Word: tarawa
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Last week Marine Major General Holland M. ("Howlin' Mad") Smith, who commanded amphibious operations in the assault on the Gilbert Islands, spoke to home folks who had quailed at the losses on Tarawa (TIME...
Said he: "Those who say that the casualties on Tarawa were too high and that such a thing must not happen again should realize that the Marines on Tarawa killed four Japs for each Marine that died. We lost approximately 1,000 Marines but the Japs lost everybody they had. ... In an offensive operation you should expect to lose more than the enemy. ... So we got Tarawa cheaper than we had any right to expect...
...these key atolls, and perhaps to others, the Japs have been hauling tons of cement and steel. As at Tarawa, they have fashioned pillboxes of coconut logs, concrete, metal and many feet of sand. Under palm trees are coastal batteries...
Most men are afraid to die. That was not true of the marines who went into Tarawa. They spent their lives recklessly. When I got back to Pearl Harbor some Army officers asked me whether the doctors hadn't doped the marines before they waded ashore through that machine-gun fire. I couldn't help being amused...
Last Post. On the morning of the third day at Tarawa we had begun burying our own dead, many of whom had been in the water for two days. It was more gruesome than I can describe. This was no dignified burial-a man's last ceremony should be dignified but this wasn't. The bulldozer, whose driver paid scant attention to the sniper who fired at him all the while, scooped a hole three feet deep. The marines, not even covered by a blanket, were laid in the hole. The bulldozer pushed some more dirt over them...