Colonel David M. Shoup, USMC
An excerpt from the field notebook David Shoup carried during the battle of Tarawa reveals a few aspects of the personality of its enigmatic author: “If you are qualified, fate has a way of getting you to the right place at the right time—tho’ sometimes it appears to be a long, long wait.” For Shoup, the former farm boy from Battle Ground, Indiana, the combination of time and place worked to his benefit on two momentous occasions, at Tarawa in 1943, and as President Dwight D. Eisenhower’s deep selection to become 22d Commandant of the Marine Corps in 1959.
Department of Defense Photo (USMC) 310552
Col David M. Shoup, here as he appeared after the battle, was the fourth and only living Marine awarded a Medal of Honor from the Tarawa fighting.
Colonel Shoup was 38 at the time of Tarawa, and he had been a Marine officer since 1926. Unlike such colorful contemporaries as Merritt Edson and Evans Carlson, Shoup had limited prior experience as a commander and only brief exposure to combat. Then came Tarawa, where Shoup, the junior colonel in the 2d Marine Division, commanded eight battalion landing teams in some of the most savage fighting of the war.
Time correspondent Robert Sherrod recorded his first impression of Shoup enroute to Betio: “He was an interesting character, this Colonel Shoup. A squat, red-faced man with a bull neck, a hard-boiled, profane shouter of orders, he would carry the biggest burden on Tarawa.” Another contemporary described Shoup as “a Marine’s Marine,” a leader the troops “could go to the well with.” First Sergeant Edward G. Doughman, who served with Shoup in China and in the Division Operations section, described him as “the brainiest, nerviest, best soldiering Marine I ever met.” It is no coincidence that Shoup also was considered the most formidable poker player in the division, a man with eyes “like two burn holes in a blanket.”
Part of Colonel Shoup’s Medal of Honor citation reflects his strength of character:
Upon arrival at the shore, he assumed command of all landed troops and, working without rest under constant withering enemy fire during the next two days, conducted smashing attacks against unbelievably strong and fanatically defended Japanese positions despite innumerable obstacles and heavy casualties.
Shoup was modest about his achievements. Another entry in his 1943 notebook contains this introspection, “I realize that I am but a bit of chaff from the threshings of life blown into the pages of history by the unknown winds of chance.”
David Shoup died on 13 January 1983 at age 78 and was buried in Arlington National Cemetery. “In his private life,” noted the Washington Post obituary, “General Shoup was a poet.”
The Third Day:
D+2 at Betio,
22 November 1943
On D+2, Chicago Daily News war correspondent Keith Wheeler released this dispatch from Tarawa: “It looks as though the Marines are winning on this blood-soaked, bomb-hammered, stinking little abattoir of an island.”
Colonel Edson issued his attack orders at 0400. As recorded in the division’s D-3 journal, Edson’s plan for D+2 was this: “1/6 attacks at 0800 to the east along south beach to establish contact with 1/2 and 2/2. 1/8 attached to 2dMar attacks at daylight to the west along north beach to eliminate Jap pockets of resistance between Beaches Red 1 and 2. 8th Mar (-LT 1/8) continues attack to east.” Edson also arranged for naval gunfire and air support to strike the eastern end of the island at 20-minute interludes throughout the morning, beginning at 0700. McLeod’s LT 3/6, still embarked at the line of departure, would land at Shoup’s call on Green Beach.
The key to the entire plan was the eastward attack by the fresh troops of Major Jones’ landing team, but Edson was unable for hours to raise the 1st Battalion, 6th Marines, on any radio net. The enterprising Major Tompkins, assistant division operations officer, volunteered to deliver the attack order personally to Major Jones. Tompkins’ hair-raising odyssey from Edson’s CP to Green Beach took nearly three hours, during which time he was nearly shot on several occasions by nervous Japanese and American sentries. By quirk, the radio nets started working again just before Tompkins reached LT 1/6. Jones had the good grace not to admit to Tompkins that he already had the attack order when the exhausted messenger arrived.
INTELLIGENCE MAP BITITU (BETIO) ISLAND
TARAWA ATOLL, GILBERT ISLANDS
SITUATION 1800 D+1
NOTE: LINES ARE GENERAL INDICATION ONLY. GAPS WERE COVERED BY SMALL GROUPS AND BY FIRE. SECONDARY LINES WERE ESTABLISHED WHERE POSSIBLE BEHIND FRONT LINES.
TAKEN FROM 20 MAR DIV SPECIAL ACTION REPORT
On Red Beach Two, Major Hays launched his attack promptly at 0700, attacking westward on a three-company front. Engineers with satchel charges and Bangalore torpedoes helped neutralize several inland Japanese positions, but the strongpoints along the re-entrant were still as dangerous as hornets’ nests. Marine light tanks made brave frontal attacks against the fortifications, even firing their 37mm guns point-blank into the embrasures, but they were inadequate for the task. One was lost to enemy fire, and the other two were withdrawn. Hays called for a section of 75mm halftracks. One was lost almost immediately, but the other used its heavier gun to considerable advantage. The center and left flank companies managed to curve around behind the main complexes, effectively cutting the Japanese off from the rest of the island. Along the beach, however, progress was measured in yards. The bright spot of the day for 1/8 came late in the afternoon when a small party of Japanese tried a sortie from the strongpoints against the Marine lines. Hays’ men, finally given real targets in the open, cut down the attackers in short order.
