In the winter of 1943, the U.S. military continued to march in the Pacific Ocean, but the attack on the islands was not always smooth, and some islands made the U.S. military feel some embarrassment. Take, for example, the Battle of Makin Island. Makin Island is one of the larger islands in the Gilbert Islands, where the Japanese guarded only a mere 500 men.
In view of this, the operation on Makin Island is inevitable for the US military. However, in order to ensure that nothing was lost, the US army still sent 6400 troops to the 27th Infantry Division, which was 10 times that of the Japanese army, and the US army also occupied an absolute sea and air superiority. From the perspective of the U.S. military, the battle on Makin Island was over in a few hours.
In January 1944, just after dawn in the morning, the U.S. landing force marched majestically toward the waters off Makin Island. U.S. reinforcements are also ready on aircraft carriers and frigates to support the landing of U.S. forces at any time. The U.S. military even hoped that the Japanese troops on Tarawa Island would come to their aid and eliminate the Japanese troops on both islands in one fell swoop. But there were no more than two thousand Japanese troops on Tarawa Island, and they had no intention of supporting Makin Island.
At the beginning of the US landing operation, it was not much resistance from the Japanese army, and hundreds of US troops were about to push to the middle of the island, who expected that there was an accident on the battleship "Mississippi", and the main turret exploded violently, resulting in more than 60 American casualties on the ship, and the attack on Makin Island was forced to be suspended.
The U.S. army decided to quickly cut through the chaos and end the battle in one day. But in the jungle, the American army was ambushed by the Japanese army. 6400 people were too frightened to advance, and the Japanese snipers' marksmanship was not bad, killing several American soldiers, which scared the US 156th Infantry Regiment to no further advance.
The next day, the U.S. military dispatched carrier-based aircraft of the carrier formation, but unexpectedly a Japanese submarine was swimming nearby. Japanese submarines sank the U.S. aircraft carrier Using the Corlism Bay, the only U.S. aircraft carrier sunk by Japanese submarines in World War II. This led to the death of more than 650 U.S. troops, including Rear Admiral Linnix.
On the third day, the U.S. military finally annihilated all the Japanese troops on the island and hung the American rice flag on Makin Island. On a small island of Makin, the Japanese army was actually sunk an aircraft carrier, and the number of casualties was even greater than that of the Japanese troops on the island combined. This seemed to be the beginning of the U.S. military's bloody battle in the Pacific in World War II.
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