Todays post is by Dr. Greg Bradsher, Senior Archivist at the National Archives at College Park, Maryland. Background. Most important of all, the bombers of MacArthur's air forces, under the command of Lieutenant General George C. Kenney, had been modified to enable new offensive tactics. [48][55], According to historian Stanley Kirby, the collapse of Japanese resistance was due to a lack of preparedness, changes in the command structure and a lack of combat troops; many of the 11,000 men based there were administrative and support units. Consequently, Japanese efforts to develop the area were delayed throughout 1943 and 1944. The attack failed, and the Japanese were driven back toward Wewak. To the invaders from Japan, and the occupiers from Australia and the United States, however, New Guineans appeared as colonial subjects at best, and as slaves at worst. [43], The remaining destroyers with about 2,700 surviving troops limped back to Rabaul. It is important to note that all ATIS units maintained close relations with the CIC units and Australian Army Field Security Service, since these units were largely responsible for the collection and dispatch of captured documents in forward areas to the language personnel stationed with tactical units. [28], "Thenceforth, the Battle of Milne Bay became an infantry struggle in the sopping jungle carried on mostly at night under pouring rain. 119 deals with the Japanese Military Police Service and Report No. The weather changed direction and Kimura's slow-moving task force was spotted by an Allied scout plane. Gen. Millard F. Harmon, who was also subordinate to Nimitz. Their operation plan decreed a five-pronged attack: one task force to establish a seaplane base at Tulagi in the lower Solomons, one to establish a seaplane base in the Louisiade Archipelago off the eastern tip of New Guinea, one of transports to land troops near Port Moresby, one with a light carrier to cover the landing, and one with two fleet carriers to sink the Allied forces sent in response. The attack force comprised 84,000 personnel, including 52,000 combat troops, 23,000 support personnel, and a naval task force of 200 vessels of 7th Fleets Task Force 77 under Rear Admiral Daniel Barbey. A force of 800 Australian troops landed on 22 October on either side of the Japanese position. Allied troops set up 105mm howitzer in Depapre New Guinea 1944. On March 1, 1944, soldiers found on the body of the commander of Baba Battalion a copy of a field order issued by him in which he ordered an attack on American positions for that same afternoon. Joining JICPOA once it became an inter-service organization were some 50 US Army Military Intelligence Service (MIS) Nisei linguists. This attack, which was designated Operation Cockpit, aimed to prevent the Japanese from transferring air units stationed near Singapore to New Guinea. By 26 April, U.S. troops secured the two eastern airfields, and later that day linked up with forces advancing from the 24th Division advancing from Tanahmerah Bay. To ease the congestion on White 1, 11 LSTs were landed off White 2, while engineers from the 2nd Engineer Special Brigade worked to clear the beach, shifting stores and equipment into Jautefa Bay. In the early months of 1944, both at Bougainville and at Rabaul, large numbers of Japanese troops were effectively put out of action without being confronted in bloody combat. It made the term amphibious a household word throughout the English-speaking world. Edwards also spoke with Graves Registration units about the importance of acquiring from the bodies of enemy soldiers everything with Japanese writing. Admiral Nimitz exploited the same intelligence advantage when he planned the next stage of the Navys campaign in the central Pacific. The headland was formed by the Cyclops Mountains, a mountain ridge rising steeply to 7,000 feet (2,100m) and was backed by Lake Sentani, extending 15 miles (24km) east to west. Incidence of malaria was almost one hundred per cent. The sinking of over 25,000 tones of Japanese ships earned the unit the nickname . [50], Three transports were assigned to the operation, Westralia, Gunston Hall and Ganymede. All agreed, of course, that the naval forces that had met with such success in the Gilbert Islands should push toward the Marianas, from which the heavy B-29 bombers of the Army Air Forces could strike at Japan. RAAF radar could not provide sufficient warning of Japanese attacks, so reliance was placed on coastwatchers and spotters in the hills until an American radar unit arrived in September with better equipment. [4] See The Beginnings of the United States Armys Japanese Language Training: From the Presidio of San Francisco to Camp Savage, Minnesota 1941-1942,. This information was put to immediate tactical use and resulted in the capture of the position by the US 7th Cavalry Squadron. Capturing it would both neutralize the Allies' principal forward base and serve as a springboard for a possible invasion of Australia. American military leaders knew that while the number of prisoners (and thus information) taken in the Pacific would be relatively small, compared to the war in Europe, Japanese records would become all that more important as an intelligence source. It showed the units to which they belonged. The Z Plan [issued as Admiral Kogas Combined Fleet Secret Operations Order No. First, with completion of the reduction of Rabaul, the South Pacific Area was closed as an active theatre, and Halsey left to take command of the U.S. 3rd Fleet. 126 is Hoko: The Spy-Hostage System of Group Control-The Clue to Japanese Psychology. On April 29, 1944, Research Report No. Furthermore, the Milne Bay affair demonstrated once again that an amphibious assault without air protection, and with an assault force inferior to that of the defenders, could not succeed. In January 1943 the Allied and the Japanese forces facing each other on New Guinea were like two battered heavyweights. After the Battle of the Bismarck Sea, in March 1943, an abandoned lifeboat at Goodenough Island (northeast of New Guinea) from the Teiyo Maru was recovered and found in it was The Japanese Army List, dated October 15, 1942. In May 1943, external requests for information available from ATIS sources led to the development of Information Request Reports published only in answer to specific requests for information. On September 6, 1943, ICPOA was designated a joint Army-Navy-Marine organization by a CINCPAC directive and was given the name Joint Intelligence Center, Pacific Ocean Areas (JICPOA). It was occupied by the Japanese during their invasion of the Dutch