all hands naval bulletin - dec 1944

8/3/2019 All Hands Naval Bulletin - Dec 1944

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Official U. S. Navy photographJap BB Ya m a to flees after two direct bomb hits from Helldiver that got safely back to i ts 3d Fleet carrier.OVERWHELMING V I C T O R YThe following is the full text of

Navy Department Communique No.554, released 17 Nou. 1944. For anearlie? account o f the action describedhere see Pacific Fleet CommuniqueNo. 168, 9. 48. The Navy Depart-ment communique uses local dates.ASED on reports-necessarily in-B complete due to the neckssity ofradio silence for certain fleet units andthe impossibility of having some of-ficers in attendance at evaluationconferences because of continuing op-erations of fleet units-the followinginformation is now available on theSecond Battle of the Philippines:

ISE RIE S of naval engagementsA and, in terms of victory, oneswhich may tu rn out to be among thedecisive battles of modern times, werewon by o u r forces against a three-pronged attack by the Japanese in anattempt to prevent our landings in thePhilippine Islands.

The fact is known. Progress of thethree-day battle which began 23 Octo-ber was promptly reported to theAmerican public as far as militarysecurity permitted. It is now possibleto give a chronological and diagram-matic review of the Second Batt le ofthe Philippines, which left the UnitedStates Fleet in command of the east-ern approaches to t he Philippines, pro-Page 2

viding support for General MacAr-thurs invading forces and maintainingwithout interruption the sea-bornesupply lines pouring men and muni-tions into the combat area.The Japanese are still wonderingwhat hit them. It is impossible, there-fore, to identify the composition ofour naval forces or to describe thedamag-ther than losses-sufferedby us in the three-day fight. All dam-age, however, was remediable andsome of the United States ships hurtin the fight are already back on duty.We lost one light carrier, the USSPrinceton; two escort carreirs, the ussSaint Lo and uss Gambier Bay; twodestroyers, the uss Johnston and USSHoel, and one destroyer escort, theuss Samuel B. Roberts, and a few les-ser craft.Against this, the Japanese definitelylost two battleships, four carriers, sixheavy cruisers, two light cruisers andan undetermined number of destroyers.These ships were seen to go down. SOseverely damaged that they may havesunk before reaching pori, and in any

event removed from action for fromone to perhaps six months, were oneJapanese battleship, three heavy cruis-ers, two light cruisers and seven de-stroyers. In addition, damaging hits

Jap Lose 2 Battleship, 4- Carrier,8 Cruisis in 2d Buttle of Philippineswere noted on six battleships, fourheavy cruisers, one light cruiser and10 destroyers.The victory not only made possiblethe continuing supply of men andmunitions to General Douglas A. Mac-Arthurs successful invasion forces,but by its magnitude can conserva-tively be said to have greatly reducedfuture casualties in both men andwater-borne equipment.Like all battles, this one did not ju sthappen. The engagements, in one ofwhich surface ships slugged it outagainst each other, and in which thefar-ranging carrier-borne U n i t e dStates aircraft both intercepted andpursued enemy ships with conspicuoussuccess, were preceded by a series ofother actions which fall into a definite,strategic pattern when reviewed inorder. I1

RELIMINARIES to the show-dawnB attle can be said to have openedwith the landings on Peleliu and Moro-tai, southwest of the Philippines, on15 September. These landings in them-selves were preceded by a two-weeksseries of feints and thrusts, by ViceAdmiral Marc A. Mitschers carriertask force of the 3d Fleet, which keptthe Japanese forces off balance while


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Japanese believed their own propa-ganda, that at least 15 carriers hadbeen sunk and varying quantities ofother warships.A task force of the Japanese navywas sighted leaving the Empire t ogive the American fleet its coup degrace; but when the astonished pilotsof the enemy scouting force saw thesize of the healthy opposition deploy-ing to receive them, the Japanese ex-pedition wheeled and ran back to thesafer waters of the Empire. AdmiralHalsey ironically observed that hisships sunk by Ja p radio announcementhad been salvaged, and were retir-in g at high speed toward the Japanesefleet.On 14 October, our carrier planesbegan working over the Philippineisland of Luzon, and th e lesser islandsof the archipelago to the south andeast, in order to come into immediatesupport of the amphibious forces ap-proaching for the invasion. Only about85 enemy planes were bagged in thesweeps over approximately 100 air-fields up to th e time o u r carriers, boththe large and fa st ones and the smallerescort ships, converged in support ofthe landings of the United States am-phibious forces on Leyte. The stra tegyhad succeeded, and the landings wereeffected by General MacArthurs forcesin complete surprise.

I11H E invasion of the PhilippinesT mployed a grand-scale use of allarms of modern warfare: land andamphibious forces, surface and sub-sur face ships, and, of course, a tre-mendous air coverage.A look at the chart will show theconfusion of islands upon whose peri-meter the initial assault was made.They form a maze of channels, ofwhich the two providing the best eg-ress t o the Pacific ar e San BernardinoStrait in the north, between Luzonand Samar Islands, and Surigao Stra itin the south, between Leyte and Min-danao.

One of the precautions our forcestook against a Japanese incursion,f ro m the westward was to post sub-mar ines on the opposite side of thearchipelago. Ear ly on the morning of23 October, before daylight, two ofour submarines flashed the word tothe invasion forces tha t a strong Jap-anese fleet was headed northeastwardfrom the South China Sea into Philip-pine waters-and characteristically re-ported, also, that they were movingin to attack. They sent four torpedoesin each of three heavy cruisers, twoof which were reported to have beenleft sinking and the third heavilydamaged. The enemy\forces scattered,and in the pursuit one of our sub-marines ran on a reef in t he middle ofthe restricted channel and had to bedestroyed, after all of the crew wasremoved to safety.

Later that day other contacts withthe enemy were reported, in MindoroStrait, south of Luzon, and off themouth of Manila Bay where the re-porting submarine badly damaged an-other heavy cruiser, which managed,however, to limp into the bay.Thus alerted, the carrier air forcesPage 4

Off ic ia l U. S. Navy photographBIG J A P CARRIER trails smoke during attack by 3d Fleet carrier planes.Picture was taken an hour and a half before she heeled ouer and sank.immediately extended their patrolsearches westward over the VisayanSea and the Sulu Sea. On Tuesday,.24October, two large enemy fleets wereseen making their way eastward. One,in the Sulu Sea, was obviously headedfor the Mindanao Sea and its exit intothe Pacific, Surigao Strait. It con-sisted of two battleships, Ftmo andYamashiro, two heavy cruisers, twolight cruisers and eight or 10 destroy-ers. Our carrier planes attacked andinflicted some damage on the battle-ships, one of the cruisers and two ofthe destroyers, but the enemy contin-ued doggedly on the way to the strait,at whose mouth, where it debouchedinto Leyte Gulf, a surprise receptioncommittee was being assembled.The larger enemy force of the cen-tral prong of at tac k was initially com-posed of five battleships, the modernYamato and Musashi, and the Nagato,Kongo and Haruna. I n support wereseven heavy cruisers, one light cruiserand from 13 to 15 destroyers. Thistask force was also engaged as itsteamed through the Sibuyan Sea bythe carr ier force of t he 3d Fleet. Oneof the Japanese battleships and twoof the cruisers were heavily damagedand most of the o ther vessels in th egroup received hits. After engagingin a running battle, the Japaneseturned back upon their course as ifdecided not to attempt to force SanBernardino Strait.While these carrier strikes were be-in g made against the two enemy fleets,o u r own ships and landing forces werebeing subjected to a very heavy airatt ack by hundreds of land-basedplanes darting out from the Philip-pines 100 o r more air fields. Duringthese attacks the Princeton was hitand set on fire, an d so damaged thatthe carrier had to be destroyed.

Among t h e attacking Japaneseplanes was one group of carrier-basedairc raft which flew in from the nor th,s o search groups were dispatched fromthe 3d Fleet to track them down. At1540 of that same Tuesday, 24 Octo-

ber, two enemy forces were detectedcoming down from the northern tipof Luzon to join battle. They includedtwo battleships, the Is e and Hyuga.,four carriers, including one large shipof the Zuikaku class, a heavy cruiser,three light cruisers and six destroyers.The 3d Fleet, upon receipt of this in-formation, turned to meet the oncom-in g enemy. IVH E United States forces aidingT nd protecting the landing onLeyte were now the target for threeconverging Japanese groups totaling,without estimating submarines, ninebattleships, four carriers, 13 heavycruisers and seven light cruisers, and30-odd destroyers. The stage was set.

Shortly after midnight, o u r PTboats off the southern approaches toSurigao Strait detected and reportedthe approach of the enemys southernforce, the one that had been batteredbut not deterred. The PTs reportedth at two of their torpedoes had prob-ably struck as many ships, but stillthe enemy came on. Three hour s later,United States destroyers on picketduty in the strait discovered the Jap-anese coming through in two columns,making about 20 knots. The destroyersattacked, and almost simultaneouslythe battleships and cruisers stationeda t th e mouth of the strait opened fire.The enemy was caught in narrowwaters, and caught in the fire, too, offive battleships he had accounted aslost in the sneak attack on PearlHarbor-the W es t Virginaa, Ma/ryland,Tennessee, California and Pennsyl-vania, all modernized and more power-fu l than ever.

The Japanese columns slowed inde-cisively t o 12 knots, and then, as shellafter shell from the American vesselsfound their marks, the enemy tried toreverse course and escape. Of the twobattleships, two heavy cruisers andtwo light, and 10 destroyers, all weresunk except one battleship, one or twocruisers, and perhaps half the destroy-ers. The next day our aviators dis-


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Official U. S. Navy photographAFTER T H E BATTLE: Friedly Filipinos help PT search fo r survivorsof .lap warships destroyed by 7t h Fleet force in Surigao Strait.covered the battleship and a fugitivecruiser, badly crippled, and finishedthem off.Our losses in the entire action wereone PT boat sunk and one destroyerdamaged.