On Green Beach, Major Jones made final preparations for the assault of 1/6 to the east. Although there were several light tanks available from the platoon which came ashore the previous evening, Jones preferred the insurance of medium tanks. Majors “Willie K.” Jones and “Mike” Ryan were good friends; Jones prevailed on their friendship to “borrow” Ryan’s two battle-scarred Shermans for the assault. Jones ordered the tanks to range no further than 50 yards ahead of his lead company, and he personally maintained radio contact with the tank commander. Jones also assigned a platoon of water-cooled .30-caliber machine guns to each rifle company and attached his combat engineers with their flame throwers and demolition squads to the lead company. The nature of the terrain and the necessity for giving Hays’ battalion wide berth made Jones constrain his attack to a platoon front in a zone of action only 100 yards wide. “It was the most unusual tactics that I ever heard of,” recalled Jones. “As I moved to the east on one side of the airfield, Larry Hays moved to the west, exactly opposite.... I was attacking towards Wood Kyle who had 1st Battalion, 2d Marines.”
Department of Defense Photo (USMC) 63505
CP scene, Betio, D+2: Col Shoup, center, with map case, confers with Maj Thomas Culhane, 2d Marines R-3, while Col Merritt A. Edson, Division chief of staff, stands in left background (hands on hips). Col Evans Carlson, an observer from the 4th Marine Division used as high-priced courier by Shoup, rests in the foreground.
Jones’ plan was sound and well executed. The advantage of having in place a fresh tactical unit with integrated supporting arms was immediately obvious. Landing Team 1/6 made rapid progress along the south coast, killing about 250 Japanese defenders and reaching the thin lines held by 2/2 and 1/2 within three hours. American casualties to this point were light.
At 1100, Shoup called Jones to his CP to receive the afternoon plan of action. Jones’ executive officer, Major Francis X. Beamer, took the occasion to replace the lead rifle company. Resistance was stiffening, the company commander had just been shot by a sniper, and the oppressive heat was beginning to take a toll. Beamer made superhuman efforts to get more water and salt tablets for his men, but several troops had already become victims of heat prostration. According to First Sergeant Lewis J. Michelony, Tarawa’s sands were “as white as snow and as hot as red-white ashes from a heated furnace.”
Back on Green Beach, now 800 yards behind LT 1/6, McLeod’s LT 3/6 began streaming ashore. The landing was uncontested but nevertheless took several hours to execute. It was not until 1100, the same time that Jones’ leading elements linked up with the 2d Marines, before 3/6 was fully established ashore.
“March Macabre,” a sketch by combat artist Kerr Eby, reflects the familiar scene of wounded or lifeless Marines being pulled to shelter under fire by their buddies.
U.S. Navy Combat Art Collection
The attack order for the 8th Marines was the same as the previous day: assault the strongpoints to the east. The obstacles were just as daunting on D+2. Three fortifications were especially formidable: a steel pillbox near the contested Burns-Philp pier; a coconut log emplacement with multiple machine guns; and a large bombproof shelter further inland. All three had been designed by Admiral Saichiro, the master engineer, to be mutually supported by fire and observation. And notwithstanding Major Crowe’s fighting spirit, these strongpoints had effectively contained the combined forces of 2/8 and 3/8 since the morning of D-Day.
Marine Corps Historical Collection
Col William K. Jones, USMC, a major during the battle of Tarawa, commanded Landing Team 1/6, the first major unit to land intact on Betio. The advance of 1/6 eastward on D+2 helped break the back of Japanese resistance, as did the unit’s repulse of the Japanese counterattack that night. Jones’ sustained combat leadership on Betio resulted in a battlefield promotion to lieutenant colonel.
On the third day, Crowe reorganized his tired forces for yet another assault. First, the former marksmanship instructor obtained cans of lubricating oil and made his troops field strip and clean their Garands before the attack. Crowe placed his battalion executive officer, Major William C. Chamberlin, in the center of the three attacking companies. Chamberlin, a former college economics professor, was no less dynamic than his red-mustached commander. Though nursing a painful wound in his shoulder from D-Day, Chamberlin was a driving force in the repetitive assaults against the three strongpoints. Staff Sergeant Hatch recalled that the executive officer was “a wild man, a guy anybody would be willing to follow.”
At 0930, a mortar crew under Chamberlin’s direction got a direct hit on the top of the coconut log emplacement which penetrated the bunker and detonated the ammunition stocks. It was a stroke of immense good fortune for the Marines. At the same time, the medium tank “Colorado” maneuvered close enough to the steel pillbox to penetrate it with direct 75 mm fire. Suddenly, two of the three emplacements were overrun.
Against the still potent and heavily defended, entrenched Japanese positions the 6th Marines advanced eastward on D+2.
