The war in Europe was responsible for the Guard's mobilization and the draft, but it was the Japanese who brought the United States into World War II. In December 1941, the Japanese struck not only America's Pacific possessions, but also those of the European powers. By March 1942 most of Southeast Asia and the Pacific Islands were in Japanese hands.
The spring of 1942 found United States forces in the Philippines continuing to hold out against the Japanese. Two National Guard tank battalions, newly-created from the tank companies of several mobilized divisions, and New Mexico's 200th Coast Artillery, sent to the islands in the autumn in 1941, were among the defenders. Without reinforcements and close to starvation, the United States forces on the Bata an Peninsula were finally forced to surrender in April. Less than a month later, the Japanese raised their flag over Corregidor, the last American stronghold. For the captured Americans, three and a half terrible years as prisoners of the Japanese were to follow.
Triangularization Despite the peacetime draft and the Guard's mobilization, the United States Army was not prepared for war. Essential equipment was lacking because Roosevelt had not wanted to alarm the public by putting the economy on a war footing before war was actually declared.
While the factories began chuming out military hardware, the Army began churning out new generals. Combat is a young man's game, and as soon as war came, both Guard and Regular Army division commanders found themselves relieved and reassigned to make way for younger men. The fact that most of these new commanders were Regulars rankled many Guardsmen. Only two Guard divisions, the 31st and 37th, were taken into combat by their Guard commanders.
In the late 1930s the Regular Army had begun "triangularizing" its four-regiment square divisions in order to create a smaller and more maneuverable three-regiment force. After Pearl Harbor, there was a rush to triangularize the Guard divisions as well. Each division lost many units and about 8,000 men. Some of these detached units were reassigned to divisions far from their home states, or to Regular Army divisions. Some remained non-divisional "orphans" for the duration of the war.
All eighteen National Guard divisions fought in World War II, and they were exactly divided between the European and Pacific theaters. The first division to deploy overseas was a Guard division, and of the first five Army divisions to enter offensive combat, four were National Guard.
These first-deploying Guard divisions--the 32nd, 34th, 45th, and a new division made up of National Guard units, the Americal--retained their personnel and their Guard identity. The later-deploying Guard divisions, on the other hand, saw many of their original personnel transferred out, to be replaced with draftees and volunteers. But even these divisions tended to maintain a strong regional flavor. When Texas' 36th landed at Anzio in 1943, the division commander--who was neither a Guardsman nor a Texan--personally planted the Lone Star flag.
First Fighting in the Pacific The relief of the Philippines was never seriously considered; the islands were too far away to defend successfully. And in the immediate aftermath of Pearl Harbor, "Europe first" was the strategic objective. But as the war progressed, the Navy--and General Douglas MacArthur, who had been rescued from Corregidor to boost civilian morale--successfuly argued for more and more resources to fight the Japanese.
In the spring of 1942 units triangularized out of the 26th Division, along with the 132nd Infantry from Illinois and the 164th Infantry from North Dakota, found themselves alerted for shipment to the Pacific. Sent to New Caledonia to protect Australia against Japanese invasion, this miscellaneous collection of Guard units was organized into the "Americal" Division. It would became the only United States Army division ever to win the Navy Presidential Unit Citation.
The Americal's 164th Infantry was sent to Guadalcanal to reinforce the Marines in October, 1942, two months after the battle began. They were the first sizable body of United States Army troops to participate in offensive combat in World War II.
On their first two nights with the Marines, the North Dakotans endured bombardment from Imperial Japanese Navy ships that was as bad as anything in World War I. Later, fighting hand-to-hand alongside Marines who were an average of 10 years younger, the "old men" from North Dakota fought off a series of suicidal night attacks on Guadalcanal's Henderson Field.
The 32nd Division from Wisconsin and Michigan was ready to sail for Europe when it was ordered west, to San Francisco. The 32nd arrived in Australia in May 1942, and by September elements were attached to Australian forces in New Guinea.