While the southern prong of theJapanese attack was being obliteratedby surface action, the northernmosthad been located from the air duringthe night-and it promptly swungfrom a southeasterly course t o anortherly one. Hot pursuit resultedin a new contact early in the morningof the 25th. The Japanese carrier shad few lanes on their decks-theyhad sent tIe ir aircr aft out against ourships the day before, and the planesapparently had to refuel on Luzon be-fore returning to their mother ships.Indeed, the Japanese airplanes camein to rejoin their carriers while theUnited States bombers and torpedoplanes were sending three of the fourships to the bottom and making thedeck of t he fourth no fit landing placefor anything. Twenty-one of the hom-ing Japanese airplanes were inter-cepted and destroyed by the fightercover of the United States forces.Not only did the aerial assault sinkthr ee of the four carr iers and damagethe fourth, but two of the Japanesedestroyers were sent down. The enemyforce turned and made their way to-ward Japan, with iome of our shipscrowding on all steam to catch them-the remainder of the 3d Fleet uni tsturned south at ful l speed fo r a reasonabout to be made clear. Our cruisersand destroyers quickly overtook thesurviving but crippled Japanese car-rier and sent it down without effort.During the night one of our submar-ines intercepted a damaged cruiser andfinished it off with torpedoes.What had caused Admiral Halseyto divert part of his force southwardwas the report that a group of ourescort carriers operating in support ofthe landings on Leyte w a s beingthreatened by superior enemy forces.The antisubmarine p a t r o l of this

group of six escort carrie rs and sevendestroyers and destroyer escorts haddetected in Wednesdays dawn an ap-proaching Japanese force of four bat-tleships, seven cruisers and nine de-stroyers. These were apparently thesurviving elements of the enemy taskforce which had been attacked fromthe air in the Sibuyan Sea and forcedto flee westward. Durinn the ninhtthe group had traversed San Bernk-din0 Strait.T h e escort carriers,. silhouettedagainst the dawn, came under heavyfire from the Japanese force which, inthe western gloom and with the Philip-pine hills providing further conceal-ment, possessed every advantage ofposition and firing power. The car-riers, converted merchantmen, headedoff to th e eastward into the ea st windat the top of their limited speed,launching airc raft t o attack the enemy.But the enemys superior speed andgun power swiftly told. The Japanesecontinued to close in, hauling aroundt o the northward and forcing this car-rier group to head southward, undercontinuous fire from the enemys 16-,14- nd 8-inch shells. Japanese marks-manship was poor, and American sea-

manship excellent, however, a n dalthough frequently straddled, o u rships were not heavily hit during th efirst part of the engagement. By 0900,though, despite a sustained air attackon the enemy and the best efforts ofthe destroyer support with smokescreens and forays against the Japan-ese, the carriers began to take con-siderable punishment. One of themwas sunk. Two destroyers and a de-stroyer escort w h i c h courageouslycharged the Japanese battleships wentdown under the enemys heavy shells.Nevertheless, the Japanese paid a n ex-horbitant price for their success, suchas it was. Two of their heavy cruiserswere sunk, and one;-perhaps two-of their destroyers went down underthe concentrated counter-attack fromsurface and air.

Still the enemy pressed his advan-

tage, and by 0920 the carrier grouphad been jockeyed into a situation withthe Japanese, only 12,000 yards dis-tant, and in position for the kill.Then, suddenly, the enemy shipshauled away, gradually widening thedistance, and t o the astonishment ofthe battered American forces, brokeoff he battle with a final and harm-less spread of torpedoes before steam-ihg over the northern horizon at highspeed, trailing oil from pierced hullsas they fled.What had happened can be recon-structed from the events already re-viewed. The Japanese admiral, with acostly local victory in sight, receivedword of the destruction of the south-ern force in Surigao Strait and theutter rout of the northern force withthe destruction of its carriers. He hadto get back through San BernardinoStrait, o r face annihilation.Further, though the Jap may nothave known it, we had a battleshipand cruise r force-a pa rt of the 7thFleet-in Leyte Gulf for the purposeof protecting the tr anspor ts and land-ing craft from any enemy force at-

tempting to destroy them. This wasthe force which so completely defeatedthe Japanese southern force beforedaylight in the southern part of LeyteGulf, a 1 m o s t annih ila ting i t a n dwhich was still available-almost un-scathed-to prevent the entrance ofthe central force.The vanguard of the returning 3dFleet units caught one stra ggling en-emy destroyer before it reached thestrait and sank it. Early the next dayair groups from our carriers rangedover the Sibuyan Sea and continuedattacks on t h e fugitives, probablysinking one heavy cruiser and a lightcruiser.Back at the scene of the attack onthe carriers, the Japanese continuedto harass the American ships withland-based planes, resulting in thesinking of a second of th e CVEs, butthe Second Battle of the Philippineswas over and decisively won. The en-emy fleet had sustained losses anddamage which materially weakenedtheir over-all naval and air strengthagainst the final drive of the UnitedStates forces against t he Empire.We must not, however, allow our-selves to feel that this victory effec-tively prevented any reinforcement ofthe Jap forces on Leyte and Samar,because he can still, by the very natureof the geography of the islands whichafford protection and hiding places forshort, fast transportation runs, con-tinued his reinforcements a t an in-creasingly diminishing rate. He cannot,however, prevent our own reinforce-ment and supply of General Mac-Arthur and his gallant troops. Ournaval and air forces will continue toinsure the control of these sea ap-proaches to the Philippines and theeffective support and supply of ourtroops.

The 3d Fleet was under commandof Admiral William F. Halsey Jr.,USN, during the operations, and the7th Fleet was under command of ViceAdmiral Thomas C. Kinkaid, USN.

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The following article i s from acombat report recorded on soundfilm hy the Officeof Naval Recordsand Library, as related by a navalofficer stationed in Hankow, China,a f e w days before the Ja p attackson Pearl Harbor and the Phi&-pznes. Today its our side that issmashing its way through thePhilippines; heres what it was likewhen the tide was running theother way.BOUT the 27th of November,A 1941, we left Hankow t o comedown the Yangtze river in a gunboat.None of us had the foggiest idea whatthe situation was up there, but weknew it was pre tty serious. We hadabout six different kinds of blow upship bills, burning ship in shallowwater, destroying ship in deepwater, and burning ship whenbeached o r when alongside a dock.But on the 27th, we got word toliquidate the go-down up there, theNavy stores and so forth, and beat iton down to Shanghai.At 1100 on the day we picked out tosail we sent word up to the Japanese,as it was the usual custom there towarn them we were leaving, and toldthem we were going to sail at 1300.So a t about 1255, down the beach a tfull speed comes a Japanese four-striper with a sword about five feetlong. He hopped on board.Nothing doing, my friend, sayshe in Japanese. You cant leave unlessyou have an escort. We can probablyarrange it in a week, 10 days at least.

We knew in 10 days it would be tooda rn late. The captain told the Jap ,Unless you want to ride this gunboatdown to Shanghai, youd bet ter easeoff on the beach here, because we aregoing to shove o f f in five minutes.The Jap changed his tune rightaway. He apparently had two or threeplans ready, for he said Well, if youjust give me a boat to get back t o mygunboat here, Ill get under way rightaway and Ill escort you down there.Youve got to have an escort becauseyou dont know what the Chinese willdo. There might be mines and al l sortsof terrible things.We gave him the boat and, by golly,they were under way about 10 minutesafter we were.So there we went, a Ja p sloop aheadof us, and the next the uss Wake andnext the Jap gunboat.About two nights down we invitedthe Japs over for the movies. W ecouldnt travel on the Yangtze at night,so we anchored and the skipper wentover and in the midst of the blackoutthere on both ships, invited the Japsover for the movies. They came, aboutnine of them, and their skipper wasjust absolutely a caricature of a Jap ;you know the kind, with teeth that

stick out and what hair he had lefthad been worked over with a clipperlike a poodle in the summer.When we got down to Shanghai,there were the other two gunboats, theLuxon and the Oahu , all boarded up-their awnings furled and the doors


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AFTER T H E B O M B l N G of Cauite, the Lanikai on the Canopus wished them luck, but said, ForGods sake, dont be a fool and sail off in that crate.Youd better stay here where youll be safe?headed for Soerabaja, first picking up some fuel oilfor her diesel from the sub tender Canopus, Friendsboats in a minesweepers motorboat.I was sent out to patrol the mouthof the bay. Id sail back and forthall day and I was supposed to reportif I saw a periscope. Needless to say,none ever showed up. Th at went onfor about three o r four days and thenI went into Manila. Got word to pickup the staff and carry them over toMariveles. This was in the midst ofan air raid about every two o r threehours, I guess-the Japs had completecontrol of the sky and were tryingto get the merchant ships that werestill in the harbor there. These wereslipping out each night, two or threeat a time.I went over alongside Pier ,I andthey were evacuating the typewriters,files and other paraphernalia thatfinally got sunk on the Pecos.The Admiral (Admiral Hart) haddecided to g o down south and directthings from Soerabaja. It was decidedthat the Lanikui would take some ofhis staff, including the flag lieuten-ant.Then, with a few other newcomers,off we all went t o Mariveles aboutthree miles away and picked up whatchow we could.Over at Mariveles everything wasin the same sort of confusion that wefound in Cavite-sort of orderly dis-order. The 4th Marines had just comein and there was stuff all over theplace. You could have anything youwanted-a machine gun, a little push-cart, a bag of rice, anything tha t youhad strength to carry off.Page 8 I

Amongst the ruins we found about15 or 20 10-gallon cans of green paintwhich we grabbed. Out in the bay wepicked up three o r four barrels ofgasoline floating around, that had beenon some torpedoed o r bombed ship. Wespent the rest of the afternoon fran-tically swabbing the green paint onthis white yacht with swabs o r any-thing else that we could lay hands on.O u r final guess was to go overalongside the Canopus and beg, bor-row or steal some fuel oil for ourdiesel. They didnt want t o give usany bu t we finally got a barrel or twoout of them.Everybody was waving at us, wish-ing us their very best and saying (ForGods sake dont be an utter fool andsail off in that crate. Youd betterst ay here whery, youll be safe. Stayon the Canopus.We g o t away about 2000 that night,the Peaw and ourselves, the last twosurface ships, I believe, that go t away.At that time we had myself, the skip-per, the four passengers, about 15 Fili-pinos in the crew and about 50,000 ofthe biggest cockroaches in the Philip-pines. I never saw such things. Wedidnt have any rats (which causedsome concern to some of the famishedpassengers, by the way) but we hadcockroaches to make up fo r it. Weused t o catch them in buckets. Pu tcorn meal in half a bucket of water,and the cockroaches would hop in,thinking it was a bucket of cornmeal.By morning the thing would be filledwith cockroaches.