LtGen Julian C. Smith Collection
The massive bombproof shelter, however, was still lethal. Improvised flanking attacks were shot to pieces before they could gather momentum. The only solution was to somehow gain the top of the sand-covered mound and drop explosives or thermite grenades down the air vents to force the defenders outside. This tough assignment went to Major Chamberlin and a squad of combat engineers under First Lieutenant Alexander Bonnyman. While riflemen and machine gunners opened a rain of fire against the strongpoint’s firing ports, this small band raced across the sands and up the steep slope. The Japanese knew they were in grave danger. Scores of them poured out of a rear entrance to attack the Marines on top. Bonnyman stepped forward, emptied his flamethrower into the onrushing Japanese, then charged them with a carbine. He was shot dead, his body rolling down the slope, but his men were inspired to overcome the Japanese counterattack. The surviving engineers rushed to place explosives against the rear entrances. Suddenly, several hundred demoralized Japanese broke out of the shelter in panic, trying to flee eastward. The Marines shot them down by the dozens, and the tank crew fired a single “dream shot” canister round which dispatched at least 20 more.
BETIO
TARAWA ATOLL, GILBERT ISLANDS
ATTACK OF THE 1ST BN. 6th MARINES (LT 1/6)
NOV. 22 1943
Lieutenant Bonnyman’s gallantry resulted in a posthumous Medal of Honor, the third to be awarded to Marines on Betio. His sacrifice almost single-handedly ended the stalemate on Red Beach Three. Nor is it coincidence that two of these highest awards were received by combat engineers. The performances of Staff Sergeant Bordelon on D-Day and Lieutenant Bonnyman on D+2 were representative of hundreds of other engineers on only a slightly less spectacular basis. As an example, nearly a third of the engineers who landed in support of LT 2/8 became casualties. According to Second Lieutenant Beryl W. Rentel, the survivors used “eight cases of TNT, eight cases of gelatin dynamite, and two 54-pound blocks of TNT” to demolish Japanese fortifications. Rentel reported that his engineers used both large blocks of TNT and an entire case of dynamite on the large bombproof shelter alone.
The 8th Marines makes its final assault on the large Japanese bombproof shelter near the Burns-Philp pier. These scenes were vividly recorded on 35mm motion picture film by Marine SSgt Norman Hatch, whose subsequent eyewitness documentary of the Tarawa fighting won a Motion Picture Academy Award in 1944.
Department of Defense Photo (USMC) 63930
At some point during the confused, violent fighting in the 8th Marines’ zone—and unknown to the Marines—Admiral Shibasaki died in his blockhouse. The tenacious Japanese commander’s failure to provide backup communications to the above-ground wires destroyed during D-Day’s preliminary bombardment had effectively kept him from influencing the battle. Japanese archives indicate Shibasaki was able to transmit one final message to General Headquarters in Tokyo early on D+2: “Our weapons have been destroyed and from now on everyone is attempting a final charge.... May Japan exist for 10,000 years!”
Department of Defense Photo (USMC) 310213
1stLt Alexander Bonnyman, Jr., USMC, was awarded the Medal of Honor posthumously for extreme bravery during the assault on the Japanese bombproof shelter on D+2. Two of the four Marines awarded the Medal of Honor for Tarawa were combat engineers: Lt Bonnyman and SSgt Bordelon.
Admiral Shibasaki’s counterpart, General Julian Smith, landed on Green Beach shortly before noon. Smith observed the deployment of McLeod’s LT 3/6 inland and conferred with Major Ryan. But Smith soon realized he was far removed from the main action towards the center of the island. He led his group back across the reef to its landing craft and ordered the coxswain to make for the pier. At this point the commanding general received a rude introduction to the facts of life on Betio. Although the Japanese strongpoints at the re-entrant were being hotly besieged by Hays’ 1/8, the defenders still held mastery over the approaches to Red Beaches One and Two. Well-aimed machine gun fire disabled the boat and killed the coxswain; the other occupants had to leap over the far gunwale into the water. Major Tompkins, ever the right man in the right place, then waded through intermittent fire for half a mile to find an LVT for the general. Even this was not an altogether safe exchange. The LVT drew further fire, which wounded the driver and further alarmed the occupants. General Smith did not reach Edson and Shoup’s combined CP until nearly 1400.
“Red Mike” Edson in the meantime had assembled his major subordinate commanders and issued orders for continuing the attack to the east that afternoon. Major Jones’ 1/6 would continue along the narrowing south coast, supported by the pack howitzers of 1/10 and all available tanks. Colonel Hall’s two battalions of the 8th Marines would continue their advance along the north coast. Jump-off time was 1330. Naval gunfire and air support would blast the areas for an hour in advance.
Colonel Hall spoke up on behalf of his exhausted, decimated landing teams, ashore and in direct contact since D-Day morning. The two landing teams had enough strength for one more assault, he told Edson, but then they must get relief. Edson promised to exchange the remnants of 2/8 and 3/8 with Murray’s fresh 2/6 on Bairiki at the first opportunity after the assault.
