Part 6

The plan of attack was simple. The Army units passed through the raiders on the east-west trail to assume the eastern-most position. The entire column of files then merely faced to the right, which placed the composite battalion on line and pointing toward the enemy to the south. Company Q held the right flank on the bank of the Kaeruka River. Company N in the center and Company F on the left flank would guide on the movements of Q. Company G held back and acted as the reserve. Within minutes of beginning the advance, the attack ran into resistance. Japanese fire from the west bank of the river was particularly heavy and Company Q crossed over to deal with this threat. At the same time Company F moved to its left to skirt around strong defenses. Company G soon moved in to fill the gap. By late afternoon the Americans were able to clear the east bank of the river. Lieutenant Colonel Brown ordered Company Q to disengage from the west bank and join in the battalion’s perimeter defense at the mouth of the river. The Marines had lost 10 dead and 21 wounded, while the Army had suffered similarly.

The enemy made no ground attack that night, but periodically fired mortars and machine guns at American lines. During a lull at 0200 three Japanese barges approached the beach, apparently unaware that ownership of the real estate was under dispute. As they neared shore, the Marines guarding the seaward portion of the perimeter opened up. One craft sank and the other two broached in the surf. Two Marines and one soldier died in the firefight, but the entire enemy force, estimated at 120 men, was destroyed in the water or on the beach.

The next morning Brown decided to disengage and move to Vura Village, where he could reorganize and direct fire support on the remaining enemy at Kaeruka prior to launching another attack. The Americans received only harassing fire as they withdrew. After a day of prepatory fire by air, artillery, and naval guns, the composite battalion returned to Kaeruka on 3 July. They seized the village against minimal resistance, killed seven more Japanese, and captured one. The raiders returned to Oloana Bay by LCI later the next day. On 9 July they made a predawn landing from an LCT on Gatukai Island to investigate reports of a 50-man Japanese unit. The Marines found evidence of the enemy but made no contact. They returned to Oloana Bay on 10 July and departed for Guadalcanal the day after. There they joined up with Lieutenant Colonel Currin and the rest of the 4th Raider Battalion.

[Sidebar (page 29): The Raider Patch

The use of Marine Corps shoulder patches in World War II originated with the creation of the 1st Marine Division insignia following the Guadalcanal campaign. This was not a new practice for Marines, since members of the Fourth Marine Brigade wore the Star and Indian Head patch of the Army 2d Infantry Division in France during World War I.

The 1st Marine Division emblem consisted of the word “Guadalcanal” lettered in white on a red numeral “1” placed on a sky-blue diamond. The white stars of the Southern Cross surrounded the number. By July 1943, the I Marine Amphibious Corps had adopted a variation for its own patch--a white-bordered, red diamond, encircled by the white stars of the Southern Cross, on a five-sided blue background. Non-divisional corps units each had a specific symbol inside the red diamond. The emblem of the I MAC raider battalions was a skull. While the raider insignia may not have been the most artistic of Marine Corps shoulder patches in the war, it certainly was the most striking.

The skull device originated with the 2d Raider Battalion, which began using it not long after that unit came into existence. Carlson issued paper emblems, consisting of a skull-like face superimposed on crossed scimitars, to his raiders prior to the Makin raid. Each piece of paper was backed with glue and allegedly raiders were to use them to mark enemy dead for psychological effect, but they stuck together in the humid tropics and proved impractical. By the time Carlson’s battalion reached Guadalcanal, the emblem had evolved into a skull backed by a crossed “Gung Ho” knife and lightning bolt. It is not clear who selected the skull for the official raider patch, but that device readily conveyed the image the raiders effectively cultivated--that of an elite force trained to close with and destroy the enemy in commando-style operations. ]

_Enogai_

The 1st Raider Battalion and the raider regimental headquarters joined in on the New Georgia operation in the early hours of 5 July. They spearheaded the night landing of the Northern Group at Rice Anchorage, a spot selected because previous reconnaissance showed it to be undefended. Coastal guns from Enogai and the island of Kolombangara fired on the APDs during the landing, but their accuracy was poor in the driving rain. The only serious interference came from enemy destroyers; a long-range torpedo sunk one of the American transports. Nevertheless, the troops and most of their equipment and supplies made it ashore, and the amphibious group was able to withdraw before daylight left them vulnerable to further enemy counter-action.

From Rice Anchorage the 1st Raider Battalion was to advance overland to seize Dragons Peninsula and the enemy’s barge bases at Enogai and Bairoko. The Army’s 3d Battalion, 148th Infantry, would head deeper into the interior and establish a blocking position on the trail connecting Enogai-Bairoko with Munda. Another Army unit--3d Battalion, 145th Infantry--would divide itself, with half securing the beachhead and the remainder serving as the reserve force. Intelligence reports indicated 500 Japanese troops were in place on Dragons Peninsula. Liversedge and the regimental headquarters accompanied the 1st Raiders.

