Shortly after Midway, The United States saw the need to control the southwest Pacific, and therefore decided to push into this strategically important area. Now that Hawaii was deemed secure from immediate attack it was time to fight to the Japanese. On July 2nd, 1942, the U. S. Joint Chiefs of Staff ordered Allied forces in the Pacific to mount a limited offensive to halt the Japanese advance in this area. Both American Commanding Officers in the Pacific, General Douglas MacArthur (SW Pacific) and Admiral Chester Nimitz (Pacific Ocean) were offensive minded, aggressive leaders, and were pleased with the directive from the Joint Chiefs of Staff. This directive called for parallel attacks on Rabaul Island, New Guinea, and the Solomon Islands Chain. Plans were started for attacking in these areas immediately.
Right after these plans were made up, the plans had to be re- evaluated because US reconnaissance showed that the Japanese were moving troops from Tulagi to Guadalcanal and building an airfield on Guadalcanal. This was horrible news to the US, an Japanese airfield in this area would jeopardize all US forces that were in the vicinity. Guadalcanal is an island 90 miles by 25 miles located in the lower Solomon Chain that is covered mostly by rain forests, mountains, and swamps. Admiral Nimitz was given command of the operation and he promptly sent out three carrier groups (Saratoga, Wasp, and Enterprize) under the command of Admiral Fletcher, to support the operation. Admiral Turner was in command of the landing force. This landing force consisted of the lst Marine division and a regiment of the 2nd Marine Division for a total of 19,000 men. General Vandergrift was in command of all of these troops. Lastly, a joint force of American and Australian cruisers and destroyers called TF44 backed up the operation.
On August 7th, 1942, 11,000 marines landed on Guadalcanal after a long bombardment from both the sea and air. The airstrip was secured on the first day and the Japanese did not contest the landing. On the second day things become a lot more interesting and difficult for the Americans. Admiral Fletcher feared a Japanese air attack coming from Rabul, and due to this he withdrew his carrier groups with Turner doing the same with his transport groups. The transports were desperately needed for their supplies, equipment, and soldiers, which amounted to 1,000 marines that were still on the boats. The marines on the island were on their own in enemy territory. Vandergrift put the Marines in a five-mile long defensive perimeter and started to finish building the airfield with the equipment he had, also using some equipment that the Japanese had left.
On the 8th, the Japanese naval commander Mikawa sent a naval force from Rabaul down between the islands of the Solomon Chain (known as "The Slot") on the night of the 8th and hit TF 44 by surprise. In two quick battles off Savo Island the allied force lost the Canberra, Quincy, Astoria, Vincennes, and the Chicago with a great loss of life. This was the worst US naval disaster since Pearl Harbor, and it would be a good lesson learned. On the night of August 20th, the Japanese that had been landed earlier charged at the Marine line along the Tenaru River in a fanatical "Banzai" attack. The young Marines held their ground and slaughtered the attackers. When the sun came up the ground before the Marine line was littered with over 800 dead Japanese. The soldiers now knew that the Japanese were beatable, and many of them had their first real combat experience.
The Japanese system of owning the areas at night continued in what the Americans called the "Tokyo Express" (Leckie 157). The ìExpressî dropped off another 6,000 troops and on September 13th, 3,500 of these troops charged the southern perimeter of the airfield. This area was defended by the lst Marine Raider Battalion under the command of Lt.Col. Merritt (Red Mike) Edson. The Marines were dug in on a ridge and were forced to defend wave after wave of "banzai" attacks. Edson was all over the field of battle, pumping up his men, and fighting right in the line with them. At one point the Japanese breached his line and he ordered a pullback and then called in artillery strikes on their previous positions catching the attackers in the open. This area became known as "Bloody Ridge", and is still famous to this day. At dawn, there were over a thousand bodies of Japanese surrounding the ridge. After the battle, Vandergrift sent large patrols into the jungle to capture the enemy who was retreating. There was almost a serious setback when a battalion of Marines was hit by a large body of Japanese and ended up being pushed back to the beach. Things looked bad for this battalion until a destroyer responded and bombarded the attacking Japanese and the Marines fled to landing crafts for quick evacuation.
On the 18th of September, the 7th Marines landed 4,200 men and this allowed Vandergrift to become even more aggressive. Firefights were now nearly a daily occurrence. The Japanese were still determined to kick the Americans off the island and were landing about a thousand men a night, however the Marines were able to keep on shooting them. The Japanese finally landed a full division on Guadalcanal under the command of General Maruyama. Maruyama planned to hit the Americans in full force and put an end to them once and for all. He had his division split into 2 attacking forces. One was to hit the Marines from the west the other would hit from the south. The second force would hit the Marines on Bloody Ridge once again. This battle would feature two of the Marine Corps legendary figures, Gunnery Sgt. John Basilone and Lt.Col. Lewis "Chesty" Puller.
