Operation Cottage - How the U.S. Army stormed an empty island.

Operation Cottage is the code name for the U.S. Army's operation to liberate Kiska Island from the Japanese in the Pacific Campaign of World War II. The operation took place from August 15-24, 1943.
The capture of Kiska Island is a truly unique case in the history of warfare, when the Japanese army suffered no casualties and the Americans lost more than 300 men killed and wounded. Also, one destroyer was damaged because it was blown up on a mine. In fact, this operation consisted entirely of "friendly fire," and the American army valiantly liberated an island without a single Japanese on it.
Kyska Island is one of the small islands of the Aleutian Range. The island is about 35 kilometers long and its width in different parts varies from 2.5 to 10 kilometers. The area of the island is 277.7 kilometres. There is no permanent population on the island.
During World War II, the island was captured by the Japanese, in the summer of 1942, when Japanese marines landed on the island and destroyed the American naval weather station located there. Subsequently, an impressive garrison of Japanese troops was stationed on the island, which, according to US intelligence services, numbered up to 10,000 people. However, the capture of these islands did not bring Japan any particular dividends.

During the first landings on Attu and Kyska, the Japanese brought ashore military units and special work parties of up to 1,200 men on each of the islands. Later, additional units and personnel were transferred here for communications and air defense, as well as for the submarine base, and the total number of garrison on Attu Island was increased to 2,500 and on Kyska Island to 5,400.
For practically a whole year after the Japanese seizure of the two Aleutian Islands, Allied action in the region was limited to minor disturbing air raids and submarine patrols, which were intended to isolate the enemy-occupied islands. In August 1942, a detachment of American cruisers and destroyers struck the occupied island of Kyska from the sea. For several months thereafter, disturbing air raids on the captured islands were carried out by American and Canadian army aircraft.
In the winter of 1942-1943, U.S. troops occupied the islands of Adak and Amchitka, where airfields for fighters were built in a short time to provide cover for the bombers in their ever-increasing raids on the islands. Soon, thanks to the activity of Allied aviation, Kyska Island was almost completely cut off from the islands directly to Japan. By isolating the enemy troops, Allied forces in the North Pacific practically solved their main task. A few thousand Japanese soldiers, experiencing supply problems (food and ammunition were delivered only by submarines), in the snow of the Aleutian Islands could hardly make any significant impact on the course of the whole war. But public opinion in the United States was unwilling to accept the fact that part of American territory was occupied by Japanese troops, even though that part was of little value.

In January 1943 Rear Admiral Kincaid assumed command of U.S. forces in the Aleutian Islands. He considered the return of the islands captured by the Japanese his main task and advocated a rapid attack on Kyska Island. However, realizing that he would not be able to accumulate enough troops and funds for this operation within a few months, he decided to concentrate on the capture of Attu Island.
The operation to capture Attu began on May 11, but fighting on the island lasted for three weeks and ended only on May 30, 1943. The battle for the island was quite bloody, the American troops lost 579 men killed and another 1,148 wounded, another nearly 2,100 men were non-combat losses, mostly due to frostbite. Japanese losses amounted to about 2,900 men, only 28 soldiers were taken prisoner, among whom were no officers.
After the capture of Attu Island, the capture of Kyska was to be the end of the entire Aleutian campaign, and the U.S. military, given the bloody battle for Attu, planned to involve a much larger force. A grouping of more than 100 ships was concentrated near Addak Island, and the landing force was to consist of up to 29,000 American soldiers and 5,500 Canadian troops. At the same time the troops received advanced Arctic equipment. In addition, beginning in late July 1943, Kyska Island was subjected to constant air raids and shipboard artillery fire. On August 13, 1943, the training landing on Adak Island was carried out, and the operation for the liberation of Kyska was to begin on August 15.

As a result, in the early morning hours of August 15, the first small group of American infantry landed on the west shore of the island, and on August 16, just to the north, Canadian units landed. No one interfered with the landing on the island, but veterans of the Battle of Attu were not at all surprised. The Americans expected that only as they advanced deeper into the island would they encounter organized resistance from Japanese troops, who had entrenched themselves on the dominant heights.
However, the enemy did not show himself in any way. Finally, at the end of the second day of the operation, when American reconnaissance reached Gertrude Bay, the location of the Japanese main installations, it became clear that Japanese troops were simply not on the island. The trap was set and slammed shut, but the enemy fled. No fighting for the island ever ensued, one of the greatest surprises in the history of wars took place, and the only combat losses of paratroopers were due to "friendly fire". On August 24, 1943, the commander of the landing force, General Charles Corlett, stated that Kiska Island was back under U.S. control.
As it was found out later, the Japanese command, realizing the impossibility of defending the island, almost isolated from the outside world, decided to evacuate its garrison. As early as July 29th, a Japanese detachment of two cruisers and ten destroyers, under cover of thick fog, made a headway into the harbor of Kyska island. Approaching the northern shores of the island, the unit made a fast passage and at 14:45 it was anchored. Within 45 minutes the Japanese ships took on board the whole garrison of the island - more than 5100 men and left Kyska the same way they had come to the island. The island's garrison was evacuated to Paramushir. On the way back, the Japanese cruiser Abukuma was sighted off the northwest coast of the island by an American submarine. This was the only contact between the troops of the two sides. At the same time, U.S. submarine patrols were leaving for bases to replenish fuel supplies, and aerial searches were impossible due to thick fog.



It is hard to believe, but the capture of the island abandoned by the Japanese soldiers resulted in quite an impressive loss of life for the Allies. While surveying the island (a large number of underground tunnels were discovered), American and Canadian soldiers lost 31 men killed and about 50 wounded, mostly due to "friendly fire". In addition, 130 soldiers earned frostbite, and while approaching the island, the destroyer Abner Reed exploded on a Japanese mine, killing 71 men aboard the destroyer and wounding 47 other sailors. In terms of the loss ratio, the "defense" of Kyski Island was the best operation of the Japanese armed forces in the Pacific Theater.