A reconnaissance patrol headed by raider Captain Clay A. Boyd had already been on the island for some time when the American force landed on 5 July. His small detachment, a coastwatcher, and the ever-present native scouts helped guide the initial waves of Marines to shore. The natives had also cut fresh trails leading to the Giza Giza River at the head of Enogai Inlet. With this advance preparation, the units covered the seven miles of rough terrain to the Giza Giza before nightfall. With darkness came heavy rain. There were no trails through the swamp on the far side of the Giza Giza, and the rain rendered the Tamoko River unfordable, so it took all of the next day for the force to move less than a mile and cross the Tamoko. There they halted and endured another night of rain.

Late in the morning on 7 July the raider advance guard met up with the enemy for the first time. In a brief fight it killed two men and captured the remaining five members of a small Japanese patrol near the village of Maranusa. From there the trail followed the steep sides of a coral ridge for a mile. In the village of Triri, at the western end of the ridge, the advance guard encountered a second patrol. The raiders killed 11 Japanese here, but lost three dead and four wounded. The attackers set up around Triri for the night and arranged ambushes along the trails entering the village. At dawn on 8 July a strong enemy force bumped into the platoon of raiders from Company D blocking the trail to Bairoko. The fight lasted all morning and the Japanese did not break off till Company C arrived on the scene. The enemy left behind 50 dead.

While the Army companies held Triri, the raider battalion moved out in the afternoon for Enogai. That trail entered yet another swamp along the southern edge of the inlet. This one was so bad that Griffith decided to return to Triri and try a new route the next day. It was just as well, for the Japanese had renewed their counterattack on the Bairoko trail and were pressing hard on the soldiers. A raider platoon from Company B slipped around the enemy flank and soon caused the Japanese to withdraw again.

On the morning of 9 July the 1st Raider Battalion headed down a different trail toward Enogai. It crossed the swamp by an easier route and led onto the high ground that dominated the objective. At 1500 Company C made contact with the Japanese defenses. Company A went into line on the left of Company C, anchoring its left flank on Leland Lagoon. Company B took the right flank. Thick jungle canopy prevented the use of mortars, but the lack of light also kept undergrowth to a minimum, leaving good fields of fire for small arms. Companies A and C were soon pinned down, though Company B reported no contact to its front. As night fell the firing slacked off.

Early the next morning Company B patrols moved forward and discovered their portion of the front unoccupied. Griffith then ordered his right flank to attack through the open terrain near the inlet. Mortars provided valuable support and Company B advanced quickly. With their flank turned, the Japanese began to pull out and cross to the spit of land on the north side of Leland Lagoon. Company A’s machine guns turned that into a bloody retreat, but its infantry platoons still could not crack the tough resistance in their immediate front. By evening, however, the raiders had surrounded these final holdouts. At first light the following day (11 July), Company D attacked with hand grenades and cleaned out the area.

American losses in the campaign against Enogai were 54 dead and 91 wounded. But the Marines and soldiers had killed 350 Japanese and seized 23 machine guns and four 140mm coastal defense guns. These results were remarkable given the handicaps which the American forces faced. The rough terrain had made it impossible for the troops to carry all the rations and ammunition they needed. (The 1st Raiders had gone without food for more than a day when supplies air-dropped to Triri finally reached them on the front lines at Enogai the evening of 10 July.) With the exception of one air strike, fire support had come entirely from the raiders’ handful of 60mm mortars.

There was also no way to quickly evacuate wounded to adequate hospitals until the Marines had taken Enogai. Then, on July 11, three PBYs flew in to carry the casualties to the rear. That mission almost had an unhappy ending when two Japanese planes appeared and strafed the PBYs as they sat on the water boarding the wounded. Luckily damage was slight and the amphibian planes were able to take off after the attack. When the PBYs departed they carried two of Liversedge’s staff officers with a plea for better aerial resupply and for the 4th Raider Battalion.

_Bairoko_

Things were worse for the 3d Battalion, 148th Infantry. After breaking off from the line of march of the 1st Raiders on 6 July, the soldiers had moved over equally difficult terrain to assume their blocking position on the Munda-Bairoko Trail on 8 July. After initial success against surprised Japanese patrols, the Army battalion fought a bloody action against an enemy force of similar strength that pushed the American soldiers off high ground and away from the important trail. Heavy jungle and poor maps prevented aerial resupply of their position, while illness and casualties sapped manpower. Liversedge led a reinforcing company from the 3d Battalion, 145th Infantry, to the scene on 13 July. Disappointed at the results of this portion of the operation, and unable to reinforce or resupply this outpost adequately, the raider colonel decided to withdraw the force to Triri. There the soldiers would recuperate for the upcoming move on Bairoko and disrupt enemy movement on the Munda-Bairoko Trail with occasional patrols.

