_A Marine throws a hand grenade during the battle for the interior of
the island._]
Major Hays finally got some flamethrowers (from Crowe’s engineers
when LT 2/8 was ordered to stand down), and the attack of 1/8 from
the east made steady, if painstaking, progress. Major Schoettel,
anxious to atone for what some perceived to be a lackluster effort on
D-Day, pressed the assault of 3/2 from the west and south. To complete
the circle, Shoup ordered a platoon of infantry and a pair of 75mm
halftracks out to the reef to keep the defenders pinned down from the
lagoon. Some of the Japanese committed _hara-kiri_; the remainder,
exhausted, fought to the end. Hays’ Marines had been attacking this
complex ever since their bloody landing on the morning of D+1. In those
48 hours, 1/8 fired 54,450 rounds of .30-caliber rifle ammunition. But
the real damage was done by the special weapons of the engineers and
the direct fire of the halftracks. Capture of the largest position,
a concrete pillbox near the beach, enabled easier approaches to the
remaining bunkers. By 1300, it was all over.
At high noon, while the fighting in both sectors was still underway,
a Navy fighter plane landed on Betio’s airstrip, weaving around the
Seabee trucks and graders. Nearby Marines swarmed over the plane to
shake the pilot’s hand. A PB2Y also landed to take out press reports
and the haggard observers, including Evans Carlson and Walter Jordan.
[Illustration:
BETIO
TARAWA ATOLL, GILBERT ISLANDS
ATTACK OF 1st BN, 8th MARINES and
3d BN, 2d MARINES
MORNING OF NOV. 23, 1943
TAKEN FROM 2D MAR DIV
SPECIAL ACTION REPORT
]
Admiral Hill and his staff came ashore at 1245. The naval officers
marveled at the great strength of the Japanese bunker system, realizing
immediately the need to reconsider their preliminary bombardment
policies. Admiral Hill called Betio “a little Gibraltar,” and observed
that “only the Marines could have made such a landing.”
When Smith received the nearly simultaneous reports from Colonels
Shoup and Holmes that both final objectives had been seized, he was
able to share the good news with Hill. The two had worked together
harmoniously to achieve this victory. Between them, they drafted a
message to Admiral Turner and General Holland Smith announcing the end
of organized resistance on Betio. It was 1305, about 76 hours after PFC
Moore first rammed LVT 4-9 (“My Deloris”) onto the seawall on Red Beach
One to begin the direct assault.
The stench of death and decay was overwhelming. “Betio would be more
habitable,” reported Robert Sherrod, “if the Marines could leave for
a few days and send a million buzzards in.” Working parties sought
doggedly to identify the dead; often the bodies were so badly shattered
or burned as to eliminate distinction between friend and foe. Chaplains
worked alongside burial teams equipped with bulldozers. General
Smith’s administrative staff worked hard to prepare accurate casualty
lists. More casualties were expected in the mop-up operations in the
surrounding islands and Apamama. Particularly distressing was the
report that nearly 100 enlisted Marines were missing and presumed dead.
The changing tides had swept many bodies of the assault troops out to
sea. The first pilot ashore reported seeing scores of floating corpses,
miles away, over the horizon.
The Japanese garrison was nearly annihilated in the fighting. The
Marines, supported by naval gunfire, carrier aviation, and Army Air
Force units, killed 97 percent of the 4,836 troops estimated to be on
Betio during the assault. Only 146 prisoners were taken, all but 17 of
them Korean laborers. The Marines captured only one Japanese officer,
30-year-old Kiyoshi Ota from Nagasaki, a Special Duty Ensign in the
_7th Sasebo Special Landing Force_. Ensign Ota told his captors the
garrison expected the landings along the south and southwest sectors
instead of the northern beaches. He also thought the reef would protect
the defenders throughout periods of low tide.
