Inside America's Fight For The Pacific | Battlezone | War Stories

[Music] the battle for the pacific started on the 18th of september 1931 when the japanese imperial army began its trail of blood and conquest to the far east here at mukden in southern manchuria lay a strategic railway which the japanese had owned since the russian japanese war in 1905 the japanese army claimed that the chinese had sabotaged the railway so they occupied mukden they asked for reinforcements to come north from korea the government in tokyo had already tried to stop the army's advance but the orders had been deliberately delayed and then ignored now the supreme command sent in more troops the government found itself powerless to stop them and the japanese marched beyond mukden to take all manchuria there was still no official state of war between china and japan but china was in no mood to submit peacefully to having almost a fifth of her territory taken away for years there had been an official boycott of japanese goods in chinese ports but it had rarely been observed now it was imposed rigorously and it led to renewed fighting the japanese demanded that the boycott be lifted and when their request was refused they invaded shanghai and occupied a densely populated part of the dockside area there was heavy fighting and large areas of the city were laid waste whilst 30 000 japanese settlers in shanghai crowded round the jetties trying to get out of what promised to turn into a prolonged war within two days the japanese mounted another invasion this time at nan king a hundred miles north of shanghai and at that time the capital city of china in the north they had already declared that manchuria had won its independence from china and would now be called manchu quo it was only another way of saying that manchuria was now a colony of japan but at nan king they once again met stiff opposition and had to send in reinforcement the japanese now decided to call for a truce the japanese could feel well satisfied for the moment manchuria renamed manchu was theirs now they could march west on mongolia protected by the great wall of china within china the nationalist government could do nothing to contest japan's control over the new state of manchu chiang kai-shek had his own problems fighting mount seiton's communists to some extent it was mao who held the key but it was when he agreed to make common cause with chiang kai-shek against the japanese in 1936 that the uneasy peace with japan came to an end on the 7th of july 1937 the japanese moved south of the great wall of china and took peaking they invaded shanghai again within two months they had over 150 000 men in china this time it was a full-scale war and the japanese looked for a decisive battle their attention centered on nanking chiang kai-shek's capital [Music] [Music] [Music] oh in december 1937 nanking fell to the japanese army the chinese nationalists have suffered a severe sector and not only in terms of arms and men the loss of nan king led to the loss of all china's wealthiest cities and ports but nan king was also an indication of what was to come some of the worst atrocities of the war were committed here the chinese nationalists fought where they could but they were soon forced to take to the rivers and the mountains of the interior where the japanese mechanized transport could not follow here they trained and re-equipped then by using the difficult terrain and with equipment supplied by germany they managed to bring the war to a stalemate the japanese had neither the men nor the money to take on the chinese in the mountains already they were having to move men back to manchuria where fighting had broken out again with the soviet union so in southern china the japanese decided to dig in and starve the chinese out but the japanese army in turn was already being starved of oil and now it was the turn of the imperial navy the united states aware of the dangers of japan in the pacific cut the oil exports which have been aiding japan's conquest in china by the fall of 1941 japan had only six months oil left because of the united states embargo and so the fleet set out on the massive gamble to take on the united states [Music] the target was pearl harbor here the american forces felt immune from attack there was a mood of confidence in all ranks of both the army and the navy at pearl harbor it was a confidence that was to prove unwarranted some in washington knew the japanese embassy had been told to destroy their papers and the americans had decoded the messages they knew that 1300 hours washington time was the hour of attack but where general marshall judged it would be a dawn attack he transmitted a warning to the philippines panama san francisco and hawaii it ended just what significance the our set may have we do not know but be on alert accordingly one pm in washington is dawn at pearl harbor but marshall's warning was accidentally delayed it was not decoded at pearl until seven hours after the attack [Music] oh the 350 japanese pilots specially trained for the attack on pearl harbor were given their final instructions for the operation in the early light of december 7th then as the sun rose over the horizon they ceremoniously drank a toast to the health of their emperor hirohito the first wave of 180 aircraft took off under the command of captain mitsuo fujita they were 90 kate single-engine bombers under his command half of them carrying torpedoes the remainder carrying armor-piercing bombs there were 51 val two-seater dive bombers and 43 zeke fighters [Music] part of this wave was actually spotted on an american army radar screen by an army private but he could contact no one from the air force and imagine that the bombers must be flying fortresses passing hawaii on route to the philippines so he told no one captain fushida remembers it today it was he who gave the historic order to attack torah torah torah we came over hawaii at 7 19. when i saw the target i yield attract attract attack [Music] american response to this surprise attack was slow the years of peace