_A Marine uses a flamethrower on a Japanese-occupied pillbox on what
had been the Marine golf course on Guam, adjoining the Marine Barracks
on Orote Peninsula._]
The most serious resistance to occupying the Mount Alutom-Mount Chachao
massif and securing the Force Beachhead Line (FBHL) across the hills
was a surprisingly strong point at the base of Mount Chachao. Major
Donald B. Hubbard, commanding the 3d Battalion, 9th Marines (replacing
Lieutenant Colonel Asmuth, wounded on W-Day), called down artillery,
and, after the barrage, his Marines attacked with grenades and
bayonets. They destroyed everything that stood in their path. When that
fight was over, Major Hubbard’s battalion counted 135 Japanese dead. As
the assault force pushed up these commanding slopes, the Marines could
spot men of Company A of the 305th Infantry atop Mount Tenjo to the
west. Lieutenant Colonel Carey A. Randall’s 1st Battalion, 9th Marines,
then moved up and made contact with the Army troops. Originally, Mount
Tenjo had been in the 3d Division zone, but General Bruce had wanted
to get his men on the high ground so they could push ahead along the
heights and not get trapped in the ravines. He also wanted to prevent
the piecemeal commitment of his division and to preserve its integrity.
Conservative estimates put the Japanese dead as a result of the
counterattack at 3,200 men. The loss of Takashina’s infantry officers,
including General Shigematsu, who had commanded the _48th Independent
Mixed Brigade_, was held to be as high as 96 percent. Takashina himself
fell to the fire from a machine gun on an American tank as he was
urging survivors out of the Fonte position and on to the north to fight
again. With Takashina’s death, tactical command of all Japanese forces
remaining on Guam was assumed by General Obata. He had only a few
senior officers remaining to rally the surviving defenders and organize
cohesive units from the shattered remnants of the battalions that had
fought to hold the heights above the Asan-Adelup beaches.
[Illustration: _This Japanese airstrip on Orote Peninsula was one of
the prime objectives of the 1st Provisional Marine Brigade in its zone.
Pockmarks on the strip resulted from the aerial, ships’ gunfire, and
artillery bombardments directed at this target._
Department of Defense Photo (USMC) 88134
]
All through the night of 28 July, Japanese troops trudged along the
paths that led from Fonte to Ordot, finding their way at times by the
light of American flares. At Ordot, two traffic control points guided
men toward Barrigada, where three composite infantry companies were
forming, or toward Finegayan, where a force of five composite companies
was to man blocking positions. As he fully expected the Americans
to conduct an aggressive pursuit on the 29th, General Obata ordered
Lieutenant Colonel Takeda to organize a delaying force that would hold
back the Marines until the withdrawal could be effected.
[Illustration: