Part 1

Transcriber’s note: Table of Contents added by Transcriber and placed into the Public Domain. Boldface is indicated with =equals signs=.

Contents

A Close Encounter: The Marine Landing on Tinian The Landing Force: Who, Where, When Sidebar: Selection of White Beach Sidebar: General Clifton B. Cates, USMC Jig Day: Feint and Landing Sidebar: Napalm: Something New in the Arsenal The Landing Sidebar: Tinian Defense Forces Counterattack Sidebar: Preparatory Strikes Sidebar: Aerial Reconnaissance and Photography The Drive South Final Days Sidebar: Medal of Honor Recipients Aftermath Sources About the Author Errata About the Series Transcriber’s Notes

A CLOSE ENCOUNTER:

THE MARINE LANDING ON TINIAN

MARINES IN WORLD WAR II COMMEMORATIVE SERIES

BY RICHARD HARWOOD

A Close Encounter:

The Marine Landing on Tinian

_by Richard Harwood_

Three weeks into the battle for Saipan, there was no doubt about the outcome and V Amphibious Corps (VAC) commanders began turning their attention to the next objective--the island of Tinian, clearly visible three miles off Saipan’s southwest coast. Its garrison of 9,000 Japanese army and navy combatants, many of them veterans of the campaigns in Manchuria, had been bombarded for seven weeks by U.S. air and sea armadas, joined in late June by massed Marine Corps and Army artillery battalions on Saipan’s southern coast. The 2d and 4th Marine Divisions, both still in the thick of the Saipan fight, had been selected for the assault mission.

The crucial question of where they would land, however, was still undecided. There was strong support among the planners for a landing on two narrow sand strips--code named White 1 and White 2--on Tinian’s northwest coast; one was 60 yards wide, the other 160. But Vice Admiral Richmond K. Turner, overall commander of the Marianas Expeditionary Force, was skeptical. He leaned toward Yellow Beach, made up of several wide, sandy strips in front of Tinian Town, the island’s heavily fortified administrative and commercial center.

On 3 July, VAC’s Amphibious Reconnaissance Battalion, commanded by Captain James L. Jones, was put on alert for reconnaissance of these potential landing sites. On 9 July, the day Saipan officially was declared secured, Jones got his operation order from Marine Lieutenant General Holland M. Smith, commander of Expeditionary Troops. His men were to scout out the Tinian beaches and their fortifications and determine their capacity to handle the landing force and keep it supplied. Accompanying naval underwater demolition teams would do the hydrographic work and locate underwater obstacles, natural or man-made.

Captain Jones picked for the job Company A under the command of Captain Merwin H. Silverthorn, Jr., the son of a Marine general and World War I veteran, and Company B, commanded by First Lieutenant Leo B. Shinn. The Navy assigned to the mission Underwater (UDT) Team 5, led by Lieutenant Commander Draper L. Kauffman, and UDT Team 7 under Lieutenant Richard F. Burke. They rehearsed the operation on the night of 9-10 July off the beaches of Saipan’s Magicienne Bay. On the evening of the 10th, the Marine and Navy units boarded the destroyer transports _Gilmer_ and _Stringham_ for the short trip into the channels separating the two islands.

The teams debarked in rubber boats at 2030, paddled to within 500 yards of the beach and swam to their destinations. Fortunately, it was a black night and although the moon rose at 2230, it was largely obscured by clouds.

Yellow Beach was assigned to Silverthorn’s Company A. He led 20 Marines and eight UDT swimmers ashore. They found a beach near Tinian Town flanked on each side by formidable cliffs. There were many floating mines and underwater boulders in the approaches. On the beach itself, double-apron barbed wire had been strung. Second Lieutenant Donald F. Neff worked his way 30 yards inland to locate exit routes for vehicles. Nearby, talkative Japanese work crews were building pillboxes and trenching with blasting charges. Neff spotted three Japanese sentries on a cliff overlooking the beach; now and then searchlights scanned the beach approaches.

