Orote Field is a former

air base An air base (sometimes referred to as a military air base, military airfield, military airport, air station, naval air station, air force station, or air force base) is an aerodrome used as a military base by a military force for the operation ...

in the

United States territory In the United States, a territory is any extent of region under the sovereign jurisdiction of the federal government of the United States, including all waters (around islands or continental tracts). The United States asserts sovereign rights for ...

Guam Guam (; ch, Guåhan ) is an organized, unincorporated territory of the United States in the Micronesia subregion of the western Pacific Ocean. It is the westernmost point and territory of the United States (reckoned from the geographic cent ...

built by the

Empire of Japan The also known as the Japanese Empire or Imperial Japan, was a historical nation-state and great power that existed from the Meiji Restoration in 1868 until the enactment of the post-World War II Constitution of Japan, 1947 constitu ...

with

Chamorro Chamorro may refer to: * Chamorro people, the indigenous people of the Mariana Islands in the Western Pacific * Chamorro language, an Austronesian language indigenous to The Marianas * Chamorro Time Zone, the time zone of Guam and the Northern Mar ...

forced labor during the

Japanese occupation of Guam The Japanese occupation of Guam was the period in the history of Guam between 1941 and 1944 when Imperial Japanese forces occupied Guam during World War II. The island was renamed Ōmiya-Jima ('Great Shrine Island'). Events leading to the occ ...

(1941-1944). It is separate from the Marine Corps amphibious airplane base at located at Sumay village that was operational from 1921 to 1931. Following the

liberation of Guam The Battle of Guam (21 July–10 August 1944) was the American recapture of the Japanese-held island of Guam, a U.S. territory in the Mariana Islands captured by the Japanese from the United States in the First Battle of Guam in 1941 during ...

in 1944, the U.S. military repaired the field for further use in the Pacific War. Located on

Naval Base Guam Naval Base Guam is a strategic U.S. naval base located on Apra Harbor and occupying the Orote Peninsula. In 2009, it was combined with Andersen Air Force Base to form Joint Region Marianas, which is a Navy-controlled joint base. The Ship Repa ...

, Orote Field was largely abandoned after World War II except for occasional training exercises. One major event in 1975 was

Operation New Life Operation New Life (23 April – 1 November 1975) was the care and processing on Guam of Vietnamese refugees evacuated before and after the Fall of Saigon, the closing day of the Vietnam War. More than 111,000 of the evacuated 130,000 Vietna ...

, when a tent city for tens of thousands of South Vietnamese refugees was erected at the field. The field was listed on the

National Register of Historic Places The National Register of Historic Places (NRHP) is the United States federal government's official list of districts, sites, buildings, structures and objects deemed worthy of preservation for their historical significance or "great artistic ...

in 1975.

History

On August 6, 1941, Naval Governor George McMillin sent a letter reporting surveys indicating that the Orote Peninsula could sustain a -by- landplane runway. However, the U.S. did not actually start construction of such a runway. During the

villages A village is a clustered human settlement or community, larger than a hamlet but smaller than a town (although the word is often used to describe both hamlets and smaller towns), with a population typically ranging from a few hundred to ...

were required to supply levies of able bodied men to work on airfields and other defense projects. Orote Field was the first of the Japanese airfields on Guam to be completed by Chamorro laborers, largely by hand, in 1943. From May 1944 through the second Battle of Guam, the airfield was attacked from the air and American troops established their beachhead on either side of the

Orote Peninsula The Orote Peninsula is a four kilometer-long peninsula jutting from the west coast of the United States territory of Guam. A major geologic feature of the island, it forms the southern coast of Apra Harbor and the northern coast of Agat Bay. Its t ...

on July 21 in order to seize the airfield and the adjacent deep water Apra Harbor. The airfield was recaptured by July 30. At that time the Seabees of the 3rd Battalion 19th Marines LLP (25th Naval Construction Battalion) got the airfield operational. The airfield was one of many U.S. airfields on Guam during the Pacific War and was closed permanently in 1946. It still sees some use as a touch-and-go training strip used by C-130 Hercules crews located nearby on Andersen Air Force Base. and The old airfield was used to house 50,000 evacuees from South Vietnam during

in 1975 and was used as a

tent city A tent city is a temporary housing facility made using tents or other temporary structures. State governments or military organizations set up tent cities to house evacuees, refugees, or soldiers. UNICEF's Supply Division supplies expandable te ...

for the 1999 Tandem Thrust military exercise. It is now part of

References

External links

*
Orote Airfield
at the Pacific Wrecks history website Defunct airports in the United States Airports in Guam Military installations of the United States in Guam Airports on the National Register of Historic Places Buildings and structures on the National Register of Historic Places in Guam Historic American Engineering Record in Guam World War II on the National Register of Historic Places in Guam Orote 1921 establishments in Guam Orote Peninsula {{Guam-geo-stub