0 The traditional culture of the Admiralty Islands
 1 Easter Islands (Chile)
 2 The WW2 Battle for Kwajalein
 3 Haiti
 4 The Marshall Islands, Combat in the Central Pacific.
 5 Pacific Islands and Micronesia
 6 Phillipines
 7 Polynesia
 8 French Polynesia
 9 San Juan Island (and 1859 "pig" war)
 10 Sicily
 11 Solomon Islands and Bougainville
 12 Sri Lanka aka Ceylon
 13 St. Helena (colorful history)
 14 Fiji and Suva
 15 South Georgia (Falklands)
 16 Taiwan (Formosa) history
 17 Puerto Rico and Vieques Island

\0 The traditional culture of the Admiralty Islands, which lie northeast of the Sepik River area of New Guinea and are administratively part of Papua New Guinea, is now practically extinct. Although the population consisted of many different language groups, the people have been popularly divided into three artistic style groups: the Usiai, who lived in the interior of Manus Island (Great Admiralty Island), the largest of the Admiralty Islands; the Matankor, who lived on the small islands to the north, east, and southeast of Manus; and the largest group, the Manus, who lived on the southern coast of Manus as well as on some offshore islands. Each group relied on the others for some items of food and manufactures; trade was active and frequent.

The Matankor produced wood carvings and decorated objects, each island having its own specialties. For example, the people on Baluan made bird-shaped bowls, ladles, and spatulas; on Lou, obsidian was carved into great hemispheric bowls; on Rambutyo figures and anthropomorphic lime spatulas were common; and the people on Pak made beds (used nowhere else in Melanesia) and slit gongs. Although the Matankor were neither culturally nor linguistically homogeneous, their art style shows a considerable uniformity. Surface designs consisted largely of repeated triangles, diamonds, rectangles, and opposed curves, often in bordered bands, sometimes in openwork or relief.

These busy, if repetitious, patterns were often accented in black and white on expanses of red background; generally they were employed as strips or in small areas rather than covering an entire object. Human or crocodile figures are common themes and were used to top house ladders, bed frames, and bedposts and to decorate canoe prows and sterns.

Freestanding oversize male and female figures, probably of ancestors, were placed on either side of the doors of men's houses. Human figures also appeared on slit gongs, with the upper body carved as one projecting lug and the legs at the gong's other end. The human figure was usually shown standing, with the arms hanging straight down and the hands either free or placed on the hips. The torso and limbs tended to be square in section, but the calves were angular. The head was ovoid in shape, and the mouth was often set at a right angle to a prognathous, muzzlelike face. A characteristic male hairstyle consisted of a cylinder capped with a sphere rising from the top of the head. Among the most impressive Matankor objects are the hemispheric bowls on four short legs.

These were equipped with a pair of spiral handles representing crocodiles' tails, and bands of designs were carved around the rims. The standard repertoire of abstract and representational motifs was also adapted to small carved objects, such as ladle handles. A favourite ornament was the kapkap, a breastplate consisting of a carved tortoiseshell plate mounted on a giant clam shell.

New Ireland The long, narrow island of New Ireland shows three distinct style areas: the northwest, the centre, and the southeast. The first area is celebrated for its malanggan carvings and masks, which share their name with a series of religious ceremonies held primarily as funerary celebrations but also (by extension) for the validation of land claims, the establishment of subclans, and other important events. In this most elaborate style of Oceania, the usual form of the face has horizontal brows, with the deep-set eyes inlaid with bright sea-snail opercula; the nose is strongly arched and massive; and the jaws, broad horizontal rectangles, show a formidable array of serrated teeth.

The fully three-dimensional figures usually have added attributes, including bird and animal forms; they often clutch frameworks of rods, which enclose them. Flat areas are pierced in intricate patterns, a technique that was probably fostered when the islanders acquired steel tools. All works were painted for fullest effect in sharply defined areas of black, white, red, and yellow; small sections of black cross-hatching and other patterns often further enhanced the design. Malanggan carvings on poles display either individual figures or several figures stacked vertically.

Freestanding carvings often illustrate mythological incidents and can be of great size. Pigs, birds, and fish are the subjects of other carvings. Seated figures used for rainmaking ceremonies were constructed from tree trunks, bamboo, and other materials; they had raised hands and were fitted with carved heads. Some malanggan masks are almost indescribably complicated, with the basic style of carved face adorned with long vertical tusks and other protrusions, fitted with openwork side panels of birds and fish, surmounted with birds, snakes, and figures, and enclosed within a lattice of bars. Some simpler types have seminaturalistic faces. Other malanggan carvings are horizontal panels.

There are several types, including one with a fish head at each end and human figures between them, another with apertures in the middle through which men put their heads, and one with representations of the moon. One type of carving that depicted a bird struggling with a snake was sometimes mounted on the head of a figure. In central New Ireland the primary objects of mortuary cults were carvings known as uli. These are standing figures with female breasts and male genitals; they sometimes have raised hands and may support smaller figures in front of them or on their shoulders. The head is usually large and is topped by a thin, upright crest; the eyes are inlaid with shell, the nose is hooked, and the wide mouth exposes the teeth above a triangular chin. The body of the uli, like that of the malanggan, is often enclosed in sweeping bands.

The intricate polychromy of the malanggan is absent, however; white is the main colour, with touches of red and black. Small uli were perched on conical constructions; large ones were housed in similarly conical huts. The ceremonies associated with the uli were elaborate, but their significance- -apart from a relationship to fertility and warfare--is obscure. Wood figures in the same powerful style were topped with skulls over which clay had been modeled; these were used in rainmaking as well as in mortuary ceremonies. Among some central groups, mortuary ceremonies also featured a large bark and cane disk with a central aperture framed by petallike projections. The disk was painted red and yellow and was kept in a hut with posts carved with the same emblem, apparently of the sun. Skulls were displayed in the disk's central aperture.

The design was echoed in the kapkaps, which were worked with exquisite delicacy in central New Ireland. The southeastern style area of New Ireland includes small nearby islands and the northern Gazelle Peninsula of New Britain. In the north of this area, figure sculpture takes the form of small chalk figures of males and females, with rounded faces, round eyes, straight noses, and wide, toothy mouths. The hands are joined in front of the torso. The white chalk is accentuated with touches of black and red--a colour scheme prevalent throughout southeastern New Ireland. Sometimes said to have been made for mortuary ceremonies, the chalk figures more probably were used by secret societies such as those on the Gazelle Peninsula. Several types of masks were made in the area.

The masks of the Tanga Islands were ephemeral constructions of bark and fibre over bamboo frames. They were semiconical in shape, with long backswept ears, thin upturned noses, and extended chins or beards. On the neighbouring mainland, masks were made of the same materials but were more naturalistic. Masks from the southwest were made of wood and had faces similar to those of the chalk figures. The end walls of houses were frequently screened with planks that were incised or painted with small and sparse units of design, often showing stylized animals and fish. Architectural sculpture, however, was rare except in the Tanga Islands and on the southwestern coast.

Knowledge of art in New Britain has largely been limited to the coastal areas and to the Gazelle Peninsula in the northeast. Masks, dance shields, and other ceremonial objects are the primary works. The Tolai people on the coast of the Gazelle Peninsula probably emigrated from southeastern New Ireland and thus share certain style characteristics, such as boomerang-shaped canoe prows, with that area. The human figure is a common subject of Tolai art and is almost always depicted standing, with arms bent and hands held to the ears.

Carved faces are naturalistic, sometimes with long beards, but in paintings the face is often reduced to round eyes and a crescent-shaped mouth. Other common motifs are disks with long triangles below them and spirals. Much Tolai art was incorporated into the ritual of two male secret societies, the Iniet and the Dukduk. Iniet initiations were held in walled enclosures lined with paintings of human figures. Long panels of openwork carving showing human figures, animals, and abstract designs were carried in one initiation dance, while the frontal bones of human skulls, which had been over-modeled, painted, and embellished with hair and beards, were worn as masks in other dances. Wooden human figures of various sizes, as well as small chalk or soft stone figures (usually human but sometimes of an animal), were also used.

The Dukduk society used male (dukduk) and female (tubuan) masks. Both types are cone-shaped and were constructed of cane and fibre. The dukduk is taller than the tubuan and is faceless. The tubuan has circular eyes and a crescent-shaped mouth painted on a dark background. Both masks have short, bushy capes of leaves. The mountains south of the Tolai's coastal area are inhabited by the Baining, who consist of several groups of seminomads.

Virtually their only works of art were masks and other objects carried in dances; these, however, being constructed of light materials (bamboo covered with bark cloth), were often of great size. The most remarkable came from the Chachet (northwestern Baining), who constructed figures up to 40 feet high for daytime mourning ceremonies. The Chachet figures had essentially tubular bodies with rudimentary arms and legs and tall heads with gaping mouths and painted eyes. Among other Baining groups, the best-known type of mask consisted of a flat upper panel, which was either circular or divided into two lobes, and a gaping mouth, from which hung a chinlike or tonguelike form.

Two enormous circular eyes were painted on the flat panel. All the Baining groups used, in addition to masks, dance headpieces made of painted vertical panels or poles topped with images painted on bark cloth. The masks and the painted designs represented many items of the natural world. The masks of the small Sulka group on the southeastern coast of New Britain were, like those of the Baining, made of ephemeral materials--in this case, narrow strips of pith bound together into a cone shape. The colour scheme of the Sulka masks is brilliant: white, black, yellow, and green designs over a bright pink background. On masks representing the human head, a swelling at the top indicates the brow, while the eyes, nose, mouth, and chin are indicated with paint or attached elements.

On featureless masks, the main cone supports either another cone with a painted underside or a large, flat, painted disk. The Sulka used wood to carve female figurines; headpieces in the shape of dogs, praying mantises, or women; and convex, oval battle shields. The western part of New Britain presents a scene of overlapping styles influenced both by other areas of the island and by nearby New Guinea. The wood-carving style of the Kilenge, for instance, was almost identical with that of the Siassi and Tami islands in its themes and patterns. Carvings on drums, a number of small objects, and, in particular, the most important type of wooden mask exemplify this affinity.

The Solomon Islands The Solomon Islands lie southeast of New Ireland. The most important islands artistically are Buka and Bougainville in the west; Choiseul, Vella Lavella, Santa Isabel, and the New Georgia group in the centre; and Guadalcanal, Malaita (Mala Mara), Ulawa, and San Cristobal in the east. Although there are various regional and local styles, in general the art of the Solomon Islands is characterized by the predominant use of the colour black, with white and red used primarily for details; the use of borders or patterned bands of design; the use of mother-of-pearl inlay; and an emphasis on the human head. Figures on the Solomon Islands were usually depicted in a sitting or squatting position, but on Buka Island standing figures can be found.

The Buka figures are somewhat perfunctorily carved, with squared-off forms and engraving on the faces. Females have slightly flared, flat-topped coiffures, while those of males are mitrelike and pointed. The human figure was a common subject on Buka. Ceremonial houses were built with posts shaped like human figures, and forked posts carved with human heads stood in front of the houses to receive the corpses of war victims. Buka-language speakers living on the northern coast of Bougainville Island sculpted comparable figures but in a more naturalistic style.

These were painted glossy black, with some red and white detail representing scarification. A constant motif in Buka-Bougainville two-dimensional art is the kokorra, a silhouette of a squatting or standing human figure with upraised hands and the male mitrelike coiffure. This figure--or the head alone--was painted and carved in bas-relief upon a great variety of objects, including canoes, paddles, slit gongs, dance clubs, and architectural elements.

The central Solomon Islanders were vigorous headhunters, building canoes of great size for their expeditions. The general model throughout the archipelago had tall, upcurved prow and stern posts, which were decorated with rows of shells and, at the waterline of the prow, a small carving (musumusu) of the head and arms of a guardian spirit. The musumusu sometimes incorporated bird characteristics. Human figures were usually depicted with the lower half of the face jutting forward boldly.

Shields in the area were normally made of plain wickerwork and had a tapered oval outline. Some were decorated with shell inlay outlining elongated anthropomorphic beings and other motifs.

In New Georgia, dancing human figures, rings, and other designs were carved in openwork on panels made of tridacna shell. The panels were used to enclose small shrines for ancestral skulls. A major focus of southern Solomon culture was bonito fishing, with its symbolic relationship to sea spirits and ancestors. The roofs of canoe houses, which were the centres of male activities, were supported on huge posts carved with full-length figures of bonito, sharks, and ancestors. Model canoes and large carvings of bonito were kept in these houses, and ancestral skulls were enshrined there. Fish and animal motifs can also be found on a variety of smaller objects, including finials, finely worked kapkaps, and bowls.

One of the most common forms of bowls, which were made in large numbers for both religious and daily use, represents a bird holding a fish in its beak and standing on a shark. Figures that combined human and animal features, such as a shark with human legs, were also common, especially on Malaita and Ulawa. Some human figures and heads featured the prognathous face characteristic of central Solomon sculpture, but the general style in the southern islands was more naturalistic in human proportions and features. Shell inlay was applied to bowls and other objects, including ceremonial clubs and dance staffs, though less lavishly than in the central Solomons.

Vanuatu Following great disruption and depopulation in the 19th century, practically nothing remains of the cultures of northern and southern Vanuatu. The central islands of the archipelago--the large island of Malakula, Pentecost (Pentecôte) to the northeast, and Ambrym to the east--are the most significant artistically. Although this group comprises several distinct style areas, it shares certain cultural characteristics. The major socioreligious institution of Vanuatu was the graded society, a hierarchical system of ceremonies performed by men and women to attain greater prestige. The number of grades and their names, as well as the name of the system itself, varied from place to place, but in all areas the grade ceremonies included the sacrifice of pigs or boars, feast giving, and the production of physical memorials.

The memorial sculpture was prescribed in form and was made in wood or from the trunks of tree fern, an easily worked material resembling compacted pine needles. On the northeastern Malakula coast and on some small neighbouring islands, large dance grounds surrounded by stone monoliths and dolmens were set up at stages of the grade ceremonies. The stones were covered by simple shelters with the main wood post carved into human form. The head on such figures was half the height of the whole post; it was shaped like an elongated diamond and had circular eyes, a long nose, and a crescent-shaped mouth. These posts supported a ridgepole consisting of a tree trunk, the spreading roots of which were roughly shaped into the likeness of a hawk.

The same image was also used for the ridgepole of ceremonial houses and on huge ceremonial banners of bark and bamboo. The bodies of these hawks are shaped like diamonds, their wings are triangular, and their heads resemble the stylized carvings of birds made for canoe prows. The eastern coast of Malakula, Pentecost Island, and Ambrym Island together form another style area.

The slit gongs of Ambrym are the largest and most elaborately carved of any in Vanuatu. As in all parts of Vanuatu where they were used, the Ambrym slit gongs were set around the dance grounds, standing upright or at a slight angle. They are found in two main forms. In the north of the island, the gongs terminate in huge three-dimensional heads with puny arms below them.

The forehead and the back of the head are scored with deep cross-hatching; the eyebrows are arched, with disk-shaped eyes filling the space below them; and the concave oval facial plane is almost filled by a massive carved nose. The slit gongs of western Ambrym, on the other hand, taper upward to an even greater height and have two to three faces in the elongated-diamond style carved on them in relief. The northern Ambrym style of face is also found on the fern-wood figures made for grade ceremonies.

These figures were sometimes of humans, with oversize heads, globular torsos, and slight limbs, but they could also have human heads with zoomorphic bodies. All were originally coated with clay and painted with vivid polychrome body-painting designs. Masks from the area include one type carved in hardwood that was common to both Ambrym and southern Pentecost; it has a bulging forehead, prominent cheeks, pierced eyes, a grinning mouth, and a huge, arched nose. Brilliantly coloured masks made from softwood were apparently usually comedic in intent.

The southern coastal peoples of Malakula, including some in the southern mountains, employed a wealth of objects not only for grade ceremonies but also for farming and initiation rituals. A major technique involved the use of a vegetable compound moistened with coconut milk to model heads or oversize seated figures over coconuts, bamboo frames, or other hard materials.

The skulls of important men were also covered with the compound and then mounted on bodies of fern wood and bamboo adorned with beaded armlets and the tusks of sacrificed pigs. Smaller heads were sometimes fastened to the shoulders of these figures. All the modeled works were fully painted, with a great use of deep blue, white, red, and yellow. Most of the modeled heads, figures, and masks have boars' tusks protruding from their mouths. Helmet masks are janiform or have quadruple faces or are surmounted with seated figures.

Carving was less significant in the southern areas than in the rest of Vanuatu, and figures were somewhat flat and squat, with broad faces indicated only by a summary series of horizontal grooves. In the mountainous northern region, sculpture appears to have been confined to large heads in fern wood and small janiform heads on spear shafts. These were carved in a powerful geometric style; the deeply cut, sharp-edged ridges and hemispheres approach total abstraction.

New Caledonia The art of New Caledonia consists almost entirely of wood sculpture; painting was used only to accentuate, in red and white, details of the carvings, which were otherwise entirely blackened. The central feature of every village was a circular ceremonial house with low walls and a towering conical thatched roof. These houses were equipped with a wealth of architectural sculpture. On either side of the door stood a massive jamb with a stylized face at the top; the rest of the jamb was ornamented with geometric designs.

The jambs were spanned by a lintel with abstract patterns, while a carved head stood between them as a sill. Inside the house, opposite the doorway, additional large figures served to demarcate special areas. The roof was crowned with a tall finial, which combined a face with stylized elements representing limbs and a headdress. Independent heads and figures of ancestors were carved on the tops of stakes planted in the ground near the ceremonial houses, at spots where their commemorative rituals had been carried out.

All these architectural carvings could be claimed and carried off by the maternal relatives of the clan for which they were made; consequently, both the actual objects and their styles were widely dispersed. The north of New Caledonia is the richest area of the island in sculpture. The masks made there are particularly striking. The long wooden faces have strongly arched eyebrows, glaring eyes (sometimes round but usually bean-shaped), and grinning, crescent-shaped, toothy mouths.

The nose springs forward from between the cheeks like a great parrot beak. Other masks of the same general style have equally prominent bulging and rounded noses. Masks from farther south are almost square; the features are flatter and angular, and the horizontal, slotted mouths are edged with red seeds. A beard of human hair hangs from the chin, and a cylindrical basket topped with a mop of human hair crowns the head. A cloak of black feathers completes the ensemble. The dancers who wore these costumes are said to have impersonated ancestral water spirits. Similar faces and clothing can be seen on some of the figures carved onto the posts of ceremonial houses.

Other figures have faces in the same styles but have domed, neckless heads; their bodies and limbs are cylindrical or ovoid and are markedly nipped in at the joints. A few small carvings show infants lying on baby carriers; they were used in magic for human fertility. Small carved heads used as a kind of currency and small heads carved on spear shafts complete the New Caledonian range of figure sculpture. War clubs had stylized phallic, tortoise, and bird-head ornamentation. The ceremonial adz, an object unique to the island, consisted of a nephrite disk mounted on a decorated shaft; it served both as a symbol of chiefly office and as a cosmic symbol.


\1 Easter Islands (Chile)

(Rapa Nui) 3220 km west of Santiago, Chile. Site of an ancient polynesian culture. Three extinct volcanos form this island 2300 mi W of Chile. It has 800 giant (moai) statues at more than 17,000 sites.

Chilean dependency in the eastern Pacific Ocean, the easternmost outpost of the Polynesian island world. It is famous for its giant stone statues. The island stands in isolation 1,200 miles (1,900 kilometres) east of Pitcairn Island and 2,200 miles west of Chile. Forming a triangle 14 miles long by seven miles wide, it has an area of 63 square miles (163 square kilometres); its highest point, Mount Terevaka, is 1,969 feet (600 metres) above sea level.

To its original inhabitants the island is known as Rapa Nui (“Great Rapa”) or Te Pito te Henua (“Navel of the World”). The first European visitors, the Dutch, named it Paaseiland (“Easter Island”) in memory of their own day of arrival. Its mixed population is predominantly of Polynesian descent; almost all live in the village of Hanga Roa on the sheltered west coast. The island is a province that is administratively part of the region of Valparaíso, Chile.

The small and hilly island is not part of a sunken landmass but is a typical oceanic high island formed by volcanoes rising from the seafloor. Geologic and oceanographic evidence shows that no perceptible emergence or submergence of the island's coastline has taken place since the last fall in sea level, which occurred less than 10,000 years ago. Three extinct volcanoes chiefly composed of tuff (a rock formed of compacted volcanic fragments) and joined by their own lava flows give the island its characteristic triangular shape. Parasitic tuff craters and cones (i.e., craters and cones formed on the side of, or near, volcanoes after the original vent has become plugged up) are interspersed in the landscape, which is otherwise dominated by eroded lava fields. Most of these fields are thickly packed with both large and small lumps of cellular and tuffaceous lava that is either black or rusty in colour. Stoneless surface soil is sparse; it is suitable for extensive cultivation mainly in the Hanga Roa and Mataveri area in the southwest, at Vaihu and on the plain southwest of the volcano Rano Raraku, and on the prehistorically cleared Poike peninsula in the eastern corner of the island. Rain collects in the partly bog-covered crater lakes of the volcanoes Rano Kao, Rano Raraku, and Rano Aroi. One intermittent stream, fed by the Rano Aroi crater lake, flows down Mount Terevaka's slopes before disappearing into the porous soil. Water from the extremely deep crater of Rano Kao, which is about 3,000 feet wide, is piped to Hanga Roa. The coast is formed by soft, eroded, ashy cliffs, with a vertical drop of about 500 to 1,000 feet; the cliffs are intercepted by long stretches of low, hard, and rugged lava formations. There is no natural harbour, but anchorage is found off Hanga Roa on the west coast; off Vinapu and Hotu-Iti on the south coast; and off Anakena and in the Bahía la Perouse on the north coast. Notable among the few small offshore islets are Motu-Nui, Motu-Iti, and Motu-Kaokao (which figured in a local bird cult) near the southwest cape. The only true sand beach is at Anakena; most other beaches are of gravel. Caves abound, many consisting of subterranean rooms joined by narrow tunnels extending far into the lava beds.

Climate The climate is subtropical. The warmest months are January through March, when the average temperature is 73° F (23° C), and the coolest months are June through August, when the average temperature is 64° F (18° C). Average annual precipitation is about 49 inches (1,250 millimetres) but with considerable annual variation. September is the driest month, and the heaviest rainfall occurs in June and July. Winds in June and August are irregular; during the rest of the year trade winds from the east and southeast are dominant. From September through March the Peru (or Humboldt) Current, which has an average temperature of about 70° F (21° C), flows against the island.

The first European to land on Easter Island was the Dutch admiral Jacob Roggeveen, who paid it a single day's visit in 1722. He and his crew found a population that they described as being of mixed physical types who worshiped huge standing statues with fires while they prostrated themselves to the rising sun. Some of them, said to be “white men,” had their earlobes slit and hanging to their shoulders, a distinctly non-Polynesian custom.

An expedition dispatched by the Spanish viceroy of Peru rediscovered the island in 1770. The Spanish spent four days ashore and were the first to report that the aborigines had their own local form of script. They estimated a population of some 3,000 persons.

A civil war seems to have raged on the island before the arrival of the British navigator Captain James Cook in 1774; a decimated, poverty-stricken Polynesian population of only about 600 or 700 men and fewer than 30 women was found by the Englishmen, who also observed that the large statues were no longer venerated, most of them having been deliberately overthrown. In 1786 the French navigator Jean-François de Galaup, comte de La Pérouse, arrived and found some 2,000 people on the island; he tried in vain to introduce domestic animals. A number of sailing vessels, including whalers, visited the island from 1792 onward. By 1860 the population was about 3,000, but a major slave raid launched from Peru in 1862, followed by smallpox epidemics, reduced the population to 111 in 1877.

At the end of the 19th century it began to increase once more. In 1864 Brother Eugène Eyraud, a French Catholic missionary, became the first foreigner to settle on the island; as a result, the population became converted to Christianity by 1868. Settlers from Tahiti began to raise sheep in 1870. In 1888 the island was annexed by Chile, which leased nearly all its territory for sheep raising; in 1954 the Chilean navy administration took over the sheep range. In 1965 a civilian governor was appointed by the Chilean government, and the islanders became full Chilean citizens. Within a single generation the Easter Islanders successfully responded to a complete acculturation to continental standards without losing their pride in their own ancestors and their skills and cusooms. Annually in February old and young of both sexes meet in contests to revive the arts and practices of the island's past, including carving, tattooing, reed-boat building, and traditional singing and dancing.

Archaeology The island is famous for its gigantic stone statues, of which there are more than 600, and for the ruins of giant stone platforms (ahus) with open courtyards on their landward sides, some of which show masterly construction. Archaeological surveys were carried out in 1886, 1914, and 1934; archaeological excavations were initiated in 1955. The excavations revealed that three distinct cultural periods are identifiable on the island. The early period is characterized by ahus at Tahai, Vinapu, and Anakena, carbon dated to c. AD 700–850. The first two were admired and described by Captain Cook; the wall in Anakena remained hidden below ground until it was excavated archaeologically in 1987.

The excavations in Anakena have revealed that a variety of statues were carved in the early period, among them a smaller prototype of the middle-period busts, which mainly differ from the latter by their rounded heads and stubby bodies. Another type was a realistic sculpture in full figure of a kneeling man with his buttocks resting on his heels and his hands on his knees, in one case with his ribs exposed, all features characteristic of pre-Inca monuments at Tiahuanaco in South America. In the middle period, c. 1050–1680, statues were deliberately destroyed and discarded, and all ahus were rebuilt with no regard for solar orientation or masonry fitting. The sole desire seems to have been to obtain strong platforms capable of supporting ever taller and heavier busts, the classical moai of the middle period.

Burial chambers also were constructed within the ahus in the middle period. The sizes of the statues made were increased until they reached stupendous dimensions; the slim and lofty busts also had huge cylindrical pukao (topknots) of red tuff placed on top of their slender heads. Most middle-period statues range from about 10 to 20 feet in height, but the biggest among those formerly standing on top of an ahu was about 32 feet tall, consisted of a single block weighing about 82 tons (74,500 kilograms), and had a pukao of about 11 tons balanced on its apex. The largest statue still standing partly buried in the deep silt below the quarries is about 37 feet tall, and the largest unfinished one with its back attached to the rock is about 68 feet tall. Traditions, supported by archaeology, suggest that the images represented important personalities who were deified after death.

Statues of the middle period were all quarried from the special yellow-gray tuff found in the crater walls of Rano Raraku. Inside and outside the crater bowl numerous unfinished statues and thousands of crude stone picks are scattered about, bearing witness to a sudden interruption of the sculptors' work. The unfinished images show that each statue had its front and sides completed to a polish before the back was detached from the bedrock. The image was then slid away to be raised at random in the rubble below the quarries to have the back finished before being moved to some distant ahu. Eye cavities and topknots were added only after the monument was erected; recent discoveries have revealed that these concavities had inlaid eyes of white coral with a dark stone disk as pupil. From one to a dozen completed statues would stand in a row on a single ahu, always facing inland.

Experiments based on island traditions in 1955–56 showed that the numerous basalt picks left in the quarries were perfectly suitable for carving the hard tuff. Reenactments showed that 12 islanders were able to lift a 25-ton statue about 10 feet off the ground and to tilt it on end on top of an ahu; this work took 18 days with no tools other than two wooden logs that were used as levers. Stones of all sizes were wedged under the statue one by one to form a slowly rising cairn in order to lift the giant monoliths upright. Tradition claimed that the statues had “walked” across the terrain to their distant destinations, but in the experiment 180 islanders were able to pull a medium statue over the ground. A renewed experiment in 1986 revived the tradition and discovered that 15 men sufficed to move a medium-sized statue over the ground in upright position by jerking it ahead with a system of ropes.

The middle-period busts clearly evolved from a local prototype and have no counterpart elsewhere. Also peculiar to the middle period was a bird cult with attendant birdman rites that survived into the third, or late, period. Its ceremonial centre was the village of Orongo, on top of Rano Kao, which consisted of stone houses with roof vaults built as false arches. These houses and contiguous circular masonry dwellings with roof entrances are characteristic of the early and middle periods on the island; while unknown elsewhere in Polynesia they are common in the adjacent area of South America.

Traditional culture The late-period Easter Islanders dwelt in boat-shaped pole-and-thatch houses or in caves. This period was marked by internal wars, general destruction, and cultural decadence. The mataa, or obsidian spearpoint, which was mass-produced, is the characteristic artifact of this period. Wood carving and small crude stone figurines replaced monumental art. Written wooden tablets covered with incised signs (called rongo-rongo) placed in boustrophedon (a method of writing in which the lines run alternately from right to left and from left to right) were copied from earlier specimens merely for ritual purposes; their proper reading was forgotten, and—despite many claims—modern attempts at deciphering them have failed.

During this period art treasures were hidden in secret family caves, while the upright ahu images were successively overthrown. Silt from the abandoned quarries descended to the chests of the blind and unfinished busts standing at the foot of the volcano, rendering their overthrow impossible and thus securing for posterity the eyeless heads that have given the island its fame.

Tradition maintains that destruction began after a period of peaceful coexistence between two people of different culture and language—the Long-Ears and the Short-Ears. The latter, tired of toiling for the former, all but exterminated them in a pyre along an ancient ditch at Poike on the far northeastern coast. Carbon dating and genealogies concur in placing this event and the beginning of the late period at about AD 1680. The original construction of the artificial Poike ditch, according to carbon dating, took place in about AD 380.

The First International Science Congress convening on Easter Island in 1984 agreed on a resolution defining the island as the site of a pre-European civilization. The recent excavations, which reveal that the earliest settlers arrived with previously developed architectural concepts and a highly specialized megalithic masonry technique, support island traditions, which claim that the first ancestors arrived in an organized party of emigrants and not merely as casually wind-driven fishermen. Easter Island was added to UNESCO's World Heritage List in 1995.

