Military searches for remains of Marines who died in the Battle of Tarawa
The Battle of Tarawa was one of the first U.S. amphibious campaigns of World War II. It also was one of the most ferocious.
Thousands of Marines charged the beach, only to be killed by Japanese machine gun fire when their boats got stuck on a coral reef. Hundreds of Marines died, thousands more were injured in three days of fighting.
Sixty-seven years later, the U.S. military is back on the tiny Pacific atoll just 80 miles north of the equator to search for the remains of Marines who never made it home.
An 11-person team from the Hawaii-based Joint POW/MIA Accounting Command could find a couple hundred Marines during the largest mission of its kind at Tarawa, said spokesman Army Maj. Ramon Osorio....
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Thousands of Marines charged the beach, only to be killed by Japanese machine gun fire when their boats got stuck on a coral reef. Hundreds of Marines died, thousands more were injured in three days of fighting.
Sixty-seven years later, the U.S. military is back on the tiny Pacific atoll just 80 miles north of the equator to search for the remains of Marines who never made it home.
An 11-person team from the Hawaii-based Joint POW/MIA Accounting Command could find a couple hundred Marines during the largest mission of its kind at Tarawa, said spokesman Army Maj. Ramon Osorio....