Fighting on Guadalcanal

Specter-like in the dark gloom of the Bougainville jungle, Marine riflemen slog up to the front lines during the bitter campaign for the tropic stronghold. Drawing, Charcoal and Pastel on Paper by Kerr Eby, 1944. (US Naval History & Heritage Command 88-159-DZ)

Publisher’s Introduction

This is a complete reprint of a small booklet measuring 4½ x 6¾ inches and numbering 75 pages that was originally published by the U.S. War Office and printed by the U.S. Government Printing Office in 1943. This online edition contains every word of the original. Typographical errors have been corrected but sentence structure and grammar have been left as in the original. The illustrations in the text are reproduced from the original and have not been altered. The photographs have been added to this online edition.

This booklet, because of its small “pocket” size, was intended to be carried by individual soldiers for use as a training aid at bases and camps outside of the Combat Zone. It carried the “RESTRICTED” classification and thus was not intended for distribution nor meant to be carried in any Combat Zone.

The original report that this was based on was probably never intended for widespread publication, but was intended to provide those back in the Zone of the Interior an idea of how training could be improved, the need for better or newer weapons and other equipment, and the tactics of the enemy, so that appropriate measures could be taken to, hopefully, correct problems and improve the situation for the men doing the fighting at the front.

There were probably other similar booklets of this type issued during the war. At least one other is known to me, covering the Aleutian campaign, but I have not been able to acquire a copy of it. Should anyone reading this have a copy of the Aleutian booklet or any other similar publications, I would appreciate hearing from you with the view towards obtaining a copy for reprinting.

Ray Merriam

Foreword

To secure the point of view of the fighting men in the Solomon Islands, Lieutenant Colonel Russel P. Reeder, Jr., of the Operations Division of the War Department General Staff, was designated as my personal representative. He reported to Major General Vandegrift, U.S.M.C., and Major General Patch, U. S. Army, on Guadalcanal, and discussed with many officers and soldiers their experiences in jungle fighting against the Japanese.

The stories of these men as told to Colonel Reeder have been printed for your information. The American Marines and Doughboys show us that the Jap is no superman. He is a tricky, vicious, and fanatical fighter. But they are beating him day after day. Theirs is a priceless record of the gallantry and resourcefulness of the American fighting man at his best.

Soldiers and officers alike should read these notes and seek to apply their lessons. We must cash in on the experience which these and other brave men have paid for in blood.

[s] George C. Marshall

Chief of Staff

I desire to thank General Marshall for the message which he has just sent me. I passed this message of congratulations on to my men.

My message to the troops of General Marshall’s in training for this type of warfare is to go back to the tactics of the French and Indian days. This is not meant facetiously. Study their tactics and fit in our modern weapons, and you have a solution. I refer to the tactics and leadership of the days of Roger’s Rangers.

Major General Vandegrift

Commanding General

First Marine Division

Interviews

Gunnery Sergeant H. L. Beards­ley, Company G, Fifth Marines

I been in the Marines sixteen years, and I been in three expeditions to China and five engage­ments since I have been in the Solomons. I will say that this 1942 model recruit we are getting can drink more water than six old timers. We have to stress water discipline all the time. They don’t seem to realize what real water discipline is. We have too many NCO’s in the Marines who are ‘namby-pam­by’ and beat around the bush. Our NCO’s are gradually toughening up and are seeing reasons why they must meet their responsi­bilities. Respectfully speaking, Sir, I think that when officers make a NCO, they should go over in their minds, ‘what kind of NCO will he make in the field.’

Sergeant Major B. Metzger, Fifth Marines

I have just been promoted from First Sergeant. In the fire fighting the Marine First Sergeant helps the Company Com­mander. He checks up on the Company as a whole, even down to checking on the evacu­ation of the wounded. I was available to the Company Commander for any emergency or­ders during the fire fight. Teach your sol­diers, Sir, that when a man is hit in the as­sault to leave him there. Too many of our men suddenly became first-aid men.

Your men have to be rugged and rough, and to win they must learn to disregard politeness and must kill.

Platoon Sergeant H. R. Strong, Company A, Fifth Marines

Some of my men thought their hand grenades were too heavy. They tossed them aside when no one was looking. Later they would have given six month’s pay for one hand grenade.

I hear that in the new jungle kits the men will get water sterilizing tablets. These will help as my men dip water out of streams.

Platoon Sergeant F. T. O’Fara, Company B, Fifth Marines

After the Japs had been located, my pla­toon has gained the element of surprise by moving in fast with bayonets and hand grenades.

In turn, they have surprised us by being in a defensive position on the reverse slope of a ridge. I think the snipers look for BAR men. [Note by Colonel Edson: No doubt about this. In one engagement, in one pla­toon, every BAR man was hit.]

Platoon Sergeant R. A. Zullo, Company C, Fifth Marines

     Sir, I would like to tell you that a man’s keenness or dullness of eye may determine whether or not he will live. Ten men in my platoon were killed because they walked up on a Jap 37-mm gun. I went up later, after the gun had been put out by our mortars, to help bring back the dead. The Japanese gun was so well camouflaged that I got within four feet of the gun before I saw it.

Corporal W. A. McCluskey, Com­pany D, Fifth Marines

Sir, the other day on ‘Bloody Ridge,’ riflemen protecting our light machine guns pulled out and left us. We were doing okay at the time, but their pulling out caused our whole outfit to withdraw. I think men in these rifle companies should receive training in the work and in the mission of the machine gun company. They should be able to act more intelligently.

Second Lieutenant Andrew Chi­sick, Fifth Marines

I think that in the regimental supply there should be extra canteens so when an outfit gets in a place like the ‘table plateau’ where there is no water, an extra canteen of water can be issued. Sir, this would really help our men stay in there. [Note by Colonel Edson: This idea is being used on certain parts of the terrain here. The turn-over in the canteens will be great if this is continued, but it is a big help at times. At one time we had a battalion without water for twenty-four hours and only two men were evacuated by heat ex­haustion—Major Lou Walt was the Battalion Commander.] My flank men in each squad in the advance are responsible to maintain contact with the squad on the right or left. Of course, we have a base squad.

Marine Gunner E. S. Rust, Fifth Marines

I hate to admit it, but it’s the truth; when we got here, a lot of our young men were confused at night. They were not used to jungle at night. They could not use their compasses at night, and we did not have enough compasses.

We have learned that when we get off the beaten trails, it seems to confuse the Japs, and we have better success.

Platoon Sergeant J. C. L. Hol­lingsworth, Company H, Fifth Marines

When we move around on these jungle trails, we have learned to have men at the rear of each platoon who carry light loads so they can get their weapons into action quickly to help overcome ambush fire from the rear.

Put the big rugged men into the heavy weapons company.

Some of our new men were so scared of our hand grenades when they were first is­sued, that they jammed down the cotter pin. Then, later in action they could not pull the pin!

I noticed, and I pointed this out to my pla­toon, that when men get hit, the men close by get to yellin’, ‘Corpsman, Corpsman, Corpsman,’ and they get so excited sometimes that they actually forget to use first-aid packets.

In first-aid training, teach correct use of injecting morphine and procedure of tagging, ’cause what you gonna do when the Corpsman gets hit?

I’d give $75.00 for a pair of tennis shoes to rest my feet and for use in night work. I have only been in the Marine Corps four years, but I have learned that you have got to develop a sense of responsibility in the men wearing chevrons.

In action we have had unauthorized per­sons yelling, ‘Cease firing,’ or ‘Commence firing.’ This caused confusion.

Platoon Sergeant George E. Aho, Company F, Fifth Marines

I put five years in the U.S. Army before joining the Marine Corps. Sir, I like the Marines better than the Army because the average Marine officer is closer to his men than the average Army officer whom I ob­served. We have comradeship in the Marine Corps. Also, the Marine enlisted men are more Spartan-like. I believe, Sir, we baby our soldiers too much in peacetime. I hope we are not doing this now. [I asked Colonel Edson what kind of NCO Sergeant Aho was, and he told me he was one of the outstanding men in his Regiment, and that he was a very rugged individual.]

In our training for this jungle warfare we had a great deal of work in hand-to-hand individual combat, use of knife, jiu-jitsu, etc. With the exception of bayonet fighting we have not used this work. I have been in many battles since I hit this island and I have never seen anyone use it.

Bring back the signal flags; needed badly.

Sir, tell the Army to get the knee mor­tar. It’s hell.

Sir, every man should have a watch.

We could use pack artillery here.

Our Battalion Commander, Major Walt, wants every last man in our Battalion to know as much as he does about the situation. It pays.

Get rid of the gold-bricks. It’s better to be short-handed having good men around than having a lot of undependables.

Corporal J. S. Stankus, Company E, Fifth Marines

Unnecessary firing gives your position away, and when you give your position away here, you pay for it.

It’s helpful in using the field glass in this tropical sun to cup your hand over the front end in order to keep out the glare.

The men in my squad fire low at the base of the trees. There is too much high firing going on. I have observed the Japs often get short of ammunition. They cut bamboo and crack it together to simulate rifle fire to draw our fire. They ain’t supermen; they’re just tricky bastards.

Put ‘bug dope’ in your jungle equipment.

A palmetto log looks sturdy for use in machine gun emplacements and dugouts, but it is spongy and rots. I have seen it collapse and pin the gun. It is better to use the hard wood.

Second Lieutenant H. M. Davis, Fifth Marines

[Promoted on the field of battle.]

Travel light. For example, to hell with the mess equipment! We used our mess cup and spoon for the first fifteen days here and en­joyed our chow. You don’t have to live like a gentleman in jungle warfare. Our mess equipment is too bulky for this type of war­fare and makes noise.

Not every man can lead a battalion. Find out who can lead your battalions before you go into the combat areas. [Remark by Colonel Edson: I would like to concur in that state­ment.]

We learned from the Nips to make the ‘stand-up covered Japanese spider hole.’ [Camouflaged American foxhole.]

In defense in the dense jungle sometimes you make a line—then, on other types of ter­rain you make strongpoints.

In an advance in a jungle it is hard for a platoon leader to keep control of his men. Corporals and their men must be taught to act individually.

Platoon Sergeant C. M. Feagin, Company I, Fifth Marines

We are learning the hard way to move quietly in this jungle.

I have been fired at many times by snipers and haven’t seen one yet.

The sabers which the Japanese officers carry have proved to be worthless. I killed two Japs who came at me with sabers and I got them first by shooting them. But, I wished I had ‘in reserve’ a good jungle knife. I don’t mean a bolo, which we should have for cutting trails, but a knife with a 12-inch blade of good steel. We could use this against these Japs as well as cutting vines that catch on us at night.” [Note: Many men expressed their wish for a jungle knife such as described here. This desire is being omitted in further remarks to avoid repeti­tion.]

Motor Section Sergeant T. E. Rumbley, Company I, Fifth Marines

Our 60-mm mortars are fine weapons if you have observers who know their stuff. The mortar was not stressed enough in our train­ing. I love our mortar.

If the numbers on the mortar sight were luminous, with a luminous strip on the stick, we would not have to use the flashlight. This flashlight business is dangerous.

Corporal Fred Carter, Company I, Fifth Marines

On the Matanikau River we got to firing at each other because of careless leadership by the junior leaders. We are curing our­selves of promiscuous firing, but I should think new units would get training to make the men careful.

We learned not to fire unless we had some­thing to shoot at. Doing otherwise discloses your position and wastes ammunition.

Sergeant Dietrich of Company I, of our Regiment, recently used his head. One night when the Japs advanced, a Jap jumped into Sergeant Dietrich’s foxhole. Sergeant Dietrich pulled the pin of a hand grenade and jumped out. There was a hell of an explosion and one less Nip.

I have been charged twice by the Japs in bayonet charge. Our Marines can out-bayo­net fight them and I know our Army men will do the same. [Note by Colonel Edson: Inci­dentally, in the last push we executed three bayo­net charges.]

A Japanese trick to draw our fire was for the hidden Jap to work his bolt back and forth. Men who got sucked in on this and fired without seeing what they were firing at, generally drew automatic fire from another direction.

Every scout should be taught to look in the trees. I was a scout and got shot in the shoulder by a Jap in a tree. I look in the trees now.

We take turns being scouts; so, all should be trained as scouts.

