Appendix V
Geography and History


Map 29
Table of Distances
frm Empress Augusta Bay

BOUGAINVILLE, largest of the Solomon Islands chain, is approximately 125 miles long and has an average width of 30 miles. It is shaped somewhat like an exclamation point stretching from southeast to northwest, with Buka island at the northwest tip representing the dot. In area, it contains about 3,500 square miles. The island is located at the extreme northwest end of the Solomons group, its center being located about 6°23' S., 155°49' E.1 Cape Torokina is located on the central part of the southwestern coast of the island. In nautical miles2 by the shortest sea route, this point lies 360 miles northwest of Lunga Point, Guadalcanal, 2,657 miles southeast of Yokohama, 3,227 miles southwest of Pearl Harbor, 190 miles northwest of Munda Point, New Georgia, 660 miles north of Port Moresby, New Guinea, 310 miles northwest of the Russell Islands, 150 miles northwest of Vella Lavella, and 210 miles east of Rabaul, New Britain.3

Bougainville, and the lesser islands Buka and Nissan, before World War II, was administered by Australia under mandate from the League of Nations. It is a mountainous, heavily wooded, and well watered region, having a relatively large population. Its normal exports are: copra, trochus shell, timber, ivory nuts, green snail shell, beche-de-mer, and turtle shell.4

Along the entire length of the island runs a high, forest covered range of mountains known in the northwest end as the Emperor range, and in the southeast end as the Crown Prince range.5 The highest point in the Emperor range is Mount Balbi which soars to 10,171 feet, while in the Crown Prince range the highest point is 7,743 feet above the sea. In both ranges many of the peaks are active volcanoes.6

Except by some natives and a few Japanese, mountainous regions of the interior generally have been unexplored by man. However, the island has been crossed several times in recent years by Australian government patrols, and in a few instances higher peaks have been scaled.7

Around the circumference of the island, from foothills to coast, there is a large, relatively flat, alluvial plain, which to a large extent along the southwest coast is covered by almost impenetrable mangrove swamps, where stands water from three inches to six feet in depth, and in which live a myriad of insects and other creatures which contrive to make life uncomfortable. On this plain, soil is generally rich and deep, a result of the

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humus produced by ages of tropic growth.8 Through the plain run innumerable short, swift flowing, unnavigable streams which often overflow their banks and change their mouths, sometimes as much as a mile, adding not only to the size and number of stagnate pools within the swamp and marsh, but also to the difficulty of charting the courses of the various waterways for cartographic purposes.9 Streams carry so much silt and debris that they sometimes tend to build themselves up above the surrounding terrain.

Rivers of Bougainville are numerous and in general larger than those found on other islands of the Solomons Group. The largest streams are in the southern part of the island where the wide Buin-Siwai plain is braided with numerous rivers descending from the heights of the Crown Prince Range. Rivers of the northern half of the island are usually shorter than those to the south but, except on the extreme tip, are fully as numerous.

Streams typically empty into the sea through swampy areas. Sometimes sand bars built up at the mouth of the stream by coastal currents cause almost complete damming. A swift and heavy flow of water after a rain, however, will often wash the sand bar away. Birds-foot delta formations, with several outlets to the sea, are typical of larger rivers. Crocodiles are frequently encountered in these areas.

Smaller rivers are fringed with the mangrove, but larger ones are often bare along their banks due to the recurrent overflow at flood periods. Normally banks are quite steep, up to 20 feet in height in some places, and hence firm. There are several relatively small meandering streams which empty into the sea at Empress Augusta Bay. These are often tidal for some distance inland and invariably swampy at their mouths. The Mamregu River, south of Mawareka is navigable only for canoes for some distance inland, and there are several good landing places along its shores. Main drainage systems in the Cape Torokina region are the Laruma and Torokina rivers, which respectively form the northwest and southeast boundaries of the area.10

Here and there, on higher land of the plain, a few small plantations, for the most part devoted to raising coconuts (and in a few instances cocoa), and numerous tiny native gardens have been cut out of the jungle, while clearings on the higher ground along the coast bear the dubious title of village. A population of some 40,000 natives live in these settlements. Chief among these villages is Kieta on the northeast coast; this town serves as the site of government of the island, and has a white population of normally 180. Due to the war and the fact that the Japanese developed certain areas for military purposes, the village of Buka, on the southern tip of Buka Island, Bonis, on the northern tip of Bougainville, Numa Numa, on the northeast coast, and Kahili and Kara on the southern tip of Bougainville, assumed an importance greatly out of proportion to their size and economic productivity.11

