And when he gets to heaven,To Saint Peter he will tell:“Another Marine reporting, sir.I’ve served my time in hell”.—PFC James A. Donohue, USMC, 1st Marine Division
Between election year politics and Olympics frenzy, we are likely to miss anniversary of an important anniversary: seventy years ago, on August 7, 1942, United States Marines landed on an obscure South Pacific island called Guadalcanal.
When news of this invasion was announced, Americans were both thrilled and puzzled: Thrilled because this was the first offensive against Japan since Pearl Harbor, and puzzled, because no one had ever heard of the place.
Part of the Solomon Islands chain southeast of Australia, covered with tropical forests, malarial swamps, and razor grass, Guadalcanal straddled the supply line between the United States and Australia. Japan began building an airfield on the island in order to cut off Australia from military aid. The U.S. tracked the progress of the Japanese project by reading Japanese naval codes, and by reports from a system of Australian “coastwatchers”—peacetime magistrates and plantation operators—who stayed behind on occupied Japanese islands to report on Japanese activities via radio. These heroic—and, outside of Australia, largely forgotten—men would play a critical role in the upcoming battle.
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