th Marines, this time with 44 tanks. Major Donovan later described the wild clash: “The battle evolved itself into a madhouse of noise, tracers, and flashing lights. As tanks were hit and set afire, they silhouetted other tanks coming out of the flickering shadows to the front or already on top of the squads.” The Marines poured in their fire, now with 2.36-inch rocket launchers, grenade launchers, self-propelled 75mm guns, and their own artillery and tanks adding to the din. When dawn broke, it was over and the shattered hulks of 24 Japanese tanks lay there smoking.

In the 4th Division zone of action, the left regiment, the 23d, also had a difficult time in the Susupe swamp. The 24th and 25th9 drove inland to the east towards the key objective of Aslito airfield. With a danger looming of overextended lines, Lieutenant General Holland Smith pulled the 165th Infantry out of his reserve (the Army’s 27th Infantry Division) and sent it ashore on D+2 to reinforce the 4th Marine Division. This same day, Major General Ralph Smith came ashore to take command of the additional Army units of his 27th Division as they landed.

With the 165th Infantry on its right flank and the 24th Marines to its left, the 25th Marines was poised on the north edge of Aslito airfield late on D+2. Its patrols found the strip was abandoned, but the 165th, assigned to capture it, decided to wait until the next day.

The division had finally approached the O-1 line, except on the left flank where contact with the 2d Division was again broken, this time near Mount Fina Susu.

This same day 17 June, saw a crucial command decision by Admiral Spruance. With the powerful10 main Japanese fleet now approaching Saipan, he ordered his fast carriers to meet the enemy ships, and that night withdrew his transports and supply ships from their offshore support positions to a safe distance from the Japanese threat.

D+3, 18 June

When the infantrymen ashore woke the next morning, they looked out in amazement at the empty ocean and a wave of uneasy questions raced through their minds: “Where in hell are our ships? What about food and ammunition we’ve got to have? Will we get back the daytime naval supporting gunfire and also the star shell illumination?” The men in frontline combat had no way of knowing that over 33,000 tons of cargo had already been unloaded when the ships withdrew.

Both Marine divisions went on the attack, while the 105th Infantry joined the 165th on the far right flank, enabling Ralph Smith to put his 27th Division into motion to occupy Aslito airfield and attack along the southern coast.

That same morning, 18 June, the 4th Marine Division attack objective was the seizure of the O-3 line. This would mean reaching the east coast of Saipan and splitting in two the Japanese forces. First, however, the 23d Marines, reinforced by a battalion of the 24th Marines, had to seize the portion of the O-2 line in its zone. This was to be the division’s line of departure. The entire division, with three infantry regiments abreast, jumped off at 1040. At 1340 the 25th Marines had reached O-3. The 24th Marines had tank-led Japanese counterattacks on both flanks but was able to reach O-3 before dark.

The 23d Marines, however, was stopped by intense enemy mortar and machine gun fire coming from southeast of Lake Susupe right on the boundary line between the two Marine divisions, making it unclear which division had responsibility for wiping out these enemy positions. At the same time, it was impossible to fire artillery on them for fear of hitting friendly troops. As a result, the 23d Marines suffered heavy casualties. So, by the end of the day, although all of the 4th Marine Division’s regiments were in contact, a gap still existed between the two Marine divisions.

The bizarre becomes commonplace in combat. For instance, one of the 23d Marines’ 75mm half-tracks fired into a Japanese cave that day, and a dense cloud of noxious fumes came pouring out. A gas alarm was sounded. This meant serious trouble, for all the riflemen had long since jettisoned their burdensome gas masks. Relief flooded through the men as it was established that the fumes were not poisonous and came from picric acid the Japanese had stored in the cave.

Over in the 2d Division’s zone, the 8th Marines saw some bitter fighting over Hill 240. A heavily defended coconut grove required saturation fire from the artillery of the11 10th Marines before the riflemen could smash their way in and clean out the grove.

The price for the two Marine divisions had been heavy. By the night of D+3 they had been bled by more than 5,000 casualties.

[Sidebar (page 10):]

Ground Command List

The Marine and Army units assigned to the Saipan operation were under these senior commanders:

V Amphibious Corps—LtGen Holland M. Smith
2d Marine Division—MajGen Thomas E. Watson
2d Marines—Col Walter J. Stuart
6th Marines—Col James P. Riseley
8th Marines—Col Clarence R. Wallace
10th Marines—Col Raphael Griffin
18th Marines—LtCol Russell Lloyd
4th Marine Division—MajGen Harry Schmidt
14th Marines—Col Louis G. DeHaven
20th Marines—LtCol Nelson K. Brown
23d Marines—Col Louis R. Jones
24th Marines—Col Franklin A. Hart
25th Marines—Col Merton J. Batchelder
27th Infantry Division—MajGen Ralph C. Smith, USA
105th Infantry—Col Leonard A. Bishop, USA
106th Infantry—Col Russell G. Ayres, USA
165th Infantry—Col Gerard W. Kelley, USA
Division Artillery—BGen Redmond F. Kernan, Jr., USA
XXIV Corps Artillery—BGen Arthur M. Harper, USA
Saipan Garrison Forces—MajGen George W. Griner, USA

