Condition Red:Marine Defense Battalionsin World War IIby Major Charles D. Me/son

apan, its military lead-ers confident theycould stagger the Unit-ed States and gain timeto seize the oil and

and other natural resources neces-sary to dominate the western Pacif-ic, attacked Pearl Harbor on 7December 1941, sinking or badlydamaging 18 ships, destroying some200 aircraft, and killing more than2,300 American servicemen. Thoughcaught by surprise, Marines of the1st, 3d, and 4th Defense Battalionsstanding guard in Hawaii foughtback as best they could. Few heavyweapons were yet in place, and am-munition remained stored on ship-board, along with many of the guns.Nevertheless, these units had eightantiaircraft machine guns in actionwithin six minutes after the firstbombs exploded at 0755. By 0820,13 machine guns were manned andready, and they cut loose when a se-cond wave of Japanese aircraft be-gan its attack a few minutes later.Unfortunately, shells for the 3-inchantiaircraft guns did not reach thehurriedly deployed firing batteriesuntil after the second and final waveof attacking aircraft had completedits deadly work. The Marinesresponded to the surprise raid withsmall arms and an eventual total of25 machine guns, claiming the des-

On the Cover: The crew of a 90mm gunstands by for action in the Solomonsduring November 1943. (Department ofDefense photo [USMC])

At left: Defense battalion Marines mana 5-inch seacoast gun at GuantanamoBay, Cuba. (Department of Defensephoto [USMC])

truction of three aircraft during themorning's fighting.

As the Japanese aircraft carrierswithdrew after the raid on Pearl Har-bor, a pair of enemy destroyers be-gan shelling Midway Island shortlybefore midnight on 7 December toneutralize the aircraft based there. Asalvo directed against Midway's SandIsland struck the power plant, whichserved as the command post of the6th Defense Battalion, grievouslywounding First Lieutenant George H.Cannon. He remained at his post un-til the other Marines wounded by thesame shell could be cared for and hiscommunications specialist, CorporalHarold Hazelwood, had put the bat-talion switchboard back into action.Cannon, who died of his wounds,earned the first Medal of Honorawarded a Marine officer duringWorld War II. Hazelwood received aNavy Cross.

For decades before Japan gambledits future on a war with the UnitedStates, the Marine Corps developedthe doctrine, equipment, and organi-zation needed for just such a conflict.Although the Army provided troopsfor the defense of the Philippines, thewesternmost American possession inthe Pacific, the Marine Corps facedtwo formidable challenges: placinggarrisons on any of the smaller pos-sessions that the Navy might use asbases at the onset of war; and seiz-ing and defending the additionalnaval bases that would enable theUnited States to project its power tothe very shores of Japan's Home Is-lands. A succession of Orange war

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plans — Orange stood for Japan in aseries of color-coded planningdocuments — provided the strategyfor the amphibious offensive re-quired to defeat Japan and the defen-sive measures to protect the basesupon which the American campaignwould depend.

As a militaristic Japan made in-roads into China in the 1930s, con-cern heightened for the security ofWake, Midway, Johnston, andPalmyra Islands, the outposts pro-tecting Hawaii, a vital staging areafor a war in the Pacific. (Althoughactually atolls — tiny islands clusteredon a reef-fringed lagoon —Wake,Midway, Johnston, and Palmyra havetraditionally been referred to as is-lands.) By 1937, the Marine Corpswas discussing the establishment ofbattalion-size security detachmentson the key Pacific outposts, and thefollowing year's War Plan Orangeproposed dispatching this sort ofdefense detachment to three of theHawaiian outposts — Wake, Midway,and Johnston. The 1938 plan calledfor a detachment of 28 officers and428 enlisted Marines at Midway,armed with 5-inch coastal defenseguns, 3-inch antiaircraft weapons,searchlights for illuminating targetsat night, and machine guns. TheWake detachment, similarlyequipped, was to be slightly smaller,25 officers and 420 enlisted men. TheJohnston Island group would consistof just nine officers and 126 enlistedmen and have only the antiaircraftguns, searchlights, and machineguns. The plan called for the units todeploy by M-Day—the date of anAmerican mobilization for war —"insufficient strength to repel minor

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naval raids and raids by small land-ing parties." In the fall of 1938, an in-spection party visited the sites to lookfor possible gun positions and fieldsof fire and to validate the initial man-power estimates.

Meanwhile, a Congressionallyauthorized board, headed by Ad-miral Arthur J. Hepburn, a formerCommander in Chief, Pacific Fleet,investigated the need to acquire ad-ditional naval bases in preparationfor war. While determining thatGuam, surrounded by Japanese pos-sessions, could not be defended; theHepburn Board emphasized the im-portance of Midway, Wake, John-ston, and Palmyra. As a result,during 1939 and 1940, Colonel Har-ry K. Pickett—Marine Officer, 14thNaval District, and CommandingOfficer, Marine Barracks, Pearl Har-bor Navy Yard — made detailed sur-veys of the four atolls.

In 1940, the Army and Navyblended the various color plans, in-cluding Orange, into a series of Rain-bow Plans designed to meet a threatfrom Germany, Japan, and Italy act-ing in concert. The plan that seemedmost realistic Rainbow 5, envisionedthat an Anglo-American coalitionwould wage war against all three

potential enemies, defeating Germa-fly first, while conducting only limit-ed offensive operations in the Pacificand ultimately throwing the fullweight of the alliance against Japan.Such was the basic strategy in effectwhen Japan attacked Pearl Harbor.

The interest of the Marine Corpsin base defense predated the proposalin the Orange Plan of 1937 to installdefense detachments at Wake, Mid-way, and Johnston Islands. Althoughthe spirit of the offensive predomi-nated over the years, both the Ad-vanced Base Force, 1914-1919, andthe Fleet Marine Force, established in1933, trained to defend the territorythey seized. In 1936, despite the ab-sence of primarily defensive units,the Marine Corps Schools at Quan-tico, Virginia, taught a 10-monthcourse in base defense, stressing coor-dination among aviation, antiair-craft, and artillery.

