User:Yvwv/Pacific War

Sites

Many places that were sites of battles, atrocities or other wartime activities can be visited.

China

See Chinese Revolutions for background.

• 1 Nanjing Massacre Memorial. Commemorates the late 1937 slaughter of a huge number of civilians in and around Nanjing by the invading Japanese army. 
• 2 Unit 731 Museum. A museum in Harbin located in a former bio-chemical weapons testing facility built by the Japanese and used to perform experiments on Chinese citizens and POWs. After the war, the Americans agreed to cover up their actions and grant immunity from prosecution to the scientists involved in exchange for being granted exclusive access to the data, as they feared that the data would end up in the hands of the Soviet Union, and many of those scientists ended up having successful careers in academia. (updated Jan 2016)

• 3 Changsha. The site of four separate battles between the Chinese and Japanese in 1939, 1941, 1942 and 1944. The first of those was the first significant victory scored by the Chinese over the Japanese during World War II. The Japanese were only able to capture Changsha on their fourth attempt in 1944. 
• 4 Chongqing. The "temporary capital" of China during World War II, after Nanjing had fallen to the Japanese. Despite numerous attempts by the Japanese to take it, Chinese resistance in the inland areas was much fiercer than the Japanese expected, and though it was heavily bombed, Chongqing managed to avoid Japanese occupation for the duration of the war. 

Mongolia

• 5 Khalkhin Gol. Site of a battle in 1939 in which the Soviets demolished a large Japanese force. This turned Japanese thinking away from expansion into Mongolia and Siberia; instead they adopted a "strike south" strategy which led directly to Pearl Harbor and their attacks in Southeast Asia. 

Southeast Asia

• 6 Burma Road. This road ran from Western China into Burma (now Myanmar) and connected to Assam in Eastern India as well. It was originally built by the Chinese in the late 30s, upgraded by the Americans later, and used throughout the war. 
• 7 Changi Museum. A former POW camp-turned-museum has information about the Japanese occupation of Singapore and what life was like in the POW camp. It focuses on the general history and conditions as well as containing personal accounts and artifacts donated by former prisoners. (updated Dec 2015)

• 8 Sandakan Memorial Park. This memorial located in the Malaysian city of Sandakan was built at the site of a former Japanese POW prison camp with funding from the Australian government to commemorate the Allied POWs who lost their lives during the Sandakan Death Marches. Only 6 people out of several thousand survived the march, and only because those 6 managed to escape. Incidentally, all 6 surivors were Australian. 

United States

• 9 Pearl Harbor. Site of the bombing in Western Honolulu that caused the United States to enter the war. 

A number of sites in the US commemorate the internment of Japanese-Americans during the war.

• 10 Manzanar Internment Camp. The largest internment camp in the United States where approximately 110,000 Japanese-Americans and Japanese nationals living in the United States during the war were forced to live after being ordered to leave their homes. This museum contains information about the camp, the experiences of those who were forced to live here, and life after the war. (updated Dec 2015)
• 11 WWII Japanese American Internment Museum. A former internment camp turned into a museum to educate people about the lives of Japanese-Americans at the Rohwer Relocation Center. (updated Dec 2015)

• 12 Topaz Museum. The Topaz Relocation Center (internment camp) housed over 11,000 Japanese-Americans. Because people were moved here before it was finished, internees were actually hired to build the wire fences to pen themselves in. (updated Dec 2015)

• 13 Tule Lake Segregation Center. (updated Oct 2017)

South Sea

• 14 Wake Island. This US-controlled island was taken by Japan shortly after Pearl Harbor and held by them throughout the war. There are ruins of Japanese fortifications, a monument for the American defenders who put up a stiff fight despite being badly outnumbered and outgunned, and a monument for a group of 98 POWs executed by the Japanese. Today the island is a US military base, off limits for most visitors. 
• 15 Henderson Airfield. The Japanese began constructing an airfield in May 1942 in Honiara. Knowing that if they completed it, they'd be able to both isolate Australia from its allies and launch potentially devastating attacks, America quickly moved to take control of the airfield. It took six months to secure the airfield, after which the Americans finished construction on it and used it to launch attacks on other islands.

  Henderson Airfield was later expanded to become the international airport of the Solomon Islands, so of course it can be visited. Other sites around the airport include Bloody Ridge (where America defended against the Japanese), The Gifu (named after the city by the same name, it was a Japanese post attacked by the US), Mount Austin (used by the Japanese to get a full view of the airfield in their plan to retake it), as well as memorials for both the Americans and Japanese that fought here. (updated Dec 2015)

• 16 Betio Island. Within a few days of Pearl Harbor, the Japanese took the Gilbert Islands, then a British colony, now part of the independent nation Kiribati. America's first attack on Japanese forces occurred in Butaritari, in the Gilberts, shortly after that.