D+4–D+7, 19–22 June

The most critical event of 19 June (and perhaps the most important of the whole Saipan campaign) took place at sea, well out of sight of the infantrymen ashore. The opposing carrier task forces clashed in a gigantic air battle. When it was over that night, the Japanese had suffered the catastrophic loss of 330 out of 430 planes they had launched. Exultant U.S. Navy fliers labelled it “The Great Marianas Turkey Shoot.” With the help of American submarines and additional carrier plane attacks the next day, the Japanese attempt to relieve Saipan by a decisive naval victory was smashed. As an official account summarized the impact ashore, “the eventual doom of the enemy garrison was assured.” And the American supply ships were able to return offshore to unload their vital cargoes.

During the four-day span of D+4 to D+7, the 105th Infantry moved slowly along the south coast and then joined the 165th Infantry in sealing off the die-hard Japanese survivors in Nafutan Point, in the southeastern corner of the island. Once the enemy was penned in, the 105th was assigned to eliminate him. The rest of the 27th Division, now including the 106th Infantry, was ordered north to be the Corps reserve.

This period, 19–22 June, marked a total shift in direction for the American troops. Pivoting on the 2d Marines on the far left flank along the western shore, the other Marine regiments swung around from their drive which had reached the east coast to face north, with their right flank on Magicienne Bay.

On 20 June, the 4th Division confronted a key objective. Lieutenant Chapin had a ringside seat:

Over in the area of the 2d Division, the 8th Marines wheeled from facing east to attack northward into the foot hills leading to Mount Tapotchau.

The Marine divisions were now facing two major problems. First, their drive north was confronted by General Saito’s main line of defense, running west to east across the island. Secondly, the terrain into which the attack had to go was a nightmare of ravines, caves, hills, valleys, and cliffs—all fortified and defended to the death by the Japanese.

June 21 brought a respite for the front line troops: “D+6 was enjoyed by all—for a change! We rested on our positions; caught up on sorely needed sleep; got some water (which had been conspicuous by its absence); and even had a good hot meal. For we got our first 10-in-1 rations. Did they ever taste good to our hungry palates, surfeited as they were with K rations!”

Simultaneously, intensive preparations were made for a coordinated attack by both Marine divisions the next morning. A total of 18 artillery battalions were massed for supporting fire. Combat efficiency was officially rated as “very satisfactory,” in spite of a sobering total of 6,165 casualties.

The following day saw the Marines attack all along the line. The 6th Marines overran parts of Mount Tipo Pali, while the 8th Marines worked its painful way into the maze of ridges and gullies that formed the foothills of Mount Tapotchau. On the right, the 24th Marines was forced into the messy business of blasting caves honeycombed along Magicienne Bay. In one of the mortar platoons, a weird encounter took place, as described at the time to this author by the participant, First Lieutenant Joseph J. Cushing:

On the left of the 4th Division, the 25th Marines made a major advance of 2,400 yards. The forward lines were now reaching an area where the Kagman Peninsula jutted out to the east. This resulted in a substantially increased frontage that the two Marine divisions could not properly cover. To deal with this, Holland Smith decided to commit his reserve, the 27th Infantry Division, to the center of the line, leaving just one battalion of the 105th Infantry way back in the rear13 to continue its long drawn-out attempt to eliminate the Japanese pocket on by-passed Nafutan Point.

This day (D+7) was also marked by the arrival of P-47 Thunderbolts of the 19th Fighter Squadron, U.S. Army Air Forces, which landed at Aslito Field. They had been launched from Navy escort carriers. When landed, they were fitted with launching racks for rockets by ground crews who had come in earlier. Later that day, eight planes took off on their first support mission of the Saipan campaign. (Only two Marine observation squadrons, VMO-2 and VMO-4, were involved in the battle for Saipan, but they provided invaluable artillery spotting for the two Marine divisions.)

While these developments were taking place in the upper echelons, down in the rock-bottom basic life of infantry platoons, the days of relentless combat pressure were exemplified by their impact on the constant duties and high stress levels on a platoon commander:

D+8–D+15, 23–30 June

Complications of a serious nature arose in the execution of the battle plan for 23 June. The battalion of the 105th Infantry still had not cleaned out Nafutan Point; there were semantic and communications differences between the two Smith generals as to orders about who would do what and when; the 106th and 165th Infantry got all tangled up in themselves during a march to take over the center portion of the American lines and were too late to jump off in the attack, thus delaying the attacks of the Marines. When the Army regiments did move out, they found that the rugged terrain in their sector and the determined enemy in camouflaged weapons positions in caves of the steep slope leading up to Mount Tapotchau made forward progress slow and difficult. The 27th Infantry Division was stalled.

