Saipan: Because Marines Never Forget

Saipan in July 2011, as seen from Tinian three miles across the strait. Saipan’s most prominent feature is Mount Tapotchau, which rises 1,554 feet and was a main objective during the 1944 campaign to take the island.

On June 14, 1944, first-wave amtracs in the company of LVT(A) amphibian tanks charge toward the beach at top speed, about 4 knots.

The beach at Chalan Kanoa where the 2dMarDiv went ashore has changed little since D-day, 1944.

Marines were dropped on the beach and faced devastating fire. They organized amid confusion and chaos and moved inland pushing the Japanese defenders back.

Today, a ship of Maritime Prepositioning Ship Squadron Three is anchored on the Philippine Sea side of Saipan in what were once the landing lanes for the amphibious tractors and landing craft of the 2dMarDiv.

Flame trees line the roads of today’s Mariana Islands and are subjects of art and photographs by the residents.

Marines following in trace behind an M4A equipped as a flame tank sweep across Saipan. Flame throwers and napalm dropped from planes were, at the time, new weapons causing not only casualties, but creating fear in the enemy.

The Japanese had time to build bunkers and ammunition storage areas that could withstand almost anything. Today, National Park Service Ranger Nancy A. Kelchner—one of four U.S. Department of the Interior rangers living in the United States Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands—guides returning veterans and others visiting with Military Historical Tours.

It was the first time during WW II that Marines had to deal with civilians in large numbers. Many people sought refuge in the island’s caves, which also were used by Japanese soldiers as last-ditch fighting positions. The Marines protected, fed and cared for the civilians and any Japanese who chose to surrender. Many soldiers did not, and died in the caves that Marines sealed permanently.

Today Garapan, the capital of Saipan, is a tourist attraction and the center of Saipan’s nightlife with hotels that offer dinner shows, island dancers, and cocktail lounges with views, piano bars, restaurants and nightclubs.

Marine communicators gathered in Garapan, home to 10,000 people, in late June 1944. The town came under heavy bombardment from Marine artillery and naval gunfire and nearly was leveled. The Battle for Saipan was the first time in WW II that Marines fought house to house.

The Japanese Jail on the outskirts of Garapan today stands in ruins. It is rumored to have held aviatrix Amelia Earhart, who had disappeared with her navigator, Fred Noonan, during her 1937 flight to circumnavigate the globe.

Not far from the Japanese Jail was the sugar cane factory, one of the successful ventures between the people of Saipan and the Japanese before the war. It was destroyed during the fighting. Today, Sugar King Park displays an engine from the sugar cane railroad that ran through most of the battle area.

Mount Tapotchau, Saipan’s highest point, is still an intimidating fusion of razor-blade- sharp cliffs, coral heads and limestone crags with cutting edges on every rock knob, formed almost entirely from coral that once was under the sea.

The struggle to take Mt. Tapotchau was arduous and deadly. Ground around the prominent peak was costly in lives, and little quarter was given by two determined foes.

Even today from the summit of Mt. Tapotchau, it is easy to see why it was prize real estate in 1944. When it fell to Marines on June 27, 1944, one leatherneck said that for many dreadful days the Japanese had “been able to look down our throats. Now, we could look down theirs.”

It had taken coral millions of years to be forced up from the sea floor and form Mt. Tapotchau. Today a winding road takes visitors almost to the top. The remaining distance is a somewhat treacherous hike over slippery rocks of long-dead coral. “Imagine trying to dig into that,” said one veteran Marine. These Marines, nonetheless, reached the summit of the peak and held against Japanese attempts to take it back.

In June 2011, Richard W. Spooner leads the way up the last knoll to the top of Mt. Tapotchau, Saipan’s highest peak, which in 1944 was heavily contested. It is the same path Marines took in the previous photo (#17).

Marines advance behind an M4A tank in the shadow of what became known as Suicide Cliff, where many Japanese soldiers and civilians jumped to their deaths.

Shrines and monuments to the dead recall the final horror of Saipan that took place at Marpi Point. The remaining Japanese troops, along with hundreds of civilians, had fled to the very northern edges of the island. Prodded by Japanese rifles and bayonets, many families jumped from the cliffs to their death. Suicide Cliff is hauntingly beautiful. A precipice rising approximately 820 feet, it overlooks what was once Marpi Field and Banzai Cliff. Today Suicide Cliff affords a view of the lush grazing fields of a cattle farm and waste management plant. Flying overhead and riding thermals below are red-tailed tropicbirds. A poignant, but mythical story says the birds came only after the suicides.