Word: rabaul
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Between Mountbatten and Nimitz, on what has been the No.1 front since the Pacific war began, General Douglas MacArthur would finish pinching off Rabaul, advance along New Guinea to a position which could threaten the East Indies...
...against Bougainville in one day. The Japanese, with recent reinforcements flown in from other bases, made three attempts at retaliation: to minor raids on Guadalcanal, one minor raid on Funafuti. Spokesmen asserted that air patrols had made it impossible for any sizable Jap naval force to remain south of Rabaul for more than 24 hours...
...from his strategic air and naval base at Rabaul, apex of a triangle, the Jap looked down anxiously on Munda. Its coral airfield had been repaired and was in operation as a fighter base. It was being used already against Rabaul's outpost, Bougainville, which the U.S. might conceivably by-pass as it had Kolombangara...
...Kenney's deputy, Major General Ennis C. Whitehead: "The attacks will continue until either the Jap's or our air force is wiped out." After four days of onslaughts by heavy, high-flying bombers and tree-shaving B-25s, the Jap force, desperately reinforced by planes from Rabaul and Kavieng, was wiped out. By week's end Whitehead's pilots had destroyed 223 Jap planes on the ground and 83 in the air, which brought to well over 500 the number of Jap planes destroyed in the Southwest area since June 16. Allied losses...
...detachment at Bai-roko Harbor was still to be done in, but victorious units from Munda moved for ward to help in the job. Army engineers and Navy Seabees prepared to restore the 4,000-ft. Munda airstrip, which would bring the U.S. just within fighter-plane range of Rabaul. Eyes turned to Vila, Munda's supplementary airstrip 17 miles away, huddled against the great cone of Kolombangara. That the Japs were determined to cling to Vila was evident when they once more took the impossible chance and sent down four ships with reinforcements. Intercepting the convoy...