Trouble along the Ilu - The Matrix Games version of Rising Sun

Tenaru, 7km ESE of Lunga Point, Guadalcanal: NIGHT [Best played as Axis] On 13 August, the Japanese High Command ordered the Seventeenth Army, headquartered at Rabaul, to retake Guadalcanal from the US 1st Marine Division. The spearhead of the operation was the 7th Division's 28th Infantry Regiment, commanded by Colonel Ichiki, the leading elements of which began landing on the night of the 18th with the first run of the "Tokyo Express." Once ashore at Taivu Point, east of the American perimeter around Henderson Field, Ichiki began to fear he had lost the element of surprise and decided to march west at once and strike the enemy with the reinforced 2nd/28 Infantry Battalion. In the early morning darkness of the 21st, Ichiki's men approached the Ilu River, also known as Alligator Creek, where they ran into listening posts of the 2nd/1 Marine Battalion positioned along the slightly higher west bank. With little regard for the Marine dispositions, Ichiki ordered an immediate attack, confident that the "cowardly" Marines could be quickly overrun with "one brush of the Samurai's armored sleeve." Before the night was over, both sides would discover the high price of this particular piece of waterfront property along Iron Bottom Sound. Design Note: Special thanks to Tom Herrschaft for the use of his Guadalcanal map.