The island is almost entirely blanketed by a heavy vegetation typical of many tropic islands. Luxuriant overgrowth forms a canopy beneath which thrive innumerable types of small plants and vines, woven thickly together to form a barrier almost impassable to humans striving to make headway through the jungle, and it is very easy to become lost without a guide.12 There are a few areas of "Kunai" grasslands on the island such as are common on Guadalcanal. Rain-forest predominates elsewhere except in planted areas. Throughout the Buin-Siwai area are numerous native clearings which are abandoned garden plots. Small grassy areas exist on the northeast coast at Chundwin, and there are brushy spots near Puruata on the west side of the island, but all of these are of very limited extent. In populated areas old garden plots which have been allowed to revert to "bush" are common, and here growth is smaller but usually more dense.

Native timber of the island includes: Tolus, Kulia, Karfilum, Mangrove, and Towan. As a rule these native trees are not over three feet in diameter at breast height. Nipa Palm grows in the coastal swamps of the sea coast in dense masses. At times large clumps of these palms become detached from the mainland and float out

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to sea. Navigators call these "floating islands". Average height of this tree is 20 feet. Casuarina trees grow along the coast west of Moila Point. These are rather low, spreading trees growing well apart and do not hinder travel. "Wait-a-bit" is a thorn bush with long streamers that usually grows along stream banks. It generally grows six to eight feet high, but the streamers are often much longer. Thorns on this bush make it difficult to move in its vicinity. Lawyer Vine, a trailer with main stems the size of a finger growing out some 30 to 40 feet, is used for binding by natives but offers no hindrance to travel. Kanda Vine is likewise a long strong trailer, utilized in making chairs and erecting guide ropes over river crossings.13

The few good trails that do exist generally follow the beaches with minor exceptions, and total no more than 200 miles in length.14 Before the war, few trails were capable of bearing vehicles. By 1945, however, there had been developed a fairly good road along the northeast coast from Buka Passage in the north, to Toiumonapu in the southeast. In the Cape Torokina sector the only trails of importance were the Numa Numa trail and the East-West trail; the former led across the island through a gap in the mountain to Numa Numa; the latter joined the Numa Numa trail near Piva and ran eastward through Popotana and Evansville.15

There are two seasons on Bougainville: a wet and a rainy. Extremes of rainfall range from a recorded maximum of 23.81 inches in July to a recorded minimum of 2.60 inches in December. Average recorded monthly rainfall is 9.51 inches a month.16 It is interesting to note here that rain fell on 17 of the first 18 days of the Bougainville campaign.17 Although the annual rainfall is in excess of 100 inches, it is relatively evenly dispersed throughout the year, since heavy rains may occur in any month. On the northern end of the island rainfall maximums occur during January and February at the time of high sun, but to the south a July-August-September maximum appears. Rainfalls up to seven inches in a 24-hour period have been recorded on the south coast. Typical tropical afternoon showers associated with convectional heating by the sun are characteristic. Travel is generally said to be easiest during the morning hours when streams are at their lowest levels.

Temperatures are uniformly high with little variation between seasons. At Kieta the maximum recorded temperature is 96° F. and the minimum 64° F. Shorter records for Buin show a maximum of 98° and a minimum of 70°. Daily range is low, averaging from 10° to 15°, and nights are uniformly warm. Humidity averages 75% to 85% in morning, 70% to 80% in the afternoon and 85% to 95% at night.

Winds are distinctly seasonal, southeast trades prevailing from May to October, and northwest monsoons from December to March. Certain residents of the area insist, however, that winds of May to October are from the southwest rather than the southeast. Remaining months are transitional with variable winds. At height of the respective seasons short but severe squalls occur with wind velocities of 30 to 50 miles per hour. These are usually accompanied by heavy rain and thunder and are associated with passage of large cumulus or cumulonimbus clouds which descend almost to the ground. These are local, and usually blow from southeast or northwest. Ordinarily they last three to four hours.18 Climate is not healthful for white men, since both humidity and heat are excessive, and malaria is endemic. Blackwater fever, dengue fever, and dysentery also occur. Among natives tuberculosis is common and leprosy is not uncommon. Acute poliomyelitis is not unknown and yaws and hookworm long have been troublesome.19

The southwest coast of Bougainville is low and fronted with islets and reefs, some of the latter being charted as much as 17 miles off shore. Several dangerous shoals exist in the Cape Torokina region, but the remainder of the coast of the

