Betio

Now, the New Zealand operations specialists who are organizing this, they confirmed that these are unstable, unexploded ordinances, and so they have to be demolished inside the bunker itself.

So from September 4th, that's tomorrow onwards, that zone in Betio that was a yellow zone is now going to become a red zone.

Transportation will be organised for the Betio residents to arrive, to leave and then come back in that period of time.

But at 3pm when the evacuations are conducted tomorrow, they are asking all of the residents to be ready with the items that they need to be able to be taken to the evacuation centres.

Okay.

No, it's a great question.

I think historians today, military historians largely look back on- The idea of island hopping and say, "What a waste," because the reality is a lot of the intermediate targets that during Operation Cartwheel, for example, Betio, the Tarawa atoll, um, highly strategically insignificant in the long run.

The theory behind Betio Island, w- you know, again, this bird-shaped island that has a long airfield along the breast of the, of the bird, and a long seaport where the bird's feet might be, the idea was if we could seize that piece of key terrain, we could use the airfield and project air power and sea power to the next island, so on and so forth, and it ended up being useless.

Um, six months later, the Americans abandoned the airfield at Betio 'cause it was too short even for B-25s, which was our smallest bomber in the Pacific.

So a lot of historians will look back and say, "No, island hopping was not the right decision.

Leapfrogging as a form of maneuver warfare would've been much more efficient, and the cost of, um, gold and blood that was expended for it." But I do think it's worth noting, there were, in spite of the fact that Tarawa and, and Operation Cartwheel could be considered an unnecessary loss, it was an operational victory, but massive losses.

It was done effectively.

So lots of good learning that in Operation Cartwheel a year later ends up being absolutely invaluable as we continue to iterate and learn.