Editing Guadalcanal campaign (section)

===Battle of the Tenaru===
{{Main|Battle of the Tenaru}}
[[File:GuadTenaruSandbar.jpg|thumb|Dead Japanese soldiers on the sandbar at the mouth of Alligator Creek, Guadalcanal after the [[Battle of the Tenaru]]]]

In response to the Allied landings, the Japanese [[Imperial General Headquarters]] assigned the task of retaking Guadalcanal to the Imperial Japanese Army's (IJA) [[Seventeenth Army (Japan)|17th Army]], a [[corps]]-sized command based at Rabaul under the command of Lieutenant General [[Harukichi Hyakutake]]. The army was to be supported by Japanese naval units, including the [[Combined Fleet]] under the command of [[Isoroku Yamamoto]], which was headquartered at [[Chuuk Lagoon|Truk]]. The 17th Army, at that time heavily involved in the Japanese [[New Guinea campaign|campaign in New Guinea]], had only a few units available to allocate to Guadalcanal. Of these, the [[Kawaguchi Detachment|35th Infantry Brigade]] under Major General [[Kiyotake Kawaguchi]] was at [[Palau]], the [[Aoba Detachment (Imperial Japanese Army)|4th (Aoba) Infantry Regiment]] under Major General [[Yumio Nasu]] was in the Philippines and the 28th (Ichiki) Infantry Regiment, under the command of Colonel [[Kiyonao Ichiki]], was berthed on transport ships near [[Guam]]. These units began to move towards Guadalcanal via Truk and Rabaul immediately, but Ichiki's regiment, being the closest, arrived in the area first. A "First Element" of Ichiki's unit, consisting of about 917 soldiers, was landed by IJN destroyers at Taivu Point, east of the Lunga perimeter, after midnight on 19 August, then conducted a {{convert|9|mi|km|adj=on}} night march west toward the Marine perimeter.<ref>Frank p. 147</ref><ref>Smith, p. 88; Evans, p. 158; and Frank, pp. 141–143. The Ichiki regiment was named after its commanding officer and was part of the [[7th Division (Imperial Japanese Army)|7th Division]] from [[Hokkaido]]. The Aoba regiment, from the [[2nd Division (Imperial Japanese Army)|2nd Division]], took its name from Aoba Castle in [[Sendai]], because most of the soldiers in the regiment were from [[Miyagi Prefecture]] (Rottman, ''Japanese Army'', p. 52). Ichiki's regiment had been assigned to invade and occupy [[Midway Atoll|Midway]], but were on their way back to Japan after the invasion was cancelled following the Japanese defeat in the [[Battle of Midway]]. Although some histories state that Ichiki's regiment was at Truk, [[Raizō Tanaka]], in Evans' book, states that he dropped off Ichiki's regiment at Guam after the Battle of Midway. Ichiki's regiment was subsequently loaded on ships for transport elsewhere but were rerouted to Truk after the Allied landings on Guadalcanal. Robert Leckie, who was at Guadalcanal, remembers the events of the Battle of the Tenaru in his book ''Helmet for My Pillow'': "Everyone had forgotten the fight and was watching the carnage, when shouting swept up the line. A group of Japanese dashed along the opposite river edge, racing in our direction. Their appearance so surprised everyone that there were no shots." Leckie, pp. 82–83</ref>

Underestimating the strength of Allied forces on Guadalcanal, Ichiki's unit conducted a nighttime frontal assault on Marine positions at Alligator Creek (often called the "Ilu River" on U.S. Marine maps) on the east side of the Lunga perimeter in the early morning hours of 21 August. [[Jacob C. Vouza|Jacob Vouza]], a Solomon Islands [[Coastwatchers|Coastwatcher]] scout, warned the Americans of the impending attack minutes before it started; the attack was defeated with heavy losses to the Japanese. After daybreak, the Marine units counterattacked Ichiki's surviving troops, killing many more of them. The dead included Ichiki; it has been reported that he died by [[seppuku]] after realizing the magnitude of his defeat.<ref>Steinberg, Rafael (1978). ''Island Fighting''. Time Life Books. p. 30</ref> In total, 789 of the original 917 members of the Ichiki Regiment's First Element were killed in the battle. About 30 survived the battle and joined Ichiki's rear guard of about 100, and these 128 Japanese returned to Taivu Point, notified 17th Army headquarters of their defeat and awaited further reinforcements and orders from Rabaul.<ref>Frank, pp. 156–158, 681; and Smith, p. 43.</ref>