The beachhead remained completely vulnerable to enemy direct-fire weapons from these heights; the Marines had to storm them before many more troops or supplies could be landed.
The size and terrain of the island precluded any Force Beachhead Line.
General Schmidt also committed one battery of 155mm howitzers of the corps artillery to the narrow beachhead on D+1.
He assigned Carlson and two companies of raiders to secure the beachhead for an Army battalion, Seabees, and a Marine defense battalion.
Planes from Segi Point and artillery from the Rendova beachhead would render support as the Army regiments advanced overland to capture Munda airfield.
Illustration: Sherman mediums from the 3d Tank Battalion lumber up the long incline from the Asan beachhead towards the scene of battle around Fonte and X-Ray Ridges.
The Southern Beaches In the south at Agat, despite favorable terrain for the attack, the 1st Brigade found enemy resistance at the beachhead to be more intense than that which the 3d Division found on the northern beaches.
The regiment would drive inland, secure a line of cliffs, and defend them until the division caught up and was ready to expand the beachhead outward.
With capture of the beachhead line and its critical high ground and the annihilation of great numbers of Japanese, the turning point of the Guam campaign had been reached.
Securing the Force Beachhead Line With the breakthrough at Fonte and failure of Takashina’s mass counterattack, the American positions could be consolidated.
The most serious resistance to occupying the Mount Alutom-Mount Chachao massif and securing the Force Beachhead Line (FBHL) across the hills was a surprisingly strong point at the base of Mount Chachao.
As Lieutenant Colonel Cushman, evaluating the action later, said: With the seizure of Fonte Hill, the capture of the beachhead was completed.
The almost complete devastation of Japanese beachhead defenses, which was not entirely expected by the Marines, permitted this peaceful combat landing.
The beachhead itself was of respectable size, despite the failure of some units to reach their first-day objectives.
As dark fell, the 2d Battalion cut itself loose from the units to its south, and formed a small battalion beachhead for the night.
At the end of the first 12 hours ashore, the 1st Marine Division held its beachhead across the intended front.
Ashore, it was apparent that what was needed on this hectic beachhead was not more troops, but more room in which to maneuver and more artillery.
It had advanced approximately 1,000 yards beyond the division beachhead line.
On the other hand, the friends of annihilation at the beachhead felt that semipermanent beach fortifications could withstand bombardment.
The 1st Battalion, 34th Infantry, remained in the beachhead area.
XXIV Corps Goes Ashore While the X Corps was engaged in seizing a beachhead and capturing the Tacloban airfield, the XXIV Corps was carrying out its mission more than fourteen miles to the south.
By utilizing a narrow road leading inland to Highway 1, egress from the 1st Cavalry Division beachhead area was accomplished.
The division had secured the beachhead area of the XXIV Corps in its zone of action.
The 77th Division had established a two-mile beachhead extending from Ipil in the north to the Bagonbon River on the south and had penetrated inland nearly a mile.
The southern half of the division's beachhead area was designated Blue Beaches 1 and 2, and the northern half was known as Orange Beaches 1 and 2.
Navy with its greatest operational challenge: protecting an enormous and vulnerable amphibious task force tethered to the beachhead against the ungodliest of furies, the Japanese kamikazes.
Cox, credited these two Marines and timely artillery fire with saving the division rear and beachhead area.
The congestion of supplies on the beachheadrendered them and the troops moving themselves and the supplies inland vulnerable to enemy air attack.
Currin turned the beachhead over to the Army occupation force and was taken back on board ship and returned to Guadalcanal.
Department of Defense Photo (USMC) ] The objectives assigned on Bougainville were to seize a substantial beachhead and build airstrips.
The Army assumed control of the beachhead as of 15 December.
But, most important, the threat to the beachheadhad been stopped.
The Marines hastily dug in, while the enemy responded quickly with a “furious hail” of mortar fire, meanwhile lashing the beachhead with machine gun and rifle fire.
Japanese war planes and ships summoned in urgency to smash the beachhead at Guadalcanal had to pass over Bougainville, the big island in the middle of the route from Rabaul.
They were sent here in some fashion to make a beachhead for the landing of their people.
Humans caught in such a cosmic trap would be in no mood to negotiate or make promises, if any sort of beachhead to the future could be set up.
I don’t believe there’s a school-girl in Beachhead that can broil a blue fish as you can.
But when Christmas-morning rose, the whole of Beachhead was softly and smoothly covered with white.
Don’t you think it is a great deal pleasanter than it would be if Beachhead was away off in the country, out of sight of the water?
Shoup later described the location of his beachhead lines the night of D-Day as “a stock market graph.
Smith Collection Navy medical personnel evacuate the wounded from the beachhead on D-Day.
Illustration: Some seriously wounded Marines were evacuated from thebeachhead by raft.
The action shows Maj Crowe’s LT 2/8 trying to expand its beachheadnear the contested Burns-Philp pier.
Its effectiveness must have given confidence that his beachhead was secured, since he came ashore at the end of the week to take personal command of the real landing.
These outfits and others are well past the beachhead stage of entry into the world capital markets.
The Allies, in addition, dominated the skies over New Britain, blunting the air attacks on the Cape Merkus beachheadand bombing almost at will throughout the island.
Puller's Marines made contact with an Army patrol from the Cape Merkus beachhead and then headed toward the north coast, beginning on 16 February.
Conoley, landed and began wading through the damp flat to take its place between the regiment's 1st and 3d Battalions as the beachhead expanded.
Next, the Marines would repulse the Japanese who harassed the secondary beachhead at Cape Merkus and secure the mountainous, jungle-covered interior of Cape Gloucester, south of the airfields and between the Green and Yellow Beaches.
That unit's medium tanks landed on 22 April at Hollandia on the northern coast of New Guinea, but a swamp just beyond the beachhead prevented the Shermans from supporting the advance inland.
General Matsuda entrusted three reinforced battalions to Katayama, who intended to hurl them against Target Hill, which he considered the anchor of the beachhead line.
South of the airfield where densely jungled ridges and ravines abounded, the beachhead perimeter was guarded by outposts and these were manned in large part by combat support troops.
On 27 August, the 1st Battalion, 5th Marines, made a shore-to-shore landing near Kokumbona and marched back to the beachhead without any measurable results.
Illustration: Marine Corps Personal Papers Collection Immediately after assault troops cleared the beachhead and moved inland, supplies and equipment, inviting targets for enemy bombers, began to litter the beach.
The Japanese had landed more than enough troops to destroy the Marine beachhead and seize the airfield.