Thor Heyerdahl published his findings on the mysterious island Aku-Aku, detailing the various mysteries on the island, and how his team found answers to most of them. Some answers were quite obvious. For instance, the red stone "hats" on top of several of the statues and referred to by the natives as pukao (top-knot) were similar to the bright red hair that crowned several of the islanders heads. No mystery there. Nor in the fact that stone implements were found - it was what would be expected with human labor involved. If aliens had built the statues, one would expect to find more sophisticated implements in the ground.

There had been plenty of trees to act as rollers to transport the stones, though most of the trees had been used up and the remainder consumed in a great fire, something which carbon dating of excavated material proved.

The answers to others were a bit more difficult - why were the statues built and why were some of them flung down? Heyerdahl, through a mixture of ingenuity and role-playing, managed to impress upon the natives his mana, and thereby secure their confidence and the answers to several puzzling questions. It was widely known that there were two types of islanders - the hanau eepe or "long-ears" and the hanau momoko or "short-ears".

All the mana was concentrated in the long-ears and they were privy to to the islands secrets. They knew, for instance, what the rongo-rongo (the script found on the island) meant, and only they knew about the statues. For a long time, the long-ears ruled the short ears, making them build the stones to honor deceased kings. Then the short ears rebelled and in the war that ensured, many of the statues were flung down.

The "Walking" Moai of Easter Island By Thor Heyerdahl, Arne Skjølsvold and Pavel Pavel Introductory experiments The first empiric experiments in carving and maneuvering Easter Island monolithic statues (moai) were conducted by the Norwegian Archaeological Expedition in 1955-56, and were published in vol. 1 of the expedition reports (Skjølsvold, 1961: 366-372, Pls. 54-61). A group of direct descendants from the prehistoric sculptors demonstrated convincingly how it was possible to carve a moai from the tuff in the abandoned image quarries of the Rano Raraku crater walls using only the basalt hand-picks (toki) left in profusion everywhere in the quarries.

The carving of a complete statue in the crater wall was not brought to an end, but on the basis of daily progress it was estimated that a medium-size moai could be finished in about a year, allowing one sculptor per every half meter of the image length. The same islanders demonstrated with equal success how their ancestors had erected their statues quite simply by pushing a slowly growing pile of stones underneath while prying the monolith up in tiny jerks with wooden poles. 18 days sufficed for 12 islanders to lift a twenty ton moai Iying on the ground up to a level of an image platform (ahu) and tilt it into an upright position.

Each of these two experiments followed methods preserved in local traditions. However, when the same islanders were asked how the statues had been transported from the quarries to the various ahu on the island, the answers were invariably that the moai had "walked" by supernatural power. This was the explanation the Easter Islanders had consistently given since first asked by the missionaries in the 1860's. Thus they had told Roussel (1926: 498) that a chief endowed with mana had ordered the statues to walk.

"Hearing his words all the statues set out and picked the places which were the most convenient to them". According to Zumbohm (1879-80, vol. 6: 128) the mythical being, whose power moved the moai from the quarry to the ahu was the god Make Make. In another version (Butaye, 1901: 29) this achievement was attributed to the priests (ivi-atua) who moved the statues at the request of those who wanted them on their family ahu. The huge figures walked for a distance and then stopped. Each day the priests repeated the charms until the images had reached the spot for which they were destined.

Asked by us if there was no other and less supernatural method, the islanders replied that their ancestors sometimes transported big building blocks on a sledge made of a forked tree (miro maunga erua). Consequently an experiment was carried out by our expedition on the landward side of Ahu Nau Nau in Anakena, where a medium-size moai placed on such a sledge was dragged a short distance across the sand by 180 islanders pulling in two parallel ropes. The experiment proved cumbersome and not very convincing, and the islanders continued to insist that their ancestors had made the statues "walk".

Combining the islanders' claim that the images had walked across the terrain with his own observation that these legless busts had a bulging belly right in front of their base, one of the expedition archaeologists, William Mulloy, proposed a theory of transportation in semi-up-right position. According to his theory, the statues had been suspended half upright with a loop around the neck which was attached to a moveable framework. By tilting this framework forward the moai would follow in a sort of rocking movement facilitated by the bulging abdomen.

This theory received wide attention and has until the present been illustrated on a guide plaque at the entrance to the quarries in the Rano Raraku National Park (Fig. 1) When Heyerdahl and Skjølsvold in 1985 announced their plans to return to Easter Island to conduct more field work, they received a letter from a Checkoslovakian engineer, Pavel Pavel. He wrote that he had become interested in the technical problems of transporting the megalithic stone statues on Easter Island because of certain statements in Heyerdahl's book and film of the expedition.

He had noticed that Heyerdahl did not believe in the Easter Islanders' claim that the statues had walked. In 1981 Pavel had therefore begun his experiments by first making a 26 cm tall moai of clay and was surprised to discover how stable it was. The reason for this stability was found to be the special design of the moai . They have a large circumference at their base, but narrow upper section, in such a way that the centre of gravity occurs at 1/3 of the total height.

Pavel had then become determined to test out a full-size model to compute how many men were needed and how much force was required to move such an object. The editorial staff of the bimonthly Veda a technika mládezi, as well as his colleagues and the administration of the agricultural construction firm for which he worked, gave him full support. From photos available in the expedition book Aku Aku, Pavel first constructed a mould of clay in which he cast a 1 m tall statue of concrete to get acquainted with the problems he would later encounter in casting a full-size figure.

Through experiments and calculations with this 1 m tall model he was able to determine the centre of gravity. From the director of the technical secondary school at Strakonice, where he had formerly been a student, he obtained the necessary working space and assistance to construct a 2,5 x 5 m wooden casting box from which he made a mould from unburnt bricks for a full-size moai. This work lasted 3 weeks. From the mould Pavel obtained a 4,5 m tall statue of concrete weighing 12 tons. With this cast he conducted two different experiments in Strakonice in 1982.

I: The first experiment was intended to test how the moai might have been transported on their crude, unfinished backs down the slopes from the quarries to the foot of the volcano. The monument was placed on its back with 10 cm thick beams underneath to give space for the ends of wooden levers. 25 persons operating with 14 levers, 4 m long, were able to move the statue (Fig. 2). This method showed that the back of the statue was easily damaged by the scratching of beams and levers. Long distance transportation of ready made moai in such a way would thus seem unlikely.

II: The second experiment was intended to test how the finished moai with carved and polished back, might have been transported to the various ahu platforms scattered all around the island. The firrn island tradition that the moai moved in an upright position seemed convincing to Pavel as it would considerably reduce the friction surface. It was assumed that, even if the image departed from the quarries with a straight base, its edges would be worn off during transportation. The model for the experiment was therefore moulded with vaguely convex base. Obviously, a flat base would have resulted in longer "steps" for the rocking moai.

To be able to move the statue forward through a system of tilting and twisting, ropes were fastened around the top of the head as well as around the base of the bust. The two loose ends of the upper rope were streched out laterally whereas the two at the base were laid out forwards in parallel fashion.

A total of 17 persons divided into two groups participated in the experiment. First, one group of 8 pulled in rope 1 to tilt the statue on edge. At that very moment, before the moai tipped back on its base, the second group pulled rope 3 forwards in such a way that the image twisted and took its first "step". Next, the two groups changed to the opposite sides and repeated the performance, this time by pulling ropes 2 and 4. As the experiment started it was found difficult to tilt the statue over on one edge, but as soon as the workers began jerking rather than pulling steadily, the procedure became much easier.

When the two groups, with more practice, succeeded in finding the exact moments of coordinating the sideways and forward jerks, they worked together rhythmically, easily and without strain. In this manner the experimental image wriggled forward as if it were "walking". Whereas 180 persons pulling a statue on its back had been used during Heyerdahl's experiment on Easter Island in 1956, 10% of that labour force had sufficed for Pavel to transport a "walking moai".

Archaeological evidence of statue transportation As a result of the claims in Pavel's letter, he was invited to join the KonTiki Museum expedition to Easter Island in 1986 to try out his experiments on an original stone statue. The expedition took place in JanuaryFebruary and was planned as an introduction to a perennial archaeological project mainly concentrated on investigations on ahu and habitation sites in the bay of Anakena.

In addition to the three authors the expedition team consisted of the Chilean archaeologist Gonzalo Figueroa and the Easter Island student Sonia Haoa. The governor of the island, Sergio Rapu, who himself is an archaeologist, participated in the field work to such a degree as his administrative and political duties allowed him. Native labourers were hired for the field work and Juan Haoa was appointed foreman. Our first undertaking was to concentrate on the problem concerning transportation of stone statues. Before trying out Pavel's method in practice a series of observations were made partly by studying statue-bases and partly through excavations around fallen statues.

Observation of statue-bases By examining a series of statues Iying abandoned along some of the old paths leading from Rano Raraku to different parts of the island, it appeared that most of the statue-bases were damaged to a greater or lesser degree. Such damage might easily have been caused if the statue had been moved in an upright position. In addition comes the fact that several of the statues were Iying face down and that many of them were broken into two or more pieces which suggests that they had fallen from an upright position. We also noticed that some of the statues were heavily worn at the base.

An extreme case is the statue now re-erected on Ahu Huri A Urenga, weere new hands have been carved above the original ones because the base had been worn down to the very lower end of the latter. It also appeared that most of the statue-bases were slightly curved, a detail which is important if the statues were intended to be moved in an upright position.

\2 The WW2 Battle for Kwajalein

Southern Kwajalein Atoll Fifty years ago, U.S. forces undertook one of the most complicated campaigns in military history-the assault and capture of major Japanese naval and air bases in the Marshall Islands. Out of the battles, which involved landings on 30 islands, arose a new and highly successful mode of amphibious warfare that sped the end of World War II.

Jan. 30, 1944 Kwajalein Island lies battered and burning tonight after two days of pulverizing naval bombardment and intensive bombing and strafing by land- and carrier-based planes. The fires of destruction on Japan's principal naval base in the Marshalls are visible to men of the 7th Infantry Division (the "Hourglass Division"), veteran troops who wait for D-Day aboard vessels of the Southern Attack Force. Roi and Namur islands, center of Japan's air power in the Marshalls, are under attack from planes and ships of the Northern Attack Force, while men of the 4th Marine Division, not yet tried in battle, also wait for D-Day.

This afternoon, the battleships Massachusetts, Indiana, and Washington pounded Kwajalein with 1,000 rounds of 16-inch ammunition-an average of one 250-pound shell every 15 seconds of the four-hour bombardment. The attacks on Kwajalein, Roi, and Namur began early yesterday. Though weather was squally and skies were overcast, planes from the carriers Cowpens, Montery, and Bunker Hill, positioned southwest of Kwajalein, took off an hour before sunrise for the first bombing run on Kwajaleins airfield and nearby buildings. Despite intense and accurate anti aircraft fire, the bombing and strafing continued over the entire island throughout the day.

At Roi and Namur, planes from the carriers Essex, Intrepid, and Cabot began their assault at dawn dropping 2,000-pound bombs on runways and scoring numerous hits on hangars, fuel dumps, and gun positions. Ninety-two Japanese aircraft were based on Roi, but U.S. planes at once gained command of the air, and after 0800, no Japanese planes were seen airborne. B-25s, flying from bases in the Gilbert Islands, joined in the attack to drop 23 tons of bombs on Kwajalein and 15 tons on Roi. 

Jan. 31, 1944 After a series of highly successful amphibious landings, American troops are ashore tonight on four small islands near Kwajalein and on five islets flanking Roi and Namur. They are tightening the noose on these two major Japanese strongholds in the Marshalls. Every objective was gained, with U.S. casualties classified as very light. In actions today around Kwajalein Island (code name, Porcelain), U.S. troops captured Enubuj (Carlson), Ennylabegan (Carlos), Gea (Carter), and Ninni (Cecil) islands, and brought Gea Pass under U.S. control. American casualties were one dead, two wounded.

Forty-eight 105mm howitzers have been set up on Enubuj and are harassing Kwajalein, as heavier 155mm funs are rapidly being landed. The naval bombardment of Kwajalein defenses continues, and destroyer Wall is delivering harassing fire on Ebeye (Burton), Japan's chief seaplane base in the Marshalls. It is known to harbor several hundred Japanese troops.

At the northern end of the atoll, the 25th Regimental Combat Team of the 4th Marine Division has secured five islets near Roi and Namur at a cost of 18 American dead, eight missing, and 40 wounded. Artillery has been established ashore, and North Pass is safe for the passage of ships.

As night falls, fresh landing troops are poised for tomorrow's strikes against Kwajalein, Roi, and Namur, the main objectives of this invasion. The action today began at dawn, when battleships Pennsylvania and Mississippi began firing on the western end of Kwajalein Island. By 0830, Enubuj, Ennylabegan, Kwajalein, Ebeye, and South Gugeegue (Beverly) were being systematically raked by the fire of four battleships, three cruisers, and four destroyers.

In preparation for landings by the 17th Regimental Combat Team on Enubuj and Ennylabegan, more than 2,000 rounds of 5-inch shells were poured on the two islands. Twenty-one tons of bombs and 50,000 rounds of .50 caliber ammunition were expended by 51 escort carrier planes in bombing and strafing runs. U.S. troops captured Enubuj at noon, taking 20 prisoners after very light resistance. Within an hour, divisional artillery began coming ashore, and by 1800 the howitzers were registered on Kwajalein.

Opposed only by a few Japanese firing light rifles and automatic weapons, the 17th RCT captured Ennylabegan by 1300 without a single American casualty. Organization began immediately to set up supply dumps and repair stations.

The landing on Gea was made shortly after dawn by B Troop, a provisional unit made up of men of the 7th Cavalry Reconnaissance Troop and Co B., 111th Infantry. After a short fight, the island was secured at 0930. Twenty-two Japanese were killed and one taken prisoner. American losses were one killed and one wounded.

Ninni, which, with Gea, guards an important entrance to the lagoon, was captured by A Troop at 1230 hours. The men first mistakenly landed on Gehh, next island northwest of Ninni, after fighting strong currents and off-shore winds in their rubber landing craft. The error was discovered after a brief reconnaissance, during which four Japanese were killed and two taken prisoner. When troops proceeded to Ninni, they found it unoccupied and took possession at once.

A unique part of today's operation was the use, for the first time in the Pacific, of an underwater demolition team. At 1000 hours and again at 1600, this team worked its way within 300 yards of the beach at the western end of Kwajalein Island, where U.S. forces will land tomorrow. They were searching for underwater obstacles and anti-boat mines. As light faded this evening, troops of the 32nd and 18th RCTs of the 7th Infantry moved from transports to LVTs. They are scheduled to make the initial landing on Kwajalein Island in the morning.

D-Day on Kwajalein Feb. 1, 1944 After a near perfect amphibious assault this morning on beaches at the west end of Kwajalein Island, troops of the 32nd and 184th Regimental Combat Teams and the 767th Tank Battalion have advanced approximately one third the length of the island against stiffening Japanese resistance. The most devastation naval, artillery, and air bombardment yet seen in the Pacific began at dawn and continued until H-Hour. At one time, two shells per second were hitting specific targets and areas ahead of the assault troops. Altogether, nearly 7,000 14-inch, 8-inch, and 5-inch shells hit Kwajalein today from supporting naval vessels alone. Most of them landed on the main beaches before the assault. Field artillery on Enubuj (Carlson) expended 29,000 round of 105mm and 155mm ammunition. Heavy bombers flew from Tarawa to drop 15 1,000- and 2,000-pound bombs on the landing area. Carriers-based dive and torpedo bombers and fighters flew a total of 96 supporting sorties. As the landing craft started for shore, Navy aircraft made a last strafing run. Artillery shells from Enubuj were still hitting the beach when the LVTs were within 35 yards. The first wave of troops landed exactly on schedule at 0930 at Red Beach 1 (in the vicinity of the invasion beach marker). One minute later, troops went shore at Read beach 2 (near USAKA Photo Lab). Within 12 minutes, 1,200 men and their equipment had landed without a single casualty, and amphibious tanks had advanced 100 yards to support the troops as they organized. So effective was the pre-landing bombardment that Japanese resistance was at first largely confined to sporadic small arms fire as the 32nd RCT advanced along the ocean side, and the 184th RCT moved forward on the lagoon side. By 1130, determined Japanese resistance had developed, but U.S. troops continued their advancement. By about 1800, they had driven approximately 1,600 yards along the length of the island from the landing beaches. The 184th has established defensive positions for the night on a line inland of the lagoon (just west of Bldg. 1010), with the 32nd dug in on a line inland from the ocean (in the area of the weather station). American casualties at the end of the first day of the Battle of Kwajalein Island are 17 dead and 46 wounded. Japanese casualties are estimated at 500 killed, 11 captured. Second Day Feb. 2, 1944 At the end of the second day's fighting on Kwajalein Island, hopes are high for a speedy victory tomorrow. But U.S. troops are wary and watchful tonight for "Banzai"- suicide counterattacks- by the 200 to 300 Japanese believed to be the only enemy survivors. Reports from prisoners indicate that 1,000 to 1,200 Japanese were killed in the assault today, and that remaining defense positions are in ruins, with all communications broken. Orders have come from the headquarters of Maj. Gen. C.H. Corlett, Commander of the 7th Infantry Division, to be alert, as "the Japanese soldier makes his suicide counterattack at dawn on the day after his cause becomes hopeless."

Today's action began at 0715, when men of the 32nd and 184th Regimental Combat Teams and 767th Tank Battalion moved forward after 15 minutes of preparatory fire from artillery on Enubuj (Carlson) Island. Advancing along the ocean side, the 32nd, with support tanks, reduced two Japanese strong points "Cat" (in the vicinity of the Country Club and golf course) and "Corn" (at the east end of the runway). Corn was protected by an elaborate tank trap that extended nearly halfway across the island. These troops are dug in for the night in the abandoned trenches and shell craters around the tank trap. The 184th, in its push up the lagoon side, met considerable resistance in the area now covered by fresh water tanks. There, the rubble of a large number of buildings offered enough cover for Japanese snipers and machine gun crews. Because tanks assigned to the 184th had been loaned to the 32nd for assault on "Corn" strong point, the infantry advance has been temporarily stalled. The 184th has taken positions for the night on al line slightly westward of that of the 32nd. U.S. casualties for the day total 11 killed in action and 241 wounded. In 70 sorties today, carrier-based planes dropped 40 tons of bombs and expended 20,800 round of .50 caliber ammunition. No Japanese aircraft has been seen operation in the entire Marshall Islands area. Naval units of the Kwajalein Island Defense Group and transports carrying reserve forces arrived in the lagoon today. The hospital ship Relief also arrived today.

Day Three Feb. 3, 1944 U.S. infantrymen pushed forward today against a fanatically determined and heavily defended enemy to gain another thousand yards in the Battle of Kwajalein. It was the costliest day yet for American troops on the island, with 54 killed in action and 255 wounded. Last night's estimates by prisoners of 200 to 300 Japanese survivors proved to be way off the mark. The 184th regimental Combat Team reports 800 to 1,000 Japanese killed in their area. In one huge block house alone, 200 dead were found, most of them apparent suicides. The 32nd reports and additional 300 enemy dead in the advance along the ocean side. U.S. troops had expected to make a rapid advance to the north end of Kwajalein today, but the 184th ran into serious trouble shortly after it moved out at 0715. As infantrymen approached the Admiralty area (around what is now the intersection of 9th St. and Lagoon Rd.), they came without warning upon the most heavily fortified area of the island. Facing themoon the rear edge of this area stood a great blockhouse of reinforced concrete. Fifty yards beyond, nearly undamaged by bombardment, were two huge shelters of thick, reinforced concrete, steel plate, and logs under a mound of sand several feet thick. Other underground shelters and concrete blockhouses, intact and active, were scattered through dense ruins, rubble, and trees. One observer described it as "trying to fight one's way across the landscape of a nightmare. "Small, often isolated, groups of infantry with rifles and whatever demolition charges they could carry or drag, blasted out one nest of Japanese after another. Smoke and flying debris were so thick that units operations 10 yards apart were unaware of each other's presence. One building was found to be empty. To prevent its possible reentry by enemy troops, it was demolished and set afire. Later it was discovered that the building had contained all the beer, sake, and candy the Japanese had on Kwajalein. Only a few bottles of beer were saved. The 32nd RCT had an easier time of it. From their jump-off point to about the location of the Terminal Building, there was little resistance. Then a pillbox off to the left (about where the projection booth of Richardson Theater is situated) caused a temporary halt. Demolition charges and 75mm shells from medium tanks drove the enemy out one by one. With resistance continuing light, the 32nd has advanced to the area of the Adult Pool. As night falls, the threat of Japanese counterattack increases. Some incidents have occurred as far as 1,000 yards behind the 32nd's advance positions. Just after sunset, bugle was heard among the Japanese at the foot of the pier at 6th St., followed by a headlong attack by screaming Japanese. They were cut down to the last man. Illuminating shells and naval searchlights, together with sporadic artillery and naval fire, are being employed to lessen the chance of night attack. But the American troops on Kwajalein are tensely awaiting the expected dawn charge.

Ebeye Another phase of the Battle of Southern Kwajalein Atoll began this morning when the 17th Regimental Combat Team made an amphibious assault on Ebeye (Burton), chief Japanese seaplanes base in the Marshalls. Among Japanese facilities there are more than 120 machine shops, warehouses, and other buildings.

A 100-yard-wide concrete ramp for seaplanes extends about 300 yards along the northern lagoon shore, with large hangars and repair shops nearby. A 160-yard concrete pier extends into the lagoon about midway along the coast. This morning's preliminary naval and air bombardment was so effective that on the landing beach (lagoon side, south end of Ebeye) and for 200 yards inland, no live Japanese were encountered. The advance proceeded steadily northward, slowed somewhat by enemy pillboxes and large number of individual rifle pits in which Japanese soldiers lie concealed, waiting for a chance to fire on U.S. troops. Through resistance is determined, it seems to consist mainly of individual and small group action without apparent direction. Some Japanese were discovered fighting with spears made of bayonets attached to poles. The 17th RCT has taken defensive positions for the night on a line about 50 yards south of the pier. Big and Little Buster, between Kwajalein and Ebeye, were also taken under fire today, and occupation was completed by 1630.

The battle of Kwajalein is over. Feb. 4, 1944 At dusk today, men of the 32nd Regimental Combat Team surged across the last 150 yards of the island, over-running the one remaining bunker and gun emplacement (now known as Bunker Hill, near Qtrs 223). Across the lagoon, two and a half miles to the north, U.S. troops can see where another American victory was won today. Ebeye was declared fully secured at 1537, after the 17th RCT made a fast, almost unopposed, advance from the pier to the north shore. The final action on Kwajalein began at sunrise, shortly after 0700, when the 32nd pushed off from last night's bivouac (near the Adult Pool) for an advantage along the ocean to 6th St., where the team was to fan out for a sweep over the entire island to the north end. Almost immediately, there was heavy fire from Japanese who had been bypassed yesterday (near the Pacific Bachelor Quarters). The advance was stalled for nearly three hours, as units turned aside to clean out positions firing on them. At the same time, the 184th RCT was encountering pockets of determined resistance in the area between the Admiralty and the lagoon (around 9th St. and Lagoon Rd.). Today, for the first time since the landings, the enemy has surrendered in considerable numbers. Many have been isolated, without water, for the past two days. Thirty-one Koreans and a Japanese scurried out of one building after the 184th brought up a loud speaker and Nisei interpreters, who broadcast promises of food, water, and immunity from harm. More than 90 prisoners were taken by the 184th during the morning. In another area, men of the 32nd covered five Korean prisoners with BARs and moved them from shelter to shelter while the prisoners persuaded others to surrender. In less than an hour, 33 prisoners were taken. By 1300, the 184th had reached its objective at the foot of the pier. After cutting off enemy withdrawal across 5th St., the 184th turned its attention to a thorough mop-up of areas to the rear. By 1430, all enemy action had been overcome on the lagoon side from landing beaches to the pier. The 2nd Battalion, 32nd RCT, was in position north of 6th St. at 1345 to begin its final assault (through what is now the trailer and old housing area). The ground was tangle of debris interlaced with trenches, many of which contained long-dead bodies. The stench of decay and the acrid odor of burned palm wood filled the air. With satchel charges, grenades, and ultimately flame throwers, the 32nd cleared dugouts and still-active pillboxes and blockhouses. When the weary victors reached the northern tip of the island at 1920, organized resistance had ceased.

Operation of the southern atoll complete. Feb. 5, 1944 The Southern Invasion Force today completed occupation of Southern Kwajalein Atoll from Ennugeliggelap in the west to Gellinam in the east. American losses were: 142 dead, 2 missing in action, 845 wounded. The best estimate of enemy losses in Southern Kwajalein Atoll is 4,938 dead and 206 prisoners, including 127 Koreans. Feb. 6, 1944 After a day spent burying enemy dead, the men of the 32nd and 184th RCTs turned Kwajalein Island over to garrison and defense forces.

Named for Pfc. Fred H. Bucholz, a member of Co. F, 3rd Platoon, who was killed in the last three hours of the Battle of Kwajalein, fighting near what is now quarters 222 and 224. He and his Sergeant were attempting to clear out Japanese soldiers who were holed up in shelters. Both men had thrown captured explosives into one of the shelters. Thinking that the explosion had killed the holdouts, they stood to survey the damage. From another shelter, a Japanese rifleman fired out a roof opening, striking Bucholz in the back and killing him instantly. Only about an hour before, Bucholz had rescued his wounded Lieutenant. Richardson Theater Named for the U.S. Army's Commanding General of the Central Pacific Area in 1944. Gen. Robert Richardson was responsible for training and logistical supply for the invasion of the Southern Kwajalein Atoll. Built in 1944, the Rich was one of seven theaters on island, and is the only one remaining. In the early years, Quonset huts by the Rich were home to the chapel, Special Services, radio station WXLG, the library, and the Hourglass.

Tinker's Grave - Tinker, the Japanese dog that survived the fighting on Kwajalein, was buried in 1962 near the turtle pond. Tinker had been taken in by the folks on Kwaj and lived out his days here.

Dyess Field On the last day of the invasion, Feb. 2, 1944, Lt. Col. Aquilla J. Dyess was leading a group of men on a charge against a Japanese position, when machine gun fire took his life only hours before the invasion was complete. He was highest-ranking officer to have been killed in the battles for Kwajalein, Roi, and Namur. After the battle on Roi, some of the men had hung a sign unofficially naming the airport Dyess Field. It wasn't until 1967 that the field was officially named. For his actions on Roi, Lt. Col. Dyess was awarded the Medal of Honor. Corlett Recreation Center Maj. Gen. Charles H. Corlett, 7th Infantry Division, commanded invasion forces at the Southern end of Kwajalein Atoll. The building named for him was built in 1985. It houses a gym where basketball, volleyball, and youth soccer are played, as well as classrooms that host various community functions like church groups and community education.

\3 Haiti

Caribbean island visited by Columbus in 1492 ruled by French all of the 1700s, the U.S. 1915-1934 and Papa Doc 60s, his son in 70s.

GEOGRAPHY - Shares (western half) island with Dominican Republic between Cuba and Puerto Rico. Defined by five mountain ranges, dividing country into three regions: northern, central, and southern. Highest peak, the Morne de la Selle, located in the south, reaches an altitude of 2,715 meters. No navigable rivers. Largest lake is Etang Saumâtre, salt-water body located in southern region.

Climate: Tropical climate influenced by NE trade winds. Wet season generally lasts from February through May, dry season from November to January. Rainfall pattern irregular because of mountainous topography. Temperature in lowland areas varies from 15°C to 25°C in winter, 25°C to 35°C in summer.

INTRODUCTION Since the signing of the Treaty of Ryswick between the kingdoms of Spain and France in 1697, the island of Hispaniola (La Isla Española) has played host to two separate and distinct societies that we now know as the nations of Haiti and the Dominican Republic. At first encounter, and without the benefit of historical background and context, most students or observers find it incongruous that two such disparate nations--one speaking French and Creole, the other Spanish--should coexist within such limited confines.

When viewed in light of the bitter struggle among European colonial powers for wealth and influence both on the continent and in the New World, however, the phenomenon becomes less puzzling. By the late seventeenth century, Spain was a declining power. Although that country would maintain its vast holdings in mainland North America and South America, Spain found itself hard pressed by British, Dutch, and French forces in the Caribbean.

The Treaty of Ryswick was but one result of this competition, as the British eventually took Jamaica and established a foothold in Central America. The French eventually proved the value of Caribbean colonization, in an economic as well as a maritime and strategic sense, by developing modern-day Haiti, then known as Saint-Domingue, into the most productive colony in the Western Hemisphere, if not the world.

Although the other European powers envied the French their island jewel, Saint-Domingue eventually was lost not to a colonial rival, but to an idea. That idea, inspired by the American Revolution and the French Revolution, was freedom; its power was such as to convince a bitterly oppressed population of African slaves that anything--reprisal, repression, even death-- was preferable to its denial. This positive impulse, liberally leavened with hatred for the white men, who had seized them, shipped them like cargo across the ocean, tortured and abused them, and forced women into concubinage and men into arduous labor, impelled the black population of Saint-Domingue to an achievement still unmatched in history: the overthrow of a slaveholding colonial power and the establishment of a revolutionary black republic.