Sergeant O. J. Marion, Company L, Fifth Marines. A Platoon Guide

You crawl in the advance—unless you are to charge and make it. The reason for this is that all men hit are hit from the knees up, except for ricochets. We have crawled up to within 25 yards of a machine gun fir­ing over our backs. The Japs don’t depress their machine guns. [Note by Colonel Edson: I saw men of Company L doing this.]

Men get killed rushing to help a wounded man. If the wounded man would crawl about ten yards to his flank, he can generally be aided in safety, as the Japs seem to fire down lanes in the jungle. [Remark by Colonel Edson: We have taught our men that the best way to aid a wounded man is to push ahead so that the wounded man can be cared for by the Corpsmen.]

The men have to be trained individually, for when the fire-fight starts, the Corporal can’t see all of his men and further, when the order for attack is given, any number of men are unable to see the man on his right or left. So you see, Sir, it takes guts for men to get up and move forward when the signal is given. The men have to depend on one another and have confidence in each other.

I was in one advance when the Japs let us come through and then rose up out of covered fox holes and shot us in the back. The best cure for that is a rear guard look­ing towards the rear.

Corporal E. J. Byrne, Company L, Fifth Marines

Get used to weird noises at night. This jungle is not still at night. The land crabs and lizards make a hell of a noise rustling on leaves. And there is a bird here that sounds like a man banging two blocks of wood together. There is another bird that makes a noise like a dog barking. I thought, Sir, this might give you an idea for your training.

Corporal F. R. McAllan, Company L, Fifth Marines

Sometimes the information doesn’t get down to us and then we are really in the dark. When we get the orders and informa­tion we can get in there and pitch better.

My platoon is the best one in the com­pany because we are like a baseball team. Our Lieutenant is like the Captain of the team. He is close to us and we like him and yet respect him. We have a wonderful platoon. I am not bragging. That’s a fact! [Note: When I read this to Colonel Edson at the end of the day, he was so delighted that he sent a runner to find out who Corporal McAllan’s platoon leader was.]

Some men used to lag behind in the ad­vance. They have finally learned to keep up as lagging is unsafe for all.

This BAR I have here is my best friend.

Colonel Merritt A. Edson, Com­manding Officer, Fifth Marines

[Colo­nel Edson was a Battalion Commander of the Raider Battalion. He was given the Fifth Marine Regiment and has made it into one of General Vande­grift’s best regiments. He is an out­standing leader and has been recom­mended by General Vandegrift for the Medal of Honor.]

If I had to train my regiment over again, I would stress small group training and the training of the individual even more than we did when we were in training.

There must be training in difficult obser­vation, which is needed for the offense. It is my observation that only five percent of the men can really see while observing.

The offensive is the most difficult to sup­port, as you cannot tell exactly where your troops are.

Whether the Japs will continue to fight as they do now, I don’t know. They defend on the low ground in the jungle. They dig standing trenches, extremely well camou­flaged.

We need the rifle grenade, or a weapon to fill the gap between hand grenade and the mortar. We need to dig the Nip out of his hole under Banyan trees, etc.

We need the knee mortar badly. The name “knee mortar” is a misnomer. It is not fired from the knee. One of my men tried this and broke his leg. The following are reasons in its favor:

It is a one-man load.

A man can carry ten rounds on his person besides his weapon.

It has a high rate of fire.

It gives to the Platoon Commander a weapon of this type which is immediately available to him.

This mortar uses the Jap all-purpose hand grenade—ranges 50 yards to 650, I be­lieve.

The Japs have three of these mortars in a Mortar Squad in each Rifle Platoon. They have two ammunition carriers per mor­tar. It can be lowered to a low angle and placed against a log and shot straight out further than a hand grenade.

I would recommend one change in the projectile. The Japs have too much high ex­plosive in the projectile and the case is too thin. We get a lot of casualties from it, but they are minor wounds.

I recommend substituting the M1919A4 (the light machine gun) for the heavy ma­chine gun for offensive operation in the jungle. The heavy machine guns are needed and are very valuable in the defense. I am even considering substituting BAR’s for the light machine guns in the offensive.

I think that the Battalion Heavy Weap­ons Company should have the 60-mm mortar to use in addition to the 81-mm mortar. I like the 81 but it cannot keep up in certain situations because of its weight and its heavy ammunition.

I think that in each of our squads there should be two BAR’s instead of one.

I suggest that you have maneuvers with ball ammunition where possible, even if you get a few casualties.

The tendency is to overload the infantry­men with ammunition. It seems to be the standard practice to start out with a belt full plus two bandoleers. We soon found out that 25 rounds was enough for two or three days if you do not have targets to shoot at. [Note: Our infantrymen approaching Buna in the jungles of New Guinea were carrying forty rounds.]

Two ammunition pockets in the belt should be converted to grenade pockets. Each man should have two hand grenades. If you don’t do that, develop slip-open pockets, which can be quickly opened and which will carry two hand grenades.

Our Marine field shoes have too heavy a ‘top’ which chafes. It should have a type of hob-nail as it slips on the jungle grasses. Rubber shoes are needed for night work.

Our basic training is all right. Empha­size scouting and patrolling and really learn it and apply it. In your training put your time and emphasis on the squad and platoon rather than on the company, battalion and regiment.

Your principle of the Command Post up and to the front is certainly true here.

In your scouting and patrolling, and your ‘training in patience’ (which you should have) have the men work against each other. Same thing for squads and platoons in their problems.

We should develop better snipers. The Japanese snipers are really annoying. All commanders, up to include the regiment, must realize you cannot clear out all the snipers before you advance. Some will be left, but they won’t be particularly effective. Annoying, yes. You can get these snipers by small groups from the reserves. Some Japanese snipers, which were by-passed in the attack, hid for two or three days and then quit. Some will hang around inside your lines for a month.

The Japanese night attacks, of course, have limited objectives; and sometimes with­drawing after dark as much as fifty yards will fool them and they won’t know where you are.

The ‘smoking lamp’ goes out at dark and you have got to be quiet.

In the Raiders we adopted the custom of dropping all rank and titles. We used nick­names for the officers. All ranks use these nicknames for us. We did this because the Nips caught onto the names of the officers and would yell or speak in the night, “This is Captain Joe Smith talking. A Company withdraw to the next hill.” So we adopted nicknames as code words. Captain Walt be­came ‘Silent Lou.’ My nickname was ‘Red Mike.’ An example of the use of these nicknames as code words is: One night the Japs put down smoke and they yelled ‘gas.’ We were green at that time and two of our Companies withdrew leaving A Company exposed on its two flanks. In this instance I was a Battalion Commander. Captain Walt called me on the voice radio to inform me of the situation. He was cautious and used the nickname as follows: He said, “Who is speaking?” and I said, “Red.” He said, “What name do you identify with ‘Silent’?” I said, “Lou.” He said, “That is correct.” So, we both know that we were talking to each other and were not talking to the enemy. He explained the situation to me. At the end of his conversation, a voice broke in and said in perfect English, “Our situa­tion here, Colonel Edson, is excellent. Thank you, Sir.” This was the enemy speaking.

A value of night training is that it lets men learn the normal noises of the woods at night. Woods are not silent at night.

The Japanese is no superman. He has the same limitations that we have. They have the advantage of experience. With proper training, our Americans are better, as our people can think better as individuals. En­courage your individuals and bring them out.

Discontinue the use of tracers for night firing. They give away your position.

Both our riflemen and machine gunners must be taught to shoot low.

This leadership business resolves itself down to being hardboiled. By that I mean getting rid of the poor leader, even if you like him personally, because this is a life and death affair. This goes right on down to the non-coms.

At Tulagi the Japanese used wooden bul­lets. I saw some of these wooden bullets. My theory for their use is that they were developed for troops which were to infiltrate behind our lines and shoot us in the back. These wooden bullets could not carry far enough to injure their attacking troops.

[Note: Colonel Edson asked me at the end of the day to read back to him what each man had said when he was interviewed. Notes by Colonel Edson which appear, were made after the men had been interviewed.]

Major Lou Walt, Commanding Officer, 2nd Battalion, Fifth Marines

[Note: Colonel Edson told me that Major Walt was one of his best leaders, and one of the best men he has ever seen in action. Major Walt is a young man of about 35 years of age. He is extremely rugged and looks like a fullback on a football team. I talked to him over twenty minutes before I was able to make a single original note as his ideas seem to echo Colonel Edson’s.]

I can report officially to you that we had nine men killed in one company in the last as­sault! Four of these men were killed by a wounded sniper who had three holes in him. He was laying in thick brush 15 yards from my command post. He was camouflaged and had been passed over for dead. You have to KILL to put them out. They attack in bunches, shoulder to shoulder. An example: we were on the Matanikau River. [See Figure 1.] Our Companies were at half-strength. This was a Raider Battalion plus two companies of the 3^rd Battalion, Fifth Marines. The Japa­nese beachhead was a thick jungle with camouflaged standing-type fox holes. They had with them in their beachhead six heavy machine guns and eight light machine guns which we captured in this action.

Figure 1

At 6:30 p.m. they smoked our two right companies, and when the smoke had en­veloped these two companies, they broke out.

They came out in a mass formation, twenty abreast, yelling, bayonets fixed, automatic weapons working, rear ranks throwing hand grenades [heavy arrow in the above sketch shows the Japanese route]. They were try­ing to escape to the sand spit at the mouth of the river in order to cross the river to get back. Our right front company had just completed a double-apron barbed-wire fence. When the Japanese hit the left flank of the right company, they killed nine out of the first eleven men they met. Then they hit the barbed­ wire. Two of our heavy machine guns opened up, shooting down along this barbed­ wire fence and dispersed their attack. It got dark—quickly like it does here. There was smoke, Japs and Marines all mixed up. Three Jap officers were swinging their two-­hand swords. There was hand-to-hand fight­ing all night long. We mopped them up at daybreak. We killed seventy-eight Japs. They killed twelve Marines and wounded twenty-six of us.

The Jap has a great deal of respect for our hand grenade, and it is a valuable weapon to us. Do you ever practice throwing it in wooded country?

The Jap is not an individual fighter. He won’t fight with a bayonet unless backed up with a dozen other Japs.

Here is something that I know the Army teaches, Sir, but I would like to say it, as we really believe in it here, and that is don’t put troops in a skirmish line until actual physical contact is made. Keep ’em in squad columns, with two scouts in front of each squad. Sometimes making files between the columns.

As in the Basic Field Manual, each man should know the objective. I make my Platoon Leader designate an objective every 100 yards in the jungle, and they work to it and reorganize. They don’t push off for the next objective until they get word from the Company Commander. This method, we have found, insures control.

I control my companies exactly the same way. I set up objectives for each company. When the companies reach their objective, they report. After the reorganization, we go ahead.

I think reserves in the attack should be kept up close so that they can be committed immediately. The Reserve Company Com­mander continually reconnoiters the ground and is ready to commit his company at once when ordered to do so. If the Reserve Com­pany is not on its toes and has to take time out for reconnaissance, this may delay them to such an extent that their effort may be useless—the situation may change if they cannot act at once. I keep my best Company Commander in reserve.

In the attack we always use the telephones from Regiment to the Battalion. The jungle is thick, but the wire can be made to keep up. The wire is supplemented by the TBX radio. If we get held up, the wire goes right out to the companies from the Battalion.

Platoon Sergeant C. C. Arndt, H & S Company, Fifth Marines

Chief Scout for the Regimental Intelligence Section. [Note: When Colonel Edson sent for his best fighters, he did not include Platoon Sergeant Arndt. After I got through talking to these men, two of them came up to me and said, “Sir, you did not see Sergeant Arndt. He has been on more patrols and does more scouting than any man in the Regiment. Could we get him for you, Sir?”]

I practice walking quietly over rocks, twigs, grass, leaves, through vines, etc. I practice this around this bivouac area. I received instructions in scouting and patrol­ling at Quantico, but I still practice this around here in the bivouac area. I believe because I practice this is the reason I am still alive. Some of the other NCO’s laughed at me because I am always seeing how quietly I can walk around and because I go out and practice on my own. But they have stopped laughing because I have been on more patrols than any man in the Regi­ment, and I am still alive.

When I am scouting and come to an opening in the jungle, and have to cross it, I generally run across quickly and quietly. Going slow here may cost a scout his life. Different types of terrain calls for different methods.

