Chapter 589 Tiger of South Asia (8)

On the sixth day of the Battle of Tarawa, the total number of U.S. soldiers on the island exceeded 3,000. They not only controlled the beach, pier, airport and other key locations, but also continued to increase their troops.

Shibasaki learned about the enemy's movements in the pier area through the front-line report. He believed that although he had to maintain his manpower, he could not turn a blind eye to the enemy's continuous reinforcement and replenishment of supplies. After hesitating for a long time, he dispatched three squadrons to launch a limited counterattack through the underground secret communication trench.

The Japanese army began to spray artillery fire at the pier and reef. The U.S. troops who were replenishing supplies on the long levee were caught off guard and fell into the sea one after another. The rest of the U.S. troops immediately suppressed them. Before the U.S. military had finished dealing with the assault here, another round of artillery shells rained down from the side and rear. Several landing craft that were unloading hurriedly pulled up anchor to avoid it, and some people shouted at the top of their throats, "Stop shooting, we are our own people, we are our own people..." The artillery fire came from a stranded landing craft. The Marines thought that some of their comrades could not distinguish the situation and fired randomly. They had no idea that it was actually a small group of Japanese soldiers who took advantage of the cover of night to sneak into the broken ship with weapons and kept shooting at the U.S. military.

When they saw grenade launchers and iron fists flying out continuously, the Marines realized that the ship had been controlled by the enemy. They turned their guns to suppress it, and the firepower of the destroyer also opened fire fiercely. Finally, the infiltrated Japanese troops were completely wiped out. However, just because of the hesitation just now, half a platoon of soldiers and two landing crafts were destroyed, and part of the pier was also destroyed. Daven, who was observing not far away, was so angry that he screamed.

On the Red Beach, more than 400 Marines gathered on the position they had finally captured, using Sherman tanks and 81mm mortars to open the way. Under the cover of destroyer fire, they advanced southward one foot at a time, gradually occupying the 150-meter depth in front, and finally occupying Green Beach - this was the second-day advancement goal that Holland had originally set for the 3rd Marine Division, and now it was 100 hours late.

Days of fighting had caused the US military to consume an extremely alarming amount of ammunition. Not only had the ammunition brought when landing been used up, but even the ammunition carried by the fallen soldiers had been collected by their comrades. Devin hid in the command bunker - the bunker where Connolly had been, now temporarily upgraded to the division headquarters, and urged the logistics supply to go ashore quickly, to ensure the supply of the front line at all costs. The driver braved the hail of bullets and unloaded the supplies onto the beach through the pier.

But what made Davin furious was that the troops risked their lives to transport not only the urgently needed ammunition, flamethrower fuel, radio parts, fresh water and rations, but also a large number of tents, wine and other supplies that were temporarily unused. Not only did they occupy precious transportation capacity, but they also put the urgently needed supplies under pressure. He ordered several bulldozers that had just landed to push all the materials that were in the way into the sea in order to free up space.

The innovative American army quickly came up with an excellent way to attack. They used the thick skin and rough flesh of the bulldozers transformed from Sherman tanks to cover the low gun holes set by the Japanese army and the holes that the enemy might appear with sand and ruins. More bulldozers worked hard on the airport runway, hoping to repair the runway as soon as possible and obtain a piece of open space, so that the troops could also obtain supplies nearby through airdrops or air transport.

As the main gun ammunition of the battleships was consumed very quickly, the stocks of high-explosive shells on each ship were generally less than 120 rounds. The officers and soldiers suddenly had an idea and used armor-piercing shells to deal with the Japanese bunkers. The result was neither good nor bad - if they could hit directly, the armor-piercing shells were much more effective than high-explosive shells. If they could not hit directly, they would basically only hear a sound. However, Holland, who was in a hurry, could not care about so much. At least armor-piercing shells had deterrent power and shock waves, which was better than doing nothing.

Davin tried to summon the aircraft on the aircraft carrier to provide close support. Since most of the US pilots were novices and the ground-to-air communication was not smooth, and the US military's advancing position and distance distribution could not be fully understood even by their own people, many Marines were injured by mistake. Devan had to give up in frustration. Relying solely on ground forces to attack, they would be blocked by the Japanese army every time they pushed forward in depth, resulting in heavy casualties. The casualty rate of the seven newly arrived battalions even exceeded that of the previous few days. Take the unit where the loud-mouthed Captain Curt was as an example. Although he still had nearly 200 people under his command, the original old unit, Company B, had only 34 soldiers, and the rest were all the remaining troops from the battalions that had never been able to restore their organizational structure. Now his number has become the Curt Battalion-level Battle Group.

That afternoon, the last batch of infantry units of the 3rd Marine Division landed on the beach in a steady stream, and the artillery unit also landed two battalions. The US military used 105mm howitzers to destroy the Japanese bunkers and fortifications in succession at very close range with direct aiming, and they were also scarred by the Japanese machine guns and mortars that appeared out of nowhere.

The US troops on the beaches advanced step by step, and more and more tanks landed. They staggered over bomb craters, tree stumps and battlefields, breaking through Japanese strongholds one by one. The entire attack rhythm began to return to the familiar track of the US military. At 5 pm, the excited Davin reported to Holland: "We are winning. We have fully occupied the positions on the north bank and are advancing to the south bank. It is expected that all goals can be achieved in one day.