The increasingly volatile situationin the Pacific which led ultimatelyto war, the evolving Orange plan fora war against Japan, and the long-time interest of the Marine Corps inbase defense set the stage for the cre-

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ation of defense battalions to garri-son the crescent of outpostsstretching from Wake and Midway toSamoa. Influenced by Americanisolationist attitudes, Major Gener-al Commandant Thomas Holcombdecided to ask for funds to form newdefensive — rather than offensive —units. In carrying out the provisionsof the plan for a conflict withOrange, the Commandant intendedlstLt George H. Cannon of the 6thDefense Battalion, though mortallywounded by fire from a Japanese sub-marine on 7 December 1941, refused toleave his post on Midway. After the war,he was awarded the Medal of Honor.

Department of Defense photo (USMC) 11158

Department of Defense photo (USCG)

Fires started by bombs dropped by Japanese aircraft are still craft gun on the parade ground of the Marine Barracks. Byburning at Pearl Harbor as Marines set up a 3-inch antiair- the end of 1942, 14 Marine defense battalions were in existence.

to make the best use of appropriat-ed funds, which had only begun toincrease after the outbreak of war inEurope during September 1939. Indoing so he reminded the public thatthe Marine Corps would play a vi-tal role in defending the nation. Af-ter the war, General Gerald C.Thomas recalled in his oral historythat General Holcomb realized thatCongress was unlikely to vote moneyfor purely offensive purposes as longas the United States remained atpeace. At a time when even battle-ships and heavy bombers were beingtouted as defensive weapons, Hol-comb seized on the concept ofdefense battalions as a means of in-creasing the strength of the Corps be-yond the current 19,432 officers andmen.

Two officers at Marine Corpsheadquarters, Colonel Charles D.Barrett and Lieutenant ColonelRobert H. Pepper, turned conceptinto reality by drawing up detailedplans for organizations expresslydesigned to defend advance bases.The Kentucky-born Barrett enteredthe Marine Corps in 1909, served inthe occupation of Vera Cruz, Mexi-co, in 1914, and during World WarII would become a major general; in1943, while commanding I MarineAmphibious Corps, he died as aresult of an accident. Pepper, would

rise to the rank of lieutenant gener-al, assuming command of Fleet Ma-rine Force, Pacific after the war.Aware that isolationism still grippedthe United States in 1939; the twoplanners emphasized the defensivemission of the new units, stressingtheir ability to "hold areas for the ul-timate offensive operations of theFleet:' As the danger of war withJapan increased, the first of several900-man defense battalions tookshape in the United States. Each ofthe new outfits consisted of three an-tiaircraft batteries, three seacoast bat-teries, ground and antiaircraftmachine gun batteries, and a team ofspecialists in administration andweapons maintenance.

In late 1939, when the MarineCorps formed its first defense battal-ions, the future was still obscure.Japan remained heavily engaged inChina, but a "phony war" persistedin western Europe. At Marine Corpsheadquarters, some advocates of thedefense battalions may have felt thatthese new units were all the servicewould need by way of expansion, atleast for now. On the other hand, wi-thin the G-3 Division of Holcomb'sstaff, officers like Colonel Pedro A.del Valle kept their eyes fixed on amore ambitious goal, the organiza-tion of Marine divisions. Eventual-ly, the Marine Corps would expand,

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creating six divisions and reaching amaximum strength in excess of450,000, but the frenzied growth oc-curred after Japan attacked the Pa-cific Fleet at Pearl Harbor on 7December 1941.

In the immediate aftermath of theoutbreak of war in Europe and Presi-dent Franklin D. Roosevelt's declara-tion of a limited national emergency,the Marine Corps grew by smallincrements that included the defensebattalions. To explain the role ofthese units, General Holcomb in 1940circulated throughout the Corps aclassified document drafted by FirstLieutenant Robert D. Heinl, Jr., whowould serve in a wartime defensebattalion, become the author ofwidely read articles and books andactive in the Marine Corps histori-cal program, and attain the grade ofcolonel. Heinl declared that "throughsheer necessity, the Marine Corps hasdevised a sort of expeditionary coastartillery capable of occupying an un-tenanted and undefended locality, ofinstalling an all around sea-airdefense, and this within three days:'

In his annual report to the Secre-tary of the Navy for the fiscal yearending in June 1940, General Hol-comb stated that four battalions hadbeen established and two othersauthorized. "The use of all six ofthese defense battalions can be fore-

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for flu' Defense Battalion

seen in existing plans," he wrote, ad-ding that the fleet commanders hadalready requested additional units ofthis type. The new organizationstook advantage of the latest advancesin automatic weapons, radios, tanks,coast and antiaircraft artillery,sound-ranging gear, and the newmystery — radar. Teams of specialists,which had mastered an array of tech-nical skills, it was hoped would ena-ble a comparatively small unit todefend a beachhead or airfield com-plex against attack from the sea orsky. As time passed and strategic cir-cumstances changed, the defense bat-talions varied in strength, weaponry,and other gear. As an official histor-ical summary of the defense battal-ions has pointed out, theircomposition also reflected "the geo-graphic nature of their location andthe availability of equipment:' Con-sequently, the same battalion mightrequire a different mix of specialistsover the years.

Envisioned as combined armsteams capable of delivering intensefirepower, defense battalions wereexpected to have their greatest impactin the kind of campaign outlined inthe Orange plan. The Navy's seago-ing transports provided strategic mo-bility for the defense battalions, butonce ashore, the units lacked vehiclesand manpower for tactical mobility.Because the battalion became essen-tially immobile when it landed, eachmember had a battle station, as ona ship, to operate a particular crew-served weapon or other piece ofequipment. As configured in 1939and 1940, a defense battalion couldachieve mobility on land only byleaving its artillery, searchlights, anddetection gear and fighting as in-fantry.

Marine Corps defense battalionscould operate as integral units in sup-port of a base or beachhead, posi-tioning their weapons and equipment

Department of Defense photo (USMC) 61403MajGen Charles D. Barrett, while acolonel, together with LtCol Robert H.Pepper, played a major role in the de-velopment of the defense battalion.

to cover assigned sectors and meetspecific threats. Moreover, theymight form detachments with a sizeand armament suitable for a partic-ular task, such as defending variousislets within an atoll or protectingseparate beachheads. Although rela-tively static when in place, the abili-ty of the battalions to divide in thisfashion provided a kind of flexibili-ty that may not have been fully ap-preciated in 1939, when the basicconcept placed one battalion, thoughof variable size, at a given place.

