[JohnR]

Originally Posted by Jim in CT

Those were some tough battles Eben. Tarawa, in particluar, is one of the least known, yet most ferocious battles in the history of planet Earth. On the day of the invasion, as it turned out, the tides were extremely low, so the Higgins boats (hoping to bring the Marines to the beach) got stuck hundreds of yards from shore on the coral reefs. The Marines had to wade in waist deep water for literally hundreds of yards, taking horrific machine gun fire. I believe 4 or 5 Marines received the Medal Of Honor at Tarawa. Eben, I was also a captain with the USMC, I hope to swap stories with your gramps when I cross over to the other side. I get chills when I think of the WWII marines, what they did was nothing short of stupifying.

My Dad graduated from Annapolis, he was 1 year ahead of a young guy named John McCain. That's about the best story from my Dad's 8 year career.

From what i have read the Pacific campaigns were far worse than the European Theatre (not that I would have close to a clue). Just nasty.

Jim - how does one put this right? If that was the BEST story of his 8 year career...?