had dulled their reactions but more than this they could not believe it was happening from the heights overlooking pearl harbor one man saw it all a young ensign on sunday leave now captain knoll of the united states navy he had got up early and was preparing breakfast i was in the kitchen of our house there looking out the window while warming the bottle for our child i could see the entrance to pearl harbor and i was saw the planes the smoke the flame the big splashes of water and i thought we were seeing some maneuvers that were uh common enough at that time at that uh minute uh the captain of my ship uh telephoned and asked me if i knew what was going on he had heard over the radio that pearl harbor was being attacked before leaving for the base which of course was my first reaction after the initial surprise i went out to the base as fast i could before leaving i sent put my family in the care of our neighbors who were americans of japanese origin and i'd like to underline at this point that no americans of japanese origin who lived in hawaiian islands were traitors to the united states for half an hour the first wave died launching their torpedoes dropping their bombs on the airfields nearly 200 planes were in flames the americans lost two and a half thousand men killed a thousand more were wounded yet the japanese force of 350 planes that inflicted these casualties on the men and ships at pearl harbor lost just 29 planes less than a tenth such was the weakness of the american response i arrived just during the second attack of the japanese bombers unfortunately we didn't have a single cannon on board and this was especially frustrating because during all our practice shooting we had won the first prize and were considered to be the best gunners in our class in the fleet in fact my chief gunner was so frustrated he had nothing to shoot and he was crying with rage all we could do was to help put out the fires and evacuate the wounded all the battleships were hit and uh there was of course a great confusion smoke of flame uh sirens or whistles we were near the battleship pennsylvania and the japanese bombs fell all around us it was a devastating blow to the prestige of the united states four battleships lay on the bottom at pearl harbor the rest severely damaged but six and a half thousand miles away admiral yamamoto heard no news of the two aircraft carriers he had thought were at pearl these the enterprise and the lexington were the real prize they had left on routine missions before nagumo's fleet had closed in yamamoto's victory was not complete and these two carriers were to severely affect japan's plans in the coming months nevertheless as the reports flew around the world and the declarations of war were made pearl harbor seemed to be an overwhelming victory for the people of japan but they had not only surprised the americans they had been successful elsewhere but the attack on pearl harbor was only the most spectacular of many attacks which the japanese launched almost simultaneously in several areas to the south and west of their country two of their main objectives were singapore and hong kong strategic centers of the british empire hong kong was attacked on december the 8th it fell to the japanese army on christmas day [Music] come back singapore the richest city of the empire was said to be invincible its defenses were strengthened by the royal navy's two largest battleships the prince of wales and the republic who had come to these waters to deter the japanese threat but when the japanese torpedo bombers opened the attack on singapore they sank both the prince of wales and the repulse as the invasion began there was now nothing to stop the troops of general yamashita from landing on the shores of northern malaya and moving south towards singapore [Music] yamashita the tiger of malaya the japanese rommel within two months he pushed his troops 300 miles through the jungles of malaya and the british opposition until he stood along the shores of the narrow straits that separate singapore island from the mainland this was the direction from which the british had thought an attack could never come after a week of bombardment singapore fell louis baum was there he witnessed the last humiliating moments the final days of the battle of singapore were drawing to a close and the city was entirely encircled with the troops around the perimeter battling to keep the japanese out you can see over there on your right on your left brother fraser hill which was the west front uh where the japanese were had a front line and from where they could overlook the city of singapore the conditions in the town at this time were of course appalling as one can expect me the whole sky was covered with a thick pile of black smoke coming from the boy from the burning oil reservoir of the naval base the sun couldn't pierce the thick cloud the roads were cluttered with burnt out vehicles with buffers and trans which had been blown up in the heavy bombardments the streets and the pavements littered with the dead of civilians the services were breaking down the water was broken down the reservoirs in the hands of japanese there's no more electricity and the conditions reached a point where general percival military commander and the civil governor shenton thomas were forced to come to the decision that from the civil point of view there was only one answer and that was to surrender the city to the japanese under the best terms possible how serious was the loss of singapore to the british it was a dark period churchill was battling at the time after the one might say the nadir of the war's history rommel was battling at the gates of alexandria the nazis were hammering at the doors of the kremlin we in britain were fighting the battle of the atlantic we were trying at the same time to rebuild our factories and industries to recreate an army to invade europe eventually and there was very little to spare in the way of a modern equipment or reinforcements of fruits for a different place like singapore it is i mean a terrible