Jones returned to his troops in his borrowed tank and issued the necessary orders. Landing Team 1/6 continued the attack at 1330, passing through Kyle’s lines in the process. Immediately it ran into heavy opposition. The deadliest fire came from heavy weapons mounted in a turret-type emplacement near the south beach. This took 90 minutes to overcome. The light tanks were brave but ineffective. Neutralization took sustained 75mm fire from one of the Sherman medium tanks. Resistance was fierce throughout Jones’ zone, and his casualties began to mount. The team had conquered 800 yards of enemy territory fairly easily in the morning, but could attain barely half that distance in the long afternoon.
The 8th Marines, having finally destroyed the three-bunker nemesis, made good progress at first, but then ran out of steam past the eastern end of the airfield. Shoup had been right the night before. The Japanese defenders may have been leaderless, but they still had an abundance of bullets and esprit left. Major Crowe pulled his leading elements back into defensive positions for the night. Jones halted, too, and placed one company north of the airfield for a direct link with Crowe. The end of the airstrip was unmanned but covered by fire.
On nearby Bairiki, all of 2/10 was now in position and firing artillery missions in support of Crowe and Jones. Company B of the 2d Medical Battalion established a field hospital to handle the overflow of casualties from Doyen. Murray’s 2/6, eager to enter the fray, waited in vain for boats to arrive to move them to Green Beach. Very few landing craft were available; many were crammed with miscellaneous supplies as the transports and cargo ships continued general unloading, regardless of the needs of the troops ashore. On Betio, Navy Seabees were already at work repairing the airstrip with bulldozers and graders despite enemy fire. From time to time, the Marines would call for help in sealing a bothersome bunker, and a bulldozer would arrive to do the job nicely. Navy beachmasters and shore party Marines on the pier continued to keep the supplies coming in, the wounded going out. At 1550, Edson requested a working party “to clear bodies around pier ... hindering shore party operations.” Late in the day the first jeep got ashore, a wild ride along the pier with every remaining Japanese sniper trying to take out the driver. Sherrod commented, “If a sign of certain victory were needed, this is it. The jeeps have arrived.”
The strain of the prolonged battle began to take effect. Colonel Hall reported that one of his Navajo Indian code-talkers had been mistaken for a Japanese and shot. A derelict, blackened LVT drifted ashore, filled with dead Marines. At the bottom of the pile was one who was still breathing, somehow, after two and a half days of unrelenting hell. “Water,” he gasped, “Pour some water on my face, will you?”
LtGen Julian C. Smith Collection
South side of RAdm Shibasaki’s headquarters on Betio is guarded by a now-destroyed Japanese light tank. The imposing blockhouse withstood direct hits by Navy 16-inch shells and 500-pound bombs. Fifty years later; the building stands.
Smith, Edson, and Shoup were near exhaustion themselves. Relatively speaking, the third day on Betio had been one of spectacular gains, but progress overall was maddeningly slow, nor was the end yet in sight. At 1600, General Smith sent this pessimistic report to General Hermle, who had taken his place on the flagship:
Situation not favorable for rapid clean-up of Betio. Heavy casualties among officers make leadership problems difficult. Still strong resistance.... Many emplacements intact on eastern end of the island.... In addition, many Japanese strongpoints to westward of our front lines within our position that have not been reduced. Progress slow and extremely costly. Complete occupation will take at least 5 days more. Naval and air bombardment a great help but does not take out emplacements.
General Smith assumed command of operations ashore at 1930. By that time he had about 7,000 Marines ashore, struggling against perhaps 1,000 Japanese defenders. Updated aerial photographs revealed many defensive positions still intact throughout much of Betio’s eastern tail. Smith and Edson believed they would need the entire 6th Marines to complete the job. When Colonel Holmes landed with the 6th Marines headquarters group, Smith told him to take command of his three landing teams by 2100. Smith then called a meeting of his commanders to assign orders for D+3.
Smith directed Holmes to have McLeod’s 3/6 pass through the lines of Jones’ 1/6 in order to have a fresh battalion lead the assault eastward. Murray’s 2/6 would land on Green Beach and proceed east in support of McLeod. All available tanks would be assigned to McLeod (when Major Jones protested that he had promised to return the two Shermans loaned by Major Ryan, Shoup told him “with crisp expletives” what he could do with his promise). Shoup’s 2d Marines, with 1/8 still attached, would continue to reduce the re-entrant strongpoints. The balance of the 8th Marines would be shuttled to Bairiki. And the 4th Battalion, 10th Marines would land its “heavy” 105mm guns on Green Beach to augment the fires of the two pack howitzer battalions already in action. Many of these plans were overcome by events of the evening.
The major catalyst that altered Smith’s plans was a series of vicious Japanese counterattacks during the night of D+2/D+3. As Edson put it, the Japanese obligingly “gave us very able assistance by trying to counterattack.” The end result was a dramatic change in the combat ratio between attackers and survivors the next day.