  In late 1943, the Americans came to oust Japan from the islands, which by then had been heavily fortified. Betio Island in Tarawa was the site of the Battle of Tarawa, considered to be one of the bloodiest battles of the war. While war relics can be found on multiple islands throughout Kiribati, Betio Island is where the main battle took place and also where the most remains. Visitors can see tanks, bunkers, shipwrecks, guns, and memorials built by the Japanese, Americans, and Australians and New Zealanders. (updated Dec 2015)

• 17 Kokoda Track. An important battle line in Papua New Guinea, between Australia and Japan, it is now a trekking destination, especially for Australians. (updated Jan 2016)
• 18 Darwin. The only Australian city to have been attacked by a Japanese air raid has a memorial monument on its wharf, and a veterans' cemetery nearby. (updated Jun 2015)
• 19 Command Ridge (Nauru). During World War II, Nauru was occupied by the Japanese military from August 1942 until their surrender at the tail end of the war in the wake of three years of near-continuous Allied air raids. Today, rusting relics from this era are scattered thoroughout the island — disused Japanese pillboxes line the shore every couple of kilometres, and old cannons can be seen along roadsides barely hidden by forest or even in plain sight between homes. However, for those who want a firsthand look at Nauru's WWII history, Command Ridge (Nauruan: Janor) is the place to go. As the island's highest point, rising to an elevation of 63 m above sea level, it was a natural lookout point for the occupiers — and today you'll find there a bevy of old artillery emplacements (including a pair of six-barrel antiaircraft guns still pointed skyward), the ruins of a prison complex used to hold interned Nauruan natives (who were treated brutally by the Japanese) as well as five members of the Australian military captured during the invasion, and — most impressive of all — the former communications center, now open for any visitors to enter. The interior is not well lit, but bring in a lantern or torch and you'll still be able to make out faded Japanese writing on the walls. (updated Mar 2017)

Philippines

• 20 Coron. This town in Palawan Province in the Philippines has excellent wreck diving; the US Navy sank about a dozen Japanese ships in shallow water in 1944. 

Japan

• 21 Okinawa Peace Park and Himeyuri Monument. Considered to be the site of one of the most brutal and bloody battles of the war, Okinawa island has many war remnants and memorials. Outside of Japan, Okinawa is often viewed as the first battle on Japanese soil however, like the other Pacific Islands, Okinawa was also colonized territory so the local population was not fully trusted by the Japanese and often treated as expendable. With the Americans being obvious enemies and the Japanese not being complete allies, the question on many Okinawans' minds was not "How am I going to survive?" but "How do I want to die?". The museums here show the war from a uniquely Okinawan perspective, including life for citizens, students and military. It also depicts well how they were mistreated by both the Japanese and the Americans during and after the war. The Peace Park and the Himeyuri Monument in Itoman are the best places to learn about the battle, but remnants and reminders of the war can be found throughout the island. (updated Aug 2015)

• 22 Iwo Jima. Another group of islands close to Japan, scene of some extremely fierce fighting. An image of victorious US Marines raising the Stars and Stripes there is quite famous. Note that currently US Military Tours has exclusive rights to the island and only US citizens who are members of the Iwo Jima Association of America, WWII veterans, or WWII prisoners of war are eligible to join the tours. 

• 23 Chiran Peace Museum for Kamikaze Pilots. As the war approached the home islands, the desperate Japanese began sending out young men to fly aircraft packed with explosives into American ships. The museum is located in Minamikyushu over the former spot where the tokko pilots (known abroad as kamikaze pilots) were trained and flew from. The museum contains information about the pilots, artifacts and letters from them, and recovered kamikaze planes. (updated Jan 2016)
• 24 Hiroshima Peace Park and Memorial Museum. Hiroshima was the first place in the world to be attacked with an atomic bomb. The museum shows how devastating the bomb was to the city and the effects it had on the people both in the immediate aftermath to the present day. (updated Aug 2015)

• 25 Nagasaki Atomic Bomb Museum and Peace Memorial Hall. Museums located on the site where the atomic bomb was dropped on August 9, 1945. The Nagasaki bombing led to Japanese surrender and is also noted as the last place to have an atomic bomb dropped on it. (updated Aug 2015)

Memorials

There are also many other sites that commemorate parts of the war.

Marine Corps War Memorial

• The 26 US Marine Corps Memorial at Arlington, Virginia, depicts the famous scene of the raising of the (American) flag on Iwo Jima, whose history is told by the movie "Flags of our Fathers" directed by Clint Eastwood. One of the soldiers involved, Ira Hayes, is commemorated in a fine song by Johnny Cash.
• 27 US National Museum of the Pacific War. Located in Fredericksburg (Texas), home town of Admiral Chester Nimitz who commanded US forces in part of the Pacific, this is a large museum complex with many exhibits. (updated Dec 2015)