Jun 27
The Casablanca Conference in 1943 confirmed the Allies’ determination to make the defeat of Germany their prime objective, but it was also decided to step up the offensive in the Pacific. At a Pacific Military Conference in Washington in March, Gen MacArthur urged a south to north advance, via New Guinea and the Philippines, while Adms King and Nimitz favored an ‘island-hopping’ strategy through the central Pacific. Both options were given tacit approval by the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and Nimitz, with the assistance of Adm Spruance, began preparations for an amphibious assault on the enemy’s outer defensive perimeter sometime in November 1943. Utilizing the islands and atolls ceded to them after World War I, Japan had constructed an outer ring of defenses, ranging from the Marinas, the Palaus and the Carolines, to the Marshall Islands in the east. Truk, in the central Carolines, became the principal naval base—the Gibraltar of the Pacific.
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