Here is the way Japs patrol. I was out on the bank of the river with another man. We were observing and were carefully cam­ouflaged. We heard a little sound and then saw two Japs crawl by about seven feet away from us. These Japs were unarmed. We started to shoot them, but did not do so as we remembered our mission. Then, fifteen yards later came eight armed Japs. They were walk­ing slowly and carefully. We did not shoot as our mission was to gain information. When I got back, we had a lot of discussion as to why the two Japs in front were not armed. Some of the fellows said maybe it was a form of Japanese company punish­ment. I believe they were the point of the patrol and were unarmed so they could crawl better.

You can tell Jap troops in the distance by their short, choppy step. [Remark by Colonel Edson: This is true and we think the reason for their short, choppy stride is be­cause they wear wooden shoes in Japan.]

Colonel DeMuth, Division Artillery Commander, Americal Division

The tactics and technique of our artillery fire as taught by the Field Artillery School at Fort Sill are okay, and are good here on Guadalcanal.

However, we have learned we have to fire 360 degrees here. Also due to the way these Japs crawl around in the jungle, we have to pay more attention to the local security around our positions.

Colonel Amor Le R. Sims, Command­ing Officer, Seventh Marines, 1^st Marine Division

Is the Army stripping down to essentials in equipment?

Teach not to waste ammunition. Learn to make every shot count.

Don’t spare your artillery. Make the most of it. Every time you get enough information, even if the target is not profitable, get artillery fire on it. They hate it.

Try to get the Japs on the move; keep bouncing them around; don’t let them get set. When you let them get set, they are hard to get out. We have had a great deal of suc­cess with the 81-mm mortar and with artillery fire. Here is an example [Figure 2]:

Figure 2.

We have the Japs surrounded with their backs to the river. The three Battalions were in close contact with the enemy. It was obvious that we had a large number of Japs sur­rounded and that the best way to get them out was to place field artillery and 81-mm fire on them. However, the problem was to put this fire on the enemy and not on our own troops. The movement which we executed was carefully coordinated with the artillery and with the mortars. Each Battalion, at a cer­tain time, was to withdraw just before the firing was due to start. We were very care­ful to explain to the men what we were doing so that they would not get a mistaken idea of the order for withdrawing. The maneuver was successful. Over five hundred Japs were killed in this action. We had forty-four Marines killed and sixty-three wounded. Our men were not hurt by the artillery and mortar fire, of course, but were killed and wounded in the fighting which took place before the withdrawal. After the firing ceased, we went in and mopped up in hand-to-hand fighting.

Our Battalion Commanders in the Seventh Marines know that in reporting in­formation at once and, if they need help to ask for it and not just try to bull things through that they are enabling Regiments to act as a team, in the right manner and in the right direction.

I have a wonderful S-2 Section in this Regiment. I have been working on this S-2 Section for over two years. I have been putting my best men in this 2 Section, and it has paid me. We insisted that the Battalions have good 2 Sections. You cannot do any better than your information.

Concentrate on communications. We de­pend to a large extent on wire communications. It is tough work, but it can be done. I have had to loan the Communications Re­gimental Section men to help carry wire through tough places, but I want communica­tions. Your information has to be timely and properly evaluated.

A Regimental Commander cannot be im­patient. Don’t push your Battalion Com­manders unless you feel there is a reluctance on their part.

Our great leader, General Vandegrift, gives me a job and lets me handle the situa­tion with a regiment in my own way. He is not impatient with me. Impatience would ruin the best plans. A mapped plan may not turn out to be feasible. So, we have learned here not to be impatient.

The forward observer of the artillery has furnished me with valuable information. Our system is to put the Artillery Observer Group with each battalion and keep the Artil­lery Liaison Officer with the Regiment.

Are you teaching your Regimental Com­manders to understand how to use artillery?

It has been impressed upon us here that logistics have to be correctly planned. The science of logistics turns out to be your life. In this Regiment, I have a fine forceful Exe­cutive Officer, Lieutenant Colonel Frisbee. I use the Executive Officer in the rear echelon seeing that the S-4 functions and that supplies get up. Don’t misunderstand me. The Execu­tive Officer lets the S-4 run his job. He checks and aids him if he needs help.

Here is a thought I would like to leave with the Regimental Commanders. Pick your officers for common sense. Basic Field Manual knowledge is fine, but it is useless without common sense. Common sense is of greater value than all the words in the book. I am two deep in my battalions in regard to Battalion Commanding Officers. That is, each one of my Battalion Executive Officers is a potential Battalion Commander. The reason for this is if the Battalion Com­mander gets killed or sick, I won’t be caught out on a limb. My Battalion Commanders use their Executive Officers in the same way I use my Regimental Officers. I back up my Executive Officer. I never see a Battalion Commander or a Staff Officer about admin­istration unless they see the Executive Officer first. My Executive Officer and I are a team. He is responsible to see that my poli­cies are carried out.

I make my Staff Officers get out of this command post—not to snoop on the troops, but to help the battalions and acquaint themselves with the general situation. Insist on night train­ing, but don’t train day and night. If I were training my Regiment again, working seven days a week, I would train three nights and four days.

Our orders to our Marines, on the per­imeter defense are, “You stay on your posi­tion and do not pull back: If they bust through you, we’ll plug up the hole, but you stay there.”

Our Battalion Commanders have learned not to pull a company out of action to use it elsewhere. For example [Figure 3]:

Figure 3

If a company is needed at point ‘X’ don’t send companies who have been committed at ‘B,’ ‘C,’ or ‘D.’ Send another company from somewhere else. If you make the mis­take of ‘milling around,’ as we call it, you will expend men’s lives. It is always ex­pensive. I have never seen it to fail to cost two times as much as the original commit­ment.

This Regiment can out-yell the Japs, out­fight them, out-bayonet them, and out-shoot them. This yelling, as in hand-to-hand ac­tion, is important. It is like a football team that talks it up.

The Japs yell at us, “Marines, we’re gonna keel you! More blood for the Emperor!” The Marines yell back, “You ----. We’ll kill you Japs. More blood for Franklin!”

The Regimental Commander must make it his personal duty to watch and be greatly interested in sanitation. Because of our great interest in sanitation, our sick list is lower than normal. Our sick list runs lower than forty men per battalion.

Lieutenant Colonel L. B. Puller, Commanding Officer, 1^st Battalion, 7^th Regiment,  First Marine Division

[Note: Lieutenant Colonel Puller is being recommended by General Vandegrift for the Medal of Honor for leading his Battalion, with seven holes in him, continually for twenty-four hours. I met him on the day he came out of the hos­pital. Lieutenant Colonel Puller had considerable experience in jungle warfare in Haiti.]

In handling my companies I take the Company Commander’s word for what is go­ing on. You have to do this to get anywhere. In order to get a true picture of what is going on in this heavy country, I make my staff get up where the fighting is. This Command Post business will ruin the American Army—and Marines—if it isn’t watched. Hell, our platoons and squads would like the command post in the attack if they are not watched! As soon as you set up a Command Post, all forward movement stops.

The ‘walky-talky’ the Japs have operates. Why can’t we have a similar one?

To hell with the telephone wire with advancing troops. We can’t carry enough wire. We received an order. “The advance will stop until the wire gets in.” This is backwards!

The staffs are twice as large as they should be. The Regimental staff is too large. I have five staff officers in the Battalion and I could get along with less. The officers have to dress and look like the men. One time the Commandant of the Marine Corps asked me why our patrols failed in Haiti. I replied, “Because of the officers’ bedding roll.” In Haiti at that time the officer had to have a pack mule, and the enlisted men saw the officers lying around in luxury, etc. The patrols were actually held up for this pack mule. Your leaders have to be up front. Those that won’t get up there, and are not in physical shape to keep up with the men, will cause plans to fail.

It is okay to say that an outfit cannot be surprised, but it is bound to happen in this type of warfare; so, therefore, your outfits must know what to do when ambushed.

Calling back Commanding Officers to Battalion and Regimental command posts to say, “How are things going?” is awful.

My Battalion moving through jungle country, acting alone, operates as follows [see Figure 4]:

Figure 4.

A platoon of D Company is attached to each rifle company because of the heavy country. C Company watches the rear. Each company is responsible for its flank. This is a time-tested and proven formation which works. If attacked from a flank, face and adjust.

In marching or in camp, we have learned here that you must have an all-around de­fense.

We need more entrenching shovels. Give shovels to men who have wire cutters. You need both the wire cutter and shovels.

I wish we had the M1 rifle, and when we get relieved from Guadalcanal, I am going to make every effort to get it.

I consider it imperative that the Army and Marines be equipped with knee mortars and only carry one type grenade. Have the hand grenade fit in the knee mortar and be of use as a hand grenade and also as a rifle grenade. You need a rifle grenadier in each squad for use against enemy machine gun nests.

The following is the result of a conference with five of the best NCO’s in the First Bat­talion of the Seventh Marines. These NCO’s were selected by Lieutenant Colonel Puller:

The Japanese fire is not always aimed. It is harassing fire and scares recruits. Get the recruits so they are used to overhead fire. Japs who have infiltrated signal to each other with their rifles by the number of shots. We get these birds by constant patrolling.

The snipers tie their guns in the trees so they can’t drop it carelessly or if wounded. In putting their light machine guns in the trees, they lash them in and have relief men ready to go up the tree.

Their machine guns don’t traverse and search.

A Jap trick:

Figure 5.

The mortar men thought they were safe. The Japanese let them fire two or three rounds. They cracked down, killed three and wounded two.

The rifle grenade demoralizes the Jap. A Japanese prisoner told me in English, “That .30 caliber cannon is terrible, Sir.” The Jap­anese sew grass and leaves to their shirts and hats.

They hit hell out of our points. They don’t wait until they could get more men. They seek to delay us. When the point goes down, teach men to get behind big trees, if close, but not behind saplings.

If you shoot their officers, they mill around. Their NCO’s are poor. You can tell they are officers by their sabers and leather puttees.

A lot of these Japs who infiltrate have radios. Think of this advantage in respect to artillery, mortar fire, location of troops, etc.

My platoon found nine Japs slipping behind our lines. [Note by Lieutenant Colonel Frisbee, Regi­mental Executive Officer: We have killed thirty-eight Japs behind our lines during the period of 7 August 1942 to 29 November 1942.]

Their outpost at times is in trees. I saw one tree which was rotten inside. The Jap­anese had a light machine gun and gunner down inside, and they had built a trap door on our side. Every once in a while the door would open, and they would poke the machine gun out and fire. We took care of this.

When we cease firing, they cease firing. When we fire, they open up. They do this to conceal their positions.

Lieutenant Sheppard, Seventh Ma­rines

[Promoted on the field of battle.]

Sir, how about training in the field with short rations? Put your patrols out from three to five days; every officer in the outfit to par­ticipate. If I were Commanding General of a training base, all people who missed one-third of the training would drop back to the next unit. I believe that the units should have a minimum of ninety days’ training in jungle warfare. I would stress in this train­ing teamwork between the leaders in all units. Liaison between support plans and all leaders. Liaison between artillery and infantry.

If I were training my unit again, I would really have some high-class patrol training. I would do everything with these patrols I could possibly think of to include losing them and making them go across coun­try without maps or compasses.

The Japanese do a lot of yelling at times, and at other times are deadly silent. One night some Japanese got in our marching column. We discovered them and bayoneted them.

At another time, I, myself heard a Japa­nese yell in good English, “K Company, forward!”

The Japs don’t like our men yelling back at them.

Master Gunnery Sergeant R. M. Fowle, Seventh Marines, First Ma­rine Division

[Note: Master Gunnery Sergeant Fowle has had twenty-four years service in the U. S. Marines.]

Sir, the first thing I would like to say is that this Japanese sniper business has been over-emphasized. They talked and talked to us about the Japanese snipers and made these young men of mine jittery. You can’t see the sniper anyhow until you start to attack, and as his fire, until the attack starts, is very inaccurate, there is no use to worry. I think this sniper business should be debunked. They hide under Banyan trees and just poke their muzzle through a hole and fire in­discriminately. When the attack starts, they will come out. Those you bypass in the at­tack must be mopped up later.