The corps commander, Holland Smith, was very displeased with this situation. It had started with the difficulties experienced in getting14 that division ashore; it was exacerbated by the time it was taking to secure Nafutan Point and the mix-up in orders there; now the advancing Marine divisions were getting infiltration and enfilading fire on their flanks because of the 27th’s lack of progress.

Accordingly, Lieutenant General Holland Smith met that afternoon with Major General Sanderford Jarman, USA, who was slated to be the island garrison commander, and asked him to press Major General Ralph Smith for much more aggressive action by the 27th. Jarman later stated:

This blunt meeting was followed the next morning (D+9) by an even blunter message from Holland Smith to Ralph Smith:

These objectives were given dramatic names by the Army regiments: Hell’s Pocket, Death Valley, and Purple Heart Ridge. It was certainly true that the terrain was perfect for the dug-in Japanese defenders: visibility from the slopes of Mount Tapotchau and from the ridge gave them fields of fire to rake any attack up the valley. Holland Smith didn’t fully recognize the severity of the opposition, and, by the end of the day, the 106th Infantry had gained little, while the 165th Infantry had been “thrown back onto the original line of departure.”

Meanwhile, the 2d Marine Division on the left was painfully slugging its way forward in the tortuous environs around Mount Tapotchau. The 4th Marine Division15 (on the right) pivoted east, driving fast into the Kagman Peninsula. There the ground was level, a plus, but covered with cane fields, a big minus, as the rifle companies well knew.

Along with the death toll in the cane fields came the physical demands placed on the troops by the hot tropical climate. Lieutenant Chapin noted small, human issues that loomed large in the minds of the assault troops:

While these local events transpired on the front lines, a major upheaval was taking place in the rear. Seeing that the corps line would be bent back some 1,500 yards in the zone of the 27th Infantry Division, Holland Smith had16 had enough. He went to see Admirals Spruance and Turner to obtain permission to relieve Ralph Smith of command of his division.

After reviewing the Marine general’s deeply felt criticism of the 27th Infantry Division’s “defective performance,” the admirals agreed to the requested change, and Ralph Smith was superseded by Major General Jarman on 24 June.

A furor arose, with bitter interservice recriminations, and the flames were fanned by lurid press reports. Holland Smith summarized his feelings three days after the relief. According to a unit history, The 27th Infantry Division in World War II, he stated, “The 27th Division won’t fight, and Ralph Smith will not make them fight.” Army generals were furious, and in Hawaii, Lieutenant General Robert Richardson, commander of the U.S. Army in the Pacific (USARPAC) convened an Army board of inquiry over the matter. The issue reached to the highest military levels in Washington.

While the Army’s Deputy Chief of Staff, Lieutenant General Joseph T. McNarney, reviewed the matter, he found some faults with Holland Smith, but then went on to say that Ralph Smith failed to exact the performance expected from a well-trained division, as evidenced by poor leadership on the part of some regimental and battalion commanders, undue hesitancy to bypass snipers “with a tendency to alibi because of lack of reserves to mop up,” poor march discipline, and lack of reconnaissance.

The Army’s official summary, United States Army in World War II, The War in the Pacific, Campaign in the Marianas (published 15 years after the operations) attributed some errors to Holland Smith’s handling of a real problem, and it also gave full recognition to the difficult terrain and bitter resistance that the Army regiments faced. The history stated that:

17 Back where the conflict was with the Japanese, the 4th Marine Division had overrun most of the Kagman Peninsula by the night of D+10. The shoreline cliffs provoked sobering thoughts in a young officer in the 24th Marines:

This unfinished state of the Japanese defenses was, in fact, a critical factor in the final American victory on Saipan. The blockading success of far-ranging submarines of the U.S. Navy had drastically reduced the supplies of cement and other construction materials destined for elaborate Saipan defenses, as well as the number of troop ships carrying Japanese reinforcements to the island. Then the quick success of the Marshalls campaign had speeded up the Marianas thrust by three months. This was decisive, for “one prisoner of war later said that, had the American assault come three months later, the island would have been impregnable.”

The 4th Marine Division encountered more than cane fields in the Kagman Peninsula—the cliffs near the ocean were studded with caves. A 20-year-old private first class in Company E, 2d Battalion, 23d Marines, Robert F. Graf, described the Marine system for dealing with these and the others that were found all through the bitter campaign:

Graf went on to picture the use of flame-throwing tanks, the ultimate weapon for dealing with the enemy deep in his hideouts. He continued:

These attacks on caves were a tricky business, because of orders not to kill any civilians who were also inside many of them, hiding from the fighting. Graf recounted his experiences further:

As the sick, scared, and often starving civilians would emerge from their hideouts, there were many pitiful scenes:

21 One of the captured persons impressed Graf so very much that the memory was vivid many years later. A Japanese woman, obviously an aristocrat, probably a wife or mistress of a high-ranking officer, “was captured. She was dressed in traditional Japanese clothing: a brilliant kimono, a broad sash around the waist, hair combed, lacquered and spotlessly clean. Although,” as Graf remarked, “she knew not what her fate would be in the hands of us, the barbarians, she stood there straight, proud, and seemingly unafraid. To me, she seemed like a queen.”