uh problem i think for the british government to decide whether they should send their few uh equipment they could spare either to sewage or to singapore one had to be sacrificed and it was the side of the sewers was the more important and their importance would go there we had to go without and the inevitable end was the fall of singapore my last position was here in the gardens of four houses behind where you're standing i had four guns and i was there when singapore fell um i wasn't actually captured physically by the japanese um we were the whole city was was surrendered but the first japanese i saw was in the streets around here because the next day the japanese didn't occupy the city until sunday morning and the next day i took a stroll around had nothing much else to do having destroyed my equipment and i turned around the corner i saw a japanese soldier and i thought i'd meet somebody you know fully armed with uh submachine gun tin hat and everything else and when i saw my meter sort of hit my watch because i knew that would be the first thing to disappear and i saw little japanese shoulder he seemed to be no harder than that um dressed into a shabby looking clothes 12 minute we weren't all that smart i thought my god is that the japanese army i didn't stay for long i went back to my uh gun position i told the soldiers there while the japanese are in the vicinity be careful uh you know they'll be with us before long were you badly treated personally not to start with no the takeover of the city the takeover of the city itself was well disciplined uh it was what the one sole concession that the japanese yamashita would agree to with general percival was that the only certain japanese but the disciplined japanese troops would occupy the city and we insisted on that to avoid a general massacre of the civilian population they occupied it the following day on the sunday and personally i can't complain i had i i didn't see any more of a japanese soldiers after that the tough times were yet to come there to follow yes general percival signed the articles of surrender 130 000 men were put into captivity [Music] another western outpost had also been dragged into the japanese embrace the philippines here on the 8th of december the day after pearl harbor the american airport was taken by surprise and half destroyed within an [Music] hour a week later little remained of american air power in the philippines the japanese planes ruled the skies over manila its extensive shipyards were now untenable as a base for the u.s fleet and manila was declared an open city by general macarthur on the day after christmas 1941 japanese civilians came out of their cellars to cheer the victorious general hommer as singapore fell to the japanese armies general macarthur's troops were being cut off in the bataan peninsula for three months they held out without food with no hope of reinforcements by march the americans knew the situation was hopeless president roosevelt ordered macarthur to leave for australia a fortnight later the men left in bataan were forced to surrender seventy thousand of them now began the famous death march 55 miles from maryvale to san fernando between seven and ten thousand of these men died on the way but it was not over yet the americans still had a toehold in the philippines the four fought in the bay of manila of these fort mills on corregidor macarthur's former headquarters held out for another month it had always seemed impregnable with its giant cannons in the network of tunnels under melinda hill where no bomb could reach [Music] so [Music] but under constant japanese attack from land sea and air even corregidor fell there was no more resistance in the philippines when the men of corregidor surrendered it was not the only loss to the united states in the western pacific guam and wake islands had been taken too but the philippines was the major prize [Music] in tokyo the crowds were ecstatic hong kong singapore the philippines within a fortnight they were to hear also of the fall of burma a resounding banzai echoed round the empire general tojo himself joined in the exaltation and the emperor came forth to greet his people but in the united states plans for revenge had already begun even before the fall of corregidor the americans conceived an attempt to bring the war home to the japanese a crazy idea to bomb tokyo 10 000 miles from the united states coast lieutenant colonel james doolittle was given the task of training a squadron of b-25 mitchell twin-engine bombers to take off from an aircraft carrier deck only 90 yards long and vice admiral halsey was ordered to take 16 of these planes across the pacific to within striking distance of the japanese capital but in mid-pacific the plan was spoiled a japanese trawler sited the american aircraft carrier two days before it reached the planned strike position the taller was sunk but halsey fearing it may have alerted the japanese fleet ordered the b-25 to take off [Music] the pilots knew as they got airborne that they could not return to the carrier their only hope after bombing tokyo was for a safe landing in china but no one had alerted the japanese in tokyo it was the emperor's birthday the sky was full of planes doolittles raiders flew over tokyo for some 30 seconds dropped a total of 16 tons of bombs then they fled to china do little remembers one airplane against orders flew to russia he had a leak in his gas tank and he flew to vladivostok because he felt he could not possibly get to china the other airplanes the other 50 in all proceeded to china two of them cracked up on the coast of china just about out of gasoline and uh by the time we got to china the weather was again very bad uh one of them cracked up on a lake in the interior um the rest of us jumped so our airplanes were all lost all 16 of the aeroplanes were lost three of doolittle's raiders as they were called in the newspapers were captured by the japanese and later executed for war crimes i felt very badly indeed i had lost all of my aircraft my crews were widely dispersed