We learned not to get excited or go off half-cocked where there is noise. The Jap­anese make noise to mislead us. They shot off some fire crackers at the start, but we have learned that where the noise is, he ain’t. You never hear him move. He sleeps in the daytime and does his work at night.

It must be impressed and drilled into young soldiers not to throw away their equip­ment. Our young men did this at first, and we regretted it, as later we needed the equip­ment. We actually found some of our new equipment, which had been thrown away, in the hands of the enemy.

Some of our men got killed because they examined Jap mortar shells. There were hundreds of these shot at us which turned out to be duds. The recruits pushed the plungers. Result—instant death.

Officers and NCO’s, during shelling, should move around and talk to the men. Quiet them down. If you don’t do this, some of them will walk around with their fingers on their triggers and they get to imagining things. And along this line, we learned to post double sentinels—one man to quiet an­other.

We learned to dig small covered fox holes. Slit trenches are best. We had men smother­ed to death in too large holes. Don’t put more than three men in any hole unless the hole has a support on top big enough to stop a 500 pound bomb.

Teach the young fellows to look over the ground and look in the trees and to learn where the enemy probably will be. The Japs will be in the toughest places and naturally on the best ground.

All my time in the Marines I have seen men bunch up, and I have talked about this and make my NCO’s talk about this all the time. The men seem to fear separation.

The Basic Field Manuals state that a mortar round must not be opened until the round is ready to be fired. This, in my opinion, is imprac­tical during battle, because to deliver a large volume of fire, you have to have hundreds of rounds opened and prepared for firing. Some of the containers for the mortar rounds get wet and have to be cut in order to get the round out. This takes up time. On occasion, it takes the entire ammunition squad and all available hands to cut open ammunition. Result may be, when “Cease firing” is given you have numerous rounds open. These rounds, when exposed to the atmosphere, become wet or damp, making them dangerous to fire at a later time, be­cause the increments won’t burn uniformly and the round falls short. We have had a round fall as great as 600 yards short of de­livery, firing at a range of 2,700. I recom­mend that additional increments be issued in waterproof containers in order to remedy this condition. Also we need additional cartridges for misfires.

The Japs are man-monkeys, and they run around considerable. In order to compete with these man-monkeys from Japan, you got to be in excellent shape and you got to be tough. We can lick them and we are doing it all the time, Sir.

I have seen some awful attempts at in­dividual cooking. However, some of my men have got to the point where they can make jam tarts.

Sanitation—I know it’s right! To vio­late it causes billions of flies and sickness. Some lousy undisciplined recruits defecated in foxholes, which caused trouble in the dark. We learned that individual cans should be buried. Some of the recruits threw the empty cans in the creek. Then, I heard that the next battalion came along and went in swimming and cut their feet. When you occupy a position for several days in the tropics, the sanitation problem becomes tre­mendous. The young officers and NCO’s must get after this at the start and keep after it all the time.

Lieutenant Colonel Frisbee, Executive Officer, Seventh Marines

I hope the Army is being toughened up. We toughened up by bivouacking—not camp­ing—at the combat ranges. We lived at these combat ranges. In order to teach our platoons to keep off the road, we made the platoons march in the fields alongside the road when they moved from one combat area to another.

We insist on overhead cover for foxholes because of the Japanese mortar fire. In do­ing this you have to guard against the men building these foxholes up too high above the level of the ground.

The other day we received a peculiar order which we carried out, but in which I did not believe. We were ordered to estab­lish Platoon listening posts. In my opinion I thought this was in error, as the listening post should either be a squad or a company. The platoon was no good, as it was not strong enough.

Try to teach your men not to steal from each other and adjacent units. If you could do this, you will save yourself a lot of trouble.

Lieutenant Colonel N. H. Hanne­kan, Commanding Officer, 2^nd Battalion, Seventh Ma­rines

[Medal of Honor man in Haiti.]

It pays in the attack in the jungle to use the heavy machine guns. There is a difference of opinion, as you have noticed, on this matter. It’s hard work, yes, but don’t over­look the value—morale and otherwise—and don’t forget about the high rate of fire. If you ditch the heavy machine guns and sub­stitute the lights in their place, you must re­member that you will be up against the Jap­anese machine gun.

Give more attention to the training of the 81-mm mortars, and the coordination of these weapons with the foot troops. We were too slow in getting the 81 into action when they were needed. Get ’em into action fast.

Be careful about withdrawing the men unless all the men know what it is about. If you don’t do this, you are liable to make the men panicky.

Now this next idea may sound strange to someone who may read your notes in an office far away, but it is a very practical means of controlling a march on a winding trail in this hot country. Marches here in the tropical jungle, where the air is hot and so steamy that there seems to be no air, takes a lot out of the men. The weak ones will say, when the march gets tough, “Hold it up!” As a result this will be passed on up to the front and the column will stop when you don’t want it to. So, as a result, we use the letter ‘H’ plus a numeral meaning to halt. The leaders and the point know what numeral we will use, and we change the numeral. For ex­ample we will use ‘H2’ the first two hours; then ‘H7,’ etc.

We had an Army company of the Infantry attached to my Battalion. They had heard so much about the Japs they were scared to death. Some of these men were sent out on a patrol and while on this patrol two were killed and three were wounded. Those not killed or wounded were in a terrible state of mind. They must learn to grit their teeth and bear it, and that we can and are beating the Japs. The Captain of this company was scared, too. They had the wrong attitude.

I am screaming for gloves to use in han­dling barbed wire. You cannot put up a barbed wire fence in a hurry if you are bare-­handed.

You must realize that there is such a thing as not attacking when ordered to do so. We have got to get to the point where the men go ahead when ordered, and damn the hindmost. Corporals must be indoctrinated with leadership to overcome this, and all ranks have got to have the ‘hate.’

We had a sad accident the other day. A man hung a hand grenade on a bandoleer. A vine pulled the pin—two men were killed. Empty bandoleers are okay in which to place hand grenades. We have had hand grenades left around at night. Then a company, we will say, gets an order to move and hand grenades are lost.

We did not start taking quinine and atabrine soon enough when we hit Guadalcanal. We are paying for this now.

Conference with three second Lieutenants and five old NCO’s of the 2^nd Battalion, Sev­enth Marines

The basic principle of leadership in the U.S. Marine Corps is that the individual is told of his responsibility in different situa­tions and is held to it.

You gotta have confidence in each other. When signals to move forward are given, you must have confidence that the men next to you will move forward even if you can­not see them. We have that kind of confi­dence in this Battalion.

We have developed signals in our Bat­talion which are not recorded in any text book. I recommend that your troops do the same.

One night when we had a position on a steep ridge, the Japs attacked up the ridge. We pulled the pins of hand grenades and let them roll down hill. Don’t forget to count ‘one Jap dead, two Japs dead’ before throw­ing the grenade. We had a Marine killed in this Battalion because he forgot to count, and a Jap picked up the hand grenade and threw it back.

We love the heavy machine gun.

The Thompson submachine gun or car­bine is needed, as they execute their attacks en masse. We understand the carbine will have more penetrating power than the Thompson.

We have two American Indians we use as ‘talkers’ on the telephone or voice radio when we want to transmit secret or important mes­sages.

Don’t forget the Japs make noise when they move, too. They are not supermen.

Be mean and kill ’em. Kill ’em dead. Our motto in this Platoon is “No prisoners.”

Second Lieutenant D. A. Clark, Seventh Marines

[Promoted on the field of battle—this officer was interviewed in the hospital where he was recuperating from wounds.]

We have a lot of trouble in my Platoon with water discipline. We also have trouble with men bunching up in order to talk to each other. They seem to do this even though it means death.

We have learned to make reconnaissance before moving into an area. We scout for ambushes. We have learned to be quiet, listen and look. I sure like to see that artillery come down on an area before we move into it.

The big problem which we have not solved completely yet to my mind is maintaining contact in the attack between units in this jungle, especially between battalions.

It takes guts to go up on the Japanese position to throw grenades and to attack.

This reconnaissance, which is so important, is also hard work because the Japs move their defensive positions.

I was on my first patrol here, and we were moving up a dry stream bed. We saw three Japs come down the river bed out of the jungle. The one in front was carrying a white flag. We thought they were surrendering. When they got up to us, they dropped the white flag and then all three threw hand grenades. We killed two of these Japs, but one got away. Ap­parently they do not mind a sacrifice in order to get information. They are tricky bas­tards.

The mortars are very effective here. An example: We were moving up a trail. We were stopped by machine gun fire. I with­drew the platoon and spread out off the trail, forming a skirmish line. I sent word back to the mortars to set up. They had to cut down some trees in order to set up properly. The observation post man comes forward and gets the azimuth and paces off the range as best he can. Then the mortars open up.

Major Buse, Assistant G-3 On General Vandegrift’s Staff

We have had to multiply our unit of fire in hand grenades by five. The yellow color on hand grenades is poor. Why can’t they be painted black, as the yellow color enables the Japs to throw them back. When we have taken a defensive position, as we have now to protect the airfield, due to the dense jungle we do not take up a formation which we would use on more open terrain, like the ter­rain in the States. That is, here we generally do not establish strongpoints. We have a shoulder-to-shoulder defense with mobile re­serves in the rear.

I am being sent back for a rest. We have been in action continually here from 7 August 1942, until this date—26 November 1942. What we all marvel at is how General Van­degrift can stand it so much better than we do. It must be his character.

General Ed Sebree, Assistant Division Commander, Americal Division

We have found it profitable to bring suc­cessful patrol leaders back to the observation posts of the mortars and artillery and let them direct the fire. We get these patrol leaders back to these points as soon as possible. The basis of this type of warfare is scouting and patrolling.

You asked about individual cooking. Yes, in my opinion the troops should know this, but it is not practical for units who are not close to water to cook that way, as they cannot clean their mess gear properly and dysentery is the result. These units put the ‘C’ ration—stew or bean—can to their mouth and eat that way. You will notice as you go to the 164^th Infantry that the Regimental Commander is relieving units who have been taking it hot and heavy from the enemy, and also units who are on that ridge up there where there is no water and where the sun is beating down in that heavy thick tropical grass.

Major Ben J. Northridge, Commanding Officer, 2^nd Battalion, 164^th Infantry

We like this M1 rifle, but we don’t like the way the front end shines.

If I could train my men over again, I would put officers and men in slit trenches and drop bombs nearby to overcome fear. We were all scared to death at first. Let’s overcome this fear. How about firing some captured .25 caliber ammunition out of cap­tured rifles to let officers and men know the sound; also captured Jap machine gun am­munition out of captured machine guns.

We are learning to get shoes off men at night if the tactical situation permits. If I could train my Battalion again I would have some maneuvers in which things were made to go wrong—communications upset, etc., and I would observe which leaders are no good and replace them on the spot—not later.

I understand that in the U. S., troops in training for this type of warfare are prac­ticing firing at short ranges. That is fine.

The Japanese powder is more smokeless than ours. We need smokeless powder. [Note: The reason the Japanese bullet, when it is fired, does not make as much smoke is probably because not as much powder is need­ed to propel a .25 caliber bullet as is needed to send a .30 caliber bullet on its way.]

Lieutenant Colonel Frank Rich­ards, Commanding Officer, 1^st Battalion, 164^th In­fantry

We don’t have enough ammunition carry­ing bags. We should have this for the mor­tars. We need these bags for other types of ammunition, too. I do not know how many as we have not experimented—all I know is we need them. We need grenade carriers, too. How to carry water and rations around in this jungle to the troops on the line is a big problem.

Train patrols in stalking certain posi­tions. I consider this very important. If I were training my Battalion again, I would have training in patience. I would have patrols wait for the enemy to expose him­self. They move around, too. They have to relieve themselves and have to get food. I would have the men in this patience training be made to stay still for hours at a time.

We are not carrying mess kits—too bulky.

Captain H. L. Crook, Commanding Officer, 3^rd Battalion, 164^th Infantry

We need better trained scouts. The poor scouts lose their lives.

When we first got here the Japanese fooled us as they like to place their machine guns on the reverse slope of the ridge, shooting up­wards.

Our rifle grenades have been effective against hidden machine gun positions. You have to KILL these Japs before they will leave. Just turning a large volume of fire in his direction will not make him leave.

The time to have air observation is when we attack. At other times when our planes go over, the Japanese keep down and keep still.

