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- Milne Bay redirects here. This article is about a World War II battle fought nearby. For the province of Papua New Guinea, see Milne Bay Province.
The Battle of Milne Bay was a battle of the Pacific campaign of World War II. Japanese marines attacked the Australian base at Milne Bay on the eastern tip of New Guinea on August 25, 1942 and fighting continued until the Japanese retreated on September 5, 1942. The battle was the first in the Pacific campaign in which Allied troops defeated Japanese land forces.
The British Field Marshal Sir William Slim, who had no part in the battle, said:
- Australian troops had, at Milne Bay, inflicted on the Japanese their first undoubted defeat on land. Some of us may forget that, of all the allies, it was the Australians who first broke the invincibility of the Japanese army.
Combat forces
In fact, it was Japanese marines, known as Special Naval Landing Forces, who attacked the Allied forces at Milne Bay. The Allies, commanded by the Australian Major General Cyril Clowes, were defending a strategically-important Royal Australian Air Force (RAAF) base. The soldiers were mainly made up of two Australian Army brigades: the 18th Infantry Brigade from the Australian 7th Division and the 7th Australian Infantry Brigade Group, a Militia formation.
The Japanese high command committed no more than 2,400 marines, from the 5th Kure Special Naval Landing Force (SNLF) and the 5th Sasebo SNLF and (non-combat) personnel from the 16th Naval Construction Unit. The Japanese force was led initially by Commander Shojiro Hayashi.
Although the Allied forces numbered about 9,000, only about half of these were infantry. And the Japanese enjoyed a significant advantage, in the form of light tanks, which the Allies had not deployed. However, the RAAF's No. 75 and 76 Squadrons, flying P-40 Kittyhawk ground attack planes would play arguably the most critical role in the fierce fighting.
The action
The tanks initially inflicted severe casualties on the Australian 2/10th Infantry Battalion and forced it to retreat. However, the Japanese infantry and landing craft were hit hard by the Kittyhawks and were forced to land further and further from their main objective, the Milne Bay airbase. On August 29, Japanese reinforcements were landed: 768 men from the 3rd Kure SNLF and 5th Yokosuka SNLF, with Commander Minoru Yano, who took over from Hayashi.
On some occasions success was near for the Japanese; the Kittyhawk pilots were forced to begin firing at enemy troops while they were in the process of taking off. RAAF ground staff, including some from other squadrons, became actively involved in the fighting, as did the US Army Corps of Engineers' 46th Engineer Regiment, which was expanding the airbase.
On September 4, the advance of a section from the Australian 2/9th Battalion was held up by fire from three Japanese machine gun positions. Corporal John French ordered the other members of the section to take cover, before he attacked and destroyed two of the machine guns with grenades. French then attacked the third position with his submachinegun. The Japanese ceased fire and the Australian section advanced to find that the machine gunners had been killed and that French had died in front of the third position. He was posthumously awarded the Victoria Cross for his actions at Milne Bay.
The following day, September 5, the Japanese high command ordered a withdrawal: according to official figures, 311 Japanese personnel were killed, with about 700 missing in action. The Japanese Navy evacuated 1,318 personnel. Of the 534 Australian casualties, 161 were killed or missing in action. The US forces had several personnel killed or wounded.
Significance
The effect on the morale of all Allied servicemen in Asia and the Pacific was profound, but especially other Australians fighting a rearguard action on the Kokoda Track, US Marines simultaneously fighting the Battle of Guadalcanal, and Slim's troops in the 14th Army who had been retreating in Burma.
External links
World War II operations and battles of the Pacific Campaign | History of Papua New Guinea | Conflicts in 1942 | Schlacht um die Milne Bay
"Battle of Milne Bay"