Emirau (Operation Cartwheel)

Background

In the Spring of 1944, General Douglas MacArthur and the US Joint Chiefs of Staff were ready to affect Operation Cartwheel: the isolation of the major Japanese naval base at Rabaul. The neutralization of Kavieng, an important Japanese stronghold and staging post for aircraft moving to Rabaul, was crucial to Cartwheel.[1] Kavieng was well-defended, with its own airfields and naval facilities, and was out of range of US land-based aircraft, so any assault would depend on USN carrier-based air power.  

Rather than risk a bloodbath at Kavieng with limited support, nearby Emirau was chosen for landing and development instead. Emirau, a hilly, densely forested island, was smaller than Kavieng at about eight miles long and two miles wide. Despite its size, it was still large enough for an airbase and was also suitable for harbor facilities. Aerial photo reconnaissance by VD-1 revealed a distinct lack of Japanese troops and installations, which led American strategists to pare down the force originally slated to assault Kavieng. Rather than use the 30,000 men of the I Amphibious Corps, the 4th Marine Regiment and various supplementary units, comprised of just under 4,000 men, were assigned to make the landing. These supplementary units included C Co, 3rd Amphibious Tractor Bn; A Co (Med), 3rd Tank Bn; a company of pioneers from 2nd Bn, 19th Mar; a composite anti-aircraft battery of 14th Defense Bn; and various signals, ordnance and motor transport detachments.[2] A covering force consisting of the battleships New Mexico, Mississippi, Idaho and Tennessee, 15 destroyers, and the escort carriers Manila Bay and Natoma Bay, patrolled the 75 miles between Emirau and Kavieng.[3]

Photo: U.S. Marines land unopposed on Emirau. A U.S. Navy attack transport is visible in the center, with a Fletcher-class a destroyer farther offshore. U.S. Naval History and Heritage Command photo 80-G-225254.

Landing

Emirau was the first operation for the “New 4th,” which had been formed (or reformed) a month prior from the four battalions of Marine Raiders. The landing was made on 20 March in two echelons. The Marines of the two assault battalions, the 1st and 2nd Bns, 4th Marines, traveled on nine high speed transports, while the remainder of the force sailed on the dock landing ships Epping Forest, Gunston Hall and Lindenwald and the attack transport Callaway. Within their welldecks, the dock landing ships carried 66 LVTs for the crossing of Emirau's fringing reef, six LCTs, 17 Sherman tanks, and a complement of radar sets and anti-aircraft guns.[4]

The attack group arrived in the transport area just after sunrise on 20 March. The Marines of the first wave transferred to their LVTs and launched under the cover of F4U Corsairs of VMF-218, while Bing Crosby’s “Oh What a Beautiful Morning” played from shipboard 1MC loudspeakers. Although the majority of the first wave made landfall smoothly, 3rd Bn’s LCVPs grounded on the reef, and these men had to wade ashore. Spirits undampened, one Raider, who had apparently seen some sign of wild pigs on the shore, decided to do a little “hog calling” to supplement rations before HQ told him to knock it off.

Some of the LVTs sent to neighboring Elomusao Island perceived enemy activity. They and the destroyer USS Anthony opened fire, leading to the wounding of one Marine when his demo pack exploded. However, the natives (of which there were about 300) and a team of Seventh Day Adventist missionaries informed the Marines that the Japanese had left Emirau months before.[5, 6] Supplies began landing at around 1100, and 3,727 troops along with 844 tons of cargo were ashore by nightfall when the ships sailed.[7] According to Corporal “Butch” Fuller of 2nd Platoon, the complete lack of opposition led the men of the 4th to name the landing the “jawbone campaign,” a tongue-in-cheek suggestion that the USMC merely persuaded the Japanese to leave the area.

Photo: Supplies and equipment being brought ashore from landing craft to support the US Marine landing force. The vehicles nearest the camera are Landing Vehicle Tracked (unarmoured) Mark I and those immediately behind are Landing Vehicle Tracked (unarmoured) Mark II. Other vehicles of both types are ferrying supplies ashore in the distance.

Post-landing

Further testimony by the islanders indicated that there were Japanese fuel and ration dumps in the vicinity of Mussau, so between 23-26 March the area was shelled by destroyers. The bombardment was effective enough that the few Japanese remaining in the area destroyed what was left and attempted escape; on the 27th, USS Hoel intercepted a large canoe carrying Japanese troops about 40 miles south of Mussau.[8] The Japanese soldiers opened fire with small arms. Hoel returned fire. Depending on the source, the result of this varies from the destruction of the canoe and Japanese to their capture after the death of the only officer.[9]

Seabees of the 18th Construction Regiment began to arrive five days post-landing and commenced the construction of a PT boat base, LCT dry docks, roads, housing, hospital facilities, radar stations, and two airfields. Meanwhile, the Marines, temporarily out of a job, found themselves left to their own devices for more than two weeks. One can be sure that they foraged, hunted, fished, and traded with the natives and Navy Seabees while on this sabbatical.

The 4th Marines were relieved as the garrison of Emirau by the US Army 147th Infantry Regiment on 11 April 1944. By this time, 18,000 men and 44,000 tons of supplies had been landed.10 Seabees and Army engineers soon transformed the island into a new hub for air power, logistics, and fleet activities. This bloodless landing effectively isolated Kavieng and left it to wither on the vine; it also formed the final link in the chain of bases surrounding Rabaul, the isolation of which permitted the Allies to continue their drive along the north coast of New Guinea toward the Philippines.

Notes

1. Grace P. Hayes, The History of the Joint Chiefs of Staff in World War II: the War

Against Japan, 1982, 312–313.

2. Gordon L. Rottman, U.S. Marine Corps World War II Order of Battle, 2002, 318.

3. Henry I. Shaw, Jr. and Douglas T. Kane, Isolation of Rabaul, 1963. 521.

4. Hayes, 558-559.

5. G-3 Journal, GHQ AFPAC 9 April 1944, "Emirau Operation — Operations of the

Emirau Landing Force", NAA(Vic): B6121/3 99A.

6. Pacific Wrecks Inc., “Emirau Island (Emira), New Ireland Province,

Papua New Guinea,” 4 December 2023, https://pacificwrecks.com/location/png_emirau.html.

7. Shaw and Kane, 522.

8. Shaw and Kane, 522.

9. John C. Chapin, “TOP OF THE LADDER: Marine Operations in the Northern

Solomons,” 1997, https://www.nps.gov/parkhistory/online_books/wapa/extcontent/usmc/pcn-190-003141-00/sec11.htm

10. John Miller Jr., CARTWHEEL: The Reduction of Rabaul, 2009. 380.os throughout