The tremendous attack that the marines were expecting due to good radio interceptions came at nighttime on October 24th. Most of the assault came against the south perimeter; Bloody Ridge again, and once again waves of "Banzai" attacks. Lt. Col. Puller's 1st Battallion, of the 7th Marines, were able to hold the position. A few hours after nightfall, the Japanese came screaming out of the jungle into heavy machine gun fire. GySgt. John Basilone, set up in the middle of the line, was able to keep a stream of bullets firing from one gun while making sure that the other guns had proper ammunition. He moved about the positions directing fire and had to run to the rear on a few instances to bring up more ammo. There were so many bodies in front of their position that several times he had to have his men crawl out and drag the bodies of the dead Japanese away because they were blocking the field of fire. The attacks numbered seven in total and went on all night long. Finally, when it ended there were 1,300 hundred Japanese lying dead in front of the marines, with a large percentage of them killed by Basilone's machine gunners. Basilone himself was credited with killing 38 Japanese and soon became the first marine of the war to receive the Medal of Honor for his actions. Unfortunately, he was killed during the Battle of Iwo Jima in 1945.
From November 13th to the 15th we have the actual naval battle of Guadalcanal. This naval battle was the first classic battleship duel between since the Battle of Jutland. The Japanese command at their base in Rabaul had prepared an extensive plan for the third attempt to seize Henderson Field. Leading the convoy of eleven transports would be a bombardment group centered around the battleships Hiei and Kirishima, which would shell the airfield on the nights of November 13 and 14 to ensure that Marine aviation would be completely ineffective. This force was under the command of Vice- Admiral Hiroaki Abe, with the transport under command of Rear-Admiral Razio Tanaka.
The American convoys were under the overall command of Rear-Admiral Richmond Kelly Turner. These convoys arrived off Lunga Point on the morning of the 12th and commenced unloading their reinforcements and supplies. Although there was still cargo aboard his ships, Turner received reports from Australian coast watchers from other islands that a Japanese force consisting of two battleships, one light cruiser, and eight to ten destroyers was heading south. Because the Japanese transports had not yet been sighted, Turner reasoned that this force had been dispatched to deal with his transports. Based on this information, Turner decided that his ships must depart before sunset. The majority of the escort, which was five cruisers and eight destroyers, were left behind under the command of Rear-Admiral Daniel Callaghan to engage the Japanese force wherever it could be found. Callaghan's force escorted the transports from the immediate area at sunset and returned to the waters off Guadalcanal. The transports would wait, with three destroyers, to the south of the island. Callaghan, who was somewhat inexperienced and had general uncertainty regarding his ships' abilities to conduct battle, aligned his 13 ships in line ahead. The four destroyers were first, then the cruisers Atlanta, San Francisco, Portland, Helena, Juneau, with another four destroyers making up his rear.
The Japanese force had fallen into disarray during the night's steaming through rainsqualls. Admiral Callaghan was hampered by poor radio discipline and the fact that an American commander had once again decided to be on a ship without the proper radar needed (Hammel 201). As a result, even when the Japanese force was detected on radar, Callaghan suffered from an unclear perception as to their composition, speed, and course. His attempt to cross the Japanese 'T' instead placed his ships on a collision course with the enemy. By the time fighting commenced at 2am, the range between the lead boats of each force had closed to mere 1000 yards.
The result of all this was a battle of monstrous proportions as both formations passed through each other. Damage was severe on both sides, with the Americans getting the worse end of the deal. However, the Japanese bombardment mission was a failure, which meant Hiei's doom the next morning as she tried to struggle back up to the base. Neither side was willing to give up the struggle to maintain control over the Sound, which would allow one side to deny supply to the other side's land forces. The stage was set for another brutal battle just two nights later on the 14th. On this night, from the north came another Japanese force trying to bombard Henderson Field. The Kirishima, a survivor of the battle two nights before, along with heavy cruisers Atago and Takao, formed the bulk of the force. In the meantime, USS Washington had approached undetected to within 8,400 yards of the Japanese force. Taking Kirishima under fire just after midnight, she sunk the Japanese ship thanks to an avalanche of 16" and 5" fire. By a quarter after midnight, Kirishima was a floating wreck. Washington proceeded to sink Ayanami, and then began a gradual disengagement from the action, avoiding several torpedo attacks in the process. For the Japanese, it was the end of any hope of winning Guadalcanal from the Americans.
In the course of three days of constant fighting in and around the area, they had lost two battleships, one heavy cruiser, three destroyers and eleven combat transports, not to mention 5,000 infantrymen that drowned, along with heavy casualties in the navy. From this point on, the Japanese would never stop retreating in the Pacific, and the US would continue to push their offensive throughout the South Pacific. The loss of life in the Guadalcanal campaign was tremendous for both sides. The US had 6,000 casualties out of 60,000 men involved including 1600 killed in action. The Japanese had even more devastating losses which amounted to 24,000 casualties of 36,000 involved.
Hammel, Eric. Battle of Guadalcanal, Decision at Sea, 1942-43. New York, N.Y.: Crown, 1966.
Leckie, Robert. Challenge for the Pacific; Guadalcanal. Garden City, N.Y.: Doubleday, 1965.
Lipmann, David H. "First Naval Battle of Guadalcanal," World War II Magazine. November 1997
Miller, John Jr. Gudalcanal; The First Offensive. Washington, D.C.: 1995. http://www.army.mil/cmh-pg/books/wwii/GuadC/GC-fm.htm