_At about 1650 on D-Day, Col Nakagawa launched his tank-infantry attack
from the north of the airfield and headed south across the front of the
1st Marines’ lines. The 1st Marine Division had been prepared for such
an eventuality, and the attack was a total failure. More than 100 enemy
tanks and their covering troops were reported as being literally blown
apart._]
Having received less than a comprehensive view of the 1st Marines’
situation, Rupertus was more determined than ever to move ashore
quickly, to see what he could, and to do whatever he could to re-ignite
the lost momentum. That he would have to operate with a gimpy leg from
a sandy trench within a beach area still under light but frequent
fire, seemed less a consideration to him than his need to see and to
know (General Rupertus had broken his ankle in a preassault training
exercise, and his foot was in a cast for the entire operation.).
Over on Colonel Nakagawa’s side, despite the incredible reports being
sent out from his headquarters, he could see from his high ground a
quite different situation. The landing force had not been “put to
route.” Ashore, and under his view, was a division of American Marines
deployed across two miles of beachhead. They had been punished on
D-Day, but were preparing to renew the fight. Predictably, their attack
would be launched behind a hail of naval gunfire, artillery, and aerial
attacks. They would be supported by U.S. tanks which had so readily
dispatched the Japanese armor on D-Day.
[Illustration: _Apparently covered by a returning 1st Marine Division
veteran’s graffiti, this Japanese light tank remains on the northwest
corner of the Peleliu airfield. Its turret blown off, it is the only
one left from the failed enemy attack of 1944._
Caption and photo by Phillip D. Orr
]
In his own D-Day counterattack, Nakagawa had lost roughly one of
his five infantry battalions. Elsewhere he had lost hundreds of his
beach defenders in fighting across the front throughout D-Day, and
in his uniformly unsuccessful night attacks against the beachhead.
Nevertheless, he still had several thousand determined warriors,
trained and armed. They were deployed throughout strong and
well-protected defensive complexes and fortifications, with ample
underground support facilities. All were armed with the discipline and
determination to kill many Americans.
[Illustration:
Caption and photo by Phillip D. Orr.
“=Sick Bay in a Shellhole: The Padre Read, ‘I am the Resurrection and
the Light’= _About thirty paces back of the Jap trench a sick bay had
been established in a big shell crater made by one of our battleship
guns.... In the center of the crater at the bottom a doctor was working
on the worst of the stretcher cases. Corpsmen, four to a stretcher,
came in continually with their bloody loads.... The padre stood by with
two canteens and a Bible, helping. He was deeply and visibly moved by
the patient suffering and death. He looked very lonely, very close to
God, as he bent over the shattered men so far from home._”]
As he had known from the start, Nakagawa’s advantage lay in the
terrain, and in his occupation and organization of that terrain. For
the present, and until that time when he would be driven from the
Umurbrogol crests which commanded the airfield clearing, he held a
dominating position. He had impressive observation over his attackers,
and hidden fire to strike with dangerous effect. His forces were
largely invisible to the Americans, and relatively impervious to their
fire superiority. His prospects for continuing to hold key terrain
components seemed good.
The Marines were attacking fortified positions, against which careful
and precise fire preparations were needed. They were, especially on the
left, under extreme pressure to assault rapidly, with more emphasis
upon speed than upon careful preparation. With enemy observation and
weapons dominating the entire Marine position, staying in place was
to invite being picked off at the hidden enemy’s leisure. General
Rupertus’ concern for momentum remained valid.
This placed the burden of rapid advance primarily upon the 1st Marines
on the left, and secondarily upon the 5th in the airfield area. In the
south, the 7th Marines already held its edge of the airfield’s terrain.
The scrub jungle largely screened the regiment from observation and it
was opposed by defenses oriented toward the sea, away from the airfield.
Puller’s 1st Marines, which had already suffered the most casualties
on D-Day, still faced the toughest terrain and positions. It had to
attack, relieve Company K, 3/1, on the Point, and assault the ridges
of Umurbrogol, south to north. Supporting that assault, Honsowetz had
to swing his east-facing 2/1 leftward, and to capture and clear the
built-up area between the airfield and the ridges. This his battalion
did on D plus 1 and 2, with the 5th Marines assisting in its zone on
the right. But then he was at the foot of the commanding ridges, and
joined in the deadly claw-scratch-and-scramble attack of Davis’ 1/1
against the Japanese on and in the ridges.
As Colonel Puller was able to close the gaps on his left, and swing
his entire regiment toward the north, he pivoted on Sabol’s 3/1 on the
left. Sabol, aided by Company B, 1/1, established contact with and
reinforced Company K on the Point. Then he headed north, with his left
on the beach and his right near the West Road along the foot of the
westernmost features of the Umurbrogol complex. In Sabol’s sector, the
terrain permitted tank support, and offered more chances for maneuver
than were afforded in the ridges further to the right. Hard fighting
was involved, but after D-Day, Sabol’s battalion was able to move north
faster than the units on his right. His advance against the enemy was
limited by the necessity to keep contact with Davis’ 1/1 on his right.
The relative rates of movement along the boundary between Sabol’s
flatter and more open zone and Davis’ very rough zone of action,
brought the first pressing need for reserves. Tactically, there was
clear necessity to press east into and over the rough terrain, and
systematically reduce the complex defenses. That job Davis’ 1/1,
Honsowetz’s 2/1, and Berger’s 2/7 did. But more troops than Sabol had
also were needed to advance north through the open terrain to begin
encirclement of the rough Umurbrogol area, and to find avenues into the
puzzle of that rugged landscape. By 17 September, reserves were badly
needed along the 1st Division’s left (west) axis of advance. But on 17
September, neither the division nor III Amphibious Corps had reserves.