We made it down to Makassar inabout two weeks, Wed sail dur ing thenight. Wed make our plans well inadvance so that around sunrise wedbe off what appeared on the ch ar t tobe a fairly good cove th at we could ge tinto and hole up du ring the day. Wedgo right alongside the beach if wecould. The firs t official move, ofcourse, would be to t r y to contact someFilipinos, all of whom beat it to thehills the first time they saw us be-cause they thought we were Japs . Wewere never able to do any more thanchicken trading with the men.The Japs flew over us every otherday o r so , but if they ever saw us theyprobably thought we were harmless.Fortunately we had the foulest sort ofweather going across the Sulu Sea,three days out in the open, and as wewere going by Jolo, we went by atnight. There was a l o t of activityover there, searchlights and a littlebooming. We discovered later th at itwas a Jap battleship and a couple ofdestroyers and wha t not bombardingJ o l o and about t o go ashore.Meanwhile, all this time fromManila we hadnt seen a sogl whocould give us any info on the war.We still were listening with our littletwo-bit radio that we picked up inManila. The radio we were supposedto use had never given a squeak cqm-ing o r going. We never g o t anythingout of that.We got down t o the first port on theCelebes, and our Dutchman wentashore and made peace with the


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natives, telling them who we were.The natives were very keen that weshould go over to a telephone about,20 miles from there. They said it wasa very short ride on the bike, andwould only take us a da y or two.After swapping a few chickens andgetting some coconuts, we went ondown t o the next port, where we weremet by a Dutch gunboat. The skipperw a s out on the bridge and wanted toknow who we were. Were we Ja p-anese or were we on their side?We roused the Dutch naval officerwe had aboard and he ave the newsacross to the gunboat, w%ich was thenwithin easy range of ou r powerfulthree-pounder. He convinced them wewere okay and that we were friendly.We got into port and over came theDutchman t o congratulate us on howwell one of our officers spoke Dutch;he could almost be taken fo r a Dutch-man.Then he said, LYouknow, we gotthe most peculiar telephone call fromSabang up the way here. They saida Japanese ship had just come in andhad two or three Germans on board,one of whom spoke fairly good Dutch,and they are on their way down thecoast. They wouldnt come over andtelephone. They were very much re-lieved to learn that we wer6nt thespearhead of the Japanese invasion.We got some charts from these fel-lows to get us through the reefsaround Makassar, and went trailingdown through some of the most beau-tiful coastline Ive ever seen, a millionsmall islands about 40 to 50 feetacross and with palm trees-just thesort of business youd see in DorothyLamours movies.


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MulberriesN these two pages are the first0 photographs released of the Mul-berries-artificial harbo rs prefabri-cated in E n d a n d . t n w d nrrnsis the

SUNKEN SH IP S form one sectorof breakwater for American Mul-berry and provides mooring placefor small craft.

PHOENIX, a concrete blockhousemounting A A guns, i s pushedinto place before being sunk aspltrt of breakwater.

Official U. S. Navy photographsFL o A T ING B R FA YwAT E R ,moored between phoenixes, pro-tects an entralzce to the harbor.


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-. ~Supplies are unloaded at Loebnitz pier and roll ashore ouer pontoon bridgeway tha t fa l ls and r ises wi th t ide .

CAUSEWAY, on e of seueral, slopesd o w n f r o m b ea ch to f loa t ing p ier-head for un l oadin g landin g cra f t ,ST O RM th a t wre c k e d U . S. p o r tbea ts against su lzke .n fre igh tersf o r m i n g p a r t of the breakwater .

WRECKED M u l b e r r y a n d l a n d h gcraft af te r storm. Seabees cleanedup, partly restored port.Page 11


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M A P or PLAYING BOARD i s shown above . Ac tua l size of theboard i s approximately 12 inches by 24 inches to make each blockI /16-inch square. The units or pieces, cu t from round ( do ll) sticks,a re 3/8 of an inch in diame ter, but pieces of oth er sizes and shapescan b e used, so long as the b oard is made big enough to hold them.Countries, colonies and pieces are colored to match names ofcountries: the oceans may be colored blue. Alterna te l ight anddark shadings on the board are only for convenience in counting

and determining diago nal l ines: you pla y on all squares alike, no t asin checkers. l h e longitude and latdud e l ines are similarly forcounting and determining horizontal and vertical l ines, and haveno other significance. The numbers and le tters along the two sidesare to identify moves when the gam e i s played by mail , semaphore,etc. Black squares ar e the block ade points. Stars ind ica te th evarious capital squares. Board sits so that players own colonyi s a t hi s le f t (drawing above i s as seen by Redland player).

Your enemy is likewise free to take overtaction any time he wishes. You continuearmin g until all of your pieces ar e pu t onthe board two at a time (b ut pieces oncedestroyed in action ca n no t be put back on )And, unless the enemy has your coloniaicapital you continue receiving 1 0 tankersof oil hach tur n. (If he has your colonialcapital, you get none and Gust flght onwith you r stored supply (see next page) .if YOU have his. YOU get 20. ) When flnall;all of your pieces have been placed on thkboard, you begin receiving 20 tankers ofoil each tu rn (unless. of co urse. the colo-nial capitals are occupied or the coloniesblockaded).NOTE Because th ere I s a trai nin g periodinvolved, a piece cann ot be moved durin gthe turn in which i t is placed on th e board.

BLITZKRIEGThis is exactly the same as undeclaredwar, except that you must win the warin the very flrst turn in which you takeovert action. ALLIESWhere more than two persons (or twoeeneral staffs) desire to Dlav in the same~ .~~.. ~ ~~ ~ ... ..~.~~~~~~i a me , - - a l i~he participants divide into twosides and then all tak e turn s playing ac-cording to the rules of an y of the variationsabove.- For instance. A and B as Redlandowwose C an d D as Greenland. A wins theincident and plays Arst for RGdland. Cthen plays for Greenland ;B plays for Rkd-l a nd : D plays for Greenland: A plays.again, etc.A and B can tell each other (providedthey speak so their opponents can hear)wh at they hav e in mind, so they wont trvto run the same forces on a swlit s t r a t e m 2but of course the enemy can h ear and--actaccordingly. (Of course, too, th e conversa-tion m ight be propaganda to deceive theen em y) On the other hand if one Allydoes Got know wh at t he othe; is doing hemay (as in Bridge) in effect trumphispartners ace, ruining his strategy.

WAR OF CONQUESTSince wars are not necpssarily foughtnnlv f n r revenee. b ut sometimes fo r simDlespoi1s,-any Ofturned into aL .the variation s above may-bewar of conquest by applyingthe following p-int system, with th e playeraccumulating the most points during a

period of play being the w inne r and receiv-ing whatever prize is provided.The winner of each war receives: P o t n t sFor winning by blitzkrieg, or win-ning s declared war in 5 tu rnsor less . . . . . . . . . . .. .. 1,000For winning an undeclared wa rbefore all the pieces are placedon the board or winning a de-clared wa r infrom 6 to 1 0 turns. 500For winning in an y other wa y. . . 200F o r each unit left on the board. . 2 0Fo r each tan ker of oil unexpended 1For each unit left on the board.. 2 0Fo r each tanke r of oil unexpended 1

The loser of each war receives:

THE BASIC RULESWhile the rules which follow mayseem long and complicated, actuallyyou will find them fairly simple onceyou see that they are devised to givethe pieces the same capabilities andlimitations as the comparable units inactual war-and also to take into con-sideration the time factor involved.Since speed, distance and mobility ar ecalculable factors in war, there is asimi lar element here: by the rules,Army and Navy units cannot changecourse dur ing one move. And sinceplanes cannot fly indefinitely, therules provide a maximum flying rangefor Air units. You will find you arefighting a war by the same generalrules that govern real wars-rulesyou more or less already know.

TO MOVE YOUR UNITSIt costs one tan ker to. move any onepiece one square. Pieces move as follows:ARMY nits can move as many squaresas desired (if you have enough oil) any-where on land. in any one straight line inan y direction, including the diagonal. Theycanno t change directions in the sa me moye.NAVY nits move exactly as arm y units.except thnt they move a t sea.AIR units move either 2 4 6 8 o r 1 0squares. (This. is to repreien t the limita-

tions of aircraft-weather need for air-strips, etc., and flying range:) Unlik e Arm yand Navy units, Air units can change direc-tionin flight as desired, so long as theymake such changes on the even square-they cannot turn on the 3rd or 5th square,etc. Air un its mu st come to rest on land,or on ships at sea (thus becoming aircraftca rr ie r s4 ee nez t page) . I f an air unitlands on wat er otherwise, it is lost. Airunits cannot land on the blockade bases.NOTE In addition to these r egula r flights,Air units may be crated by moving o c esquare in an y direction. (This puts the Airvnit in a different range: a target whichwas inaccessible because it was 5 squaresaway is now 4 squares away and thuswithin range.) Howeyer, a n pl r unit can-not engage in any flight during the samed a y it is crated nor can it crate ontoa n enemy-occupied square.TO T A K E E N E M Y UNITSYour Army or Navy unit simply movesonto the sq uare occupied by t he enemyunit, and the enemy unit is taken fro m theboard. Your unit must stop in th at squareand cannot be moved again until anotherdav (other units mav still be moved thatsam e day, of course); Your Air unit can bomb an enemy unitou t of existence and fly on-but th e enemyun it must be in the even square (2nd. 4th,etc.). Air units can also destroy by landin gon the square occupied by the enemy unitbut they cannot take off again until an-othe r turn. However, if an A ir unit chooses(and if it can do i t within its flying rangeand oil supply) i t may make a suicidedive to destroy 2 enemy units-by bomb-ing one enemy unit and then flying onto destroy a second unit. If it does this,the two enemy units and the silicide Airunit a re aZZ removed f rom th e board. Airunits need not necessarily return to origi-nal bases. They can fly from land to ship,or ship to land (if th ey have the range).If they do not have range enough to flvto safety, they suffer th e consequences ofenemy atta ck or loss at sea, as the casemay be.UNITS ON THE SAME SQUAREAir units can ffy over any units on theboard, but Army or Navy units cannotmove through anoth er unit in thei r course.You cannot drive your Arm y into the sea,or fly Air u nits i nto the sea, etc., simply


