An exploration of the actions and fate of the First Marine Division during the invasion of the Pacific island of Peleliu in September 1944. On September 15, 1944, the United States, in its effort to defeat the Japanese Empire, invaded a tiny island named Peleliu. This campaign inflicted terrific losses on the First Marines until they were withdrawn. The division would be out of action for six months, with the three rifle regiments averaging over 50% casualties - the highest unit losses in Marine Corps history. This book analyses in detail the many things that went wrong to make these casualties so excessive, and in doing so, corrects several earlier accounts of the campaign. AUTHOR: Peter Margaritis minored in History at Ohio State University. A retired chief petty officer, he has an extensive military background in communications and naval intelligence. He now writes and lectures on military history. He has written many technical manuals and guides as a civilian, dozens of reports in the military, and several articles on World War II and the Civil War. He is the co-author (with George Peto) of 22 on Peleliu (Casemate 2017) and has also written several short books on the European theater. 32 b/w photographs