32nd Infantry Division (United States)

The United States 32nd Infantry Division was formed from Army National Guard units from Wisconsin and Michigan and fought primarily during World War I and World War II. With roots as the Iron Brigade in the American Civil War, the division's ancestral units came to be referred to as the ''Iron Jaw Division''. During tough combat in France in World War I, it soon acquired from the French the nickname ''Les Terribles'', referring to its fortitude in advancing over terrain others could not. It was the first allied division to pierce the German Hindenburg Line of defense, and the 32nd then adopted its shoulder patch; a line shot through with a red arrow, to signify its tenacity in piercing the enemy line. It then became known as the ''Red Arrow Division''.

During World War II, the division was credited with many "firsts". It was the first United States division to deploy as an entire unit overseas and among the first of seven U.S. Army and U.S. Marine units to engage in offensive ground combat operations during 1942. The division was among the first divisions to engage the enemy and were still fighting holdouts after the official Japanese surrender. The 32nd logged a total of 654 days of combat during World War II, more than any other United States Army division. The unit was inactivated in 1946 after occupation duty in Japan.

During 1961, the division was called up for a one-year tour of service in the state of Washington during the Berlin Crisis. In 1967, the 32nd Infantry Division (now made up completely of units from Wisconsin) was inactivated and partially reorganized as the 32nd Infantry Brigade, the largest unit of the Wisconsin Army National Guard.

World War I

Activation, organization and training

When the United States declared war on Germany on 11 April 1917, the Wisconsin Adjutant General ordered the Milwaukee troops to add a squadron, and Troop C and Troop D were added. The Guard units' Troop A and Troop B had been mustered out of federal service less than a year earlier on 20 October 1916 and 6 March 1917, respectively. The Adjutant General then directed the unit to add a new regiment, and the Second and Third Squadrons were formed as the First Wisconsin Cavalry, with units organized in various cities. Troop E commanded by Captain John S. Coney was formed in Kenosha on 10 May 1917, and the Wisconsin Cavalry was officially formed on 29 May 1917.

Only two months later, the 32nd Division was activated in July 1917 at Camp MacArthur, Waco, Texas of National Guard units from Wisconsin and Michigan. Wisconsin furnished approximately 15,000 men, and another 8,000 troops came from Michigan. The division was made up of the 125th and 126th Infantry Regiments (63rd Infantry Brigade) and the 127th and 128th Infantry Regiments (64th Infantry Brigade), as well as three artillery regiments within the 57th Field Artillery Brigade. On 4 August 1917, Battery F, 121st Field Artillery regiment was the first unit to arrive at Camp MacArthur. The remainder arrived as soon as trains could be mustered for transportation.

On 26 August 1917, Major General James Parker assumed command. General Parker had previously been awarded the Medal of Honor during the Philippine–American War. On 18 September 1917, General Parker left for France on special duty with his chief of staff, Lieut. Col. E. H. DeArmond. Brigadier General William G. Haan assumed command in his absence. When General Parker returned in December, he was almost immediately transferred to the 85th Infantry Division at Camp Custer, Michigan. General Haan assumed command once again. In keeping with the 1917 Army Tables of Organizations, he reorganized the division during September to increase the number of men in each regiment.

The 120th Field Artillery Regiment was organized on 22 September 1917 at Camp MacArthur, as a part of the 57th Field Artillery Brigade, better known as the ''Iron Brigade''. The nickname originated with the 1st Wisconsin Cavalry and was traditionally given to crack artillery units in the Civil War. Once at Camp MacArthur, the division was resupplied for their overseas assignment. Shortly before the division left for France, 4,000 National Army troops from Wisconsin and Michigan were transferred to the division.

Captain Alien L. Briggs returned to Camp MacArthur to assist with training. He had been an Aide-de-camp to General Parker and had been in Europe when the war broke out in 1914. He had observed the training methods used in military schools in France. As training intensified in preparation for leaving for France, five French and four British officers, along with several non-commissioned officers, joined the division as instructors. A trench system was built outside the camp in which the division practiced the techniques of trench warfare. There was a continual shortage of equipment that hampered training in the artillery and machine gun battalions. Additional training for junior and non-commissioned officers was implemented, and General Haan offered additional daily instruction to the brigade, regimental and battalion commanders.