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island is generally free of reefs.20 There are few anchorages and fewer harbors. The strait that separates Buka from Bougainville is probably the best anchorage in the area, but Blanche Harbor in the Treasury group south of Bougainville is also very good. Other harbors in the area, suitable only for small craft, are Rawa, located at Kieta on the northeast coast; Tonolai, on the southwestern corner of Bougainville; and the anchorage on the southeastern corner of the island off the coast of Buin.21 Empress Augusta Bay, southeast of Cape Torokina, is sheltered only from southeast winds, but has the advantage of possessing from eight to 24 fathoms of water.22

Beaches of the island are generally of grey-black sand and vary in width from 15 to 200 yards. In some areas jungle growth extends over the beach to the water's edge, thus effectively blotting out any evidence of a beach, to such an extent that two bulldozers can not pass abreast between jungle and sea.23 Often the inland side of a beach drops away into swamp, further limiting possibilities for using the beach for landing operations, this being particularly true of many of the beaches in the Cape Torokina area.24 However, it must be said that the slope of beaches is gradual in many instances, and approaches to them are relatively clear of natural obstacles, giving an opportunity for grounding landing craft.25 Some beaches in the Cape Torokina area are nevertheless so steep that landing craft cannot be beached along the entire length of keel. In addition a 12 foot bank exists at the surf line in this area. Surf is high and strong, so much so in the Cape Torokina area that many landing boats broached on D-day.26 After the operation Admiral Halsey pronounced beach and terrain conditions "worse than anything ever encountered before in the South Pacific."27

An officer who participated in the campaign gives an appropriate description of the jungle as it applied to Bougainville:

A jungle is the practically impenetrable "green hell" of popular imagination, and an amazing variety of other things. It varies from mangrove swamps and scrub thickets to vine-draped, giant forests. It towers skyward, and it cowers at its own feet; it's as prolific as microbes, and it's as sterile as a stone; it's all embracing as quicksand and it's as repellant as nausea. The jungle is the enemy of all creatures; it devours its own young, and its young strangle it; the jungle is Moloch, the dark stench of whose corruption is overwhelming.28

This was the first--the greatest--enemy that had to be conquered by the Marines fighting for a beachhead at Bougainville.

At the outbreak of war there were said to be over 100 Asiatics, including two Japanese, on Bougainville and adjacent Islands. Many of the Chinese were interned at Kieta or impressed into service by the Japanese; several others were evacuated to Fiji by the Allies.

Almost all white residents of Bougainville Island, estimated to number 107 in April, 1942, were evacuated after the outbreak of war. One group came out by submarine as late as June, 1943.

Aside from District Officers at Kieta and patrol officers in the sub-districts, all permanent white residents were either planters or missionaries. Roman Catholic, Methodists, and Seventh Day Adventist denominations were active on the island: Catholics, under Bishop Wade, who was evacuated with his staff in April, 1943, were numerically the strongest. There were 22 Catholic mission stations on the island with a white personnel of 36 before the war. These included Americans, Germans and French. Half of these were reported missing and many were interned by the Japanese. Headquarters of the Methodist Mission was located at Kahili under the Rev. A. H. Voyce, while a second Methodist Mission was at Teop on the NE coast.29

A small detachment of Australian Imperial Forces personnel was operating on the island in conjunction with Australian coastwatchers in late June, 1943, but a radio message of 22 June reported that Japanese pressure on our patrols was forcing them to retire to the interior and that their

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activities would in the future be drastically curtailed. This group was finally evacuated in the submarine Guardfish in July.30

Economic development of Bougainville was almost exclusively confined to copra production. Cocoanut trees were planted, usually about 27 feet apart, on the better drained properties which were easily accessible from the sea.

Most European plantations were owned by Burns, Philp & Co., Ltd., through its subsidiary, Choiseul Plantations, Ltd. (CPL). More important CPL properties were Baniu, Paua, Tinputs, Teopasino, Inus, Kiriwina, Arigua, Toimonapu, Kunua and Sorakan. Excepting last named, all were located on the east coast. Behind Raua Bay a road led inland to a Dutch coffee plantation, controlled by Burns, Philp & Company, 800 feet above sea level.