and i think i have never felt sadder or less successful than i did after the tokyo raid nevertheless 77 men survived the raid they were given a triumphant welcome in china by madame chiang kai-shek on the other hand the raid did have two desirable uh results one is it caused the japanese people to question their warlords who had told them that japan would never be bombed two it gave the folks at home the first good news that they had had all news prior to that had been unfavorable the doolittle raid was important not simply because it caused the japanese people to question their military leaders it also strengthened admiral yamamoto's argument that if japan was to be defended against such raids the united states fleet would have to be defeated and japan would have to capture midway but this was not yet the concern of the japanese their eyes still look to the south and the rich oil fields of the dutch east indies these were now secured by a series of lightning raids which took borneo the celebs java and sumatra but now the japanese advance slowed down in new guinea the australians stuck it out in the dense jungle they were helped by the local natives and the japanese found it hard going slowly the australians fell back climbing the central mountain range up the kokoda track a jungle trail which would get them to port moors beyond the southern side of the island [Music] the japanese needed to take fort mosby but they could not get up the kokoda track port moresby was never captured it was to prove to be a crucial factor in the war in the pacific ever since the beginning of hostilities australia had been within the range of the japanese bombers operating either from aircraft carriers or from air bases in the southern territories that the japanese captured and even before macarthur had left the philippines to set up his base in australia the japanese had bombed darwin on the northern coast on the 19th of february with a total of 242 bombers this raid had sunk several ships including the united states destroyer fiery as well as killing over 200 civilians [Music] but the japanese knew that if they were to seriously hamper the americans lines of communication with macarthur's forces they would have to control the seas immediately to the north of australia and this meant that they needed to capture port moresby it was now becoming obvious that this would be very difficult to take by land and so a naval assault was prepared the invasion forces assembled on the 4th of may 1942 and sailed south from rebel into the coral sea but here the americans were ready alerted by their decoding experts they had moved two aircraft carriers to yorktown and lexington into the coral sea on the 7th of may a reconnaissance plane from the yorktown sited the japanese forties the american planes took off to fight the japanese ships beyond the horizon it was to be the first naval battle in history where the opposing commanders could not see the enemy it was also to be the first time that the japanese fleet felt the strength of an american carrier-borne strike as the american torpedo bombers approached the japanese the weather worsened one of the japanese carriers the zuikaku was completely obscured by the storm so the other japanese carrier shakaku became the main target for the american planes it was put out of action [Music] but the planes from the zuikaku had been launched at the height of the storm now they found the american fleet in bright sunshine under blue skies the yorktown was hit and seemed on the point of sinking the lexington was hit was blown up by its own arsenal and sunk [Music] the japanese withdrew and turned their attention to midway [Music] yamamoto put together the largest fleet in the world [Music] the americans already aware of yamamoto's plans because they could now decode any japanese radio signal called every ship they could to this decisive battle the severely damaged yorktown limped back to pearl harbor engineers estimated it would take them three months to repair it admiral nimitz gave them two days somehow the yorktown was made seaworthy in time it meant that the americans could put three aircraft carriers into the battle the enterprise the hornet and the yorktown [Music] the americans also had midway itself here from a small landing strip flying fortresses could take off it was a squadron of these flying fortresses on a reconnaissance mission that first spotted the japanese fleet as the bombs dropped the alert was sounded on both sides it was june the 4th 1942 the battle of midway was about to begin [Music] the japanese made the first move within 15 minutes 108 planes were in the skies [Music] the americans were ready they sent off a first wave of fighters to defend the [Music] island on midway itself most of the planes were off the ground when the japanese struck and a heavy anti-aircraft barrage helped to keep the runways unharmed although there was a lot of damage as the japanese fighter pilots turned back to the carriers they radioed that a second strike was necessary if midway was to be taken [Music] it was at this point that admiral nagumo the victor of pearl harbor made a decision that was to turn the course of the battle he had expected that the first attack on midway would be sufficient so he had kept his reserve planes ready to ward off an attack from the american fleet but his reconnaissance planes had not cited the american fleet at all so nagumo now changed his instructions to his bomber crews they were to unload the torpedoes that they carried to fight against ships and load bombs to drop on midway but as they did this and as the plane stood defenses on the decks of the carriers the american fleet came within striking [Music] range at first the japanese shot the americans out of the skies but later as further attacks mounted the americans were successful torpedo squadron eight was in the thick of it of these men only one survived ensign gay who became a national hero after the battle today he's the captain for twa what were his most vivid impressions of this decisive encounter my first