Because a defense battalion could,in effect, form task organizations, itsomewhat resembled the larger in-fantry regiment, which could employbattalion combat teams. Accordingto Lieutenant Heinl, in terms of"strength and variety of material;' thedefense battalion "fnight well be aregiment. Actually, the seacoast andantiaircraft artillery groups arealmost small battalions, while theother three separate batteries (search-light and sound locator and the twomachine gun units) are undeniablebatteries in the accepted sense of theword:'

Despite the lieutenant's enthusiasm

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for the defense battalions, they haddefinite weaknesses, particularly ininfantry and armor for mobilereserves in the event of a large-scaleenemy landing. The failings,however, seemed acceptable to theGeneral Board of the Navy — roughlycomparable to the War Department'sGeneral Staff—which felt that thebattalions could nevertheless protectoutlying bases against raids by air-craft, ships, and comparatively smalllanding parties. Concern that thedefense battalions, in their currentconfiguration, might not be able torepulse more ambitious hostile land-ings caused the Marine Corps to de-bate, during the spring of 1941, thefeasibility of creating separate infan-try battalions to fight alongside thedefense units.

The proposed 850-man infantrybattalions would forestall any pos-sible need to detail infantrymen fromthe regiments to reinforce the defensebattalions. Consequently, Secretaryof the Navy Frank Knox approvedthe creation of separate infantry bat-talions to serve with the defense bat-talions. After the Japanese attack onPearl Harbor, the regiments anddivisions — and for a time the special-ized units such as the raiders—demanded a lion's share of manpow-er, and with few exceptions, thedefense battalions had to fend forthemselves without the planned in-fantry battalions, though occasion-ally with an organic rifle company.Every Marine in a typical defensebattalion had to train to fight as aninfantryman in an emergency, withthe members of gun and searchlightcrews leaving their usual battle sta-tions. Rifle companies served at var-ious times with the 6th, 7th, and 51stDefense Battalions, and such a com-ponent was planned for the 52d, butnot assigned. Those battalions thatincluded a company of infantry borethe title "composite:'

Improvements in equipment, achanging strategic situation, anddeployment in areas that varied from

desolate coral atolls to dense jungleensured that no single table of equip-ment or organization could apply atall times to every defense battalion.Each of the organizations tended tobe unique —"one of a kind," as a bat-talion's history stated. Weapons andpersonnel reflected a unit's destina-tion and duties, much as a child'serector set took the shape dictated bythe person assembling the parts, orsuch was the view of James H. Pow-ers, a veteran of the 8th Defense Bat-talion. The selection and assignmentof men and equipment proved a dy-namic process, as units moved about,split into detachments, underwentredesignation, and traded old equip-ment for new. Much of the weaponsand material came from the stocks ofthe U.S. Army, which had similarlyequipped coast and antiaircraft ar-tillery units. The first 155mm gunsdated from World War I, but theArmy quickly made modern typesavailable, along with new 90mm an-tiaircraft guns that replaced the3-inch weapons initially used by thedefense battalions. In addition, theArmy provided both primitivesound-ranging equipment and threetypes of Signal Corps radar — theearly-model 5CR268 and SCR27Oand the more advanced 5CR268,which provided automatic targettracking and gun-laying.

By October 1941, the tables of or-ganization for the new defense bat-talions had certain features incommon, each calling for a head-quarters battery, a sound-locator andsearchlight battery, a 5-inch seacoastartillery group, a 3-inch antiaircraftgroup, and a machine-gun group.The specific allocation of personneland equipment within each battaliondepended, however, on where thebattalion deployed and the changes"prescribed by the Commandantfrom time to time:' In brief, thedefense battalions adhered to certainstandard configurations, with in-dividual variations due to time andcircumstance. The average battalion

strength during the war was 1,372officers and men, including Navymedical personnel. Like manpower,the equipment used by the defensebattalions also varied, although thearmament of the typical wartime unitconsisted of eight 155mm guns,twelve 90mm guns, nineteen 40mmguns, twenty-eight 20mm guns, andthirty-five .50-caliber heavy machineguns, supplemented in some in-stances by eight M3 light tanks.

Beginning early in 1940, thedefense battalions operated indepen-dently, or in concert with larger units,to secure strategic locations in the At-lantic and the Pacific. Colonel Har-ry K. Pickett's 3d Defense Battalionundertook to support the currentWar Plan Orange by occupying Mid-way Island on 29 September 1940,setting up its weapons on two bleak,sandy spits described by one Marineas being "inhabited by more than amillion birds:' Contingency plans forthe Atlantic approaches to theWestern Hemisphere called fordeploying defense battalions in sup-port of a possible landing in Marti-nique during October 1940, but thecrisis passed. In February of the fol-lowing year, the 4th Defense Battal-ion, under Colonel Jesse L. Perkins,secured the rocky and brush-coveredhills overlooking Guantanamo Bay,Cuba. A composite unit of infantryand artillery, the 7th Defense Battal-ion, commanded by LieutenantColonel Lester A. Dessez, landed atAmerican Samoa in March 1941 andbecame the first element of the FleetMarine Force to deploy to theSouthern Hemisphere during theprewar national emergency. Besidessecuring naval and air bases, the bat-talion trained a self-defense force ofSamoan Marines.

Plans to forestall a German inva-sion of the Azores by sending amixed force of soldiers and Marines,including defense battalions, provedunnecessary, but the most ambitiousof the prewar deployments occurred

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in the Atlantic. In June 1941, ColonelLloyd L. Leech's 5th Defense Battal-ion, less its seacoast artillery compo-nent, arrived in Iceland with the 1stMarine Brigade, which included the6th Marines, an infantry regiment,and the 2d Battalion, 10th Marines,an artillery outfit. The brigade tookover the defense of Iceland from Brit-ish troops, releasing them from theprotection of this critical region foreven more important duty elsewhere.Once in place, the defense battalionand the other Marines assumedresponsibility for helping keep openthe Atlantic sea lanes to the UnitedKingdom.