By early December, it had received the equipment assigned to it and was judged to be ready for deployment. War Department inspectors found the division more advanced in its training than any other division in the United States. Orders were received in late December, and the first troops left Waco on 2 January 1918 for the New York Port of Embarkation at Hoboken, New Jersey. The infantry was moved first, arriving at Camp Merritt before the division headquarters sailed. The unit received its first casualties when the SS Tuscania (1914) was sunk by a German U-boat. Brigadier General William G. Haan led the unit when it arrived in France.

Combat in France

The 32nd Division arrived on the Western Front in February 1918. The 32nd was the sixth U.S. division to join the American Expeditionary Force (AEF), under General John J. Pershing. The unit's morale was temporarily lessened when they learned they were assigned to create a depot for I Corps that would train replacement soldiers. Major General Haan reminded his commanders that it was every soldier's duty to contribute their best to the war effort, including training replacements. However, Haan lobbied Pershing and after several stormy sessions, finally convinced him that the 32nd could hold its own as a division. Up to this point much of the war had been a stalemate, fought from static trench lines over the same few kilometers of terrain. Over the next six months, the division was under constant fire, with only 10 days' rest. The division took a leading role in three important offensives, fighting on five fronts, suffered more than 14,000 casualties, captured more than 2,000 prisoners, and never yielded ground to the enemy.

Major General James Parker had re-assumed command on 7 December 1917, and led the unit into Alsace in May 1918, attacking in seven days. During the Battle of Marne, they captured Fismes. The only American unit in French General Charles Mangin's famous 10th French Army, it fought between the Moroccans and the Foreign Legion, two of the best divisions in the French army in the Battle of Oise- Battle of Aisne offensive. The 10th Army took Juvigny. In the five-day battle against five German divisions, the 32nd suffered 2,848 casualties.

On 18 May 1918, four battalions of the 32nd division replaced decimated French troops on the front line at Haute Alsace, along a front from the Aspach-le-Bas to the Swiss border. The division's units conducted combat patrols into Germany itself, gaining the distinction of being the first US troops to set foot on enemy soil in World War I.

Moving out of their trenches, the division fought continuously for 20 days during the Meuse–Argonne offensive. The division was the front line element of the Third U.S. Army. The Germans were well dug in after four years of trench warfare and had orders to hold the line at all costs. On 14 October at 5:30 am, the division broke through the maze of barbed wire and took the line of trenches forming the Hindenburg Line and moved on to the last German stronghold at Kriemhilde Stellung, where they reached the Meuse River. The 32nd was the first Allied Army unit to penetrate the Hindenburg Line. They then captured Côte Dame de Marie, the key to all the defenses in the area. Over the next five days the division continued to advance while under nearly constant machine gun and artillery fire. The 32nd Division defeated 11 German divisions in the Argonne fighting, including the fearsome Prussian Guards and the German Army's 28th Division, known as Kaiser's Own. The offensive cost the division 5,950 casualties.

Their next objective was to flank the Germans at Metz and they marched to the Rhine River. There they occupied the center sector in the Koblenz bridgehead for four months, during which they held and 63 towns.

Origin of nickname ''Les Terribles''

The division fought in three major offensives, engaging and defeating 23 German divisions. They took 2,153 prisoners and gained , pushing back every German counterattack. During the drive to capture Fismes, they successfully attacked over open ground at great cost.

The authorized strength of the 3rd battalion was 20 officers and 1,000 men, but by 4 August it had only 12 officers and 350 men on the line. As they advanced over of mostly open ground, the Germans targeted them with intense artillery and machine gun fire. They were reinforced by the 2nd Battalion, 127th Infantry, which was also understrength. The 127th Infantry finally captured Fismes, but they lost many men. By the end of the day, the 3rd Battalion had only two officers and 94 men; the 2nd Battalion had five officers and 104 men.

General de Mondesir, the 38th French Corps Commander, which the 32nd served under, went to the front to observe the fighting. When he saw how the 32nd cleared the Germans out of their reinforced positions with unrelenting and successful attacks, he exclaimed, ''Oui, Oui, Les soldats terribles, tres bien, tres bien!'' General Charles Mangin heard of it and referred to the 32nd Division as ''Les Terribles'' when he asked for the division to join his 10th French Army north of Soissons. He later made the nickname official when he incorporated it in his citation for their attack at Juvigny. The division's shoulder patch, a line shot through with a red arrow, symbolizes the fact that the 32nd Division penetrated every German line of defense that it faced during World War I.

