Navy carrier aviation, although some evidence of Japanese tunneling was visible. Heavy foliage and ground cover predominated on aerial photos taken during attacks by U.S. Material collected by the Office of Naval Intelligence and the Marine Corps before the war was only marginally useful as the Japanese had strictly controlled peacetime access to the Palaus, which they had administered under a League of Nations mandate since 1920. intelligence on the Japanese dispositions on Peleliu was sparse. Stalemate II was to be the largest amphibious operation in the Pacific to date, with more than 1,600 ships and craft and more than 800 aircraft deployed. However, with two days until D-day, and assessing that the operation remained a prerequisite of the planned Leyte Gulf landings, Nimitz did not countermand it. Halsey, whose forces were to support the landings, proposed bypassing the relatively isolated Palaus based on the meager opposition his carrier pilots had encountered there on airstrikes. Roosevelt at a high-level strategy conference held in Hawaii from 26 July to 10 August 1944.
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MacArthur stressed the continued necessity of Stalemate II to President Franklin D. Given the shifting strategic picture in the Pacific, the Joint Staff questioned CINCPOA whether a Palaus operation was still necessary, but Nimitz indicated it was. “It is certain that if we repay the Americans (who rely solely upon material power) with material power it will shock them beyond imagination….” 1 The Japanese “Palau Sector Group Training for Victory” directive, captured during the battle, stated: Greater flexibility was accorded to subordinate leaders and they were charged to seize tactical opportunity wherever possible, adapting their movement to take advantage of cover and concealment and bringing fire to bear when its effect would be greatest. Arranged in successive lines and using the natural terrain, systems of camouflaged and heavily fortified positions with interlocking fields of fire were constructed on reverse slopes and among other masking terrain features that favored the defenders.
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If this occurred, the attackers were to be channeled into “kill” zones beyond the beaches. Although the importance of advantageously sited beach strongpoints was recognized, Japanese commanders accepted that landing forces might not be destroyed or repulsed at water’s edge. landing forces at Tarawa, Saipan, and Guam-and the tactical shift away from attempting to repel amphibious landings at the beach to delaying and inflicting maximum casualties and damage on the enemy. This gradually resulted in a stronger defense in depth-experienced in degrees by U.S. Landings on Peleliu by the 1st Marine Division, backed up by the Army’s 81st Infantry Division, were scheduled for 15 September.įacing overwhelming Allied firepower and material advantage, Japanese commanders realized that a change in defensive strategy was necessary. Thus, the original Stalemate concept was canceled on 7 July, and planning for Stalemate II, a scaled-down version that limited initial attacks to the southern Palaus and the islands of Yap and Ulithi (in the Carolines group northeast of the Palaus), began. The operation, designated “Stalemate,” was set for 8 September.įighting on Saipan in particular was harder and of longer duration than anticipated and required deployment of a theater reserve, the Army’s 27th Infantry Division, which had been slated for the Palau operation. The Joint Chiefs of Staff issued the respective planning order on 12 March, directing CINCPOA to occupy the Marianas-Palaus line. Occupation of the Palaus would also bolster control of the broader approaches to Japan’s Home Islands. In June 1944, concurrently with the beginning of Forager, Japanese carrier forces and naval aviation were soundly defeated in the Battle of the Philippine Sea.Ĭapturing the Palaus group, part of the widely dispersed Caroline Islands, appeared a logical step in securing the right flank of MacArthur’s projected operations in the Philippines and breaking into Japan’s second line of defense. Nimitz (Commander in Chief, Pacific Ocean Areas-CINCPOA) had broken through the Gilberts and Marshalls chains, and were engaged in Operation Forager, the capture of Saipan, Guam, and Tinian in the Marianas.
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At the same time, naval and ground forces subordinate to Admiral Chester W. By the summer of 1944, General Douglas MacArthur’s Southwest Pacific Area forces were moving beyond New Guinea toward the Philippines.