After getting my feet wet, so to speak, with the Counter Landing scenario, this one was easy enough to sort out. The scenario takes every Marine leader counter in the game, so there are plenty of leaders running around, and I happened to get the good side on just about all of them. The Japanese didn't fair so well, with a lot of -0-0 leaders and a couple of 7 morale LTs. I set up the Japanese with the two casemates on the cliffs overlooking the beach, the big guns in the jungle just back from the central cliff hexes where they could get some shots at approaching LVTs, and nearly all the infantry in jungle next to the 4 hexes that were available for beach landings, so that they could immediately start assaulting Marines as they hit the beach. One Japanese infantry platoon and the sergeant set up back from the beach, acting as a mobile reserve and to try to block or at least keep up with anything that made a dash for the airfield. The 25mm Japanese AA unit was set up in the jungle just south of the airfield. The first wave of Marines got on the beach having lost just one LVT on the approach, and half of them had a movement point remaining to allow them to disembark from the LVTs on the beach before being assaulted. And immediately on the Japanese turn, 3 of 4 beach hexes were assaulted. The second wave had the Marine Colonel on one of the LVTs. Playing solo, I randomized which of the 3 LVTs (2 LVTs and the LVT-a4) was the target when the Japanese 75/88 fired at the hex. And luck of the draw, the Colonel and the infantry platoon with him took the plunge. Thankfully the Decapitation rule is not in effect before the units hit the beach, so in the rush to get on the beach, nobody else noticed. The LVT-a4 that had been stacked with the Colonel did become disrupted but the other LVT shrugged it off. While the Marines took the first losses, having so much OBA and some air cover made a lot of difference. Japanese became disrupted and demoralized quickly, and rolled poorly in assaults. While several times, assaults had to take a break while both sides rolled for morale in order to continue, overall the Marines were able to keep up the firepower and overwhelm the Japanese advantages in assault. This began to tell pretty quickly as the Marines rolled up the Japanese left flank, and a single Marine platoon and a good LT made their dash for the airfield. In a couple of turns, the airfield was taken and the Japanese never made good on any attempts to either take it back or use the AA firepower a few hexes away to destroy the Marines. The Japanese on the beach melted away, and even the Japanese Sergeant and his platoon came apart when targeted with a total of 60 factors of OBA. At the end of 8 turns, the Japanese were down to one demoralized reduced platoon and some demoralized or disrupted guns in the jungle behind the beach, where they had little effect on the Marines squeezing towards them. With little more they could do, I called it a game. Total Japanese losses 14 steps to 9 Marine, which counted 3 LVTs. Great game.

In reviewing the victory conditions again, this should have been listed as a draw. The US lost too many units. Anything 6 steps or more gives the Japanese a partial victory, so the 9 Marine steps lost brings the results to a draw.