Captain John A. Gossett, Commanding Officer, Com­pany H, 164^th Infantry

Teach the men capacities of the hand gre­nades; and handling men! I thought I knew how to handle men, but since I have been here I have revised my ideas as I have learned a great deal. I have learned the primitive, rough and tumble way. You can’t pat all men on the back. You have to be rough with some men in order to get results. It is not my na­ture to be rough, but I am forcing myself, and I have learned which of my men I can pat on the back and which I have to deal with in the hardest manner.

Captain John A. Dawson, Commanding Officer, Com­pany B, 164^th Infantry

If I could train my company again, I would have some maneuvers on which the men were deprived of food, water and comforts in order to find out which NCO’s and men can’t take it. I would relieve these people. This type of maneuver would teach men to know and expect hardships. It will lessen the shock when they come up against the real thing in the presence of the enemy.

It is important that the entire squad know the BAR. Not just two men. Reason, think of the BAR men who are wounded, get killed, and become sick and have to be evacuated.

They don’t appreciate the principle of reconnaissance here, or give us time for this very important thing. We must have time to do this as it saves lives and puts us in the proper position.

Our Battalion Pioneer Section must have better and more complete training in carry­ing food, water and ammunition and in cut­ting trails.

Sergeant L. R. Lang, Platoon Sergeant, Company E, 164^th Infantry

Are we getting more small hand radios? Man, they’re sure needed, for communication within the Company and within the Battalion is tough.

Sir, are our men in the U.S. receiving individual training? I notice here that when I have to put two men out for say forty-eight hours, most of the men are upset unless they have a NCO along.

For Pete’s sake, Sir, teach the men not to be ‘trigger happy.’ [Note: An expression used on Guadalcanal for men who are very nervous and who fire without seeing the enemy. This type of man is dangerous and has caused a lot of trouble. He has also given the position away.]

Are we getting a glass sight for the M1 for sniper work?

Sergeant D. L. Golden, Company F, 164^th Infantry

[Note by Colonel D. E. Moore, Commanding Officer, 164^th In­fantry: 
Sergeant Golden is an outstand­ing NCO in this Regiment.)

The biggest thing I have learned since I hit Guadalcanal is that the Japanese camou­flage is miles ahead of ours. Their individual can camouflage himself a lot better than ours. We must practice and train in this.

Every man should be equipped with a com­pass, and must know how to use the compass. The dumbbells who don’t know how to use one have to be helped instead of being able to help themselves. Those who don’t know how to use a compass can’t help you or their NCO’s.

I have been on twenty patrols in the last forty days, and in most all of these patrols we went out from 2 to 5 miles. Getting communica­tions back to the gun position is an awful prob­lem. Can you help us?

Lieutenant John S. Graves, Platoon Leader, Company C, 164^th Infantry

The biggest thing I have learned since I hit this island is that leadership and initiative is so important here. The Platoon Leader can only be in one spot at a time, and men must be trained to act correctly on their own. I have never seen this type of training.

Sergeant W. V. Demoss, Squad Leader, Company C, 164^th Infantry

Sir, I would like to say that there is no place for recruits here. We need trained sol­diers who have initiative and know what is the right thing to do. The jungle here is so thick that the Squad Leaders cannot get around all of the time to see men and to tell them what to do.

Staff Sergeant A. L. Chapman, Pla­toon Sergeant, Company G, 164^th Infan­try

We want better field glasses. Can’t we get a glass for spotting men in foliage? And along this line how about some training in shooting at vague targets, at close ranges, in dense woods. And, Sir, I would suggest some training in throwing hand grenades in woods.

Sergeant C. W. Arrowood, Com­pany F, 164^th Infantry

My message for you to take back, Colonel, is to stress real scouting and patrolling and to teach them to go the hard way.

I have been on fifteen patrols, and each time a patrol was fired on, the man with a net on his helmet drew the fire. I have seen .25 caliber bullets go through our new helmet; so, as for me, I use a fatigue field hat. [Note: I talked to a man who showed me his steel helmet with a .25 caliber bullet hole in it. The man received a slight head wound. He was convinced, and so am I, that if he had not had on his steel helmet when this bullet was fired at him, he would have been killed.]

The Jap knee mortar gives us hell. They come in fast, thick and accurate. Can’t we have one?

Colonel B. E. Moore, Commanding Officer, 164^th In­fantry

[Note: When I saw Colonel Moore, he was interviewing a patrol and patrol leader who had just come back. They had been on a reconnaissance for fifteen hours. The patrol leader had been met at an ad­vance position and, as he had valuable information of the enemy, he was con­ducted by jeep to the observation post of the artillery where he directed artil­lery fire; then returned to the Colonel where he made his report. The patrol and its leader were nearly exhausted. Colonel Moore had on hand small sample bottles of brandy which he issued one small sample bottle to each two men. He made them dilute this brandy with water in their canteen cups. It was noticeable that this helped them. The following in­terview took place after the patrol had been dismissed. One could not be around Colonel Moore very long with­out realizing that he is a leader and Regimental Commander, in every sense of the word.]

The M1 rifle is a fine rifle. It is doing fine work here.

The greatest problem is leaders, and you have to find some way to weed out the weak ones. The platoon leaders who cannot com­mand, who cannot foresee things, and who cannot act on the spur of the moment in an emergency are a distinct detriment.

It is hot here, as you can see. Men strug­gle; they get heat exhaustion. They come out vomiting, and throwing away equipment. The leaders must be leaders and they must be alert to establish straggler lines and stop this thing.

The men have been taught to take salt tablets, but the leaders don’t see to this. Re­sult, heat exhaustion.

Many of the junior leaders have not used their heads at times. In their training, I recommend you put them up against situa­tions where they must use their heads. For example, Commanding Officer, Company L, reports he had only thirty-five men; that the rest had heat ex­haustion. He did not have sense enough to rest his men, make them take salt, etc.

The good leaders seem to get killed; the poor leaders get the men killed. The big problem is leadership and getting the shoulder straps on the right people.

Not one man in fifty can lead a patrol in this jungle. If you can find out who the good patrol leaders are before you hit the combat zone, you have found out something.

I have had to get rid of about twenty-five officers because they just weren’t leaders! I had to make the Battalion Commander weed out the poor junior leaders. This process is con­tinuous. Our junior leaders are finding out that they must know more about their men.

The good leaders know their men.

Notes given by a U. S. Marine on Guadalcanal

For patrols from one to ten days duration I suggest a pack whose contents are as follows:

The top half of our present pack to con­tain:

Dehydrated rations and type “D” rations for the period expected.

1 or 2 canteens, depending on the ter­rain in which you are operating.

Medical kit containing: Band-Aids, sulfa, atabrine, salve for protection against skin infection, tablets for the puri­fication of water of a squad’s canteens.

1 cake of soap

1 pair extra socks

1 pair shoe laces

1 shirt, flannel or woolen

All above in rubber bag.

1 poncho

1 can of oil and cleaning gear for weapon where such is not part of the weapon you carry.

The following equipment:

Good field glasses for all leaders down to sergeants in rifle units, and to squad leaders in weapons squads.

Compass—same distribution

Bush knife 12-inch blade made of good steel for all hands

Helmet for all

Camouflage net for all helmets

Mosquito net, head, for all

Entrenching shovel for all

We need a rubber bag which will keep everything dry and can be used for floating contents across streams. Must be light and rugged.

I also favor canvas leggings, greased shoes and hobnails for footing in climbing hills, a pair of flannel gloves for protection against insects while sleeping.

Officers and men must be in identical uni­form.

The following was dictated to a steno­grapher, in my presence,

by Colonel G. C. Thomas, U. S. Marine Corps, Chief of Staff to Major General Vandegrift

We are operating our staff strictly along Leavenworth lines I learned while a student there. Job has been too big and clerks too few to engage in lengthy orders. Campaign has been fought with almost a total absence of paper work, and we have gotten over that jump by continuous, close personal contact between troop commanders and staff. This method was practicable because we have not been operating a very large area.

Our successful Commanders are invari­ably those who understand the use of in­fantry weapons. The work of our artillery has, I feel, been exceptional. Our forward observers have been right in the front line, and artillery fire has caused the enemy many casualties.

We feel that we have been successful. We have caused the enemy enormous losses in men. Our battle casualties to date exceed 3,500, of which about one-third have been killed in action.

Most of the fighting here has been car­ried out at extremely close range, and there has been as much throwing of hand grenades as in firing a weapon. No previous report, or even comment, on our enemy and our fighting has been made. For one thing, we do not want to appear boastful; for another, we have been literally so busy we have not had time to really think things out.

Concerning our enemy, several things are apparent. All of his efforts have been in the form of attacks on a narrow front at rather widely separated points. These were mass at­tacks, and although orders and operations maps captured have shown that they were to be simultaneous attacks, this was never the case. Our feeling is that his failure to esti­mate the terrain difficulties caused the lack of coordination. The result has been favorable to us, as it has permitted the shifting of our all too small reserves from one area to another.

We believe that the enemy has dispersed his efforts and has therefore failed to make any gain at any one point. When given his choice, he operates exclusively at night. As I said before, he attacks on a very narrow front, practically en masse. This leads to many ‘purple nights’ when we watch longingly for sunrise. The result for him has been almost complete annihilation in every case. As far as we can determine, these various attacking groups are started out, and there are indica­tions that they pass out of real control of their higher leaders. We have never seen anything to indicate that any effort has been reinforced after the initial push has been made.

The Japanese soldiers fight with a sort of fanaticism and never surrender. We have taken practically no prisoners. Officers about to be taken prisoner sometimes commit suicide. Perhaps of greatest assistance to us has been captured orders and maps. A great deal of information has been gotten from cap­tured diaries. Our interpreters on the spot were able to get from captured orders information on which we have successfully op­erated at once. It causes me to want never to write another order.

The Japanese try all of the tricks, make all of the noises, and infiltrate as many snipers as is reported they did in Bataan and Malaya. These things have little effect on good troops who hold their positions, which they can do with safety and fight them when they come up. So far as I have been able to determine, though we have had hundreds of snipers in our position, only one man has been killed by a sniper. We usually get every one of them. Don’t worry about them. They are ducks on the pond when daylight comes.

In their air attacks and in their ground operations, the Japanese appear to follow very definite patterns. Each attack appears to be the same. They are easily disconcerted by surprise, and if they fail to succeed in what is apparently the only way they know how to fight, they become ineffective. We have care­fully avoided night attacks, making all of our offensive moves by day. Our officers feel that the Japs have placed so much stress on night fighting that they cannot or do not fight well at all in the daytime.

Our officer casualties have been high, because it is necessary for the officer to be prac­tically in the firing line in jungle fighting; otherwise he loses control. We have lost a number of Company Commanders and quite a few Battalion Commanders. We have man­aged to keep up our officer replacement by field promotions of selected non-commissioned officers who have proven themselves in battle. It is not likely that the Division will receive any officers no matter how long it may operate.

This account is hasty, disconnected and rambling, but I have attempted to get down just a few of the points on which I believe we have some conclusion.

Lessons Learned

The following is a digest of lessons learned in the tactics of Jungle Warfare as a result of interviews which are attached.

