The document summarizes key events of the Philippine Campaign during World War 2, including the Japanese invasion and conquest of the Philippines from 1941-1942, the battles of Bataan and Corregidor, the Bataan Death March, subsequent liberation efforts by the US including the raid at Cabanatuan POW camp, and major naval/land battles like Leyte Gulf, Manila, and Zigzag Pass as the Americans fought to retake the Philippines from 1945.

1. The Philippine Campaign
Sir Malit

2. • The Philippine Campaign or the Battle of the
Philippines, fought 8 December 1941 – 8 May
1942, was the invasion of the Philippines by
Japan and the defense of the islands by
Filipino and United States forces.

3. • The Japanese launched the invasion by sea from
Formosa over 200 miles to the north of the
Philippines. The defending forces outnumbered
the Japanese invaders by 3 to 2, however were a
mixed force of non-combat experienced regular,
national guard, constabulary and newly created
Commonwealth units. The Japanese used first-
line troops at the outset of the campaign
concentrating forces in the first month enabling a
swift overrun of most of Luzon.

4. The Japanese Objective
• The Japanese planned to occupy the
Philippines as part of their plan for a "Greater
East Asia War" in which their Southern
Expeditionary Army Group seized sources of
raw materials in Malaya and the Netherlands
East Indies while the Combined Fleet
neutralized the United States Pacific Fleet.

5. • The Southern Expeditionary Army was created on 6
November 1941, commanded by Gen. Count Hisaichi
Terauchi, who had previously been Minister of War. It
was ordered to prepare for war in the event that
negotiations with the United States did not succeed in
peacefully meeting Japanese objectives. Under
Terauchi's command were four corps-equivalent
armies, comprising ten divisions and three combined
arms brigades, including the 14th Army. Operations
against the Philippines and Malaya were to be
conducted simultaneously when Imperial General
Headquarters ordered.

6. The Japanese
Landed
The
Japanese
forces came
from
Formosa
(Taiwan)

7. The invasion of the Philippines had three objectives:
• To prevent the use of the Philippines as an
advance base of operations by American
forces
• To acquire staging areas and supply bases to
enhance operations against the Netherlands
East Indies
• To secure the lines of communication between
occupied areas in the south and the Japanese
Home Islands.

8. The Battle of Bataan
• The Battle of Bataan (7
January – 9 April 1942)
was a battle that
represented the most
intense phase of
Imperial Japan's
invasion of the
Philippines during
World War II.

9. • In January 1942, forces of the Imperial
Japanese Army and Navy invaded Luzon along
with several islands in the Philippine
Archipelago after the bombing of the
American naval base at Pearl Harbor. The
commander-in-chief of all Filipino and
American forces in the islands, General
Douglas MacArthur, consolidated all of his
Luzon-based units on the Bataan Peninsula to
fight against the Japanese invaders.

10. Gen. Edward P. King
• After months of fighting
the invading Japanese
Army and with food and
medicine exhausted, King
himself, accepting sole
responsibility to disobey
MacArthur's and
Wainwright's orders,
chose to surrender his
troops on 9 April 1942.
(This day is
commemorated in the
Philippines as Araw ng
Kagitingan "Day of
Valor").
A combined American and
Filipino force of over 75,000
surrendered; this was the
largest surrender of a military
force in American history.
Thousands of these soldiers
would die under Japanese
captivity during the ensuing
Bataan Death March and
imprisonment.

11. • Despite a lack of supplies, Filipino (many were
U.S. Nationals) and American forces managed
to fight the Japanese for three months,
engaging them initially in a fighting retreat
southward. As the combined Filipino and
American forces made a last stand, the delay
cost the Japanese valuable time and
prevented immediate victory across the
Pacific.

12. • The surrender at Bataan, with 140,000
soldiers surrendering in the Philippines
altogether, was the largest in American and
Filipino military histories, and was the largest
United States surrender since the American
Civil War's Battle of Harper's Ferry. Soon
afterwards, Filipino and American (including
Filipino-American and Chinese-Filipino)
prisoners of war were forced into the Bataan
Death March.

14. The Bataan Death March
• The Bataan Death March
was the forcible transfer by
the Imperial Japanese Army
of 60,000–80,000 Filipino
and American prisoners of
war from Saisaih Point and
Mariveles to Camp
O'Donnell, Capas, Tarlac, via
San Fernando, Pampanga,
where the prisoners were
loaded onto trains.
• The 60 mi (97 km) march
was characterized by severe
physical abuse. It was later
judged by an Allied military
commission to be a
Japanese war crime.