The 5th Defense Battalion set upits antiaircraft weapons, 3-inch gunsand machine guns, around the Reyk-javik airfield and harbor, where it be-came the first Marine Corps unit tomake operational use of the Army-developed SCR-268 and -270 radars.After-action reports covering the bat-talion's service in Iceland, declaredthat only "young, wide-awake, intel-ligent men" could operate the temper-amental sets satisfactorily. Thanks tothe efforts of the crews, the Marinesproved able to incorporate their ra-dar into the British air-defense andfighter-control system for "routinewatches and training:' Even thoughthe battalion played a critical role indefending against long-range Ger-man patrol planes, its members alsohad to engage in labor and construc-tion duty, as became common inother areas. Replaced by Army units,the last elements of the Marine gar-rison force left Iceland in March1942.

Of the seven Marine defense bat-talions organized by late 1941, onestood guard in Iceland, five served inthe Pacific — including the 4th, post-ed briefly at Guantanamo Bay — andanother trained on the west coast fora westward deployment. The firstPacific-based defense battalions werenicknamed the "Rainbow Five" afterthe war plan in effect when theJapanese attacked Pearl Harbor. The

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five units were: the 7th in Samoa; the6th, which took over from a detach-ment of the 3d at Midway Island; the3d and 4th at Pearl Harbor, and the1st divided among Pearl Harbor andJohnston, Palmyra, and Wake Is-lands. A sixth defense battalion, the2d, remained in training inCalifornia.

The first real test of the basedefense concept in the Pacific War be-gan with savage air attacks againstWake Island on 8 December and last-ed 15 days. Wake's defenders lackedradar and sound-ranging equipment,forcing the 400-man Marine garrisonto rely on optical equipment to spotand identify the attacking aircraft,which inflicted heavy losses on theAmericans during the first bombingraids. Commander Winfield S. Cun-ningham, who headed the Wake Is-land naval base, later insisted that"one radar" could have turned defeat

into victory. In contrast, TechnicalSergeant Charles A. Holmes, a fire-control specialist, believed that radar"would never have affected the out-come of the situation The set,moreover, might have fallen intoJapanese hands sufficiently intact toyield useful intelligence.

On 11 December, the fire of the5-inch guns of Major George H. Pot-ter's coastal defense batteries forcedthe withdrawal of the first Japanesenaval assault force consisting of threecruisers, their escorting destroyers,and a pair of troop transports. A Ma-rine communications officer vividlyremembered the repeated attacks byJapanese aircraft throughout thesiege. During each raid, he said, "oneor two would be smoking frommachine gun or antiaircraft fire:'Captain Bryghte D. Godbold's 3-inchantiaircraft group seemed especiallydeadly, and sometimes one or twoaircraft would be missing from aJapanese formation as it flew out of

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range. Gun crews stayed with theirweapons during the increasinglystronger air raids, while those Ma-rines not needed at their battle sta-tions were "hotfooting it for shelter:'

Early on, the Marines realized theywere fighting a losing battle,although, as Technical Sergeant Hol-mes pointed out, "We did our best todefend the atoll. . . ." and to preventthe Japanese from establishing them-selves there. With limited means attheir disposal — the weapons of thedefense detachment and a few fight-er planes — the Marines sank onewarship with aerial bombs andanother with artillery fire, and dur-ing the final assault inflictedhundreds of casualties on theJapanese who stormed ashore fromself-propelled barges and two lighttransports beached on the reef. Onthe morning of 23 December, beforea relief expedition could get closeenough to help, the defenders ofWake Island surrendered.

On Iceland, 5th Defense Battalion Marines, attached to the1st Provisional Marine Brigade, man a 75mm pack howitzeras British officers of the Iceland garrison look on. Note the

Photo courtesy of the U.S. Naval Institute

polar bear patches on the right shoulders of the onlookingMarine officers. In the background are truck-mounted.50-caliber antiaircraft machine guns on special tripods.

While the Wake Island garrisonfought against overwhelming num-bers and ultimately had to yield,Japanese naval forces began a short-lived harassment of Johnston andPalmyra that lasted until late Decem-ber and stopped short of attemptedlandings. On 12 December, shellsfrom a pair of submarines detonat-ed a 12,000-gallon fuel storage tankon Johnston Island, but fire from5-inch coast defense guns emplacedthere forced the raiders to submerge.Similarly, a battery on Palmyra droveoff a submarine that shelled the is-land on Christmas Eve.

The delays and confusion atten-dant upon organizing and mountingthe relief expedition, which includ-ed the 4th Defense Battalion andships that had survived the onslaughtagainst Pearl Harbor, demonstratedthe limits of improvisation. As aresult, the Marine Corps actedpromptly to reinforce the outlyinggarrisons still in American hands.The defense battalions at Pearl Har-bor provided additional men andmaterial for Midway, Johnston, andPalmyra Islands, and defense battal-ions fresh from training deployed to

the Pacific. The war thus entered adefensive phase that contained theadvancing Japanese and lasted intothe summer of 1942.

On 21 January, the 2d MarineBrigade (the 8th Marines and the 2dBattalion, 10th Marines, the latter re-cently returned from Iceland) arrivedin Samoa, along with LieutenantColonel Raymond E. Knapp's 2dDefense Battalion. The newcomersbuilt on the foundation supplied bythe 7th Defense Battalion and werethemselves reinforced by the newlyactivated 8th Defense Battalion un-der Lieutenant Colonel Augustus W.Cockrell. The Marines in Samoa an-chored a line of bases and airfieldsthat protected the exposed sea routesto Australia and New Zealand, whichwere judged likely objectives for theadvancing Japanese.

On 27 May 1942, the 8th DefenseBattalion moved southwest fromSamoa to the Wallis Islands, a Frenchpossession. Tanks, field artillery, mo-tor transport, and infantry reinforcedthe defense battalion, which re-mained there through 1943. The stayproved uneventful except for a visitfrom Eleanor Roosevelt, the Presi-dent's wife, who was touring the Pa-cific theater of war.

Elsewhere in the Pacific, LieutenantColonel Harold D. Shannon's 6thDefense Battalion strengthened thedefenses of Midway where, by thespring of 1942, reinforcements ar-rived in the form of the antiaircraftgroup of the 3d Defense Battalion,plus radar, light tanks, aircraft, in-fantrymen, and raiders. The Palmyragarrison was redesignated the 1stMarine Defense Battalion — of whichit had been a detachment beforeMarch 1942—under LieutenantColonel Bert A. Bone, with thedetachment on Johnston Islandreverting to control of the islandcommander. During March, the flowof reinforcements to the South Pacificcontinued, as Army troops arrivedin New Caledonia and the NewHebrides, while Marine aviators andColonel Harold S. Fassett's 4thDefense Battalion established itselfon the island of Efate in the lattergroup.