• 1. Troops must receive a high degree of in­dividual training to prepare for jungle war­fare. The individual in combat will be required to act on his own a large part of the time. This is due to the dense foliage. How­ever, individuals must feel the very presence of their squad leaders and other leaders, and know that they are important members of a team which can lick the enemy. The leaders must take pains to carefully explain to the privates what their responsibilities are, and what is expected of them in each situation. Furthermore, weak individuals who cannot be trusted to act correctly without supervision must be weeded out, preferably before they ar­rive in the Combat Zone.
• Individuals must have thorough practice in throwing hand grenades in woods. They must reach a much higher degree of proficiency in the art of camouflage. This will require con­stant application in the training period.
• By realistic training a large amount of fear can be overcome in the individual. He should know before he reaches the Combat Zone what it feels like to have bombs explode near him, what a sniper’s bullet sounds like, and what overhead machine gun and artillery fire sound like.
• The prowess of the enemy must not be over emphasized. American soldiers and ma­rines can whip the Jap and they are doing so every day. Many men stated that they had been talked to so much about the Japanese snipers that at first they were afraid.
• Individual riflemen must know the tactical relationship between the machine gun and their rifle in order to be able to act intel­ligently.
• Training in observing and firing at vague targets must be emphasized.
• 2.  In training, scouting and patrolling must be emphasized. Major General Vandegrift, Commanding the First Marine Division, states that jungle warfare against the Japanese is a question of going back to the tactics of the French and Indian days, with these tactics ad­justed to fit in with our modern weapons.
• Men should receive training in patience. Our national character is foreign to this idea. We are an impetuous people. Training in pa­tience is needed as sometimes the men will be required to remain motionless and quiet for hours at a time.
• 3.  Not every man can lead a patrol success­fully in the jungle. The good patrol leaders should be discovered in the training period.
• In training, patrols should be sent out from ten to fifteen hours at a time. Due to the slow way in which a patrol moves, it is necessary to keep patrols out for long periods of time. The problem of getting communication back from the patrol to friendly territory in the jungle is a hard one. It must be made easier by training. Patrols should be confronted with unusual situations.
• 4.  The Japanese knee mortar is needed. An all-purpose hand grenade, which, in ad­dition to being used as a hand grenade, can be used in the knee mortar and as a rifle gre­nade, should be adopted.
• Mortar squads must learn to set up quickly and be able to operate in wooded terrain.
• 5.  All units must receive practice in the problem of maintaining contact in the advance in the jungle.
• 6.  In the following interviews there are many remarks on leadership. The leadership shown by the 5^th and 7^th Regiments of the U. S. Marines stands out because of their great wealth in experienced officers and NCO’s. On the other hand the remark of Colonel B. E. Moore, Commanding Officer of the 164^th In­fantry, emphasizes the great problems in the leadership which confronted a partially trained regiment which had been rushed to the Combat Zone.

A GI on Guadalcanal firing a water-cooled .50-caliber machine gun from beneath an improvised lean-to. Sketch by Sgt. Howard Brodie, a U.S. Army combat war artist.

Soldiers going up the Matanakau River - Guadalcanal by Howard Brodie,  1943.

Officers of a Marine Raider Battalion led by Colonel Merritt A. Edson (seated at desk), confer before another attack. Staff officer in center foreground follows strategy on map.

Coffee comes in large quantities in the Marine Corps.

A Marine takes time out to shave at front on Guadalcanal Island.

Marines get a drink from the lister bag, Marine Camp, Guadalcanal, January 30, 1943. Note sign that reads, “Yea Town Pump.”

In this tented store somewhere in the Pacific, U.S. Marine fighters buy razor blades, soap, shaving accessories, and toothpaste, all made in the U.S.A., January 11, 1943. Possibly Guadalcanal.

A grave in U.S. military cemetery No.1 at Guadalcanal marked by a shell. Photographed December 1942.

“Here Rest Our Honored Dead” who fell in the struggle for Guadalcanal. The lovely cemetery at Lunga Point, where Army, Marine, and Navy men lie together, has been landscaped and made uniform, and arrangements have been made for its perpetual care. Photographed in 1945.

A Grave on Guadalcanal. A marker indicates the grave of Private First Class Anthony L. Almeida, a Marine who fell at Guadalcanal. Photographed in September 1943.

“And these are the dead, who died so that all men might be free.” Behind the two stars of David are the graves, left to right, of an unidentified sailor, soldier and a Marine.

This huge crater was caused by a 100 pound bomb the Japanese dropped on Guadalcanal. The vastness of the crater can be seen by comparing it with the Marine siting at the bottom, and other standing on the edge at right foreground of the photo. Photographed March 23, 1943.

Advancing inland observing any enemy activity.

The Army’s Galloping Gizmo band plays an evening concert for Marines at Henderson Field. Photographed December 1942.

Dancer Ray Bolger does his ablutions on a South Pacific island. The Broadway star was photographed in front of the tent of Major Irving “Bob” Kriendler, USMC, New York friend who put him up for the night after Bolger gave his first performance here. Bolger is washing out Kriendler’s steel helmet, with his tooth brush and other toilet articles laid out on an empty mashed potato can nearby. After visiting and playing before service camps in many parts of the South Pacific, Bolger reports that Marines live a “ruggeder” life than any Allied fighters. “They take to the jungle almost as well as natives,” he says. Photographed September 19, 1943.

Randolph Scott, movie star, center, inspects Japanese helmet captured by U.S. Marines on Bougainville. Scott recently visited South Pacific camps to give stage shows and this picture was snapped following one of his appearances. With Scott are (left to right): Sergeant Maurice U. Tome, Jr., and on the right Private First Class Earnest J. J. Kusyner. Photographed December 1942.

Australian Major J.V. Mather paying a native his weekly wage of five shillings for work as a stevedore. Cooperation by these natives has relieved Marines of working parties, enabling them to spend most of their time on the fighting fronts.

Members of the 1st Battalion, 11th Marines unlimbering an anti-aircraft gun during continuous training for their part in the defense of the island in the South Pacific.

Foliage Camouflages Guadalcanal Tower. Lieutenant Colonel Wright C. Taylor, USMC, looking over the situation from aloft on a look-out tower on the beach at Guadalcanal.

Supplies piled high on the beach at Guadalcanal Island.

Supplies piled high on the beach at Guadalcanal Island. Photographed August 8, 1942.

Marine sounding the air-raid alarm, Marine Camp, Guadalcanal, January 30, 1943.

Landing at Guadalcanal. The latest shipment of reinforcements for Guadalcanal prepare to leave a landing boat, from USS Neville (APA-9) on the shores of the island.

The Statue Survived – Found intact amidst the wreckage after a Japanese bombing of Visale, Guadalcanal, this statue of the Blessed Virgin and Christ child were removed to the office of the Guadalcanal U.S. Chaplain, where it watches protectively over the foxhole refuge against air attacks, July 20, 1943.

Native tending to graves on Guadalcanal, 1943.

This three-inch anti-aircraft gun, left intact by the Japanese in their hurried flight before American troops at the outset of the Guadalcanal Campaign is now being used by U.S. Marines against its former owners. Large quantities of ammunition were seized as well. November 4, 1942.

Strewn along the shore of Guadalcanal island, the wreckage of these ships of the Son of Heaven’s proud fleet lie sodden and sagging, as though cast up by a titanic storm. No surge of primeval wave or bolt of lightning could be more effective than the man-made thunderbolt that wreaked this havoc – the bombs and guns of Uncle Sam’s Navy. Photo Caption: High and Dry, smashed by the U.S. Navy’s guns during the last stages of the battle for Guadalcanal, this Japanese landing boat and its sister ships litter the shore of the Pacific stronghold.

Private First Class Louis L. Wilcoxsen is shown while assigned to mosquito control work in the Southern Pacific, Guadalcanal, where his engineering unit of 1st Marine Division is located. He sprays a stagnant pool with diesel oil to kill larvae of the Anopheles mosquito, spreaders of malaria, August 1943.

The former nose piece of an enemy 14” shell which fell on Henderson Field, Guadalcanal, during a bombardment, is used as an alarm gong against raids.

 Members of a Malaria Control Unit on Guadalcanal these men use a power sprayer mounted on a “jeep” to spray pools of water where malaria-transmitting mosquitoes breed. A small gasoline compressor provides pressure for the 15-gallon tank which many contain either oil or insecticide.

Presentation of Awards by Brigadier General William H. Rupertus, USMC, Assistant Division Commander of the 1st Marine Division. Colonel Merritt Austin Edson, USMC, wearing the Medal of Honor, awarded for his extraordinary heroism in combat at Guadalcanal 13-14 September 1942. He is shown being congratulated by Brigadier General Rupertus. On the left is Lieutenant Guy Tarrant. Note, during the early landing stages, Colonel Edson also received two Navy Crosses for his “extraordinary heroism”.

Marine sells Japanese items in souvenir shop on Guadalcanal.

Marines playing cards beside hut on Guadalcanal, 1942.

Marines set up radio communication site on Guadalcanal, 1942.

Marine eyes captured Japanese bathtub on Guadalcanal, 1942.

US officers question Japanese prisoner on Guadalcanal, 1942.

Marines inspect Japanese gun emplacement on Guadalcanal, 1942.

Marines digging in on Guadalcanal beach, 1942.

Marines set up mortar under enemy fire on Guadalcanal.

Soldiers fishing with dynamite on Guadalcanal, 1943.

35th Infantry troops returning to base after 21 days in a fighting line to capture the Gifu on Guadalcanal, 1943.

Marines unload supplies on Guadalcanal beach, 1942.

Marines search for Japanese snipers on Guadalcanal, 1942.

Japanese dispersal area near Lunga Airfield on Guadalcanal, 1942.

Marine leaves foxhole after Japanese air raid on Guadalcanal, 1942.

Soldiers with Japanese prisoners on Guadalcanal, 1943.

Troops Inspect captured Japanese barge on Guadalcanal, 1942.

Japanese landing barges leave transport for Guadalcanal beach.

Marine guards a captured Japanese steamroller at airfield on Guadalcanal, 1942.

Marines jeeps and landing craft on Guadalcanal beach, 1942.

Japanese soldiers captured by Marines on Guadalcanal, 1942.

Marine at Browning .50-cal, water-cooled anti-aircraft machine gun, Guadalcanal, 1942.

Marines use Japanese AAA gun named “Susie Q”, 1942.

Wounded troops await transport on Guadalcanal beach, 1943.

Marine uses bayonet to dig foxhole on Guadalcanal, 1942.

Marine uses a raft to cross a flooded road during the rainy season on Guadalcanal.

Jeep on captured Japanese air base on Guadalcanal, 1942.

Japanese prisoners captured by US troops on Guadalcanal.

Seabees footbridge over river on Guadalcanal.

Guadalcanal‘s Bloody Ridge, September 1942.

Fighting on Guadalcanal, 1942.

Marine mans machine gun while other Marines bathe a the river.

Tojo Ice Company ice plant building, Guadalcanal, late 1942.

Destroyed building, Guadalcanal, late 1942.

Marines in LVT Amphibious Tractor land on Guadalcanal, 1942.

Jeep crossing a coconut tree log bridge over the Bonegi River, Guadalcanal, late 1942.

Beachhead on Guadalcanal.

Marine mortar company sets up on Bloody Ridge, Guadalcanal.

Jeeps maneuver over muddy road on Guadalcanal.

Fighting on Guadalcanal.

1st Marine Division landing on Guadalcanal in LCPs, August 1942.

Marine mortar squad in action on Guadalcanal.

Wrecked Japanese landing craft, Gavutu Beach, Guadalcanal, August-September 1942.

Marine 155mm howitzers in action, Guadalcanal, 1943.

Captured Japanese ammunition box with ammunition strips for the Type 92 machine gun, Guadalcanal, 1942.

Japanese soldier throwing a Type 91 grenade, Guadalcanal, September 1942.

Lewis Puller on Guadalcanal, 1942.

Tenaru River, Guadalcanal, 1942.

Army Jeeps driving up Wright Road toward the area of the Japanese Gifu strongpoint on Guadalcanal, 1942.

LtGen Thomas Holcomb (left front), Col Merritt Edson (right rear), and MajGen Alexander Vandegrift touring Guadalcanal, November 1942.

Secretary of the Navy Frank Knox, left, touring Guadalcanal with Adm Nimitz, Adm Halsey, and Army Gen J Lawton Collins, Jan 21, 1943. Apparently no one thought to tell Knox his helmet was on backwards.

Soldiers are pictured after discovering human remains in the jungles of the tiny island.

Marines on Guadalcanal.

A man dressed as Santa Claus visited wounded troops at Christmas time in 1942.

Marines on Guadalcanal beach.

Marines driving a truck during the rainy season.

Marines wait on the beach for a troop ship to pick them up.

A wiry, stooped infantryman smoking an old pipe carries a heavy container filled with supplies up over the hills to the front on Guadalcanal, 1943.

Aid station on Guadalcanal.

Marine tossing a grenade on Guadalcanal.

Infantrymen clean their weapons next to a foxhole after a bloody battle.

