The Conquering Tide: War in the Pacific Islands, 1942–1944

by Ian W. Toll

history will show that half a century of colonial rule achieved a Pax Britannica in the Solomons.

Across the sea, water-drenched corpses; Across the mountains, grass-covered corpses. We shall die by the side of our Emperor, We shall never look back. —“UMI YUKABA” (Across the Sea) Anthem of the Imperial Japanese Navy

peculiar psychology of the Navy Department, which frequently seemed to retire from the realm of logic into a dim religious world in which Neptune was God, Mahan his prophet, and the United States Navy the only true Church.”

reasonable share of culpability must be attributed to WATCHTOWER’S cumbersome and ambiguous command arrangements, and thus to King

yup

The 1st Marines, counterattacking at daybreak with an envelopment which caught the enemy in the rear and on the flank, thus cutting off his withdrawal and pushing him from inland in the direction of the sea, virtually annihilated his force and achieved a victory fully commensurate with the military traditions of our Corps.”48