Major Jones sensed his exposed forces would be the likely target for any Banzai attack and took precautions. Gathering his artillery forward observers and naval fire control spotters, Jones arranged for field artillery support starting 75 yards from his front lines to a point 500 yards out, where naval gunfire would take over. He placed Company A on the left, next to the airstrip, and Company B on the right, next to the south shore. He worried about the 150-yard gap across the runway to Company C, but that could not be helped. Jones used a tank to bring a stockpile of grenades, small arms ammunition, and water to be positioned 50 yards behind the lines.
BETIO
TARAWA ATOLL, GILBERT ISLANDS
ATTACH OF THE 2d BN., 8th MARINES
NOV. 22, 1943
TAKEN FROM 2d BN 8th MARINES SPECIAL ACTION REPORT.
The first counterattack came at 1930. A force of 50 Japanese infiltrated past Jones’ outposts in the thick vegetation and penetrated the border between the two companies south of the airstrip. Jones’ reserve force, comprised of “my mortar platoon and my headquarters cooks and bakers and admin people,” contained the penetration and killed the enemy in two hours of close-in fighting under the leadership of First Lieutenant Lyle “Spook” Specht. An intense fire from the pack howitzers of 1/10 and 2/10 prevented the Japanese from reinforcing the penetration. By 2130 the lines were stabilized. Jones asked Major Kyle for a company to be positioned 100 yards to the rear of his lines. The best Kyle could provide was a composite force of 40 troops from the 2d Marines.
Department of Defense Photo (USMC) 63640
Destruction along the eastern end of Red Beach Three leads toward the long pier in the distant background. Japanese gunners maintained a deadly antiboat fire in this direction, as witnessed by these two wrecked LVTs and the various sunken craft.
The Japanese struck Jones’ lines again at 2300. One force made a noisy demonstration across from Company A’s lines—taunting, clinking canteens against their helmets, yelling Banzai!—while a second force attacked Company B with a silent rush. The Marines repulsed this attack, too, but were forced to use their machine guns, thereby revealing their positions. Jones asked McLeod for a full company from 3/6 to reinforce the 2d Marines to the rear of the fighting.
A third attack came at 0300 in the morning when the Japanese moved several 7.7mm machine guns into nearby wrecked trucks and opened fire on the Marine automatic weapons positions. Marine NCOs volunteered to crawl forward against this oncoming fire and lob grenades into the improvised machine gun nests. This did the job, and the battlefield grew silent again. Jones called for star shell illumination from the destroyers in the lagoon.
At 0400, a force of some 300 Japanese launched a frenzied attack against the same two companies. The Marines met them with every available weapon. Artillery fire from 10th Marines howitzers on Red Beach Two and Bairiki Island rained a murderous crossfire. Two destroyers in the lagoon, Schroeder (DD 301) and Sigsbee (DD 502), opened up on the flanks. The wave of screaming attackers took hideous casualties but kept coming. Pockets of men locked together in bloody hand-to-hand fighting. Private Jack Stambaugh of B Company killed three screaming Japanese with his bayonet; an officer impaled him with his samurai sword; another Marine brained the officer with a rifle butt. First Lieutenant Norman K. Thomas, acting commander of Company B, reached Major Jones on the field phone, exclaiming “We’re killing them as fast as they come at us, but we can’t hold out much longer; we need reinforcements!” Jones’ reply was tough, “We haven’t got them; you’ve got to hold!”
Marines use newly arrived jeeps to carry machine gun ammunition, demolitions, and other ordnance forward from the beach to troops fighting in the front lines.
LtGen Julian C. Smith Collection
Jones’ Marines lost 40 dead and 100 wounded in the wild fighting, but hold they did. In an hour it was all over. The supporting arms never stopped shooting down the Japanese, attacking or retreating. Both destroyers emptied their magazines of 5-inch shells. The 1st Battalion, 10th Marines fired 1,300 rounds that long night, many shells being unloaded over the pier while the fire missions were underway. At first light, the Marines counted 200 dead Japanese within 50 yards of their lines, plus an additional 125 bodies beyond that range, badly mangled by artillery or naval gunfire. Other bodies lay scattered throughout the Marine lines. Major Jones had to blink back tears of pride and grief as he walked his lines that dawn. Several of his Marines grabbed his arm and muttered, “They told us we had to hold, and by God, we held.”
INTELLIGENCE MAP BITITU (BETIO) ISLAND
TARAWA ATOLL, GILBERT ISLANDS
SITUATION 1800 D+2
NOTE: LINES ARE GENERAL INDICATION ONLY. GAPS WERE COVERED BY SMALL GROUPS AND BY FIRE. SECONDARY LINES WERE ESTABLISHED WHERE POSSIBLE BEHIND FRONT LINES.
TAKEN FROM 2D MAR DIV SPECIAL ACTION REPORT
Completing the Task:
23–28 November 1943
“This was not only worse than Guadalcanal,” admitted Lieutenant Colonel Carlson, “It was the damnedest fight I’ve seen in 30 years of this business.”
The costly counterattacks during the night of 22–23 November effectively broke the back of the Japanese defense. Had they remained in their bunkers until the bitter end, the defenders probably would have exacted a higher toll in American lives. Facing inevitable defeat in detail, however, nearly 600 Japanese chose to die by taking the offensive during the night action.
