Operations of the 2d Battalion, 35th Infantry (25th Division), on Mount Austen, Guadalcanal

Covers the operations of the Second Battalion, 35th Infantry Regiment (25th Division), in reducing the Gifu Strongpoint on Mount Austen during the battle to seize and secure the island of Guadalcanal in January 1943. The American success on Guadalcanal is generally considered the turning point of the war in the Pacific. Prior to that victory, the Japanese Army had moved swiftly and at will through the South Pacific, seizing strategic islands, with Australia and New Zealand as the ultimate objectives. The recapture of Guadalcanal represented not only the turning point in the Pacific War, but also the first major defeat the Japanese Army had ever suffered in its history.