The saga of the Haitian Revolution is so dramatic that it is surprising that it has never served as the scenario for a Hollywood production. Its images are varied and intense: the voodoo ceremony and pact sealed in the Bois Cayman (Alligator Woods) in anticipation of the slave revolt of 1791; the blazing, bloody revolt itself; foreign intervention by British and Spanish forces; the charismatic figure of François-Dominique Toussaint Louverture, his rise and fateful decision to switch his allegiance from Spain to France, his surprisingly effective command of troops in the field, the relative restraint with which he treated white survivors and prisoners, the competence of his brief stint as ruler; the French expedition of 1802, of which Toussaint exclaimed, "All France has come to invade us"; Toussaint's betrayal and seizure by the French; and the ensuing revolution led by Jean-aacque Dessalines, Henri (Henry) Christophe, and Alexandre Pétion.

Given the distinctive and auspicious origins of the Haitian republic, there is some irony in that the Dominicans commemorate as their independence day the date of their overthrow of Haitian rule. The Dominican revolt, however, came as a response to annexation by a Haitian state that had passed from the promise of orderly administration under Toussaint to the hard-handed despotism of Dessalines and had then experienced division, both racial and political, between the forces of Christophe and Pétion. By the time of its conquest of Santo Domingo (later to become the Dominican Republic), Haiti had come under the comparatively stable, but uninspired, stewardship of Jean-Pierre Boyer.

Although viewed, both at the time and today, by most Dominicans as a crude and oppressive state dominated by the military, the Haiti that occupied both eastern and western Hispaniola from 1822 to 1844 can itself be seen as a victim of international political and economic isolation. Because they either resented the existence of a black republic or feared a similar uprising in their own slave-owning regions, the European colonial powers and the United States shunned relations with Haiti; in the process, they contributed to the establishment of an impoverished society, ruled by the military, guided by the gun rather than the ballot, and controlled by a small, mostly mulatto, ruling group that lived well, while their countrymen either struggled to eke out a subsistence-level existence on small plots of land or flocked to the banners of regional strongmen in the seemingly never-ending contest for power.

To be sure, the French colonial experience had left the Haitians completely unprepared for orderly democratic self-government, but the isolation of the post-independence period assured the exclusion of liberalizing influences that might have guided Haiti along a somewhat different path of political and economic development. By the same token, however, it may be that Western governments of the time, and even those of the early twentieth century, were incapable of dealing with a black republic on an equal basis. The United States occupation of Haiti (1915-34) certainly brought little of lasting value to the country's political culture or institutions, in part because the Americans saw the Haitians as uncivilized lackeys and treated them as such.

Both nations of Hispaniola share--along with much of the developing world--the strong tendency toward political organization built upon the personalistic followings of strongmen, or caudillos, rather than on more legalistic bases, such as constitutionalism. This similarity in political culture helps to explain the chronologically staggered parallels between the brutal regimes of Rafael Leónidas Trujillo Molina (1930-61) in the Dominican Republic and that of the Duvaliers--François Duvalier (1957-71) and his son, Jean-Claude Duvalier (1971-86)-- in Haiti.

Both regimes lasted for approximately thirty years; both were headed by nonideological despots; both regimes sustained themselves in power by employing terror and ruthlessly suppressing dissent; both drew the ire of an international community that ultimately proved incapable of directly forcing them from power; and both left their countries mired in political chaos and internal conflict upon their demise. One may only hope that the unstable situation in Haiti after the fall of the Duvalier regime will resolve itself without further analogy to Dominican history--that is, without a civil war. As of late 1990, however, the outcome of the situation remained extremely unpredictable.

Lieutenant General Prosper Avril took power in Haiti in September 1988, ousting the highly unpopular military regime led by Lieutenant General Henri Namphy. Avril, a product of the Haitian military tradition and the Duvalierist system, initially gave assurances that he would serve only as a transitional figure on the road to representative democracy. Whatever his personal feelings or motivations, however, Avril by his actions proved himself to be simply another corrupt Haitian military strongman. Having scheduled elections for 1990, he arrested and expelled leading political figures and declared a state of siege in January of that year.

These actions triggered demonstrations, protests, and rioting among a population weary of exploitation and insincere promises of reform. Despite his public rhetoric, Avril presided over a military institution that perpetuated the Duvalierist traditions of extortion, graft, and price-gouging through state-owned enterprises. At the same time, the military made no substantive effort to address the problem of political violence. By early 1990, Haitians had had enough of promises; many decided to take action on their own, much as they had during the uprising of 1985 that swept Jean-Claude Duvalier from power.

Violent demonstrations began in earnest in early March 1990, ostensibly in response to the army's fatal shooting of an eleven- year-old girl in Petit Goâve. Streets blazed across Haiti as demonstrators ignited tires and automobiles, chanted anti-Avril slogans, and fought with army troops. Avril soon recognized the untenable nature of his position; the United States ambassador reportedly influenced the general's decision to step down in a private meeting held on March 12. Avril's flight from Haiti on a United States Air Force transport added his name to a long list of failed Haitian strongmen, and it left the country under the guidance of yet another military officer, Major General (subsequently promoted to Lieutenant General) Hérard Abraham.

Consultations among civilian political figures produced a provisional government headed by a judge of the Court of Cassation (supreme court), Ertha Pascal-Trouillot, a woman little-known outside legal circles. Judge Pascal Trouillot reportedly accepted the post of provisional president after three other supreme court judges declined; she was sworn in on March 13. Appointed along with her was a nineteen-member Council of State, made up of prominent civic and political leaders.

Although the new government announced no clear definitions of the powers of the council vis-à-vis the provisional president, some reports indicated that the president could exercise independent authority in some areas. The most compelling reality, however, was that all powers of the provisional government had been granted by the Haitian Armed Forces (Forces Armées d'Haïti--FAd'H), which would provide the government's only mandate--and perhaps its major political constituency--until valid popular elections could be held.

The Conseil Electoral Permanent (Permanent Electoral Council- -CEP) scheduled local, legislative, and presidential elections for sometime between November 4 and November 29, 1990. The prospects for their successful implementation, however, appeared highly problematical at best. Seemingly unchecked political violence, which conjured up for many the horrible images of the bloody election day of November 1987, presented the major obstacle to free and fair balloting. Negotiations between the FAd'H and the CEP sought to establish security mechanisms that would prevent a recurrence of the 1987 tragedy. Popular confidence in these efforts, however, did not appear to be very great.

In a larger sense, the utter absence of any democratic tradition, or framework, in Haiti stacked the odds heavily against a smooth governmental transition. Economist Mats Lundahl has referred to Haiti as a hysteretic state, "not simply one where the past has shaped the present, but also one where history constitutes one of the strongest obstacles to change." Several conditions prevailing in Haiti gave substance to this definition.

Among the wide array of personalistic political parties, only three--Marc Bazin's Movement for the Installation of Democracy in Haiti (Mouvement pour l'Instouration de la Démocratie en Haïti-- MIDH), Serge Gilles's National Progressive Revolutionary Haitian Party (Parti Progressiste Révolutionnaire Haïtien--Ponpra), and Sylvio C. Claude's Christian Democrat Party of Haiti (Parti National Chrétien d'Haiti--PDCH)--displayed any semblance of coherent programs or disciplined party apparatus.

The odyssey of the Haitian military, from dominant power before the Duvaliers to subordinate status under the dynastic dictatorship, left uncertain the intentions of the FAd'H under Abraham's leadership. The return of such infamous Duvalierist cronies as former interior minister Roger LaFontant and persistent rumors that Jean-Claude himself was contemplating a return to the nation he had bled dry for fifteen years provoked outrage among a population that wanted nothing so much as to rid itself of the remaining vestiges of that predatory regime.

Aristide's inauguration on February 7, 1991, was a gala event, befitting its historic nature. As expected, the new president delivered a spellbinding inaugural address. In it, he renounced his US$10,000 a month salary as a "scandal in a country where people cannot eat." Although the address was short on specifics of policy, its tone was one of gratitude and support for the poverty-afflicted constituency that had provided such a striking electoral mandate. The address was also conciliatory with regard to the military. Aristide described a "wedding between the army and the people," and hinted that the army would henceforth function as a public security force in order to lessen the threat emanating from right-wing forces such as those directed by Lafontant.

Beyond his rhetorical outreach to the rank and file, Aristide moved quickly to shore up his rule in the face of possible opposition from within the officer corps of the FAd'H.In his inaugural address, he called on General Abraham to retire six of the eight highest-ranking generals as well as the colonel who commanded the Presidential Guard. The appeal reflected Aristide's surprisingly powerful position, based on his overwhelming electoral victory and his demonstrated popular support, which extended even to the ranks of the military. The fact that Abraham complied with the request confirmed the already rather obvious disarray of the FAd'H and the general unwillingness of the institution to reassume political power in Haiti. On February 9, Aristide proposed René Préval as Haiti's prime minister. Préval, a Belgian-trained agronomist and close associate of the president, was subsequently approved by the National Assembly. Although Aristide won a smashing personal victory in his presidential race, no one party or movement achieved a majority in the assembly. This fact promised a certain degree of stalemate and inertia in the legislative process under the Aristide administration. Such a situation did not seem conducive to the development of programs to deal effectively with the country's many severe problems. At the same time, however, an assembly based on coalition and compromise should serve to check any temptation by the new government toward heavy-handed or even authoritarian rule. In any case, the assembly was a new institution in a new government in what many hoped would be a new and democratic Haiti. March 14, 1991 Richard A. Haggerty Dec 1989

The History Of Haiti
 A tiny topical island sits in the Caribbean, decorated with palm trees and colorful hibiscus flowers. Its mountains stand majestically looking down upon sandy beaches and green valleys. From afar it appears as any other island one might encounter sailing the turquoise waters of the Caribbean. Yet, as we draw closer we notice a difference. There are no tourist resorts dotting the coasts, no high rise hotels with sand volleyball courts and marimba bands. This is Haiti, this is different. If the land could speak it would tell of tragedy and violence, of abuse and bloodshed, of power and greed. Why does the country stand apart from its neighbors? The answer lies in the turbulent history of this tiny nation.

The Early Years Christopher Columbus landed on the tiny island he called, "La isla espanola" in December 1492 (The name was later shortened to Hispanola). The island was inhabited by local Arawak Indians who referred to their home as "Hayti", or mountainous land. In keeping with imperialistic ideology, the Spaniards used and abused the native Arawaks to the point of near extinction.

It's location and lush soil made Haiti a treasure constantly sought after by Britain, France and Spain. Finally, by the middle of the 17th century the island became a French colony.

Under French rule Haiti flourished. Haitian products were in great demand in the European market and the tiny island became invaluable as a resource for cocoa, cotton, sugar cane and coffee. Unfortunately, the great demands for these products also created a demand for inexpensive labor. The French, as the Spanish before them looked to Africa as a solution to the labor problem. They imported slaves from the west coast of Africa.

By 1780, Haiti was one of the wealthiest regions in the world. France relied heavily on the slave trade to maintain its economic base. This created a number of problems that would later affect the future of Haiti. First, the slaves brought with them the religious practices of voodoo which for them was more a lifestyle than a religion. Second, the French treated the slaves with undue harshness creating hatred amid an already resentful environment. Third, a class of mulattos arose from the relations of the slave owners and the slaves. There arose a class system, still present today, with a minority of light skinned, sophisticated, Catholic, French-speaking Haitians at odds with dark-skinned, voodoo worshipping, Creole-speaking masses.

In 1791, a successful slave revolt was initiated against the French. The Haitian slaves ousted Napoleon, and by 1804, the island becomes the first black independent nation, with General Dessalines declaring himself emperor. With power comes abuse and the abuses of Dessalines led to his assassination. He was followed by Henri Christophe, an illiterate ex-slave who ruled in the north and Alexandre Petion, a mulatto who ruled in the south. When Christophe died the north and south united. In 1844, the island split into two countries, Haiti and the Dominican Republic. The tiny country of Haiti was in a state of anarchy, poverty was rampant and there was no one with the support or ability to rule and govern fairly. The class system was ever present with the wealthy at one extreme and the poor at the other.

The Occupation Years By 1915, American marines stepped in to calm the situation. The occupation had both positive and negative effects. Thanks to the Marines, the infrastructure of the country was enhanced. Paved roads, houses, hospitals and sewage systems were built. However, once again the Haitians found themselves in an occupied state and their rulers were white. This resulted in even greater power for the lighter skinned Haitians.

Duvalier Years When the Americans left in 1934 the country was still in shambles. There was a constant struggle for power between the Catholic Church and the followers of voodoo. The United States fruit companies that settled and developed on lands taken from Haitian peasants were a source of constant tension. Many leaders came and went but no one united or moved the nation forward.

In 1957, Francois Duvalier, "Papa Doc", declared himself "President for life". Fear ruled the nation under Duvalier and his Tontons Macoutes. Terror reigned under the police repression of his government. Unfortunately, even that stable, structured government didn't help the people economically, educationally or otherwise. With the death of Duvalier, his son Jean Claude, ("Baby Doc") came into power. Life under Baby Doc was only slightly better for the Haitian people than before. His rule was tainted with crimes of repression and a plundering of the riches of the country. Finally, Baby Doc was exiled to France.

Haiti Today After the exile, the country was ridden with mass massacres and rigged elections. Today, power goes back and forth from one leader to the next without any positive results for the people. In 1990, a priest from the slums of Port Au Prince was elected by 67% of the people. Jean Bertrand Aristide was seen as the first leader of the people since 1804. The rooster emblem of Aristide replaced the guinea faun worn by the Tontons Macoutes.

In 1991, a military coup ended the Aristide presidency and he went into exile. The Organization of American States imposed a strict embargo against Haiti causing the country great economic hardship. Many Haitians tried to escape by boat only to suffer death or relocation to camps at Guantanomo, Cuba.

Today, Haiti is still struggling with poverty and instability. Elections have failed to produce leadership that can deal with the many problems of this tiny country. The future of Haiti depends on the ability of its leaders to discover solutions to bring it successfully into the 21st century


\4 The Marshall Islands, Combat in the Central Pacific.

There were many bombs dropped during World War II. But few were as devastating to the Japanese as the one Admiral Chester Nimitz dropped on Dec. 6, 1943, when he proposed a radical revision of Operation Flintlock, the invasion of the Marshalls. Nimitz's Central Pacific commanders recoiled in shock. Nimitz proposed to abandon their plans to take Maloelap and Wotje. Instead, he wanted to concentrate the forces for a strike at the heart of the Marshalls, Kwajalein Atoll. Most of the Pacific commanders opposed the bold new plan. They feared it was too risky to strike deep inside the perimeter of the Marshalls with several powerful bases and hundreds of airplanes within striking range. Nimitz overrules others Nimitz felt that carrier forces and land-based fighters and bombers from the Gilberts could eliminate Japanese air power. Kwajalein would be easier to take. And, with the world's largest lagoon, would make a better staging base for future operations. Nimitz will prevail, and 50 years ago, with the most powerful invasion forces, seized Kwajalein Atoll. Considered by military historians as the most successful amphibious operation, the invasion of the Marshall Islands, code named Operation Flintlock, served as the model for future operations in the pacific and paved the road to Tokyo. The Japanese expected to be attacked in the Marshalls, but not at Kwajalein, which was not as heavily defended as bases at Wotje, Maloelap, Mili, and Jaluit, a big payoff for striking at the center instead of the perimeter.

Significant operation Operation Flintlock was one of the most significant operations in the Pacific Campaign. The seizure of the Kwajalein Atoll was the first capture of Japanese pre-war territory. It pierced the Japanese defense perimeter. It took strategic control of the Marshalls away from the Japanese. It severed Japanese lines of communication. It shortened the pacific campaign. Loss of American life was less than one percent. Masterful planning, naval and air superiority, and heavy preliminary bombing characterized the operation. American forces assaulted Majuro, which was undefended, on Jan. 30, 1944, one day prior to the invasion. Two weeks after the seizure of Kwajalein Atoll, American forces captured Eniwetok.

Left to wither Waiting for reinforcements that never came and continuously harassed by air raids, the remaining garrisons in the Marshalls were bypassed and left isolated, powerless, and doomed to "wither on the vine." With their eastern flank penetrated, the Japanese could not hold the Bismarks, Solomons, or New Guinea.

Ahead of schedule Land-based air raids and reconnaissance flights enabled the neutralization and bypassing of Truk and allowed American forces to seize the Marianas and Philippines well ahead of schedule. The war was shortened and many American lives were saved. Many Japanese garrisons slated for invasion were effectively neutralized and bypassed. The drive through the Pacific was accelerated, and the seizure of the Marianas was advanced six to 12 months. The Marianas brought Japan within range of American B29s and the final blows to end the war.

A History of the strategy leading up to the invasion of the Marshalls Strategic planning in the Pacific started at the turn of the 20th century with the American acquisition of distant possessions in the Pacific. In 1904, following Japan's attack on Russia, Lt. Gen. Chaffee, Army Chief of Staff, proposed that the recently formed Joint Board (of the Army and Navy) provide war plans involving cooperation between the Navy and the Army in the event of war. That request gave rise to the color plans- a series of war plans designated as a specific color corresponding to a specific nation. The Orange plans, contingency plans for war with Japan, were reviewed and revised up through the '20s and '30s. They called for an assault through the Central Pacific. Military planners studied the Orange plans and applied them to their strategy in the Central Pacific campaign.

More than one color The advent of the Axis coalition gave rise to another series of war plans, based on multiple nations- the Rainbow plans, Rainbow 5 called for alliance with Britain and outlined the American/British objectives at the outbreak of the war. It called for the Central Pacific offense to take a back seat to the war with Germany. The campaigns in the Pacific would be primarily defensive, with limited offenses until Germany was defeated. The defense of Australia and New Zealand was vital. Japan's early success in the war invalidated the Rainbow 5 plan's fundamental strategy and postponed the offensive provisions in the Pacific. Japan had weakened the U.S. Pacific Fleet, snatched the Philippines, Wake, Guam, the Gilberts, Malaya, Burma, and the Netherlands Indies, and advanced into New Guinea and the Solomons close to Australia.

Two great commands On March 30, 1942, the Joint Chiefs organized the Pacific theater into two commands-the Southwest Pacific under Gen. Douglas MacArthur in Australia and the Pacific Ocean Area under Nimitz in Hawaii. The primary mission of the two commands was to defend communication lines between the U.S. and Australia, contain the Japanese, and prepare for amphibious offensives. In early 1942 the U.S. sent a substantial number of forces to Australia.

Time to strike By the middle of 1942, Japan had overextended herself and was defeated at Midway and in the Coral Sea. Crippled by the loss of four aircraft carriers and hundreds of planes, the Japanese fleet no longer advanced. The time was ripe for the Allies to take the offensive.

Pacific forces began their advance through the Solomons and New Guinea and halted Japan's southward expansion. At the Casablanca Conference in January 1943, Adm. Ernest King and Gen. George Marshall persuaded the British to keep offensive pressure on the Japanese in the Central Pacific by utilizing resources already available in the Pacific and not hurting the primary offensive in Europe. Offensive pressure in the south would also help keep Australia and New Zealand secure.

Trident Conference On May 11, 1943, the Combined Chiefs of Staff met at the Trident Conference to re-examine the Pacific Strategy. They proposed a Central Pacific offense, which included the Marshalls. The Central Pacific offensive, as opposed to the southern route leading to the Philippines preferred by MacArthur, was shorter and more direct. It did not require as many troops and supplies, utilized the U.S. Fleet to its best advantage, and would isolate Japan from her overseas empire.

Battle-tested troops By the end of May 1943, American war planners had proposed the invasion of the Marshalls for October. However, the assault required two divisions of "battle-tested shock troops with amphibious training" since it would be the first U.S. assault against a fortified atoll. The only qualified troops available were the 1st Marine Division in the South Pacific. Transferring those troops would deprive those regions of their only amphibious divisions with combat experience and presented several political and military risks. The Joint planners and JCS agreed that MacArthur's campaign should not be interrupted, but concluded that the Central Pacific drive could be launched anyway. The Joint War Plans Committee was ordered to prepare a plan to assault the Marshalls for November or December.

Not an easy task The committee had to produce a plan that would not interrupt MacArthur's operation. Yet they required his troops for an invasion of the Marshalls. Unable to solve the problem, they presented a new plan that called for seizure of the Gilberts as an alternate course of action. The Joint Chefs agreed to assault the Gilberts in November 1943, as a prelude to a drive in the Marshalls. Seizure of the Gilberts would require fewer troops and would provide air bases to be used in strikes against the Marshalls and Carolines.

Lessons learned The seizure of Tarawa validated American amphibious doctrine. But casualties were high. American planners had underestimated the strength of the Japanese island fortress. The naval artillery couldn't penetrate the concrete and steel bunkers overlaid with coral and coconut logs. Preliminary naval and air bombardment was inadequate. Most Japanese weapons were still operational when the men reached the shore. Tactical and logistical deficiencies also hampered the assault. In addition, hydrographic information was inadequate. The battle at Tarawa tested an amphibious doctrine that had never been used, and the lessons learned would be applied to Kwajalein. The experience gained at Tarawa, coupled with the expansion of U.S. arms in the Pacific, made the almost perfect amphibious operation at Kwajalein possible.


\5 Pacific Islands and Micronesia

collectively referred to as Melanesia, Micronesia, and Polynesia, also sometimes known as Oceania.

This usage rules out the Australian island continent, the Asia-related Indonesian, Philippine, and Jap archipela-goes, and the Ryukyu, Bonin-Volcano, and Kuril island arcs that project seaward from Japan. Neither does the term encompass the Aleutian chain connecting Kamchatka and Alaska nor such isolated islands of the Pacific Ocean as Juan Fernandez off the coast of South America.

Although the Pacific Ocean makes up nearly one-third of the Earth's surface, the Pacific Islands discussed in this article add up to a little less than 500,000 sq miles (1,300,000 km2) of land area. New Guinea, the largest island in the world after Greenland, represents 70 percent of this total, and New Zealand accounts for 20 percent. The remaining 10 percent of the land area of the Pacific is divided among more than 10,000 scattered islands.

The Pacific Islands lie mainly in the area bounded by latitudes 23° N and 27° S and longitudes 130° E and 125° W. Exceptions to this are New Zealand, which lies in the southern temperate zone, and Easter Island, which stands in isolation at longitude 109° W, almost halfway to South America. (Australia, New Zealand, and Hawaii are treated in separate articles.) For convenient reference, the Pacific Islands are customarily divided into three ethnogeographic groupings.

The great arc of islands located north and east of Australia and south of the Equator is called Melanesia (from the Greek words melas, “black,” and nesos, “island”) after the predominantly dark-skinned peoples of New Guinea, the Bismarcks, Solomon Islands, Vanuatu (formerly the New Hebrides), New Caledonia, and Fiji. North of the Equator and east of the Philippines is another island arc that ranges from Palau (Belau) and the Marianas in the west through the Carolines and Marshalls all the way to Kiribati (formerly the Gilbert Islands).

This is Micronesia, so named because of the smaller size of these islands and atolls. In the eastern Pacific, and largely enclosed within a huge triangle formed by Hawaii in the north, New Zealand to the south, and Easter Is far to the east, are the “many” (poly-) islands of Polynesia.

Other components of this widely scattered collection are Samoa, Tonga, French Polynesia (including the Society, Tuamotu, and Marquesas Islands), and the Cook Islands. In this, the last section of the Pacific Ocean to be inhabited, the islanders share a cultural tradition that relates them closely to many Fijians. Fiji, indeed, is actually a transitional territory between Melanesia and Polynesia.

Since the 16th century, the Western world has shown an interest in the Pacific Islands that has been expressed in the activities of explorers, scientists, artists and writers, missionaries, commercial entrepreneurs, and imperialistic statesmen.

The variety of the Pacific's environments, both physical and biotic, continues to be a laboratory for experimenting in social and cultural adaptation. Though insularity has often dominated this process, its effect has been offset by the opportunities for human contact and exchange in many directions across the ocean's expanse.

In the 20th century, the islands and their inhabitants have continued to attract international interest, although for new reasons, such as their strategic significance in the relationships of the world powers in Europe, Asia, and America. Attention has also centred on the problems created for Pacific islanders by nature's limitation of land and resources in the face of expanding populations and rising standards of living.

The islands may be classified as either continental or oceanic. The former are associated with the ancient continental platforms of Asia and Australia, now partially submerged. Oceanic islands, located eastward in the deeper Pacific basin, are differentiated as high volcanic-based islands or low coral islands and atolls.

A coral island may be single, or two or more coral islets may be part of an atoll if connected by a reef ringing a lagoon. The “high–low” distinction is misleading as the two types occur in many combinations, and some coral islands have been elevated considerably by changes in the ocean level.

Continental islands The islands of the broad western Pacific margin, formed mainly of metamorphosed rocks, sediments, and andesitic volcanic material, are separated from the basaltic volcanic islands of the central and eastern Pacific by deep ocean trenches along the eastern borders of Japan, the Marianas, New Guinea, Solomon Islands, Fiji, and New Zealand, a demarcation that is commonly called the Andesite Line.

These continental islands, faulted and folded in mountainous arcs, tend to be higher and larger than those farther east and have rich soils that support almost every kind of vegetation. New Guinea, 1,500 miles long and with a maximum width of nearly 500 miles, is a good example. Its snowcapped mountains rise to about 16,400 feet (5,000 metres), its interior is dissected by high plateaus and extensive river systems, and its slopes and coastal margins contain dense forests and vast swamps.

High oceanic islands Extensive volcanic mountain ranges in the central and eastern Pacific rise abruptly from the ocean deep, their cores of dense black basalt built up from lava flows from the fractured seafloor. Where summits stand in high relief above sea level, they represent most of the islands that constitute Polynesia and Micronesia. Small to intermediate in land area, nowhere do they match the extent of continental islands.

Hawaii's snow-topped Mauna Kea reaches 13,796 feet, though most oceanic islands have peaks of somewhat less than 5,000 feet. Topography is extremely rugged, with sharp ridges, deep canyons, high cliffs, and waterfalls abounding. Human communities occupy the more congenial lower slopes, floodplains, and wide strands. The islands, rich in iron and magnesium oxides, are densely forested but lack the mineral wealth of continental islands.

Low coral islands Most Pacific islands are coral formations, although all rest on volcanic or other cores. In the shallow waters of the tropics, both continental and oceanic islands attract coral growth in the form of fringing reefs, partially submerged platforms of consolidated limestone, with coral organisms at the ocean edge feeding on materials carried in by waves and currents.

Coral-building polyps and algae secrete calcium carbonate from seawater, forming skeletal frameworks that adhere to land surfaces or to the rock remains of coralline ancestors. Many islands have been gradually submerged through a combination of sinking, caused by geologic action, and flooding, caused by the melting of ice caps. As islands were flooded, coral growth continued outward, producing barrier reefs farther from shore and separated from it by a lagoon.

A coral atoll results when still further flooding reduces an island to a submarine condition. The usually irregular reef continues to build up in the warm shallows. It encircles a clear-surfaced lagoon of moderate depth and in time supports a number of islets, known locally as motu, built up from reef debris to 20 or 30 feet above sea level.

Atolls exist in all shapes and sizes. Kwajalein Atoll in the Marshalls is the world's largest, being about 80 miles long and 20 miles wide, with a lagoon area of 655 square miles. Openings, or passages, which commonly occur on the leeward side of Pacific atolls, permit access to the lagoon by ocean shipping. The only source of fresh water is rain.

Successive elevations of an island above sea level by geologic action have created a variety of “raised” coral formations. The northern half of Guam, for example, is a coralline limestone plateau rising to 850 feet, while the mountains in the southern half of the island, formed by volcanic activity, reach elevations up to 1,300 feet. Nauru and Banaba (Ocean Island) are raised coral islands that stand at elevations of about 210 and 265 feet, respectively. They have deeper soil and a more adequate water supply than atoll islets, as well as surface deposits of phosphate rock (derived from guano) that have been mined commercially.

Micronesia

Federated States of Micronesia, country in the western Pacific Ocean. It is composed of more than 600 islands and islets in the Caroline Islands archipelago and is divided, roughly along cultural and linguistic lines, into the states of Yap, Chuuk, Pohnpei, and Kosrae. The total land area is 271 sq mi (701 sq km). The capital is Palikir, on the island of Pohnpei.

To the west of the Federated States of Micronesia lies the Republic of Palau, also in the Caroline archipelago, and to the east is the Republic of the Marshall Islands. These two nations, together with the Commonwealth of the Northern Marianas and the Federated States of Micronesia, were administered by the US as the Trust Territory of the Pacific Islands from 1947 to 1986.

The islands are of two general types: high volcanic islands that support a large variety of plant forms and low-lying coral atolls with poorer soil. The main landmass in Yap is distinctive in that it was formed by folds in the Earth's crust and is continental in geologic composition. Each of the four states has as its population centre an elevated landmass of fairly large extent. These range in size from Pohnpei, with an area of 129 square miles, to Yap and Chuuk, each with 39 square miles.

The volcanic islands of Chuuk are an anomaly in the Pacific since they are encircled by a reef but have not yet subsided beneath sea level to become a classic atoll. Yap Island and six islands in the Chuuk group rise to more than 500 feet (150 metres), and Kosrae and Pohnpei islands have peaks of 2,061 feet and 2,593 feet, respectively. The coral atolls consist of groups of small islands, formed atop a coral reef enclosing a lagoon. The climate is tropical, with high humidity and a mean annual temperature of 81° F (27° C). There is little seasonal variation in temperature.

Rainfall averages 120 inches (3,000 millimetres) per year throughout the area, although Pohnpei receives more than 200 inches yearly. There are distinct rainy and dry seasons, the latter occurring during the height of the northeasterly trade-wind season between December and April. Yap, which alone is situated in the monsoon area, has westerly winds for part of the year. Numerous typhoons originate in the east each year, usually spinning off to the northwest toward Yap and the Mariana Islands and seldom striking any of the other islands.