The 32nd was ordered to take Buna, one of three towns held by the Japanese on the northern tip of the island. As one historian noted, "a more grueling campaign is not of record in World War II." The Japanese were in heavily-fortified bunkers. With no heavy artillery, no tanks, and flamethrowers that fizzled, the 126th and 128th Infantry had to take the bunkers by rushing them with grenades. Supplies were so short that men were down to half rations; malaria broke out despite the quinine ration. The smell of decomposing bodies, American, Australian, and Japanese, lay over the hot and humid jungle.
Douglas MacArthur's retum to the Philippines after his PT-boat rescue was a personal as well as a military crusade. When the Buna campaign bogged down, MacArthur sent for Robert Eichelberger, the corps commander, and ordered him to "take Buna or don't come back alive."
After hard fighting, the 32nd did take Buna, and Eichelberger went on to higher command. The 32nd was relieved in New Guinea by the fresh troops of the 41st Infantry Division from Washington and Oregon. Later, in ferocious combat on the tiny coral island of Biak, the men of the 41st Division would earn the nickname "Jungleers." Many more American soldiers would become adept at jungle combat in the months to come, as United States forces began to implement the strategy of "island hopping" toward Japan.
"Over There" Again - The European Theater The first Army division to deploy to Europe was the 34th Infantry Division from Minnesota, Iowa, and South Dakota. They arrived in Northern Ireland on January 31, 1942, and landed in North Africa in November of that year. The 34th was one of the first Army divisions to enter combat.
In July of 1943 the Allied offensive moved to Sicily, where the 45th Infantry Division from Oklahoma, Arizona, and Colorado landed as part of General Patton's Seventh Army. When American and British forces turned to Italy itself, the 45th followed Texas' 36th Division in assaulting Salerno, south of Naples.
The strategy of getting at Germany from the south came from the British. But when Winston Churchill called Italy the "soft underbelly of Europe," he apparently forgot its mountainous terrain. Three National Guard infantry divisions, the 34th, 45th, a nd 36th, fought in Italy, and month for month it was the toughest combat in the European theater. The Germans held the high ground tenaciously, and the Allies had to fight their way up "one damn mountain after another." The Germans were eventually pushed back, but it was a very slow process.
Across the Channel to France Italy became "the forgotten theater as preparations for the invasion of France accelerated. By May 1944, four National Guard divisions, the 28th, 29th, 30th, and 35th were in England. Only the 29th crossed the English Channel on D-day, June 6; its 116th Infantry was the assault regiment at Omaha Beach. But by mid-summer all four Guard divisions were fighting among the hedgerows of Normandy. By fall, the 26th and 44th divisions were also helping to push the Germans back.
After the successes of the summer and fall, the German Army's December counteroffensive in the wooded, hilly terrain of the Ardennes Forest was a complete shock. The 28th Infantry Division was holding a quiet sector of the American lines, recuperating after a severe mauling the month before in the Huertgen Forest.
On the 16th, the Germans' Fifth Panzer Army hit the 28th Infantry Division all along its front. The 110th Infantry was in position on the crucial approaches to Bastogne. Ordered to hold at all costs and denied permission to fall back to a safer position, the 110th fought until they were completely surrounded. Most of those not killed or wounded were captured, including the regimental commander--but their two-day stand permitted Bastogne to be reinforced by the 101st Airborne Division, a crucial factor in the outcome of the battle.
For at least a week it was unclear whether or not the bulge in the Allied lines would become a hole. Since the Normandy invasion Allied soldiers had been on the offensive. But in the week before Christmas, 1944, Americans in the Ardennes were engaged in desperate defensive combat, trying to keep the German attack from becoming a breakthrough. Gun crews sacrificed themselves to try to hold crucial bridges; single platoons stayed behind to cover regimental withdrawals.
When the German tide had finally been turned and the Allies were back on the offensive, almost every United States division in Europe, including the 26th, 30th, 35th, 36th, and 45th, had fought in the Ardennes. The 30th Infantry division had been rushed in during the terrible chaos and confusion of the second day, and saw some of the heaviest fighting. The "Battle of the Bulge" lasted for a month, and was the largest ever fought by the United States Army.