West of Midway Island, between4 and 6 June 1942, the course of thewar changed abruptly when anAmerican carrier task force sank fourJapanese aircraft carriers and des-troyed the cadre of veteran fliers whohad won the opening naval battles ofthe war from Pearl Harbor to the In-

The 5th Defense Battalion lived in Nissen hut camps as thisthroughout the unit's stay in Iceland. Most of them were built

and weatherproo fed by the Marines upon their arrival andbefore the onset of the exceptionally cold Icelandic winter.

Depcrtment of Defense photo (USMC) 528669

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dian Ocean. A reinforced defensebattlion, though hundreds of milesfrom the actual sinkings, contribut-ed greatly to the American victory.Since the fall of Wake Island, Ameri-can reinforcements had poured intoMidway. Colonel Shannon's 6thDefense Battalion, now 1,700-strong,helped build the island's defenseseven as it stood guard against an an-ticipated Japanese attack. The laborprojects included constructing under-water obstacles, unloading and dis-tributing supplies, and buildingemplacements for guns and sheltersfor ammunition and personnel.Shannon told his Marines that "Ourjob is to hold Midway . . . . Keepcool, calm, and collected; make yourbullets count."

On 4 June, the Japanese openedthe Battle of Midway by launchinga massive air strike designed to softenthe island for invasion. Radar pickedup the attackers at a distance of 100miles and identified them at 93 miles,providing warning for Midway-basedfighters to intercept and antiaircraftbatteries to prepare for action. Thestruggle began at about 0630 and hadended by 0700, with the deadliest ofthe fighting by the defense battalioncompressed into what one participantdescribed as a "furious 17-minute ac-tion." The Marine antiaircraft gun-ners claimed the destruction of 10 ofthe attackers, but damage at Midway

proved severe, with flames andsmoke billowing from a fuel storagearea and aircraft hangars. The is-land's defenders remained in thefight, however, causing the Japanesenaval commander to decide on afollow-up attack. His ordnancespecialists were in the midst ofreplacing armor-piercing bombs,designed for use against ships, withhigh explosives for ground targets,when the American carrier pilotspounced in the first of their devastat-ing attacks. The resistance by theMarines at Midway, both the avia-tors and the members of the defensebattalion, thus helped set the stagefor one of the decisive naval battlesof World War II.

After making this contribution to

eventual victory over Japan, the 6thDefense Battalion remained at Mid-way for the rest of the war. As oneof its Marines, Ned Tetlow, pointedout, the long stay enabled the unitto develop a "distinct identity:'

During the defensive phase of thePacific War, the defense battalion un-derwent conceptual changes back inthe United States. Two new tables oforganization and equipment receivedofficial approval in the spring of1942. One called for a battalion of1,146 officers and men that had aheadquarters and service battery, a155mm artillery group of two batter-ies, a 90mm antiaircraft artillerygroup of three batteries, plus asearchlight battery, and a specialweapons group, made up of one bat-tery each of Browning machine guns,Oerlikon 20mm cannon, and Bofors40mm cannon. The other documentcalled for a slightly smaller compo-site unit, in which a rifle companyand a pack howitzer battery replacedsome of the less mobile weapons.Moreover, plans called for one of thecomposite defense battalions or-ganized in 1942 to be manned byAfrican-Americans under commandof white officers.

The wartime demand for man-power and the racial policy of the

Marine Corps Historical Collection

Smoke rises from Wake Island after a Japanese air attack. The command post usedby the detachment of the 1st Defense Battalion lies in the right foreground.

Defense battalion commander Maj James P 5. Devereaux pressed this ammunitionbunker into service as his command post during the defense of Wake Island.

Photo by the author

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Roosevelt administration caused theMarine Corps to agree in February1942 to accept African-Americanrecruits for the first time since theRevolutionary War, when a fewblacks had served in the Continen-tal Marines. The Commandant,General Holcomb, insisted that racialsegregation — not only lawful in mostplaces at the time, but enforcedthroughout much of Americansociety—would prevail and that theAfrican-Americans would performuseful military duty. To gain a mili-tary advantage from these recruits,without integrating the races, theMarine Corps decided to group themin a black unit that could train large-ly in isolation and fight almost in-dependently. Holcomb's policyresulted in the creation of the 51stDefense Battalion (Composite), corn-

manded by whites but manned byAfrican-Americans who had trainedat the Montford Point Camp, a ra-cially segregated facility at CampLejeune, North Carolina.

A decision to use the draft, begin-ning in January 1943, as the normalmeans of obtaining manpower for allthe services brought more blacks intothe Marine Corps than a singlebattalion — plus its training base andadministrative overhead — could ab-sorb. The transition of the 51st froma composite unit to an ordinarydefense battalion released infantry-men and howitzer crews to help forma cadre for a second African-American defense battalion, the 52d.Because the nature of the conflict wasagain changing as the advancetoward Japan accelerated, the MarineCorps organized no additional black

defense battalions, instead creatingnumerous independent companies toprovide logistics support for am-phibious operations.

The steps taken in May 1942toward standardized equipment be-gan bringing order to a sometimesbewildering array of new and old,simple and complex. When a veteranmaster sergeant joined one of thedefense battalions as a replacement,he asked to see the "new 155mmguns," but, to his astonishment, wasshown a weapon fabricated in 1918,"1 thought we had new guns here!"he bellowed. The radio gear and ra-dar required unceasing maintenanceand fine-tuning by specialists whothemselves were fresh from training.Radar, in particular, seemed a mys-tery to the uninitiated and a challengeto the newly minted technicians. In

Under a heavily clouded sky, Marines of the 16th Defense Bat-talion man a 3-inch antiaircraft artillery position on Johnston

Department of Defense photo (USMC) 55863

Island. Note the absence of protective parapets or camouflage.Johnston was not seriously threatened in the course of the war.

In the 4 June 1942 Japanese air raid on Midway a numberof Marines in the garrison, including some from the 6th

Defense Battalion, were killed. Here, the surviving Marinesprepare to bury their buddies with full military honors.