As Sabol’s 3/1 fought up the easier terrain on the 1st Marines’ left,
Davis’ 1/1 drove into the center with his left on the break between
coral ridge country and Sabol’s more open flat zone. Among his early
surprises, as he approached the foot of the ridge area, was another
of the blockhouses Admiral Oldendorf had reportedly destroyed with
pre-D-Day gunfire. Although it had been on the planning map for weeks,
those who first encountered it, reported the emplacement as “not having
a mark on it!”
The blockhouse was part of an impressive defense complex. It was
connected to and supported by a web of pillboxes and emplacements,
which it in turn supported. The walls were four-feet thick, of
reinforced concrete. Happily, Davis was given a naval gunfire support
team which called in the fires of the USS _Mississippi_. Between them,
they made fairly short work of the entire complex, and 1/1 could
advance until it ran into the far more insoluble Japanese ridge defense
systems.
Major Davis, who was to earn a Medal of Honor in the Korean War in
1950, said of the attack into and along or across those ridges, “It was
the most difficult assignment I have ever seen.”
During the 1st Marines’ action in the first four days of the campaign,
all three of its battalions battled alongside, and up onto Umurbrogol’s
terrible, cave-filled, coral ridges. Berger’s 2/7, initially in
division reserve, but assigned to the 1st Marines on D plus 1, was
immediately thrown into the struggle. Puller fed two separate companies
of the battalion into the fight piecemeal. Shortly thereafter, 2/7 was
given a central zone of action between Colonel Puller’s 1st and 2d
Battalions. The 1st Marines continued attacking on a four-battalion
front about a 1,000 yards wide, against stubborn and able defenders
in underground caves and fortifications within an incredible jumble
of ridges and cliffs. Every advance opened the advancing Marines to
new fire from heretofore hidden positions on flanks, in rear, in caves
above or below newly won ground.
Nothing better illustrated the tactical dilemmas posed by Umurbrogol
than did the 19 September seizure of, then withdrawal from, Hill 100,
a ridge bordering the so-called Horseshoe Valley at the eastern limit
of the Pocket. It lay in the sector of Lieutenant Colonel Honsowetz’
2d Battalion, 1st Marines, to which Company B of Major Ray Davis’ 1st
Battalion was attached. Company B, 1/1, having landed with 242 men,
had 90 men left when its commander, Captain Everett P. Pope, received
Honsowetz’ order to take what the Marines were then calling Hill 100.
The Japanese called it _Higashiyama_ (East Mountain).
Initially supported by tanks, Pope’s company lost that support when the
two leading tanks slipped off an approach causeway. Continuing with
only mortar support, and into the face of heavy defending mortar and
machine-gun fire, Pope’s Marines reached the summit near twilight,
only to discover that the ridge’s northeast extension led to still
higher ground, from which its defenders were pouring fire upon the
contested Hill 100. Equally threatening was fire from the enemy caves
inside the parallel ridge to the west, called Five Brothers. In the
settling darkness Pope’s men, liberally supported by 2/1’s heavy
mortars, were able to hang on. Throughout the night, there was a series
of enemy probes and counterattacks onto the ridge top. They were beaten
off by the supporting mortars and by hand-to-hand brawls involving not
only rifles but also knives, and even rocks, thrown intermittently with
grenades, as supplies of them ran low. Pope’s men were still clinging
to the ridge top when dawn broke; but the number of unwounded Marines
was by now down to eight. Pope was ordered to withdraw and was able to
take his wounded out. But the dead he had to leave on the ridge, not
to be recovered until 3 October, when the ridge was finally recaptured
for good. This action was illustrative and prophetic of the Japanese
defenders’ skillful use of mutually supporting positions throughout
Umurbrogol.
By D plus 4, the 1st Marines was a regiment in name only, having
suffered 1,500 casualties. This fact led to a serious disagreement
between General Rupertus, who kept urging Puller onward, and the
general’s superior, Major General Roy S. Geiger, III Amphibious Corps
commander. Based on his own experiences in commanding major ground
operations at Bougainville and Guam, Geiger was very aware of the
lowered combat efficiency such losses impose upon a committed combat
unit.
On 21 September, after visiting Colonel Puller in his forward CP and
observing his exhausted condition, and that of his troops, Geiger
conferred in the 1st Division CP with Rupertus and some of his staff.
Rupertus was still not willing to admit that his division needed
reinforcement, but Geiger overruled him. He ordered the newly available
321st Regiment Combat Team (RCT), 81st Infantry Division, then on
Angaur, to be attached to the Marine division. Geiger further ordered
Rupertus to stand down the 1st Marines, and to send them back to
Pavuvu, the division’s rear area base in the Russell Islands.
On 21 September (D plus 5), Rupertus had ordered his 7th Marines to
relieve what was left of the 1st and 2d Battalions of the 1st Marines.
By then, the 1st Marines was reporting 1,749 casualties. It reported
killing an estimated 3,942 Japanese, the capture of 10 defended coral
ridges, the destruction of three blockhouses, 22 pillboxes, 13 antitank
guns, and 144 defended caves.
[Illustration: _Near the edge of a clearing, a Marine rifleman fires a
rifle grenade with good effect into an enemy position up ahead into the
northern, difficult portion of Peleliu._
Department of Defense Photo (USMC) 96106
]
In that fighting the assault battalions had captured much of the crest
required to deny the enemy observation and effective fire on the
airfield and logistic areas. Light aircraft had begun operating on D
plus 5 from Peleliu’s scarred, and still-under-repair airfield. With
Purple Beach in American control, the division’s logistical life-line
was assured. Although the Japanese still had some observation over the
now operating airfield and rear areas, their reduced capability was to
harass rather than to threaten.
[Illustration: