War Without Quarter

Colonel Ichiki's men were practically wiped out the night before in wave after wave of banzai attacks across the Tenaru into the well-prepared Marine defenses. Canister, machine-gun fire, and courage had broken Ichiki's back. As dawn rose above the sand bar it was time for the Marines to mop up..

1942-08-21

HS02

Colonel Ichiki's men were practically wiped out the night before in wave after wave of banzai attacks across the Tenaru into the well-prepared Marine defenses. Canister, machine-gun fire, and courage had broken Ichiki's back. As dawn rose above the sand bar it was time for the Marines to mop up..

Tenaru River, Guadalcanal

The Battle of the Tenaru, sometimes called the Battle of the Ilu River or the Battle of Alligator Creek, was a land battle between the Imperial Japanese Army and Allied ground forces that took place on August 21, 1942 on the island of Guadalcanal during the Pacific campaign of World War II. The battle was the first major Japanese land offensive during the Guadalcanal campaign. In the battle, U.S. Marines, under the overall command of U.S. Major General Alexander Vandegrift, repulsed an assault by the "First Element" of the "Ichiki" Regiment, under the command of Japanese Colonel Kiyonao Ichiki. The Marines were defending the Lunga perimeter, which guarded Henderson Field, which had been captured by the Allies in landings on Guadalcanal on August 7. Ichiki's unit was sent to Guadalcanal in response to the Allied landings with the mission of recapturing the airfield and driving the Allied forces off the island. Underestimating the strength of Allied forces on Guadalcanal, which at the time numbered about 11,000 personnel, Ichiki's unit conducted a nighttime frontal assault on Marine positions at Alligator Creek on the east side of the Lunga perimeter. Jacob Vouza, a Coastwatcher scout, warned the Americans of the impending attack minutes before Ichiki's assault. The Japanese were defeated with heavy losses. The Marines counterattacked Ichiki's surviving troops after daybreak, killing many more. All but 128 of the original 917 of the Ichiki Regiment's First Element died. The battle was the first of three separate major land offensives by the Japanese in the Guadalcanal campaign. The Japanese realized after Tenaru that Allied forces on Guadalcanal were much greater in number than originally estimated and sent larger forces to the island for their subsequent attempts to retake Henderson Field.

American

Japanese

Scenario Type = Standard