A friendly U.S. Marine gives a little Japanese boy a ride on his shoulders, only a few days after Saipan was secured in June 1944.


A friendly U.S. Marine gives a little Japanese boy a ride on his shoulders, only a few days after Saipan was secured in June 1944.

While the battle officially ended on July 9, Japanese resistance still persisted with Captain Sake Oba and 46 other soldiers who survived with him during the last banzai charge. After the battle, Oba and his soldiers led many Japanese civilians throughout the jungle of the island to escape capture by the Americans, while also conducting guerrilla-style attacks on pursuing forces.

The Americans tried numerous times to hunt them down but failed due to their speed and stealth. In September 1944, the Marines began conducting patrols in the island's interior, searching for survivors who were raiding their camp for supplies. Although some of the soldiers wanted to fight, Captain Oba asserted that their primary concerns were to protect the civilians and to stay alive to continue the war.

At one point, the Japanese soldiers and civilians were almost captured by the Americans as they hid in a clearing and ledges of a mountain, some were less than 20 feet (6.1 m) above the heads of the Marines, but the Americans failed to see them. Oba's holdout lasted for over a year (approximately 16 months) before finally surrendering on December 1, 1945, three months after the official surrender of Japan.

Oba was so successful in his resistance that the Marines nicknamed him the "Fox," and once even caused the reassignment of a commander.

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