Word: tapotchau
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...slopes of Tapotchau...
...practice to attack during the latter part of the morning, thereby holding up our advance a number of mornings. Aslito airfield, "the primary objective," was taken by our regiment after the Marines had twice tried in vain. Other units of the division had the job of taking Mount Tapotchau while the Marines took both flanks and a great deal of the lower ground that flanked the mountain...
...foot-by-foot battle even after the island's peak, Mt. Tapotchau, had been captured. Japs hung on in the ravines until they were killed. Tanks had to be used against pockets no bigger than 100 yards in diameter. Many Jap caves had steel doors which were opened periodically for machine guns to fire. Snipers were everywhere. An Army colonel was shot through the heart by a sniper who had hidden more than a week. A recurrent gag, reported TIME Correspondent Robert Sherrod, was that the safest place to be was in the front line...
...dawn on D-day Saipan looked like a low-lying prehistoric monster whose high, rising spine was Mt. Tapotchau. Already the sugar-mill town of Charan Kanoa was afire or smoking at several points and there was some smoke rising from Garapan from the bombing and shelling of the previous two days. At 5:45 the big guns began-gunfire from 5-inch destroyer to 16-inch battleship shells. Tinian Island, five miles south of Saipan, got its share of shells against artillery emplacements and other targets...
...brigadier general and his staff. We rode out to a control vessel to await orders to land. By now the acrid stench of gunpowder was strong, even 3,000 yards offshore in the control boat. A pall of smoke now covered the length of the island, obscuring even Mt. Tapotchau. A shell splashed 150 yards off our bow. Said the captain: "I think we are being sniped...