concern was zeros that were strafing me in the water so each time they would come down i'd dive to get away from them and well it was just time to survive within four minutes three japanese aircraft carriers were out of action now there was only one japanese carrier left in the battle the hiroyu it sent its last aircraft to sink the [Music] yorktown the yorktown was already rudderless and lifting the deck with a massive twisted metal fire raged everywhere but now the final attack from the hereus planes made the end inevitable [Music] but the yorktown was soon avenged the enterprise sent 40 planes to find the hiroyu the last japanese carrier and destroy it [Music] so i saw it all i was right in the middle of the whole thing a matter of fact some of the ships were close enough so that if there'd been someone on it that i knew i could have recognized so all the time you were in the water you were completely surrounded by japanese oh yes quite a few and i saw their ships taking them off of their carriers and their carriers were burning and uh of course their airplanes then right about this time had come back from midway and they were all having to land in the water because their carriers were [Music] [Music] burning [Music] when admiral yamamoto first heard the news he decided to send reinforcements to the battle but when he learned that all four japanese aircraft carriers had been lost he pulled his forces back he had taken on the american pacific fleet and been beaten six months of victories were over the japanese flood had been stopped [Music] now began the long push back the 7th of august 1942 gradle canal here the japanese menaced all american lines of communication in the south pacific a young marine edwin morgan was there i personally was afraid that i would be afraid not do my job there's a great deal confusion the first night we even some units fired at each other and there was the strangeness of finally seeing the japanese they were strange they were asians we were keen and we had the morale was certainly very high we weren't as well trained as we thought we were but we were confident there was a great deal of confusion the maps were bad there's confusion as to the names of the rivers and the distances for instance we were told that we must take mount austin which is miles away very 2000 feet high the first day it wasn't taken for months [Music] henderson field proved to be the key to the battle for guadalcanal the japanese sent in an elite unit of the imperial marines to recapture it led by one of the heroes of singapore colonel ichiki they decided to come around through the jungle and come down this ridge which leads straight to the airport there's no obstacle between this ridge and the airport and the sea it's about a thousand yards long covered with kunai grass and on either flank are the valleys of the lunga river and the tenaru river it's a sort of a door to the airport they attacked on the evening of the 12th aided by a bombardment of japanese cruisers at sea which plastered the ridge then they came on in the usual way uh almost shoulder to shoulder all night long they found here 400 men under colonel edson of the raider battalion which suffered heavily but held [Applause] there were more than 700 japanese dead they were all dead because the wounded refused to surrender this is the first taste we had of the japanese method of fighting to the last man when our corpsmen approached them to try and help the wounded they'd explode grenades in their faces killing themselves and the corpsmen it was about this time that the campaign began to we became become as savage as the japanese and self-defense uh it became gradually a fight of extermination no quarter no mercy it's also about this time that disease set in distantry malaria increased from week to week fatigue we were living in the jungle we were dirty most of the time fighting was more or less constant the bombardment was constant we began to realize it was going to be long hard and brutal then came a stoke of luck for the united states that set the seal on the fate of japan admiral yamamoto the architect of the victories in the pacific the leading japanese strategist decided it was time to take a personal appraisal of the worsening situation [Music] he was in control of an immense front based on hundreds of tiny islands any of which might be the next target he flew from base to base on the 17th of april 1943 he left rabal heading southeast for the solomon islands the americans knew his exact location they had intercepted the japanese radio signals and from gradle canal 18 p-38 lightning fighters took off to intercept yamamoto [Music] they caught him above bougainville well inside japanese territory his plane was unescorted the american fighters were too fast for the bomber [Music] [Music] an era in the history of japan was ended it was admiral yamamoto who had said i will give you six months of victories but then i can promise nothing japan had enjoyed greater victories than any in its history but as the ashes of yamamoto were ceremoniously put to rest japan's victories were over yamamoto must have realized it before his death the war was over for yamamoto but not for japan for the shinto priests for the dignity of the court for prime minister tojo and for 80 million japanese the war would continue fifteen major battles of the second world war their impact was enormous and decisive see newly released documentary footage on the dramatic encounters in the atlantic and the pacific see the great historical battles in russia the normandy landing the bombing of berlin the invasion of italy see the big battles of world war ii the fateful encounters upon which hung the destinies of men and nations see the big battles

Channel: War Stories

Views: 515,185

Rating: 4.7159762 out of 5

Keywords: military history, war, war documentary, military tactics, war stories, history of war, pacific war, war with japan, battlezone, archive footage, war films, iwo jima, rape of nanking

Id: rhMCKwbs0qU

Length: 49min 22sec (2962 seconds)

Published: Wed Jan 27 2021