Campaign for the Marianas
Washington DC: U.S. Marine Corps, Historical Division, 1946. Presumed First Edition, First printing thus. Wraps. viii, and pagination by section. Illustrations. Maps (some with color). Footnotes. Some cover wear and soiling. Rare surviving review draft (Foreword...all comments should be forwarded within 60 days after receipt...your cooperation in providing material for the revision...) Capt. James R. Stockman prepared the sections on The Battle for Saipan (40 pages) and The Tinian Fight (ii, 29, [1] pages). Capt. Phillips D. Carleton prepared the section on The Guam Operation (ii,48, 4 pages). Colonel Stockman joined the Marine Corps in 1942, and he retired in 1969. His World War II service included combat operations at Saipan and Okinawa. He was author of "The Battle for Tarawa," the official Marine Corps account of that operation, and he also wrote books about the Okinawa and Saipan campaigns. He was a graduate of the Marine Corps Amphibious Warfare School at Quantico and the Imperial Defense College in London. His decorations included a Silver Star, Bronze Star and Legion of Merit. In retirement, Colonel Stockman was a military analyst with RCA for three years, then an analyst with Potomac Research Institute. Phillips D. Carleton lived with the Marines, watched them fight and listened to their accounts of the action. During the war, he was with the Twenty Ninth Marines on Motobu Peninsula, the Twenty Second Marines during the fight for Naha, and spent considerable time with the Sixth Reconnaissance Company. Most of the material in this monograph is the result of Captain Carleton’s personal observations or was gained through his interviews with the officers and men who fought in the battles. This monograph is one of a series concerning important engagement of marine Corps units in World War II. It has been prepared largely from special action reports, records, and accounts submitted by the various organizations that participated in the Marianas Campaign. The purpose of the monograph is to provide the reader with a factual account of the three operations that comprised the campaign: Saipan, Guam and Tinian. In its present form, this monograph is tentative and subject to correction. The Mariana and Palau Islands campaign, also known as Operation Forager, was an offensive launched by United States forces against Imperial Japanese forces in the Mariana Islands and Palau in the Pacific Ocean between June and November 1944 during the Pacific War. The United States offensive, under the overall command of Chester Nimitz, followed the Gilbert and Marshall Islands campaign and was intended to neutralize Japanese bases in the central Pacific, support the Allied drive to retake the Philippines, and provide bases for a strategic bombing campaign against Japan. The United States invasion force was supported by a massive combat force. The Fifth Fleet was commanded by Vice Admiral Raymond A. Spruance. Task Force 58, commanded by Vice Admiral Marc Mitscher, consisted of 15 carriers, 7 battleships, 11 cruisers, 86 destroyers and over 900 planes. The invasion force, commanded by Vice Admiral Richmond Kelly Turner, consisted of 56 attack transports, 84 landing craft and over 127,000 troops. Beginning the offensive, United States Marine Corps and United States Army forces, with support from the United States Navy, executed landings on Saipan in June 1944. In response, the Imperial Japanese Navy's Combined Fleet sortied to attack the U.S. Navy fleet supporting the landings. In the resulting aircraft carrier Battle of the Philippine Sea (the so-called "Great Marianas Turkey Shoot") on 19–20 June, the Japanese naval forces were decisively defeated with heavy and irreplaceable losses to their carrier-borne and land-based aircraft. U.S. forces executed landings on Saipan in June 1944 and Guam and Tinian in July 1944. After heavy fighting, Saipan was secured in July and Guam and Tinian in August 1944. The U.S. then constructed airfields on Saipan and Tinian where B-29s were based to conduct strategic bombing missions against the Japanese mainland until the end of World War II, including the nuclear attacks on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Condition: Good, Book's name in ink on spine.
Keywords: Marine Corps, WWII, Pacific Theater, Saipan, Guam, Tinian, Amphibious Landings, Beachhead, Military Training, 2nd Marine Division, 3rd Marine Division, 4th Marine Division, Combat Operations, Ushi Airfield, Casualty Statistics
[Book #82009]
Price: $750.00