Largest single block property before the war was the 5,000 acre Numa Numa cocoanut plantation, operated by Buka Plantation & Trading Co., Ltd. This organization also operated Bonis Plantation on the tip just across from Buka Airdrome. They employed a Japanese, Yatoshi, to operate their copra collecting vessel.31

In addition to the above-mentioned properties there were numerous small, independently owned plantings, almost all of which were on the east coast. One at Toberoi, north of the Kieta Airdrome, was developed by a German, Dr. Kroning, former German Government physician at Kieta. Numerous mission stations also operated small plantations at many places along the coast.32

Native population figures for Bougainville have never been accurately established. A fairly complete 1940 census figure gives 39,309 "counted natives living in villages". There are no large settlements. Villages range from 50 to 200 in population, often with subsidiary settlements known as "half-line" villages a half-mile or more away. Largest concentrations of natives are found in the Buin-Siwai area of southern Bougainville; missionaries estimate total native population at 42,000 to 45,000.33

Bougainville natives are primarily of Melanesian extraction with an admixture of Papuan-speaking peoples and some very black tribes along the coast, who may have been driven from New Guinea. All practice digging-stick agriculture. Of 18 distinct native languages which have been observed, half have predominantly Papuan affinities, these including the most populous districts.

Pidgin English, nearest approach to a universal language on Bougainville, is understood by the majority of natives in more accessible coastal areas; in almost all villages someone will be found who is able to speak it. Bougainville Pidgin is similar to that spoken on New Guinea and New Britain, and is much less closely related to English than is the Pidgin of the southern and central Solomons.34

In German times natives of the Kieta Administrative District, which included all of Bougainville Island, were very troublesome and in one year alone some ten punitive expeditions had to be dispatched to that area. During the decade prior to the outbreak of war, great strides were made in bringing the native population under government control and the island became a most important source of indentured labor for the Territory of New Guinea.

The native is characterized as small but strong, and an indefatigable worker when in the right mood. He is destinctly "moody". When content, he will carry on an incessant jabbering with his companions. Work is always going well when there is plenty of noise among native carriers, but a quiet one will bear watching as he becomes sullen, for he is apt to duck out. Of all inhabitants of Bougainville Islands those of the Buin-Siwai district have been said to be perhaps the most tractable. In former times plantations took large groups of natives on three-year contracts, and when their time was finished another group would go. In obtaining labor, legal procedure was to contract government appointed "Luluia" or "Kukari", whose compensation was exemption from an annual government tax of 10 shillings.35

Missionaries have reached all but a few in the far interior. "Teacher boys" have a reputation for being very faithful, especially the Methodists

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and Seventh Day Adventists, as they were trained by English-speaking missionaries. Where French and Germans have been operating it has been found more difficult to win the natives confidence.36

Natives of Bougainville and Buka are coal black in color. In contrast to brown skinned natives of other surrrounding districts, these are eagerly sought after as plantation laborers, for they are energetic, efficient and cheerful. Furthermore, Bougainville natives are able to adapt themselves with facility to the white man's way of life.37 On the other hand, tribal fights sometimes occur, and raids are occasionally made on coastal villages by inhabitants of the mountains. This has caused the government much difficulty, even in recent years.38

Alvaro de Mendana, a Spanish explorer, sailing from Peru, in two ships Los Reyes and Todos Santos, is reported to have originally discovered the Solomon Islands, in 1567. Two centuries elapsed, however, before Bougainville Island was sighted in 1768, actual discovery occurring when the French navigator, Louis Antoine de Bougainville (1729-1811), sighted it on his voyage around the world (1766-1769) in the ships Boudeuse and Etoile. Later adventurers such as Quires, Shortland, d'Urville, Blackwood, Yule, Simpson, and Moresby sailed in the waters around the island. Buka island had been sighted a year earlier (1767) than Bougainville by Captain Philip Carteret of the British sloop Swallow.39

Little attention was paid to the Solomon Islands by western nations until the middle of the 19th century.40 It was in quest of a colonial empire that the British and Dutch extended their authority and control over regions of the southwest Pacific. At about the same time, the German empire, under leadership of Bismarck, also evidenced an interest in this sphere. Between 1870 and 1880 imperial Germany began to take keen interest in Pacific territories.