Silverthorn, Burke, and their men made it back to the _Gilmer_ safely. Their impression of Yellow Beach as a landing site was distinctly unfavorable.

To the north, at the White Beaches assigned to Company B, things had not gone well. Strong currents pushed the rubber boats off course. The team headed for White 1 was swept 800 yards north of its destination and never got ashore. The party headed for White 2 wound up on White 1 and reconnoitered the area. Both parties were picked up by the _Gilmer_. The next night 10 swimmers from Company A were sent back to reconnoiter White 2 and had a successful trip.

The reports on the White beaches were encouraging. Although the landing areas were very restricted, it was concluded that amphibian tractors (LVTs) and other vehicles could negotiate the reefs and get ashore, and that troops with little difficulty could clamber over the low cliffs flanking the beaches. Marines forced to disembark from boats at the reef could safely wade ashore through the shallow surf. Members of Kauffman’s UDT party confirmed the Marine findings and reported that “no mines or manmade underwater obstructions were found.”

A few hours after the reconnaissance team returned from White 2, Admiral Turner’s objections were withdrawn and a command decision to use the northern beaches was made. On 20 July, a time and date for the landing were fixed: 0730 on 24 July.

_The Landing Force: Who, Where, When_

The task of seizing Tinian was assigned to the two Marine divisions on Saipan--the 2d and the 4th. The third division on the island--the Army’s 27th Infantry--would remain on Saipan in reserve. All three had been severely battered during the Saipan campaign, suffering more than 14,000 casualties, including nearly 3,200 dead.

For the 2d Marine Division, the Tinian battle would be the fourth time around in a span of little more than 18 months. The division left Guadalcanal in February 1943, having suffered 1,000 battle casualties. Another 12,500 men had diagnosed cases of malaria. Nine months later--on 20 November 1943--the division had gone through one of the most intense 72 hours of combat in the history of island warfare at Tarawa. It sustained 3,200 casualties, including nearly a thousand dead. Ten weeks before Tarawa, the division was still malaria-ridden, with troops being hospitalized for the disease at the rate of 40 a day. The ranks were filled with gaunt men whose skins were yellowed by daily doses of Atabrine pills. The Saipan operation seven months later, led by division commander Major General Thomas E. Watson, took a heavy toll of these men--5,000 wounded, 1,300 dead.

Watson had earned a reputation at Saipan as a hard-charging leader. When the division stalled fighting its way up Mount Topatchau, he was unimpressed. The historian Ronald Spector wrote, in the midst of that effort, “he was heard shouting over a field telephone, ‘There’s not a goddamn thing up on that hill but some Japs with machine guns and mortars. Now get the hell up there and get them!’” His assistant division commander was Brigadier General Merritt A. “Red Mike” Edson, who was awarded a Medal of Honor for his heroism on Guadalcanal.

The 4th Division had had a busy, if slightly less demanding, year as well. It went directly into combat after its formation at Camp Pendleton, California, landing on 31 January 1944 in the Marshall Islands where it suffered moderate casualties--fewer than 800 men--in the capture of Roi-Namur. At Saipan its losses reached 6,000, including about 1,000 dead. The Tinian landing would be its third in a little over six months and would be the first under a new divisional commander--Major General Clifton B. Cates, a well-decorated World War I veteran, who would become the 19th Commandant of the Marine Corps in 1948.

Still, “the morale of the troops committed to the Tinian operation was generally high,” then-Major Carl W. Hoffman wrote in the official history of the battle. “This fact takes on significance only when it is recalled that the Marines involved had just survived a bitter 25-day struggle and that, with only a fortnight lapse (as distinguished from a fortnight rest), they were again to assault enemy-held shores.... [Their] spirit ... was revealed more in a philosophical shrug, accompanied with a ‘here-we-go-again’ remark, than in a resentful complaint [at] being called upon again so soon.”

The morale of the troops was sustained by the preinvasion fires directed at Tinian. For Jig minus 1 and Jig Day (Jig being the name given to D Day at Tinian), Rear Admiral Harry W. Hill, commander of the Northern Landing Force, had divided the island into five fire support sectors, assigning specific ships to each. His purpose was two-fold: destruction and deception to confuse and deceive the Japanese as to the landing intentions of the Marines.

