Last week the Navy and the Army moved up to Japan's outer doorstep in the Central Pacific (see map). Simultaneously, a new Central Pacific Command was created; at its head Pacific Commander in Chief Admiral Chester W. Nimitz put a 57-year-old Hoosier, Vice Admiral Raymond A. Spruance, veteran of the Battle of Midway.
On Tarawa, Makin and Abemama, tiny pin points of coral and sand, Admiral Spruance's Marines and soldiers fought Japs for whom there was no line of retreat. But ahead of the Americans there was a pregnant line of advanceĀto the Marshalls, to the Japs' great naval-and-air center...
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