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This was a surprise military strike by the Imperial Japanese Navy Air Service upon the United States against the naval base at Pearl Harbor -
The troops ate cavalry horses and mules. The lack of food and supplies, along with diseases such as malaria, scurvy, and dysentery, took their toll.
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In response, Admiral Nimitz sent two carriers, the Yorktown and the Lexington, to intercept the Japanese in the Coral Sea. There, in early May, carriers from both sides launched all-out airstrikes against each other
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Around 78,000 prisoners of war were forced to march. They were sick, exhausted, and starving. They went 65 miles to a Japanese prison camp. Almost 10,000 troops died on this march, which was later to be called the Bataan Death March.
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At the end of March, a crane loaded sixteen B-25s onto the aircraft carrier Hornet. The next day, the Hornet headed west across the Pacific. On April 18, American bombs fell on Japan for the first time. -
Admiral Nimitz had been waiting for the opportunity to ambush the Japanese fleet. He immediately ordered carriers to take up positions near Midway. The Americans were ready. The Japanese ran into a blizzard of antiaircraft fire, and 38 planes were shot down. The Battle of Midway was a turning point in the war. The Japanese navy lost four large carriers and the heart of its fleet. -
The U.S. began its Central Pacific Campaign against Japan by seizing the heavily fortified, Japanese-held island of Betio in the Tarawa Atoll in the Gilbert Islands. When the landing craft hit the reef, at least 20 ships ran aground. Raked by Japanese fire, only one marine in three made it ashore. More than 1,000 marines died on Tarawa. Photos of bodies lying crumpled next to burning landing craft shocked Americans back home -
Despite strong Japanese resistance, American troops captured all three by August 1944.
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In October 1944, over 700 ships carrying more than 160,000 troops sailed for Leyte Gulf in the Philippines. To stop the American invasion, the Japanese sent four aircraft carriers toward the Philippines from the north and secretly dispatched another fleet from the west. Although the Japanese fleet had retreated, the campaign to recapture the Philippines from the Japanese was long and grueling. More than 80,000 Japanese were killed and fewer than 1,000 surrendered.
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The Battle of Leyte Gulf was the largest naval battle in history. Kamikaze pilots would deliberately crash their planes into American ships, killing themselves but also inflicting severe damage. Luckily for the Americans, just as their situation was becoming desperate, the Japanese commander, believing more American ships were on the way, ordered a retreat.