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to get them out of t he way. The jam-upis konsidered a problem of snarled move-ment, etc. Excep t for pieces placed on topOf others to form a new type of unit ( thisis explained below) no two units camOCCUPY the same square.BAllLING FOR RESOURCESAlthough you normally re c p ed 2 0 tank-krs of oil during each day this amoun tmay be more or less depenbing upon whocontrols the coionies and blockade points.If, at the bedinnlng of your turn, you havean Army un lt in the capltal of the enemyscolony YOU receive 10 ext ra tank ers of oilfor th& turn (and for every turn in whichYour Army unit remains there) on the pre-sumption th at you are getti ng tha t colonysproduction. If, at the beginning of yourturn, the enemy has an Army unit in thecapital of your colony, you receive 1 0 tank-ers less during that turn and every turnin which the Army un it remains there. IfYou control each others colonv in t ha t man-ner it balances out-you ge t 1 0 extra and10s; 1 0 so tha t you get your usual 20. Ifthe enhmy has a Nav y unit in either ofthe blockade Doints off-your colonv at thest ar t of yourturn you-lose 5 tafikers ofoil for each turn it SQ remains. If he hasboth blockade points, you lose 10 . (Ofcourse if he ha s both points an d th e col-onys capital as well, the war is over.)However, while the blockaded belligerentloses tankers, the one who is doing theblockading does not get any extr? tankersas a result :a blockade deprives the enemyof supplies bu t does not give supplies tothe blockader.MAKING CARRIERS, AMPHIBIOUS UNITSAND TRANSPORISArmy un its may be moved over water b ybeing placed on Nav y units-and they thuscan be utilized either as amphibious unitsor troop transports. To get them on theNavv unit mu st be touchine shore. an6 theArmy un it then moves on k he same wayit would move if t he Na vy unit squarewere land. The Nav y unit must also betouching land fo r the Army un it to g et off.Army units can be loaded aboard Airunits for par atr oo p opcr;Ltions. However,Ai r units serving as paratroo p transports inthis way cannot serve as bombers a t thesa me time (i. e.. they can not destroy enemyunits and fl$ away,.- A paratroo p unit ma t.however, land on an y un it ( or double uni t)asho re and destroy it. In such a move, theArmy unit cannot move off during thatturn it being presumed that the Armyunitparticipated in t he takin g of th e pieceand has thus already moved. If the para-trooD unit lands in an UnOCCUDied sauar e.th e -Army unit ma y move off in accord:ance with note ( 4 ) just below.Air units can be placed on Navy un itsby flight or by crating t o make aircraftcarriers. However. corrzer-based Az r unztshave a total flying-rauge of only squaresinstead o 1 0 . If your Air unit takes offfrom a d i p and cannot bomb and e i therfly on to i a nd or re turn- to the carr ie rwithin th e 4 squ ares of flight ( 2 going and2 returning), it crashes into the sea andIs lost. If an aircraft carrier unit takesanother Navy unit by moving onto itssquare th e Air unit cannot move off itsN av y h i t d u ri ng t h a t turn.NOTE: (1 ) A uni t can carry only oneother unit at a time.(2) When the 2 units are moved together,two tankers of oil are expended fo r eachsquare moved.( 3 ) When a double un it is destroyed byenemy action, the whole double unit isremoved.(4 ) T he unit which is being carried isnot considered to have moved just becausethe carrier ha s moved. If it moves onto th ecarrier in one turn. it cannot move offuntil a la te r turn-but if it wa s on thecarrier when the day started, even thoughboth pieces are moved together, the toppiece can then still be moved off duringthe same day.( 5 ) When the bottom piece is movedand stops to le t the top piece move off, thebottom piece cannot move again th at day.. SHORE DEFENSES AND OFFSHOREBOMBARDMENTSIf an enemy Navy unit touches againstthe shire , your Army unit can destroy itIf i t i s in a str aig ht 1in.e wit h it , by movingto the shore and expending an additionaltan ker of oil for the bombardment. Sim-ilarly, a Nav y u nit can knock o ut a n A-Yunit touching the shore (and thus consid-ered sho re installations) by moving to theshore and expending an additional tankerof oil fo r th e bombardment-again if it isin a s traight line with the shore d i t . .Page 24

NEUTRALIAS ROLEThe th ree little countries between th e twnbelligerent countries unhappily &&-aih ewhim of. th e two big enemies but t hey m aih-tain thei r neutrality if possible. Thev havestanding armies. which S C P V P as a inr t of- -. _ _Maginof line between the belligerents. Ifa belligerent piece enters within the boun-daries of one of tine neutral countries. thatcountry s Army piece ma y be moved tointern th e invading piece (th at is to say.

the other belligerent must play for theneutral country and use his own oil tomove the neutral piece to take the enemypiece off the board). But if a belligerentpiece moves into a neutral country to cap-tu re or destroy one of the n eutral units,the remaining units (if any ) of t hat par-ticular country [NOTE: Not ALL threecountries-just the one] join wit h theforces of t he non-aggressor belligerent andar e henceforth allies and used by th ebelligerent as he sees At .

Two Sam ple S trateg ies [or B at tle Plans1SITZKRI EG

-This is the simplest to execute. Itsobjective is to move into the enemycapita l and win b y invasion in one stroke.Against an unsuspecting enemy, it canwork beautifully. On the flrst dav:

. I . , , . I . , , nCost : 2 tankers of oii ; you store up 18.On your next day:

. , . , .Thatco sts you 1 6 tankkrs. You have 40tankers left, enough to move your Armyunits into the enemy capital. thus:

And the war is over!

This effectively stops you temporarizy,because your Air units when they knockout the neutral army bannot then go onand bomb out his A;my uni ts to o (theyare three squares away not two andthu s out of bombing rank e). Andwhenyour Army units go down toward his

capital, they must take his Army unitswhich stops them there rather than let-ting them go on to the capital. Oncethey ar e stopped he can t ake Your Armyunits with otheg un it s of his, and thebattle is on.Or, while YOU are busy with your sitz-krieg strategy he might be executing astrategy of his awn which might forceYou t o modify yours Simply to counterhi s theat.OVERSEAS INVASIONHe re is the second basic plan. First:

That costs you 1 t a nke r ; you save 1 9On your second move:

As your third day starts you have 2 0tankers more. o r a total bf 39. It costsyou 2 0 to fly your paratroop unit to theenemy colony and one more to move theArm y unit off onto the capital. Wit h 1 8left, you can move the Navy unit far-thest out UP to the most distant blockadepoint, and then move the other Navyunit on the diagonal up to the o ther

it would be impossible for your invadingNavy to steam up to the top blockadepoint. You would have to stop to taketh at Navy unit, which would be lyingin its course. Meanwhlle the derensecould bring up other reinforcements a ndth e battle wouId be on. But if the defensedid not steam his fleet up and move itout on the very f irst move t her e wouldbe no way to stop your attkck.These ar e the two classic strategies. Inbetween and in combination there arecountless other variations. Stran ge sur -prises can result. For th is is war!


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A L L I E DTERRITORYJA P- HE 0

15 NOV. 1944

age 16


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February our air patrols reported thatvirtually all Jap warships had fledRabaul.Alterations were made through theSpring on other enemy targets, fromSatawan and Ponape in the Carolinesto Paramushiru in the Kurils, and onMarcus and Wake. Late in March, ina three-day visit to Palau, Woleai andYaq Task Force 58 made a cleansweep: every ship anchored there sunkor damaged. A few days later Ad-miral King reported that 2,000,000tons of Jap shipping had been de-stroyed since the start of hostilities.By early April American sovereign-ty had been established over all butfour of the numerous Marshall atolls,and Navy civil affairs officers hadmoved in to govern our first con-quests. The springboard, having sup-ported many small jumps, was readyfor a big one.Leap Year

On 14 June our forces took theirthird and most daring leap of theLanding plumb in the enemysackyard, they invaded the Marianas,a 1300-mile advance from Kwajalein.Forced to fight by this invasion ofa key defense only 1,250 miles fromthe Jap mainland, the Japanese fleetat last came out of hiding to exchangelong-range air blows with the Navy.I n a two-day running battle, the Japswere routed and fled into the nightafter suffering a crippling defeat ,i nwhich they had two carriers sunk,four others damaged, and a battleshipand two cruisers damaged. In addi-tion, 402 of their planes were shotdown in a single day, a record carnagestill known among Pacific airmen asthe Marianas turkey shoot.Saipan fell on 8 July, Tinian on 1August. By 9 August, Jap resistanceon Guam was at an end, and the firstU. S. territory taken by the Japs hadcome back under the American flag.From the Marianas, our warshipsand planes battered the Bonin andVolcano Islands, little over 500 milesfrom Japan. Smashing raids on thePalaus and Philippines followed, withAdmiral Halseys 3d Fleet carryingout the first seaborne attack on thePhilippines as h is planes sank or dam-aged 89 ships, destroyed 68 planes,five airfields, and, in onespectacular blow, wiped out an entire

52-ship convoy. Two days later the3d Fleet softened up Palau, thenmoved back to the central Philippinesand shot down 156 planes, destroyed277 on the ground, sank 40 more shipsand damaged 43 others.On 14 September our Central Pacificforces invaded the Palau Islands,marines landing on heavily defendedPeleliu and Army troops stcrmingrshore four days later on AngaurIsland. In five months, Jap losses inthe Marianas and Palaus totaled over66,000-63,388 dead and 3,267 cap-tured.With the Marianas and Palausunder control, the s tag e was now setfor the Central Pacific assault to co-incide with another pressing upwardfrom the Southwest Pacific. Objec-tive : he Philippines.Return to the Philippines

If the advance across the CentralPacific looked suspiciously like a dag-ger pointed straight at the heart ofthe Philippines, the advance up fromNew Guinea was a curving scimitaraimed at their belly.Three trip-hammer blows fell inrapid succession. Following a monthof naval and air poundings, the U. S.6th Army landed on Arawe, NewBritain, 10 days before Christmas.On Christmas marines establishedbeachheads on both sides of CapeGloucester. On 1 January Alliedfighters landed behind the Jap linesat Saidor, New Guinea.By 10 February Australian andU. S. troops had sliced through Huonpeninsula, met, and isolated the lastJa ps there. Five days later NewZealand and American troops occu-pied the Green Islands and the north-ern end of the Solomons archipelago.With this, and the neutralization ofbattered Rabaul, General MacArthurannounced the Solomon Islands cam-paign strategically completed.On the last day of February Ameri-cans landed in the Admiralty Islands.Marines had already joined with Armyforces on Cape Gloucester, winningthe entire southern half of New Brit-ain. On 20 March marines landed onEmirau and by 11 April most of NewBritain was ours as the Ja ps fled to alast stand at Rabaul. An estimated100,000 Ja ps were now cut off andfacing almost certain destruction.At Hollandia, big Jap base in New

