2nd Battalion, 25th Marine Regiment is a reserve infantry battalion in the United States Marine Corps , currently headquartered in Garden City, New York, with its subordinate units located throughout the Mid-Atlantic States. The battalion falls under the command of the 25th Marine Regiment and the 4th Marine Division.
The battalion was first activated on 01 May, 1943 at the new Marine Corps Base of Camp Lejeune, New River, North Carolina. In August and September, 1943, they were relocated to Camp Pendleton, Oceanside, California to complete their training. In January 1944, they were deployed to the Marshall Islands in the Central Pacific and participated in the first of their WWII combat actions on several islets of Kwajalein Atoll in support of the 4th Marine Division's primary mission of securing the largest connecting islets of Roi and Namur at the north end of Kwajalein Atoll.
There soon followed actions on Saipan (15 Jun-09 Jul, 1944) and Tinian (24 Jul-09 Aug, 1944) in the Northern Marianas Islands, for which the 4th Marine Division received the Navy Presidential Unit Citation. In February 1945, the battalion landed with other units of the 4th Marine Division on the island of Iwo Jima in the Bonin 'Volcano' Islands of Japan. The resulting battle was the bloodiest for the United States Marine Corps in WWII and resulted in a second Navy Presidential Unit Citation for the 4th Marine Division.
In October 1945, the 25th Marine Regiment and the entire 4th Marine Division were relocated to Camp Pendleton, Oceanside, California and were subsequently de-activated on 31 October, 1945.
On 01 July, 1962, 2/25 was re-activated and assigned to the 4th Marine Division, Marine Forces Reserve. The battalion has since participated, in whole or in part in the First Gulf War (1990-1991) and the Global War on Terror (2001-Present) as well as making some deployments to African nations like Senegal and Mozambique. In addition, 2/25 has been deployed to such diverse locations as Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, Lithuania, Romania and Norway to participate in training activities.
Description
The 2nd and 4th Marine Divisions landed on 24 July 1944, supported by naval bombardment and artillery firing across the strait from Saipan. A successful feint for the major settlement of Tinian Town diverted defenders from the actual landing site on the north of the island. The battleship Colorado and the destroyer Norman Scott were both hit by 6-inch (150 mm) Japanese shore batteries. Colorado was hit 22 times, killing 44 men. Norman Scott was hit six times, killing the captain, Seymore Owens, and 22 of his seamen. The Japanese adopted the same stubborn resistance as on Saipan, retreating during the day and attacking at night. The gentler terrain of Tinian allowed the attackers more effective use of tanks and artillery than in the mountains of Saipan, and the island was secured in nine days of fighting. On 31 July, the surviving Japanese launched a suicide charge.
The battle saw the first use of napalm in the Pacific. Of the 120 jettisonable tanks dropped during the operation, 25 contained the napalm mixture and the remainder an oil-gasoline mixture. Of the entire number, only 14 were duds, and eight of these were set afire by subsequent strafing runs. Carried by Vought F4U Corsairs, the "fire bombs", also known as napalm bombs, burned away foliage concealing enemy installations.
Aftermath
Japanese losses were far greater than American losses. The Japanese lost 8,010. Only 313 Japanese were taken prisoner. American losses stood at 328 dead and 1,571 wounded. Several hundred Japanese troops held out in the jungles for months. The garrison on Aguijan Island off the southwest cape of Tinian, commanded by Lieutenant Kinichi Yamada, held out until the end of the war, surrendering on 4 September 1945. The last holdout on Tinian, Murata Susumu, was not captured until 1953.
After the battle, Tinian became an important base for further Allied operations in the Pacific Campaign. Camps were built for 50,000 troops. Fifteen thousand Seabees turned the island into the busiest airfield of the war, with six 7,900-foot (2,400 m) runways for attacks by B-29 Superfortress bombers on targets in the Philippines, the Ryukyu Islands and mainland Japan, including the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
Four 1000-bed hospitals were planned and located in preparation for the invasion of Japan. None were actually built, as the Japanese surrendered after the atomic bombs were dropped, which thus ended the need for the hospitals.