The 2d Marine Division still had five more hours of hard fighting on Betio the morning of D+3 before the island could be conquered. Late in the morning, General Smith sent this report to Admiral Hill on Maryland:
Decisive defeat of enemy counterattack last night destroyed bulk of hostile resistance. Expect complete annihilation of enemy on Betio this date. Strongly recommend that you and your chief of staff come ashore this date to get information about the type of hostile resistance which will be encountered in future operations.
Meanwhile, following a systematic preliminary bombardment, the fresh troops of McLeod’s LT 3/6 passed through Jones’ lines and commenced their attack to the east. By now, Marine assault tactics were well refined. Led by tanks and combat engineers with flamethrowers and high explosives, the troops of 3/6 made rapid progress. Only one bunker, a well-armed complex along the north shore, provided effective opposition. McLeod took advantage of the heavy brush along the south shore to bypass the obstacle, leaving one rifle company to encircle and eventually overrun it. Momentum was maintained; the remaining Japanese seemed dispirited. By 1300, McLeod reached the eastern tip of Betio, having inflicted more than 450 Japanese casualties at the loss of 34 of his Marines. McLeod’s report summarized the general collapse of the Japanese defensive system in the eastern zone following the counterattacks: “At no time was there any determined defensive.... We used flamethrowers and could have used more. Medium tanks were excellent. My light tanks didn’t fire a shot.”
U.S. Navy Combat Art Collection
“Tarawa No. II,” a sketch by combat artist Kerr Eby, reflects the difficulty in landing reinforcements over the long pier throughout the battle. As Gen Julian Smith personally learned, landing across Green Beach took longer but was much safer.
Marines fire a M-1919A4 machine gun from an improvised “shelter” in the battlefield.
Department of Defense Photo 63495
The toughest fight of the fourth day occurred on the Red Beach One/Two border where Colonel Shoup directed the combined forces of Hays’ 1/8 and Schoettel’s 3/2 against the “re-entrant” strongpoints. The Japanese defenders in these positions were clearly the most disciplined—and the deadliest—on the island. From these bunkers, Japanese antiboat gunners had thoroughly disrupted the landings of four different battalions, and they had very nearly killed General Smith the day before. The seaward approaches to these strongpoints were littered with wrecked LVTs and bloated bodies.
Department of Defense Photo (USMC) 63455
A Marine throws a hand grenade during the battle for the interior of the island.
Major Hays finally got some flamethrowers (from Crowe’s engineers when LT 2/8 was ordered to stand down), and the attack of 1/8 from the east made steady, if painstaking, progress. Major Schoettel, anxious to atone for what some perceived to be a lackluster effort on D-Day, pressed the assault of 3/2 from the west and south. To complete the circle, Shoup ordered a platoon of infantry and a pair of 75mm halftracks out to the reef to keep the defenders pinned down from the lagoon. Some of the Japanese committed hara-kiri; the remainder, exhausted, fought to the end. Hays’ Marines had been attacking this complex ever since their bloody landing on the morning of D+1. In those 48 hours, 1/8 fired 54,450 rounds of .30-caliber rifle ammunition. But the real damage was done by the special weapons of the engineers and the direct fire of the halftracks. Capture of the largest position, a concrete pillbox near the beach, enabled easier approaches to the remaining bunkers. By 1300, it was all over.
At high noon, while the fighting in both sectors was still underway, a Navy fighter plane landed on Betio’s airstrip, weaving around the Seabee trucks and graders. Nearby Marines swarmed over the plane to shake the pilot’s hand. A PB2Y also landed to take out press reports and the haggard observers, including Evans Carlson and Walter Jordan.
BETIO
TARAWA ATOLL, GILBERT ISLANDS
ATTACK OF 1st BN, 8th MARINES and
3d BN, 2d MARINES
MORNING OF NOV. 23, 1943
TAKEN FROM 2D MAR DIV SPECIAL ACTION REPORT
Admiral Hill and his staff came ashore at 1245. The naval officers marveled at the great strength of the Japanese bunker system, realizing immediately the need to reconsider their preliminary bombardment policies. Admiral Hill called Betio “a little Gibraltar,” and observed that “only the Marines could have made such a landing.”
When Smith received the nearly simultaneous reports from Colonels Shoup and Holmes that both final objectives had been seized, he was able to share the good news with Hill. The two had worked together harmoniously to achieve this victory. Between them, they drafted a message to Admiral Turner and General Holland Smith announcing the end of organized resistance on Betio. It was 1305, about 76 hours after PFC Moore first rammed LVT 4-9 (“My Deloris”) onto the seawall on Red Beach One to begin the direct assault.
The stench of death and decay was overwhelming. “Betio would be more habitable,” reported Robert Sherrod, “if the Marines could leave for a few days and send a million buzzards in.” Working parties sought doggedly to identify the dead; often the bodies were so badly shattered or burned as to eliminate distinction between friend and foe. Chaplains worked alongside burial teams equipped with bulldozers. General Smith’s administrative staff worked hard to prepare accurate casualty lists. More casualties were expected in the mop-up operations in the surrounding islands and Apamama. Particularly distressing was the report that nearly 100 enlisted Marines were missing and presumed dead. The changing tides had swept many bodies of the assault troops out to sea. The first pilot ashore reported seeing scores of floating corpses, miles away, over the horizon.