The Germans gambled everything on this last great offensive, and when it failed, the end of the war in Europe was near. Stubborn resistance continued, but by May 1945 Patton's Third Army was in Czechoslovakia and the Red Army was advancing street-by-street in Berlin. Hitler committed suicide in his bunker under the Reichstag, and the war in Europe was over.
National Guard Aviation in Combat National Guard flying units had contributed to the victory in Europe. After Pearl Harbor, most of the 29 squadrons that had been mobilized began flying anti-submarine patrols along both coasts. The Army Air Forces were desperately short of trained instructors for its thousands of new personnel, and eight National Guard squadrons spent the entire war in stateside training camps. All of the squadrons lost personnel as experienced pilots and crewmen were transferred to other units.
Three of the first observation squadrons to depart the United States were the 111th (Texas), 122nd (Louisiana), and the 154th (Arkansas). They sailed for the Mediterranean as part of the 68th Observation Group, and took part in the invasion of North Africa. While operating in Algeria and Tunisia, the Group modified its P-38 fighters for photo reconnaisance work by mounting nose cameras in the aircraft. P-38s modified in this manner soon began to roll off stateside assembly lines.
Other squadrons which saw early combat were Michigan's 107th Observation Squadron, and the 109th from Minnesota. Redesignated as tactical reconnaissance squadrons, the two units flew photo-reconnaissance missions for the Normandy invasion planners. In July 1944, the 107th became the first United States Army Air Forces unit to operate from French soil.
Seven National Guard observation squadrons fought in the Pacific. Surprisingly, only two, the 106th (Alabama) and the 110th (Missouri) fought in the main Southwestem Pacific theatre. The 106th, redesignated a reconnaissance squadron (bombardment) began flying out of Guadalcanal's Henderson Field in July, 1943; the 110th flew reconnaissance missions out of New Guinea, the Philippines, and Okinawa.
Five National Guard squadrons took part in what was probably the least-known theatre of World War II, China-Burma-India. The 103rd (Pennsylvania) and 123rd (Oregon) squadrons flew photo-reconnaissance missions over Burma's mountainous jungles. California's 115th, redesignated the 115th Liaison Squadron, along with the 127th Liaison Squadron from Kansas, flew observation, light transport, and evacuation missions for the land-locked British, Chinese, and American troops who could not be supplied or evacuated in any other way. After the war, Lord Louis Mountbatten, theatre commander, paid tribute to such American flying units, especially their hair-raising ability to take off from and land in tiny jungle clearings.
Conclusion of the War in the Pacific By early 1944 American and Australian forces were taking one Pacific island after another, hopscotching closer and closer to Japan itself. Crucial airstrips were rapidly built on each one, and the tide of war had turned in our favor. But the enemy fought under the code of the samurai, which emphasized the disgrace of defeat and the glory of dying for the Emperor. The Japanese defended their territory literally to the death.
Douglas MacArthur's return to the Philippines came in October 1944, when United States troops landed on the island of Leyte. Among the assault troops was California's 184th Infantry, one of three National Guard infantry regiments assigned to Regular Army divisions after it was triangularized out of the 40th Infantry Division (which would also see combat in the Philippines). After hard fighting, and the largest naval battle in history, Leyte fell.
In January 1945 began the battle for Luzon, the main Philippine island. The assault at Lingayen Gulf went according to plan, but New England's 43rd Infantry Division, experienced veterans of the Pacific fighting, ran into forbidding terrain and fanatical resistance--a foretaste of things to come.
With Lingayen secured, the 37th Infantry Division, Ohio's Buckeyes, joined the 1st Cavalry Division in the race for Manila. The Buckeyes' 148th Infantry won a Presidential Unit Citation and four posthumous Medals of Honor in the bitter fighting for the Philippine capital, in which more than 100,000 civilians died.
After the month-long battle for Manila, the 37th Infantry Divison was sent to join the 31st (Florida, Alabama, Louisiana, and Mississippi, the "Dixie Division"), 32nd, and 33rd (Illinois), who were fighting in the rugged mountains of northern Luzon. When Japan surrendered after the dropping of a second atomic bomb in August 1945, Japanese soldiers, many of them sick and starving, were still holding out in the mountains of north-central Luzon.
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