Over on the west side of Saipan, the 2d Marine Division had a memorable day on 25 June. Ever since the landing, the towering peak of Mount Tapotchau had swarmed with Japanese artillery spotters looking straight down on every Marine move and then calling in precisely accurate fire on the American troops. Now, however, in a series of brilliant tactical maneuvers, with a battalion of the 8th Marines clawing up the eastern slope, a battalion of the 29th Marines (then attached to the 8th Marines) was able to infiltrate around the right flank in single file behind a screen of smoke and gain the dominating peak without the loss of a single man.

Meanwhile, back at Nafutan Point, the battalion of the 105th Infantry assigned to clean out the by-passed Japanese pockets had had continuous problems. The official Army account commented, “The attack of the infantry companies was frequently uncoordinated; units repeatedly withdrew from advanced positions to their previous night’s bivouacs; they repeatedly yielded ground they had gained.”

The stalemate came to a climax on the night of D+11. Approximately 500 of the trapped Japanese, all the able-bodied men who remained, passed “undetected” or “sneaked through” (as the Army later reported) the lines of the encircling battalion. The enemy headed for nearby Aslito airfield and there was chaos initially there. One P-47 plane was destroyed and two others damaged. The Japanese quickly continued on to Hill 500, hoping to reunite there with their main forces. What they found instead was the 25th Marines resting in reserve with an artillery battalion of the 14th Marines. The escaping Japanese were finished off the following morning.

On the front lines in the center of the island, General Jarman, now in temporary command of the 27th Infantry Division, took direct action that same day (D+11). An inspection by two of his senior officers of the near edge of Death Valley revealed that battalions of the 105th Infantry “were standing still when there was no reason why they should not move forward.” That did it. Jarman relieved the colonel commanding the 106th and replaced him with his division chief of staff. (Nineteen other officers of the 27th Infantry Division were also relieved after the Saipan battle was over, although only one of them had commanded a unit in battle.)

While these developments were taking place in the upper echelons, the junior officers in the front lines had their own, more immediate, daily concerns. As the author recalled:

For the next several days, the 27th Infantry Division probed and maneuvered and attacked at Hell’s Pocket, Death Valley, and Purple Heart Ridge. On 28 June, Army Major General George W. Griner, who had been quickly sent from Hawaii upon the relief of Ralph Smith, took over command of the division, so Jarman could revert to his previous assignment as garrison force commander. The 106th marked the day by eradicating the last enemy resistance in the spot that had caused so much grief: Hell’s Pocket.

The 2d Marine Division meanwhile inched northward toward the town of Garapan, meeting ferocious enemy resistance. Tipo Pali was now in 6th Marines’ hands. The 8th Marines encountered four small23 hills strongly defended by the enemy. Because of their size in comparison with Mount Tapotchau, they were called “pimples.” Each was named after a battalion commander. Painfully, one by one, they were assaulted and taken over the next few days.

Near Garapan, about 500 yards to the front of the 2d Marines’ lines, an enemy platoon on what was named “Flame Tree Hill” was well dug in, utilizing the caves masked by the bright foliage on the hill. The morning of 29 June, a heavy artillery barrage as well as machine gun and mortar fire raked the slopes of the hill. Then friendly mortars laid a smoke screen. This was followed by a pause in all firing. As hoped, the enemy raced from their caves to repel the expected attack. Suddenly the mortars lobbed high explosives on the hill. Artillery shells equipped with time fuses and machine gun and rifle fire laid down another heavy barrage. The enemy, caught in the open, was wiped out almost to a man.

To the right, the 6th Marines mopped up its area and now held the most commanding ground, with all three of its battalions in favorable positions. In fact, since replacement drafts had not yet arrived, the 2d Marine Division had all three of its infantry regiments deployed on line. Thus it was necessary for its commander, Major General Watson, to organize a division reserve from support units.

The pressure on manpower was further illustrated by the fact that, in this difficult terrain, “eight stretcher bearers were needed to evacuate one wounded Marine.” In addition, there was, of course, the deep-seated psychological and physical pressure from the constant, day after day, close combat. “Everyone on the island felt the weight of fatigue settling down.”

24 On the 4th Division front, the drive forward was easier, but its left flank had to be bent sharply backward toward the 27th Infantry Division. By nightfall on 28 June, the Marine division’s lines formed an inverted L with the 23d Marines and part of the 165th Infantry facing north, while the rest of the Army regiment and two battalions of the 24th Marines faced west. This strange alignment was a focus of attention when each battalion was issued its nightly overlay from corps headquarters showing the lines of the corps at that time, so that friendly fire from artillery and supporting Navy destroyers would not hit friendly troops. Once again, enemy planes raided, hitting both the airfield and anchorage. As usual, enemy night patrols were active.

