Summary
The battles in the European theater and the one in the Pacific theater were waged in completely different ways. Europe had been primarily a land battle with the ground forces playing the pivotal role in success. The Pacific campaign though was different. There was a higher dependency on both aerial support and combined amphibious landings were the Navy and Army working together achieved the goal that neither would be able to achieve if working separately.
Naval superiority would play a much more significant role in the Pacific because in order to successfully land troops on the ground you first had to control the seas around the landing areas.
Initially the Japanese held this superiority because of their early success in the Philippines and other battles in the Pacific theater and their rapid attacks directly after their surprise attack at Pearl Harbor, HI. Taking advantage of the United States initial vulnerability after Pearl Harbor, HI the Japanese first took the islands of the Philippines and then a series of others between Japan and Australian effectively setting up a wide barrier of islands to act as a buffer between the conflict and mainland Japan.
This changed after the Battle of Midway which many historians and military strategist agree was the turning point for the Allies. The fighting would be hard but the United States began a slow journey towards Japan and the end of the war.
Island by island the United States continued to progress. After the Battle of Midway the Allies initiated a strategy referred to as island hopping or leapfrogging. This strategy involved bypassing large concentration of the enemy on land capturing the islands around them thus cutting off their supplies, building make shift air strips to then take advantage of the long range capabilities of the air craft to attack strongholds without engaging them directly, then following this up with a land invasion at key strategic areas such as Tarawa, Saipan, Okinawa, Iwo Jima and many others. This eventually put the United States within bombing range of Japan.
The United States had already been bombing parts of the island of Japan when President Harry Truman ordered the dropping of the atomic bomb first at Hiroshima and then a few days later at Nagasaki. After the devastating damage caused by these two bombings Japan officially surrenders on September 2nd 1945 and World War II is officially over.
Naval superiority would play a much more significant role in the Pacific because in order to successfully land troops on the ground you first had to control the seas around the landing areas.
Initially the Japanese held this superiority because of their early success in the Philippines and other battles in the Pacific theater and their rapid attacks directly after their surprise attack at Pearl Harbor, HI. Taking advantage of the United States initial vulnerability after Pearl Harbor, HI the Japanese first took the islands of the Philippines and then a series of others between Japan and Australian effectively setting up a wide barrier of islands to act as a buffer between the conflict and mainland Japan.
This changed after the Battle of Midway which many historians and military strategist agree was the turning point for the Allies. The fighting would be hard but the United States began a slow journey towards Japan and the end of the war.
Island by island the United States continued to progress. After the Battle of Midway the Allies initiated a strategy referred to as island hopping or leapfrogging. This strategy involved bypassing large concentration of the enemy on land capturing the islands around them thus cutting off their supplies, building make shift air strips to then take advantage of the long range capabilities of the air craft to attack strongholds without engaging them directly, then following this up with a land invasion at key strategic areas such as Tarawa, Saipan, Okinawa, Iwo Jima and many others. This eventually put the United States within bombing range of Japan.
The United States had already been bombing parts of the island of Japan when President Harry Truman ordered the dropping of the atomic bomb first at Hiroshima and then a few days later at Nagasaki. After the devastating damage caused by these two bombings Japan officially surrenders on September 2nd 1945 and World War II is officially over.