Guinea, bombers destro~red 288 Japplanes in one week. Following a con-ference between Admiral Nimitz andGeneral MacArthur, a t which plans

AJULY 1940: 1,076 vessels d isplacing 1,875,000 t o n s&J U L Y 1943: 18,421 vesse ls d isp lac ing 4,926,586 tons15 NOV 1 9 4 4 : 56,270 v e s s e l s d i s p l a c i n g 10,486,184 t o n s

c

were completely integrated, amphibi-ous forces and Army troops of theSouthwest Pacific command landed atHollandia and Aitaps on 22 April; sixdays later our plmes were operatingfrom airfields a t both bases.A month later another leap-froglanding carried the Allied forces 125miles further up the coast to pick offthe Japs Wakde Island bomber field.Next jump was to Biak Island, andthe first tank battle in the SouthwestPacific. On 2 July t roops landed onNoemfoor Island, and by the end ofJuly we had seized the coastal areaof Sansapor and two nearby islandsat the western tip of Netherland NewGuinea, 600 miles southeast of thePhilippines.The narrowing miles to the Philip-pines shrunk still further when on 14September, the same day Central Pa-cific forces were invading the Palaus,Southwest Pacific forces swept intoMorotai Island in the Halmaherasgroup, less than 400 miles fremDavao. Four days later it was re-vealed that General MacArthur wouldlead the invasion of the Philippines,with the Navy protecting and sup-porting the campaign.On 19 October the assault came,achieving complete surprise, with the3d and 7th Fleets supporting a land-ing on Leyte, midway between Davaoand Luzon. In the f irst 24 hours 250,-000 troops were reportedlv p~ ashore,more than were landed by the Alliesduring the first day in Normandy.This wa s it-and the Jap fleetfinally came out for a showdown bat-tle (see page 2). In the first greatmeeting of U. S. and Jap fleets, andtheir first surface action, the Japssent two fleets throuKh the Philip-pines toward the beachhead a t Leyte,a third steaming down from Formosa.

They met a stagge ring defeat. AI1three J a p fleets were put t o rout, with24 Jap warships sunk, including twobattleships, four carriers, six heavycruisers and two light ones; 1 3 shipsso severely damaged that they mayhave sunk, and 21 sh im damaged. Oneof the wars most crushing defeats,

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the Second Battle of the Philippinessaw the Japs risk 60 ships, have 58of them sunk o r damaged.The year of battle that had begunwith the attack on the Gilberts woundup with American forces returning, aspromised, to the Philippines-an ad-vance of 3,000 miles from Tarawa,4500 from Pearl Harbor. The nextchapter would be written in 1945.CBl Round-Up ,

Pushed out of India, and back inBurma, the Japs did some pushing oftheir own in China. From bases inChina the 14th AAF had long whit-tled away Japans shipping, sinkingmore than 384,000 tons since 1 Jan.1944, w t h 107,600 tons more prob-ably sunk, 105,700 tons damaged. Buta 14th AAF officer bitterly summedup the sad fact at years end: Fromall of these missions, eight of our ai rbases are missing. Throwing backChinese army forces, the Jap drivethrough China, to provide a land routefor supplies and to clear the coastagainst expected invasion, had forcedthe abandonment of one hard-wonU. S. base after another.From China in mid-year a newweapon brought the war down on theJaps own mainland-far-ranging B-29Superfortresses of the newly formed20th AAF. Half as large again asFlying Fortresses, the B-29s madetheir first raid on Japan on 15 June,giving the Japs their first homelandbombing since General Doolittlesfliers took off from the Hornet in 1942.

The initial raid struck JapansPittsburgh, Yawata, wiping out anestimated 20% of the empires steelcapacity. Lat er raids smashed Sasebo,Choguku, Kyushu and Nagasaki inJapan proper, the Mukden area inMawhuria , Formosa, Rangoon, Palem-bang, Singapore, Sumatra, Nankingand Shanghai. Growing numbers ofB-29s promised new air terror for theJa p in 45.The sinking of the Nazi battleshipTivitx, by RAF fliers with 12,000-tonbombs, freed further British Fleetunit s fo r the Pacific.Navy News of 1944

Sad-blow in the Navys year wasthe death on 28 April of the man whohad led it during its greatest growth-Secretary of th e Navy Frank Knox.Into his place stepped James Forres-tal, who as Under Secretary of t heNavy had supervised its expansionsince 1940. Ralph A. Bard, AssistantSecretary since early 1941, becameUnder Secretary.By 1944s end the U. S. Navy wasa more powerful force than sea powerhad ever known. From its alreadygreat strength in 1940, with 1,076vessels displacing 1,875,000 tons, it hadmushroomed into a giant of 56,000vessels, more tha n 10,000.000 tons. Itsair arm had more than 30,000 planes.Among new Navy ships commis-sioned were the 45,000-ton super-battleships Missouri and Wisconsin,joining their sister ships, the Iowa andNew Jersey, already in action. New2200-ton superdestroyers, of the AllenM . Sumner class, were added to thefleet, as were many new landing ves-sels and rocket-firing landing craft.

Rockets were also used by Navyplanes, against U-boats, other planes,and shore installations, and in Octoberthe Navy announced that it was nowprepared to use jet-assisted take-offsfor carrier planes and flying boats.Navy manpower was up to 3,200,-000, plus Marine Corps and CoastGuard personnel. This was almost 10times its Pearl Harbor size and afurther increase to 3,389,000 in 1945was authorized if needed. It was offi-cially announced that no demobiliza-tion could be expected for the Navybefore the defeat of Japan.Now 28 months old, the Womens

and-dent&f schools, and 1,000 enlistedmen had been chosen from the ranksfor the term which began 1 November1944. No trainees either from theservice or civil life will enter V-12 inthe term starting 1 March 1945.On the War Bond front, the Navyse t new records fo r itself. Almost2,000,000 military allotments for WarBonds were in force at the end ofOctober and 93.8% of the Navys civil-ian personnel were participating viathe payroll savings plan. Total salesfor the Navy were expected to passthe one-billion-dollar mark (1944 salesalone approximated $600,000,000, morethan doubling the 1943 total). About4% of all Series E War Bonds soldduring the w ar have been sold to Navypersonnel, the Treasury estimated.Looking forward to 1945, AdmiralKing estimated t hat the Ja p Navy hadbeen reduced to not more than one-half of its maximum strength afterthe Philippines battle, and that whenthe w ar in Europe releases the power-ful forces engaged there, the greaterpart of them will be brought to bearagainst Japan.In his review of a year of con-tinuous progress and gratifying suc-cess, Admiral Nimitz reported thatWe have cleared out of the way anumber of essential preliminaries totackling the main strength of th eenemy. . . .All opportunities we cancreate o r which present themselveswill be exploited to the utmost to bringthe enemy to decisive defeat at th eearliest possible time.

S E V E N A C T IO N S398I H O W N B E L O W

NEW G U I N E A I 04 I1324 21-26 p r . ) ti

T R U K 85 1 150(29 pr.- IMay) 29

M A R I A N A S B O N I N SV O L C A N O E ~ . PALAU. I~. .a 6Ju n e -7Au o . ) -87PHILIPPINES PALAU.H A L M A H &A SI I t350 j 911YUKYUS. FORMOSA.--UZON( 9 - 1 6 OCt.) = 4