Prior to dawn on 18 July four APDs brought the 4th Raider Battalion and fresh supplies to Enogai. Most of the Rice Anchorage garrison had also moved up to join the main force. This gave Liversedge four battalions, but all of them were significantly understrength due to losses already suffered in the New Georgia campaign. The 4th Raider Battalion was short more than 200 men. The 1st Raiders reorganized into two full companies (B and D), with A and C becoming skeleton units. A detachment of the 3d Battalion, 145th Infantry, remained at Rice Anchorage. More important, the enemy at Bairoko was now aware of the threat to its position. Marine patrols in mid-July noted that the Japanese were busily fortifying the landward approaches to their last harbor on the north coast of the island.

Liversedge issued his order for the attack. It would commence the morning of 20 July with two companies of the 1st Raider Battalion and all of the 4th advancing from Enogai while the 3d Battalion, 148th Infantry, moved out along the Triri-Bairoko Trail. The American forces would converge on the Japanese from two directions. The remaining Army battalion guarded Triri; Companies A and C of the raiders defended Enogai. These units also served as the reserve. Liversedge requested an air-strike on Bairoko timed to coincide with the attack, but it never materialized.

The movement toward Bairoko kicked off at 0800 and the 1st Raider Battalion made contact with enemy outposts two hours later. Companies B and D deployed into line and pushed through a series of Japanese outguards. By noon Griffith’s men had reached the main defenses, which consisted of four fortified lines on parallel coral ridges just a few hundred yards from the harbor. The bunkers were mutually supporting and well protected by coconut logs and coral. Each held a machine gun or automatic weapon. Here the 1st Battalion’s attack ground to a halt. Liversedge, accompanying the northern prong of his offensive, committed the 4th Battalion in an attempt to turn the enemy flank, but it met the same heavy resistance. The raider companies slowly worked their way forward, and by late afternoon they had seized the first two enemy lines. However, throughout this advance enemy 90mm mortar fire swept the Marine units and inflicted numerous casualties.

The southern prong of the attack was faring less well. The Army battalion made its first contact with the enemy just 1,000 yards from Bairoko, but the Japanese held a vital piece of high ground that blocked the trail. With the lagoon on one side and a deep swamp on the other, there was no room for the soldiers to maneuver to the flanks of the enemy position. With the approval of the executive officer of the raider regiment, the commander of the Army battalion pulled back his lead units and used his two 81mm mortars to soften the defenses.

When news of the halt in the southern attack made it to Liversedge at 1600, he asked the commanders of the raider battalions for their input. Griffith and Currin checked their lines. They were running out of water and ammunition, casualties had been heavy, and there was no friendly fire support. Neither battalion had any fresh reserves to commit to the fight. Moreover, a large number of men would be needed to hand-carry the many wounded to the rear, The 4th Raiders alone had 90 litter cases. From their current positions on high ground the Marine commanders could see the harbor just a few hundred yards away, but continued attacks against a well-entrenched enemy with fire superiority seemed wasteful. Not long after 1700 Liversedge issued orders for all battalions to pull back into defensive positions for the night in preparation for a withdrawal to Enogai and Triri the next day. He requested air strikes to cover the latter movement.

The move back across Dragons Peninsula on 21 July went smoothly from a tactical point of view. After failing to provide air support for the attack, higher echelons sent 250 sorties against Bairoko to cover the withdrawal. The Japanese did not pursue, but even so it was tough going on the ground. Water was in short supply and everyone had to take turns carrying litters. The column moved slowly and halted every few hundred yards. In the afternoon rubber boats picked up most of the wounded and ferried them to the rear. By that evening the entire force was back in its enclaves at Enogai and Triri. PBYs made another trip to evacuate wounded, though this time two Zero fighters damaged one of the amphibian planes after take-off and forced it to return to Enogai Inlet. Total American casualties were 49 killed, 200 wounded, and two missing--the vast majority of them suffered by the raider battalions.

The failure to seize the objective and the severe American losses were plainly the result of poor logistics and a lack of firepower. A Joint Chiefs of Staff post mortem on the operation noted that “lightly armed troops cannot be expected to attack fixed positions defended by heavy automatic weapons, mortars, and heavy artillery.” Another factor of significance, however, was the absence of surprise. The raiders had taken Enogai against similar odds because the enemy had not expected an attack from anywhere but the sea. Victory at Enogai provided ample warning to the garrison at Bairoko, and the Japanese there made themselves ready for an overland assault. The raiders might still have won with a suicidal effort, but Bairoko was not worth it.