Nimitz and others finally breathed a sigh of relief. By now, everyone was completely numb to the numbers. At the beginning, everyone was shouting when there were 2,000 casualties. Later, when thousands of casualties were paid every day, the bravery of the US military was aroused. By the sixth day, the total casualties of the US military had exceeded 6,000. Although four regiments and the divisional engineer battalion were mobilized at once, they still felt that the front-line troops were not enough. After a short rest of two days, the first batch of landing troops readjusted their organization and launched the attack. Now it is equivalent to all the main infantry forces of the 3rd Marine Division on the island.

After continuous fierce fighting, the situation of the Japanese army was not much better. Shibasaki had lost more than half of his manpower. A large number of wounded soldiers either died directly on the battlefield with the US military, or struggled to die in the bunker due to lack of medical care and medicine. The organization of his two battalions was completely disrupted, and some squadrons were completely wiped out. While harassing the US military, his troops were divided and surrounded by the enemy in many isolated strongholds. Some people could not even drink a sip of water. If they did not want to surrender, all of them would be killed in battle. But the telegram he sent to the Combined Fleet was still very optimistic: "The enemy attacked desperately, and suffered heavy casualties. Our army fought bravely and fought for every inch of land. At present, the troops still have half of their strength, and ammunition and food can still be supported. All our soldiers will wait for the arrival of the Combined Fleet with the spirit of dying for the sake of righteousness!"

Unlike history, this time, because of the reinforcement of the Combined Fleet, the Japanese officers and soldiers were in a difficult situation, but there was no scene of daring to charge and committing suicide because of despair. On the contrary, they were full of confidence in the final victory. The most common sentence they heard was-the Combined Fleet will avenge us! According to Shibasaki's arrangement, after the battle on the 7th day, all surface positions on the north bank were abandoned, and the entire army went underground. The positions on the south bank resisted for another day and waited for an opportunity to go underground as well.

Starting from the morning of the 7th day, the U.S. military launched a large-scale offensive, with the main goal of clearing all enemy forces on the north bank and attacking the south bank at the same time. The Japanese resistance was as tenacious as ever. Every bunker, every trench, every machine gun nest, and even every coconut tree became a tough target. In the area of ​​densely built fortifications on the south bank, although the Japanese army was determined to give up, the resistance was unprecedentedly tenacious. The U.S. army only advanced a few dozen meters in a few hours, and finally used a large number of armor-piercing shells to attack continuously for 2 hours regardless of cost, and finally swept this area flat.

After counting the number of effective combat personnel yesterday, Daven was shocked by the huge number of casualties and finally woke up from the fanatical atmosphere. In view of the fact that victory in seizing the entire island is in sight, he no longer requires officers and soldiers of various units to advance desperately, but instead adopts a tactical joint attack that mainly relies on technical equipment and minimizes the sacrifice of personnel. At the junction of the defensive positions on the north and south banks, the Japanese army has a huge bunker group equipped with an 8-inch naval gun, multiple 75mm guns and more than ten machine guns, surrounded by thick steel plates and coconut wood. The U.S. military had been unable to approach, and the battleships could not hit this blind spot because of the angle.

Daven personally used the radio to command the carrier-based aircraft to drop bombs, and finally, with the assistance of the newly landed sea and air liaison officers, he used 24 SBDs to drop 500 kg of aerial bombs to destroy the bunker group, and then the flamethrowers ambushed around rushed up, and dozens of fire columns were aimed at the wreckage and attacked fiercely, completely destroying the remaining Japanese troops with burning and scorching.

Of course, in addition to the soldiers who fought bravely, some people suffered from "combat phobia", and were disturbed by the cruel reality of the battlefield and the dead and wounded companions. They were in a state of mental breakdown, not only shouting hysterically, but also often doing irrational behavior. A recruit from Massachusetts went crazy at night, picked up his Thompson submachine gun and fired all the bullets at his comrades, and finally gave himself a melon grenade, which almost broke the morale of the entire battalion.

Almost at the same time, the main force of the Combined Fleet entered Perth's 400-kilometer air defense circle, but no one noticed the fleet's arrival.

At 4 p.m. Australian time, Tsukahara Jishizo issued an order to attack, and nearly 175 attack aircraft were arranged in two echelons to start the attack. At 5:15, a shrill alarm sounded over Perth. At this time, it was still more than 60 kilometers away from the arrival of the Japanese attack aircraft group - it was completely too late.

At 4:57, Fuchida Mitsuo led the attack aircraft group to break into the sky over Perth City. The Comet Kai and Tianshan Kai dropped a large number of bombs and incendiary bombs. The city was full of panicked Australian people. There were very few Australian aircraft that took off to meet the enemy and anti-aircraft guns that could fire shells. At 5:18, the whole city of Perth was burning with raging fire, and the flames reflected half of the sky red, completely covering the figure of the sunset.

When the confidential staff carefully handed over the urgent telegram from Australia, Holland was informing them that the attack and airport construction were progressing simultaneously, and it was expected that Tarawa Airport would be put into use in two days.

The mood of the crowd had just improved, and this news stunned them again.

Everyone knew: the combined fleet was coming...