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EUROPE: WE CLOSE ON GElXAIANYO U R third year of participation in thousands of smaller craft appeared captured comrades behind. However,the war in Europe saw the Nazis off the coast of Normandy and thou- thei r heroic stand, together with othe rbattered from all sides, stripped of sands of troops swarmed ashore under airborne landings ahead of ourhuge areas of conquered ter ritory and cover of the greatest sea and ai r ground forces, made possible a moveforced back almost to their own pre- bombardment in the history of war. by the British 2d Army that thr eat -war frontiers in the west and east, O u r warships steamed close inshore ened to outflank the Siegfried Line.where powerful Allied armies got set and dueled with shore batteries. Fi re Behind that fron t the gl-eat Belgianf o r the kill. support for advancing troops was con- port of Antwerp was captured intact,After invading western Europe in tinued fo r miles inland, with naval giving the Allies a deep-water portthe largest amphibious operation in gunfire liaison officers accompanying just a few mles behind the frontall history, the Allies liberated France, the troops to spot targets. Beachhead6 lines. It was opened to shipping earlyBelgium and Luxembourg. Greece also were established and consolidated, and in November when British commandos,was cleared of Germans in 1944, and within two weeks Allied troops were in a costly amphibious operationthree of Hitlers satellites-Rumania, advancing inland on a 116-mile fron t. landed on Walcheren Islann at theFinland and Bulgaria-were knocked Af te r cap tur ing Cherbourg on 26 mouth of the Schelde rive r and wipedout of the war. Large portions of Hol- June, giving the Allies a major port , out stubborn German resistance.land, Italy , Poland, Yugoslavia, Czech- the U. S. 1s t Army launched an offen- Two weeks la te r the Allies openedoslovakia, Albania and Hungary were sive on a 30-mile front and Slowly a full-scale offensive that carried intowreyted from the invaders. pushed the Germans back from the Germany a t several points. The end,driven from the Atlantic, and our con- ish and Canadian troops took Caenvoys continued giving Britain and Rus- af te r a 33-day struggle and by 20 July Invasion of Southern Francesia the flow of food and war materials were punching slowing forward to - A fourth European fr ont had beenso necessary for the mounting offen- , ward Paris , 110 miles away. opened 15 August when an Allieds1ves. Aerial assau lts on German In the meantime, the U. S. 3d Army force of 800 vessels landed troops incities and factories went on unceas- broke out of the beachhead and made Southern France. Heavy aeria l andingly, reducing a considerable portion lightning thrusts across the Bri ttany naval bombardments softened upof the Reich to rubble. peninsula and eastward toward Paris. coastal defenses for two hours beforeOne of the mechanized columns ad- the assau lt. Allied troops encounteredBattle of the Atlantic vanced 52 miles in two days, then surprisingly light resistance. As theyOur success in keeping supply lines swept ahead 42 miles on the t hir d fanned out inland it was found thatopen to Britain made possible the tre- day. Another column turned north about 40% of the defending troopsmendous offensive launched from there and forced the withdrawal of German were Russian, Czech and Polish pris-in June. The turn ing point came last forces which had been blocking expan- oners of war. Invasion forces of t heDecember when eight of a pack of 15 sion of the Normandy beachhead. U. S. 7th Army pushed ahead 35 milesU-boats were sunk in a n eight-day As the 3d Armys onrushing col- during the first three days, effectedrunn ing fight. umns neared Paris, French patriots a junction with the 3d Army on 11On 26 December the German pocket- arose from the underground on 23 September and began bat ter ingbattleship Schurnhorst engaged an August and, aided by the arrival of through the Belfort Gap gateway toAllied convoy bound for Russia and Allied troops, liberated the city. Germany. By 20 November its team-was sent t o the bottom by British war- As the Germans fell back behind mate, the French 1st Army, hadships, led by the powerful D u k e of the Siegfried Line, pursued by t he reached the upper Rhine.York. During the same9week three U . S. 3d and 1st Armies, the British The falianFrontNazi destroyers and a blockade run- 2d and Canadian 1s t Armles swungner were sunk in the Bay of Biscay. northeast through France and into A year ago the Italian campai@The death blow was administered on Belgium and Holland. was bogged down below Cassino by12 November t o th e ! f irpi tz , Germanys Aachen, a city of 160,000, was the winter rains, mountainous terrain andlast battleship, by a force of 29 RAF first large German city to be Cap- stubborn German resistance. Then, inLancasters. Three direct hits by tured. It was blasted to rubble and an operation on 22 Janu-special armor-piercing six-ton bombs then occupied by the U. s. 1st Army ary, u. s* orces seized a beachheadsank the pride of the German navy in after the defenders had spurned a behind the front at Ami0 and PushedTromsoe Fjord in northern Norway. surrender ultimatum on 20 October. within 20 miles of Rome. The Ger-In February it was announced that The Allies suffered a reverse at Am- mans counterattacked and for severalU.S. and Brazilian forces had bagged hem, in Holland, where survivors of days the situation was tense and seri-18 U-boats in the South Atlantic. an initial force of 6,000 airborne OUs. When efforts to ta ke CassinoFive British sloops on escort duty ac- troops were forced to fall back. leav- failed, the inhabitants were warnedcounted f or six U-boats in 20 days ing 1,200 wounded and 2,800 killed or t o leave and the city was leveleti withduring March, and the greatest con- 3,500 tons of bombs and 85,000 artil-voy in history arrived safely in Eng- lery projectiles on 1 5 March. But stillland with vast stores and troops for the Germans there held out. Twothe for thcoming invasion. The success months later, to break the stalemate,of the Allied battle against subs was the U. S. 5th Army launched its big-hdicated by an announcement on 10 gest offensive on 18 May, capturedMag that 1,250,000 tons of wa r equip- Cassino and soon had the Germans inment had been convoyed to Russia in broken retreat toward Rome.the previous six months with only 2%lost by sinkings.Ship losses continued to declineuntil, in Ju ly, a joint Anglo-Americanstatement revealed that U-boats were campaign. The Germans retreated sonow the hunted instead of the hunt- rapidly that the 5th Army had diffi-ers. It reported that more than 500 culty keeping in contact. It was esti-U-boats had been sunk since the war mated that the Germans lost 70,000started, 17 of these a fte r D day while men, about 60% of their troops inattempting t o interfere with cross- Italy , in 24 days. Meanwhile, a FrenchChannel traffic. arm y captured the island of Elba.O n 19 July Leghorn, the greatItalian port and naval base, fell toAfter months of preparat ion, the advancing Allied troops. The Ger-long-awaited western fr on t in Europe mans abandoned Florence and fellwas opened on 6 June when an in- back to the Gothic Line, north of thevasion armada of 4,000 ships and 1941 f i g w e is fo r December oaly. Arno river. Rimini was taken by the

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German U-boats were virtually base of the Cherbourg Peninsula. Brit- if not at hand, was in sight.

The W est ern FronS


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British 8th Army in October, whilethe 5th Army neared Bologna in anadvance slowed by rains and ruggedterrain.U. S. and British cruisers and de-stroyers supported ground troops inthe campaign with almost daily bom-bardments of military objectivesalong the coast.Late in September-British amphibi-ous forces landed in Albania andGreece, meeting little resistance as theGermans fled northward. Corinth andAthens were liberated without a fight,and the last Germans pulled out ofGreece on 2 November. Yugoslav Par-tisans cleared much of the Dalmatiancoast, and Albanian partisans freedtheir capital city, Tirana.The Eastern Fron t

The third Russian winter offensivewa s launched on 6 January as the RedArmy drove 10 miles into pre-warPoland. Germans made such a hur-ried retreat that dinners were foundhot on barracks stoves. The two-and-a-half year siege of Leningrad waslifted on 21 January and the RedArmy crossed into Estonia two weekslater . Another offensive took KrivoiRog after four months of fightingand the Ukranian army swept intoBessarabia.

The Russians were still rolling for-ward in April. They recapturedOdessa, drove into the Crimea andlaid siege to Sevastapol, and advancedinto Rumania. Sevastapol fell on 9May.In June the Red Army opened th eoffensive th at took Finland out of t hewar. It crashed through Finnish de-fenses on the Karelian Isthmus and

advanced 1 5 miles the firs t day. Driv-ing 60 miles up the isthmus, the Rus-sians captured Viipuri.A renewed Russian offensive, co-ordinated with th e invasion of France,opened on 23 June. In four days theyhad librated, 1,700 places and werewithin 34 miles of the old Polish bor-der in the north. In 22 days one RedArmy had advanced 265 miles, anaverage of 12 miles a day, andreached the 1941 Soviet-German bor-der on 19 July. Another army pushedto the Baltic Sea west of Riga, en-circling an estimated 375,000 Germansin Latvia and Estonia.Early in August, after advancing440 miles toward Berlin in 52 days,the Red Armies on the central frontslowly came to a stop at the borderof Ea st Prussia a nd the gates of War-saw. However, other Russians wereoccupying Rumania and Bulgaria andmoving into Yugoslavia, where theyjoined forces with the Yugoslav Par-tisans. By ear ly September, Rumania ,Bulgaria and Finland had asked foror arranged armistice terms. Rigawas captured in October, freeing twoSoviet armies for the drive into EastPrussia. Far t o the north, a Redarmy took Petsamo and was helping

the Finns clear their country of re-maining German troops.As the western Allies opened theirbig drive into Germany in November,Russian troops hammered a t the gatesof Budapest.

The (Aerial FrontA year ago this month Berlin wasbeing razed from the air. The de-molition began in earnest on 22 No-vember when Allied heavy bombersdropped 2,300 tons of explosives on theNazi capital and left it a se a offlames. Fo r five days the destructioncontinued on a nightly schedule, asmillions of civilians were evacuatedfrom the city. Bremen, the Ru hr andEmden also took an incessant blast-

ing.By early December it was estimatedthat one-third of Berlin was in ruins.On 24 December some 3,000 Alliedplanes smashed at gun emplacementsalong the invasion coast and Berlinwas pounded again. A record of 11,-00 0 tons of bombs were dumped onEuropean targets during December.On 20 February 2,000 U. S. bombersand escorting fighters raided eightGerman plane production centers andknocked out an estimated one-fourthof Nazi fighter plane output. Newsix-ton factory buster bombs wereused for the first time in March, andshuttle bombing was started betweenItaly and England.The ai r assault on the Reich reachednew intensity during April and forcedthe Nazi to utilize the greater por-tion of the Luftwaffe for home de-fense. On more than one occasion3,000 Allied planes were put in theair for assaults on Europe. Bombersbased in Ita ly began striking at Buda-pest and Ploesti oil refineries. Shut-tle bombers from Britain and Italyreloaded in Russia and struck againon their way home.In May, Allied air attacks wereshifted from industrial centers towestern defense areas and supplylines feeding them in preparation forthe coming invasion. During thismonth 130,000 tons of bombs weredropped on Europe in 29 days and700 Luftwaffe fighters were shotdown.The aerial assault on Germany con-tinued unabated after the liberationof France. Operating from Frenchairfields, our planes now were able toreach every pa rt of th e Reich; sur-prise raids were possible because thebombers no longer had t o fly overlong stretches of occupied territoryen route to their targets.Ge rman Secret WeaponsHitlers revenge for his reverses onall fronts came in the form of robotbombs (V-1) which began f alling onLondon and vicinity soon after D day.Fired from launching platformsacross the Channel, these one-tonbuzz-bombs wreaked great destruc-tion until counter measures and theliberation of the French coast reducedrobot bomb launchings to isolated ef-forts from planes.

The British revealed in Novemberthat the Germans were using anotherte rr or weapon-rocket bombs (V-2).Launched about 10 0 miles away inGermany, they were fired into thestratosphere and descended at speeds.estimated from 800 to 2,000 miles anhour. Germans also used these rocketbombs against Allied troops and posi-tions in Europe.


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P i c t u r e Highlights from

Dawn of 20 Nov. at TarawaNov.-Dec. 1943 also marked dawn of a yearf crushing offensives against Japs. Marines conqueredisland in 76-hour battle, bloodiest in Corps history ;Armywon Makin. Later, task forces hi t Carolines, Marshalls.

Carrier task forces hit Jap base atFeb. 1944Truk in two-day attack, bagging 23201 planes. Raid, said Admiral Nimitz, was re-turn visit for Jap fleets Pearl Harbor one, 7 Dec. 1941.Partial settlement of debt included this enemy cruiser.

O f f i c i a l U. S. Coast Guard ohotooraoh- .Achieving complete surprise, forces1944 of Gen. MacArthur and Admiraloff Jap 18thn airf ields a t Hollandia and Aitape, 420 milespines. Here LST enters Tanahmerah Bay.24 1


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in 1944.H ere o ne of t h e m bl as ts enem y pos i ti on on Ley t e .Rockets were a l so used om o t her l an d i ng c ra ft ando n N av y aircraft dur img th e past year.

S o p o w e r f u l t h a t in t he l as twar they would have been classed as cruisers, themew 2,200-ton Al l en M . Sumner class of D D s j o in e dt h e f leet t h i s year . T h i s i s f irst pic ture released.

British Official photographT ow ed across t h e C hanne l and set uboff N or m a ndy , pre f abr ica t ed por t ab l eports helpedto ma ke poss ib le t h e l iberat iom b f w es t e rn Europe .


