Island Infernos: The US Army's Pacific War Odyssey, 1944

by John C. McManus

In the bigger picture, control of the Marshalls yielded significant strategic results. In addition to shattering a Japanese outpost line and clearing the way for devastating US Navy carrier strikes against Japanese naval forces at Truk in the Carolines, the American victories in the Marshalls netted them a slew of useful bases from which to continue Admiral Nimitz’s Central Pacific drive. As he had anticipated, the capture of the Marshalls accelerated the war’s timetable by several months, making major summertime operations in the Marianas—the fulcrum of Japanese Central Pacific defenses—not only possible but likely. Moreover, American planes now threatened the major Japanese naval base at Truk and threatened the flank of their South Pacific bases in the Solomons and, to some extent, even New Guinea. Flintlock reinforced the notion among the Joint Chiefs that Nimitz’s island-hopping campaign offered the most attractive means of defeating Japan.