Word: airstrips
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...troops inched forward. On the west coast the crack, new 6th Marine Division fought its way into the suburbs of Naha. In the center the 1st Marine and 77th Army Divisions pressed closer to Shuri. On the east coast the 96th Army Division captured Conical Hill dominating the Yonabaru airstrip; then doughboys swept ahead to take the airfield itself. Again & again the Japanese came out of mud-filled foxholes and caves to counterattack...
...veteran reporter (who saw Poland, the Low Countries and France invaded, and once rode in a 6-29 on a raid on Japan) flew with a U.S.A.A.F. captain to Saint-Nazaire to cover the scheduled surrender of some hard-to-convince Nazis. Landing at a likely-looking airstrip near the town, they were met by a heel-clicking group of German officers. One of the Germans identified himself as the "commanding officer," and promptly unconditionally surrendered the entire force of 27,000-including the Luftwaffe...
...bottom of the Allied line of attack, Australians jabbed a small but significant arrow away from Japan and straight toward the Japs' stolen empire. Landing on the swampy, oil-rich island of Tarakan off Borneo's northeast coast, Aussie troops drove the Japanese off an airstrip. Soon Allied planes would be using it to work over the South China Sea, Borneo and The Netherlands East Indies...
Tarakan, a triangular island some 15 miles long and eleven miles wide, was a rich prewar fuel-oil reserve. Some of its product was so pure it could be pumped directly into ships' bunkers. The oil was a big long-range item, but it was Tarakan's airstrip that was the immediate military attraction...
Then the night bombers struck. Antiaircraft guns filled the sky with arching tracer fire as the planes came in to hit the U.S.-held Yonton airstrip. Some of the bombs caused damage; one hit a hospital, killing twelve people...