From Guadalcanal to Okinawa, the Marine Corps earned its fame for tackling a few of the bloodiest battles of World Warfare II’s Pacific Theater. What few keep in mind is that the U.S. Army often fought alongside the Marines by way of a few of the fiercest battles in historical past.
Nonetheless, just one Army regiment — the 147th Infantry — stood shoulder to shoulder with Marines in 5 of the hardest Pacific campaigns. Its troopers fought in the identical jungles, on the identical seashores and throughout the identical volcanic rock, but their story stays largely unknown.
The 147th Infantry: From the Buckeye Division to the Pacific Theater
The 147th Infantry Regiment was initially a part of the Ohio Nationwide Guard’s thirty seventh Infantry Division. When the Army reorganized its divisions in 1942 from 4 regiments to a few, the 147th was minimize unfastened and have become an impartial regiment.
That independence meant it might be despatched wherever it was wanted most. As a substitute of combating as half of a bigger division, the 147th was repeatedly connected to Marine models combating within the Pacific. Unbiased models like this had been often tasked with holding floor, clearing out bypassed Japanese positions and doing the damaging work of rooting out survivors after the principle battles ended.
It was an uncommon position for an Army unit, and it quickly positioned the regiment on the entrance traces of practically each main Marine battle within the Pacific.
The Battle of Guadalcanal
The regiment’s baptism by fireplace got here on Guadalcanal in late 1942 and early 1943. Japanese forces had already been hammered for months, however hundreds dug in across the ridges of Mount Austen. The 147th would ultimately be referred to as upon to assist the opposite troops take the place.
In keeping with the Army’s official historical past, on January 20, 1943, “the 3d Battalion, 147th … started transferring into the entrance line between the sixth Marines and the 182d Infantry” throughout the ultimate push to remove Japanese resistance. Common Alexander Patch mixed the 147th, the 182nd Infantry and the sixth Marines into the Composite Army-Marine Division.
For a number of weeks, the troopers and Marines hacked by way of dense jungle, crossed rivers below fireplace and fought bitterly for each ridge. By the point Guadalcanal was declared safe on Feb. 9, 1943, the 147th had misplaced dozens of males however proved it may battle in a few of the Pacific’s harshest terrain.
The U.S. Army on Saipan and Tinian
After garrison responsibility on a number of smaller islands, the 147th returned to fight in the summertime of 1944 throughout the invasions of Saipan and Tinian.
On Saipan, the regiment landed behind the Marine divisions and the Army’s twenty seventh Infantry Division. It was tasked with clearing caves, bunkers and pillboxes that usually hid diehard Japanese defenders that had been bypassed by the principle drive.
The troopers needed to resort to utilizing satchel expenses and flamethrowers to stop Japanese troops from launching shock assaults towards unsuspecting rear-echelon troops. Even after Saipan was formally secured, the 147th fought skirmishes towards stragglers who refused to give up.
A couple of weeks later, the regiment landed on the close by island of Tinian. There, the boys perfected their brutal craft. They once more used flamethrowers, satchel expenses and grenades to burn or blast Japanese troopers out of caves and tunnels. These techniques, refined within the Marianas, would outline the regiment’s position for the remainder of the warfare.
The Marine Corps and Iwo Jima
The regiment’s hardest project got here on Iwo Jima in March 1945. Though the battle stays the most important all-marine amphibious assault in historical past, the Army performed their half within the engagement.
After the Marines captured the island’s airfields within the first week of the engagement, hundreds of Japanese troopers nonetheless hid within the island’s underground tunnel complexes. The 147th was introduced in to root these troops out whereas the Marines completed securing the island.
They turned referred to as the “Cave Males.” Pvt. James McGuire of Firm B recalled, “Our firm shaped groups outfitted with guts, flashlights and pistols.”
Platoon chief James J. Ahern described the risks bluntly: “I threw in a white phosphorous grenade and the Jap threw it again… I tossed in a fragmentation grenade and the Jap threw it again… This obtained my dander up. I cleared the cave with a flamethrower.”
For 3 months, the regiment hunted down Japanese troops who tried to flee or ambush them. Fifteen males had been killed and 144 wounded, however the 147th killed greater than 1,600 Japanese and captured practically 900 extra. Hundreds of others had been sealed inside their tunnels without end.
Lt. Gen. Robert C. Richardson, commanding Army forces within the Pacific, recommended the regiment for its “constant braveness and fight ingenuity … in coping with an enemy decided upon a course of fanatical resistance.”
The Closing Battle on Okinawa
Recent from Iwo, the 147th landed on Okinawa in April 1945. After the collapse of organized Japanese resistance, the regiment once more turned to cave-clearing operations, making use of its hard-earned techniques within the ultimate bloody battle of the Pacific.
Dozens of troops from the regiment had been killed or wounded, attempting to root out the final fanatical Japanese troops on the island. Like on Iwo, the troopers needed to resort to easily sealing the caves, without end trapping the enemy underground. By the top of the summer time, the island was declared safe, and with it the street to Japan itself lay open.
One battalion from the regiment was despatched again to Tinian, the place the boys helped guard the parts for the atomic bombs that will destroy Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Following the top of the warfare in September 1945, the regiment was rotated again house with little fanfare.
A Forgotten Regiment with a Distinctive Distinction
Regardless of its report, the 147th stays comparatively unknown. Its impartial standing meant the regiment had no divisional patch that might earn recognition, no giant public id, and it often operated within the shadows of the Marine Corps. The Marines, rightly, acquired widespread public recognition for his or her pricey assaults all through the Pacific.
The Army, regardless of constituting the overwhelming majority of the troops numbers within the theater and conducting nearly all of amphibious assaults, are sometimes forgotten. The troopers of the 147th combating beside the Marines or mopping up behind them, hardly ever noticed their names within the headlines.
But their achievements had been spectacular. Over the course of the warfare, the regiment fought in additional landings, cleared extra caves and killed or captured extra enemy troops than many Marine regiments. On Iwo Jima alone, their tally of enemy killed and captured amounted to almost 10 p.c of the island’s whole Japanese garrison.
Lately, historians have begun to revive the regiment’s place in WWII historical past. On the seventy fifth anniversary of Iwo Jima in 2020, veterans’ accounts introduced the hazard of their work again into the highlight. “Daytime or nighttime, fight motion on Iwo Jima was at all times thrilling. The dangers had been there, some days had been extra adventurous than others,” Ahern mentioned.
The regiment might not have raised a flag on Mount Suribachi, however it fought — and bled — in 5 of the Marine Corps’ hardest battles. Its legacy is a reminder that the Army, too, paid closely within the island warfare towards Japan, and that victory within the Pacific was a joint effort.
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