The inability to base bombers at Hollandia meant that MacArthur could not follow through on his promise to provide heavy bomber support for Nimitz’s Mariana operations. On balance, Hollandia was MacArthur’s finest operational moment in World War II. Though it was hardly the gutsy gamble portrayed by Willoughby and the SWPA commander himself, it did serve as a textbook example of operational imagination and efficient interservice coordination, as well as how to acquire and exploit actionable intelligence.