Casualties and decorations

The division was still engaging German troops east of the Meuse River when the Armistice was finally signed. The division suffered a total of 13,261 casualties, including 2,250 men killed in action and 11,011 wounded, placing it third in the number of battle deaths among U.S. Army divisions. The American, French, and Belgian governments decorated more than 800 officers and enlisted men for their gallantry in combat.

All four infantry regiments, the three artillery regiments, and the division's three machine gun battalions all were awarded the Croix de guerre by the Republic of France. The flag and standard of every unit in the division was authorized four American battle streamers. The 32nd Division was the only American division recognized with a ''nom-de-guerre'' by an Allied nation during the war.

Inactivation and reorganization

Following the war's end, the division served in the Army of Occupation in Germany, commanded by Maj. Gen. William Lassiter. The division was inactivated on 5 April 1919. On 24 July 1924, the 32nd Division was reorganized incorporating National Guard units from Wisconsin and Michigan. Its headquarters home was at Lansing, Michigan.

Interwar period

In the period between the World Wars, the 32nd Division was understrength, with training rarely leaving the local drill hall except for the yearly summer encampment. During 1937 and 1938, the 107th Engineer Battalion trained at Camp Grayling in Michigan, with emphasis on boat drills and float bridging. The Regiment was short of men, had no vehicles, and what equipment it had was of World War I vintage.

Only the fall of France in June 1940 injected some urgency into their training operations, and on 27 August 1940, Congress authorized inducting the National Guard into federal service. Eighteen National Guard divisions were activated, including the 32nd. On 16 September 1940 Congress authorized the first peacetime draft in United States history.

When the division was federalized on 15 October 1940, It was authorized to have a peacetime strength of about 11,600 soldiers, but like almost all units in the National Guard and the Regular Army prior to World War II, was not at full strength nor was it assigned all of the equipment it was authorized. Training for many soldiers was incomplete. The division was scheduled to receive a year of training. In October 1940, the division began a six-day motor march to Camp Beauregard, Louisiana. On 26 January 1941, the 32nd Division relocated to the recently completed Camp Livingston, about northeast of Alexandria, Louisiana. The unit then spent the next 16 months training in Louisiana.

During the summer of 1941, the division moved to Camp Beauregard, Louisiana. as part in the Third and Fourth Army maneuvers—nicknamed the Louisiana Maneuvers—which provided the army high command a good look at the preparedness of the regiment. The first test, which was held in the vicinity of Camp Beauregard, was conducted 16–27 June and included the 32nd Division as well as the 37th Division from Ohio. From 16–30 August, the maneuvers expanded to include the 34th and 38th Divisions. During September, the largest maneuvers were held with the Seventh Corps of the Second Army, opposing the Fourth, Fifth, and Eighth Corps of the Third Army. The Grand Rapids Guard was part of the Fifth Corps. It was the largest maneuver of its kind in the history of the Army and included some 100,000 men.

National Guard units were at the time not required to serve active duty outside of the western hemisphere and draftees were inducted for a maximum of one year of service. But on 7 August 1941, by a margin of a single vote, Congress approved an indefinite extension of service for the Guard, draftees, and Reserve officers, including the Red Arrow Division.

World War II

During January and February 1942, the division lost one of its infantry regiments when, like all U.S. Army divisions, its "square" infantry division structure was reorganized into a triangular organization, centered on three instead of four infantry regiments. It was left with the 126th Infantry Regiment, 127th Infantry Regiment, and the 128th Infantry Regiment. The three existing artillery regiments (120th, 121st and 126th) were converted into four separate battalions (120th, 121st, 126th and 129th), and supporting units. In early February 1942 it received a new commander, Major General Edwin F. Harding.

Pacific Theater

After the Attack on Pearl Harbor, the division was one of the first to be prepared for overseas duty. The division was initially ordered to prepare for an early departure overseas to Europe and the division moved to Fort Devens, Massachusetts, for transport to Northern Ireland. The 107th Engineer Battalion left Camp Livingston on 2 January 1942, and was shipped by train to Fort Dix, New Jersey, where it lost its 2nd battalion and was redesignated the 107th Engineer Combat Battalion. The 107th was shipped ahead of the rest of the division as an advance party so they could prepare an overseas camp for the division's arrival.