On the high islands, mangrove swamps grow along the shore, and grassland or scrub ascends to tropical rain forests in the interior mountain areas. Settlements are almost without exception located near the coast. Volcanic islands, with their richer soil, support many different species of plant life. On coral atolls the predominant forms of vegetation are the coconut palm and pandanus and breadfruit trees. Atoll dwellers typically locate their houses on the lagoon side of the island.

The people The native people of the Federated States, while generally classified as Micronesian, are very diverse in physical types, cultures, and languages. The people of Yap Island have Melanesian-like features and speak a language only distantly related to the other languages of the area. Inhabitants of the coral atolls in Yap state are similar in language and culture to the people of Chuuk, although their languages are not mutually intelligible. Both Chuuk and Pohnpei contain several dialects, and the inhabitants of Kapingamarangi and Nukuoro, two atolls in the southwestern portion of Pohnpei state, are Polynesians and speak languages unrelated to Pohnpeian. Only Kosrae has complete ethnic and linguistic unity.

Altogether eight local languages are recognized as distinct, and dialectal differences in the outlying atolls add further variety. Almost half of the total population lives in Chuuk. Pohnpei has about 30 percent, and Yap and Kosrae have about 10 percent and 7 percent, respectively. In recent years there has been some migration to the towns for employment and education, and the four main towns—the capitals of each state—now contain about one-quarter of the total population. The birth rate remains high, and mortality rates have been sharply reduced. The population is growing by about 3 percent yearly. Almost the entire population is Christian. English is spoken widely in commerce and government throughout the nation.

The eastern Caroline Islands, like the Marshall and Gilbert islands, were probably first settled from the New Hebrides–Fiji area in the millennium before the Christian Era. Archaeological and linguistic evidence suggests that the earliest migrants worked their way up the chain of islands to the east and gradually spread westward from the Marshalls. Pottery dating to the beginning of the Christian Era has been found in Chuuk, and artifacts of similar antiquity have been unearthed in other islands in the east.

The languages of the area, with the exception of the two Polynesian outliers and Yap, are closely related to one another and show striking similarities to Vanuatuan tongues.

The high island of Yap appears to have been settled from the west, probably from the Philippines or Indonesia. Pottery and shell adzes found there date from the 2nd century AD and show a resemblance to types discovered in the Marianas. Yap's caste system and other features of its social organization are unparalleled elsewhere in the area. The renowned Yapese stone money was quarried in nearby Palau and the Marianas. In later centuries a reciprocal tribute and trade system was evolved with the surrounding coral atolls, sometimes termed the Yap Empire or Yapese Empire.

In the eastern islands of Pohnpei and Kosrae, some seven centuries ago, a major social upheaval occurred, possibly under the impact of invasion from the south. Fortified settlements were built of huge basaltic logs, their ruins still visible today, and political authority over each island was centralized even as the society became more stratified.

The islands were visited occasionally during the 16th century by Spanish navigators and were later named for the Spanish king Charles II. During the 19th century European naval ships followed whalers and traders to the islands, and the inhabitants experienced their first intensive contact with foreigners and their wares.

In 1886 Spain finally colonized the Carolines, but its short rule was ended in 1899 when the islands were sold to Germany at the conclusion of the Spanish-American War. Germany, in turn, yielded the islands at the outbreak of World War I to Japan, which gained formal title to them in 1920 as a League of Nations mandate. At first Japan attempted to develop a solid economy; later it used the islands as an outlet for surplus population; and finally it fortified them just before WW II.

In July 1947 the Carolines, together with the Marshalls and northern Marianas, became a UN trust territory under U.S. admin. They were designated as a strategic area to allow the United States to set up military bases as deemed necessary; consequently, ultimate responsibility for the Trust Territory of the Pacific Islands rested in the UN Security Council rather than in the UN General Assembly, as was the case with other trust territories. Micronesian leaders began negotiations with the United States for full self-govt in 1969.

The constitution that was drafted in 1975 became the basis for the federated government that went into effect in 1979. By that time, however, the Marianas, the Marshalls, and Palau had voted to separate from the proposed federation; this left only the “inner states” of Yap, Truk (later Chuuk), Kosrae, and Ponape (later Pohnpei) to compose the new political entity. In a 1983 plebiscite, voters approved a Compact of Free Association with the US.

The compact provides for internal self-government for the Federated States of Micronesia, while requiring that the United States remain responsible for defense and external security and that it provide financial assistance. The articles of the compact provide for the Federated States of Micronesia to become fully independent and alter its status with the United States at any time, providing this change of status is approved in plebiscites. The compact has a 15-year duration but is renewable by mutual consent. The Federated States of Micronesia became a member of the UN on Sept. 17, 1991. The Rev. Francis X. Hezel, S.J.

\6 Phillipines

Malay natives inhabit 11 of 7100 islands running NS 1100 miles. First visited by Magellan in 1521. Named by the Spanish for King Phillip II, founded Manila in 1571 and cede to U.S. in 1898 for $20 million. Became independent 4th of Jul 1945. U.S. left their bases 1992.

Republic of the Philippines, in SE Asia, is an archi-pelago of some 7100 islands and islets lying about 500 miles off the coast. The total land area of the Philippines is 115,800 sq mi (300,000 sq kms). It is bounded by the Philippine Sea to the east, the Celebes Sea to the south, and the South China Sea to the west and north. The Philippines takes its name from Philip II, who was king of Spain during the Spanish colonization of the islands in the 16th century.

Manila is the biggest city and the national capital. It is located on Luzon, the largest island, which has a land area of 40,420 square miles. Mindanao, at 36,537 square miles the second largest island, lies in the south. The archipelago spreads out in the form of a triangle, with the islands south of Palawan, the Sulu Archipelago, and the island of Mindanao forming (west–east) its southern base and the Batan Islands, in the north, its apex.

The islands stretch for about 1,150 miles (1,850 kilometres) from north to south and for about 700 miles from east to west at their widest extent. Only about two-fifths of the islands and islets have names, and only some 350 have areas of one square mile or more.

The large islands fall into three groups: (1) the Luzon group in the north and west, consisting of Luzon, Mindoro, and Palawan; (2) the Visayan group in the centre, consisting of Bohol, Cebu, Leyte, Masbate, Negros, Panay, and Samar; and (3) Mindanao in the south. Because it was under Spanish rule for 333 years and under U.S. tutelage for a further 48 years, the Philippines has many cultural affinities with the West.

It is, for example, the fourth most populous country in which English is an official language and the only Roman Catholic country in SE Asia. Its peoples, however, are Asian in consciousness and in aspiration.

In many ways Filipino society is composed of paradoxes, perhaps the most apparent being the great extremes of wealth and poverty in the nation. The Philippines is a country of rich resources, but it is primarily agricult-ural, although a high degree of domestic and foreign investment has spurred the rapid development of its industrial potential. Educationally, it is among the most advanced of Asian countries, having a high literacy rate.

The irregular config of the archipelago, the coastline of more than 21,500 miles, the great extent of mountainous country, the narrow and interrupted coastal plains, the generally northward trend of the river systems, and the lakes are the outstanding physical features of the Philippines. The islands are composed of volcanic, coral, and all principal rock formations. The mountain ranges for the most part run in the same general direction as the islands themselves, approximately north to south.

The Cordillera Central, the central mountain chain of Luzon, running north to the Luzon Strait from the northern boundary of the central plain, is the most prominent range. It consists of two and in places three parallel ranges, each of which averages 5,900 feet (1,800 metres) in height. The Sierra Madre, extending along the Pacific coast from northern to central Luzon, is the longest mountain range in the country. This range and the Cordillera Central merge in north-central Luzon to form the Caraballo Mountains. To the north of the latter, and between the two ranges, is the fertile Cagayan Valley.

The narrow Ilocos, or Malayan, range, lying close along the west coast of northern Luzon, rises in places to more than 5,000 feet and is seldom less than 3,500 feet in height; it is largely volcanic. In the southwestern part of northern Luzon are the rugged Zambales Mountains, consisting of more or less isolated old volcanic stocks (rock formed under great heat and pressure deep beneath the Earth's surface).

The central plain of Luzon, about 150 by 50 miles, is only about 100 feet above sea level except near its centre. The greater part of southern Luzon is occupied by isolated volcanoes and irregular masses of hills and mountains. The highest peak is Mayon Volcano (8,077 feet) near Legazpi in Albay province.

Through the island of Palawan, about 25 miles wide and more than 250 miles long, there extends a range with an average height of from 4,000 to 5,000 feet. Each of the Visayan Islands except Samar and Bohol is traversed longitudinally by a single range with occasional spurs.

Several peaks in Panay reach an altitude of 6,000 feet or more. Canlaon Volcano, on Negros, is 8,087 feet high, and other peaks reach altitudes of more than 6,000 feet. There are several important ranges on Mindanao, the Diuata (Diwata) Mountains along the eastern coast being the most prominent. West of this lies the fertile valley of the Agusan River, 20-30 mi wide. Farther west and SW is the Cotabato Valley of the Mindanao River (Río Grande de Mindanao), and between its lower course and the southern coast lies a range trending NW-SE.

On the SE border of the basin of the Mindanao River is Mount Apo, at 9,692 feet (2,954 metres) the highest peak in the Philippines. Around Lake Lanao are a number of volcanic peaks, and a low cordillera extends through the Zamboanga Peninsula in the far west. The plains lying amid the mountains for example, the central plain of Luzon and the central plain of Panay have the greatest density of population in the islands, except Cebu, where the people live mostly on the coastal plain because the interior is high and rugged.

The most important rivers are the Cagayan, Agno, Pam-panga, Pasig, and Bicol on Luzon and the Mindanao and Agusan on Mindanao. The Pasig, which flows through the Manila, is commercially important. The largest lake in the archipelago is Laguna de Bay, located south of Manila. Volcanoes are a conspicuous feature of the land-scape, but there is relatively little volcanic activity.

There are altogether about 50 volcanoes, of which more than 10 are known to be active. All gradations of volcanoes can be seen, from the almost perfect cone of Mayon, which has been compared to Mount Fuji in Japan, to old, worn-down volcanic stocks, the present forms of which give little indication of their origin. The several distinct volcanic areas are in south-central and southern Luzon and on the islands of Negros, Mindanao, Jolo, and elsewhere. Tremors and earthquakes are common.

Climate The climate of the Philippines is tropical and is strongly affected by monsoon (rain-bearing) winds, which blow from the southwest from approximately May to October and from the northeast from November to February. Thus, temperatures remain relatively constant from north to south during the year, and seasons consist of periods of wet and dry. Throughout the country, however, there are considerable variations in the frequency and amount of precipitation.

The western shores facing the South China Sea have marked dry and wet seasons. The dry season generally begins in December and ends in May, the first three months being cool and the second three hot; the rest of the year consists of the wet season.

The dry season shortens progressively to the east until it ceases to occur. During the wet season, rainfall is heavy in all parts of the archipelago except for an area extending southward through the centre of the Visayan group to central Mindanao and then southwestward through the Sulu Archipelago; rain is heaviest along the eastern shores facing the Pacific Ocean.

From Jun to Dec typhoons often strike the archipelago. Most of these storms come from the southeast, their frequency generally increasing from south to north; in some years the number of typhoons reaches 25 or more. Typhoons are heaviest in Samar, Leyte, eastern Quezon province, and the Batan Islands, and when accompanied by floods or high winds they may cause great loss of life and property.

Mindanao is generally free from typhoons. November through February constitutes the most agreeable season; the air is cool and invigorating at night, and the days are pleasant and sunny. During the hot part of the dry season in most places, and especially in the cities of Cebu, Davao, and Manila, the temperature sometimes rises as high as 100° F (38° C).

Overall temperatures decline with altitude, however, and cities and towns located at higher elevations—such as Baguio in northern Luzon, Majayjay and Lucban south of Manila, and Malaybalay in central Mindanao—experience a pleasant climate throughout the year; at times the temperature in these places dips as low as 43° F (6° C).


\7 Polynesia

Ethnogeographic grouping of islands scattered across a huge triangular area of the east-central Pacific Ocean. The triangle has its apex at the Hawaiian Islands in the north and its base angles at New Zealand in the west and Easter Island in the east.

Polynesia (from Greek poly, “many,” and nesoi, “islands”) comprises the island groups of Samoa (American Samoa and Samoa), the Cook Islands, French Polynesia (Tahiti and the other Society Islands, the Marquesas Islands, the Austral Islands, and the Tuamotu Archipelago), the island of Niue, the islands of Tokelau, Tuvalu (formerly the Ellice Islands), the islands of Tonga and of Wallis and Futuna, the Hawaiian Islands, and Pitcairn Island. New Zealand's original inhabitants, the Maori, are also Polynesian; Fiji is sometimes included in Polynesia because of the proportion of its population that is Polynesian.

On the basis of both archaeological evidence and relative linguistic homogeneity, authorities believe that central Polynesia was settled by migration from Melanesia beginning some 3,000 to 4,000 years ago. Secondary migrations then occurred from the central island groups to the more remote areas of Polynesia. Samoan peoples are believed to have settled the Marquesas perhaps as early as AD 300, and Easter Island may have been settled from the Marquesas as early as AD 400. Hawaii also was settled by voyagers from the Marquesas some time in the second half of the 1st millennium AD; centuries later explorers from the Society Islands arrived.

The Societies were probably the point of origin for the Polynesians who later settled the Cook Islands. Either the Marquesas or the Societies were the point of origin for the people who settled New Zealand sometime before AD 1000. The closely related Polynesian languages, which are spread over a vast area of the Pacific Ocean, tend to support the archaeological indication of relatively recent dispersal of Polynesian culture. Prior to European contact, settlement in the Polynesian islands was either in hamlets or villages.

The larger volcanic islands in general were settled in hamlets, because food resources were diversified and spread over many environmental zones. Houses were clust-ered in groups of four or five, with gardens, taro patches, coconut trees, and breadfruit growing in the immediate vicinity. Village-type settlements of 30 or more houses were found, especially along the coasts, in Samoa and New Zealand. Such settlements were often fortified by walls of stone or wooden palisades. Both hamlet and village settlement depended upon kinship patterns and family descent for organization.

The usual Polynesian kinship pattern is based on an extended patrilineal, patrilocal family. Adoption, however, was common, and social custom was flexible. In certain societies (e.g., those of Tahiti and Hawaii), kinship could be traced through the female line if it conferred greater advantage; though male descent lines were preferred, in practice descent was bilateral. The most common type of kinship-based descent group in Polynesian society was the “ramage” type, in which descent passed from firstborn son to firstborn son and was traceable back to the mythological past.

The ruling chief of an independent district or island was supposed to be the most direct descendant in the senior line from the head of the family that had established itself on the land by virtue of first occupancy or conquest. Another major type of kinship-based org, the descent line, seems to be the result of a breakdown in the lower levels of ramage organization.

Descent line is unconcerned with ranking based on rela-tive position to a particular male line of descent and with genealogical relationship of one descent line to another. In ancient Polynesian societies, the chief, though highest in social status and clearly the reposi-tory of sacred power for the group, was regarded as the first among equals.

In some Polynesian societies such as those of Hawaii, Tahiti, and Tonga this system gave way to a new order in which the families of the chiefs (sometimes determined by prestige or greater force) established themselves as a class apart from commoners and their position became hereditarily fixed.

Their genealogies provided connections with creator gods from whom they derived their mana (superior and super-natural power). Rigid taboos, the infringement of which often involved the death penalty, were laid down to protect the chief from being familiarly approached by those not of his blood or rank and to uphold the relig-ious system that supported him. In these societies social stratification was clear-cut, and warfare was frequent.

It is also notable that in societies of this type, Christian missionaries succeeded in overthrowing ancient religious practices only after they had converted the chiefs. Because chiefly powers were deeply rooted in religious belief and made effective through religious taboos, the chiefs lost much of their hold on the people through this change.

Religion and magic played an important role in tradi-tional Polynesian culture. The gods of Polynesia were a complex assortment, including malevolent as well as benevolent beings, and they varied in rank and importance from those of the pantheon (who had a part in the cosmo-gony) to strictly local gods. Each of these beings had its own ritual requirements, and often schools of priests were required to carry them out.

Among the religious practices were sacrifice (sometimes human sacrifice), chanting, great feasting, and fertility rites. One of the key beliefs of the culture was that all things animate and inanimate possess mana. This mana was dynamic and could be damaged, sapped, or nullified by improper actions. Women especially were considered power-ful (though unclean) creatures, capable of defiling the sacredness of certain tracts of land or groves and any number of inanimate objects with which they came into contact.

An elaborate system of social rules was established on the principle of mana, both to protect mana and to avoid violations of taboo (tapu). Magic was also pervasive, and countless rituals regarding love, war, revenge, agriculture, and fishing were practiced. Polynesian culture had a largely marine-based way of life supplemented by horticulture and arboriculture.

In addition to fish, mollusks and crustaceans were an important source of food. Fishing was often a group activity, with a line of men driving fish toward shore or spreading and drawing enormous nets. Polynesian fishermen explored vast expanses of ocean around their island homes, taking grouper, schools of tuna, and sometimes sharks and rays, which were a delicacy.

Other dietary staples were generally provided by gardens and groves in which crops of sweet potatoes, taro, breadfruit, bananas, sugarcane, and coconuts were cultivated. Kava, a nonalcoholic, euphoria-producing beverage made from the root of the pepper plant, was a favourite drink of the elders and was used ceremonially.

Food plants also provided raw material for much of Polynesian material culture. Breadfruit wood was used in canoe-making, and its sap served as caulking; the inner bark, or bast, of the breadfruit tree (as well as that of the paper mulberry plant) was soaked and beaten into cloth called tapa. Leaves of some plants were used in weaving mats, clothing, sails, and other household goods. The outrigger canoe, which could negotiate shallow lagoons, land over reefs, and be easily hauled ashore, was essential to island life.

When a second canoe was substituted for the outrigger float, the craft became a double canoe. Both the single canoe and the double canoe were often equipped with mat sails. Very large double canoes for interisland communication or for settlement expeditions were vessels 100–150 feet (30–45 metres) long, decked over and supporting a thatched house. These were capable of transporting families, domesticated animals, and plants over great stretches of ocean.

Over the course of time, each island group developed distinctive artistic skills. The ruined stone temples of the Society Islands, Easter Island, and the Marquesas indicate a fine grasp of masonry and architecture.

Functional goods canoes, war clubs, dance shields, fish hooks—were elegantly designed and meticulously decorated. Feather cloaks represented a phenomenal amount of effort in the gathering of thousands of small, rare feathers, arranging them in tufts, and tying them in overlapping rows onto a fabric of extremely fine netting. The exchange of goods and services among Polynesian societies was characterized by redistribution and reciprocity. This system, evident even in the late 20th century, is exemplified in early land-holding practices.

In traditional Polynesian societies, land was corporately held, and sections were apportioned to various family groups. As social organization evolved, however, each island group began to develop its own methods of land distribution, some of which were determined by social class. Contact with European culture that began in the late 1700s radically altered life in Polynesia.

Spanish explorers searching for riches and eager to spread Christianity were the first Europeans to explore Polynesia. Álvaro de Mendaña de Neira landed on the Marquesas in 1595, and in 1606 Pedro Fernández de Quirós sighted the Tuamotu Archipelago and the northern Cook Islands.

The Dutch arrived soon thereafter. In 1642 Abel Tasman sighted New Zealand and later Tonga. British and French exploration in Polynesia began in 1767 with the British navigator Samuel Wallis, who explored Tahiti; in the same year, the French navigator Louis-Antoine de Bougainville reached Tahiti and later the Samoan islands. The British naval officer and explorer Captain James Cook circum-navigated and charted the two major islands of New Zealand in 1769 and 1770 and later reached Tahiti.

In 1778 Cook landed on the Hawaiian Islands, which he named the Sandwich Islands in honour of the earl of Sandwich. Resistance to European intervention occurred in almost all of the Polynesian islands, but such movements were brief.

Hawaii was annexed by the US in 1898; France annexed the Marquesas and Society Islands in 1880; Chile claimed Easter Island in 1888; the British annexed New Zealand in 1840 and the Cook Islands in 1901; and Tonga remained an independent kingdom but came under British protection from 1900.

By the end of the 19th cen, all of Polynesia was under the control of European powers and the United States. During the 20th cen, Western Samoa (now Samoa) achieved its independence (1962); American Samoa became a U.S. territory (1929); Hawaii became the 50th state of the US (1959); New Zealand achieved independence (1947) within the Commonwealth; the Cook Islands became politically dependent on New Zealand; and the Marquesas Islands, Society Islands, and Tuamotu Archipelago were made the French overseas territory of French Polynesia.

Colonizers and, especially, Christian missionaries, in imposing Western belief systems and cultural ways, effectively wiped out Polynesian local traditions and customs. Most of the traditional ways were lost or amalgamated with Western ways. Of the Polynesian islands, Samoa and Tonga retain more of traditional culture than the others. Elsewhere, Western influence is evident nearly everywhere, particularly in the conspicuous presence of consumer goods.

The Polynesian way of life had considerable romantic appeal for many Western artists and writers because it represented to them a simple, natural way of life, free of “civilization” and bourgeois attitudes. The French painter Paul Gauguin lived and worked for several years toward the end of his life in Tahiti and the Marquesas, taking Polynesian people and culture as subjects for his paintings.

Another example of this phenomenon is Herman Melville, who as a young man worked aboard a number of Pacific-bound whaling ships and wrote about his experiences in the South Seas in Typee: A Peep at Polynesian Life (1846) and Omoo: A tale of Adventures in the South Seas (1847).


\8 French Polynesia

118 isles and atolls, officially Territory of French Polynesia, French Territoire de la Polynésie Française, overseas territory of France, a collection of island groups in the south-central Pacific Ocean. Included are some 130 islands, divided among five archipelagoes, scattered across the Pacific between latitudes 7° and 27° S and longitudes 134° and 155° W.

The archipelagoes are the Society Islands, the Tuamotu Archipelago, the Gambier Islands, the Marquesas Islands, and the Tubuai Islands. The territory's area (inc inland water) is some 1,550 sq mi (4,000 sq km). The capital, Papeete, is on Tahiti, the territory's largest island (402 sq mi), in the Society group. There are five distinct groups of islands, all protrusions of parallel submarine ridges trending from the NW to the SE.

The Society Islands are the most westerly of the group and the most important in terms of land area (40%) and population (85%). Except for a few small atolls, the Society Islands are of the high-island type, their formation having resulted from the emergence of under-water volcanoes. The volcanic cones are highly eroded and cut up into high crests and deep, radiating valleys. The often lushly vegetated mountains drop abruptly to narrow coastal strips or directly into lagoons or the sea. The islands are protected from the force of the sea by almost completely encircling barrier reefs.

The most highly populated of the Society Islands are Tahiti and its neighbour, Moorea, both situated in the eastern Windward Group, or Iles du Vent. Tahiti, formed of two ancient volcanic cones, is particularly striking because of its dramatic silhouette, which rises 7,352 feet (2,241 metres) above sea level.

The mountains are empty of all human settlement, habita-tion and planting being entirely limited to the coastal strip and valley outlets of the island. Moorea, separated from Tahiti by a channel 8.5 miles (14 km) wide, is also a high island and is encircled with very white coral sand beaches. It is well-connected to Tahiti by boat and taxi planes—a consequence of the booming tourist industry.

Some 75 miles to the west of Tahiti are the Leeward Islands, or Iles sous le Vent, made up of five high islands and four atolls. They closely resemble the Windward Islands in appearance. Raiatea, a double island group, is the largest and most densely populated of the Leeward Group. Separated by a channel that is about two miles wide, Raiatea and its northern neighbour, Vaitoare, are located on the same mountain mass and lie within a single barrier reef. Both have coastal plains suitable for growing coconut palms and raising stock.

The growing of vanilla, once an important crop, declined in the 1970s. The Leeward Group's port is Uturoa, located on Raiatea. To the east of Raiatea is the picturesque island of Huahine, a volcanic structure bisected by a shallow arm of the sea.

Finally, to the west of Raiatea lies the beautiful little island named Bora-Bora. It is formed from two volcanic peaks rising to 2,385 feet and 2,169 feet and dropping abruptly to the lagoon. Bora-Bora is one of the centres of the tourist trade in French Polynesia.

The Tuamotu Archipelago, lying to the east of the Society Islands, has an area of 280 square miles and consists of some 80 islands. These are low, flat islands or atolls of coral origin, surrounding a lagoon. Their size varies greatly: the largest ones, such as Rangiroa, reach 29 square miles; the smallest are made up of a few acres of land barely protruding above the surface of the sea.

With only porous, coral-based soils and with no permanent streams, they have no agricultural potential aside from the ever-present coconut trees. The lagoons, however, are a source of fish, pearls, and mother-of-pearl shell. Only Rangiroa, with its airport, is in close contact with Tahiti. Elsewhere, living conditions are difficult, and many people emigrate to Tahiti. French nuclear installa-tions are situated in the Tuamotus; test sites are on Mururoa and Fangataufa, both ceded to France in l964.

Morphologically different, the Îles Gambier (Mangareva) lie at the southern extremity of the Tuamotu Archipelago and include four large, high islands and a few islets (14 square miles). The main island is Mangareva. The 14 islands of the Marquesas group lie 900 miles to the NE of Tahiti. They have a land area of 405 square miles.

Some of them are high islands (over 4,000 feet), with sharp and twisting contours. Unlike the Society Islands, they are not protected from the sea by a barrier reef, with the result that they lack a coastal plain. Appro-aching the islands from the sea is difficult. People live exclusively in the valleys, where they engage in farming.

The Austral Islands, or Îles Tubuai, 450 miles south of Tahiti, make up the southernmost part of the territory. This chain of four islands, with the addition of the isolated island of Rapa in the SE and the unin- habited Marotiri and Maria islands, covers 57 square miles. All of the islands are of volcanic origin but are relatively low (270 to 1,440 feet) and have unpronounced contours. Income is derived from agriculture (taro, arrowroot, copra, market vegetables) and pandanus plaiting.

Like the Marquesas and the Gambier-Tuamotus, the Austral Islands have poor connections with Tahiti. As elsewhere, the hard living conditions cause many people to migrate to Tahiti and Papeete.

Climate - The climate is tropical—warm and humid. A warm rainy season lasts from November to April, and a relatively cool dry season from May to October. The dispersion of the islands through 20° of latitude, however, results in regional climatic variation. Except in the Marquesas and the northern Tuamotus, rainfall is abundant, falling in violent showers. As much as 120 inches (3,050 millimetres) falls on the coastal areas. There are local variations due to differing exposures; on average, the windward coasts receive more precipitation.

The temp varies only slightly throughout the year. At Papeete the average annual temp is 79° F (26° C); the high average is 91° F (33° C) in March and the low average 70° F (21° C) in Aug. The Austral Islands, farther south, enjoy a cooler climate; the low average can go down to 64° F (18° C) in Sep. The relative humidity is always high—80 to 90% on the average. The high areas are continually enveloped in a heavy clouds.

The territory is in the trade-wind zone. The dominant winds thus blow from the north and NE, but they tend toward the southeast between May and Oct. There are long periods of calm (April, May, June) but with occasional typhoons. During occurrences of El Nino Current the territory is frequently in danger of typhoons.

Admin and social conditions Represented in the French parliament by two deputies and a senator and placed under French law, the territory is admin locally under the statutes of 1977 and 1984. These provide for a popularly elected territorial assembly, a high commissioner appointed by the French govt, and a president and Cabinet selected from the assembly. Schooling is compulsory to the end of primary school and is conducted largely in government schools, supplemented by mission schools.

Cultural life Polynesia's cultural and artistic tradi-tions have been misrepresented and to an extent have been reduced to a sort of folklore by the romantic image that Europeans adopted. A local ethnographic museum and a local learned society have contributed to efforts to preserve the territory's cultural heritage. The absence of newspapers in Polynesian languages, the small amount of broadcasting in the Tahitian lang, and the nonrecog-nition of vernacular languages as official languages all threaten what survives of Polynesian culture. History Archaeological evidence suggests that the Marquesas Islands may have been settled in about 200 BC from western Polynesia. In subsequent dispersions, Polynesians from the Marquesas migrated to the Hawaiian Islands in about AD 300 and reached the Society Islands by about the 9th century AD. Large chieftainships were formed on Tahiti, Bora-Bora, and Raiatea. Teriaroa, north of Tahiti, was a royal retreat, and Taputapuatea, on Raiatea, was the most sacred shrine in the islands. European contact with the islands of French Polynesia was gradual. The Portuguese navigator Ferdinand Magellan sighted Pukapuka in the Tuamotu group in 1521. The southern Marquesas Islands were discovered in 1595.

The Dutch explorer Jacob Roggeveen in 1722 discovered Makatea, Bora-Bora, and Maupiti. Capt Samuel Wallis in 1767 discovered Tahiti, Moorea, and Maiao Iti. The Society Islands were named after the Royal Society, which had sponsored the expedition under Captain James Cook that observed from Tahiti the 1769 transit of the planet Venus. Tubuai was discovered on Cook's last voyage, 1777.

The history of the Society Island groups is virtually that of Tahiti, which was made a French protectorate in 1842 and a colony in 1880. French missionaries went to the Gambier group in 1834, and in 1844 a French protectorate was proclaimed, followed by annexation in 1881. The Austral Islands were also evangelized from Tahiti, and as late as 1888 Rimatara and Rurutu sought British protection, which was refused.

They were placed under the French protectorate in 1889 and annexed in 1900. The Tuamotus were part of the kingdom of the Pomare family of Tahiti, which came originally from Fakarava. These islands were claimed as dependencies of Tahiti within the protectorate by France in 1847 and became part of the colony in 1880. In the Marquesas, Nuku Hiva was annexed to the United States in 1813 by Captain David Porter of the frigate Essex, but the annexation was never ratified.