The end of the saga of Nafutan Point, way to the rear, had come the day before (27 June). The Japanese breakout had left almost no fighting men behind there. Accordingly, the battalion of the 105th Infantry at last overran the area after enduring a final banzai charge. The soldiers found over 500 enemy bodies in the area, some killed in the charge and some by their own hand.

D+15 (30 June) marked a good day for the Army. After fierce fighting, the 27th Infantry Division finally burst through Death Valley, captured Purple Heart Ridge, and drew alongside the 8th Marines. Holland Smith gave due recognition: “No one had any tougher job to do.” The gaps on the flanks with the 2d and 4th Marine Divisions were now closed. In doing so, the Army had sustained most of the 1,836 casualties inflicted upon it since D-Day. The 4th Marine Division, however, had suffered 4,454 casualties to date, while the 2d Marine Division had lost 4,488 men.

The corps front now ran from Garapan, past the four pimples, to the 4th Marine Division’s left boundary. Here, it ran sharply25 northward to Hill 700. From there it ran to the east coast. Central Saipan was in American hands. Most of the replenishment supplies had been unloaded. The enemy had begun withdrawing to his preplanned final defensive lines. The Army’s official history summed up these days’ costly victories this way, “The battle for central Saipan can be said to have come to a successful end.”

D+16–D+19, 1–4 July

Now Holland Smith turned his attention to operation plans to drive through the northern third of Saipan and bring the campaign to a successful, albeit a bloody, conclusion. His next objective line ran from Garapan up the west coast to Tanapag and then eastward across the island. Past Tanapag, near Flores Point, the 2d Marine Division would be pinched out and become the corps reserve. That would leave the 27th Infantry Division and the 4th Marine Division to assault General Saito’s final defenses.

The easiest assignment during this period fell to the 4th Marine Division on the east coast. It advanced 3,500 yards against light opposition, veering to its left, ending on 4 July with its left flank some 2,000 yards north of Tanapag, right on the west coast.

As usual, what looked like “light opposition” to General Schmidt in his divisional CP looked very different to that tired, tense lieutenant who described a painfully typical rifle platoon situation on D+16:

At this point more enemy fire spattered around the small group of Marines. The source seemed to be right on top of them, so the lieutenant told two of his men to throw some grenades over into the area he thought the fire was coming from—about 20 feet away. Under cover of that, the Marines worked a rifleman forward a couple of yards to try to get a bead on the Japanese, but he was unable to spot them and the enemy fire seemed to grow heavier.

Pressing hard against the Japanese defenses constantly resulted in these kinds of face-to-face encounters. Three days later (D+19), Lieutenant Colonel Chambers observed a memorable act of bravery:

The commanding officer of the 1st Battalion, 25th Marines, Lieutenant Colonel Hollis U. (“Musty”) Mustain was nearest the crisis. Chambers went on:

Chambers also noted that, by D+19, out of 28 officers and 690 enlisted men in his rifle companies at the start of the campaign, he now had only 6 officers and 315 men left in those companies. Counting his headquarters company, he had just 468 men remaining of the battalion’s original total strength of 1,050, so one rifle company simply had to be disbanded. The grim toll was repeated28 in another battalion which had had 22 out of 29 officers and 490 enlisted men either killed or wounded in action.

Next to the 4th Marine Division was the 27th Infantry Division in the center of the line of attack. It, too, had a far easier time than in the grinding experiences it had just come through. Its advance also veered left, and was “against negligible resistance” with “the enemy in full flight.” Thus it reached the west coast, pinching off the 2d Marine Division and allowing it to go into reserve.

There was a different story in the 2d Marine Division zone of action at the beginning of this period. On 2 July Flametree Hill was seized and the 2d Marines stormed into Garapan, the second largest city in the Mariana Islands. What the regiment found was a shambles; the town had been completely leveled by naval gunfire and Marine artillery.

With the other two divisions already having veered their attack to the left and reached the northwest coast, the 2d Marine Division was now able to go into corps reserve, as planned, on 4 July. (Holland Smith, seeing the end in sight on Saipan, wanted this division rested for the forthcoming assault on neighboring Tinian Island.)

The Japanese, meanwhile, were falling back to a final defensive line north of Garapan. The American attack of the preceding weeks had not only shattered their manpower, their artillery, and their tanks, but the enemy also was desperate for food. “Many of them had been so pressed for provisions that they were eating field grass and tree bark.”

D+20–D+23, 5–8 July

Any Japanese “withdrawal” meant that some of their men were left behind in caves to fight to the death. This tactic produced again and again for the American troops the life-threatening question of whether there were civilians hidden inside who should be saved. There was a typical grim episode at this time for First Lieutenant Frederic A. Stott, in the 1st Battalion, 24th Marines:

This kind of treacherous action by the Japanese was demonstrated in a different form on the following day (D+21). Lieutenant Colonel Chambers described how he dealt summarily with it—and, by contrast how his men treated genuine civilians who had been hiding:

Once the 2d Marine Division became corps reserve, it was obvious to General Smith that the time was ripe for a banzai attack. He duly warned all units to be alert, and paid a personal visit on 6 July to General Griner, of the 27th Infantry Division, to stress the likelihood of an attack coming down the coastline on the flat ground of the Tanapag Plain.