The rest of the division was to have three months to prepare for embarkation to the front in Europe. However, Japan had rapidly advanced into the South Pacific, progressively occupying an increasing number of islands. Japan was evidently intent on cutting Australia off from its American supply lines, and Australia feared that Japan was planning to invade. Prime Minister John Curtin demanded the Allies release Australian troops from the Mediterranean and North Africa front to defend their home. The United States initially sent the 41st Infantry Division, less one regiment, from where it was training at Ft. Lewis, Washington. The 41st Division arrived in Melbourne on 6 April 1942.

Though the Allies released the Australian 6th and 7th Divisions, the 9th could not be spared. In a compromise, the 32nd was notified on 25 March, less than six weeks after Harding was placed in command, to turn around and ship out west to the Pacific instead. Harding was told the entire unit was to be ready to board ships in San Francisco in only three weeks. Implementing these orders cost the division's preparedness a great deal. The 35th Division, in lieu of an aborted mission to the Philippines to reinforce American forces there, was designated to replace the 32nd Division for eventual shipment to England.

The 114th Engineer Combat Battalion was hurriedly assigned to replace the 107th Engineers, who were already in the middle of the Atlantic bound for Ireland. On 1 June 1942, the original 107th Engineer Combat Battalion was redesignated the 2nd Battalion, 112th Engineer Regiment; on 19 August 1943, at Saunton Sands near Camp Braunton, England, the 2nd Battalion, 112th Engineers was redesignated as the 254th Engineer Combat Battalion.

The division boarded 13 freight trains and 25 passenger trains at Fort Devens near Boston on 9 April 1942 and arrived five days later in Oakland, California. Portions of the unit were then transported by bus to Pier 7 in San Francisco, where they boarded the U.S. Army ferry for Angel Island in San Francisco Bay, which was utilized by the Army as Fort McDowell. The remainder were housed at Fort Ord near Monterey, California, at the Dog Track Pavilion in Emeryville and at the Cow Palace, where the men slept uncomfortably in stadium chairs and in horse stalls.

On 22 April 1942, just before the division boarded ships in San Francisco bound for Australia, they received about 3,000 additional soldiers, most of whom had just finished basic training, to fill in their incomplete ranks. The division was still missing about 1,800 men. The division had to make do with whatever equipment was found in depots near San Francisco. Not even its firearms allocation was complete; it could not obtain any compact M1 carbine rifles meant for officers and support forces, forcing the division to arm them with the regular infantry's longer, heavier yet more powerful M1 Garand. They traded in their World War I-era horse-drawn artillery pieces for new 105mm M101 howitzers, though they received scant training on the new guns.

After eight days waiting for transit, the division returned to San Francisco and boarded a convoy of seven Matson Line ships, including the S.S. ''Lurline'' and USS ''Hugh L. Scott'' at Pier 42. The convoy (SF 43) was escorted by the cruiser USS ''Indianapolis'' and two corvettes. Four days out of San Francisco, the Lurline ship's crew discovered the division's mascot, a dog named Vicksburg. She was named for the town she was born in and the location of the final major campaign of the American Civil War. (Vicksburg was killed in a road accident in Southport, Australia on 8 October 1942). A monument to the dog still exists at the former entrance to Camp Cable.

Taking a southerly route to avoid the Japanese Navy, they arrived in southern Australia at Port Adelaide on 14 May 1942, having traveled in 23 days. They were the first American division in World War II to be moved in a single convoy from the United States to the front lines.

Training in Australia

After the division arrived in Adelaide, the 126th Infantry Regiment was sent to Camp Sandy Creek (north of Adelaide), and the 127th and 128th went to Camp Woodside, east of Adelaide and from Camp Sandy Creek. Once the unit arrived in Australia, rather than begin combat training, the division was forced to build its new camps from scratch. Their initial training was planned to be oriented around a defense of the Australian mainland. However, instead of learning the basics of patrolling and maneuvering, they cut down trees, dug wells and latrines, and set up kitchens and tents. The division did not begin training again for several weeks.

Preparedness for jungle warfare

Although the 32nd had spent a good deal of time training in Louisiana with considerable swamp close at hand, their destination at that time was Europe. Most official records state that the men had little additional training for jungle conditions while in Australia. General Eichelberger, MacArthur's Chief of Staff, wrote that "In Washington I had read General MacArthur's estimates of his two infantry divisions, and these reports and our own inspections had convinced my staff and me that the American troops were in no sense ready for jungle warfare." However, some veterans interviewed report they received general training with weapons and practice at terrain maneuvers, and in jungle warfare. They said this increased once the unit arrived in Brisbane.