Tinian Town, under this scheme, got the heaviest pounding the day before the landing--almost 3,000 rounds of 5- to 16-inch shells from the battleships _Colorado_, _Tennessee_, and _California_, the cruiser _Cleveland_, and seven destroyers: _Ramey_, _Wadleigh_, _Norman Scott_, _Monssen_, _Waller_, _Pringle_ and _Philip_. _Colorado_ had the best day, knocking out with 60 rounds of 16-inch shells the two 6-inch coastal defense guns the Japanese had emplaced on the west coast near Faibus San Hilo Point, guns that easily could have covered the White Beaches.

Firing on the White Beach area itself was minimal for purposes of deception and for lack of suitable targets. The cruiser _Louisville_ fired 390 rounds into the area before calling it a day.

There was a lot of air activity on the 23d. At three periods during the day, naval gunfire and artillery barrages were halted to allow massive air strikes on railroad junctions, pillboxes, villages, gun emplacements, cane fields, and the beaches at Tinian Town. More than 350 Navy and Army planes took part, dropping 500 bombs, 200 rockets, 42 incendiary clusters, and 34 napalm bombs. This was only the second use of napalm during the Pacific War; napalm bombs were first used on Tinian the day before.

That evening, 37 LSTs at anchor off Saipan were loaded with 4th Marine Division troops. Rations for three days, water and medical supplies, ammunition, vehicles, and other equipment had been preloaded, beginning on 15 July. The troops were going to travel light: a spoon, a pair of socks, insect repellant, and emergency supplies in their pockets, and no pack on their backs.

“Close at hand,” the historians Jeter Isely and Philip Crowl wrote in their classic _The U.S. Marines and Amphibious War_, “rode the ships of the two transport divisions that would carry two regiments of the 2d Marine Division on a diversionary feint against Tinian Town and would later disembark them along with the third regiment across the northwestern beaches.” (A similar feint was made by 2d Division Marines less than a year later off the southeast beaches of Okinawa, and by the same division lying off Kuwait City nearly 50 years later in the Desert Storm operation).

The 4th was designated the assault division for Tinian. The beaches were not wide enough to accommodate battalions landing abreast, much less divisions. Instead, the assault troops would land by columns--squads, platoons, and companies.

The 2d Division would follow on after taking part in the massive feint off the beaches of Tinian Town, hoping to tie down the main Japanese defense forces and spring the surprise of a landing over the lightly defended northern beaches.

To give the 4th more punch immediately after landing, the 2d was stripped of some of its firepower, such as tank and artillery units. It would, accordingly, be at the lowest strength at Tinian of any Marine division involved in an amphibious operation in World War II.

Despite these additions, the 4th, too, would be understrength--“skinny” was the descriptive word used by Lieutenant Colonel Justice M. “Jumping Joe” Chambers, commander of the 3d Battalion, 25th Marines, who was to earn a Medal of Honor in the Iwo Jima operation little more than six months later. The division’s infantry battalions had received only one replacement draft after the Saipan fighting. At full strength they averaged 880 men; at Tinian the average strength was down by more than 35 percent to 565.

For all these reasons--combat fatigue, heavy losses during previous weeks and months, and understrength units--the Marines on Tinian would play a cautious game. Admiral Turner had said he would give them two weeks to seize the island. Major General Harry Schmidt, who relieved Lieutenant General Holland M. Smith as VAC commander, promised to get it done in 10 days. In the event, the island was secured after nine days. In retrospect, analysts say the operation could have been finished off sooner by more aggressive tactics. Time, however, was no great factor; the relatively slow pace of the operation probably kept casualties at a minimum and reduced the probabilities of troop fatigue. Tinian was easy on the eyes, but the heat and humidity were brutal, the cane fields were hard going, and it was the season of monsoons.