French occupation of the group followed the landing of forces from a French warship, requested by the chief of Tahuata (near Hiva Oa). Soon after there was a quarrel with the French; in 1842 the chiefs ceded sovereignty to France. The islands were administered as the French Colony of Oceania. The colony was ruled by a naval government until 1885, when an organic decree provided for a French governor and Privy Council and for a General Council, representing the islands, that had some control over fiscal policies.

The powers of the General Council, however, were cut back in 1899, and in 1903 it was replaced by an advisory council, the function of which was purely administrative. In 1940 the voters on the islands chose to side with the Free French Government of Charles de Gaulle, and many islanders fought alongside Allied armies during World War II. French Polynesia was made an overseas territory of France in 1946.

It was provided with a territorial assembly and was allowed to elect one representative to the French National Assembly and one to the French Senate. In 1957 the French government extended the powers of the local Territorial Assembly.

In 1958 Pouvanaa a Oopa, vice president of the Council of Government, announced a plan to secede from France and form an independent Tahitian republic. He was subse-quently arrested; the movement collapsed, and local powers were again curtailed. France issued new statutes granting more local autonomy in 1977, but the pro-inde-pendence and pro-autonomy parties continued to call for popular election of the president and either more autonomy or outright independence.

In 1963 the French government began the nuclear testing program on Mururoa atoll. Mururoa and neighbouring Fangataufa were ceded to France by the territorial assembly in 1964. In response to worldwide pressure the tests were moved underground on Fangataufa in 1975.

In the mid-1980s political parties and environmental-protection and human rights groups united to protest France's continued nuclear testing. In 1985 world attention focused on the area when the French secret service blew up a yacht owned by the Greenpeace environ-mental group as it was preparing to lead a protest near Mururoa atoll.


\9 San Juan Island (and 1859 "pig" war)

San Juans are Washington State's best kept secret. Visitors to San Juan Island will be delightfully surprised as they disembark from the ferry to the quaint seaside village of Friday Harbor.

Orcas Island is home of Moran State Park which has over 30 miles of hiking trails. The bustle of downtown East-sound will keep you busy shopping, sightseeing and just plain having fun. They say Lopez Island is where you want to go to relax and get away from it all. Find yourself boating, bicycling or just hanging out.

Shaw Island is definitely the place to go if you're looking for rest and relaxation. Not only is this the smallest island serviced by the ferry, it's also the least commercial.

THE SAN JUAN ISLAND'S "PIG WAR" AMERICAN HISTORY, JUL\AUG 1997. By Haydock, Michael D.

In 1859, the US and Great Britain confronted each other in the San Juan Islands of the Pacific NW, nearly engaging in armed conflict over disputed territory and a dead pig.

THE AMERICAN ARNY OFFICER knew that the odds against him were overwhelming. The three warships set at anchor in the bay below his camp mounted a total of 61 guns and carried nearly a thousand men, including a contingent of Royal Marines. Manned by just 66 soldiers, his own recently occupied position was fortified by earthworks and protected only by a single six-pounder gun and two mountain howitzers. The orders that Captain George Edward Pickett of the U.S. Army had received from his commanding general had been clear, however, and he was determined to hold his position. Pickett had served with valor in the Mexican War right after his graduation from the United States Military Academy at West Point, and he had subsequently seen duty at several frontier posts. Now, on August 3, 1859, the man whose name would be forever linked to the most famous of all Civil War charges was the American commander on the scene as the United States and Great Britain again stood on the brink of war. The issue dividing the two countries this time was the ownership of the often fog-shrouded San Juan Islands that dot the strait between what is today the state of Washington and British Columbia's Vancouver Island.(*) The San Juan Islands constituted the last bit of disputed territory along the border between the United States and the British colonies to the north--today's Canada (see map, page 44). An 1818 treaty had extended the international border westward along the forty-ninth parallel, from Lake of the Woods, at what is today the far western tip of the province of Ontario, as far as the Rocky Mountains. Beyond that lay a vast, little-explored region between Spanish California to the south and Russian Alaska to the north, which was vaguely referred to as the "Oregon Country." By failing to agree on the partitioning of the territory, the two countries had left it open to exploration and occupation by nationals of both. But on June 15, 1846, after many years of conflicting claims, the United States and Great Britain signed the Oregon Treaty, establishing the boundary at the forty-ninth parallel west from the Rocky Mountains "to the middle of the channel which separates the continent from Vancouver's Island and thence southerly through the middle of the said channel and of Fuca's Straits to the Pacific Ocean." Remaining to be resolved was the exact location of the boundary through that channel, in the middle of which lay the San Juan Islands. The Haro Strait to their west separated the islands from Vancouver's Island; it was this channel that the Americans claimed as the boundary. For its part, Britain insisted that the international boundary ran down the eastern, Rosario Strait, and that the San Juan Islands therefore belonged to the Crown. Because its territory north of the forty-ninth parallel and west of the Rockies had not yet attracted an abundance of permanent settlers, the British government in 1849 leased all of Vancouver's Island to the Hudson's Bay Company for seven shillings a year, with the proviso that the company take over efforts at colonization. In 1851, James Douglas, formerly chief factor of the Hudson's Bay Company on Vancouver's Island, was appointed governor of that colony. By the end of 1853, the British presence on the 24-mile-long and 8-mile-wide San Juan Island itself included a Hudson's Bay Company's fishing station and Bellevue Farm, a 4,500-head sheep ranch. The following year, a United States customs collector, Isaac N. Ebey, landed on San Juan Island with his deputy, Henry Webber, and attempted to collect duties from the farm manager, who swore out a warrant for the deputy's arrest for trespassing on British soil. Nothing further came of this incident, and the dispute was allowed to simmer. In March 1855, American sheriff Ellis Barnes of Whatcom County, the northernmost county in Washington Territory,(*) supported by a party of ten armed men, rounded up 35 sheep belonging to the Hudson's Bay Company, intending to sell them as payment for back taxes. This action generated protests from Governor Douglas to his counterpart, Governor Isaac I. Stevens of Washington, and to the British Colonial Office and led to the submission of a claim for $15,000 in damages by the Hudson's Bay Company. The situation created enough concern in Washington, D.C., that Secretary of State William L. Marcy wrote to Governor Stevens to recommend that the officials of the Washington Territory do nothing that might provoke conflict in the area. He further urged that neither the Americans nor the British should attempt to exercise exclusive sovereign rights until the ownership of the islands could be settled. Marcy requested that the British Colonial Office send a similar message to Governor Douglas, which they did. It appeared that officials in the seats of government in London and Washington, D.C., believed that the dispute over the ownership of the islands would be decided in due course. A Joint Boundary Commission, with Archibald Campbell as the head of the American delegation and Royal Navy Captain James C. Prevost leading the British, met in the disputed area several times during 1857 but settled nothing. The matter rested uneasily through both the Indian uprising that threatened the Washington Territory in the mid- 1850s and the Fraser River gold rush of 1857-58 in the Hudson's Bay Company's territory of New Caledonia. The uprising brought a greatly increased American military presence to the Pacific Northwest, and the gold rush led Britain to establish New Caledonia as a formal colony, known as British Columbia, with James Douglas--already governor of Vancouver's Island--as its governor. By 1859, 18 Americans, unsuccessful in the gold fields of the Fraser River valley, had settled on San Juan Island. In June of that year, one of them, Lyman A. Cutlar, shot a pig that he saw rooting in his garden. Realizing that the animal was from the Hudson's Bay Company farm, Cutlar offered to compensate the farm manager. But when informed that the pig was a prize breeder with a value of $100, Cutlar refused to pay. His stance occasioned a visit by A. G. Dallas, president of the board of the Hudson's Bay Company and son-in-law of Governor Douglas, and several other gentlemen to Cutlar's farm to inform him that he was trespassing on British soil and would be subject to arrest by British authorities if he did not pay what was owed. This already volatile situation was exacerbated by the arrival on the scene of Brigadier General William Selby Harney, the recently appointed commander of the United States' Military Department of Oregon. The 58-year-old Harney was well known in the army for his bravery in battle, his foul temper and vividly vulgar tongue, his frequent insubordination, and his disposition to overlook or avoid both the military chain of command and the prerogatives of other government departments in order to achieve what he considered necessary ends. Based at Fort Vancouver, Washington Territory, General Harney sailed to San Juan Island in July 1859 aboard the USS Massachusetts. Upon his arrival, he met some of the American residents of the island and learned about Indian attacks on the settlement and the incident with the pig, as well as the American islanders' fear and dislike of the British. Harney immediately pledged his support and suggested that they draft a petition--for which he provided the wording--requesting that he station a military force on the island. Without consulting either civil territorial authorities or his superiors in the War Department, Harney then ordered Captain Pickett and Company D of the Ninth Infantry to proceed from Fort Bellingham on the mainland to San Juan Island and establish a post, ostensibly to protect the inhabitants from hostile Indians and "to resist all attempts at interference by the British authorities residing at Vancouver's Island, by intimidation or force...." Although he issued the order on July 11, Harney did not send a report of his action to the War Department in Washington, D.C., until July 19; that report did not arrive there until September. When James Douglas heard of Harney's action, he issued orders to Captain Geoffrey Phipps Hornby of the British man-of-war Tribune, which had been dispatched from Hong Kong to the Pacific coast of North America, to land a force of Royal Marines on the island. Although the governor was fully within his rights to issue these orders, he was approached on July 29 by British naval officers who advised him against this course of action because it was contrary to Royal Navy policy in the Pacific. Douglas then dispatched a second set of orders to Hornby, countermanding his original instructions. Nonetheless, Hornby decided to invite Pickett to parlay with him aboard the Tribune on August 3. The American officer suggested that they meet in the American camp instead. Hornby acquiesced and came ashore accompanied by Captains James Prevost and G. H. Richards, the two British boundary commissioners. The meeting, held in Pickett's tent, was polite, but not cordial. Hornby opened by producing an extract of Secretary of State Marcy's communication of four years earlier, and Pickett countered by citing the age of the letter. When Hornby asked on what terms Pickett had occupied the island, the American captain declared that he had done so on orders from the general commanding the territory in order to protect the lives of American citizens. Pickett added that he believed General Harney was acting under orders of the government in Washington. But such was not the case; news of General Harney's orders to Pickett would not even reach the capital for more than a month. Captain Hornby then handed Pickett a letter dated the previous day. It was a copy of a formal protest that Governor Douglas of British Columbia had filed with General Harney. Pickett responded that, as an officer in the United States Army, he would follow his general's orders, not those of a British governor. His patience nearly exhausted, Hornby stated that, as the United States had occupied a disputed island with a military force, it was incumbent on Britain to take similar action. "I am under orders from my government," Pickett answered. "I cannot allow any joint occupation of the island before I communicate with, and hear from, General Harney." With that, the meeting concluded, and Pickett requested that Hornby compose a letter covering the main points of their conversation, which the British naval officer agreed to do. When the letter arrived that afternoon, Pickett wrote a careful acknowledgment, reiterating that he was on the island at the orders of his government and urging that no further action be taken until he had the opportunity to communicate with General Harney. In response to a statement in Hornby's letter that put the blame for any future confrontation on the Americans, Pickett artfully replied: "Should you see fit to act otherwise, you will then be the person who will bring on a most unfortunate and disastrous difficulty, and not the US' officials."

Remaining with his ship in the harbor for several more weeks, Captain Hornby made no attempt to land a party of marines. On his return to Vancouver's Island, he endured the wrath of Governor Douglas, whose temper worsened when Rear Admiral Robert L. Baynes, cmdr of British naval forces in the Pacific, arrived and informed the impatient and bellicose civilian functionary that he had no inten-tion of precipitating a war with the US in the absence of express instructions from the British Admiralty and the govt in London.

Baynes suggested that both he and the governor write to their superiors and await their responses before proceeding further. He did agree, however, to keep at least one ship of war stationed in the bay at San Juan Island below the American camp until further orders had been received.

Pickett's rept of his encounter with the cmdr of the Tribune pleased General Harney, who was, however, concer-ned by the capt's assessment that his forces were too weak to repel any full-scale attack by the British. Harney, therefore, dispatched reinforcements to San Juan Island, over the continued protests of Governor Douglas, until the Amer garrison there numbered 461. By the end of Aug, the British contingent assigned to the San Juan Islands included five warships, mounting 167 guns and carrying complements of more than two thousand, including Royal Marines and engineers.

When President James Buchanan learned on Sep 3 1859, of the confrontation with the British through newspapers in the American capital, he was shocked. After receiving General Harney's Jul 19 report on that same day, the pres took swift action. He directed the acting secretary of war, W.R. Drinkard, to send an urgent msg to General Harney stating that "the President was not prepared to learn that you had ordered military possession to be taken of the Island of San Juan or Bellevue.

Although he believes the Straits of Haro to be the true boundary between Great Britain and the US, under the Treaty of Jun 15 1846,... he had not anticipated that so decided a step would have been resorted to without insts" Secretary of State Lewis Cass assured the British amb, Lord Lyons, that General Harney was not acting on the instructions of his govt, and Buchanan dispatched the general in chief of the army, 73-year-old Winfield Scott, to the Pacific NW to order Harney to desist.

In spite of his poor health, Scott left New York City on Sep 20 on the steamer Star of the West for the long sea voyage to the west coast, arriving in San Francisco on October 17. Scott immediately continued on to Fort Van-couver, where he met with General Harney on October 21 and with Captain Pickett the following day. Scott conclu-ded from these meetings that both men were quite proud of their actions, and he set about at once to defuse the situation they had created.

In negotiating with Governor Douglas, Scott resurrected the offer of joint military occupation of San Juan Isle, which Britain's Capt Hornby had made to Captain Pickett at their meeting in Aug. Scott also unilaterally reduced the American garrison stationed there to a single company under the command of Captain Lewis C. Hunt. Governor Douglas accepted the arrangement, on the condition that Pickett not be reinstated at that post.

This being agreed to, General Scott thought the matter resolved and began to plan his return to the District of Columbia. Before leaving, however, he attempted to per-suade General Harney to relinquish his command in Oregon and transfer to the Department of the West, whose hdqrs was in St Louis, but the troublesome gen flatly refused.

Returning to the nation's capital, General Scott reported on the matter to Secy of War John B. Floyd and expressed grave doubts about the wisdom of leaving Harney in cmd. "The highest obligation of my station," Scott stated, "compels me to suggest a doubt whether it be safe in respect to our foreign relations, or just to the gallant officers and men of the Oregon Department, to leave them longer, at so great a distance, subject to the ignorance, passion, and caprice, of the present hdqrs of that Dept."

Even after the joint-occupation agreement was reached, the British naval personnel on the scene continued to act with remarkable restraint. When Governor Douglas told Admiral Baynes that he had received word from the British government that such an occupation should now take place, he demanded that marines be landed on the island immedi-ately. But Baynes resisted, preferring to wait until clear instructions had been received from the Admiralty.

Those orders arrived in March of the following year, and shortly afterward, a Royal Marine detachment of 84 men, under the command of Captain George Bazalgette, landed and set up camp on the opposite end of the island from the American troops.

On Apr 10 1860, General Harney--furious that he had not been advised about the joint-occupation agreement and that his man, Pickett, had been replaced as commander on the island--committed a final act of insubordination. In spite of the agreement reached by General Scott and the British, and in violation of Scott's direct orders, Harney sent Company D under Captain Pickett back to San Juan Island to relieve Capt Hunt's Fourth Inf company.

When this news--and the flurry of protests from the British govt that it caused--reached Washington, reaction was swift and coordinated. The departments of state and war being of one mind, Secretary of State Cass reported to the president that, on Jun 8, the adjutant general sent a dispatch to Harney, ordering him to turn over command to the officer next in rank and to . . repair without delay to Washington City, and report in person to the "Secretaries of State and War."

Harney avoided court-martial but received a reprimand from Secretary of War Floyd for his actions "... which might have been attended by disastrous consequences." Given command of the Department of the West, he traveled to St. Louis, but after reporting difficulties with his officers, he was recalled from that post in May 1861. He held no further command and was retired in 1863.

General Harney's departure from the Northwest mollified the British, who withdrew their objection to Captain Pickett commanding on San Juan Island. Pickett, a Virginian, left that post on Jun 25 1861, and soon after, he resigned his commission and traveled to Richmond, where he was appointed a colonel in the army being formed by the Confederate States of America.

For the next decade, the boundary location for the still jointly occupied San Juan Islands remained in dispute. Finally, the US and Great Britain submitted the matter to Kaiser Wilhelm I of Germany for arbitration. On Oct 21, 1872, he ruled that the boundary should be drawn through the Haro Strait, which made the San Juan Islands part of the United States. Britain withdrew its garrison of Royal Marines a month later.

Peaceful negotiations won out, ending a confrontation that could have escalated into war, a conflict that, as Admiral Baynes remarked, would have involved "two great nations in a war over a squabble about a pig."

(*) The mainland west of the Rocky Mountains, from the forty-ninth parallel to Alaska, was known as New Caledonia until 1858, when it became the colony of Brit Columbia. Vancouver Island--until 1861 known as "Vancou-ver's Island"--was a separate British colony. The two former colonies together joined the Canadian confedera-tion as the province of British Columbia in 1871.

(*) The US divided the Oregon Territory in 1853. The northern portion became known as the Washington Terr. The San Juan Islands were considered by the U.S. to be part of that territory's Whatcom County. The southern section of the former Oregon Territory was admitted into the Union as the state of Oregon in 1859.

In 1860, the United States and Great Britain agreed to occupy the San Juan Islands jointly, thus bringing to an end a dispute over ownership of the 172-island archi-pelago off the coast of Washington which had threatened to escalate into war. Today, at San Juan Island National Historical Park, the Union Jack flies at the site of the British camp (left) that was manned by a contingent of Royal Marines.

In 1859, then-Captain George E. Pickett--best known for leading the ill-fated charge against Federal troops at Gettysburg on Jul 3, 1863--commanded a company of the U.S. Ninth Infantry that was dispatched to San Juan Island, when the killing of a Hudson Bay Company pig by an American revived claims of ownership of that island and others in the San Juan Island chain by both in the US and Great Britain.

Brigadier General Willian Selby Harney commander of the U.S. Army's Department of Oregon, ordered Pickett and his men to occupy San Juan Island in July 1859 to "protect" Americans living there from Indians and the British.

In the wake of the joint-occupation agreement worked out between Douglas and American General Winfield Scott, whom President James Buchanan had dispatched to the region to defuse the situation, a contingent of British Royal Marines arrived on San Juan Island in Mar 1860, setting up camp on its north-west coast. Both nations remained on the island until 1872, when Kaiser Wilhelm I of Germany, who had been asked to mediate, ruled in favor of the US.


\10 Sicily

Italian island, the largest and one of the most densely populated in the Mediterranean Sea. Together with the Egadi, Lipari, Pelagie, and Panteleria islands, Sicily forms an autonomous region of Italy. It lies about 100 miles (160 km) northeast of Tunisia (northern Africa). The island is separated from the mainland by the Strait of Messina (2 miles [3 km] wide in the north and 10 miles [16 km] wide in the South). The capital is Palermo.

History Sicily was inhabited 10,000 years ago. Its strategic location at the centre of the Mediterranean has made the island a crossroads of history, a pawn of conquest and empire, and a melting pot for a dozen or more ethnic groups whose warriors or merchants sought its shores. At the coming of the Greeks, three peoples occupied Sicily: in the east the Siculi, or Sicels, who gave their name to the island but were reputed to be latecomers from Italy; to the west of the Gelas River, the Sicani; and in the extreme west the Elymians, a people to whom a Trojan origin was assigned, with their chief centres at Segesta and at Eryx (Erice). The Siculi spoke an Indo-European language; there are no remains of the languages of the other peoples. There were also Phoenician settlements on the island. The Greeks settled Sicilian towns between the 8th and 6th centuries BC. The mountainous centre remained in the hands of Siculi and Sicani, who were increasingly Hellenized in ideas and material culture.

In the 3rd century BC the island became the first Roman province. The Byzantine general Belisarius occupied Sicily in AD 535, at the start of hostilities with the Ostrogoths in Italy, and after a short time Sicily came under Byzantine rule. In 965 the island fell to Arab conquest from North Africa, in 1060 to Normans, who progressively Latinized the island. In the 12th and 13th centuries the island formed a part of the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies (or Naples), and in the 18th century Sicily was ruled by the Bourbons. During the 19th century the island was a major centre of revolutionary movements: in 1860, as a result of Giuseppe Garibaldi's revolt, it was liberated from the Bourbons and in the following year was incorporated into the united kingdom of Italy. In 1947 Sicily gained regional autonomy.

Physical and human geography The island is mostly mountainous, and seismic and volcanic activity is quite intense. Europe's highest active volcano is Mount Etna (10,700 feet [3,261 m]). The only wide valley is the fertile plain of Catalina in the east. The climate is subtropical and Mediterranean. Annual precipitation on the plains is 16–24 inches (400–600 mm), and in the mountains 47–55 inches (1,200–1,400 mm). Underground water and springs are plentiful. The natural vegetation of Sicily has been greatly reduced by human influence, and forests occupy only 4 percent of the territory.

Sicilians are a diverse people, having had contact with a great variety of ethnic stocks and physical types throughout the centuries. Despite its position at the crossroads of many Mediterranean civilizations, it retains many characteristics of more rural regions bred of its isolation and distance from mainland Italy. One peculiar feature of the separateness of Sicilian life is the persistence of the Mafia, an organization dating from the European Middle Ages that gradually evolved into a paralegal criminal brotherhood. It gives certain parts of the island virtually a dual government, standard of conduct, and system of enforcement—one is the legitimate regime and the other a shadow, but a pervasive social, economic, and political network maintaining its powers through violence.

Sicily's strong cultural traditions can be seen in the development of Italian lyrical poetry as well as in the works of such modern writers as Giovanni Verga, Luigi Pirandello, and Leonardo Sciascia and in the proliferation of the Italian popular song, said to have begun in Sicily. Several other examples of folk art—such as embroidery, painting, and puppetry—and popular religious festivals mark Sicily's contribution to Italian culture.

The island's economy has remained relatively underdeveloped, but heavy-industrial activity, based on the oil-refining and chemical industries, has expanded markedly in the latter decades of the 20th century. Large quantities of natural gas and sulfur are produced, although the latter has been declining. Other industries include food processing, salt extraction, wine making, textiles, and shipbuilding. The region is mainly agricultural. Wheat, barley, corn (maize), olives, citrus fruit, almonds, wine grapes, and some cotton are produced, and cattle, mules, donkeys, and sheep are raised. Area 9,830 square miles (25,460 square km). Pop. (1990 est.) 5,172,785.

ETNA AND MAN Since the dawn of humanity, Sicily's great volcano has inspired the culture and religion of all people who have lived in its shadow. It has given one of the most fertile areas to the Mediterranean, but with its frequent eruptions it has often threatened human settlements, buried cultivated areas, and destroyed homes. The relationship of the people to their mountain is understandably complex. Here some aspects of human life and activity on the slopes of an unusually active and large volcano will be discussed, such as the feelings the people in eastern Sicily have for "a' muntagna" (the mountain), a chronology of Etna's fiery assaults on inhabited and cultivated areas, and attempts to protect inhabited areas from invasion by lava flows. While these pages are yet to be written, you may read a bit about this subject in some chapters of the Etna FAQ.

"SCASSAU A MUNTAGNA!" Every few years, these words cried by the inhabitants of the villages on the slopes of Etna, signalled the initiation of a new eruption that apparently threatened their homes and land. Apart from being a fine example of Sicilian dialect (the rough translation is "the mountain has broken"), this expression reflects one of the rare instants in the life of a Sicilian living on the flanks of the volcan when the usual indifference changes abruptly into excitement and apprehension.

The chance, in a lifetime of a person living near Etna, to see her or his home invaded by lava is very low. Although everybody here has seen the volcano erupt many times, the normal rhythm of life is rarely affected by these activities, and the most serious encounter with the volcano is comonly limited to a fall of ash or small scoriae.

Contrary to common belief outside the Etna region, life close to the volcano is essentially peaceful and pleasant, for the area enjoys a particularly favorable climate, extremely fertile soils, and a spectacular scenery. Catania, the largest city near the mountain, is vigorously recovering from years of mafia-related violence and decadence, and its most acute problems are of social rather than volcanic origin. Since Millennia man is attracted by Etna, and at the same time the news of its activity has the taste of a remote, mysterious terror, especially to those living far from Sicily. Even though many people, among them a good proportion of the visitors to this site, have only vague ideas about the location of the volcano relative to towns and other places in and around Sicily, there is a remarkable worldwide interest in the volcano.

What is it that makes Etna the subject of such intense interest? Why are there so many people living on this volcano? And how true are the notions of frequent disasters caused by its eruptions, and of the threat of future eruptions? I describe here the way in which human life is influenced by, and interacts with, the presence and volcanic activity of Etna, how the local population feels about the mountain, and why Etna enjoys such a great fame all over the globe. This will to some degree be interwoven with my own experience in the past 10 years, assembled during many visits to the area, and - since early 1997 - during my residence in Catania.

THE FAME OF A UNIQUE VOLCANO Since the dawn of the ancient Mediterranean cultures, the volcano and its ceaseless activity has deeply impressed the humans who lived to see it, and spread the news of this fire-breathing giant far beyond the shores of Sicily. But it was not only its destructive and terrifying potential that rendered it famous, the ancient descriptions also vastly enlarge upon the charming character of the Etnean landscapes and the exceptional fertility of its soils. Certainly the paintings of horrors and cataclysms were more persistent in the historic records, even though these do not represent the ultimate truth. Among the factors contributing to this strong emphasis on the negative side there were the earthquakes that repeatedly ravaged the eastern coast of Sicily and adjacent areas. These events which had far more devastating effects than Etna's eruptions, have often been wrongly attributed to the volcano, although it is now known taht most of the regional seismicity is only remotely related to the volcanic activity.

Due to this mixing of the effects of earthquakes and eruptions, an image of a fierceful, deadly volcano has emerged, guilty of tens of thousands of victims and repeated destruction of towns and villages, and of vast stretches of fertile land. Two major disasters are generally cited in general geology texts (and in the touristic literature): one in 1169, reponsible of up to 15,000 deaths, and another in 1669 which is said to have killed up to 20,000 people. Etna thus would have produced more victims than Vesuvio (Vesuvius) , a highly explosive and much more densely populated volcano near the city of Napoli (Naples).

In both the 1169 and 1669 events, however, no victims were produced by eruptions. In the former case it is not even sure if there was any eruption. The 1169 deaths almost certainly resulted from a tectonic earthquake (Magnitude 7) originating from the Malta Escarpment, a seismically active fault zone extending from Etna to the southeast. The 1669 eruption on the other hand did actually take place and was destructive indeed. Some 15 villages, including Nicolosi, were buried under the lava (see a map of the 1669 lava flow), and Catania was seriously endangered by the lava which broke through the city walls in two places.

There is nevertheless no reason to assume that anybody was killed by the lava flow that arrived at Catania only one month after the beginning of the eruption. While contemporary sources (eyewitness accounts) do not mention any fatalities, it appears that the overwhelming death-toll of the violent (exceeding Magnitude 7) earthquake that devastated all of eastern Sicily only 24 years after the eruption somehow found its way into reporting on the 1669 eruption in secondary sources. A much more recent misinformation of the same type attributes 5 deaths to the 1928 eruption of Etna, and one has to refer to the primary sources describing that event to see that in fact it did not produce any fatalities.

When the encounter is too close... The lava flow of 1381 (?) Left: Cliff at the coast of Ognina, the easternmost part of Catania, cutting into what is believed to be a lava flow of the 1381 eruption (there is some evidence, however, that this flow is up to 200 years older). This is the latest but one flow to reach the area now occupied by the city of Catania. Right: The port of Ulysses, which was partly filled by the lava of the 1381 (?) eruption, at the northern end of Ognina.

The lava flow of 1983 Left: View southwards from the summit of Monte Vetore, about 1.5 km southwest of Rifugio Sapienza. Black lava in the middle ground is of the March-August 1983 eruption which buried forests, cultivated land, many isolated buildings and restaurants, and cut the Nicolosi-Rifugio Sapienza road in numerous places. Right: Among the more successful efforts to alter the course of the 1983 lava flow was the construction of earthen barriers to prevent the lateral spreading of the lava which was threatening a major hotel and an astronomical observatory. One such barrier, with some minor black flows that spilled over its crest, is visible in the lower central part of the photo. The large cone in the right background is Montagnola.

The threat to the Grand'Albergo Left: This photo shows the delicate situation that developed during the 1983 eruption when a lava flow (in the left foreground) threatened to surround the northern flank of Monte Vetore (left background) and reach the area of the Grande Albergo dell'Etna (center background). The earth barriers shown in the previous photo prevented the flow from taking this dangerous course. Right: In March 1985, only two years after the 1983 eruption, another lava flow came quite close to the Grande Albergo; but this time the flow front soon stagnated, and the threat to the hotel did not persist although the eruption continued for another four months.

It is for these and other dramatized descriptions of Etna and its er89-456+1uptions that each time there is some activity there is a high public interest, especially in regions and countries other than Sicily. Having in mind the vision of a killer volcano, tourists (especially American citizens) ponder whether to cancel their forthcoming holidays in Sicily once the mass-media report that Etna is in activity. Reporters and television crews flock at the mountain, hoping to be there when the "Big Bang" occurs. Many wonder why there are people living near an active volcano with such a devastating potential. As a particular feature I have received in the past 2 years many questions from Americans who were worrying about their relatives stationed at the military air base of Sigonella, some 15 km south of Catania.