Less than two months after their arrival in Australia, the unit was moved in July 1942 halfway across Australia, northeast to Camp Tamborine, about south of Brisbane on Australia's east coast. The majority of the division and its equipment was split up and shipped by railroad, while some were transported on five Liberty Ships. Each Australian state had a different rail gauge (or width), and the equipment and men had to be offloaded at each state's boundary and reloaded onto a new train. The division's trains crossed four states before it reached Brisbane.

On 30 August, Camp Tamborine was renamed Camp Cable, in honor of Sergeant Gerald O. Cable, a soldier in Service Company, 126th Infantry. Sergeant Cable was the sole casualty when his Liberty ship, en route from Adelaide to Brisbane, was torpedoed by a Japanese submarine, making him the first soldier of the 32nd Division to die in combat during World War II.

Japanese assault on Port Moresby

The Battle of Coral Sea in early May followed by the Allied victory at the Battle of Midway in early June foiled Japan's plans to capture Port Moresby by sea. The Japanese were undaunted. A Japanese convoy conveyed Maj. Gen. Tomitarō Horii with about 4,400 troops onto the beach at Gona during the night of 21–22 July 1942 on the north-eastern shore of Papua New Guinea. They proceeded inland to Popondetta and then south-westward onto the Kokoda Trail with the object of capturing Port Moresby. By 13 August, the Japanese had landed about 11,100 men, which the object of securing a base to dominate the south Pacific. The Allies commonly believed the Japanese intended to invade Australia, whose Cape York Peninsula was only from New Guinea. Unknown to the Allies, the Chief of the Imperial Japanese Naval General Staff, Osami Nagano, had proposed an invasion, but this plan was rejected in favor of a decision to occupy Midway Island with the intention of cutting Australia off from United States supply lines, eventually forcing Australia to surrender.

General Willoughby continued to believe that the Japanese only intended to build airfields on the northern coast with the intent to attack Port Moresby and Australia by air. But the Japanese fought up the northern side of the Owen Stanley Mountains and in the middle of September, after weeks of fighting, descended the southern slopes to Ioribaiwa Ridge, within of Port Moresby. At the peak of their effort, the Japanese had 16,000 troops in the region. Japanese engineers remained on the coast to fortify the beachhead and build a system of reinforced and cross-linked bunkers.

The Allied air forces relentlessly attacked the Japanese supply lines over the Owen Stanley Mountains that connected the Japanese forces to Buna, Sanananda, and Gona. The weakened Japanese forces, attacked from the air and on the front and flanks by Australian forces, were finally stopped on 17 September at Imita Range, south of Ioribaiwa.

Japanese withdrawal from Kokoda Track

On Guadalcanal, Lieutenant General Harukichi Hyakutake's initial thrust to re-take the island's Henderson Field had been badly defeated. Meanwhile, a landing at Milne Bay had also been repulsed. With the concurrence of the Japanese command staff, he ordered General Horii to withdraw his troops on the Kokoda Track until the issue at Guadalcanal was decided. On 28 September, General Horii and his troops began to hastily withdraw northward over the Owen Stanley Mountains to Kokoda and then to Buna–Gona.

Transport to New Guinea

General Douglas MacArthur had repeatedly requested Washington, D.C. to send him additional troops with which to initiate an offensive campaign and had been pointedly told he would have to make do with the troops on hand. MacArthur had decided as soon as he had reached Australia that the key to its defense lay not on the mainland but in New Guinea. On 13 September 1942 he ordered parts of the 32nd Division to Papua New Guinea even though they had less than two months of training. This would become part of the opening ground offensive against Japanese troops in the Southwest Pacific Area, and MacArthur expected the Americans to quickly and easily advance on and capture the Japanese forward base at Buna.

The U.S. Army typically required divisions to train as a unit for a full year before entering combat. The 32nd had arrived in Australia in April 1942, spent several weeks building its first camp, was transported to a new camp in July, and nearly one third of its troops had been in boot camp only five months previously. Nonetheless U.S. officers decided it was the most combat-ready unit in Australia.

Kapa Kapa Trail march

The Australian Army units on New Guinea were under increasing pressure from the Japanese forces who had advanced within of Port Moresby. Anxious to blunt the Japanese attack, and although no white man had crossed using that route since 1917, General Douglas MacArthur issued orders for United States forces to take the Kapa Kapa Trail running parallel to the Kokoda Track. The 32nd's Divisional Headquarters and two regimental combat teams formed around the 126th and 128th infantry regiments were deployed to Port Moresby between 15 and 29 September 1942.