Shortly before General Julian Smith’s announcement of victory at Betio,
his Army counterpart, General Ralph Smith, signalled “Makin taken!” In
three days of sharp fighting on Butaritari Island, the Army wiped out
the Japanese garrison at the cost of 200 American casualties. Bad blood
developed between “Howling Mad” Smith and Ralph Smith over the conduct
of this operation which would have unfortunate consequences in a later
amphibious campaign.
The grimy Marines on Betio took a deep breath and sank to the ground.
Many had been awake since the night before the landing. As Captain
Carl Hoffman recalled, “There was just no way to rest; there was
virtually no way to eat. Mostly it was close, hand-to-hand fighting and
survival for three and a half days. It seemed like the longest period
of my life.” Lieutenant Lillibridge had no nourishment at all until
the afternoon of D+3. “One of my men mixed up a canteen cup full of
hot water, chocolate, coffee, and sugar, and gave it to me, saying he
thought I needed something. It was the best meal I ever had.”
The Marines stared numbly at the desolation that surrounded them.
Lieutenant Colonel Russell Lloyd, executive officer of the 6th Marines,
took a minute to scratch out a hasty note to his wife, saying “I’m on
Tarawa in the midst of the worst destruction I’ve ever seen.” Chaplain
Willard walked along Red Beach One, finally clear of enemy pillboxes.
“Along the shore,” he wrote, “I counted the bodies of 76 Marines
staring up at me, half in, half out of the water.” Robert Sherrod also
took the opportunity to walk about the island. “What I saw on Betio
was, I am certain, one of the greatest works of devastation wrought by
man.” Sherrod whistled at the proliferation of heavy machine guns and
77mm antiboat guns along the northwest shore. As he described one scene:
Amtrack Number 4-8 is jammed against the seawall barricade. Three
waterlogged Marines lie beneath it. Four others are scattered
nearby, and there is one hanging on a two-foot-high strand of
barbed wire who does not touch the coral flat at all. Back of the
77mm gun are many hundreds of rounds of 77mm ammunition.
Other Japanese forces in the Gilberts exacted a high toll among the
invasion force. Six Japanese submarines reached the area during D+2.
One of these, the _I-175_, torpedoed the escort carrier _Liscome
Bay_ just before sunrise on 24 November off Makin. The explosion was
terrific--Admiral Hill saw the flash at Tarawa, 93 miles away--and the
ship sank quickly, taking 644 souls to the bottom.
The Marines on Betio conducted a joint flag-raising ceremony later that
same morning. Two of the few surviving palm trees were selected as
poles, but the Marines were hard put to find a British flag. Finally,
Major Holland, the New Zealand officer who had proved so prophetic
about the tides at Tarawa, produced a Union Jack. A field musician
played the appropriate bugle calls; Marines all over the small island
stood and saluted. Each could reckon the cost.
At this time came the good news from Captain James Jones (brother
to Major “Willie K.” Jones) at Apamama. Jones’ V Amphibious Corps
Reconnaissance Company had landed by rubber rafts from the transport
submarine _Nautilus_ during the night of 20-21 November. The small
Japanese garrison at first kept the scouts at bay. The _Nautilus_ then
surfaced and bombarded the Japanese positions with deck guns. This
killed some of the defenders; the remainder committed _hara-kiri_. The
island was deemed secure by the 24th. General Julian Smith sent General
Hermle and McLeod’s LT 3/6 to take command of Apamama until base
defense forces could arrive.
[Illustration: _One of the few Japanese prisoners taken on Betio, this
man was captured late in the battle._
LtGen Julian C. Smith Collection
]
General Smith kept his promise to his assault troops at Tarawa.
Amphibious transports entered the lagoon on 24 November and backloaded
Combat Teams 2 and 8. To Lieutenant Lillibridge, going back on board
ship after Betio was like going to heaven. “The Navy personnel were
unbelievably generous and kind ... we were treated to a full-scale
turkey dinner.... The Navy officers helped serve the food.” But
Lillibridge, like many other surviving troop leaders, suffered from
post-combat trauma. The lieutenant had lost over half the members of
his platoon, and he was consumed with guilt.
[Illustration: