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The Aleutian Islands campaign (Japanese: アリューシャン方面の戦い, romanized: Aryūshan hōmen no tatakai) was a military campaign fought between 3 June 1942 and 15 August 1943 on and around the Aleutian Islands in the American Theater of World War II during the Pacific War.
The Japanese planned to occupy islands in the Aleutians in order to extend their defensive perimeter in the North Pacific to make it more difficult for the U.S. to attack Japan from that area. The air raid on Dutch Harbor was conducted to support the invasions on Kiska Island and Attu Island by the Japanese military under Operation AL.
The Japanese occupation of Attu (Operation AL) was the result of an invasion of the Aleutian Islands in Alaska during World War II. Imperial Japanese Army troops landed on 7 June 1942, the day after the invasion of nearby Kiska .
The Battle of Attu (codenamed Operation Landcrab), [4] which took place on 11–30 May 1943, was fought between forces of the United States, aided by Canadian reconnaissance and fighter-bomber support, and Japan on Attu Island off the coast of the Territory of Alaska as part of the Aleutian Islands campaign during the American Theater and the Pacific Theater.
On June 3, 1942, at 5:45 a.m., 20 Japanese planes from two aircraft carriers of the Imperial Japanese Navy bombed Dutch Harbor in the "Battle of Dutch Harbor," targeting the radio station and the petroleum storage tanks, and continuing the fight a day later. It was the first aerial attack on the continental United States during World War II.
The Japanese attack on the U.S. Naval Base at Pearl Harbor destroyed almost 200 U.S. aircraft, took 2,400 lives, and swayed Americans to support the decision to join World War II.
The attack on Pearl Harbor and beginning of the Pacific Theater in World War II, coupled with Japanese threats to mainland Alaska along with the rest of the United States West Coast, had already made the construction of a defense access highway to Alaska a priority.
Operation Cottage was a tactical maneuver which completed the Aleutian Islands campaign.On August 15, 1943, Allied military forces landed on Kiska Island, which had been occupied by Japanese forces since June 1942.