There is, however, a good proportion of people who have a more realistic idea of Etna and visit the volcano to enjoy the spectacle of its eruptions and its scenic beauty. The possibility to see flowing lava and ejections of incandescent pyroclastics at fairly close range in a highly accessible place attracts the curiosity of many visitors. For this same reason the effusive summit activity that is occurring at the time of writing (March 1999) is provoking a massive touristic response. Apart from the aforementioned exaggerations and false informations, Etna continues to be veiled in mystery and fascination even on the eve of the year 2000, and I believe that this is fully justified.

To a geologist living near this volcano, who has been in the summit area more than 35 times in 2 years, the principal attraction is to see the constant changes that occur up there, the appearance and growth of cones, the filling and subsidence of craters, the resurfacing of certain areas by lava flows and pyroclastic deposits. The fame that Etna enjoys among volcanologists is that of an unusually versatile, highly active and complex volcano, located in a tectonic setting that appears to be among the most puzzling in the world. It is well-studied and its activity is documented over an exceptionally long period, and yet working on Etna is a challenge for it is so densely populated and has vast areas of high agricultural value. Even though Etna is barely a killer volcano, it has a high destructive potential.


\11 Solomon Islands

In 2000 The US has warned Americans to stay away from Solomon Islands, despite the signing of a peace agreement between warring factions last month. The Solomons' two rival factions - the Malaita Eagle Force and the Isatabu Freedom Movement - and the govt reached a peace deal after a week of intense Australian-brokered negotiations.

The US welcomed the deal at the time, but called on all the parties to the conflict to "honour the peace agreement, lay down their arms and resolutely engage in restoring civil order." However, the American travel warning says the truce has not eliminated the threat of fighting and Americans should avoid the islands or leave if they're already there.

Country in the SW Pacific Ocean. A double chain of volcanic islands and coral atolls in Melanesia and occupies a total land area of 10,954 sq mi. Buka and Bougainville islands, at the NW end of the Solomons chain, form the North Solomons province of Papua New Guinea. Honiara, on Guadalcanal Island, is Solomon Islands' capital and largest city.

The main islands of the group are large and rugged, rising to 8,028 ft at Mt Makarakomburu on Guadalcanal. They lie in two parallel chains: the western includes Vella Lavella, Kolombangara, New Georgia, & Guadalcanal; the eastern, Choiseul Island, Santa Isabel, and Malaita. The chains converge on Makira (San Cristóbal) Island. Geologically, they are part of the volcanic arc extending from New Ireland, in Papua New Guinea, to Vanuatu.

The climate is tropical oceanic; that is, hot and humid, but relieved by cool winds and abundant, year-round rainfall. Temps seldom exceed 90F and rainfall generally averages 120-140 in a year. Heavily wooded, mountainous terrain is characteristic and, altho there are extensive plains, only those on the northern side of Guadalcanal have been developed for large-scale agriculture. As in most island groups, animal life is limited. There are hot springs on Savo, where a volcano last erupted in the 1840s. Solomon Islands has a number of other volcanoes. Tinakula in the Santa Cruz group and Kavachi, a submarine volcano near New Georgia, for example, have erupted regularly every few years, and Simbo Island has a solfatara (a volcanic area or vent that yields only hot vapours and sulfurous gases). Earthquakes and destructive cyclones also occur regularly.

Bougainville Ä The island of Bougainville is really part of the North Solomons, a name that is more indicative of its true geographic and ethnic alignment than its current position as an Eastern outpost of Papua New Guinea (PNG). True, PNG is an autonomous country, but Australian business interests call the shots and cash the checks here. There is a lot of potential wealth in PNG, but the country needs big cash to punch the big holes it takes to pull out the buried mineral wealth. A vast store of cash is something the T-shirt, flip flop wearing natives don't have a lot of. Western history of the islands started when Louis Antoine de Bougainville generously gave his name to the big island (and the colorful thorny flowering bush that comes from the region). When he approached the smaller island to the north he was greeted by cheers of "buka buka," which loosely translated, means "What? What?" He promptly named the island Buka. The lush islands were traded like baseball cards between the French, British, Germans, Japanese and Australians without anyone bothering to ask the locals their opinion until, in 1964, copper was discovered in Panguna. Overnight, Bougainville copper created an instant metropolis and the money flowed. But mostly it flowed out of Bougainville and into Australian and PNG pockets. Laborers and technicians were flown in to work the mine, but only one in five of the 4,000 laborers was a foreigner. Although a few folks benefited, the quality of life for the people actually decreased as pollution from the mine began to destroy their pristine homeland. The Burnham Declaration was formulated in July, 1997, when the islands' different factions agreed to pursue a negotiated settlement. A cease-fire is set to begin on April 1. The issue of the mine was left for a later discussion, and the Bougainvillian demand that the mine stay closed may prove to be intractable. —Robert Young Pelton

History of Solomon Islands It would be fair to say that outsiders rarely been welcome in the Solomon Islands. And since they are neighbors, to understand the problems in Bougainville one has to understand the Solomons. The Solomons is an archipelago of 992 islands, of which 347 are inhabited. They were named after King Solomon to allude to their potential gold riches, and well-meaning but historically deluded folks will tell you that Solomon Islanders are a lost tribe of Israel brought here from Africa by King Solomon, who used to come here to collect his fabulous wealth and bring it back to Africa. But that is how history, politics and news goes here in the Solomon Islands, where apocryphal stories from a friend of a friend mutate with hard but murky facts. The islanders here are Melanesians. It is hard to distinguish a Solomon Islander from a Caribe, or from some African tribes. They are very different from the rough-hewn highlanders of Papua New Guinea or the brown-skinned, heavyset islanders of Fiji or even lighter-skinned, softer featured Polynesians. The islanders here are more than provincial, they are truly insular. Talk to any islander and they will tell you their island of birth and the differences between not only Solomon islanders and outsiders, the differences between peoples from each island group. In most cases one islander will have a group of cousins that will extend into the hundreds. This genetic and social hub overlaps, until almost every islander can claim a connection to just about every other person. What this means is that geographic barriers are really nonexistent. When you look at a map of Bougainville you will see that there are islands that are divided up into different legal entities, seemingly at random. Its as if the borders were drawn by cranky colonial administrators rather than the local chiefs. While the islanders of the Solomons were attacked mercilessly by the Tongans in attempts to extract tribute, it was the Europeans that really did a number on the locals. Kidnapping, disease, theft and general colonial larceny quickly made the islanders realize that getting your head cut off was much better that being dragged off to work in cane fields the rest of your life. It didn't take long for a well-deserved fear and loathing of foreigners made the Solomons the most dangerous archipelago in the South Pacific. It became a place where islanders needed no provocation to attack any outsider who landed. Of course, any unsuspecting European would end up becoming the forerunner of pizza delivery. The Islanders ate their victims and kept the skulls like macabre toys from a Happy Meal. Today, the only remnants of this violent past are found in the head-bashing clubs and war canoe carvings sold in the tourist shops. The Spanish take credit for "discovering" the Solomons, even though the Islanders may have seen the Europeans first. The Solomon Islanders were quite comfortable sailing thousands of miles in their canoes, getting by with star maps made of reeds and fishing hooks to catch dinner. But when Spanish sailors from Peru went to look for a great continent rumored to be to the west of South America, they ran into the Solomon Islands. Twenty-five-year-old Don Alvaro de Medana y Neyra (the nephew of the Spanish Viceroy of Peru) left in November of 1567 on an exploration with two ships. His main contribution was to "name" a number of spots and return home without any fabulous riches or even postcards—a shortage that continues to this day. He had the smarts to name the islands after the biblical king Solomon, so that investors would overlook his empty holds and assume their was plenty of gold to be found there. Medana returned to the Solomons again 1595 and promptly died of malaria. His emaciated men sailed back half-alive two months later, and the region slipped into obscurity. The Solomons were rediscovered in 1767 by a Briton, a Yank and a Frenchman. One less poetic but more pragmatic Frenchmen called the islands "the land of the rustic people" or "Des Arcasides." Whalers, sandalwood hunters, turtle poachers and other enterprising foreigners began to make themselves less and less welcome. Islanders were asked to gather sandalwood logs and then simply shot to avoid payment when the traders returned. Entire villages died from foreign-introduced disease. After Europeans began tricking or kidnapping natives to work overseas, hostility towards them increased. Between 1865 and 1900, over 29,000 islanders were hired, convinced or kidnapped to work in the cane fields of Queensland and Fiji. Many times the kidnappers dressed like priests, invited islanders to services and then kidnapped them when they showed up. Toward the end of the 19th century, only about 50 traders and missionaries lived in the Solomons. Cannibalism, headhunting and unprovoked violence kept many sailors and traders away. The first rebellion against was in 1927, when the residents of Malaita killed all but one of a British government tax collecting team. A number of rebels were hanged in the capital including the leader Basiani. World War II brought the region to the attention of the world when the Solomons were known for their debilitating heat, rugged terrain, ferocious shark attacks and fierce fighting. The war served to expose Solomon Islanders to Americans, who treated the islanders as equals unlike their colonial masters, the British. The Solomons is a refreshing unpolitical place where politicians are viewed as small-minded, incompetent, magnificently corrupt nincompoops, and anybody worth their salt sticks to business, not government. In 1947 there was another uprising called the Marching Rule which was opposed to post-war restoration of British colonial rule. The rebels wanted the United States instead. The last Americans left in 1950 but it took until July 7, 1978 for the Solomons to gain independence. It is unfortunate that most visitors to the Solomons arrive in Honeira. A place known for its ramshackle airport, bad Japanese business hotels, world-class potholes, and uninspired Third World architecture. Most Americans cannot begin to tell you where Bougainville or the Solomons are, but most know that Guadacanal is in the South Pacific and that many an American and Australian gave their lives to free it from the Japanese—the same Japanese that fill the island's only mildewing luxury resort. The island got its name from the town of Wadi al Canar in Southern Spain when Gallego, the captain of the Santiago, sailed here on April 9, 1568. The English and French did a little colonial meddling, but there was little of interest on the island until the Japanese built an airstrip. The Japanese invaded on June 8, 1942. The U.S. Marines landed six months later on August 7 to deny the Japanese the use of what is now called Henderson Field. It was the pivotal battle in the South Pacific that began the retreat of the Japanese and the establishment of freedom in these islands. The capital of the Solomons was Auki on Maliata before the war but it was too damaged to repair once the fighting was over. The new capital was named Honeira or Nahoneira, which means "facing the Northeast winds." Honeira was created in 1943 when the U.S. built a war supply center to support the invasion of Guadacanal. The ridges around the city are former battlefields where it still common to find crusty ammunition and other detritus of war.


\12 Sri Lanka aka Ceylon

Island in the Indian Ocean south of the Indian subconti-nent, 445 km long and 225 km wide with tropical beaches, verdant vegetation, old monuments and a thousand delights to please all tastes. The relief features of the island consist of a mountainous mass somewhat south of the centre, with height exceeding 2,500 metres, surrounded by broad plains. Palm fringed beaches surround the island and the sea temperature rarely falls below 27OC.

Colombo, admin capital of Sri Lanka. (Sri Jayawardenepura Kotte is the legislative and judicial capital.) It is situated on the west coast of the island, just south of the Kelani River, and is a principal port of the Indian Ocean. Colombo has one of the largest artificial harbours in the world and handles the majority of Sri Lanka's foreign trade. The earliest written mention of the port may be that of Fa-hsien, a Chinese traveler of the 5th century AD, who referred to the port as Kao-lan-pu. The Sinhalese called the port Kolamba, which the Portuguese thought was derived from the Sinhalese word for mango trees (kola, “leaves”; amba, “mango”).

A more likely explanation is that kolamba was an old Sinhalese word meaning “port,” or “ferry.” In the 8th century AD Arab traders settled near the site of the modern port. From the 16th century onward, the port was developed by the Portuguese, the Dutch, and the British, who each in turn established themselves on the island. In 1815, when the Sinhalese chiefs deposed the king of Kandy in the heart of Ceylon (now Sri Lanka) and ceded his territory to the British, Colombo became the capital of the island.

Western influence in the city has diminished since Sri Lanka gained its independence in 1948. The oldest districts of the city, which are nearest to the harbour and north of Beira Lake, are known as the Fort and the Pettah (a name deriving from the Tamil word pettai, meaning “the town outside the fort”). The Fort is still a focal point of government and commercial activity, although less so than in the past.

The Pettah has become a district of small shops, markets, and sidewalk stalls, with all the characteristic features of an Oriental bazaar. The built-up area of Cinnamon Gardens, which is south of Beira Lake, was an important cinnamon-growing region during the Dutch period. Colombo's important buildings include the Secretariat, the Town Hall, the Clock Tower, St. Lucia's Cathedral, and the Galle Face Hotel.

Other distinctive buildings in the city are the Wolvendahl Church, built by the Dutch in 1749; a complex of hospitals; the University of Colombo (1921); several Buddhist and Hindu temples; and the residences of the head of state and of the prime minister.

The city's manufacturing industries are based on the processing of raw materials exported through the port. General engineering industries are connected with public utilities and with the sale, service, repair, and assembly of motor vehicles and other machinery; light manufacturing industries process food, drinks, and tobacco. Numerous factories are located on the city's periphery.

Colombo also remains the commercial centre of the island; the head offices of local and foreign banks, the Ins Corp (which has a monopoly of insurance), brokerage houses, and govt corps are all located in the city. Trains connect Colombo with other major cities on the island. There are also bus services within the city and with all parts of Sri Lanka.

The intl airport is located at Katunayake, and Ratmalana airport handles domestic flights. Colombo has numerous parks and playing fields. Among them are the Galle Face Green by the sea, the Vihara Maha Devi Park, and the Ridgeway Golf Links. Cricket and football (soccer and rugby) grounds are located throughout the city; tennis and track events are also popular. Sea bathing and surfing can be enjoyed at Mount Lavinia Beach, which is about 7 miles (11 km) south of the city. The National Zoological Gardens of Sri Lanka is located at Dehiwala, south of Colombo. Pop. (1990 est.) 615,000.

Climate & Seasons: In the lowlands the climate is typi-cally tropical with an average temp of 27 C in Colombo. In the higher elevations it can be quite cool with temps going down to 16OC at an altitude of nearly 2,000 metres. Bright, sunny warm days are the rule and are common even during the height of the monsoon - climatically Sri Lanka has no off season. The SW monsoon brings rain mainly from May to Jul to the western, southern and central regions of the island, while the NE monsoon rains occur in the northern and eastern regions in Dec and Jan.

History: Recent excavations show that even during the Neolithic Age, there were food gatherers and rice cultivators in Sri Lanka. Very little is known of this period; documented history began with the arrival of the Aryans from North India. The Aryans introduced the use of iron and an advanced form of agriculture and irrigation. They also introduced the art of government. Of the Aryan settlements, Anuradhapura grew into a powerful kingdom under the rule of king Pandukabhaya. According to history he is accepted as the founder of Anuradhapura.

During the reign of King Devanampiya Tissa, a descendent of Pandukabhaya, Buddhism was introduced in 247 B.C. by Arahat Mahinda, the son of Emperor Asoka of India. This is the most important event in Sri Lankan history as it set the country on the road to cultural greatness. As a new civilisation flourished Sri Lanka became rich and prosperous.

In the mid 2nd cen BC. a large part of north Sri Lanka came under the rule of an invader from South India. From the beginning of the Christian era and up to the end of the 4th cen AD. Sri Lanka was governed by an unbroken dynasty called Lambakarna, which paid great attention to the development of irrigation. A great king of this dynasty, Mahasen (3rd cen AD) started the construction of large `tanks' or irrigation reservoirs. Another great `tank' builder was Dhatusena, who was put to death by his son Kasyapa who made Sigiriya a royal city with his fortress capital on the summit of the rock.

As a result of invasions from South India the kingdom of Anuradhapura fell by the end of the 10th century A.D. Vijayabahu 1 repulsed the invaders and established his capital at Polonnaruwa in the 11th century A.D. Other great kings of Polonnaruwa were Parakrama Bahu the Great and Nissanka Malla both of whom adorned the city with numerous buildings of architectural beauty.

Invasion was intermittent and the cap was constantly moved until the Portuguese arrived in 1505, when the chief city was est at Kotte, in the W.lowlands. Portu-guese came to trade in spices but stayed to rule till 1656 in the coastal regions, as did the Dutch thereafter.

Dutch rule lasted from 1656 to 1796, in which year they were displaced by the British. During this period the highland Kingdom, with its capital in Kandy, retained its independence despite repeated assaults by foreign powers who ruled the rest of the country. In 1815 the kingdom of Kandy was ceded to the British and thus they established their rule over the whole island.

Modern communications, western med services, education in English, as well as the plantation industry (first coffee then tea, rubber and coconut) developed during British rule. By a process of peaceful, constitutional evolution, Sri Lanka won back her independence in 1948 and is now a sovereign republic, with membership in the Commonwealth of Nations and the UN Organisation.

Economy: Sri Lanka is mainly an agricultural country. The chief crop is rice with which the country is almost self sufficient. Tea, rubber and coconut are also important agricultural crops, with tea being a major foreign exchange earner. Sri Lanka is also a major exporter of precious and semi-precious stones. Within the last few years remittances from Sri Lankans employed abroad have contributed a large share towards foreign exchange.

The last three decades have seen tourism emerge as an important industry. There has also been a rapid growth in manufacturing industries which offer a wide range of export goods such as petroleum products, leather goods, ready made garments and electronic equipment.

Demography: Sri Lanka has a population of 18.5 million of whom the majority are Sinhalese (74%). Other ethnic groups are made up of Sri Lankan Tamils (12.6%), Indian Tamils (5.5%), Moors, Malays, Burghers (of Portuguese & Dutch descent) and others (7.9%).

Although Sri Lanka is a multi-religious country, Buddhists constitute the majority with 69.3%. Other religious groups are Hindus 15.5%, Muslims 7.6% and Christians 7.5%. Sri Lanka's literacy rate of 88.6% is one of the highest in Asia.

Language & Religion: Sinhala and Tamil are official languages in Sri Lanka. Sinhala, a language of Indo-Aryan origin is the language of the majority. English is widely spoken and understood. Place names and sign-boards on buses and trains are usually in all three languages. Sri Lanka is a land of religious freedom and tolerance. Wherever you travel you will come across a Buddhist Temple or Dagaba, a Hindu Kovil, a Christian Church or a Mosque, each with its own distinctive architecture. When visiting holy places please conform to the requirements as regards dress in order not to show disrespect.

Government: The Democratic Socialist Republic of Sri Lanka is a free, independent and sovereign nation. A system of administration through provincial councils was introduced in 1988. Legislative power is exercised by Parliament, elected by universal franchise on a proportional representation basis. Executive power of the people, including defence, is exercised by the President, who is also elected by the people.

What to Wear: Light cotton dresses and light weight suits. A wide-brimmed beach hat and sun glasses, comfort-able shoes/sandals. In the hill country pullovers will be necessary. Visitors should be decently clad when visiting any place of worship. Beach wear is NOT suitable for temples and shrines. All visitors to Buddhist and Hindu temples are expected to be unshod and have their heads uncovered. Topless sunbathing is prohibited.

Currency: One Sri Lankan rupee is made up of 100 cents. Currency notes are in the denominations of Rs.10, Rs.20, Rs.50, Rs.100, Rs.500 and Rs. 1000. Coins are in the following denominations: 1 cent, 2 cents, 5 cents, 10 cents, 25 cents, 50 cents, one rupee, two rupees and five rupees.

Credit cards: Reputed credit and charge cards are widely accepted by shops in Sri Lanka. In some cases the shops may try to add a surcharge to the price of the merchandise purchased. This is not an acceptable practice and in such cases the card company should be contacted so that corrective action can be taken.

AirLanka Office, B.O.I. Building Sir Baron Jayatilake Mawatha, Colombo 1 Languages - Sinhala, Tamil, English, Hindi, Nepali, Kannada, Telungu,

Television: There are 8 channels - Rupavahini, ITN, MTV, MTV News Vision TNL, Dynavision and ETV I & II. A wide variety of programmes covering various subjects are telecast on these channels which include Newsbrief from BBC & CNN. Please refer daily press for programmes

Voltage - 230-240 volts 50 cycles A.C.

Holidays: In addition to Saturday and Sunday, the full moon day (Poya Day) of each month is a holiday in Sri Lanka. On Poya Days all places of entertainment are closed and no liquor is sold. Hotels make special arrangements for customers to order their liquor the day before Poya holiday.

Tourist Police: Special Tourist Police Units are available to assist our visitors. Tourist Police Units Tourist Police, Fort Police Station, Bank of Ceylon Mawatha, Fort, Colombo

Useful Addresses Air Lanka, York Street, Colombo 1 Tel: Reservations, Ticket Office, Flight Info - 0735555

Colombo Intl Airport, Katunayake: Tel 45-2911 Tourist Info (Airport) Tel: 45 - 2281 Ratmalana Airport: Tel 716261 & 717776

General Hospital, Regent Street Colombo 8 (24 hr Emergency and Out Patient Treatment) Tel: 691111/693184 Ambulance. 322222 Emergency: 33333 Police: 433333


\13 St. Helena (colorful history)

Emperor Napoleon exiled died there in 1821. The island was subsequently used as a place of exile for Zulu warriors during the Zulu wars, and for Boer prisoners during the Boer wars at the turn of the 20th century. History 1502 - 1821 St Helena is an Island and British colony in the South Atlantic Ocean, 1,200 miles (1,950 km) west of the southwestern coast of Africa. St. Helena has an area of 47 sq miles (122kmý), an extreme length southwest-northeast) of 10.5 miles (17 km), and an extreme breadth of 6.5 miles (10 km). The capital and port is Jamestown . The island of Ascension and the island group of Tristan da Cunha are dependencies of St. Helena. The island was discovered on May 21, 1502, which, in the Eastern church, is the feast day of St. Helena, mother of the Roman emperor Constantine. Its island), was a Spanish navigator in the service of Portugal. The existence of the island was known only to the discoverer, João da Nova (known as João da Nova Castella, or John Newcastle, on theortuguese until 1588, when the English navigator Captain Thomas Cavendish of HMS Desire visited St. Helena on his return from a voyage around the world. The island soon became a port of call for ships en route between Europe and the East Indies. In 1633 the Dutch formally annexed the island, although they never occupied it. Arms of the East India Company By the late 17th century, the Island of St. Helena was known to be a welcome landfall on the long journey home from the East Indies. A respite from the ocean, where fresh water and provisions could be purchased. There was the chance that other sailors might be there, with news and gossip of ships and shipping, a chance for crews to recover from the rigours of the voyage and to pray that they might reach home safely. The proprietors of the Cape, the Dutch East India Company, cast envious eyes towards St. Helena, and plans were laid to take the Island, and so give the Company complete control of the trade route through the eastern South Atlantic. However, in 1659 the English East India Company took possession of the island under charter from Charles II. The first Governor to be appointed was Captain John Dutton. When King Charles II declared war on Holland in 1672, the Dutch decided to act. The Dutch Occupation, 1672 A squadron of ships, led by Jacob de Gens, set sail from the Cape and arrived off the Island about 20th December. Soldiers began to make several unsuccessful attempts to secure a landing on the rocky coast. Despite a lack of troops and poor fortifications, the English were initially able to use the natural fortress to their advantage, and resist the Dutch. On New Year's Eve, a party of soldiers had been observed landing at Lemon Valley, but were repulsed by the islanders, who rolled rocks and boulders down the steep cliffs. The Dutch retired to their ships to think again. Returning after dark, a light was seen near another landing place, Bennetts Point, close to Swanley Valley. The story then tells that a traitor named W. Coxe, accompanied by his slave, had lit a fire and was waiting to guide the Dutch invasion force.

Five hundred men came ashore and were led up the precipitous cliffs by Coxe and his slave, who was then murdered to keep the treacherous story secret. The troops moved across the Island, routed a small English force at High Peak, and appeared high above the defenders of James Fort at Ladder Hill. The small group in the fort were trapped, the Dutch were above them and also attacking them from the sea. Governor Beale realizing that great loss of life would accompany any further opposition, retired with his people and their valuables in the ship, Humphrey and Elizabeth, which was anchored in the bay.

The Dutch found that Beale had spiked the guns and spoiled the powder before leaving, and the only prize was a ship with slaves and some ivory. Thinking that the English had been routed, they mended the fort, and with now a reduced garrison, sat back to enjoy and make use of their new possession.

Governor Beale reached Brazil and at once set out in a sloop to warn English shipping away from the Island, and had the good fortune to meet up with a fleet from England, under Captain Richard Munden. This expeditionary force had set sail before news of the capture of St. Helena had reached England, but Munden determined to recapture the Island immediately, without waiting for specific orders.

The Recapture of St Helena, 1672 `Black' Oliver, a slave who had escaped with Governor Beale, volunteered to guide the invading force. Troops landed in the Prosperous Bay area, where a gallant and skilful sailor named Tom scrambled up the cliff carrying a ball of twine. When he had found a secure footing, he hauled up a strong rope, and the soldiers climbed up one by one. This place is still known as `Holdfast Tom'.

By the time the force arrived at Rupert's Hill, overlooking James Fort, the Dutch had surrendered to Munden's ships after a naval bombardment. At sunset on 15th May 1673, the English took possession of James Fort, and once more the English flag flew on the Island of St. Helena.

The first inhabitants were company employees and English settlers, accompanied by slaves from South Asia (Goa), the East Indies (Malaya), and Madagascar. An influx of new settlers followed the Great Fire of London. St. Helena is often referred to as the lost county of England: not a shire county, such as Somerset or Yorkshire, but the older designation of certain cities and their districts, very similar to what are now known as borough counties.

'King Henry did make this city {Exeter} with its suburbs, a County by means whereof they have justices of the peace, a Sheriff, constables, and all other officers that pertained to a county.' Tristam Risden 1630 Postal Stone in Jamestown: sailors outbound for the Cape or East Indies would leave their mail to be forwarded by ships returning to England. This is no longer of prime importance, but that St. Helena was so considered in the 18th century is shown by the Honourable East India Company's Laws and Constitution of 1682, where they make provision for a Sheriff, as one who administers justice in a county. St. Helena still has a Sheriff; it is, if not administratively, still a county; but it has been forgotten. The East India Company on St Helena, 1673 - 1834 In the history of the East India Company, there is a constant thread of conflict between the Directors in London, with their worries of profit, loss and investment and the man at the sharp end, weeks from home, advice or help. The Governor had to make his decisions based on his experience and what he thought the Directors would approve.

A famous visitor arrived on St Helena in 1676: Edmund Halley arrived to observe the Transit of Mercury and Venus from a stone built observatory on one of the island's central ridges, now called Halley's Mount.

In 1795, Governor Brooke was faced with the opportunity to make his name with the Company and to demonstrate the usefulness of St. Helena. News from England was that the French had overrun Holland, and it was supposed that the Dutch would become allies of the French and so declare war on England. Now there were the Dutch at the Cape who were as yet unaware of this news, and Brooke thought that he could assemble a force to wrest the Cape from them. A council of war backed him, and an invasion force of some six hundred men was embarked on the Company ships.

Hardly had the ships been loaded, when news was received that an English force, commanded by Admiral Sir George Elphinstone and General Craig was on the way to the Cape. Intelligence also disclosed that sailing northwards was a fleet of laden Dutch merchantmen which had now become potential enemy prizes. The expeditionary force was unloaded and the ships set sail to capture the Dutch fleet. Eight large ships were captured, and sent back to England.

Despite this happy event, the war at the Cape was not going well for the English, and Sir George Elphinstone requested assistance. Governor Brooke once again assembled his forces and despatched them to the Cape. Over four hundred men of the St. Helena Corps took part in the Battle of Muizenburg on 7th August and the rest of the campaign that ended in the surrender of the Dutch on 16th October.

Governor Brooke's help in providing money, ships, artillery and men earned him high praise and swords of honour from the Governor-General in India and the Court of Director in London.

The Malay slaves of the Dutch were given their freedom by the victorious English; volunteering for service with the Company, they were formed into two companies of artillery to serve on St. Helena. Eleven years later, in 1806, another Governor, Robert Patton was faced with a similar request for help. Fortunately (so he thought) he had quite explicit instructions from the Directors in London: 'We hereby direct you to afford every aid in your power, consistently with due protection and security of your own Island, to H.M. Land and Naval forces under the command Major-General Sir David Baird and Sir Home Popham in every operation in which you may be required by them to assist.' When they arrived at St. Helena, and asked for his support, the Governor at once assembled two hundred and eighty men from the Garrison Light Infantry and Artillery, and placed them under Popham's command for the expedition to take Buenos Aires. Though the St. Helena detachment fought bravely, the whole enterprise met with ignominious failure. This time there were no jewelled swords or letters of warm commendation, only a severe reprimand for the efforts of Governor Patton. In their long and scathing letter, the Directors went on to question every other aspect of the Governor's administration. To compound the ignominy, not long afterwards, the newly purchased Company brig Jolly Tar was stolen from James Bay by some of the soldiers of the garrison, who killed the commanding officer, imprisoned others and carried it off to Brazil. Map of St Helena in 1812 Worse still (and even less the Governor's fault) an epidemic of measles was brought from the Cape and devastated the Island in the following year, killing nearly two hundred people. In July 1807, Governor Patton resigned, and sailed for England in weakened health. By 1673 nearly half the inhabitants were imported slaves, but between 1826 and 1836 all slaves were freed. The remoteness of St. Helena made it attractive to the powers of Europe as a place of exile for Napoleon, and he was confined at Longwood on the island from October 1815 until his death in May 1821.