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1 7 : U. S., French troops reach Hitler linein Italy. U. S Chinese troops cap-tu re Myitkyinaairdrome. U. s. orcesinvad e Wakd e. Allied carrier-f orceplanes raid Soerabaja.1 8 : Cassino falls to Allies.1 9 : Large convoy reaches Russia withoutloss of me rch ant ship.2 1 - 2 3 : Land-based Navy planes bombKurils.2 4 : U. S. troops take Torracina, Italy.2 5 :U. S. orces link Anzio beachhead w ithmainfront. Nav y reveals bombersusing rocket guns against U-boats.2 7 : Allies land on B iak Island.2 8 : Army, Navy bombers raid Saipan.2 9 : First tank fight in Southwest Paciflc

30: Chinese isolate J a p garrison atccurs on Biak.Kamaing.JUNE1 - 2 : U. S. troops take Velletri and Val-monone, Italy.2 : Army lands unopposed on Owi andWundi Islands near Biak. Fortress-5s from ltaly raid Balkans, land inHussia.4 : U. S. 5th Army takes Rome.5: U. S. heavies bomb Pas-de-Calais andBoulogne ar ea s of France.6 : Allies invade Normandy following in-tense aerial, warship bombardment.U. S. bombers give Bangkok, Thai-land, worst raid.7: Allied invasion troops in France ex-pand beachhead. take Baveux.Allies in Italy score major- bEeakithro ugh north west of Rome.8 : Allied bombers sink four J a p destrou-er s off B iak.9 : Allies captu re Ste. Mere-Eglise, Fran ce.1 0 : 5th Army captures Tuscania Italy.Red Army opens offensive againstF in1 n d.1 0 - 1 4 : U. ,S. task force attacks Saipan.Tinian, Guam, Rota.1 3 : Germans launch robot bomb att ack onEngland. 5th Army drives 7 0 milesnorth of Rome.1 4 : U. S. forces land on Saipan. Carrierplanes at ta ck Bonin. Volcano Is-

1 5 :1 6 :1 7 :1 8 :

19 :

20 :2 1 :

2 2 :2 3 :

lands.B - 2 9 superfortresses bomb Yawata.Japan. Americans capture Charan -Kanoa Saipan.Chinese kapture Kamaing.Mitchells, Aghter escort dest roy 50 Ja pplanes in raid off Sorong.Yanks cut across Cherbourg penin-sula. Red Army takes Kiovisto.break s Mannerheim line. U. S.Pacific Fleet forces destroy 4 0 2 JapPlanes off Saipan ;we lose 27 planes.U. S. carrier planes sink Jap carrierdamage many w arships, drive off bigJap fleet near Saipan in First Battleof the Phili ppine Sea. U. S. heavybombers hit Nazi robot bases.Red Army take s Viipuri Finland.Yanks in control of all Biak air-fields. Ja ps capture Changsha.Approximately 2 , 2 0 0 U. S. bombers inshuttle raid between England andRussia on Berlin. Allied ta sk forceplanes raid Port Blair in Bay ofBengal.Allied bombers sink six J a p vessels inSorong area.Red Army unleashes offensive againstNazis nea r Vitebsk. U. S. carrierplanes attack Iwo Jima, shoot down1 1 6 J a p planes; w e lose five.

ll Fronts During Our Third War Year2 3 - 2 4 : U. S. heavies bomb Ploesti oil2 4 : Allies break into Mogaung Burma.25 : Allies tak e Follonica ItalG.25-26 : Navy task force d el ls Paramushim.2 5 - 2 8 : Allied planes drop 1 5 3 to ns of bombs2 6 : Yanks take Cherbourg.2 8 : Reds take Mogilev, drive towards2 9 : Two thousand U. S. planes bomb in-dust rial Germany. China-based Lib-

erators bomb Takao , Formosa.3 0 : Danes riot against Nazis in Copen-hagen.

center.

on Yap.Minsk.

JULY2 : Yanks land on Noemfoor Island.2-3: Paciflc Fl eet carrie r force r aidsBonin, Volcanoes.3 : Russians capture Minsk.4 : Reds capture Polotzk British takeUkrul. India. U. S. forces take7 :

8 :9 :1 3 :

13-1

Garap an, capital of Saipan.B - 2 9 s raid Sasebo, Yawata in Japan.Thousand-bomber raid on Germanybrings out heavy fighter opposition-11 5 Nazi fighters sh ot down.Organized resistance ends on Saipan.Caen falls to British, Canadians. U. S.5th Army takes Vqlterra, Italy.Red Army captures Vilna. Navy landplanes bomb Volcanoes. Na vy an -nounces Task Force 58 destroyed7 6 7 Ja p planes, san k or damaged 70ships in months Pacific operations :its loss 1 5 7 planes.. 4 : British: Greek l andi ng force Wipesout Axis garrison on Symi.

Off ic ia l U. S. A r m y S i g n a l Corps photographsAugust: Paris was Liberated.Allied-bombers raid Bula, Geram oilRobot bonlbs strike London af ter flve-center. Red troops tak e Pinsk.nirrht l u l l

1 4 :1 5 :1 6 : British 8th Army takes Arezzo Italy.1 8 : British break through at east end ofNorm andy peninsula. Prem ier Tojoof Jap an is relieved of hi s job.More than 1 , 8 0 0 U. S. planes attackrobot bases.1 9 : Allies take Leghorn, Italy. Reds cross1 9 4 1 Nazi border.2 0 : Americans invade Guam, aft er carrierplanes and warships soften upisland defenses fo r 17 days.2 1 : R A F blasts Nazi convoy off Helgoland.2 3 : Marines land on Tinian. Russiansenter Lublin.2 4 : Allied air patrol planes sink Jap ves-sel within 70 miles of Mindanao.2 4 - 2 5 : U. S. carrier ulanes hit Palaus. Y au

-.-D.. --.I.

. .and Ulithi.2 5 : Allied naval force attacks Sabang.2 6 : Chinese troops retake Leiyang. KedArmy takes Deblin, 35 miles fromWarsaw. Double-size robot bombshit England.on Halmahera.2 7 : Allied planes begin large-scale attacks28 : Russians capture Brest-Litovsk.2 8 - 3 0 : Liberators bomb Truk.2 9 : Red artillerv shells Warsaw suburbs.Yanks tike Coutances. France.

October: Yanks breached Siegfried Lime.AUGUST1 : Russians reach Baltic.2 : American flag raised over Tiniar).2 - 3 : Robot-bomb attack lasts 1 4 hours.3 : Americans take Rennes. Brittany.3-4: U. S. warships, carrier planes batterBonins Volcanoes.4 : Allied patrols enter Florence. U. S..Chinese troops take Myitkyina.7 : Yanks cut off Brittany.8 : Hengyang palls to Japs. B-24s attackShanghai harbor area.8 - 9 : Allied bombers hit J a u airdromes atDavao.9 : U. S. tank s bypass Le Mans. Armybombers use Marianas bases to hitIwo Jima. Nav y reveals Americansare back on Baker Island. east Ofthe Gilberts. Jap resistance ends onGuam.10 : B - 2 9 s bomb Nagasaki, Japan a nd Pal-embang. Sumatra. Russians renewWars aw drive.11: British .reveal carrier planes att ackNorweeian coast1 2 : Allies in control of Florence.1 3 : Allied bombers practically neutral-

ize ~i al ma he rn irdromes.1 5 : Allies land on R ivi era In i nvasio n .OfSouthern France. China-based Lib-erators raid Ja p naval base in Pes-cadores.1 7 : Red Army reaches East Prussian bor-der. J a m uushed out of EasternIndia. RXF-drops 70,000 incendiarybombs on Kiel. Stettin.1 9 - 2 2 : Red Army takes Jassy, 350 otherplaces in Rumania drive.2 0 : B - 2 9 s bomb Yawat a. U. S. troopsclose in on Paris. French troopsenter Toulon.2 1 : Liberators Mitchells bomb Halmah eraand Da;ao.2 2 - 2 3 : Italy-based bombers att ack Vienna.2 3 :Marseille, Grenoble fall to Allies. FF Iannounces Par is is free. Liberatorsmake heaviest raid on Halmahera.24 : Par is ba ttle continues.28 : Yanks reach Marne River. Reds drive10 miles into Transylvania.2 8 - 2 9 : Allied planes str afe, bomb Davao.2 9 : Polish troops take Fano, Italy.30: Red Army takes Ploesti.31: British tak e Amiens, France. RedArmy enters Bucharest.

2 5 : Paris liberated.5 : Paris liberated.28 : Yanks reach Marne River. Reds drive10 miles into Transylvania.2 8 - 2 9 : Allied planes str afe, bomb Davao.2 9 : Polish troops take Fano, Italy.30: Red Army takes Ploesti.31: British tak e Amiens, France. RedArmy enters Bucharest.SEPTEMBER1: U. S. c a rr iw D1nne.s hlast Volcanoes- fo r three days. Bombers-make heav-iest raid on Davao and Palaus.2 : U. S. 1st Army enters Belgium. 5thArmy cautures Pisa. Robot bombsh i t Pa r i sbarges, cargo ships.2 - 4 : Allied planes sink or damage 4 9 J a u3 - 4 : Liberators hit Marcus Island for firsttime.4 : Finns, Russians conclude armistice.British c apture Breda, Holland.

5: Russia declares war on Bulgaria.6 - 1 3 : Navv task force shelln Paiaus.7 : ap s captu re -Ling& China airbase.Allies land at Soepiori Island.8 : Russians enter Bulgaria. 3rd Fleetunits attack ne ar Mindanao. sinkOfficial U. S. A r m y Air Forces photographJutze: B-29s first bombed Jafian. B-29sbom b Anshan, Manchuria.30 : Allies land at Sansapor.3 1 : Yanks take Avranches. France.

3 2 coastal vessels 20 sampans B-2 9 s raid Anshan, Manchuria, Maltslifts blackouts.Page 27


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THE RETIREMENT PAY QUESTIONHeres Straight Dope on the Laws and Regulationson Retirement Pay and Pensions for Naval Personnel

HATS the straight dope on re-w irement?That question, in a variety of forms,is constantly directed at BuPers andMarine Corps and Coast Guard head-quarters-from officers and enlistedpersonnel who have served longenough to anticipate retirement afterthe war, from reservists who a re con-sidering making the regular servicetheir career and from personnel dis-abled in service.The retirement question has thous-ands of answers, depending on indi-vidual service records and other cir-cumstances and upon numerous Fed-eral statut es and Navy, Marine Corpsand Coast Guard regulations affectingretirement. But there are generalstatements which cover most situa-tions, and these are summarized be-low.In general, the Navy and MarineCorps operate under the same retire-ment laws and their retirement regu-lations are the same in most cases.The Coast Guard operates with theNavy only in time of war o r when thePresident so directs, and upon termi-nation of the emergency it is sched-uled to revert to the peacetime juris-diction of the Treasury Department.Coast Guard retirement laws and reg-ulations are not identical with thoseof the Navy and Marine Corps, andCoast Guard retirement procedure ispresented separately in this article.

