ABSTRACT
With the loss of four irreplaceable carriers, Japan concentrated on building “stationary flat-tops,” that is, airfields, to defend its far-flung perimeter. One day a local commander at Tulagi took a pleasure excursion over to Guadalcanal, 19 miles to the south, finding there a site for an airfield on the plain east of the Lunga River, next to one of the copra plantations formerly operated by Lever Brothers. On 22 May 1942 a Japanese reconnaissance plane, probably part of the 5th Air Radar from Rabaul, was spotted flying over it. On 8 June some of the Japanese force from Tulagi set up camp near Lunga Point, and on 19 June an airfield survey team was dispatched.1