Department of Defense photo (USN) 12703

9

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The South Pacific

Shoulder Insigniaarines serving with the Army's 2d Division inWorld War I wore the Indian-head shoulderpatch, and during the occupation of Iceland,

in late 1941 and early 1942, members of the Marine brigadeadopted the polar-bear flash worn by the British garrisonthey were relieving. The Marines who sewed on the polar-bear insignia included men of the 5th Defense Battalion.Marine shoulder insignia proliferated after the officialrecognition of the 1st Marine Division's patch in 1943.

The designs chosen by the wartime defense battalionsmight either reflect the insignia of a Marine amphibiouscorps or of the Fleet Marine Force Pacific, but they mightalso be created by the individual battalion. Worn on theleft shoulder of field jackets, overcoats, service blouses andshirts, the patches identified individual Marines as mem-bers of a specific unit. On 1 August 1945, Marine Corpsheadquarters recognized 33 such designs, although othersexisted.

evaluating the radar specialists, Cap-tain Wade W. Larkin explained thatthe device was "technically complexenough for them to be justifiablyproud of what they were doing;' eventhough they could not talk openlyabout so "confidential" a piece ofequipment. At the time, radar wascutting-edge technology; Vern C.Smith, who helped operate one of thenew sets in the Wallis Islands,recalled that his SCR-268, acquiredfrom another battalion, was so newthat its serial number "was a singledigit."

The demarcation between thedefensive phase and the beginningsof the counteroffensive provedblurred at the time. Despite theAmerican victory at Midway, theenemy seemed dangerous, aggres-sive, and capable of resuming theoffensive. To forestall the threat tothe sea lanes between Hawaii andAustralia, the 4th Defense Battalionin July 1942 provided a detachmentto protect Espiritu Santo. However,the invasion of the southern Solo-mon Islands and its immediate con-

10

sequences clearly reversed the tide ofwar in the Pacific.

On 7 August 1942, the 3d DefenseBattalion, commanded by ColonelRobert H. Pepper, who had been soinstrumental in creating this kind ofunit, landed in support of the 1st Ma-rine Divisions attack on Guadalcanaland the subsequent defense of the is-land against Japanese counterthrusts.The machine gun and antiaircraftgroups landed "almost with the firstwaves" at Guadalcanal, although theseacoast artillery did not arrive un-til late August. Once the coastal

4

defense guns were ashore, theyscored hits on three enemy ships thathad beached themselves to landtroops. In general, the 3d Defense

Battle of Midway—and the navalbase established on the nearby islandof Tulagi. In early September, the 5thDefense Battalion, led by LieutenantColonel William F. Parks, supplieda detachment that took over atTulagi.

A combat correspondent with the1st Marine Division, Technical Ser-geant George McMillan, describedthe initial lodgment on Guadalcanalas a "stretch of beach, acres ofstraight-lined coconut grove, thefields of head-high kunai grass, andjungle-covered foothills." Six monthsof violent counterattacks by Japaneseair, ground, and naval forces shat-tered the appearance of calm.Throughout the fighting "malaria,jungle rot, and malnutrition' plaguedthe Americans, according to SecondLieutenant Cyril P. Zurlinden, Jr., ofthe 2d Marine Division, whichreplaced the 1st Marine Division inJanuary 1943, after the 1st had leftthe previous December.

Elements of the 5th Defense Bat-talion not needed at Tulagi occupied

Department of Defense photo (USMC)

African-American Marines of the 51st Defense Battalion are shown here in train-ing at Montford Point, Camp Lejeune, before their deployment to the Pacific War.

Battalion lent strength to the defensesof Lunga Point, Henderson Field—named for Major Lofton R. Hender-son, a Marine aviator killed in the

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South Pacific Tales

Funafuti in the Ellice Islands on 2 Oc-tober 1942. The Ellice force set up itsweapons hundreds of miles from thenearest major American base andfor the next 11 months held thenorthernmost position in the SouthPacific, just short of the boundarybetween that area and the CentralPacific. The battalion's commandingofficer, Colonel George F. Good, Jr.,recalled that his ragtag antiaircraftand ground defenses "stuck out likea sore thumb:' The Ellice Islandsserved as a staging area for raids onthe Japanese-held Gilbert Islands andconsequently bore the brunt of some10 Japanese air attacks, during whichthe 90mm antiaircraft guns downedat least six bombers. Meanwhile, ele-ments of the 5th Defense Battalionon Tulagi combined in January 1943with a 5-inch battery from the 3d tobecome the 14th Defense Battalion.

The 9th Defense Battalion, underColonel David R. Nimmer, reachedGuadalcanal in December 1942, setup its weapons around the airfieldcomplex at Koli Point, and prompt-ly destroyed a dozen enemy aircraft.Francis E. Chadwick, a member ofthe artillery group, recalled that theunit "met only stragglers upon land-ing and found an undersize, beaten

enemy battalion." The Marinedefense battalion thereupon beganreequipping in preparation for thenext move up the Solomons chain.In January 1943, the 11th DefenseBattalion, commanded by ColonelCharles N. Muldrow, relieved the 9thBattalion of its responsibilities atGuadalcanal.

Marines serving in the defense bat-talions learned lessons — some ofthem immortalized in legend — not

taught in training or in the manuals.They learned about "air-raid coffee:'strong enough to "lift one's scalpseveral inches per gulp:' Coffee potswould go on the fire when thingswere quiet; then the air-raid alarmwould signal Condition Red, whichmeant that an air raid was imminent,and the Marines would man theirbattle stations, sometimes for hours,waiting for and fighting off the at-tackers as the coffee boiled merrilyaway. The resulting brew becamethick enough to eat with a fork, andMaster Technical Sergeant TheodoreC. Link claimed that the coffee"snapped back at the drinker:'

Veterans also learned to take ad-vantage of members of newly arrivedunits, lavishly supplied but inex-perienced in the ways of the world.A widely told story related how"wolf-hungry" Marines, who hadbeen subsisting on canned rations,smelled steaks cooking at a field gal-ley run by another service. As Tech-nical Sergeant Asa Bordages told it,a Marine shouted "Condition Red!Condition Red!" The air raid signalsent the newcomers scrambling forcover, and by the time they realizedit was a false alarm, the Marineswere gone, and so were the steaks.

