page_title: Japanese occupation of the Gilbert Islands
section_title: Northern Gilbert Islands
hierarchical_section_title: Japanese occupation of the Gilbert Islands / Northern Gilbert Islands
caption_attribution_description: English: OCE-3a-Oceania-Japanese Occupation-10 Shillings ND (1942)
context_page_description: The Japanese occupation of the Gilbert Islands was the period in the history of Kiribati between 1941 and 1945 when Imperial Japanese forces occupied Gilbert Islands during World War II, on the Pacific War theatre.
  From 1941 to 1943, Imperial Japanese Navy forces occupied the Gilbert Islands and from 1942 until 1945 Ocean Island where were the headquarters of the Gilbert and Ellice Islands colony.
context_section_description: The Japanese occupation of the Northern Gilbert Islands could be fall onto three periods:
  from 10 December 1941 to 16 August 1942, with a light Japanese occupation of Makin Islands (nowadays Butaritari and Makin) to the raid by the Marines. During this first period, only Butaritari was garrisoned with a seaplane base;
  from 20 August 1942 to March 1943, with a gradual increase of the expansion towards South, including Tarawa and Abemama, and also Nauru outside of the Gilberts, to become fortified places with airfields;
  the last phase, before the end of occupation, from March to the end of battle of Tarawa and battle of Makin on 23 November 1943.
  On the day of their attack on Pearl Harbor, Japanese military forces onboard the minelayer Okinoshima which was serving as flagship for Admiral Kiyohide Shima in Operation Gi (the invasion of the Gilbert Islands) and had deployed from Jaluit with a Special Naval Landing Force (SNLF) embarked. From 9-10 December, Okinoshima supported the Japanese landings on Makin and on Tarawa, and on 24 December, the seizure of Abaiang. The 51st Guards Force from Jaluit Atoll occupied on 10 December 1941 (local time 0045), Makin and on 11 December Little Makin, then later Abaiang and Marakei in the northern Gilbert Islands. Japanese immediately seized the New Zealand Coastwatchers of Makin. Within two days, a seaplane base was built on Makin lagoon by Nagata Maru.
  Few hours before Makin occupation, on 10 December 1941, the same Japanese landing military (DesDiv 29/Section 1's Asanagi and Yūnagi) visited Tarawa, where they round up the Europeans and informed them that they cannot leave the atoll without the permission of the naval commander, Kiyohide Shima. The Japanese destroyed all means of transportation and ransack the Burns Philp trading station, then departed for Makin atoll.
  On 31 August 1942, Japanese troops occupied also Abemama. On September, some remote central and southern islands were also briefly visited or occupied (Tamana was the southernmost) especially for destroying the Coastwatchers network, headquartered on Beru. On 15 September 1942, Japanese forces occupied Tarawa and began fortifying the atoll, mainly Betio islet where they built an airfield. In response, on 2 October 1942, US forces occupied the Ellice Islands and began constructing airfields on Funafuti, Nukufetau and Nanumea as a base of operations against the Japanese occupation in the Gilbert and Marshall Islands.
  On 27 March 1943, a Japanese aircraft attacked the new American airfield at Funafuti for the first time.
  On 6 November 1943, the United States Seventh Air Force established its forward headquarters base on Funafuti, to prepare the battle of Tarawa.
  Rear Admiral Keiji Shibazaki was killed on 20 November 1943, as the last commander of the Japanese 3rd Special Base Force — in garrison on the island of Betio — and of the Gilbert Islands, Nauru and Ocean Island. Admiral Carl Henry Jones (1893 - 1958) became thereafter the U.S. commander of the Gilbert Islands subarea (from 18 Dec 1943 to 1 Oct 1944), at the end of this battle.
caption: 10 shillings of the Japanese occupation currency, 1942
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