Seventy Years Ago: Guadalcanal, Day 2

The 11,000 marines landing on Guadalcanal encountered no initial Japanese opposition. The marine force was made up mostly of recruits fresh from military training, equipped with old bolt-action (1903 Springfield) rifles.

Because of the desire to get the force into action quickly, logistics planners loaded the ships with only 60 days worth of supplies instead of 90 days. Marines began referring to the invasion as "Operation Shoestring." Even worse, unloading supplies on the beach and transporting them to supply dumps was taking longer than expected.

Marines fighting on Tulagi and two other small islands, unlike Guadalcanal itself, encountered fierce Japanese defenses. Japanese aircraft from Rabaul attacked the landing force during the first two days of the invasion. Japan lost 36 aircraft. Admiral Fletcher's force lost 19, including fourteen fighters.

In a still controversial move, on August 8th Admiral Fletcher, possibly thinking things were going smoothly on the beaches, withdrew the three carriers providing air support for the invasion, leaving Admiral Turner helpless against any further Japanese air attacks.

The air strip under construction by Japan, which the marines renamed Henderson Field, would not be able to operate aircraft for almost two weeks.

In the meantime, Admiral Turner tried to unload his transport ships before leaving the area, but by the morning of August 9, had unloaded less than half of the supplies the ships carried. Five days worth of food had been landed from the transports, which, along with captured Japanese provisions, gave the Marines a total of 14 days worth of food. To conserve supplies, the troops were limited to two meals per day.

Marines referred to the departure of Fletcher and Turner as the "great Navy Bug-out."

That night things got worse.