[Sidebar (page 3): Selection of White Beach

The selection of the northwestern beaches was universally regarded as the key to the quick success of the Tinian operation. The credit for this choice, however, has been debated for years. Carl Hoffman, in his history of the battle, quoted Major General Harry Schmidt on the issue: “Many high ranking officers have asked who originated the plan.... While the 4th Division was under my command and prior to the Marianas campaign, my planning officer, Lieutenant Colonel Evans F. Carlson, made such a plan and probably such a plan was turned in to the V Amphibious Corps.”

The division’s intelligence officer, Lieutenant Colonel Gooderham L. McCormick, a Reservist who later became mayor of Phildelphia, agreed. So did Lieutenant Victor Maghakian of the division’s reconnaissance unit: “The man who definitely planned that landing ... was Evans F. Carlson.... He told me all about that Tinian plan before he was wounded [22 June] on Saipan.”

Others minimized Carlson’s role, including Marine Major General Graves B. Erskine, who was then the V Amphibious Corps chief of staff, and Marine Colonel Robert E. Hogaboom, the operations officer for the landing forces at Saipan and Tinian. Admiral Harry W. Hill, commander of the Northern Attack Force, told Hoffman that “if there were plans and I presume there were tentative ones, none of them were available to me or my staff.”

Hoffman discovered that before the war, students at the Marine Corps Schools at Quantico had come up with the northern beaches solution to the “then-theoretical Tinian solution.”

But historian Ronald Spector, in his Pacific war history, _Eagle Against the Sun_, left no doubt who had forced the issue. It was Marine Lieutenant General Holland M. Smith. When he and Admiral Hill proposed the use of White Beaches 1 and 2, Admiral Turner firmly vetoed [the] proposal and told [Hill] to work on planning for a landing near Tinian Town. Hill reluctantly complied, but he ordered part of his staff to keep working on the White Beaches plan.... [After reconnaissance reports] Hill and Smith tried once again to change Admiral Turner’s mind, but he remained obstinate.

In a characteristic exchange, the admiral told General Smith: “You are not going to land on the White Beaches; I won’t land you there.” “Oh yes you will,” replied the general. “You’ll land me any goddamned place I tell you to.” Turner was adamant: “I’m telling you now it can’t be done. It’s absolutely impossible.” “How do you know it’s impossible?” asked Smith. “You’re just so goddamned scared that some of your boats will be hurt.”

Neither this exchange nor the more subtle efforts of Admiral Hill served to convince Turner, so Hill reluctantly took the matter to Admiral Spruance [Turner’s superior]. Spruance liked the White Beaches idea, but he was reluctant to overrule Turner, his expert on amphibious warfare. A conference with Turner and his subordinate commanders was arranged on board the flagship. All spoke in favor of the White Beaches. Spruance turned to Turner. The latter calmly announced that he favored the White Beaches also.

In a letter written to Hoffman in 1950, Turner said: “... before the reconnaissances of July 10 and 11 were made, I had (without announcement) tentatively decided to accept the White Beaches unless the reconnaissance reports were decidedly unfavorable.”

This was one of those cases, as John F. Kennedy once said, in which “victory has many fathers but defeat is an orphan.” ]

[Sidebar (page 5): General Clifton B. Cates, USMC

Clifton B. Cates, a native Tennessean, was commissioned in 1917, and was sent to France with the 6th Marines in World War I. He had outstanding service in five major engagements of the war, and returned to the United States a well-decorated young officer after his tour in the occupation of Germany. One of his early assignments following the war was as aide to Major General Commandant George Barnett. During his more than 37 years as a Marine, Cates was one of the few officers who held commands of a platoon, a company, a battalion, a regiment, and a division in combat. He was the 19th Commandant of the Marine Corps at the outset of the Korean War.

His assignments during the interwar years consisted of a combination of schooling, staff assignments, and command, such as his tour as battalion commander in the 4th Marines, then in Shanghai. In 1940, he took command of the Basic School, then in the Philadelphia Navy Yard. He took command of the 1st Marines in May 1942.

