ABSTRACT
This chapter paints the transition from Japanese supremacy to a stage of stalemate and finally defeat in the Solomons. Guadalcanal was mostly an American theatre and the Australians played a secondary role in Bougainville. The first large-scale amphibious expedition in the Pacific was launched by the American armed forces at Guadalcanal. Since Guadalcanal was an amphibious expedition, equal attention is given to the land and aerial-naval aspects. The first section gives an account of the strategic landscape in mid-1942. The next section concentrates on the campaign in Guadalcanal, and the third section focuses on the ‘foxhole’ perspective. The last two sections turn the spotlight on combat in New Georgia and Bougainville, which resulted in the culmination of the Solomons Campaign. Both Yamamoto and the IJA initially underestimated the threat posed by the American ground and aerial force in the Lower Solomons. Japan had no chance of winning a drawn-out, attrition-oriented war with the United States because of the latter’s superiority in manpower resources and productive capacity.