The Japanese garrison was nearly annihilated in the fighting. The Marines, supported by naval gunfire, carrier aviation, and Army Air Force units, killed 97 percent of the 4,836 troops estimated to be on Betio during the assault. Only 146 prisoners were taken, all but 17 of them Korean laborers. The Marines captured only one Japanese officer, 30-year-old Kiyoshi Ota from Nagasaki, a Special Duty Ensign in the 7th Sasebo Special Landing Force. Ensign Ota told his captors the garrison expected the landings along the south and southwest sectors instead of the northern beaches. He also thought the reef would protect the defenders throughout periods of low tide.
Shortly before General Julian Smith’s announcement of victory at Betio, his Army counterpart, General Ralph Smith, signalled “Makin taken!” In three days of sharp fighting on Butaritari Island, the Army wiped out the Japanese garrison at the cost of 200 American casualties. Bad blood developed between “Howling Mad” Smith and Ralph Smith over the conduct of this operation which would have unfortunate consequences in a later amphibious campaign.
The grimy Marines on Betio took a deep breath and sank to the ground. Many had been awake since the night before the landing. As Captain Carl Hoffman recalled, “There was just no way to rest; there was virtually no way to eat. Mostly it was close, hand-to-hand fighting and survival for three and a half days. It seemed like the longest period of my life.” Lieutenant Lillibridge had no nourishment at all until the afternoon of D+3. “One of my men mixed up a canteen cup full of hot water, chocolate, coffee, and sugar, and gave it to me, saying he thought I needed something. It was the best meal I ever had.”
The Marines stared numbly at the desolation that surrounded them. Lieutenant Colonel Russell Lloyd, executive officer of the 6th Marines, took a minute to scratch out a hasty note to his wife, saying “I’m on Tarawa in the midst of the worst destruction I’ve ever seen.” Chaplain Willard walked along Red Beach One, finally clear of enemy pillboxes. “Along the shore,” he wrote, “I counted the bodies of 76 Marines staring up at me, half in, half out of the water.” Robert Sherrod also took the opportunity to walk about the island. “What I saw on Betio was, I am certain, one of the greatest works of devastation wrought by man.” Sherrod whistled at the proliferation of heavy machine guns and 77mm antiboat guns along the northwest shore. As he described one scene:
Amtrack Number 4-8 is jammed against the seawall barricade. Three waterlogged Marines lie beneath it. Four others are scattered nearby, and there is one hanging on a two-foot-high strand of barbed wire who does not touch the coral flat at all. Back of the 77mm gun are many hundreds of rounds of 77mm ammunition.
Other Japanese forces in the Gilberts exacted a high toll among the invasion force. Six Japanese submarines reached the area during D+2. One of these, the I-175, torpedoed the escort carrier Liscome Bay just before sunrise on 24 November off Makin. The explosion was terrific—Admiral Hill saw the flash at Tarawa, 93 miles away—and the ship sank quickly, taking 644 souls to the bottom.
The Marines on Betio conducted a joint flag-raising ceremony later that same morning. Two of the few surviving palm trees were selected as poles, but the Marines were hard put to find a British flag. Finally, Major Holland, the New Zealand officer who had proved so prophetic about the tides at Tarawa, produced a Union Jack. A field musician played the appropriate bugle calls; Marines all over the small island stood and saluted. Each could reckon the cost.
At this time came the good news from Captain James Jones (brother to Major “Willie K.” Jones) at Apamama. Jones’ V Amphibious Corps Reconnaissance Company had landed by rubber rafts from the transport submarine Nautilus during the night of 20–21 November. The small Japanese garrison at first kept the scouts at bay. The Nautilus then surfaced and bombarded the Japanese positions with deck guns. This killed some of the defenders; the remainder committed hara-kiri. The island was deemed secure by the 24th. General Julian Smith sent General Hermle and McLeod’s LT 3/6 to take command of Apamama until base defense forces could arrive.
One of the few Japanese prisoners taken on Betio, this man was captured late in the battle.
LtGen Julian C. Smith Collection
General Smith kept his promise to his assault troops at Tarawa. Amphibious transports entered the lagoon on 24 November and backloaded Combat Teams 2 and 8. To Lieutenant Lillibridge, going back on board ship after Betio was like going to heaven. “The Navy personnel were unbelievably generous and kind ... we were treated to a full-scale turkey dinner.... The Navy officers helped serve the food.” But Lillibridge, like many other surviving troop leaders, suffered from post-combat trauma. The lieutenant had lost over half the members of his platoon, and he was consumed with guilt.
Marine Corps Personal Papers, LtGen Julian C. Smith Collection
Navy Seabees managed to get their first bulldozer ashore on D-Day. With it, and the ones that followed, the Seabees built artillery revetments, smothered enemy positions, dug mass graves, and rebuilt the damaged runway—all while under fire.
