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Amphibious tractor was invented
It was invented in the late 1930s to rescue people in Florida swamps. It had never been used in combat, and the Navy bought only 200 of them in 1941. -
Philippines surrendered to the Japanese
The troops in the Bataan Peninsula surrendered, and a small force held out on the island of Corregidor in Manila Bay. -
U.S. decoded Japan’s message
The U.S. decoded Japanese messages and alerted the United States of the Japanese's attack on New Guinea. In response, Admiral Nimitz sent two carriers, the Yorktown and the Lexington, to intercept the Japanese in the Coral Sea. -
Defenders of the Bataan Peninsula surrendered
The Allied forces were forced to surrender to the Japanese, due to the fatal conditions of their soldiers. -
America bombs fell on Japan for the first time
President Roosevelt put Lieutenant Colonel Doolittle in command of the mission to bomb Tokyo. At the end of March, a crane loaded sixteen B-25s onto the aircraft carrier Hornet. -
Japanese launched their aircraft against Midway
The Japanese ran into fire, and 38 planes were shot down. As the Japanese prepared a second wave to attack Midway, aircraft from the American carriers Hornet, Yorktown, and Enterprise launched a counterattack. -
Battle of Midway was over
The Japanese navy lost four large carriers. Six months after Pearl Harbor, the United States had stopped the Japanese from advancing. The battle killed 362 Americans and 3,057 Japanese. -
American captured the Mariana Islands
American military planners wanted to use the Marianas as a base for a new heavy bomber, the B-29 Superfortress. Admiral Nimitz decided to invade three of the Mariana Islands: Saipan, Tinian, and Guam -
Battle of Leyte Gulf began
The battle was known as the bloodiest battle of WWII. It destroyed the Imperial Japanese Navy as an offensive force and decisively led to the defeat of Japan in 1945. -
MacArthur's troops captured Manila
The battle left the city in ruins and more than 100,000 Filipino civilians dead. The remaining Japanese retreated into the rugged terrain north of Manila. They were still fighting in August 1945 when word came that Japan had surrendered.