The Exile of Napoleon, 1815 - 1821 The fortunes of St. Helena changed drastically with the exile of Napoleon: a large garrison was established on the island and naval ships were on constant patrol in case of a rescue attempt. In addition, Tristan da Cunha was garrisonned to prevent a rescue attempt being mounted from there. The remains of the fortifications, including numerous rusting cannon, are still evident in many places around the island. Upon Napoleon's death in 1821 nearly all of the garrison was withdrawn.

History, 1821 - Present Day, The Decline of St Helena. Sugar Loaf Hill, 1821 by J Wathen During Napoleon's exile the island was placed under the jurisdiction of the British crown. Subsequently, the East India Company resumed control until the collapse of the company in 1834 led to their inevitable withdrawal from St. Helena and the island became a British Crown Colony. With this transition the relative prosperity of the island vanished. Charles Darwin, who visited St. Helena in 1836 when homebound on the Beagle, remarked that "so little level or useful land is there, that it seems surprising how so many people, (about 5,000) can subsist.

The lower orders, or the emancipated slaves [slavery was abolished in 1832], are, I believe, extremely poor; they complain of want of work; a fact which is also shewn by the cheap labour. From the reduction in number of public servants owing to the island being given up by the East India Company & consequent emigration of many of the richer people, the poverty probably will increase" A salvaged Brazilian Slave ship brought unwelcome visitors to St Helena - termites invaded the island, and have been a pest ever since, even forcing the reconstruction of the Castle in 1860. St. Helena remained a busy port of call for sailing ships until about 1870 when steam started replacing sail, and the opening of the Suez Canal (1869) changed the pattern of sea routes.

Chief Dinizulu - St. Helena again became a place of exile: in 1890 Dinizulu, the son of Cetewayo, and his entourage were confined on the island, and from 1900 to 1902 6,000 Boer prisoners of war were camped on Deadwood Plain and Broad Bottom. In the early part of this century the island economy became almost totally dependent upon monoculture - New Zealand flax was planted over a large area of the central part of the island and was cut and processed for the manufacture of rope and string. The demand for flax disappeared in 1966. Although there has been significant flax clearance since, flax still covers some areas of the interior of St. Helena.

In the early 1960s the development of a telecommunications centre on the island dependency of Ascension and employment there of workers from St. Helena somewhat restored prosperity. St. Helena was given some measure of self-rule through an Order in Council and Royal Instructions in 1966 (effective January 1967) that provided for local executive and legislative councils; this order was replaced by the 1988 constitution (effective January 1989).

Present Day St Helena St. Helena is a British Dependent Territory and one of the last relics of the colonies. The island has a Governor and the upper echelons of the administration mostly are expatriate British. The islanders are represented by an elected Executive Council (EXCO) and Legislative Council (LEGCO) although these bodies have little real influence on the running of the island.

St. Helena is administered by a governor who is also president of the Legislative Council. The speaker, the chief secretary and the treasurer (as ex-officio members), and 12 elected members constitute the LEGCO. EXCO is headed by the governor and includes the aforementioned ex-officio members and five of the elected members of the LEGCO; the latter are chairmen of the council committees and oversee departments of the government. Education is compulsory and free for children between 5 and 15 years old.

The population in 1987 was 5,644. The main centres of population are Jamestown (the capital), Half Tree Hollow, and Longwood. Ascension Island and the Falklands provide employment for a large number of Saints. There is a large Saint population in the UK and a substantial St. Helenian community settled in South Africa. Saints are extremely hospitable and visitors to the island are made to feel very welcome. Coffee crops with Sandy Bay in the Background St. Helena's main income is from the export of fish. St. Helena coffee is of very high quality but the production is quite small. Tourism operates on only a very limited scale. Imports are high and the island has a large budget deficit; St. Helena receives a substantial annual grant-in-aid from the UK, most of which is budget aid although a significant portion is a shipping subsidy for the operation of the RMS .

Less than one-third of the island is suitable for farming or forestry. Principal crops are corn (maize), potatoes, and green vegetables, and some sheep, goats, cattle, and pigs are raised. There are no minerals and virtually no industry, but some locally grown timber is used for construction purposes. Fish, primarily tuna, are caught in the waters around St. Helena; some is frozen at a cold-storage facility in the vicinity, and the remainder is dried and salted on the island. Virtually the entire output is exported. About two-thirds of the colony's budget is provided by the United Kingdom in the form of a subsidy; the remainder is raised from the sale of postage stamps and from customs duties and wharf fees.

The only port, Jamestown, has a good anchorage for ships, and there is passenger and cargo service.


\14 Fiji and Suva

Former Brit.colony of 322 islands, 106 are inhabited off the NE corner of Australia. Viti Levu is the largest island where the capital is. Population is 50% Indian. SOVEREIGN DEMOCRATIC REPUBLIC OF FIJI, Fijian VITI, country and archipelago in the South Pacific Ocean. It surrounds the Koro Sea about 1,300 miles (2,100 km) north of Auckland, N.Z. The archipelago consists of some 300 islands and 540 islets scattered over about 1,000,000 square miles (3,000,000kmý. Of the 300 islands, about 100 are inhabited. The total land area is 7,056 square miles. The capital, Suva, is on the southeast coast of the largest island, Viti Levu ("Great Fiji"). Fiji includes within its borders Rotuma, an island of 18 square miles located about 400 miles north-northwest of Suva; Rotuma has a Polynesian population and was administered from Fiji in colonial times.

The land Relief Fiji has a complex geologic history. Based on a submerged platform of ancient formation, the Fiji islands are largely the product of volcanic action, sedimentary deposit, and formations of coral. Viti Levu, the largest island, has an area of about 4,000 square miles and accounts for more than half of Fiji's land. A jagged dividing range running from north to south has several peaks above 3,000 feet (914 metres), the highest being Mount Tomanivi (formerly Mount Victoria) at 4,341 feet. The main river systems--the Rewa, Navua, Sigatoka, and Ba--all have their headwaters in the central mountain area. To the southeast and southwest, and to the south where the range divides, the mountains give way to plateaus, then lowlands. The coastal plains in the west, northwest, and southeast account for only 15 percent of Viti Levu's area but are the main centres of agriculture and settlement. Vanua Levu, the second largest island, has an area of about 2,140 square miles. It is divided along its length by a mountain range with peaks rising to more than 3,000 feet. On the island's northern coast, away from the mouth of the Dreketi River, the coastal plains are narrow. Most of the other islands, including the Lomaiviti, Lau, and Yasawa groups, are volcanic in origin, but, like the major islands, they are bounded by coral reefs, offshore rocks, and shoals that make the Koro Sea hazardous for navigation.

Climate At Suva the average summer high temperature is 85º F (29º C) and the average winter low is 68º F (20º C); temperatures typically are lower in elevated inland areas. All districts receive the greatest amount of rainfall in the season from November through March, during which time hurricanes are also experienced perhaps once every two years. While rainfall is reduced in the east of the larger islands from April to October, giving an annual average of 120 inches (3,050 millimetres) per year, it virtually ceases in the west, to give an annual rainfall of 70 inches, thus making for a sharp contrast in both climatic conditions and agriculture between east and west. Plant and animal life Almost half of Fiji's total area remains in forest, while dry grasslands are found in western areas of the large islands. Coconut palms are common in coastal areas, and almost all tropical fruits and vegetables can be grown. Much of the shoreline is composed of reefs and rocks, while mangrove swamps are found on eastern coasts. There are few white-sand swimming beaches and, because of the encircling reef, little surf. Most animals, including pigs, dogs, cattle, and a few horses, are domesticated. Mongooses, introduced to prey on snakes and rats, are often seen.

Questions about Fiji What's the best time of year to go to Fiji? If you're coming from North America, you should try to set out between mid-April and August because that's when airfares on Air Pacific and Air New Zealand are at their lowest levels. The return portion of your ticket can be used anytime during its validity (you don't need to leave by September 1st). The airlines have made mid-April to August their low season because that's winter in New Zealand and Australia, their main destinations, but by a happy coincidence June to October are the coolest and driest months in Fiji. You'll also miss the hurricane season, which runs from November to April. Should I bring a tent? Not unless you plan to hike or surf in some really remote areas, and even then it's better to stay in local villages and experience the culture. Backpacker camps are found on the vast majority of islands you'll want to visit and the only advantage in having a tent is that you'd be able to pitch it on the premises at a discount if the dormitory happened to be full. That said, camping is allowed and accepted in most parts of Fiji, so long as you get permission, observe the local etiquette, and don't leave a mess. What can I do in one week? You can easily travel right around the main island, Viti Levu, by road. On this 486-kilometer journey you could trek over the Sigatoka sand dunes, spend a night at a Coral Coast resort, take advantage of the many sightseeing and entertainment options in the capital Suva, and explore the unforgettable north coast. You might still have a day or two left over for daytrips to some of the resort islands off Nadi, and with a little planning you could throw in the old colonial capital, Levuka. Do you recommend renting a car? That depends on you. Public bus service is very frequent and inexpensive on Viti Levu, making a rental car a definite luxury. It's also rather expensive, starting around US$50 a day with unlimited kilometers. Gas costs US$2.50 a US gallon. On the plus side, the traffic is light, the main highways are paved, and your home drivers license will be accepted. Driving is on the left and it can be hazardous at night due to people/animals on the road, unmarked speed humps in the villages, erratic local motorists, etc. If you do decide to rent, a dozen companies have offices at Nadi International Airport, including Avis, Budget, Hertz, and Thrifty. Are there any health hazards in Fiji which I should know about? Malaria doesn't exist here and the water is safe to drink, but outbreaks of mosquito-borne dengue fever do occur. The only way to prevent it is to try to avoid being bitten. You might check the Centers for Disease Control, listed on our Pacific Links page, for current information on dengue fever as it's not always a problem. In practice it's usually local residents who are affected, not visitors. South Pacific Handbook Fiji Handbook Tahiti Handbook Tonga - Samoa Handbook

----- Historical Overview of the Fiji Islands Polynesian and Melanesian Inhabitation From half a mile offshore, the Fiji Islands today look much the way they did to the first Polynesians to reach these shores 3,500 years ago. More than three hundred islands in the Fiji group are large enough to support human habitation, but even today fewer than one third of the islands are inhabited. The two largest islands -- Viti Levu and Vanua Levu -- together account for 87% of the land mass and 93% of the population. The first seafarers to land here came from a relatively crowded chain of islands stretching back toward Southeast Asia. These rich, empty islands must have been Nirvana to them. The first Polynesians had Fiji to themselves for about 2,000 years before a second wave of immigrants arrived from Melanesia. Over 1,000 more years passed before Abel Tasman, the first European to discover Fiji, sailed past Taveuni in 1643. By then the Fiji Islands were well populated by a cohesive, but not entirely cooperative, mixed race. Captain Cook's Era One hundred and thirty years later, in 1774, Captain Cook (whose crew included young Lieutenant Bligh), sighted islands in the Lau group but declined to stop. The first detailed observations of Fiji were made fifteen years later by Bligh, now a full fledged Captain (but temporarily limited to command of a lifeboat following the Bounty mutiny in 1789). Considering his circumstances, he made remarkably accurate and detailed observations as his crew rowed and sailed through the channel between the two main islands of Viti Levu and Vanua Levu (now known as Bligh Waters). Bligh didn't come ashore either, perhaps because he was chased out to sea by warriors from the Yasawa Islands. European Traders, Greed and Disease Not until the dawning of the new century, 1800, did Europeans venture ashore in Fiji, where they discovered lush stands of sandalwood, a cargo of which could be bought for fifty dollars and sold to the Chinese for twenty thousand dollars. After 3,500 years of successful, if not necessarily peaceful, existence, the addition of European greed to an already unstable and barbarous mix of tribal rivalries ushered in a particularly disastrous period for Fijians. The islands were already divided among hundreds of warring factions, and the only white men able to survive in Fiji were escaped convicts from Australia or plucky raconteurs like Charles Savage and Martin Bushart, who quickly allied themselves with the strongest chiefs and earned their everlasting respect by introducing the wonders of powder and shot.

After the white men got to Fiji it took only ten years to denude the forests of sandalwood. And beche-de-mer, a shallow ocean sea slug considered an aphrodisiac in Asia, was fished out in just 25 years. The Fijian people did not fare much better. Disease introduced from the outside, including measles brought back by the paramount chief after a state visit to Australia, reduced the population by nearly half in eighty years. By 1921 the Fijian population stood at 84,000, only 42% of the prediscovery population. The late 1800's were exciting but lawless times in Fiji. The paramount chief, Cakobau, having barely survived his bout with measles, watched the resulting epidemic wipe out one third of his people. At the same time, an American con man who had set fire to his own home and trading post during a particularly spirited Fourth of July celebration managed to convince the American government to back his demands for $44,000 in damages from Cakobau. And in Levuka, the 2,000 or so settlers were getting restless. With American warships hovering nearby and the possibility of a US takeover in the wind, Cakobau decided to cede his kingdom to Great Britain. British Colonial Rule When Britain took over Fiji in 1874, the United Kingdom was the world master of colonization. Partly by accident and partly by design, Fiji did well under the rule of the first two British governors, both of whom had experience in other British colonies. Sir Arthur Gordon realized that the chiefly system in Fiji worked well, so rather than try to lay down the law from above, he ruled the country through the existing chiefs, whose communal land he protected from ever being sold. To this day the chiefly system functions well in Fiji and the Fijian people remain in control of more than 80% of their land. Arrival of Indentured Laborers from India: The Stage is Set Sir Arthur Gordon also realized that it would be futile to try to make Fijians work the land of the foreign plantation owners. Using the tried-and-true colonial recipe of divide and conquer, he initiated the immigration of indentured workers from India. Over a period of 40 years ending in 1916, 63,000 Indian workers came to Fiji to work out a ten-year contract. More than half of them elected to stay behind when the contract expired. These Indian workers, without access to the communal land belonging to the Fijians, either continued farming small leased plots of land or went into business. Today the majority of Fiji businesses are Indian owned and managed.

World War I Under the heavy wing of the British colonial powers, Fiji entered the 20th century: a peaceful, relatively prosperous little country mostly unaffected by the world beyond the surrounding seas. Fiji was hardly noticed during World War I except by Count Felix von Luckner, whose infamous raider the SEEADLER was wrecked in the Society Islands. Intent on finding a new schooner with which to continue the war, von Luckner and five men sailed to Fiji in an open boat. They found a suitable ship to commandeer in Wakaya, but their plans were foiled by the untimely arrival of a British officer and four Indian soldiers. Lacking the uniforms in which to fight chivalrously, they surrendered and were interned in Auckland for the remainder of the war. World War II While W.W.II narrowly bypassed Fiji, Fijian soldiers fought on behalf of their British masters in both the Pacific and European theaters. So skilled were the Fijian warriors in jungle warfare that the term "missing-in-action" was modified in their case to "not-yet-arrived". Independence from Britain, 1970 During the 1960's, Fiji's Indian population began to bristle under the inequities of Colonial rule, which they blamed for their second-class position. In 1970 Fiji was granted independence from Britain while remaining within the Commonwealth. The new Constitution went part way toward granting equal rights to all Fiji citizens, regardless of race, but it still protected Fijian land and isolated the Indian population from full equality. For fifteen years after independence Fiji was governed by an Alliance government which appeared on the surface to be a model of social compromise. However, by 1985, a new Coalition party was formed which claimed to better represent the working people in Fiji, the majority of whom are Indian. The Coalition party, dedicated to eliminating the prerogatives of the chiefly oligarchy, won the elections in 1987 and threatened to turn Fijian politics on its ear. This proved to be too much for the extremist taukei (landowners). Bloodless Coup, 1987 In May, 1987, Lieutenant Colonel Sitiveni Rabuka led a bloodless coup to take over government on behalf of the Fijian people. Many of the hard-line old-timers were invited back into government, but when the new Government of National Unity threatened to sack Rabuka, he held another coup and pronounced himself head of state of the new Republic of Fiji. With the support of the traditional Great Council of Chiefs, Rabuka pressed for a government of customary rule unthreatened by the Indian presence, dedicated to Christianity as the official religion, and guided by cultural fundamentalism. The coups had a devastating effect on the Fijian economy. Fiji was thrown out of the Commonwealth, suffered an 11% decline in the gross domestic product, and lost thousands of Indian professionals and their families to overseas emigration: nearly 30,000 all told. But, like all predominantly agrarian peoples whose chiefs and politicians are constantly bickering, the people of Fiji, both Fijian and Indian, continued their normal lives with little attention paid to government. These people, with next to no help from above, put the country back on its feet. Constitutional Change and Free Elections, 1992 During free elections in 1992, (now Major-General) Rabuka was elected Prime Minister. A new Constitution was promulgated which permanently guarantees government control by Fijians, a blatantly racist document but one which is working for the time being. Fiji's economy has rebounded to previously unmatched levels, and government has once again earned the trust of outside investors. While the Indian population in Fiji is specifically isolated from full representation in government, an argument can be made in support of the new Constitution: there are very few countries left in the world which are unambiguously ruled by their endemic people. And, in comparison to surrounding Pacific nations, Fiji is well-run and prosperous. No one starves in Fiji, and not too many of the powerful leaders are able to profit at the expense of their country. The people who live in Fiji are happy, despite the overtones of political unrest, and the visitor to the islands would never guess at the tumultuous history which has shaped the country. It seems odd that a culture which was renown for their savage cannibalism barely more than one hundred years ago should be so peaceful and friendly now, but the overwhelming impression that is left on the foreign visitor or resident in Fiji is that these are the nicest people anywhere. Part of the reason, at least in respect to the Fijian people, is that they control their own destiny. Whereas many of the native peoples in the world are little more than guests in their own lands, powerless to express themselves against the press of outside forces, Fijians own their own land and have every reason to believe that it will always be thus. They welcome visitors to these islands openly and warmly, with none of the subsurface hostility which is so common in Micronesia and in the Caribbean.

Suva - Capital and largest city of the Fiji Islands (often referred to simply as Fiji). Located in Rewa Province, Suva is on the southeastern coast of Viti Levu Island, on Suva Point, near the mouth of the Rewa River. It is Fiji's chief seaport, with excellent harbor facilities, and a major commercial center. Tourism is also important to the city's economic base. Light manufactures include the production of cigarettes, soap, textiles, processed food, and beverages. Suva is the site of the University of the South Pacific (1968), the Fiji School of Medicine (1886), the National Archives of Fiji (1954), and the Fiji Museum (1906), which houses collections of archaeological and ethnological artifacts from Pacific islands. The settlement, established in 1849, grew as a stop on transpacific trade routes. In 1882, Suva became the capital of Fiji, and during WW II (1939-1945) the city was an Allied air base. Population (1986) 69,665.

Founded in 1849, Suva was made a city in 1952 and is now one of the largest urban centres in the South Pacific islands. It lies on Suva Point between the mouth of the Rewa River (east) and Suva Harbour (west), a regular stop for transpacific shipping. The city has road and air connections with Nadi, 132 mi (212 km) west, site of an international airport. Suva's economic activities include tourism (encouraged by its status as a free port) and light manufacturing such as cigarette making and soapmaking, copra crushing, baking, and brewing.

The city's newspapers and periodicals and broadcasting facilities are in Fijian, Hindi, and English, reflecting its mixed population. Suva is the site of the Fiji School of Medicine and Nursing (1928), the University of the South Pacific (1968), and Fuji College of Agriculture, all of which serve a large area of the South Pacific. The city also has a teachers' training college, an institute of technology, and hospitals. The Fiji Museum houses notable historical and ethnological collections.


\15 South Georgia (Falklands)

Mountainous, barren islands 800 mi east of the British Falkland Islands, of which it is a dependency. It has an area of 1,450 square mi, is 100 mi long by 20 mi wide, and rises to Mount Paget (9,625 ft). overseas territory of the UK, also claimed by Argentina; Grytviken, formerly a whaling station on South Georgia, is the garrison town

The island's bleak Antarctic climate, with perpetual snow covering three-fourths of the island, supports only hardy grasses and other tundra plants. Reindeer were introduced on to the island shortly after 1900 and have survived. Marine life is abundant offshore, and there are a number of species of penguins and seals. Whalinsgeorgiag ceased in the area in 1965. About 20 scientists and support personnel maintain the British Antarctic Survey station at Grytviken on King Edward Point.

Captain James Cook visited and claimed South Georgia for Britain in 1775. Sir Ernest Shackleton first crossed it in 1916 while in search of aid for his ill-fated trans-Antarctic expedition. He died later on the island and was buried there. It was not until 1964–65 that the island's interior was further explored, including the first ascent of Mount Paget. The island was the site of military occupation during Argentina's unsuccessful attempt to annex the Falkland Islands and their dependencies in 1982.

South Georgia Island is isolated from the civilized world and trapped in the most cruel of climates, but it was destined for discovery. From its first recorded sightings more than 300 years ago until the 20th century, this icy paradise in the Southern Ocean has attracted explorers, merchants and governments.

London-born merchant Antoine de la Roche may have been the first person to sight South Georgia Island or any of its Sub-Antarctic counterparts. In April 1675, as he was sailing from Lima to England, his ship was blown south as it rounded Cape Horn. He and his crew reported seeing ice-covered mountains.

Some historians, particularly those supporting Argentina's claim to ownership of South Georgia, believe that de la Roche was wrong, and that he had in fact sighted Beauchene Island, 800 miles further west. This is unlikely, as Beauchene Island does not possess the high mountains or bays referred to in Roche's account.

Those historians contend that a Spanish treasure ship, the Leon, first discovered South Georgia in 1756 while heading east on a voyage commissioned by the French company Sieur Duclos, of St. Malo. Sailing from Lima to Cadiz, the Leon was blown far off course after rounding Cape Horn.

The Leon crew first sighted the island on the morning of June 29. The feast day of St. Peter is July 1, so they named the island after the saint. Some Spanish and Argentine publications refer to the island as Isla de San Pedro in preference to the English name.

Captain Cook's Icy Reception - The first voyager known to set foot on the island, in 1775, was Captain James Cook. He and his crew landed at three places around Possession Bay and partly charted the coastline. Cook gave the name Cape Disappointment to the southern tip of the main island when he realized this was not continental Antarctica. An officer of the Royal Navy, Cook named it The Isle of Georgia in honor of his king. He could not have imagined that two centuries later it would become the stage for the most southerly battle in all naval and military history.

Cook's account described his first cautious approach to the coast: "the head of the bay ... was terminated by a huge mass of snow and ice of vast extent ... just like the side or face of an ice isle ... pieces were continually breaking from them and floating out to sea. A great fall happened while we were in the bay: it made a noise like a cannon. Not a tree or shrub to be seen, not even big enough to make a toothpick. I landed in three different places, displayed our Colours and took possession of the Country in His Majesty's name under a discharge of small arms."

Despite claiming South Georgia for Britain, Cook saw little potential for the island and the area south of it. If any explorer pushed further south than Cook, "I shall not envy him the fame of his discovery," he wrote, "but I make bold to declare that the world will derive no benefit from it."

Cook's accounts of fur seals in the region, however, piqued the interest of sealers from the United States and Britain at a time when seal numbers were dropping in the Northern Hemisphere. The next few decades saw many such commercial voyages heading south to the area.

Scientific Approach In 1877, an Austrian visitor to South Georgia, Heinrich Klutschak, made observations that he later published. He was followed in 1882 by a group of German scientists who lived for a year at Royal Bay. They made extensive records of South Georgia's geology, biology, meteorology and topography, and prepared detailed maps of part of the hinterland around Royal Bay. This was the first major attempt to define the island's natural characteristics.

Island For Rent In 1887, the governor at Port Stanley, Thomas Kerr, received an inquiry from a retired naval officer, Captain C.D. Inglis, who wanted to buy the island outright, or at least rent it for 99 years. Inglis wanted to produce wool and mutton for export.

Kerr passed the request to the Colonial Office with the comment that his administration knew very little about the place other than that it was "covered in snow to great depths, surrounded by icebergs and fringed with glaciers." Kerr saw no objection to renting the entire island to Captain Inglis for a nominal fee if he really did wish to graze his sheep there. The captain, however, lost interest in the project before London ever replied.

Ideas of Whaling Fifteen years later, a scientific party arrived, this time from Sweden. The country had mounted an expedition to explore the Antarctic Peninsula, and in 1902 some of the Swedes paid a winter visit to Cumberland East Bay and made a mapping and geological survey. Commanding their ship was a Norwegian, Captain Carl Anton Larsen, a man experienced with whaling in Arctic waters.

Larsen subsequently lost his ship in the Weddell Sea and was rescued by an Argentine warship, but his short time on South Georgia had sown the seeds of a plan to introduce whaling to the Antarctic.

By 1904, the first land-based whaling station at South Georgia was set up in Grytviken. Whaling became a major activity at the island -- from 1904 to 1965, about 175,250 whales were processed there.

Test of Endurance - One visit of note, though not scientific, was that of Sir Ernest Shackleton and the crew of the whaleboat James Caird. Shackleton had sailed for the Antarctic on the Endurance and stayed a month at Grytviken on South Georgia before making the final leg of the journey in December 1914 to the Weddell Sea. There, the Endurance was trapped and destroyed in the pack ice, and Shackleton and his men trekked and hauled their whaleboat across the ice before eventually reaching Elephant Island.

Shackleton left most of his crew there and set sail in an open boat for about 800 miles across the appalling conditions of the Southern Ocean. This was among the most epic small boat journeys of all time. The men landed at King Haakon Bay on the uninhabited south coast of South Georgia, and Shackleton and two others trekked across the then-unmapped glaciers and mountains of the island to Stromness -- the first crossing of this rugged island.

Shackleton's first contact with the outside world for 17 months was when he heard the steam whistle of the whaling factory at Stromness on May 20, 1916. His arrival at the whaling station caused some concern, so bedraggled was his appearance, but he was eventually recognized by the manager of the whaling station. Shackleton later went on to rescue the men who had been left at King Haakon Bay and Elephant Island. Amazingly, not a single man was lost on the expedition.

The scale of Shackleton's achievement was recognized in 1964 when the well-equipped Combined Services Expedition had great difficulties and nearly lost three men in an avalanche, despite starting fresh and having plenty of food and modern equipment.

Age of Discovery - In 1920, the British Colonial Office, aware that whale stocks needed to be conserved, imposed a tax on whale oil. With money from whale oil taxes, the Discovery Investigations (1925-1939) were financed and based at South Georgia.

To study South Georgia, Captain R.F. Scott's Discovery was fitted out and sent south from Canada, where the vessel had been on duty as a store ship for the Hudson Bay Company. The Discovery was joined by the William Scoresby, and during an epic five-and-a-half day cruise in bad weather around South Georgia, they took 370 water samples and 307 plankton net hauls. Scientists worked nonstop on studies of the krill and whale populations. Accurate charts subsequently were made of South Georgia, the South Orkney and South Shetland Islands.

The Discovery Investigations comprised 13 voyages, which gathered information about Antarctic and Sub-Antarctic islands, and made important advances in biology of the oceans and charts of the regions. Back to top

British Base - In 1943, the British Antarctic Survey began as a wartime naval operation. It was transferred to the British Colonial Office in 1945 and called the Falkland Islands Dependencies Survey until 1962. In 1949-50, the org established a new base at King Edward Point on South Georgia's northeastern coast. This station assumed responsibility for meteorological observations.

In 1962-63, a large hospital and residential building, Shackleton House, was built at King Edward Point, but today there are no scientists working at the station: All are located in field camps or at Bird Island, to the extreme north. Today, the British Antarctic Survey (BAS) is responsible for nearly all the British government's scientific research in South Georgia.

Getting There - S.Georgia lacks roads or a/p. The only access is by sea, and the journey can take up to 10 days battling against south Atlantic gales. Alastair Fother-gill, producer of The Living Edens: South Georgia Island, and his veteran Antarctic team sailed on the yacht Golden Fleece, navigated by owners Jerome and Sally Poncet. "Sally and Jerome were among the very first people ever to take a yacht to Antarctica, and their knowledge of S.Georgia is second to none," Fothergill says.

Golden Fleece became the crew's home during the eight months of filming, spread throughout two years. Filming was difficult because of the extreme cold. "At one stage, the yacht's water tanks completely froze," Fothergill says. "On another occasion, a massive storm pushed the yacht up onto an ice-covered beach." The team spent that night sleeping on the shore.

Fothergill also has produced Life in the Freezer, a six-part BBC television series exploring the delicate balance of nature in the Antarctic region. "Making Life in the Freezer, I was lucky enough to visit many special places in Antarctica, but none of them were as spectacular as South Georgia. I knew I had to go back and make a film that would reveal a complete year in this island's extraordinary natural history," Fothergill says.

Breeding Oasis - Despite its isolation, South Georgia is a vital breeding oasis for some of the greatest concen-trations of wildlife on the planet. More than 2 million southern fur seals - 95% of the world's population - crowd onto the island each summer. Half the world's population of southern elephant seals also come to breed. Millions of penguins make the island their home; in some places, complete hillsides are covered with their nests. A quarter of a million albatrosses return each year, including the spectacular wandering albatross.

With its 3-meter wingspan, the wandering albatross is a truly spectacular bird, and south Georgia is home to half the world's population. Under the cover of darkness to avoid predators, an estimated 10 million other seabirds -- petrels and prions -- return each night to nest in underground burrows.

Cycle of Life - The Living Edens: South Georgia Island reveals for the first time the complete year-round cycle of life on South Georgia. Wandering albatrosses take a full year to raise their young, and the filmmakers follow one particular chick through the entire process. In the depths of winter, it sits all alone on its nest as temperatures drop to -30 degrees Celsius and 100-knot winds batter the island. King penguin chicks survive this unforgiving weather by huddling together for warmth. Cameraman Michael Richards braved wind-chill temperatures down to -70 degrees to film this extraordinary sequence. The Living Edens: South Georgia Island portrays the natural history of an unspoiled Eden in the icy grip of Antarctica.


\16 Taiwan (Formosa) history

About 100 mi off the SE coast of the China mainland north of the Philippines. It is approx 245 mi long (north south) and 90 mi across at its widest point. The largest city, Taipei, is the seat of the govt of the Rep of China (Nationalist China). In addition to the main island, the Nationalist govt has jurisdiction over 22 islands in the Taiwan group and 64 islands to the west in the Pescadores Archipelago, with a total area of 13,900 sq mi.

Taiwan is bounded to the north by the East China Sea, which separates it from the Ryukyu Islands, Okinawa, and Japan; to the east by the Pacific Ocean; to the south by the Bashi Channel, which separates it from the Philip-pines; and to the west by the Taiwan (Formosa) Strait, which separates it from the China mainland. From the mid-1660s to 1895 Taiwan was administered by the Imperial Chinese government, after which (until 1945) the island was ruled by the Japs as a colony.

In 1945 Taiwan reverted to China, and in 1949 it became the last territory controlled by the Nationalist govt. The Nationalists have continued to claim jurisdiction over the Chinese mainland, whereas the govt of the People's Rep of China on the mainland claims jurisdiction over Taiwan; both govts are in agreement that the island is a sheng (province) of China. Taipei since 1949 designated by the Nationalists as the provisional capital of the Republic of China was the provincial capital until 1967, when the cap was moved to Chung-hsing Hsin-ts'un.

Taiwan is part of the great island system rimming the western Pacific Ocean. The island is formed by a great fault block trending north-northeast to south-southwest and tilted toward the west. The more gently rising western face of the block borders the shallow Taiwan Strait, under which the continental shelf connects the island to the Chinese mainland.

The terraced tablelands and alluvial plains along the western face of the block provide the principal areas of dense population and the major cities. The steeply sloping eastern face of the block marks the edge of the continental shelf and the beginning of the Pacific Ocean. Aside from one major rift valley, the east coast provides little room for human settlement.

The coastline on the west is simple and straight, bordered with low sand dunes and lagoons. Deepwater ports are situated at Chi-lung (Keelung), at the northern tip of the island, and at Kao-hsiung, on the southwestern coast. The crest of the Chung-yang Shan-mo (Central Range) lies east of and parallels the island's axis. Scores of peaks rise to about 10,000 feet, the highest being Yü Shan (13,113 ft) in the south central part of the island. Around the mountainous area are numerous independent hills, with an average height of 5,000 feet.

The rivers, nearly all of which rise in the Chung-yang Shan-mo, are short and subject to extreme seasonal variations in flow. Lacking steady currents, most rivers are unreliable for irrigation or hydroelectric power generation. Late-summer typhoons, however, bring torrential rains that are liable to cause floods, especially in the plains, necessitating an extensive system of dikes.

The principal rivers are the Tan-shui Ho in the northwest, the Cho-shui Hsi, in the west, and the Kao-p'ing Hsi in the south. Alluvial soil on the plains and in the valleys covers about one-fourth of the island and is its chief resource. The upland soils, subject to drastic erosion, are leached, acid, and infertile.

History Taiwan was known to the Chinese as early as the 3rd century AD, but settlement by the Chinese was not significant until the first quarter of the 17th century after recurrent famines in Fukien Province encouraged emigration of Fukienese from the mainland. Before then the island was a base of operations for Chinese and Japanese pirates. The Portuguese, who first visited the island in 1590 and named it Ilha Formosa (Beautiful Isle), made several unsuccessful attempts at settlement.

The Dutch and Spaniards established more lasting settle-ments, the Dutch at An-p'ing in southwestern Taiwan in 1624, the Spaniards in 1626 at Chi-lung in the north. Until 1646, when the Dutch seized the Spanish settle-ments, northern Taiwan was under Spanish domination, the south under Dutch control. The Dutch were expelled in 1661 by Cheng Ch'eng-kung, a man of mixed Chinese-Jap parentage and a supporter of the defeated Ming emperors, who used the island as a centre of opposition to the Ch'ing (Manchu) regime.

Imperial Chinese rule In 1683, 20 years after Cheng Ch'eng-kung's death, the island fell to the Ch'ing and became part of Fukien Province. Meanwhile, sizable migrations of refugees, Ming supporters, had increased the population to about 200,000. As migrants streamed in from southeastern China, large areas in the north were settled. T'ai-nan (then called T'ai-wan) was the capital. By 1842 the population was estimated at 2,500,000, and both rice and sugar had become important exports to mainland China.

In 1858 the Treaty of T'ien-ching (Tientsin) designated two Taiwan ports as treaty ports, T'ai-nan and Tan-shui, the latter a river port, long used as a port of call under the Spanish and Dutch, and downstream from the growing city of Taipei. Tea became an important export crop, and the island's trade centre shifted to the north, particularly to Tan-shui, where British trading companies established their headquarters.

Japan's continued interest in the island was reflected in a Japanese punitive expedition of 1874 ostensibly to protect the lives of Ryukyu fishermen along the island's coasts. The French blockaded the island during the undeclared Sino-French war of 1884–85 and occupied Chi-lung for a short period. In 1886 Taiwan became a separate province of China with a legal capital at T'ai-chung and a temporary capital at Taipei, which became the legal capital in 1894.

Japanese rule - In 1895, as a result of the Treaty of Shimonoseki after the Sino-Japanese War, China ceded Taiwan and the Pescadores Islands to Japan, and the Japanese occupied Taipei in June of that year over the violent opposition of the Taiwanese population. For several months a Republic of Taiwan was in existence, but it was overcome by Jap forces. The Japs also faced the hostility of the aborigines, some of whom remained uncontrolled until the outbreak of the Pacific war.

Taiwan was developed as a supplier of rice and sugar for Japan. Irrigation projects, agricultural extension services, and improvements in transportation and power supplies led to rapid increases in Taiwan's gross domestic product.

Japanese policy was oriented toward the Japanization of the Taiwanese; Japanese was the language of instruction in a widespread basic educational system, and even after the end of World War II Japanese remained a lingua franca among the various Chinese dialect groups. In the 1930s Japanese economic policy shifted toward the development of industries based on relatively cheap hydroelectric power. Nevertheless, rice and sugar remained the basis of Taiwan's prewar export trade, almost all of which was directed toward Japan. Imports consisted largely of diverse manufactures from Japan. During World War II, Taiwan was a major staging area for Japan's invasion of Southeast Asia.

The Republic of China Taiwan's history after World War II falls roughly into two periods: one from 1945 to about 1970, when the Nationalist government's position had considerable international support, especially from the United States; and one since 1970, when the major focus of international diplomatic attention shifted to the People's Republic of China.

Republic of China 1945 to c. 1970 As a result of the Cairo agreement of 1943, Taiwan was turned over to the Chinese Nationalist government on Oct. 25, 1945, after the defeat of Japan. Many Taiwanese welcomed liberation from Japanese control, but much to their chagrin, the Nationalists' objectives toward Taiwan were essentially to maintain Japanese colonial institutions—substituting mainlanders for Japanese—and to exploit the island for rebuilding the war-torn mainland. When in early 1947 the Taiwanese urban middle class protested, the mainlanders massacred thousands of them. Thirty years would pass before a new generation of Taiwanese political leaders emerged and mass Taiwanese resentment subsided.

In 1949–50, following the victories of the Chinese Communists on the mainland, a stream of Nationalist troops, government officials, and other refugees poured onto the island. Final defeat for Chiang Kai-shek's Nationalists seemed only a matter of time. Little outside assistance was forthcoming, and the United States, among others, appeared determined to allow the civil war to run its course toward the eventual destruction of the KMT and the incorporation of Taiwan into the People's Republic. The People's Liberation Army, however, placed priority on mopping up holdout Nationalist units on the mainland and on subduing Tibet. And because Peking lacked substantial capability to land its forces on Taiwan or even on such lesser remaining Nationalist-held islands as Quemoy and Matsu close by the mainland, there was no immediate prospect of Chiang's final defeat. He survived until the outbreak of the Korean War provided a decisive respite.

When North Korean troops invaded South Korea in June 1950, U.S. Pres. Harry S. Truman, assuming Peking's complicity in the action from the outset, interposed the U.S. 7th Fleet between Taiwan and the mainland; during the conflict the United States increased its economic and military aid to Taipei. In the first of several major crises over Quemoy and Matsu, following the Korean War, the United States incorporated the Republic of China into its Pacific defense system. A mutual defense treaty signed in December 1954 pledged the United States to the defense of Taiwan and the neighbouring Pescadores Islands.

After the Bandung Conference in April 1955, there was substantial hope that Peking might limit its tactics to the “peaceful liberation” of Taiwan. During the initial stages of talks that began in August 1955 between the United States and China, it seemed that this hope might be formalized in a treaty mutually renouncing the use or threat of force in the Taiwan area. These talks broke down, however, and by 1958 Peking had adopted a more militant approach. In August 1958 Peking resumed an artillery bombardment of Quemoy and issued an ultimatum demanding the surrender of the island's Nationalist garrison, an ultimatum broken by the interposition of U.S. naval power and the behind-the-scenes withdrawal of Soviet support.

U.S. support was important in the consolidation and rejuvenation of the KMT and its governmental organs. There was a dramatic increase in industrial and commercial construction on Taiwan and a significant improvement in communications and educational facilities. The KMT began incorporating members who were younger, better educated, more widely traveled, and much less likely to have been selected because of political connections alone.

In its first two decades on Taiwan, the KMT began to lose some of its original militancy. Memories of defeat provided the basis for much Nationalist solidarity during the 1950s and early '60s, and most officials, at least publicly, believed that their presence on the island would be temporary. As younger mainlanders and Taiwanese rose to positions of authority, however, and as the pain of defeat faded, Taiwan itself became more the focus of attention.

Yet, the strongest voices associated with Chiang and his son and political heir, Chiang Ching-kuo, continued to insist on the inevitability of reconquest of the mainland. The approved scenario held that reconquest would originate in an uprising in China, followed by popular demand for a Nationalist return. The certainty of this view waned over the years, but in the mid-1960s the intensification of the Vietnam War and the upheaval on the mainland during the Cultural Revolution revived the hopes of many in the KMT. Thus, economic modernization, despite its success, was never considered as the main goal. Modernization would provide the necessary basis, it was argued, to build up power and international prestige and to assure support from allies—all required for the eventual counterattack.

The key to external support was the United States, the policy of which was indicated by its position toward the seating question at the United Nations. Until 1970 the United States was able to postpone consideration of resolutions to replace Taipei's representatives with those of Peking. U.S. firmness at the United Nations and other evidence of U.S. fidelity—as well as the reluctance of many independent countries in Africa and Asia to recognize Peking—made Chiang's government confident that its international position was reasonably secure.

During the 1960s this spirit of confidence and lessening of tension was reinforced by an increased American demand for Taiwanese goods, which transformed Taiwan from an aid client of the United States to a trading partner. The economic boom also aided the KMT: the growing Taiwanese interest in collective political demands—including a secret separatist movement that was actively suppressed by the KMT—was transformed into a pursuit of individual economic advancement. Chiang Kai-shek began to turn over the supervision of domestic affairs to his son, who became deputy premier in 1969 and premier in 1972; after his father's death in April 1975 he became chairman of the KMT and in 1978 president of Taiwan.

Taiwan since 1970 Domestically, the transition in the 1970s from Chiang Kai-shek to Chiang Ching-kuo as president was accompanied by a gradual shift from a more autocratic to a more populist style of authoritarianism. Chiang Ching-kuo's political associates recruited more Taiwanese into higher positions in the KMT and the military, and the President made frequent visits to all parts of Taiwan.

Between 1969 and 1971, U.S. restrictions on trade and travel by Americans to China were eased, and the United States began to explore alternatives to opposing Peking's representation in the United Nations. Meanwhile, a number of countries severed diplomatic relations with Taipei, and in 1971 Taiwan was ousted from the United Nations and the People's Republic seated. U.S. Pres. Richard M. Nixon visited Peking in 1972, and the following year the United States established quasi-diplomatic relations with the People's Republic.

For Taipei, the new U.S.–China diplomacy came as a devastating setback. Nationalist officials began to prepare the island for greater international isolation, but a stalemate in U.S.–China relations during the mid-1970s provided a temporary reprieve for the island. That reprieve appeared to be over on Jan. 1, 1979, with U.S. establishment of formal diplomatic relations with the People's Republic of China. In the normalization agreement the United States accepted an end to all official U.S. defense ties with Taiwan and acknowledged the position that there is but one China and that Taiwan is part of China. It thus precluded itself from any future support for an independent Taiwan. Subsequently, however, the U.S. Congress passed the Taiwan Relations Act, authorizing continued social and economic ties with Taiwan. The United States also unilaterally stated that it would continue to sell defensive arms to Taiwan, a move that complicated U.S.–China talks concerning greater defense cooperation.

In the early 1980s the KMT rejected overtures from the People's Republic for negotiations toward eventual reunification. Domestically, financial scandals jolted the KMT, as evidence emerged that rich Taiwanese businessmen wielded influence over KMT officials and could neutralize government regulators. Chiang Ching-kuo opened communications with the Chinese Communist mainland and with domestic political opposition in 1985. The opposition formed the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) in 1986, and in 1987 the KMT lifted martial law, which had been in effect since 1949. The government began permitting visits to the Chinese mainland; scholars, journalists, businesspeople, tourists, and people visiting relatives traveled to the People's Republic.

In Jan 1988 Chiang Ching-kuo died. His chosen successor, Vice Pres. Lee Teng-hui, became Taiwan's first Taiwanese president. Despite the struggle between conservatives and progressives within the KMT, political democratization continued. Control of the KMT party organization began passing from central party career cadres to local Taiwanese politicians. The DPP suffered internal conflict between moderates aiming to win elections and radicals advocating Taiwanese independence. Nevertheless, a significant minority of the Taiwanese public supported the DPP.

Taiwan's legislative and local elections in December 1989 were the first in which parties other than the KMT were allowed to participate. With the collapse of Soviet Communism in the early 1990s and the resulting dramatic changes in world diplomacy and the balance of power, Taiwan's relations with the United States improved to some extent. Taiwan asserted its de facto autonomy through a pragmatic diplomacy but also began normalizing relations with the People's Republic of China by establishing organs for managing ongoing economic and social intercourse and for negotiating possible eventual reunification. The advent of political liberalization in Taiwan focused renewed attention on social problems and fostered a cultural renaissance.


\17 Puerto Rico and Vieques Island

Commonwealth of Puerto Rico, Estado Libre Asociado de Puerto Rico, self-governing island commonwealth of the West Indies, associated with the US.

The main island lies approx 50 mi from the island of Hispaniola to the west and roughly 40 miles from the Virgin Islands to the east. The U.S. mainland is about 1,000 miles to the NW. Puerto Rico covers an area of 3,515 sq mi, inc offshore islands. It has a mountainous tropical ecosystem with very little flat land and few mineral resources; it also has a rapidly growing population. The capital is San Juan.

Christopher Columbus discovered the island in 1493. Under Spanish authority from that time until 1898, Puerto Rico's lack of resources resulted in neglect and minimal investment by the Spanish. San Juan, however, has one of the best harbours in the Caribbean, and the Spanish built fortifications to protect this asset for their vital oceanic trade routes. When the US acquired Puerto Rico in 1898 as a result of the Spanish-American War, it found itself in control of a poor island whose inhabitants were mostly involved in small-scale agriculture.

The social system at that time was Spanish and conserva-tive; the people were mostly rural, poor, uneducated, Roman Catholic, and resistant to change. The sudden intrusion of capitalistic ideas and values assured a high degree of social and cultural conflict.

Modern Puerto Rico is generally well-off by Latin-American stds. Beginning in the 1940s, a political coalition between the Puerto Rican leader Luis Munoz Marín and the U.S. appointed governor, Rexford Guy Tugwell, was forged to promote a self-help pgm, called Operation Bootstrap, of economic development and social welfare. In a little more than four decades, much of the territory's crushing poverty was eliminated.

This was done partly through emphasis on the development of manufacturing and service industries, the latter related to an enormous growth in tourism. Improvements have been made largely with the cooperation of the US, but relationships with that country have also become a focal point of political turmoil. Various factions have bitterly disputed the political status of the island, and, although a majority voted to retain its commonwealth relationships, strong minorities have continued to push for statehood or at times with violence independence.

Puerto Rico's mountainous backbone is the easternmost extension of a tightly folded and faulted ridge that extends from the Central American mainland across the northern Caribbean to the Lesser Antilles. While the highest point on the island reaches only about 4,389 ft at Mount Punta, there is a marine trough north of San Juan that plunges to more than 30,000 feet (9,144 metres) below sea level, one of the lowest ocean depths.

The great difference in crustal elevations illustrates the strong tectonic forces that have operated in geologic history to create these features. Puerto Rico still occasionally suffers from earthquakes, reflecting the ongoing geologic processes. Rectangularly shaped, the island measures, at most, only about 111 miles from east to west and a mere 40 miles from north to south. Two important islands off the east coast, Vieques and Culebra, are also parts of Puerto Rico, as is the island of Mona to the west.

Most of Puerto Rico is either mountainous or hilly terrain, with nearly a fourth of the island composed of steep slopes that inhibit agriculture and increase building costs. The highest mountain range, the Central Cordillera, with altitudes exceeding 3,000 feet, trends east–west and is located off-centre, closer to the south coast. Slopes rise abruptly from the south coast to the highest peaks and descend more gently toward the north.

The Caguas Basin is the largest of several basins in the mountains that provide level land for settlements and agriculture. There is a continuous but narrow lowland along the north coast. Most people live along the coastal lowlands, and migration from the mountainous rural areas to the coastal cities continues to empty out the island's interior.

Most of Puerto Rico's precipitation falls on the island's north mountain coastal slopes, the majority of the permanent rivers flow from the interior to the north coast. The river courses on the south coast are dry most of the year, carrying water only after rainfall. No river is large enough for navigation, but several north-flowing rivers have been dammed for hydroelectric power and to provide drinking and irrigation waters. Irrigation along the south coast is essential for agriculture.

Ethnic composition - In 1493 Columbus found the island of Borinquen (the Amerindian name for Puerto Rico) to be inhabited by Taino Indians, a subgroup of the Arawak. About 200 years later the Taino population of some 30,000 had been reduced to only 2,000. Only a few African household slaves were brought to Puerto Rico in the early years of settlement, because the plantation system was not introduced until the early 19th century.

For some 300 years Spanish males constituted the largest group of immigrants. The Spanish interbred with Amer-indians and Africans with little social stigma. When slavery was abolished in 1873, only about 5% of the pop was pure African. Some Chinese, Italians, Corsicans, Lebanese, Germans, Scottish, and Irish also found their way to the island in the mid-19th cen. During this time the pop grew steadily, becoming racially and culturally homogenous.

People from the US arrived after 1898, and the most recent large-scale immigration was the arrival of 23,000 Cubans after Fidel Castro came to power and an almost equal number of largely job-seeking people from the Dominican Republic. Although Puerto Rico's pop today is racially mixed and there is no overt racism, pure Spanish bloodlines are still socially important for the elite grp

Linguistic composition - Many English words have found their way into the Spanish of Puerto Rico, and numerous attempts at bilingual education have been made throughout the 20th cen, but Puerto Rico remains predominantly Spanish-speaking.

Religion - Puerto Rico is primarily Roman Catholic, a legacy of its centuries as a Spanish colony. In the 19th cen the church's loyalty to Spain eroded much of its popular support. After 1898 Protestantism began to grow, and the single largest Protestant church is the Pente-costal Church of God. Puerto Rico's constitution guarantees freedom of religion.

Vieques Island, second in size only to the main island. It lies 13 miles south east of the main island, fronting south on the Caribbean Sea and north on the Vieques Sound, which connects the Caribbean with the Atlantic Ocean. Composed mostly of volcanic and granite intru-sives, the generally hilly island is 21 mi long and 3 mi wide. It was annexed to Puerto Rico in 1854.

History - The first inhabitants of Puerto Rico, probably from the Florida Peninsula, reached the island more than 1,000 years before the arrival of the Spanish. These primitive inhabitants collected food from the seashore and wild fruit from the land. By the year AD 1000 Arawak Indians, who developed the Taino culture, had arrived by way of the Lesser Antilles from the tropical forests of South America.

The Arawak, living in small villages, were organized in clans and led by a cacique, or chief. They were a peace-ful people who, with a limited knowledge of agriculture, lived on such domesticated tropical crops as pineapples, cassava, and sweet potatoes supplemented by seafood.

Anthropologists est their numbers to have been between 20,000 and 50,000. On a fertile island the Arawak lived an easy life disturbed only by occasional visits from their Carib neighbours on the islands to the south and east. At the time of discovery, Carib Indians occupied most of the Lesser Antilles, the Virgin Islands, and Vieques.

In 1493 Christopher Columbus left Spain on his second voyage to the Indies with an elaborate expedition of 17 ships and about 1,500 men. At the island of Guadeloupe the Spaniards rescued several Arawak Indians who had been taken from Boriquén, the Indian name for Puerto Rico, by the Caribs. Columbus agreed to return them to their island, and on Nov. 19, 1493, the expedition anchored in a bay on the west coast of Puerto Rico.

Columbus formally took possession of the island in the name of Ferdinand and Isabella, the rulers of Spain, and named it San Juan Bautista. Two days were spent on the island before the ships moved westward to Hispaniola, where the first settlement in the New World was estab.

Spanish rule to the 19th cen - Early settlement. For 15 years the island was neglected except for an occasional visit by a ship putting in for supplies. In 1508 Juan Ponce de León, who previously had accompanied Columbus, was granted permission to explore San Juan Bautista in recognition of his valuable colonizing efforts in eastern Hispaniola. On the north coast, Ponce de León found a well-protected bay that could offer safe harbour for a large number of sailing vessels, and he founded the first town, Caparra, the site of the first mining and agricultural efforts.

The harbour was named Puerto Rico because of its obvious excellent potentialities. In this area was located the most important settlement on the island; through time and common use the port became known as San Juan, while the name Puerto Rico came to be applied to the whole island.

The peaceful and friendly relations with the Arawak did not last long. The Spaniards expected the Indians to acknowledge the sovereignty of the king of Spain by pay-ment of gold tribute. The Indians were shown Christian ways. In return for this education, which was rarely given, the Arawak were expected to work and supply either more gold or provisions of food. In 1511 the Indians rebelled against the Spanish, who with their superior arms rapidly subjugated them.

Placer mining of gold was continued by Indians brought from other islands and by blacks brought from Africa by some of the early traders. After the 1530s, however, gold production markedly declined with dwindling Indian labour, and the Spanish colonists, with slaves from Africa, turned to agriculture.

Puerto Rico, however, did not prosper economically. Carib Indians from neighbouring islands made frequent raids, carrying off food and slaves and destroying property. The colony continued to lead a precarious existence, ravaged by plagues and plundered by French, British, and Dutch pirates. Repeatedly during the mid-16th century the French burned and sacked San German, the second community to be established on the island. People began to leave the island at every opportunity.

In the second half of the 16th century Spain, recognizing the strategic importance of Puerto Rico, undertook to convert San Juan into a military outpost. The fortress El Morro, built with the financial subsidy from the Mexican mines, was well constructed and perfectly located to dominate the narrow entrance to the harbour. Later, a stronger and larger fortress was built to the east and on the Atlantic side of the city. In the early 17th century the city was surrounded by a stone wall, 25 feet high and 18 feet thick, two parts of which still stand. These defenses made San Juan almost impregnable.

Sir Francis Drake attacked the town in 1595 but failed to gain the harbour. Three years later George Clifford, 3rd Earl of Cumberland, had complete military success but was forced to abandon his conquest owing to an outbreak of plague among his troops. In 1625 a Dutchman, Bowdoin Hendrik, sailed into the harbour, captured and burned the town, but failed to subdue El Morro.

San Juan, as the most exposed military outpost guarding the heart of Spain's New World empire, received political and economic attention from the mother country. The rural inhabitants of the interior of the island, however, were ignored by Spain and scorned by the presidial residents of San Juan. As the French, English, Danish, and Dutch fought over and settled the Lesser Antilles during the 17th and 18th centuries, rural Puerto Ricans, ignoring the edicts of Spain, found profit in clandestine trade.

Ginger, hides, sugar, tobacco, and cattle from the island were in great demand, and while the colonial authorities of San Juan rarely ventured out of their walled defenses for fear of the reprisals of the buccaneers, the rural settlers prospered in a modest way through contacts with the non-Spanish European traders. No large plantations were established, and the farmer, with little help, cultivated his own land. Contrary to the fears of Spain, this contact with foreigners did not corrupt the islanders, who remained loyal and were willing to participate in aggressive expeditions.

Under the US to 1952 - Early years. On Oct. 18, 1898, the island was turned over to the U.S forces, and General John R. Brooke became military governor. Puerto Rico was ceded to the United States by the Treaty of Paris, signed Dec. 10, 1898 (ratified by the U.S. Senate Feb. 6, 1899).

In the work of policing the country, in the accompanying tasks of sanitation, construction of highways and other public works, accounting for the expenditure of public funds, and establishing a system of public education, the military control that lasted until May 1, 1900, proved effective in bridging the period of transfer from the control of Spain to the system under U.S. civil govt.

The U.S. military, however, ruled with little regard for political sensitivities. The U.S. Congress passed the Foraker Act, under which civil govt was instituted in May 1900. Under this act the United States exercised the controlling power, a condition that proved distasteful to many Puerto Ricans; the organic law was subsequently amended to give a wider native participation in the govt.

The Olmsted Act, approved by Congress on July 15, 1909, placed the supervision of Puerto Rican affairs in the jurisdiction of an executive dept to be designated by the pres. The people, however, demanded a larger measure of local control. The majority also asked for US citizenship and many other changes.

As a result, Congress passed a new organic act (the Jones Act), which came into effect on Mar 2 1917. Under its terms Puerto Rico became a territory of the US organized but unincorporated, and citizenship of the US was conferred collectively on Puerto Ricans, allowing the right to retain the old status if preferred. Only 288 persons declared in favour of the latter.

The local civil govt, however, even with modifications, fell far short of the measure of self-govt that Puerto Ricans expected in light of the democratic tradition of the US. Key officials, including the governor, were presidential appointees and thus beyond local control.

In spite of the legal limitations on political autonomy, a climate of freedom was slowly developed as a result of the change of sovereignty. At first this new order was sometimes mistrusted, resented, and misunderstood, but in the long run it was recognized as beneficial and assimilated by the islanders.

For example, the separation of church from state, resulting in open competition for religious adherence, demonstrated the new climate in a practical way; govt pgms that dealt directly with the vital needs of the people for education, health and sanitation, and regulation of working conditions all reflected a change designed to remedy centuries of neglect.

Economic and social changes Early U.S. governors were mainly preoccupied with Americanizing Puerto Rican institutions, language, and political habits but had no clear policy on the island's eventual political status. This approach created strong resistance from many native leaders led by Luis Muñoz Rivera, who had fought for autonomy under Spain. The economic reorientation of the island as a result of the change in sovereignty had almost an immediate and profound effect on all aspects of life. Included within the U.S. tariff walls, Puerto Rican agricultural products, particularly sugar, had a ready market.

Aided by the adoption of U.S. currency and by unobstructed financial movement, Puerto Rico experienced within a short period a large capital investment that revolutionized the production of sugar. A sevenfold expansion in acreage between 1899 and 1939, new disease-resistant plants, rapid-transportation facilities, large and efficient cane-grinding mills, and complete corporate management within a generation converted the economy of the island into one in which 75 percent of the population directly or indirectly was dependent upon sugar. The population increased from about 950,000 in 1899 to more than 1,540,000 in 1930. Glaring inequalities of wealth contributed to sharpened social and political tensions.

The island was forced to import much of its food. Coffee was neglected at a time when weather conditions and transportation problems dictated financial and government aid. Only tobacco production experienced growth, which failed to be sustained after the 1920s when U.S. smokers shifted from cigars to cigarettes.

The shock of these economic changes might have been absorbed in spite of the island's limited resources if at the same time Puerto Rico had not been undergoing a severe social change as a result of the application of modern sanitation means and medical knowledge to a people with a very high death rate. The population was threatening to double its number in two generations. The two counterpressures—expansion of corporate control over the limited productive land and increasing population pressure—reached an explosive stage when the economic depression occupied the attention of government officials in the United States. Recurring hurricanes joined with declining exports to aggravate the economic distress of the island.

Vieques (also called Isabel Segunda), the chief town, is located on an inlet of the northern coast. Since 1941 about 70 percent of Vieques has been under the jurisdiction of the U.S. Navy. Sugarcane is the principal crop in the civilian areas of the island; coconuts, grains, sweet potatoes, avocados, bananas, and papayas are also grown. Fishing is important and cattle are also raised. Vieques municipio, which is coterminous with the island, has four barrios (wards), three of them rural. Pop. (1990) 8,602.

Culebra Island Spanish Isla De Culebra, island, Puerto Rico, 20 miles (30 km) east of Puerto Rico island and 15 miles west of St. Thomas, Virgin Islands. The island fronts north on the Atlantic Ocean and south and west on Vieques Sound, which connects the Atlantic with the Caribbean Sea. About 7 miles (11 km) long and 2 miles (3 km) wide, Culebra Island is 10 square miles (26 square km) in area. Its hilly, almost barren mass of limestone and igneous intrusions rises to 646 feet (197 m) at Mount Resaca. The island's deep bay, Puerto Grande, on the southeast, was used as a U.S. naval base until 1975. Culebra has sparse, thin soils and no permanent streams; grazing and fishing are the principal activities of its few inhabitants. Pop. (1990) 1,542.