Guam: "We Said We'd Come Back" 1944 US Navy; World War II

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more at http://quickfound.net/ US invasion to retake Guam from the Japanese during World War II. Public domain film from the US Navy, slightly cropped to remove uneven edges, with the aspect ratio corrected, and mild video noise reduction applied. The soundtrack was also processed with volume normalization, noise reduction, clipping reduction, and/or equalization . There is a broadband hum in the audio of this film which I cannot completely remove. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/ http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guam Guam is an organized, unincorporated territory of the United States in the western Pacific Ocean. It is one of five U.S. territories with an established civilian government. Guam is listed as one of sixteen Non-Self-Governing Territories by the Special Committee on Decolonization of the United Nations. The island's capital is Hagåtña (formerly Agaña). Guam is the largest and southernmost of the Mariana Islands. The Chamorros, Guam's indigenous people, first populated the island approximately 4,000 years ago... The Spanish-American War and World War II The United States took control of the island in the 1898 Spanish-American War, as part of the Treaty of Paris (1898). Guam came to serve as a station for American ships traveling to and from the Philippines, while the Northern Mariana Islands passed to Germany, and then to Japan. During World War II, Guam was attacked and invaded by the armed forces of Japan on December 8, 1941. The Northern Mariana Islands had become a Japanese protectorate before the war... Guam's Chamorros believed their northern brethren should have been compassionate towards them, whereas having been occupied for over 30 years, the Northern Mariana Chamorros were loyal to Japan. Guam's Japanese occupation lasted for approximately thirty-one months. During this period, the indigenous people of Guam were subjected to forced labor, family separation, incarceration, execution, concentration camps and forced prostitution. Approximately one thousand people died during the occupation, according to Congressional Testimony in 2004. Some historians estimate that war violence killed 10% of Guam's some 20,000 population. The United States returned and fought the Battle of Guam on July 21, 1944, to recapture the island from Japanese military occupation. More than 18,000 Japanese were killed as only 485 surrendered. Sergeant Shoichi Yokoi, who surrendered in January 1972, appears to have been the last confirmed Japanese holdout in Guam. To this day, Guam remains the only U.S. soil with a sizeable population to have been occupied by a foreign military power, since the War of 1812. The United States also captured and occupied the Northern Marianas... http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Guam_(1944) The Second Battle of Guam (July 21 — August 10, 1944) was the American capture of the Japanese held island of Guam, a United States territory (in the Mariana Islands) during the Pacific campaign of World War II... The Allied plan for the invasion of the Marianas called for heavy preliminary bombardment, first by carrier aircraft and planes based in the Marshall Islands to the east, then once air superiority was gained, close bombardment by battleships. Guam was chosen as a target because its large size made it suitable as a base... the deep-water harbor at Apra was suitable for the largest ships; and the two airfields would be suitable for B-29 Superfortress bombers. The invasion of Saipan was scheduled for June 15, 1944, with landings on Guam tentatively set for June 18. The original timetable was optimistic, however. A large Japanese carrier attack and stubborn resistance by the unexpectedly large garrison on Saipan led to the invasion of Guam being postponed for a month... Guam, ringed by reefs, cliffs, and heavy surf, presents a formidable challenge for an attacker. But despite the obstacles, on July 21, the Americans landed on both sides of the Orote peninsula on the western side of Guam, planning to cut off the airfield... By nightfall the Americans had established beachheads about 2,000 meters deep... the two beachheads were joined up on July 25, and the Orote airfield and Apra harbor were captured by July 30... Rain and thick jungle made conditions difficult for the Americans, but after an engagement at Mount Barrigada from August 2 to August 4, the Japanese line collapsed; the rest of the battle was a pursuit to the north. As in other battles of the Pacific War, the Japanese refused to surrender, and almost all were killed. On August 10, after 3 long weeks of bloody and ferocious fighting, organized Japanese resistance ended, and Guam was declared secure. The next day, Obata committed ritual suicide...