Line of Departure: Tarawa - The Matrix Games version of Rising Sun

Betio, Tarawa Atoll, Gilbert Islands: [Best played as Allied] The image most people have of the war with Japan is of amphibious assaults on coral islands in the central Pacific. The attack on Betio Island, usually just known as Tarawa, by the US 2nd Marine Division in the fall of 1943, was one of the first. Once a British possession, Betio had been occupied in December of 1941. Then with the reverses suffered in 1942, Japanese Imperial Headquarters decided to fortify the island and build an airfield to serve as an important link in Japan's defensive perimeter. It was the mission of Admiral Shibasaki's 3rd Special Base Force to prepare the Gilbert Islands to face an American attack. By November 1943, the tiny island had been built into a formidable fortress with concrete pillboxes, log bunkers and a considerable number of heavy caliber support weapons. Alerted to the approaching invasion force on the 19th, the defenders spent the next morning under an intense naval bombardment that destroyed the above ground facilities but left most of the combat power of the garrison intact. It was up to the marines of the reinforced 2nd Marine RCT, churning through the choppy seas toward Red Beach, to force their way ashore in the face of a well-organized defense on the island that came to be know only as "Bloody Tarawa". Design Note: Map scale has been adjusted for clarity and playability.