Off Guadalcanal, Solomon Islands In the summer of 1942, the Japanese had to be stopped in their drive to cut off Australia by severing the US shipping lanes. So far in the Pacific War, the Japanese had destroyed the US battle fleet at Pearl Harbor; destroyed the US Asiatic Fleet in the Philippines; sunk the combined Dutch, British, Australian and American fleet in the East Indies (Java); punished the British fleet in Malaya and Ceylon and pushed the Indian Ocean fleet back to Africa; captured southeast Asia, the Philippines, the resource rich East Indies, and many island chains for defense...