The plateau was totally impenetrable by vehicles. The coral sinkholes
and uplifted knobs forced any infantry moving through to crawl, climb,
or clamber down into successive small terrain compartments of rough and
jagged surfaces. Evacuating any casualties would involve unavoidable
rough handling of stretchers and their wounded passengers. The area
was occupied and defended by scattered small units and individuals who
did not sally forth, and who bitterly resisted movement into their
moonscape. When Americans moved along the West Road, these Japanese
ignored individuals, took under fire only groups or individuals which
appeared to them to be rich targets.
The only tactical option along the West Road was to seize and hold
the coral spires and cliffs commanding the road, and to defend such
positions against infiltrators. Once those heights were seized, troop
units and trucks could move along West Road. Until seized, the “cliff”
offered concealment and some cover to occupying Japanese. Until those
cliff positions were seized and held, the Japanese therein could be
only temporarily silenced by heavy firepower. Until they were driven
from their commanding positions, the road could not be treated as truly
open.
Those terrain conditions existed for three-quarters of a mile along
the West Road. There, abreast the north end of the Pocket, the plateau
of coral sinkholes merged into a more systematic group of limestone
ridges. These ridges trended slightly northeast, broadening the coastal
strip to an east-west width of 200 to 400 yards.
Into that milieu, the 321st RCT was launched on 23 September, behind an
hour-long intensive naval gunfire and artillery preparation against the
high ground commanding the West Road. The initial Army reconnaissance
patrols moved generally west of the road, somewhat screened from any
Japanese still on the “cliff” just east of the road by vegetation and
small terrain features. These tactics worked until larger units of
the 2d Battalion, 321st, moved out astride the West Road. Then they
experienced galling fire from the heights above the road.
The 321st’s 2d Battalion had relieved 3d Battalion, 1st Marines, along
an east-west line across the road, and up onto the heights just above
the road. Near that point, the 1st Marines had been tied into the
forward left flank of 3d Battalion, 7th Marines. The orders for the
advance called for 3/7 to follow behind the elements of 2/321, along
the high ground as the soldiers seized the succeeding west edge of the
cliff and advanced northward. However, the advanced elements along the
ridge were immediately out-paced by the other 2/321 elements in the
flat to their west. Instead of fighting north to seize the ridge, units
responsible for that cliff abandoned it, side-stepping down to the
road. They then advanced along the road, and soon reported that 3/7 was
not keeping contact along the high ground.
[Illustration: