oscar-griswold – Wiki Philippines

Definition

Oscar Griswold (Oscar Woolverton Griswold; October 22, 1886 – September 28, 1959) was a lieutenant general of the United States Army, an infantry officer of the West Point class of 1910 who spent the central years of World War II commanding the XIV Corps in the South Pacific and South West Pacific Areas. (Wikipedia — Oscar Griswold) He took over the corps from Alexander Patch on April 26, 1943, salvaged the stalled New Georgia campaign by concentrating divisions in front of Munda, broke the Japanese 17th Army’s counterattack on Bougainville in March 1944, and then led the corps in the liberation of the Philippines — the drive south from the Lingayen landings of January 9, 1945 to Manila, where he was the senior ground commander of the battle, “the top ground commander only under MacArthur and Krueger,” with the 1st Cavalry, 37th Infantry, and 11th Airborne Divisions under him. (Wikipedia — Oscar Griswold, Wikipedia — XIV Corps, Wikipedia — Battle of Manila)

After the war Griswold commanded the Seventh Army (June 11, 1946 – March 15, 1947) and, briefly, the Third Army, retiring as a lieutenant general on October 31, 1947 and settling at The Broadmoor in Colorado Springs, where he helped bring the United States Air Force Academy to the city before his death in 1959. (Wikipedia — Oscar Griswold) Contrary to two often-repeated claims, he never commanded the 37th Infantry Division — his pre-war commands were the 29th Infantry Regiment and, in August–October 1941, the 4th Infantry Division — and he never commanded the Sixth Army; the Tenth Army nomination MacArthur made for him in June 1945 went to Joseph Stilwell instead. (Wikipedia — Oscar Griswold)

Identities

Source Type	Identity
Wikipedia	Oscar Griswold
Wikidata	Oscar Griswold (Q7106010)
DBpedia	Oscar Griswold
ProductOntology	N/A
Wiktionary	N/A
Library of Congress Subject Headings (LCSH)	N/A
MeSH	N/A
NCBI Taxonomy	N/A
AGROVOC	N/A
Google Scholar	Oscar Griswold XIV Corps New Georgia Bougainville Manila 1945 lieutenant general Luzon campaign
ConceptNet	N/A
OpenCyc	N/A

Also Known As

Oscar Woolverton Griswold (full name)
Oscar W. Griswold

Examples and Analogies

The troubleshooter of New Georgia: when the 43rd Division’s drive on Munda stalled in July 1943, Griswold — Hester’s superior — radioed Halsey that “at least another division was needed to break the stalemate,” was given field command, and massed the 37th and 43rd Divisions into a corps offensive that overran the Munda airfield on August 5–6, 1943. (Wikipedia — New Georgia campaign, Wikipedia — XIV Corps)
“Kings of the Solomons”: on Bougainville his XIV Corps — the 37th and Americal Divisions with two Fijian battalions — defeated the once-fine Japanese 17th Army’s March 1944 counterattack, earning the corps its nickname while its airfields put Allied bombers within reach of Rabaul. (Wikipedia — XIV Corps)
A race run by two divisions: the dash to Manila paired the 1st Cavalry Division’s drive through Cabanatuan with the 37th Infantry Division’s push down the central plain, so that by February 1, 1945 both were “poised north of Manila” — the mounted arm and the Ohio National Guard division converging on the same city. (Wikipedia — XIV Corps)
The near-miss of 1945: nominated for Tenth Army after Buckner was killed at Okinawa, Griswold shows that Pacific seniority did not guarantee the biggest commands; Stilwell received the appointment. (Wikipedia — Oscar Griswold)

Usage Scenarios

1. Studying the Liberation of Manila

Griswold’s XIV Corps fought the February 3 – March 3, 1945 battle for Manila with roughly 35,000 troops — the 1st Cavalry and 37th Infantry Divisions doing most of the fighting, joined by the 11th Airborne Division and some 3,000 Filipino guerrillas — the largest urban battle American forces had fought to that point. (Wikipedia — Battle of Manila)

2. Comparing the Two Luzon Fronts

The Luzon campaign divided cleanly between Sixth Army’s two corps: while I Corps ground north against Yamashita’s Shobu Group toward Balete Pass and the Villa Verde Trail — where the 32nd Division’s fight produced four Medals of Honor — Griswold’s XIV Corps drove south from Lingayen, took Manila, and broke the Shimbu Line east of the city. (Wikipedia — XIV Corps, Wikipedia — 32nd Infantry Division)

3. Tracing Corps Command in the Pacific

Griswold’s tenure — one corps headquarters from New Georgia through Bougainville to Luzon — illustrates how the Army fought the Solomons with a small number of corps teams accumulating jungle experience across campaigns. (Wikipedia — Oscar Griswold)

4. Postwar Administration

His 1946–47 Seventh and Third Army commands show how Pacific-war lieutenant generals closed out their careers in occupation-era posts before retiring. (Wikipedia — Oscar Griswold)

