One of those people was Japanese Rear Admiral Meichi Shibasaki, who said “a million Americans” wouldn’t be able to take Tarawa in “100 years.” Americans took the atoll in 76 hours. “There are people that argue Tarawa should never have been taken.” Photo courtesy of the National Museum of the Marine Corps.“Tarawa was a bloody, bloody battle,” said Annette Amerman, a historian with the Marine Corps History Department in Quantico, Va. Many Marines had to wade through the open ocean to make it to the beach. These landing crafts were unable to make it to shore on the first day of the battle due to a neap, or weak, tide. Navy landing craft filled with sailors and Marines heads toward Tarawa during the battle in November 1943. America had never met this kind of force in an amphibious operation. Japanese troops on Betio were equipped with 8-inch, turret-mounted naval rifles coast defense, anti-aircraft, anti-boat and field artillery guns and howitzers and many other light tanks and weapons. The initial landings by the 2nd Marine Division met heavy Japanese resistance. Previous landings met little or no hostility. Until then, Americans didn’t face much opposition during amphibious assaults. The Battle of Tarawa was the first major American offensive in the central Pacific. Tarawa’s main island, Betio, was the target of the Navy and Marine Corps. The Japanese seized the then-British-occupied isle just days after Japan’s attack at Pearl Harbor. The island of Tarawa was the first target in the Allied campaign.Ībout 80 nautical miles north of the equator, Tarawa is the largest atoll of the Gilberts, a 16-island chain roughly halfway between Hawaii and Papua New Guinea. commanders determined that amphibious attacks on Japanese-occupied islands was the key to victory. “island-hopping” campaign in the central Pacific during World War II. The November 1943 invasion of the Gilbert Islands was the beginning of the U.S.
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