As early as 1857, the widely known firm of Godeffroy and Sohn had entered Pacific trade competition and over a period of some twenty years exercised an ever increasing influence over Pacific commerce. When international trading jealousies began to appear about 1875, Godeffroy and Sohn and several of its German cohorts found that they needed financial and moral assistance from their government. This aid Prince Bismarck, being interested in the colonial expansion of Germany, willingly gave. Where trading companies went, there they carried German sovereignty. Since there were but few planters and traders in the northern Solomons, and since the only governmental control exercised there was that of the natives, Germans went ahead with their plans for eventual colonization, by proclaiming on 3 November 1884 this area--to include New Ireland, New Britain and northest New Guinea--to be a part of the German empire, having received opposition from neither the ill-organized natives nor from other colonial powers.41

This action naturally caused a furor in Australia, where German inroads were feared, for farsighted Australians even then realized that in the hands of an unfriendly power, these islands were a dagger pointing at the heart of their country--a springboard for invasion. Furthermore, Australia was denied the privilege of developing trade and commerce in the islands as long as they were not a British possession. Many representations were made by Australian nationals to Whitehall in London, but to no avail. The British government was adamant about causing trouble through making a claim in a sphere in which it was not particularly interested, so no action was taken.42

Finally by virtue of the Samoa Convention of 14 November 1899, Great Britain assumed responsibility for the southern Solomons, and recognized Germany's sovereignty over the northern Solomons.43 In 1905 Kieta became the administrative center of the Bougainville District of the German protectorate.

As late as 1893, when the British first laid official claim to the Solomons, only 50 white men--traders and missionaries--lived in the entire archipelago. Prior to that time, with the exception

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of Germany's claim laid on the northern islands, the islands as a whole were unclaimed by any civilized nation, and for the most part had been unvisited except by certain explorers and white "labor agents". Natives were often very badly treated by these "labor agents" who frequently kidnapped and literally enslaved them on plantations in other parts of the Pacific. As a result the natives became quite antagonistic toward white men.44

With the outbreak of World War I, Australian troops invaded Bougainville, and after a short skirmish in which one German officer and 30 German native troops, and two Australian officers and four other ranks lost their lives, the Australians, on 12 September 1914, raised their colors in place of the German. Finally in December 1920, the German islands Bougainville, Buka, Nissan, and lesser islands surrounding them, together with the Bismarck archipelago and a portion of New Guinea, were assigned by the League of Nations to Australia as a mandate; Australia set up a civil administration over the mandated area on 9 May 1921.45

The District Officer at Kieta, assisted by a small staff, worked under instructions received from administrative headquarters of the territory at Lae; headquarters having been moved thence from Rabaul. A line running through the Bougainville Straits between the Kahili coast on the southern part of Bougainville, and the Shortland-Faisi Islands to the south, separated the Mandated Territory of New Guinea, as the area became known, from the British Solomon Islands.46

Bougainville was occupied by the Japanese on 12 March 1942 and used as a supply base and fueling depot for the outposts in the Solomons. Both at its northern end and its southern tip, there are sheltered harbors for naval vessels and level areas on which airports could be constructed. Under Australian mandate civilian airports had been built which the Japanese tentatively planned to use.

After we had landed on Guadalcanal, especially after the naval defeat the Japanese suffered off Guadalcanal on 13-14 November 1942, work was rushed on twin airports at both the northern and southern ends of Bougainville, one for fighter protection and one for bombers. Though the whole island had been kept under constant survey by aerial reconnaissance and night patrols during the Spring and Summer of 1943, few Allied attacks had been made against Bougainville, because all our available aircraft were being used in the conquest of the New Georgia Islands. By later summer, however, land bases had been established near enough to Bougainville to make possible its complete neutralization. To neutralize the island meant rendering the four airports on the island at least temporarily unusable, at the same time maintaining a constant inspection of secondary airports that the Japanese had under construction on the east coast at Kieta and elsewhere. The Japanese were desperately trying to retain possession of their barge routes from Rabaul southward.

The exact number of Japanese troops on the island was difficult to estimate but reconnaissance had placed the figure at 44,000. Almost all enemy troops were being used, however, as protective garrisons for airports, or to guard at a few coast defenses the former administrative center at Kieta harbor on the east coast and at Empress Augusta Bay on the west coast. Barge routes for supplies ran down around the coast from Rabaul, while many naval vessels had been sighted in a well-protected harbor at Shortland Island and in the large and sheltered bay at Buin at the south end of the island. Troops could be transported by night either south from Rabaul or north from Choiseul Island where the enemy held strong bases. In our favor, initially at least, was the discovery that the Japanese had not attempted to improve interior roads or trails but had relied largely on barge traffic and convoy to supply or transport their troops. When we took over control of both the sea lanes and air, they found it extremely difficult to mass troops against our stroke.47

Upon landing the Japanese apparently had begun immediate preparations for an assault on