MacArthur believed based on available intelligence that the U.S. forces could guard the right flank of the Australian forces and entrap the Imperial Japanese troops between the two allied forces. Beginning on 14 October 900 troops of the 2nd Battalion, 114th Engineer Battalion, 19th Portable Hospital, and the 107th Quartermaster Company of 126th Infantry, commanded by Lt. Col. Henry A. Geerds, departed in stages from Karekodobu, nicknamed "Kalamazoo" by the GIs who had a hard time pronouncing the local name.

They were charged with making an extremely difficult trek inland over the Kapa Kapa Trail toward Jaure, where they were to flank the Japanese on the Kokoda Trail. The total distance over the mountains to the Japanese positions was over , and most of the trail was barely a goat path. The men carried only six days rations, expecting to be resupplied en route. The food, however, was very poor, including hardtack, rice and bully beef, some of which had become rancid and sickening many men. They had leather toilet seats but no machetes, insect repellent, waterproof containers for medicine or personal effects, and it rained heavily every day. The men found themselves utterly unprepared for the extremely harsh conditions found in the jungle. The Kapa Kapa trail across the Owen Stanley divide was a "dank and eerie place, rougher and more precipitous" than the Kokoda Track on which the Australians and Japanese were then fighting.

Lead elements of the 126th finally crossed the gap near Mount Obree, which they nicknamed Ghost Mountain, where all of the remaining native porters abandoned the Americans, leaving them to carry their own equipment. On 20 November 1942, after almost 42 days on the trail, crossing exceedingly difficult terrain, including hogback ridges, jungle, and mountainous high-altitude passes, E Company was the first to reach Soputa near the front. The remainder of the battalion trickled in over the next few days. As a result of the extremely difficult march and the decimated ranks of the unit, the battalion earned the nickname of ''The Ghost Battalion''. No other troops were tasked with making the same trek.

Attack on Buna

Two weeks later the remainder of 128th RCT was flown to Wanigela near the Buna where they joined the Australian 18th Brigade. They were to begin an assault on 16 November 1942 on the main Japanese beachheads in eastern New Guinea.

The 32nd Division was among the first of all US divisions to engage in a ground assault against the enemy in World War II. General Harding was nearly killed before the attack began. The first day of the assault, Harding was on board a sixty-two-foot wooden coastal trawler, the Australian civilian crewed ''Minnamurra'' that was operating as part of the U.S. Army's Small Ships Section, with his headquarters company when it and its convoy carrying important artillery and supplies was attacked by Japanese fighter-bombers. Harding saved himself by diving overboard and swimming to shore. The attack destroyed all five vessels and the supplies Harding was relying on for the upcoming attack. More were sunk over the following days or ran aground. General George Kenney wielded a great deal of influence over MacArthur, and although he had no knowledge of jungle warfare, insisted that tanks had no role in ground action in the jungle, but that the "artillery in this theater flies." Harding reluctantly accepted MacArthur's decision to go ahead with the attack and to rely on direct air support in place of tanks or heavy artillery.

Japanese defenses

The Japanese were now commanded by Maj. Gen. Kensaku Oda, who succeeded General Horii, who had drowned in the Kumusi River while retreating from their initial attack across the Kokoda Track on Port Moresby. The Japanese at Buna-Gona were unable to dig deep trenches or shelters due to the water table. Instead, they built hundreds of coconut log bunkers. These had mutually supporting lines of fire and were organized in depth. The bunkers were often linked by trenches allowing the Japanese to move at will among them, reinforcing one another.

Buna was General Douglas MacArthur's first ground offensive campaign against Japanese troops in World War II. He received intelligence from Brigadier General Charles Willoughby, who told MacArthur before the operation that there was "little indication of an attempt to make a strong stand against the Allied advance." Other intelligence he received led him to believe that Buna was held by about 1,000 sick and malnourished soldiers. Unfamiliar with the state of Japanese defenses, Lieutenant General Richard K. Sutherland, MacArthur's chief of staff, glibly referred to these fortifications as "hasty field entrenchments."

The division's performance in battle under the circumstances was not surprising. It was unprepared for offensive operations against what turned out to be some of the strongest Japanese fortified positions in the South Pacific, and was severely hampered by completely inadequate fire support.

