Word: nauru
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Wake, north of the Marshalls and vulnerable to an attack from Pearl Harbor, is the low-lying, V-shaped coral mound once so courageously defended by Major James P. Devereux and his Marines. Directly west of the Gilberts the isolated, three-by-four-mile mound of Nauru rises 225 feet above the sea. A coral reef encircles it closely. Because of its rich phosphate deposits (in addition to its strategic position), it is jealously held...
Admiral Pownall's forces had still more business. From the Marshalls they headed for Nauru, the British phosphate island seized by the Japs in early 1942. There, Tarawa to Truk, the Jap Pearl Harbor, the American fleet, including battleships, shelled and bombed the enemy's airdrome and shore defenses. The score: ten Jap planes destroyed; two U.S. planes lost, one U.S. destroyer damaged by shore batteries...
Bombers and torpedo bombers from a U.S. carrier force unloaded 90 tons of explosives on Nauru, 500 miles west of the Gilberts. And on Saturday, when the landing forces struck, Army Liberators again attacked objectives in the Marshalls. Purpose: to ground or knock out the Jap air force before the invasion fleet arrived...
With its usual reticence, the Navy released no details. Targets were Tarawa, important Jap air base, and tiny Nauru. Said the Navy: "Operations were carried out according to plan during the night preceding and a good portion of the day." (The Marcus raid lasted only nine hours.) Said Tokyo: 200 planes made the attack, 20 were shot down...
Four-motored Liberators ranged far out over the Pacific last week, striking at Tarawa Island in the Jap-controlled Gilberts and at Nauru Island 400 miles west...