15. The Fall of Corregidor
• The Imperial Japanese Army
then concentrated on the
island of Corregidor. Lt.
General Jonathan Wainwright
refused to surrender. The
island was relentlessly
pummelled by the Imperial
Japanese artillery for several
weeks. The island was
surrounded and cut off from
receiving any reinforcements
and supplies from the United
States. On the night of May 5,
the Imperial Japanese landed
troops and tanks. They quickly
began advancing towards
Malinta Tunnel where there
were thousands of patients
and nurses.

16. The raid at Cabanatuan
• The Raid at Cabanatuan, also known as The
Great Raid, was a rescue of Allied prisoners of
war (POWs) and civilians from a Japanese
camp near Cabanatuan City, in the Philippines.
On January 30, 1945, during World War II,
United States Army Rangers, Alamo Scouts,
and Filipino guerrillas liberated more than 500
from the POW camp.

17. • In a night time raid, under the cover of darkness and a
distraction by a P-61 Black Widow, the group surprised
the Japanese forces in and around the camp. Hundreds
of Japanese troops were killed in the 30-minute
coordinated attack; the Americans suffered minimal
casualties. The Rangers, Scouts, and guerrillas escorted
the POWs back to American lines. The rescue allowed
the prisoners to tell of the death march and prison
camp atrocities, which sparked a new rush of resolve
for the war against Japan. The rescuers were awarded
commendations by MacArthur, and were also
recognized by President Franklin D. Roosevelt.

18. Henry L. Mucci
• In January 1945, Mucci led 121
Army Rangers in liberating the
Cabanatuan Prison Camp with
the loss of only 2 men killed in
action. Mucci refused to sit
back on the mission and
joined his soldiers on the
ground in combat, an unusual
position for a colonel. The raid
was supported by some 250
Filipino guerrillas, many of
whom were unarmed, who
guided the Rangers through
Japanese held territory and
held off Japanese
reinforcements while the
American Rangers freed the
POWs.

19. The 6th Ranger battalion

20. Battle of Leyte Gulf
• The Battle of Leyte Gulf is generally
considered to be the largest naval battle of
World War II and, by some criteria, possibly
the largest naval battle in history.

21. Battle of Leyte Gulf
• It was fought in waters near the Philippine islands of
Leyte, Samar and Luzon, from 23–26 October 1944,
between combined American and Australian forces and
the Imperial Japanese Navy. On 20 October, United
States troops invaded the island of Leyte as part of a
strategy aimed at isolating Japan from the countries it
had occupied in Southeast Asia, and in particular
looting the vast supply of oil on Leyte. The Imperial
Japanese Navy (IJN) mobilized nearly all of its
remaining major naval vessels in an attempt to defeat
the Allied invasion but was repulsed by the U.S. Navy's
3rd and 7th Fleets. The IJN failed to achieve its
objective, suffered very heavy losses, and never sailed
to battle in comparable force thereafter. The majority
of its surviving heavy ships, deprived of fuel, remained
in their bases for the rest of the Pacific War.

22. The Leyte Landings
• After advancing island
by island across the
Pacific Ocean, U.S.
General Douglas
MacArthur wades
ashore onto the
Philippine island of
Leyte, fulfilling his
promise to return to the
area he was forced to
flee in 1942.

23. The Leyte Landings

24. The Battle of Manila
(1945)
• The Battle of Manila (February 3, 1945 –
March 3, 1945) was a major battle of the
Philippine campaign of 1944-45 during World
War II that was fought by the American and
Filipino forces against the Empire of Japan in
Manila, the capital city of the Philippines. The
one-month battle, which culminated in the
massacre of over 100,000 civilians and
complete devastation of the city, was the
scene of the worst urban fighting in the Pacific
theater.

25. Battle of Zigzag Pass
• On 31 January 1945, driving west of Olongapo,
the 38th Division advanced east on the
intricate maze of enemy fortifications in 'Zig-
Zag Pass', at the same time seeking out both
Japanese flanks. But on the morning of 1
February, after about three miles (5 km) of
steady progress, the 152nd Regiment ran into
Japanese strongpoints at 'Horseshoe Bend',
the first known major 'Zig-Zag Pass' obstacles.