With the 2d Marines and 8th Marines off to Hawaii, McLeod’s 3/6 enroute to Apamama, and Murray’s 2/6 beginning its long trek through the other islands of the Tarawa Atoll, Major Jones’ 1/6 became the last infantry unit on Betio. Its work was tedious: burying the dead, flushing out die-hard snipers, hosting visiting dignitaries.
The first of these was Major General Holland Smith. The V Amphibious Corps Commander flew to Betio on 24 November and spent an emotional afternoon viewing the carnage with Julian Smith. “Howling Mad” Smith was shaken by the experience. In his words: “The sight of our dead floating in the waters of the lagoon and lying along the blood-soaked beaches is one I will never forget. Over the pitted, blasted island hung a miasma of coral dust and death, nauseating and horrifying.”
Major Jones recalled that Holland Smith had tears in his eyes as he walked through the ruins. Robert Sherrod also accompanied the generals. They came upon one sight that moved all of them to tears. It was a dead Marine, leaning forward against the seawall, “one arm still supported upright by the weight of his body. On top of the seawall, just beyond his upraised hand, lies a blue and white flag, a beach marker to tell succeeding waves where to land.” Holland Smith cleared his throat and said, “How can men like that ever be defeated?”
Company D, 2d Tank Battalion, was designated as the scout company for the 2d Marine Division for the Tarawa operation. Small elements of these scouts landed on Eita and Buota Islands while the fighting on Betio still raged, discovering and shadowing a sizeable Japanese force. On 23 November, Lieutenant Colonel Manley Curry’s 3d Battalion, 10th Marines, landed on Eita. The battalion’s pack howitzers were initially intended to augment fires on Betio; when that island finally fell, the artillerymen turned their guns to support the 2d Battalion, 6th Marines, in clearing the rest of the islands in the atoll.
“Ebb Tide—Tarawa,” a sketch by Kerr Eby, evokes the tragic view of the beachhead.
U.S. Navy Combat Art Collection
Lieutenant Colonel Murray’s LT 2/6 boarded boats from Betio at 0500 on 24 November and landed on Buota. Murray set a fierce pace, the Marines frequently wading across the sandspits that joined the succeeding islands. Soon he was out of range of Curry’s guns on Eita. Curry detached Battery G to follow Murray in trace. The Marines learned from friendly natives that a Japanese force of about 175 naval infantry was ahead on the larger island of Buariki, near the northwest point of the atoll. Murray’s lead elements caught up with the enemy at dusk on 26 November. There was a sharp exchange of fire in very thick vegetation before both sides broke contact. Murray positioned his forces for an all-out assault in the morning.
The battle of Buariki on 27 November was the last engagement in the Gilberts, and it was just as deadly as each preceding encounter with the Special Naval Landing Forces. Murray attacked the Japanese defensive positions at first light, getting one salvo of supporting fire from Battery G before the lines became too intermingled in the extended melee. Here the fighting was similar to Guadalcanal: much hand-to-hand brawling in tangled underbrush. The Japanese had no elaborate defenses as on Betio, but the Imperial sea soldiers took advantage of cover and concealment, made every shot count, and fought to the last man. All 175 were slain. Murray’s victory was dearly bought: 32 officers and men killed, 59 others wounded. The following day, the Marines crossed to the last remaining islet. There were no more Japanese to be found. On 28 November, Julian Smith announced “remaining enemy forces on Tarawa wiped out.”
Admirals Nimitz and Spruance came to Betio just before Julian Smith’s announcement. Nimitz quickly saw that the basic Japanese defenses were still intact. He directed his staff to diagnose the exact construction methods used; within a month an identical set of bunkers and pillboxes was being built on the naval bombardment island of Kahoolawe in the Hawaiian Islands.
Admiral Nimitz paused to present the first of many combat awards to Marines of the 2d Marine Division. In time, other recognition followed. The entire division was awarded the Presidential Unit Citation. Colonel David Monroe Shoup received the Medal of Honor. Major “Jim” Crowe and his executive officer, Major Bill Chamberlin, received the Navy Cross. So did Lieutenant Colonel Herb Amey (posthumously), Major Mike Ryan, and Corporal John Spillane, the LVT crewchief and prospective baseball star who caught the Japanese hand grenades in mid-air on D-Day before his luck ran out.
MajGen Julian C. Smith, wearing helmet liner at center, describes the nature of the recently completed conquest of Betio to Adm Chester Nimitz, facing camera, and Army LtGen Robert Richardson during their visit to the island on 27 November 1943. An exhausted Col Edson looks on at right. While they talked, the smell of death pervaded over the island.
Department of Defense Photo (USMC) 65437
Some of the senior officers in the division were jealous of Shoup’s Medal of Honor, but Julian Smith knew full well whose strong shoulders had borne the critical first 36 hours of the assault. Shoup was philosophical. As he recorded in his combat notebook, “With God and the U.S. Navy in direct support of the 2d MarDiv there was never any doubt that we would get Betio. For several hours, however, there was considerable haggling over the exact price we were to pay for it.”
[Sidebar ([page 46]):]