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Australia to the south.48 Early months of the occupation were spent in building up a reserve supply of men and material for the planned campaign and also in constructing airfields and an advance naval base from which to launch that assault. From the Rabaul-Bougainville area the enemy time and time again struck Allied advance bases at Port Moresby and Darwin in attempt to neutralize those bases and in hope of catching the American South Pacific Fleet at anchor. Furthermore, they wished to imperil the American Australian life-line.49

During the period in which they occupied Bougainville, the Japanese succeeded in building airfields of great value to their cause in the Buka-Bonis area in the north and in the Kahili-Kara area to the south. Further they organized for defense every obvious landing beach in the vicinity of these positions. In addition, they spent much effort in cultivating friendship of natives, and were successful to the extent that they existed on Bougainville for a considerable period of time, even though cut off from the Japanese empire.50 That the Allies recognized the fact that natives in certain instances may have become friendly to the Japanese, is evidenced by the fact that our troops were warned before they went ashore that many natives were unreliable. It would appear that Japan had succeeded in gaining some converts to her Greater East Asia Doctrine.51

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Table of Contents ** Previous Chapter (Appendix IV) * Next Chapter (Appendix VI)


Footnotes

1. V Amphibious Force, Distance Chart--Pacific Ocean. Prepared by the 64th Engr. Top. Bn, USAFICPA. No. 390.

2. 6,080.27 feet; there are 5,280 feet in a statute mile.

3. IMAC Opn Rpt, I (B), 19-20; see also Headquarters USAFISPA, Objective Folder; Bougainville Island, Solomon Group T, 3. For the latter document see the bibliography in appendix.

4. Hawthorne Daniel, Islands of the Pacific (New York, 1943), 134.

5. R. W. Robson, The Pacific Islands Handbook, 1944 (New York, 1945), 240.

6. Hydrographic Office, USN, Sailing Directions For the Pacific Islands, Vol. I (Washington, 1938), 416-423.

7. Daniel, op. cit., 135-136.

8. Frank O. Hough, The Island War: The United States Marine Corps in the Pacific (Philadelphia, 1947), 105.

9. IMAC, C-2 Estimate of the Situation, 8.

10. 3d MarDiv, D-2 Terrain Study, 1.

11. Robson, op. cit., 230.

12. 3d MarDiv, D-2 Terrain Study, 2.

13. Ibid., 2. See also IMAC C-2 Estimate of the Situation, passim.

14. Daniel, op. cit., 136.

15. Hough, op. cit., 105.

16. IMAC C-2 estimate of the Situation, 1. It should be noted here that the natives consider the two seasons to be determined by the direction of the winds and refer to them as the northwest and southeast seasons.

17. Monks, op. cit., 134.

18. IMAC C-2 Estimate of the Situation, passim.

19. Daniel, op. cit., 143.

20. Hydrographic Office, op. cit., 165, 421.

21. Daniel, op. cit., 136.

22. IMAC C-2 Estimate of the Situation, 2; cf. Hydrographic Office, op. cit., 416-423.

23. Combat Narratives, 43.

24. Josephy, op. cit., 89.

25. IMAC C-2 Estimate of the Situation, 1-2.

26. Burrus, op. cit., 43.

27. Halsey, SoPac Narrative, 9.

28. Ralph Jenkins in an article in Telephony. See bibliography in appendix.

29. Feldt, op. cit., 126-127.

30. Ibid., 145-146.

31. Robson, op. cit., 236.

32. Feldt., op. cit., 123.

33. Daniel, op. cit., 135.

34. Feldt, op. cit., 160.

35. Sholefield, op. cit., 50-73.

36. Feldt, op. cit., 60-67.

37. Ibid., 160-163, 167-168.

38. Robson, op. cit., 232, 240.

39. Robson, op. cit., 224, 281.

40. Ibid., 223-230.

41. Scholefield, op. cit., 97-107.

42. Ibid., 119-124.

43. Ibid., 324; cf. Robson, op. cit., 225.

44. Daniel, op. cit., 146-147.

45. Robson, op. cit., 228.

46. Objective Folder: Bougainville, supra; 3.

47. Robson, op. cit., 220.

48. Robson, loc. cit. indicates this as the reason for Japanese occupation of the Solomons, but no indication can be found, after a thorough search of Japanese records, that the Japanese actually had an invasion of Australia in mind.

49. Miller, op. cit., 465-466.

50. Feldt, op. cit., 160-167.

51. IMAC C-2 Estimate of the Situation, 27-28.



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