General Saito was now cornered in his sixth (and last) command post, a miserable cave in Paradise Valley north of Tanapag. The valley was constantly raked by American artillery and naval gunfire; he had left only fragmentary remnants of his troops; he was himself sick, hungry, and wounded. After giving orders for one last fanatical banzai charge, he decided to commit hara-kiri in his cave. At 10 a.m. on 6 July, facing31 east and crying “Tenno Haika! Banzai! [Long live the Emperor! Ten thousand ages!],” he drew his own blood first with his own sword and then his adjutant shot him and Admiral Nagumo in the head with a pistol, but not before he said, “I will meet my staff in Yasakuni Shrine 3 a.m., 7 July!” This was to be the time ordered for the commencement of the final attack.

The ultimate outcome was clear to Saito: “Whether we attack, or whether we stay where we are, there is only death.”

The threat of a mad, all-out enemy charge was nothing new to the troops on Saipan. A rifleman recounted one such experience:

His account continued with a dramatic description of the tense waiting he endured, while he listened32 to the enemy “yells and screams going on for hours.” The noise increased as Marine artillery and mortars, pounding in the direction of the Japanese sounds, added to the deafening din. The Marines were waiting in their foxholes with clips of ammo placed close at hand so that they could reload fast, fixing their bayonets onto their rifles, ensuring that their knives were loose in their scabbard all in anticipation of the forthcoming attacks. Listening to the screaming, all senses alert, many of the men had prayers on their lips as they waited. Unexpectedly, there was silence, a silence that signaled the enemy’s advance. Then:

This was the wild chaos that General Smith predicted as the final convulsive effort of the Japanese. And it came indeed in the early morning hours of 7 July (D+22), the climactic moment of the battle for Saipan. The theoretical Japanese objective was to smash through Tanapag and Garapan and reach all the way down to Charan-Kanoa. It was a “fearful charge of flesh and fire, savage and primitive.... Some of the enemy were armed only with rocks or a knife mounted on a pole.”

The avalanche hit the 105th Infantry, dug in for the night with two battalions on the main line of resistance and the regimental headquarters behind them. However, those two forward battalions had left a 500-yard gap between them, which they planned to cover by fire.

The Japanese found this gap, poured through it, and headed pell-mell for the regimental headquarters of the 105th. The men of the frontline battalions fought valiantly but were unable to stop the banzai onslaught.

Three artillery battalions of the 10th Marines behind the 105th were the next target. The gunners could not set their fuses fast enough, even when cut to four-tenths of a second, to stop the enemy right on top of them. So they lowered the muzzles of their 105mm howitzers and34 spewed ricochet fire by bouncing their shells off the foreground. Many of the other guns could not fire at all, since Army troops ahead of them were inextricably intertwined with the Japanese attackers. However, other Marines in the artillery battalions fired every type of small weapon they could find. The fire direction center of one of their battalions was almost wiped out, and the battalion commander was killed. The cane field to their front was swarming with enemy troops. The guns were overrun and the Marine artillerymen, after removing the firing locks of their guns, fell back to continue the fight as infantrymen.

The official history of the 27th Infantry Division recounts sadly the reactions of its fellow regiments when the firestorm broke on the 105th. The men of the nearby 165th Infantry chose that morning to “stand where they were and shoot Japs without any effort to move forward.” By 1600 that afternoon, after finally starting to move to the relief of the shattered 105th, the 165th “was still 200 to 300 yards short” of making contact. This tardiness was unfortunately matched by “the long delay in the arrival of the 106th Infantry” to try to shore up the battered troops of the 105th.

The extraordinarily bitter hand-to-hand fighting finally took the momentum out of the Japanese surge, and it was stopped at last at the CP of the 105th some 800 yards35 south of Tanapag. By 1800 most of the ground lost had been regained.

It had been a ghastly day. The 105th Infantry’s two battalions had suffered a shocking 918 casualties while killing 2,295 Japanese. One of the Marine artillery battalions had 127 casualties, but had accounted for 322 of the enemy. A final count of the Japanese dead reached the staggering total of 4,311, some due to previous shell-fire, but the vast majority killed in the banzai charge.

Amidst the carnage, there had been countless acts of bravery. Two that were recognized by later awards of the Army Medal of Honor were the leadership and “resistance to the death” of Army Lieutenant Colonel William J. O’Brien, commander of a battalion of the 105th Infantry, and one of his squad leaders, Sergeant Thomas A. Baker.

Three Marines each “gallantly gave his life in the service of his country” and were posthumously awarded the Navy Medal of Honor. They were Private First Class Harold C. Agerholm, Private First Class Harold G. Epperson, and Sergeant Grant F. Timmerman.

The 3d Battalion, 10th Marines, which had fought so tenaciously in the banzai assault, received the Navy Unit Commendation. Four years later, the 105th Infantry and its attached tank battalion were awarded the Army Distinguished Unit Citation.