While the naval retirement systemfunctions along well-defined lines, itshould be remembered that voluntaryretirement is not always a right ofa n officer o r enlisted person. In manyinstances it is discretionary with thePresident.Once retired, an officer or enlistedman remains on the retired list, evenif called back to active duty.Retirement falls into two classes-officer and enlisted. Eac h of these,in turn, may be sub-divided into reg-ular Navy and Naval Reserve o r Ma-rme Corps and Marine Corps Re-serve, as the case may be, and then

into retirement for service o r retire-ment fo r disability. Fo r regularNavy o r Marine Corps enlisted retire-ment, the Fleet Reserve o r Fleet Ma-rine Corps Reserve is an intermediatestage, since a majority of regularNavy and Marine Corps enlisted menpass to the retired list from this Re-serve.Active duty service, as used forpurposes of retirement and disabilitypay, includes generally any combina-tion of regular and reserve service,commissioned, wa rran t o r enlisted.An officer o r enlisted person entitledo retirement f o r service-connectedphysical disabilities may elect to ac-cept retired pay from the Navy o rpension from the veterans Adminis-ration. Retired pay is the same, de-pending upon rank o r rating andlength of service, regardless of natureof disabilty. Pension o r compensa-

tion from the Veterans Administra-tion varies, depending on the natureof the disability.Neither officer nor enlisted person-nel, under existing law, may drawboth retired pay and disabilty pen-sions except that Public Law 314,78th Congress, recently authorizedpersons of the regular Navy drawingretired pay fo r military or naval serv-ice and eligible for pension o r com-pensation from the Veterans Admin-istration to accept the latter if theywaive the equivalent in retired pay.To prevent duplication of payments,the department with which any suchwaiver is filed will notify the Veter-ans Administration of t he receipt ofsuch waiver, the amount waived, andth e effective date of the reduction inretired pay (the individual need takeno action beyond signing the waiver).Under present rulings of theBureau of Int ernal Revenue, retiredpay for service is subject to Federalincome tax whereas retired pay fordisability incurred in the line of dut yand V eterans Administration pensionsar e not.The same laws and regulations f o rservice-connected physical disabilitywhich apply to male officers and en-listed personnel of the Navy, MarineCorps and Coast Guard apply like-wise to officers and enlisted personnelof the womens reserves of these thr eebranches of the armed forces.

Since the womens reserves are butrecently established and temporary,as now set up, there is no provisionfor ret iremen t of womens reserve

personnel for service. This situationprobably would be changed should anyo r all of the womens reserves bemade permanent by subsequent Con-gressional legislation.The Navy Nurse Corps and its ow nreserve operate under se parat e retire-ment laws, administered by the Bu-reau of Medicine and Surgery for allbut final action in each case. Retire-ment prqcedure for this branch of theservice is, like th at of th e CoastGuard, presented separately.COMMISSIONED AND WARRANTOFFICERS OF THE REGULARNAVY AND MARINE CORPS

NDER th e law, commissioned offi-U cers of the Marine Corps are re-tired in like manner and with thesame relative conditions in all re-spects as provided fo r commissionedofficers of th e line of the Navy, a ndcommissioned warrant and warrantofficers of the Marine Corps underthe same conditions provided for sim-ilar officers of the Navy. Althoughthe words regular Navy are usedthroughout, that which follows re-garding retirement of naval officers isapplicable also to officers of corre-sponding grades of the Marine Corps.FOR SERVICE:Upon his own application submitted toSecNav via offlcial channel; a line offlcerof the regular Navy may be retired with2 0 years or more of active commissionedservice. Approval of such applicationsis a discretionary matter with the Presi-dent. Upon approval of the Presidentthe Officer is transferred to the retired

MUSTERING-OUT PAYFor most personnel not covered bythe retirement and disability provi-sions outlined in this article, thereis available upon release to inactiveduty or honorable discharge a sumof money commonly called muster-ing-out pay.The mustering-out pay law ap-

plies to those who leave the serviceon o r after 7 Dec. 1941. The scaleof payments follows:To eligible veterans with less than60 days active service, $100.Those with active service of 60days o r more but no service outsidethe continental limits of the UnitedStates o r in Alaska, $200, payable intwo monthly installments of $100each.Those with active service of 60days or more and with service out-side the continental limits of theUnited States or in Alaska, $300,payable in three equal monthly in-stallments.All personnel with the above serv-ice ar e eligible for the benefits of themustering-out pay law e x c e p t th e fol-lowing :(1) Those who were not dischargedI under honorable conditions.

( 2 ) Those who at the time of dischargeor release from active duty aretransferred or returned to the re-tired list with retired pay or to astatus in which they receice re tire-ment pay.( 3 ) Those discharged or released fromactive duty on their own request toaccept employment who have notserved outside the continental lim-its of the United States or inAlaska.(4 ) Members of the armed forces whosetotal active service has been as astudent detailed fo r training undercertain specialized or college train-ing programs.(5 ) Any member of the armed forcesfor any active service performedprior to date of discharge for thePurpose of entering the U. S. NavalAcademy, the U. S. Coast GuardAcademy.cademy or the U. S. Military( 6 ) Those whose only service has beenas a cadet at the U. S. Coast GuardAcademy or as a midshipman at theU. S. Naval Academy or in a pre-paratory school after nomination asa principal, alternate, or candidatefor admission to any such academy.( 7 ) Any officer, who a t time. of dis-charge or release from active serv-ice, held a grade higher than that ofcaptain in the Marine Corps or lieu-tenant in the Navy or Coast Guardor any captain or lieutenant withover 1 7 years service for pay pur-poses.

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which selected or adjudged fltted, in ac-cordance with section 12(b ) of th e LinePersonnel Act of 2 3 June 1 9 3 8 .When a regular officer is being retired,he is automatically considered for thehono r of being placed on th e retired listat one grade higher if he has been spe-cially commended by SecNav (or the Sec-ret ary of W ar ) for performance of dutyin actual combat.The term specially commended is in-terpr eted strictl y by the Board of Decora-tions, Medals and Awards, and the highergrade is recommended for relatively fewof those who ar e considered. When sucha recommendation is approved by SecNav.the officer is, upon retirement, advancedto the higher rank on the retired list (butwith retired pay based on his ra nk at timeof retirement).FOR DISABILITY:

Corps. whether under a temworam or wer-manen t appointment and commissionedservice on active dut); in the Marine CorpsItescrve and thc Zlatlonal Kava1 Yolun-teers.Upon reaching 6 4 years of age, all reg-ular commissioned officers on the activelist, except those serving in the ranks ofadmiral and vice admiral, are retired bythe President in their current rank at7570 of the active duty pay (in casesbelow th e rank of rea r admiral, 75% ofbase pay and. 75% of longevity) they weredrawing at time of retirement, regar dlessof length of service and wheth er the irrank is permanent or temporary. Officersserving in the rank of admiral or viceadmiral on the active list under tempo-rary appointments or designations be-come subject t o. the 64-year a ge retire-ment aft er reverting to their previous rankupon the termination of their temporaryappointments or upon the termination ofthe duty which resulted in their designa-tions as admiral or vice admiral.The Pay Readjustment Act of 1 9 4 2 pro-vides that the retired wav of a n y officer

Upon liis own application, submittedSecNav v ia offlcial channels, a n officeror staff. includ-commissioned -warran t and warranters may be retired with 30 yearsduty service. Approval of suchis a discretionary matter, Uwon awwroval of the

f less th an 3 0 years.An officer who is retired upon his ow n3 0 years active service75% of t he highest pay ofApproval of an offlcers request for re-4 0 years or more of activeis by law mandatory upone Presiden t. Th is officer! reti red pa y75% of the active duty payhis permanent grade at time of retire-e 75% of base pay and 75 % of*For purposes of 30- or 40-year retire-ment in th e regular Navy, active duty asan officer or enlisted man in t he ArmyMarine Corps Coast Guard and

their reserve componbnts including serv-ice as a midshipman if appointed priorto 4 March 1 9 1 3 , and military service inthe adjunc t forces ma y be counted. How-ever, only active commissioned service inthe various branches of the service maybe counted for 20-year retirement. Serv-ice that may be counted for 20-year re-tirement of officers in the regular MarineCorps is restricted by law to commissionedservice on the active list of the Marine

Any regular Navy or Marine .officerwho is retired for physical disability in-curr ed in line of dut y is entitled to retireduav a t 75 % of the active dutv Dav of hispermanent-rank- or of the rahK ih whichdisability is determined to have been in-curred if servin g unde r a higher temporaryof the regu lar Navy who served- in a nycapacity as a member of the military ornaval forces of the U. S. prior to 1 2 Nov. amointment..Regular officers who are found to beincapacitated for service by reason of dis-ability not the result of an incident of t he1 9 1 8 hereafter retired under any provisionof law. shall. unless such officer is en-titled t b retired pay of a higher grade, be75% of his active duty pay at time ofretirement (i. e.. 75% of base way a n d service ar e whollv retired wi th one vearspay, or if the disability is not the iesul tof thei r own misconduct, ma y instead bePlaced on the retired list with 50% oftheir active dutv D a y (i.e.. 5 0 % of base. .75% of longevity).Officers of the r em la r Navv an d MarineCorps who have - been spkcially com-mended by SecNav (o r the Secretary of

W ar ) fo r performance of du ty in actualcombat are. upon retirement. placed uponway an d 5 0 4 of lonkevitvj. if the Presi-dent s o determines. (Retirkment provisionsfor one years pay an d 50% of p ay do notapply to offlcers of the Naval Reserve orhe retired list with the rank of the nexthigher grade-with 7 5 % of th e active dut ypay of the grade in which serving at thetime of retirement. This does not applyto line officers on a permanent promotionlist who fai l physically for promotion, ar efound incapacitated for service by reasonof physical disability cont racted in lineof duty and are retired i

all hands naval bulletin - dec 1944

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