 

The 1st Marine Division on Guadalcanal

Original caption: “Moving to Jungle Front: A detachment of United States Marines pauses in a jungle clearing for a brief rest en route to the front on Guadalcanal Island. The Marine in the right foreground has attached to his helmet netting for use in camouflaging himself in the dense undergrowth. Shortly after this photo was snapped, these Leathernecks drove an enemy band far into the hills. December 1942.” (USMC photo)

by Philip A. Katcher

Guadalcanal was one of the most important battles of World War II; it was the first step towards Allied victory in the South Pacific and thereafter Japan never regained the offensive. “After Guadalcanal,” one senior Imperial Japanese Navy planner later wrote, “I knew we could not win the war. I did not think we would lose, but I knew we could not win.”

Even so, the battle is rarely given more than a brief discussion in many accounts of the war. This is not totally surprising because Guadalcanal was not a simple battle. It was more like a series of running fights, with long periods of very little action in between, at the end of which the Japanese were not really destroyed, but simply held off. The Japanese then evacuated the island fairly easily, so there was no clear-cut victory as in many other decisive battles.

One who knew the island could well even wonder why anybody would want to fight a battle there. Author Jack London, who knew the area well, called Guadalcanal a “place of death,” with its inhabitants mostly snakes, giant lizards, scorpions, crocodiles, poisonous spiders, leeches and ferocious white ants.

The answer was that American planners needed to take some islands in the area to secure communications between the U.S. and Australia. Their original plan did not include Guadalcanal, however, they later discovered the Japanese force there was building an airfield estimated to be able to hold sixty planes which would be finished in mid-August. Guadalcanal, therefore, was included in the plan and was to be taken 1 August.

In June 1942 the 1st Marine Division, newly arrived in New Zealand, was handed the job of occupying and defending Tulagi and adjacent positions, including Guadalcanal, the Florida Islands and the Santa Cruz Islands. The original target date of 1 August was impossible because not all the Marines had landed in New Zealand and the ships would have to be re-packed, combat loading style, before they headed towards the objectives. The new landing date was 7 August.

The 1st Marine Division, as it started out on its first great battle, had 956 officers and 18,146 enlisted men. It was made up of three regiments, called “Marines” in the Corps, the 1st, 5th, and 7th, each with three battalions. Its artillery was in the 11th Marines, a four-battalion regiment with a dozen 155 mm howitzers, a dozen 105-mm howitzers, and thirty-six 75-mm howitzers. The division further had the 1st Marine Tank Battalion, equipped with M3 “Stuart” tanks; the 1st Marine Service Battalion; the 1st Special Weapons Battalion; the 1st Pioneer Battalion; the 1st Engineer Battalion; the 1st Parachute Battalion; the 1st Amphibious Tractor Battalion; the 1st Medical Battalion; the 1st Raider Battalion; the 3rd Defense Battalion, and a headquarters battalion.

The Americans, unaware of the small size of the Japanese garrison on Guadalcanal, which was mostly made up of laborers, expected a rough landing. “This is a knock-down and drag-out fight,” one Marine colonel told correspondent Richard Tregaskis. “Things are going to go wrong on the beach, and people are going to get hurt. But those are good kids and I think they’ll be all right.”

Marines on the invasion fleet spent their time continuously taking apart their weapons, cleaning them and putting them back together again. Others sharpened bayonets, machetes and bolo knives. Some even made crude blackjacks out of canvas sacks filled with lead balls.

Final orders were issued just prior to landing. “The coming offensive in the Guadalcanal area,” it read, “marks the first offensive of the war against the enemy, involving ground forces of the United States. The Marines have been selected to initiate this action which will prove to be the forerunner of successive offensive actions that will end in ultimate victory for our cause. Our country expects nothing but victory from us and it shall have just that. The word failure shall not even be considered as being in our vocabulary.

“We have worked hard and trained faithfully for this action and I have every confidence in our ability and desire to force our will upon the enemy. We are meeting a tough and wily opponent but he is not sufficiently tough or wily to overcome us because We Are Marines.”

The troops were awakened, those who managed to sleep, at 4 a.m., 7 August 1942. Within a very short time the large black mass which were Guadalcanal’s hills could be seen from the decks against a South Pacific dawn. At 6:14 the naval barrage of the islands began; there was no reply. The troops made their way down the gangways and into invasion craft. At 9:10 the boats of the 1st and 3rd Battalions of the 5th Marines hit the shore. Still no enemy fire was heard. At 11 a.m. the 1st Marines (Reinforced) landed behind the first wave, and all units began the drive inland. Virtually the only casualty of the landing was a private who cut himself opening a coconut.

Nervous because of the unexpectedly easy landing after all that training about the ferocious Japanese, the advancing men moved, at best, slowly. “On the beach west of the main perimeter I found the 1st Battalion, 5th Marines, moving as if it were about to encounter the entire Imperial Army. I gave the battalion commander hell,” later wrote division commanding general A. A. Vandegrift. “The day’s objective was the Tenaru River, about two miles west, which I wanted defended by nightfall.

“At [Colonel Clifton B.] Cates’ CP [command post of Combat Group B, made up of the 1st Marines; 3rd Battalion, 11th Marines, and support units] I learned that his right battalion was bogged down in an immense rain forest west of the Ilu River. Our informants in New Zealand had failed to report this obstacle, a fetid morass so thick with overgrowth you couldn’t see Mt. Austen or anything else from its depths. In working their way through it the troops, in poor condition from the weeks aboard ship, seemed about done in by the heat and high humidity.”

Meanwhile, other 1st Marine Division troops were landing on other islands: Tulagi, capital of the British Solomon Islands Protectorate, Florida, Tanambogo, and Gavutu. There fighting was tough, against some 1,500 Japanese combat troops on these islands, of whom only twenty-five were taken alive as prisoners, while another seventy are thought to have escaped to other islands. The rest died in their positions, a clear indication of the type of fighting the Marines would face.

The islands did fall, however, and the Marines sent to take them, minus a small garrison for each, were sent on to Guadalcanal itself.

On Guadalcanal, however, invading Americans found half-eaten meals abandoned, along with a vast supply of booty which even included an ice plant. The latter was quickly decorated with a sign reading, “Tojo Ice Plant, Under New Management.”

The war at sea nearby, however, was not going as smoothly. On 8 August a Japanese naval force, eight ships boasting thirty-four eight-inch guns, ten 5.5-inch guns, twenty-seven five-inch and 4.7-inch guns and sixty-two torpedo tubes, came down towards the American and Australian fleet anchored off Guadalcanal. The U.S. Navy had already pulled out its carriers nearby because of “the large number of enemy torpedo planes and bombers in vicinity,” against which they had only seventy-eight carrier-based planes which were already low on fuel. On 10 August, at 1 a.m., the Japanese ships came into range and opened fire. Within forty-six minutes the Japanese Navy had sunk the U.S. cruisers Astoria, Quincy and Vincennes and the Royal Australian Navy cruiser Canberra, along with one destroyer. The U.S. cruiser Chicago was badly damaged. The Navy’s support forces had to withdraw, leaving the Marines on shore alone.

On 20 August, however, help arrived for the Marines in the form of two squadrons of airplanes, one of fighters and the other of bombers, which were to be stationed at the captured Japanese airfield on Guadalcanal. The field had been named Henderson Field, after Marine flyer Major Lofton R. Henderson, who had been killed at Midway.

The field was just about ready for them. The main runway was 3,778 feet long and 160 feet wide and was surfaced with a mixture of coral gravel and cement. Much of the equipment used to build it had been abandoned by the Japanese, including five steamrollers, two tractors, a large supply of cement and an electric light system which ran the length of the runway.

“Morale’s gone up twenty points this afternoon,” said one officer after the planes landed. It was just in time, too, for the Japanese 17th Army had decided to re-take Guadalcanal and their men were on their way. The initial force assigned the task had some 6,000 men, which were thought enough to beat the 10,000 Marines believed on the island. General Kiyotake Kawaguchi, the Japanese commander, wasn’t overconfident, although he did think his men would win, and even told one acquaintance that defeating the Marines would be “serious business.”

The first of the Japanese troops to land was a 900-man force under Colonel Kiyono Ichiki. The colonel left 125 men to guard the landing site and pushed on towards the waiting Marines with the rest.

A little after midnight, 21 August 1942, the Japanese force hit the Marine defenses along the Tenaru. “It was on us in an instant,” wrote Private Robert Leckie of the 2nd Battalion, 1st Marines, who manned a hole along the riverbank, “and then we were firing. We were so disorganized we had not the sense to disperse, clustering around that open pit as though we were born of it. Falsetto screeching rose directly opposite us and we were blasting away at it, sure that human intruders had provoked the cry of the birds. I helped the Gentleman fire his gun, although I was not his assistant. He concentrated on the river bank, firing burst after burst there, convinced that the Japs were preparing to swim the river. The screeching stopped.”

The Marines would not be moved. Heroic actions were almost commonplace.

Private Al Schmidt, his one leg battered and the rest of his machine gun crew dead, single-handed loaded and fired his gun time and time again. One Japanese soldier got close enough to toss a grenade into Schmidt’s foxhole, the fragments blinding him and wounding him in the arms and shoulders. “God damn it, they got me in the eyes,” he yelled, adding, “I can smell the rotten buggers.” And he kept on firing. By the time it was all over he’d been firing five hours straight. Carried towards an aid station, he handed a lieutenant his .45 and passed out. For that day’s action Private Schmidt received the Medal of Honor, one of America’s first authentic heroes of World War II.

The line was holding, but a reserve platoon was sent in about 2:30 a.m., and artillery was called in along the front a half-hour later.

When it got lighter as the sun rose, tanks from Company B, 1st Tank Battalion, drove through Japanese lines, firing canister from their 37-mm guns as they went. Getting some distance from the Marine lines, the tankers were radioed to return. “Let us alone,” the tank commander replied, “we’re too busy killing Japs.”

Final replacements from the 1st Battalion, 1st Marines, arrived by 8:30 and it was all over. Even the Japanese, persistent as they were, admitted so, turning and trying to escape. Some ran back into the dense forests, while others ran along the beach. Some 250 of them, escaping on the open beach route, were spotted by Henderson Field-based fighters which easily mowed them all down. Only fifteen prisoners were taken, all but two of whom were wounded to begin with. Against a Marine loss of thirty-four dead and seventy-five wounded, virtually the entire Japanese detachment had been destroyed.

“The attack of the Ichiki detachment,” the colonel radioed his headquarters, “was not entirely successful.”

The attack had also made it clear to 1st Marine Division headquarters that the Japanese, despite first appearances, hadn’t given up Guadalcanal altogether. Therefore, on 21 August, they recalled the 2nd Battalion, 5th Marines, from the nearby island of Tulagi. The battalion was assigned the role of a mobile reserve for the Guadalcanal garrison.

The Japanese decided that it would be harder to get the Marines off Guadalcanal than they originally thought. According to one of their training manuals, “Westerners … being very haughty, effeminate and cowardly … intensely dislike fighting in the rain or mist or in the dark. They cannot conceive night to be a proper time for battle … although it is excellent for dancing. In these weaknesses lie our opportunity.” This, however, didn’t appear to be true. It would take men, not propaganda, to beat the Marines.

Therefore they planned a major attack. The 35th Brigade, 2,400 men, landed at Taivu Point east of Henderson Field, while 1,100 men under Colonel Akinsouke Oka landed west of the field at Kokumbona. The eastern-based troops were to take the hill, later called “Bloody Ridge,” which overlooked the field, joined by Oka’s men from the west.

The 35th Brigade beat a way through almost impossible terrain to run into defensive positions of Company C, Marine Raiders, about 9:30 p.m. on 13 September. Initially the attack was a success, driving the Marine company against Company B’s position, but the terrain itself as much as the Marines stopped the Japanese from taking advantage of their initial successes and moving quickly forward.

Reinforcements, the 2nd Battalion, 5th Marines, were sent to the Raiders’ position, despite protests from Lieutenant Colonel Merritt E. “Red Mike” Edson, Raider commander, that his men alone could handle anything the Japanese could throw at them. As it turned out, a combination of Japanese airpower and thick jungle slowed the men of the 2nd down so much they never got to the Raiders. Edson’s men dug in around the southern slope of the high knob in the center of the ridge.

Towards evening the Japanese caught their second wind and began harassing the Marines. They even tossed a smoke pot into the Marine lines, yelling in English, “Gas attack!” Finally, as it grew dark, the Japanese, firing their weapons from the hip and yelling as they came, scrambled out of their holes and at the Marines.

