This fully-illustrated account details all the major battles, decisions, and outcomes as the Japanese military sought to collapse the United States' principal military enclave in East Asia and seize a country rich in natural and human resources for their Greater East Asia Prosperity Sphere. The planned 50-day campaign took 133 days because they underestimated the grit of their foes. Despite horrendous conditions, lack of air support, food, and medicine, sheer grit compelled the Americans and Filipinos not to give up, even if the rest of the world had given up on them. AGES: 10 and up AUTHOR: Jay Wertz is the author of seven books: D-Day: The Campaign Across France; The World Turns to War; The Pacific, Volume One: Pearl Harbor to Guadalcanal; The Pacific, Volume Two: The Solomons to Saipan; The Native American Experience; The Civil War Experience 1861-1865 and co-author of Smithsonian's Great Battles and Battlefields of the Civil War with prominent historian Edwin C. Bearss. He is currently writing additional volumes of War Stories: World War II Firsthand, a twelve-part book series of eyewitness accounts.
