부산대학교 도서관

This article features Japanese Colonel Kunio Nakagawa who had set foot on Peleliu. Colonel Nakagawa's prolonged and determined defense of the tiny island inspired awe in Tokyo, and 10 times during the fighting Emperor Hirohito commended the beleaguered garrison. Promoted to lieutenant colonel, in 1938 Nakagawa entered a nine-month special course at the War College designed to pre pare midlevel officers to fill staff assignments in the scores of new divisions and brigades that Japan had mobilized for the China war. Nakagawa chose to defend the island from a redoubt anchored in the central mountains. He proposed to construct a warren of underground tunnels, fixed strong points and pillboxes and to utilize whatever natural terrain the island provided to mount a defense with mutually supporting interlocking zones of fire. The end result would be a defender's dream and an attacker's nightmare.