Colonel William McKennon, of the Parachute Battalion, was a battalion commander on Bloody Ridge when the attack hit. “The first assault,” he later wrote, “came vomiting forth from a triangular patch of jungle directly on our left front. There was little rifle fire, but the Japs poured blast after blast of bullets from their Nambus … light machine guns … against our own machine gun positions. A Nambu is hard to locate because it gives off no appreciable muzzle glare, and it is particularly effective in a night attack. But in firepower there is nothing like our own machine guns. The three we had set up poured it into the oncoming Japs, smashed them back, knocked them over, broke their assault. The guns never jammed. There were screams and bleating, and then comparative silence in the hollow. The firing had lasted perhaps five seconds. It seemed like hours.”

The first assault had been beaten back quickly, but the Japanese did not give up after only one attack. They came again and again at the Marine line. The Marines were forced to slowly fall back, reforming along their reserve line as they called in 105-mm howitzer fire against their attackers. Still, by dawn, it was obvious that the attack had failed.

Two men from the Raiders, including Colonel Edson, received Medals of Honor for the night’s defense. The Japanese admitted a loss of 633 men, with another 505 wounded. The survivors made their way west to where Colonel Oka’s men were still working their way to join the attack. Oka’s men never even got into the fight … not that their extra bodies would have made all that much difference in the end.

Having stood off two major attacks, the Marines decided to go on the offensive themselves, to give themselves more breathing room. On 23 September the 1st Battalion, 7th Marines, headed across the Matanikau River, west of Henderson Field. The plan called for Edson’s Raiders to stage a holding attack across the river at its mouth, while the main attack would be south of that, the troops turning once the river had been crossed, while another force would pass through that group and move further west before turning north to the sea double pincer movement. The three forces would trap any Japanese along the river.

Right from the start, however, the attack got bogged down on strong Japanese defenses. The 2nd Battalion, 5th Marines, was sent in after them, but by the 26th the Marines were still stalled on the Matanikau. The Raiders then came in, but it still took three assaults before the Marines could force their way across the light brown stream.

The 1st Marine Division lost more men in that series of attacks than it had in any other action of the entire campaign.

By 9 October the Marines were securely dug in on the western bank of the Matanikau, their lines some three miles deeper into Japanese-held Guadalcanal than they had been before the attack. At that point the Marine drive was called off.

While the Marine offensive was slowly grinding on, a decision had been reached in Tokyo to make a major new effort on Guadalcanal. The 2nd (Sendai) Division was chosen for the task, their commander telling them, “This is the decisive battle between Japan and the United States, a battle in which the rise or fall of the Japanese Empire will be decided.”

The Japanese landed a series of reinforcements on the island. Artillery landed 11 October; the 2nd Division and two battalions of the 38th Division, along with three batteries of heavy artillery, a battery of mountain artillery, a mortar battalion, three rapid-fire gun battalions and sixteen tanks landed 19 October. For the first time Japanese outnumbered Americans on Guadalcanal.

Not only did they outnumber them, but they had badly shocked the Marines with an astounding naval barrage on the night of 13 October. The battleships Haruna and Kongo sent in 14-inch shells, while supporting ships shelled Henderson Field with thousands of eight- and four-inch shells. The bombardment, which lasted two-and-a-half hours, ending about three in the morning, put at least thirteen shell craters in the airfield’s runway, virtually ruined the pagoda headquarters, and knocked down trees among nearby artillery and air units left and right. Yet, except for some momentary cases of shell shock, the basic aim of the nighttime barrage wasn’t accomplished. At the first sign of dawn scout bombers managed to take off on the pitted runway, only to spot the transports and destroyers, filled with Japanese troops, which were heading towards Guadalcanal.

The Marines had been warned to expect another, perhaps larger, attack. This one would obviously be the big one.

Before it came, however, the 1st Marine Division also received reinforcements in the form of the Army’s 164th Infantry Regiment, an unblooded National Guard outfit.

The Japanese plan was as elaborate as the American one on the Matanikau had been. It, too, called for a three-prong attack. Two attacks would fall on the Matanikau, one along the beach to the north, the other to the south, while Colonel Oka’s troops would attack positions around Bloody Ridge. The plan called for all attacks to be launched the same time on 22 October.

The Japanese plan was one which, if it were to work, would require excellent communications, an ability for all the troops to be in their proper places in time and plain old luck. The Japanese, as it turned out, would have none of these. Not only did the almost impossible terrain slow down the heavily-equipped Japanese troops, preventing most of them from being in position in time, but frankly very poor communications meant that the various commanders didn’t know where the other prongs were.

The easiest position to reach was along the lower Matanikau, and the Japanese 4th and 124th Regiments were in their proper places there on time. On 22 October, at 6 p.m., their artillery opened up, dropping shells on the defenders from the 1st Battalion, 7th Marines, and a battalion of the 164th. As the barrage let up, the attack, led by nine 18-ton medium tanks, came towards the defenders. Infantry ran forward, in between the tanks, yelling, “Blood for the Emperor! Marine you die!”

“To hell with your Goddamned Emperor,” one Marine yelled back. “Blood for Franklin and Eleanor!”

The Marines called in supporting fire from 105-mm howitzers. That and anti-tank fire from the Marine and Army line knocked out all but one tank. That tank rolled over American foxholes until one Marine jumped up, ran over, and jammed a hand grenade in its tracks. The explosion blew the tracks apart, the tank rocking back and forth once and then coming to a stop. A nearby tank destroyer spotted it, took quick aim and put one shell directly into the Japanese tank. The lucky shot must have hit the tank’s ammunition supply because a giant explosion blew the unlucky tank and its obviously dead crew back 20 yards into the sea.

By 3 a.m. the Japanese had made almost eight separate attacks, each one of which had been beaten back, but the Marines were running out of ammunition. The 3rd Battalion, 164th Infantry, came into the line, bringing with them the newly-issued M1 rifles. The Marines on Guadalcanal still used the older M1903 bolt-action rifles, and the increased firepower from the Army’s weapons made a difference. The Japanese were stopped.

Afterwards the Marines counted 250 Japanese dead along their front, including one major whose last diary entry read, “I do not know what excuse to give. I apologize for what I have done … I am going to return my borrowed life today with short interest.” Marine casualties were nineteen dead, thirty wounded and twelve missing.

The attack served to warn the Marines that the Japanese they had seen on transports were landed and around the Marine positions. Quickly the 2nd Battalion, 7th Marines, was sent to the upper Matanikau, where the next attack was expected. Sure enough, the Japanese hit again … but not on 22 October, but at 3 a.m., 24 October, and not on the Matanikau.

It was then they hit Bloody Ridge in a typical ‘banzai’ charge. Sergeant John Basilone, who was later awarded the Medal of Honor for his part in that night’s action, told a Marine combat correspondent a few days later, “They kept coming and we kept firing. We all thought our end had come. Some Japs would sneak through the lines and behind us. It got pretty bad because I’d have to stop firing every once in a while and shoot behind me with my pistol. At dawn our guns were just burnt out. Altogether we got rid of 26,000 rounds.”

The Japanese rushes were stopped by 7 a.m., and the Marines later counted 941 bodies under their burnt-out guns.

The final Japanese attack, as uncoordinated as the others but made with a larger force, came where it was expected, the upper Matanikau. There the 29th and 16th Japanese Infantry Regiments hit Companies E, F, and G, 7th Marines. Company F was virtually destroyed, while Company E fell back under extreme pressure. There was only one machine gun platoon holding the position between the companies.

Sergeant Mitchell Paige, the platoon commander, had lost virtually all his men to wounds. He actually picked up his machine gun in his arms, like a scene from a B-grade movie, and went on the attack. Later he described what he did. “Anyway, I decided it was too unhealthy to stay in one place for too long, so I would fire a burst and then move. Each time I shifted, grenades fell just where I had been. Over the nose of the ridge in the tall grass, which was later burned for security, I thought I saw some movement. Right off the nose, in the grass, thirty Japs stood up. One of them was looking at me through field glasses. I let them have it with a full burst and they peeled off like grass under a mowing machine.” Paige said he got “… so wound up I couldn’t stop,” rounding up a skirmish line of assorted Marines and driving back the Japanese attack almost by himself. He received both a battlefield commission and the Medal of Honor for his actions. When the Japanese finally gave up the attack some 110 of their soldiers lay dead in front of Paige’s position.

Every Japanese attack failed. But what the Japanese Army and Navy could not do, Guadalcanal itself was doing to the division. In October alone the division reported 1,941 men ill with malaria, while men who were supposedly well were just about totally mentally and physically exhausted.

General Vandegrift decided one way to restore morale would be to return to the attack, instead of passively waiting for the next Japanese attack. He returned to a drive across the Matanikau, with the 5th Marines taking the brunt of the action. Their 1st Battalion was stopped, but the 2nd Battalion moved ahead fairly rapidly, so the 3rd Battalion was sent in with the 1st. By 2 November the regiment had reported 450 dead Japanese accounted for, against Marine losses of about forty, although most Japanese facing them did manage to retreat successfully rather than be trapped by the Marines.

The 3rd Battalion, 7th Marines, and three artillery battalions were sent forward, too. However, the Marines, even with an additional Army regiment, were so hard-pressed to defend the territory they already had within their lines that they could not hold any more. Therefore, on 4 November, when General Vandegrift learned that the Japanese had landed additional troops east of the American lines, at Tetere, he ordered the drive stopped and the troops pulled back to their original defensive lines.

While the offensive was going on, Vandegrift sent men to try to build another airfield, this one at Aola Bay. The 2nd Marine Raider Battalion was sent with the engineers on the mission. The engineers promptly discovered that the area was too marshy to build a landing strip on. The Marines then returned overland to their main defensive positions. Their march took them 150 miles through Japanese lines. They lost, however, only seventeen dead and eighteen wounded, while killing 488 Japanese during their trek.

Illness continued to plague the 1st Marine Division, which had already been stationed in a combat zone far longer than the typical Marine unit was supposed to. Finally General Vandegrift had to admit officially the division was “no longer capable of offensive operations.” The division’s final report said that, “The cumulative effort of long periods of fatigue and strain, endless labor by day and vigilance by night were aggravated to an alarming degree by the growing malarial rate.”

The Army’s Americal Division was landed to take over the job of defending America’s first step on the road to Tokyo. The command of the island was turned over to the Army on 7 December 1942, one year to the day after the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor to force America into the war.

The 5th Marines were the last to leave, according to General Vandegrift, “… some so weak they could scarcely climb the cargo nets draped over the sides of the fat transports.” On the 9th the general visited the site of the graves of so many of his men, almost 7,000 of them. Then he, too, left.

What had it all meant? It was not a total victory for the Americans in that the Japanese had been able to evacuate their troops fairly easily when they finally decided to abandon the island. And yet, in the long run, it may have been one of the most important victories of the war. The Japanese had lost some 32,000 men, while Marines killed in action were 1,979 with an additional 6,000 wounded. The airfield was, at the end of it all, securely in American hands. American tactics, communications and weapons had proved themselves superior to those of the Japanese. And, perhaps the most important, the long road of Japanese conquests came to an end. They were never again to capture any major pieces of territory, while the Americans were just beginning to build their list of conquests … conquests which eventually ended at Tokyo.

Bibliography

Katcher, Philip. U.S. 1st Marine Division, 1941-1945. London, 1979.

McMillan, George. The Old Breed. Washington, D.C., 1949.

Smith, S. E. The United States Marine Corps in World War II. New York, 1969.

Tregaskis, Richard. Guadalcanal Diary. New York, 1943.

Toland, John. The Rising Sun. New York, 1970.

Vandegrift, A. A. Once A Marine. New York, 1964.

Marines serving food, Guadalcanal, circa 1942. Marines in the front lines at Guadalcanal take time out for food. It was prepared in the comparative safety of a behind-the-lines galley and brought to the front in big containers. (USMC photo)

A few yards from the front lines on Guadalcanal, marked by barbed wire, a U.S. Marine fighting force pitched their tents and dug adjoining foxholes. The occupant of this tent placed his rifle and two hand grenades close to the foxhole just in case. (USMC photo)

A well-camouflaged machine gun emplacement on the front line position of U.S. Marines. (USMC photo)

Dug-in 37mm anti-tank gun of the 1st Marine Division on Guadalcanal, late 1942.