While American forces secured

Department of Defense photo (USMC) 62095

The 3d Defense Battalion operated this 5CR268, the first search radar establishedon Guadalcanal after the 1st Marine Division landed there on 7 August 1942.

Searchlights and antiaircraft weapons of the 3d Defense Battalion on Guadalcanalpoint upwards to detect and destroj Japanese aircraft bombing Allied forces.

Department of Defense photo (USMC) 63327

12

Guadalcanal and improved the secu-rity of the supply line to Australiaand New Zealand, increasing num-bers of Marines arrived in the Pacif-ic, many of them members of defensebau:alions. The number of these unitstotaled 14 at the end of 1942, and theMarine Corps continued to form newones into the following year. Threeother divisions were activated dur-ing 1943, and a sixth would takeshape during 1944. As the Pacificcampaigns progressed, the various di-visions and other units were assignedin varying combinations to corpscommands. Eventually the V Am-phibious Corps operated fromHawaii westward; the I Marine Am-phibious Corps had its headquarterson Noumea but would become theIII Amphibious Corps on 15 April1944, before it moved its base to theliberated island of Guam.

From Guadalcanal, the Marinesjoined in advancing into the centraland northern Solomons during thesummer and fall of 1943, forming

one jaw of a pincers designed to con-verge on the Japanese base at Rabaulon the island of New Britain. WhileGeneral Douglas MacArthur, theArmy officer in command in theSouthwest Pacific masterminded theRabaul campaign as an initial steptoward the liberation of the Philip-pines, Admiral Chester W. Nimitzprepared for a thrust across the Pa-cific from Hawaii through the Gilbertand Marshall Islands. By the end of1943, Marines would gain a lodg-ment in the northern Solomons andland in the Gilberts and on New Bri-tain; clearly the United States was onthe move.

Once the American counteroffen-sive got under way in earnest, themission of the typical defense battal-ion changed. Initially, the defensebattalions were expected to land ata site already under friendlycontrol — either a previously deve-loped base or a beachhead securedby assault troops — and remain untilrelieved. In actual practice, this con-

13

cept did not work, for it overlookedthe vulnerability of amphibiousforces, especially to aerial attack,during and immediately after a land-ing. Experience dictated that thedefense battalions land with the as-sault waves, whenever possible, andimmediately set up their weapons.Besides protecting the beachheadduring its most vulnerable period,the battalions freed other elements ofthe Fleet Marine Force from respon-sibility for guarding airfields andharbors. Whatever their role, thedefense battalions received less cover-age in the press than airmen, infan-try, or raiders. A veteran of the 11thDefense Battalion, Donald T. Regan,who would become Secretary of theTreasury in the cabinet of PresidentRonald Reagan, remembered theanonymity that cloaked these units."1 felt;' he said, "we were doing quitea bit to protect those who were do-ing the more public fighting."

In providing this protection, inwhich Regan took such pride,

An aging M1918 155mm gun, manned by the 5th Defense Bat-talion, stands guard over the Pacific surf from amid the beach-

Department of Defense photo (USMC) 51652

front palms at Funafuti in the Ellice Islands, the first stop inthe Pacific following the unit's departure from Iceland.

R

T he defense battalions employed several differentweapons against the attack of enemy aircraft.The M3 3-inch antiaircraft gun, initially used in

shipboard and ground defense, was the heaviest weaponavailable to the Marines when the defense battalions wereorganized. When positioned, the gun rested on a foldingM2A2 platform, dubbed a 'spider' mount, which had fourlong stabilizing outriggers. The gun fired a 12.87-poundhigh explosive round which had a maximum horizontalrange of 14,780 yards and could nearly reach a 10,000-yardceiling. The weapons, each having an eight-man crew whocould fire 25 rounds per minute, were organized in the bat-talions in four-gun batteries. They were successfully em-ployed at Wake, Johnston, Palmyra, and Midway Islands.By the summer of 1942, however, the M-3 was replaced

by the Army's 90mm antiaircraft weapon.This excellent M1A1 gun had an increased range and a

greater killing power than the M3. It became the standardantiaircraft artillery piece for the defense and AAA bat-talions. This gun could fire a 23.4-pound projectile, witha 30-second time fuze out a horizontal distance of 18,890yards and had a vertical range of 11,273 yards. The 10-mancrew could crank off 28 rounds-per-minute. The M1A1could be towed on its single axle, dual-wheel carriage. Ithad a distinctive perforated firing platform. The MarineCorps' 90mms generally landed early in an amphibious as-sault to provide immediate AAA defense at the beachhead.It had a dual role in that it could be directed against groundtargets as well.

Antiaircraft Artillery

ful in the destruction of enemy air-craft" whenever the improvisedwarning system was functioning.This experience may well have in-fluenced a decision to convene a ra-dar board at Marine Corps

defense battalions on Guadalcanaloperated long-range radar integratedwith the control network of MarineAircraft Group 23. LieutenantColonel Walter L. J. Bayler— the last

man off Wake Island, who had car-ried dispatches to Pearl Harbor onthe only Navy plane to reach Wakeduring the siege — declared that thegroup's fighters were "highly success-

headquarters.Formed in February 1943, the

board was headed by Bayler and in-cluded Lieutenant Colonel Edward C.Dyer, who was thoroughly familiarwith the techniques and equipmentused by Britain's Royal Air Force todirect fighters. The board stan-dardized procedures for "plotting,filtering, telling, and warning;' as theradar specialists fed information toa direction center that integrated an-tiaircraft and coastal defense, theprimary responsibilities of thedefense battalions, with the intercep-tion of attacking aircraft by pilots ofthe Marine Corps, Army, or Navy.The radar board refused, moreover,to lift the veil of secrecy that con-cealed the radar program, directingthat "no further items on the subjectwould be released" until the Armyand Navy were convinced the enemyalready had the information fromsome other source.

On 21 February 1943, the 43d In-fantry Division, the 3d Raider Bat-

Department of Defense photo (IJSMC) 59215

This 3d Defense Battalion 90mm antiaircraft gun, dug in at Guadalcanal, servedin a dual role with its ability to engage targets on the ground as well as in the air.