While attention centered on the bloody battle on the coast, the 23d Marines was attacking a strong Japanese force well protected by caves in a cliff inland. The key to their elimination was an ingenious improvisation. In order to provide fire support, truck-mounted rocket launchers were lowered over the cliff by chains attached to tanks. Once down at the base, their fire, supplemented by that of rocket gunboats off shore, snuffed out the enemy resistance.

The next day, D+23, 8 July, saw the beginning of the end. The Japanese had spent the last of their unit manpower in the banzai charge; now it was time for the final American mop-up. LVTs rescued men of the 105th Infantry who had waded out from the shore to the reef to escape the Japanese. Holland Smith then moved most of the 27th Infantry Division into reserve, and put the 2d Marine Division back on the line of attack, with the 105th Infantry attached. Together with the 4th Marine Division, they swept north towards the end of the island.

Along the coast there were bizarre spectacles that presaged a macabre ending to the campaign. The official Marine history pictured the scene:

D+24, 9 July

It was to be the final day of a long, grueling campaign. The 6th and 8th Marines came down from the hills to the last western beaches, while the 4th Marine Division, with the 2d Marines attached, reached Marpi Point, the northern end of the island.

There a final drama of horror was played out. Lieutenant Colonel Chambers watched, amazed:

Lieutenant Stott in that same division witnessed other unbelievable forms of self-destruction:

With this kind of fanaticism characterizing the Japanese, it is not surprising that 23,811 of the enemy were known dead, with uncounted thousands of others charred by flamethrowers and sealed forever in their caves. Only 736 prisoners of war were taken, and of these 438 were Koreans. American casualties numbered 3,225 killed in action, 13,061 wounded in action, and 326 missing in action.

The island was officially declared “secured” at 1615 on 9 July (although “mopping up” continued afterwards). The 4th Marine Division was later awarded the Presidential Unit Citation for its “outstanding performance in combat” on Saipan and its subsequent assault on the neighboring island of Tinian.

Saipan’s Legacy

The campaign on Saipan had brought many American casualties, and it also heralded the kind of fighting which would be experienced in subsequent operations in the Central and Western Pacific in the days that lay ahead in the Pacific War. Holland Smith declared it “the decisive battle of the Pacific offensive” for it “opened the way to the home islands.” Japanese General Saito had written that “the fate of the Empire will be decided in this one action.” A Japanese admiral agreed, “Our war was lost with the loss of Saipan.” It had truly been a “strategic strike” for the United States.

The proof of these fundamental judgements was dramatized four months later, when 100 B-29 bombers took off from Saipan bound for Tokyo.

There were other fateful results. The United States now had a secure advanced naval base for further punishing strikes close to enemy shores. Emperor Hirohito was now forced to consider a diplomatic settlement of the war. The militaristic General Tojo, the Premier, and his entire cabinet fell from power on 18 July, nine days after Saipan’s loss.

The lessons learned in this campaign would be observed in future American operations, as flaws were analyzed and corrected. The clear need to improve aviation support for the ground troops led directly to the better results in the Philippine Islands and on Iwo Jima and Okinawa. The artillery-spotting missions flown by VMO-2 and -4, set a pattern for the use of the light planes in the future.

Naval gunfire support was also closely reviewed. General Saito had written, “If there just were no naval gunfire, we feel we could fight it out with the enemy in a decisive battle.” While more than 8,500 tons of ammunition were fired by U.S. Navy ships, the flat trajectory of the naval guns “proved somewhat limiting,” as the shells didn’t have the plunging and penetrating effect which was needed against Japanese strongholds.

Finally, there were lessons learned from the supply confusion that had marred the early days on the beaches and hadn’t improved much since the days of the Guadalcanal landing. Logistic problems had arisen because, once a beach was in friendly hands, the ships were unloaded as rapidly as possible and the sailors in the landing craft were in a hurry to get into the beaches and back out again. Supplies were spread all over the beach, partly because of the enemy’s artillery and mortar harassing fire on the beaches, but also because of the corps’ hard-driving, rapid attack, the estimate of resupply requirements was far too small. For example, a shortage of radio batteries was never corrected. There was insufficient time to sort and separate equipment and supplies adequately. Consequently, there were mix-ups, with Marine uniforms getting into Army dumps and Army supplies showing up in Marine dumps.

It was after the beach confusion at Saipan that the Navy decided a permanent corps shore party should be organized. It would be solely responsible for the movement of all supplies from the beach to the dumps and for the subsequent issue to the divisions.

Tactical lessons learned were also new to the Central Pacific war. Instead of a small atoll, the battle had been one of movement on a sizable land mass, and it was further complicated by the numerous caves and the defensive systems they provided for the Japanese. The enemy had defended caves before, but never on such a large scale. On Saipan, these caves were both natural and man-made. Often natural vegetation gave them excellent camouflage. Some had steel doors which could be opened for an artillery piece or machine gun to fire, and then retreat behind the door before return fire could take effect. The flame-throwing tanks could reach many of these caves and so proved very useful. Unfortunately, their range was limited on Saipan, but this was later improved.