In World War II, Cates commanded the 1st Marines in the landing on Guadalcanal. After returning to the States, he was promoted to brigadier general. He went back to the Pacific war in mid-1944 to take command of the 4th Marine Division in time for the Tinian operation. He also led it in the Iwo Jima assault, and was decorated at the end of the fighting with his second Distinguished Service Medal. Part of the citation accompanying the medal reads: “Repeatedly disregarding his own personal safety. Major General Cates traversed his own front lines daily to rally his tired, depleted units and by his undaunted valor, tenacious perseverance, and staunch leadership in the face of overwhelming odds, constantly inspired his stout-hearted Marines to heroic effort during critical phases of the campaign.”

On 1 January 1948, General Cates took over as Commandant of the Marine Corps, remaining until 31 December 1951, when he reverted to the three stars of a lieutenant general and began his second tour as Commandant of the Marine Corps Schools at Quantico, Virginia. General Cates retired on 30 June 1954. He died on 4 June 1970. ]

_Jig Day: Feint and Landing_

The first troop ships moved out of Saipan’s Charan Kanoa harbor at 0330, 24 July. They were the transports _Knox_, _Calvert_, _Fuller_, _Bell_, _Heywood_, and _John Land_. They were carrying the 2d and 8th Marines (infantry regiments) of the 2d Marine Division on a mission of deception that turned out to be far bloodier than the White Beach landings and far bloodier than anyone had anticipated. They had a muscular escort--the battleship _Colorado_, the light cruiser _Cleveland_, and the destroyers _Ramey_, _Norman Scott_, _Wadleigh_, and _Monssen_.

The convoy moved into Sunharon Harbor opposite Tinian Town just before dawn. A few minutes after 0600, the _Calvert_ began lowering its landing craft and by 0630 all 22 of its boats were in the water. Marines climbed down the cargo nets. Within a half hour, 244 Navy and Army planes began strafing and bombing runs paying particular attention to Tinian Town. Shells and rockets from battleships, heavy and light cruisers, destroyers, and 30 gunboats saturated the beaches. The massed artillery battalions on southern Saipan thundered in with their 105s and 155s.

After a half-hour of this furious bombardment, the LCVPs (landing craft, vehicle and personnel) from _Calvert_ began their run toward the beach at Tinian Town, receiving heavy artillery and mortar fire from the shore. Admiral Hill, seeking to avoid casualties, ordered the boats to withdraw and reform. A second run started and immediately drew fire from the shore; several boats were sprayed with shell fragments. But they continued on to within 400 yards of the beach before turning back.

While the small boats engaged in this maneuver, the battleship _Colorado_ came under fire at a range of 3,200 yards from two 6-inch naval guns near Tinian Town, guns that had gone undetected during the weeks of preinvasion surveillance and preparatory fires. Within 15 minutes, the Japanese gunners scored 22 direct hits on _Colorado_ and six direct hits on the destroyer _Norman Scott_, which was attempting to protect the battleship. Casualties among the crews and Marine detachments on the two ships were heavy: 62 killed and 223 wounded. Ten Marines were among the dead, 31 were among the wounded. _Colorado_ was through for the day and limped off back to Saipan. The Japanese battery survived for four more days until destroyed by the battleship _Tennessee_.

The losses sustained by the two ships exceeded those suffered that day by the Marine landing force on the northwestern beaches. But the feint served its purpose. It froze in place around Tinian Town a whole battalion of the _50th Infantry Regiment_ and various elements of the _56th Naval Guard Force_. And it convinced the Japanese commander, Colonel Kiyochi Ogata, that he had thwarted an invasion. His message to Tokyo described how his forces had repelled 100 landing barges.

These “barges” were reloaded on the _Calvert_ at 1000 and the convoy steamed north to the White Beaches where 4th Division troops had landed after a mishap in their planning. An underwater demolition team using floats carrying explosives swam to White Beach 2 shortly before dawn to blast away boulders and destroy beach mines. The mission failed because of a squall. The floats scattered, the explosives were lost and a few hours later, Marines paid a price for this aborted mission.