The Japanese invasion and conquest of Burma concluded in May, 1942. The campaign marked the beginning of Japan’s years-long campaign in the South-East Asian region in the Second World War.
In the image below, Japanese troops can be seen lined up at the Burmese border in January, shortly before the invasion began.
The Doolittle Raid, a series of US bomb attacks on Japan, took place on the 18th of April, 1942. Also called the Tokyo Raid, it was seen as retaliation for the Pearl Harbor attack a few months before.
The first of Japan’s Second World War attacks on Darwin, Australia occurred on the 19th of February, 1942.
The same fleet that bombed Pearl Harbor bombed the Northern Territory, but considerably more bombs were dropped on Australia than in the US.
Darwin Post Office destroyed X
The attack came in two waves, and hundreds of people – including civilians – were killed. It was the beginning of many Japanese attacks on Australia (there were approximately 100 more attacks), who had been involved in the conflict since the beginning of the war.
This is Christmas Day in Papua New Guinea in 1942. Injured Australian soldier George C. “Dick” Whittington is helped to a hospital by Raphael Oimbari. These native men were named the “Fuzzy Wuzzy Angels” by the Australian soldiers for the help they provided them in the Second World War.
Sadly, the injured soldier died a few weeks after this picture was taken.
Halfway through the Second World War, after Japan bombed Pearl Harbor and the United States joined the conflict, American citizens and legal US residents of Japanese descent were moved to internment camps for the remainder of the war.
Construction of the Gila River War Relocation Center in Arizona began in May 1942.
A few months later, in the same year, the camp hosted a Christian service and then a Harvest Festival parade on Thanksgiving Day. The holiday fell on the 26th of November that year.
Following the Fall of Singapore, the Japanese Imperial Army began the Sook Ching, or the “purge through cleansing” of allegedly “hostile” Chinese in Singapore, on the 18th of February 1942.
Later, the Sook Ching would be extended to also include the Chinese in Malaya.
Chinese Singaporean authorities place the death toll of the massacre at around 100 000.
While the Japanese authorities admitted the massacre did take place, their official figures place the death toll at fewer than 5000.
The massacre continued until the 4th of March.
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