Thus it was that the hard experiences on Saipan led to a variety of changes which paid valuable dividends in saving American lives in the future Pacific campaigns. And the loss of the island was a strategic strike from which the Japanese never recovered, as the United States drove forward to ultimate victory.

Sources

There are five principal official sources for the facts about the unit actions on Saipan. These range from preliminary, condensed accounts to massive, detailed final studies which reach down to the level of company operations. In the interests of brevity, the author of this monograph has limited himself to covering the actions of regiments and divisions, with minor special exceptions.

1) Henry I. Shaw, Jr., Bernard C. Nalty, and Edwin T. Turnbladh, Central Pacific Drive, vol. 3, History of U.S. Marine Corps Operations in World War II (Washington: Historical Branch, G-3 Division, Headquarters, U.S. Marine Corps, 1966).

2) Philip A. Crowl, Campaign in the Marianas, vol 9, United States Army in World War II, The War in the Pacific (Washington: Office of the Chief of Military History, Department of the Army, 1960).

3) Maj Carl W. Hoffman, USMC, Saipan: The Beginning of the End (Washington: Historical Division, Headquarters, U.S. Marine Corps, 1950).

4) Capt James R. Stockman, USMC, Campaign for the Marianas (Washington: Historical Division, Headquarters, U.S. Marine Corps, 1946).

5) Capt Edmund G. Love, USA, The 27th Infantry Division in World War II (Washington: Infantry Journal Press, 1949).

In addition, there is a wide variety of other literature on the Saipan operation. This material ranges from a 19-page essay by a Naval Academy midshipman, to first-hand accounts appearing in the Marine Corps Gazette, to wildly subjective books dealing with individual experiences or the “Smith vs Smith” controversy.

To supplement the framework of unit tactics, vignettes of individuals have been drawn from two principal sources:

1) The Personal Papers Collection of the Marine Corps Historical Center has useful memoirs, particularly those of Frederick A. Stott (473-4A32), John C. Chapin (671-4A44), and Robert F. Graf (1946-6B12).

2) In the Center’s Oral History Collection, the author examined well over a dozen reminiscences and found only four that involved front-line experiences: Lieutenant Colonel Justice M. Chambers, USMCR (C2); Captain Carl W. Hoffman, USMC, (H2); Lieutenant Colonel William K. Jones, USMC, (J2); and Lieutenant John H. Craven, ChC, USN, (C3).

About the Author

Captain John C. Chapin earned a bachelor of arts degree with honors in history from Yale University in 1942 and was commissioned later that year. He served as a rifle platoon leader in the 24th Marines, 4th Marine Division, and was wounded in action during the assault landings on Roi-Namur and Saipan.

Transferred to duty at the Historical Division, Headquarters Marine Corps, he wrote the first official histories of the 4th and 5th Marine Divisions. Moving to reserve status at the end of World War II, he earned a master’s degree in history at George Washington University with a thesis on “The Marine Occupation of Haiti, 1915–1922.”

Now a captain in retired status, he has devoted major portions of 10 years to writing history as a volunteer at the Marine Corps Historical Center. His first publication there was an official monograph, A History of VMFA-115, for one of the Marine Corps’ better-known squadrons. With support from the Historical Center and the Marine Corps Historical Foundation, he then spent some years researching and interviewing for the writing of a new book, Uncommon Men—The Sergeants Major of the Marine Corps. This was published by the White Mane Publishing Co.

Acknowledgement is gratefully made to Lieutenant General William K. Jones, USMC (Ret), for his first draft of an account of the Saipan operation.

Transcriber’s Notes

Punctuation, hyphenation, and spelling were made consistent when a predominant preference was found in this book; otherwise they were not changed.

Simple typographical errors were corrected; occasional unbalanced quotation marks retained.

To make this eBook easier to read, particularly on handheld devices, some images have been made relatively larger than in the original pamphlet, and centered, rather than offset to one side or the other; and some were placed a little earlier or later than in the original. Sidebars in the original have been repositioned between chapters and identified as “[Sidebar (page nn):”, where the page reference is to the original location in the source book. In the Plain Text version, the matching closing right bracket follows the last line of the Sidebar’s text and is on a separate line to make it more noticeable. In the HTML versions, that bracket follows the colon, and each Sidebar is displayed within a box.

Frontispiece: The original photograph was printed across two pages, and the middle, which appears here as a vertical gap, was lost in the binding. An excellent copy of the full photograph may be found on the web at:

www.mcu.usmc.mil/historydivision/World%20War%20II/SAIPAN%2083261.jpg

Page 17: “would be multi cave openings” was printed that way.

Page 21: ‘battalions of the 105th Infantry “were standing still when there was no reason why they should not move forward.” That did it. Jarman relieved the colonel commanding the 106th and replaced him’ was printed that way, with references to two different regiments.

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