Harding relieved

After taking a large number of casualties and making virtually no progress, MacArthur became frustrated with the 32nd Division's performance and gave Major General Robert Eichelberger authority to remove Harding, which Eichelberger promptly did. Eichelberger then ordered a two-day pause in operations, had hot food brought to the front, got additional supplies moved forward, and was able to get the detached 128th restored to the division. These were all actions that Harding had requested and been denied.

Casualties and refitting

U. S. Air Force historian Stanley Falk wrote, "The Papuan campaign was one of the costliest Allied victories of the Pacific war in terms of casualties per troops committed." Of the 9,825 men of the 32nd Division who entered combat, the division suffered 2,520 battle casualties, including 586 killed in action. More telling was the huge number who were casualties due to illness: 7,125 (66%, with 2,952 requiring hospitalization), and 100 more died from other causes. The total casualty count of 9,956 exceeded the division's entire battle strength.

The Ghost Mountain Boys of the 2/126th were especially hard hit. When Buna was taken they finished the fight with only six officers and 126 troops standing out of the 900 plus who had started out from Kapa Kapa. The extremely difficult march by the U.S. 2/126th from Kapa Kapa to Jaure and the brutal combat at Buna-Gona taught the Allied armies important lessons that they applied throughout the Pacific Theater and remainder of the war in the Pacific.

Refitting and retraining

After the 32nd Division wrapped up operations at Buna, the men were slowly transported to Australia for rest, rehabilitation and training. The first units arrived in Brisbane, Australia on 1 March 1943. The complete move took several weeks because of the limited number of planes available to transport the troops over the Owen Stanley Mountains and the few ships available to get the men from Port Moresby to Australia. The last units arrived in April. Upon arrival, some men spent a few days camped near Brisbane and went into town to get drunk. The division then returned to Camp Cable where it had been stationed before it left for New Guinea.

On 1 March 1943, Major General William H. Gill at Camp Carson, Colorado was ordered to Australia to assume command of the division. After a period of rest, the division began training to induct the many replacements into its ranks and help them incorporate the lessons of jungle warfare the division had gained in battle. During March, the 107th Quartermaster Battalion was reorganized as the 32nd Quartermaster Company, and the ordnance detachment was redesignated the 732nd Ordnance Company. The 121st Field Artillery Battalion's 155 mm howitzers were replaced with 75 mm howitzers. By October 1943 the division was ready for combat and moved back to New Guinea. From 16 to 30 October 1943 the 32nd Division was moved from Australia back to New Guinea. At Milne Bay and Goodenough Island they continued their training and prepared for future combat operations.

During December 1943 the U.S. Sixth Army was given the mission to capture Saidor with the goal to cut off the Japanese retreat from Finschhafen. The 32nd division formed the majority of the Michaelmas Task Force given the assignment to help establish a blocking position at Saidor with the intent to trap an entire Japanese division at Sio. They were charged with seizing the airfield at Saidor and securing the surrounding area. The main combat power for the task force was the 126th Infantry.

Operation Cartwheel and Western New Guinea

On 2 January 1944, the 32nd Division took part in Operation Cartwheel, part of MacArthur's "leap-frog" operational plan to take strategic points to use as forward bases. MacArthur sent Allied forces westward along the northern coast of New Guinea in a sequence of operations against selected locations that would provide landing fields for aircraft. This was designed to provide his ground forces with continued close air support and deny the enemy sea and airborne resupply, effectively cutting the Japanese forces off as they were under attack.

Elements of the 32nd's 126th Infantry Regimental Combat Team landed at Saidor on the north coast of New Guinea and helped to end enemy resistance there on 14 April 1944.Miller, ''CARTWHEEL: The Reduction of Rabaul'', p. 296 On 23 April, elements took part in the landing at Aitape, the division arriving on 3 May. After meeting slight initial resistance, the 32nd had to withstand savage counterattacks in the Driniumor River area.

By 31 August, Aitape was secured and the division rested. Elements landed on Morotai on 15 September. The 32nd's command post opened at Hollandia, Dutch New Guinea on 1 October, setting the stage for the advance into the Philippines.

Philippines battles

Battle of Leyte

The Battle of Leyte was the invasion and conquest of Leyte in the Philippines by American and Filipino guerrilla forces under the command of MacArthur. The U.S. forces fought Japanese Army forces led by General Tomoyuki Yamashita. The battle took place from 17 October to 31 December 1944 and launched the Philippines campaign of 1944–45, the goal of which was to recapture and liberate the entire Philippine Archipelago

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