14

\ \t¼t

talion, and a detachment from the11th Defense Battalion secured theRussell Islands as a base for furtheroperations in the Solomons and else-where. Seacoast and antiaircraft ar-tillery landed at Banika, and twoweeks later, when the Japaneselaunched their first air strikes, the an-tiaircraft weapons were ready. The10th Defense Battalion, underColonel Robert Blake, arrived on 24February to reinforce the detach-ment. The Russells soon became aboomtown — a jerry-built stagingarea for Allied units arriving in theSouth Pacific, reorganizing, or mov-ing to other battlegrounds.

The 12th Defense Battalion, com-manded by Colonel William H. Har-rison, covered the occupation ofWoodlark Island, northeast of NewGuinea, by Army ground units on 30June 1943. In just 16 days, Army en-gineers built an airfield, which thebattalion protected until the end ofthe year. The main purpose of theWoodlark operation was to screenthe landings on New Georgia in thecentral Solomons.

Elements of the 9th, 10th, and 11th

Defense Battalions supported the Ar-my's XIV Corps in the central Solo-mons campaign. The stronglyreinforced 9th Defense Battalion,now commanded by LieutenantColonel William J. Scheyer, partici-pated in various aspects of the fight-ing. The 155mm and antiaircraftartillery groups landed on 30 June atRendova Island, just off the coast ofNew Georgia. In the confusion of theRendova landings, during which theassault waves arrived off scheduleand out of sequence, antiaircraft gun-ners doubled as infantry in eliminat-ing light opposition, and members ofthe 155mm unit, looking for firingpositions, clashed with Japanesepatrols. The heavy guns set up andregistered in time to support the mainlandings at New Georgia's Zananabeaches on 2 July. The 90mm antiair-craft guns also were ready that sameday, fortunately so, since theJapanese launched the first of 159 airraids carried out during the cam-paign. The battalion's antiaircraftweapons downed 46 aircraft, includ-ing 13 of 16 in one formation. Ed-mund D. Hadley, serving with theantiaircraft group, helped fight off

15

one of the heaviest raids. "1 will al-ways think of July 4, 1943, as the daythe planes fell;' he said, his memorysharpened by the fact that he and his90mm gun crew had to dive into amud hole to escape a Zero fighterstrafing Rendova.

The curtain of antiaircraft fire thatprotected Rendova and the Zananabeaches had an unintended effect onone of the two secondary landings onNew Georgia — Rice Anchorage andWickham Anchorage. Fragmentsfrom antiaircraft shells fired fromRendova rained down upon Rice An-chorage, to the north, where ele-ments of the 11th Defense Battalionguarded a beachhead seized by theMarine 1st Raider Regiment. Thecommander of a raider battalionrecalled setting Condition Redwhenever the 90mm guns cut looseon Rendova, for their "shrapnel wasscreaming in the air above the trees;'as it tumbled to earth.

The main landing on Zananabeach, New Georgia, took place on2 July under the cover of fire fromantiaircraft guns and 155mm artilleryon Rendova. Machine guns and lightantiaircraft weapons promptly

Photo courtesy of the U.S. Naval InstituteAn LST brings the 9th Defense Battalion to Rendova Island, set up its artillery and antiaircraft guns to support the assaultwhere the unit helped overcome Japanese resistance and then on heavily defended neighboring island of New Georgia.

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deployed from Rendova across thenarrow strait to New Georgia to helpprotect the beachhead there. Lighttanks from the 9th, 10th, and 11thDefense Battalions helped Armytroops punch through the Japanesedefenses barring the way to the prin-cipal objective, Munda Point airfield.The M3A1 Stuart light tanks andtheir crews defied jungle, mud, andsuicidal counterattacks in spearhead-ing a slow and deliberate attack. Thetank gunners fired 37mm canisterrounds to strip away the jungle con-cealing Japanese bunkers, followedup with high-explosive shells to pene-trate the fortifications, and usedmachine guns to cut down the sur-vivors as they fled. Captain RobertW. Blake, a tank commander whoearned the Navy Cross in the centralSolomons, noted that "death on theMunda Trail" was noisy, violent, andfar from romantic. "1 trip the seatlever;' he wrote, "and drop down be-hind the periscopic sight. I level thesight dot at the black slot and pressthe firing switch. Wham, the gunbucks, a wad of smoke billows

through the trees. The concealingbranches are left raw and broken."According to one analysis of thefighting, "A handful of Marine tanks,handicapped by difficult jungle, hadspearheaded most of the successfulattacks on New Georgia:'

On 4 August, the Marine tanksthat had survived Japanese fire, for-midable terrain, and mechanicalbreakdown, moved onto MundaPoint airfield, littered with wreckedairplanes and pockmarked with shellcraters. The infantry mopped up onthe next day, and the 9th DefenseBattalion moved its antiaircraftweapons into position to protect thecaptured airdrome, while its 155mmguns prepared to shell the Japanesegarrison on nearby Kolombangara.

The 4th Defense Battalion covereda landing by Army forces on 15 Au-gust at Vella Lavella, the north-westernmost island in the centralSolomons. The battalion's antiair-craft weapons, concentrated nearBarakoma harbor, shot down 42Japanese aircraft during 121 raids.Attempts to land cargo elsewhere on

16

the island, and thus speed the distri-bution of supplies, triggered a savagereaction from Japanese air power.Speed proved less important thansecurity, and after the sinking of anLST on 1 October, 1 Marine Am-phibious Corps directed that all shipswould unload at Barakoma under anantiaircraft shield provided by the4th Defense Battalion.

The tank platoons of the 9th, 10th,and 11th Defense Battalions—veterans of the conquest of NewGeorgia — boarded landing craft andsailed due west to Arundel Island,where Army troops landed on 27August. As had happened during theearlier capture of Munda Point, theStuart tanks used their 37mm gunsto breach a succession of defensivepositions, suffering steady attritionin the process. On 19 September, allthe surviving armor formed tworanks, the rear covering the frontrank, which plunged ahead, firing37mm canister to strip away the jun-gle concealment as the tanks gougedpaths for advancing soldiers. Thischarge proved to be the last major

Splattered by mud from a near-miss, Marines operating anoptical gun director check the equipment for damage as they

Department of Defense photo (USMC) 58419

prepare for the next Japanese air attack on Rendova. On VellaLavella, Marines downed 42 enemy aircraft in 121 raids.