Japanese Overextension

The magnitude of these successes encouraged the more daring Japanese planners to consider expansion beyond the original perimeter. During their discussions, the Doolittle raid of 18 April 1942 struck Tokyo. Although the damage caused was inconsequential, the reach of the attack supported a growing feeling that the Japanese perimeter would gain in strength if it had greater defense in depth.

Accordingly a new plan was approved, providing for (a) an advance into the Solomons and Port Moresby, to be followed, if successful, by a further advance into New Caledonia, Samoa and the Fiji Islands, (b) the capture of Midway, and (c) the temporary occupation of the Aleutians. Accomplishment of such a program would cut off the line of communication between Australia and the United States, reduce the threat from Alaska, and deny the United States all major staging areas more advanced than Pearl Harbor.

By stretching and overextending her line of advance, Japan was committed to an expensive and exacting supply problem, she delayed the fortification of the perimeter originally decided upon, jeopardized her economic program for exploiting the resources of the area already captured, and laid herself open to early counter-attack in far advanced and, as yet, weak positions.