During the battle, Allied forces landed on the island to capture Japanese bases as part of their advance through the Pacific towards the Philippines.

Sporadic fighting took place over the course of two months as the Allies secured the three airfields on the island and pushed the surviving Japanese troops to the southeastern coast.

[1][2][3][4] The landscape is dominated by limestone and coral terraces, topped by a 670 ft (200 m) tall hill, which is covered by tropical rainforest, like much of the interior.

In the words of the U.S. official history: "There, their rations were again cut in half, and the shelter and blankets provided covered but a fraction of the inmates.

[10] Noemfoor was also used as a staging area for Japanese troops moving to reinforce Biak, which was invaded by the Allies in May 1944 as part of their westward advance along the northern New Guinea coast.

[4] By 20 June, Japanese forces on Biak had been largely defeated and construction work began on the Mokmer airfield, which was operational two days later.

[14] In describing his preparations for the Western New Guinea campaign, General Douglas MacArthur wrote in his memoirs that: "[t]he Hollandia Invasion initiated a marked change in the tempo of my advance westward.

Subsequent assaults against Wakde, Biak, Noemfoor, and Sansapor were mounted in quick succession, and, in contrast to previous campaigns, I planned no attempt to complete all phases of one operation before moving on to the next objective.

"[15] At the time of the battle, the area's strategic importance lay in its proximity along planned Allied avenues of advance through the southwest Pacific and western New Guinea toward the Philippines.

[11] Specifically, Noemfoor was selected for invasion for four reasons:[16] At the end of June, RAAF HQ reported that although the Namber and Kamiri airfields were serviceable, they were barely being used and "a possibly generous" estimate suggested that only 19 Japanese bombers and 37 fighters remained in New Guinea.

About 5,500 of these were support and service personnel, including 3,000 assigned to the rapid upgrading of Japanese airfields, as well as construction of new air fields, following the capture of the island.

[24][25] Shimizu had arrived on the island on 8 June and had organized his defending troops into fourteen strongpoints; ultimately these were too widely dispersed to enable a coherent defense.

[2][26] However, Japanese aircraft played no significant role in the ensuing battle as the 23rd Air Flotilla was redeployed to resist US forces around Saipan on 13 June.

[14] The landing force mounted at Finschhafen and Toem, in late June, and sailed to the objective in three groups after orders had been drawn up and rehearsals had been undertaken.

[30] In response to the bombardment, Japanese antiaircraft guns briefly fired upon spotting aircraft until being knocked out by naval gunfire from Allied ships.

The island was surrounded by "an almost solid ring" of coral, but this did not hinder the landing and American newspapers later reported "almost no loss" of troops before reaching the shore.

[14] A group of about 40 Japanese were killed around some of the caves in the area, but the majority of Japanese troops had withdrawn inland, as part of Shimizu's plan to move east towards Broe Bay to wait for evacuation; as a consequence the only opposition to the landing was an hour-long artillery bombardment from an inland battery, which fell on the landing beach and reef.

[2][39] The regiment's 1st Battalion arrived first, suffering 72 non battle casualties as several sticks were dropped from low altitude, resulting in a large number of leg fractures.

[43] The 2nd Battalion, 158th Infantry Regiment embarked upon 20 LCTs and sailed down the western coast to capture Namber Airfield which came under Allied control, without resistance, on 6 July.

[18] However, individual Japanese soldiers continued guerrilla activities, albeit largely limited to night time raids.

[24] While this was taking place, the Dutch detachment were able to establish contact with local chiefs who assisted in mopping up operations against the Japanese from late July.

Despite US artillery and air strikes, the Japanese commander managed to slip through the US cordon with a small force and withdrew towards Pakriki, on the coast.

[49] On the afternoon of 6 July, before the formal cessation of hostilities on the ground, an RAAF P-40 fighter squadron had landed at Kamiri,[9] supporting operations on Noemfoor and becoming the first of many Allied air force units to be based there.

By 2 September, two parallel 7,000 ft (2,100 m) runways had been completed; soon afterwards, B-24 Liberator heavy bombers began operating from Kornasoren Airfield, against Japanese petroleum facilities at Balikpapan, Borneo.