The 1st Raider Regiment and its assorted battalions settled into defensive positions for the rest of July. The sole action consisted of patrols toward Bairoko and nuisance raids from Japanese aircraft. In early August elements of the force took up new blocking positions on the Munda-Bairoko Trail. On 9 August they made contact with Army troops from the Southern Landing Group. (Munda Airfield had fallen four days earlier.) Later in the month two Army battalions moved cautiously against Bairoko and found their way barred by only an occasional small outpost. The main enemy force had escaped by sea and the soldiers took control of the harbor on 24 August.

The raider headquarters and both Marine battalions embarked in transports on 28 August and sailed for Guadalcanal. The New Georgia campaign had been a costly one. Each raider battalion had suffered battle casualties of more than 25 percent. In addition, sickness had claimed an even greater number. The 1st Raiders now had just 245 effectives; the 4th Raiders only 154.

_Bougainville_

In the immediate aftermath of the fall of New Georgia, the Allies seized other islands in the vicinity, to include Arundel, Vella Lavella, and Kolombangara. Thereafter the South Pacific command turned its attention to the next major step in the encirclement of Rabaul. There were several options, but the final choice was a landing on Bougainville, the largest island in the Solomons group. A month later MacArthur’s command would assault Cape Gloucester on the western end of New Britain. Rabaul would then be within range of Allied land-based fighter aircraft coming from two directions. Air power thus could neutralize the Japanese bastion and allow it to be by-passed. The scheduled D-day for Bougainville was 1 November 1943.

Several factors dictated Halsey’s scheme of maneuver for the offensive. First, he had too few transports and Marines to make a direct assault on the heavily defended enemy airfields located on the northern and southern ends of the island. Another consideration was the range of land-based fighters from bases in the Central Solomons--they could only effectively cover a landing in the southern half of Bougainville. The planners settled on the Empress Augusta Bay-Cape Torokina region on the western side of the island. Defenses were negligible there, and Bougainville’s difficult terrain would prevent any rapid reaction from enemy ground forces located elsewhere on the island. Once ashore, the invasion force would seize a defensible perimeter, build an airfield, and eventually neutralize the remainder of the island from this enclave. A patrol landed by submarine in late September discovered that the areas back of the landing beaches were swampy. Aerial reconnaissance in October also discovered the construction of new defenses. Neither of these facts changed the plan, however.

For this operation, the 2d and 3d Raider Battalions were organized as the 2d Raider Regiment, with Shapley in command. Lieutenant Colonel Joseph P. McCaffery took over the 2d Raider Battalion. Because of insufficient shipping, the initial landing consisted of just two regiments of the 3d Marine Division, reinforced by the raiders and the 3d Defense Battalion. The remainder of the Marines and the Army’s 37th Division would follow at a later time.

On 1 November, the 3d and 9th Marines, assisted by the 2d Raider Battalion, seized a swath of the coast from Cape Torokina to the northwest. At the same time, the 3d Raider Battalion (less Company M) assaulted Puruata Island off Cape Torokina. Japanese defenses in the landing area consisted of a single company supported by a 75mm gun. One platoon occupied Puruata and a squad held Torokina Island, while the rest of the Japanese infantry and the gun were dug in on the cape itself.

The small Japanese force gave a good account of itself. The 75mm gun enfiladed the eastern landing beaches, while machine guns on the two small islands and the cape placed the approaches to this area in a crossfire. The result was havoc among the initial right flank assault waves, which landed in considerable disorder. The 75mm gun destroyed four landing craft and damaged 10 others before Sergeant Robert A. Owens of the 1st Battalion, 3d Marines silenced it. (He received a posthumous Medal of Honor for his single-handed charge against the key position.)

The 2d Raider Battalion, landing just to the left of Owens’ battalion, suffered from the gun, and from mortar and machine gun fire raking the beach. McCaffery succeeded in reorganizing his force on the beach and launching an attack that swept away the enemy defenses, but he fell mortally wounded in the process. Other battalions farther to the west met little or no resistance, except from high surf that caused many landing craft to broach. Company M, 3d Raiders, temporarily attached to the 2d Raider Battalion, moved out at noon and occupied a blocking position 1,500 yards up the Piva Trail, the main avenue of approach into the beachhead. The 3d Raiders silenced the machine guns on Puruata on D-day, and destroyed the last defenders on that island by late afternoon on 2 November. Total raider casualties to this point were three killed and 15 wounded.