East Indies in 1942, who planned to use it as a base for their expansion towards the Australian mandated territories of Papua and New Guinea. [14], Operation Mo was the designation given by the Japanese to their initial plan to take possession of Port Moresby. [25] But fighters did provide cover for the transports, and for bombers when their targets were within range. Also produced were ATIS Publications. [52], Seven LSTs and the Australian transport Westralia were unloaded over the shore at White 1, landing 4,200 tonnes of combat supplies and over 300 vehicles on the first day. Report No. U.S. Military forces began capturing records almost as soon as the war began and started exploiting them immediately. The story begins on March 31, 1944, when two Japanese Kawanishi flying boats were enroute to Mindanao in the Philippines. The submarine picked up the documents on May 11th and sailed to Darwin. [citation needed]. Over 120 of these Research Reports were published. Landings were made at two points in the Hollandia area on April 22, 1944, with the U.S. 24th Infantry Division moving ashore at Tanahmerah Bay and the 41st Infantry Division pushing inland at Humboldt Bay, 25 miles (40 km) to the east. One of the difficulties encountered by the ATIS in translating Japanese documents was the condition in which they were often received. [37], The Allies conducted a deception operation to ensure that the Japanese continued to believe that they would land at Hansa Bay rather than Hollandia. Aerial resupply brought some relief, and on 30 April a group of 12 LCTs, towed by several LSTs, arrived at Humboldt Bay. [64][66] Both Humboldt and Tanahmerah were developed with naval base, ammunition, repair and fuel facilities. On October 22, 1944, X Corps captured four sketches, one of gun positions north of Dulag, Leyte, and three of San Roque, Catmon Hill Area, Leyte, containing gun and coastal defense positions. Copies of the documents were made in Brisbane and the original documents were returned to the aircraft crash site by another submarine. The landing was unopposed as the enemy garrison indicated its intention of surrendering by hoisting a white flag at the first sight of the invasion force. The documents were then sent on to ATIS, SWPA, for final examination. These totaled 11,000 men under the command of General Masazumi Inada, Major General Toyozo Kitazono and Rear Admiral Yoshikazu Endo (Ninth Fleet). MacArthur's rollback began with the 16 November 1942 22 January 1943 Battle of Buna-Gona. Opposition on the ground at Hollandia was negligible and within four days the two divisions had secured inland Japanese airfields. The War Department Intelligence Service established a secret school at the Presidio of San Francisco to teach individuals to be Japanese-language interpreters and translators. Rabaul overlooks Simpson Harbor, a considerable natural anchorage, and was ideal for the construction of airfields. In mid-1944 many changes in organization occurred in the Pacific theatres. While it was beyond MacArthur's capabilities to deny Buna to the Japanese, the same could not be said of Milne Bay, which was easily accessible by Allied naval forces. 84 dealt with The Japanese and Bacterial Warfare. [48] These meager results were not commensurate with either the resources expended or the expectations that had been promoted. Later, the procedure was altered again to cope with the tons of documents captured at main Japanese bases. The U.S. 24th Division's 19th and 21st Regimental Combat Teams (RCTs) were to land at Tanahmerah Bay. Most regrettable!!' Except for some fairly heavy air raids, the Japanese reacted feebly to this penetration of their last defenses before the Philippines. After taking evasive routes to the west of the Admiralty Islands to avoid air attack,[42] the convoy turned back towards their objective late in the afternoon. For his action during the Biak operation, Jack Y. Cannon, the commanding officer of the 41st CIC Detachment received the Silver Star. West Papua is the western half of the island of New Guinea, formerly known as Dutch New Guinea. [5], Allied intelligence successes led to the decision to land at Hollandia. [8], The Japanese high command intended to hold Hollandia. All elements, with the exception of the twenty-man garrison had returned to Bantam Bay by 3 April. At Kokoda [between Port Moresby and Buna] 268 documents were captured, at Buna 1,349, at Lae [eastern New Guinea] 1,562, while at Saipan in July 1944 the figure reached at least 27 tons.[14]. The fires around White 1 continued until 27 April when the engineers were released to return to the beach. Image courtesy of the Library of Congress. On 17 September, the Japanese had reached the village of Ioribaiwa, just 30 kilometres (20mi) from the Allied airdrome at Port Moresby. Historians acknowledge that the deciphering of the Z Plan was one of the greatest single intelligence feats of the war in the South West Pacific Area. 1, List of Japanese Military Conventional Signs and Abbreviations (March 4, 1943); No. Fukudome was still carrying the Z Plan and the cipher codes. 39 with Navy Operations, Plans and Orders (1941-1944). graduate Hollandia. Historian Samuel Eliot Morison summed up the results this way: the enemy had shot his bolt; he never showed up again in these waters. 7 was cancelled and no record is held that No. Japanese expansion in East Asia began in 1931 with the invasion of Manchuria and continued in 1937 with a brutal attack on China. Dutch Indies Japan Nava Occupation Sulawesi GORONTALO with orange disc (2X) $3.25 . His contemplated offensive against Wau died a-borning. They included plans, charts, air defense details on all Japanese-held Pacific islands, and battle orders. The landings at Hollandia and Aitape were followed just four weeks later by landings at Wakde, Sarmi and Toem, to the west. ATIS was directed to make available to the board any and all information having to do with the identification of Japanese war criminals. MacArthur, the supreme commander in the area, also commanded all U.S. Army troops in the Southwest Pacific in his capacity as commanding general, U.S. Army Forces in the Far East. US troops debark from LST-66 at Tanahmerah Bay Hollandia. On 5 March, Imperial General Headquarters by Navy . During July and August 1944 the Japanese 18th Army, based on Wewak, mounted an attack on Aitape, employing more than 20,000 troops in the forward area. This information was given to the 163rd Infantry Regiment of the 41st Infantry Division who used it in subsequent offensive operations. 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