Strategies

Mass against a stalemate: at New Georgia he traded breadth for concentration, bringing in the 37th Division and later the 25th to convert a stalled regimental advance into a corps offensive. (Wikipedia — New Georgia campaign)
Bypass and starve: on Bougainville the corps held the Torokina perimeter and let the bypassed 17th Army destroy itself against it — of some 65,000 Japanese on the island, about 8,200 died in combat and 16,600 from illness. (Wikipedia — XIV Corps)
Speed before set-piece: on Luzon he pushed the 1st Cavalry and 37th Divisions down parallel axes toward Manila ahead of a methodical clearance, freeing the Santo Tomas internees on February 3 and the Bilibid POWs on February 4. (Wikipedia — XIV Corps, Wikipedia — Battle of Manila)
Firepower over infantry assault: at Intramuros, “Griswold and Beightler were not willing to attempt the assault with infantry alone,” and the February 23 preparation fired indirect artillery at ranges up to 8,000 yards alongside point-blank fire. (Wikipedia — Battle of Manila)
Flexible task organization: the corps absorbed and shed divisions fluidly — the 11th Airborne passed to its control from the Eighth Army, the 6th Division joined on February 17, and on July 1, 1945 it began clearing northern Luzon with the 6th, 32nd, 37th, and 38th Divisions. (Wikipedia — XIV Corps)

Security and Safety Measures

Internees and prisoners first: the corps’ operations were explicitly framed around freeing the 3,700 internees at Santo Tomas, the 800 POWs at Bilibid, and — with elements of the 11th Airborne aided by XIV Corps Special Troops — the 2,100 internees at Los Baños on February 23, 1945. (Wikipedia — XIV Corps, Wikipedia — Battle of Manila)
Restrictions on bombardment, then their removal: MacArthur had largely forbidden artillery and air support inside Manila; the restrictions were dropped to save American lives once street fighting began. (Wikipedia — Battle of Manila)
Guerrilla integration: Marking’s and Hunters ROTC guerrillas worked inside and around the city with XIV Corps units, adding local intelligence and manpower to the liberation. (Wikipedia — Battle of Manila)
Water security east of Manila: the corps opened the Shimbu Line operations with the Antipolo fighting of March 8–11, 1945 before the sector passed to XI Corps on March 15 — a handover driven by the need to secure the dams supplying the capital. (Wikipedia — Battle of Wawa Dam)

Historical Context

Griswold was commissioned in 1910 (72nd of 83 at West Point) after a Nevada ranch childhood, served in China 1914–1917, and fought in the Meuse-Argonne as a major and lieutenant colonel of the 84th Division. Between the wars he taught at West Point and cycled through the General Staff, the Infantry Board, and the Office of the Chief of Infantry before commanding the 29th Infantry Regiment — where the Army’s first Parachute Test Platoon was organized under him — and the 4th Infantry Division in 1940–41. (Wikipedia — Oscar Griswold)

His war divides into three acts. In the Solomons he inherited a stalled New Georgia campaign in July 1943, took Munda in August, cleared Arundel in September, and let Vella Lavella bypass Kolombangara; on Bougainville his corps shattered the 17th Army’s March 1944 counterattack, earning the name “Kings of the Solomons.” (Wikipedia — New Georgia campaign, Wikipedia — XIV Corps) On Luzon, from the January 9, 1945 landing at Lingayen Gulf, his corps took the southern axis — Binmaley, San Carlos, Malasiqui, Tarlac, the Bamban hills — and closed on Manila, where a month of urban combat ended with Intramuros assaulted on February 23–24 and the city declared liberated in early March; he was promoted lieutenant general on April 14, 1945. (Wikipedia — XIV Corps, Wikipedia — Battle of Manila, Wikipedia — Oscar Griswold) After the handover of the Shimbu front to XI Corps, XIV Corps cleared southern Luzon (March 15 – May 20) and then northern Luzon from July 1; postwar came the Seventh and Third Armies, retirement, and a 1956 appearance on This Is Your Life. (Wikipedia — XIV Corps, Wikipedia — Oscar Griswold)

Challenges and Controversies

The Razing of Intramuros

The decision to use massed artillery against the walled city — up to 140 guns firing the February 23 preparation — made Griswold and Beightler the responsible commanders for the practical demolition of Spanish-era Manila. Army historian Robert R. Smith concluded that “Intramuros would be practically razed” and that “American lives were understandably far more valuable than historic landmarks”; only San Agustin Church survived in the old city. (Wikipedia — Battle of Manila)

The Civilian Toll of Manila

More than 100,000 Filipino civilians died in the battle from Japanese massacres and from both Japanese and American artillery and aerial fire; one estimate attributes roughly 40 percent of non-combatant deaths to American bombardment — the shadow over the corps’ most famous victory. (Wikipedia — Battle of Manila)

The Human Cost of the Bypass

On Bougainville, the strategy Griswold’s corps embodied — hold a perimeter, let the bypassed enemy wither — produced twice as many Japanese deaths from illness (about 16,600) as from combat (about 8,200), a ratio cited both as the strategy’s economy and as its moral cost. (Wikipedia — XIV Corps)

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Oscar Griswold