Inferno - Max Hastings [278]
ONCE U.S. PLANES could operate from Tarawa, they swiftly destroyed Japanese air capability throughout the Marshall Islands. In early February 1944, the marines were pleasantly surprised by the ease with which they captured the Majuro, Kwajalein and Roi-Namur Atolls—a personal triumph for Nimitz, who overruled all his subordinates to insist upon assaulting the central Marshalls rather than the heavily defended easternmost islands. They then took Eniwetok, at the extreme northwestern end of the Marshall chain, while Spruance’s carrier aircraft devastated the key Japanese base at Truk, in the Carolines. The speed of these successes enabled Nimitz to advance the timetable for the next phase of his campaign, scheduling an attack on the Marianas for June rather than September 1944.
A powerful competitive element entered U.S. conduct of the struggle. MacArthur, fearful that the New Guinea campaign would become a backwater, accelerated his own operations. His troops seized the Admiralty Islands three months ahead of schedule, thus encircling Rabaul and forcing the Japanese to withdraw up the northern coast of New Guinea. In April 1944, he staged his most daring and dramatic coup of the war, capturing Hollandia in Dutch New Guinea, bypassing 40,000 Japanese troops, and in June repulsing a strong Japanese counterattack along the Driniumor River. His forces also captured the Vogelkop Peninsula, at the western end of New Guinea, together with the nearby island of Biak, which became an important air base.
There is a persuasive argument, advanced by the U.S. Navy at the time and by many historians since, that MacArthur’s campaign became redundant at the end of 1943; that the only purpose of his subsequent bitter and bloody campaign in the Philippines was to fulfil the personal ambitions of its commander at the expense of many Filipino lives, along with those of several thousand Americans. U.S. dominance of air and sea had become so great that Japanese forces in the southwest Pacific were incapable of transporting troops to threaten Allied strategic purposes. In late 1943 U.S. submarines, decisive contributors to victory, began to wreak havoc upon Japan’s supply links to its overextended empire. Many Japanese island garrisons were starved of weapons and ammunition as well as food.
Yet it is characteristic of all wars, and especially of the greatest in human history, that events and personalities acquire a momentum of their own. MacArthur existed. He held a grand title, and had been exalted by propaganda into the most famous of American warlords. His public-relations machine was the most effective branch of his headquarters. Though Roosevelt and his associates, together with most of the nation’s military leaders, thought him a charlatan, when a 1945 poll asked Americans whom they considered their greatest general, 43 percent replied MacArthur against 31 percent for Eisenhower, 17 percent for Gen. George Patton and 1 percent for Gen. George Marshall. SWPA’s supreme commander had a physical presence, strength of will and personal authority greater than those of the U.S. chiefs of staff. Although MacArthur was never given the massive resources he demanded, he exercised a political and moral influence which sufficed to sustain his campaign and enable him to pursue his chosen personal objectives. Rationally, the United States might have halted its ground operations against Japan in 1944 once the Marianas had been secured. From its air bases,