Seen by the Japanese High Command as a top strategic location, Guadalcanal was to serve as the starting point for an invasion of New Guinea, Australia, and total dominance in the Pacific. Barley nine months after Pearl Harbor, U.S. forces struck back at the Japanese on this small island half a world away, to fight what would be one of the decisive battles of the war in the Pacific, and stopping the expansion of Japanese forces into the Pacific, and even into the Indian Ocean. The victory of the 1st marine Division at Guadalcanal is told here in pictures for the first time, and ranks with the most bloody, dramatic, heroic, and enduring campaigns of military history. The longest and most complicated operation of the Pacific war this led to more deaths at sea than on the island itself. Involving three major land battles, five navel ones, and almost continual arial combat this changed the nature of warfare, and marked the first victory over Japanese forces in the Pacific, forcing them from offensive to defensive strategies, and is rightly regarded as the turning-point in this field of World War II. Capturing every detail of this hard-won island in vivid, dramatic photography, Eric Hammell's book is a valuable addition to this part of history, and a fitting tribute to the men who sacrificed so much in winning the first stepping stone on the path to Tokyo Bay and victory over the Japanese.