They were unable to relaunch phosphate mining operations, but succeeded in transforming Nauru into a powerful stronghold, which United States forces chose to bypass during their reconquest of the Pacific.

Still overpopulated with troops and imported labourers, the island was subject to food shortages, which worsened as the Allies' island-hopping strategy left Nauru completely cut off.

The island had some of the world's largest and highest quality deposits of phosphate, a key component in fertiliser, making it a strategically important resource on which agriculture in Australia and New Zealand depended.

Beginning in the 1920s, the Nauruans received royalties for the mining of their lands, an income that allowed them to cover their needs, but which was minimal compared with the actual value of the island's phosphate exports.

[4] In spite of the economic importance of Nauru for Australia and New Zealand, the island was left militarily unprotected, since a stipulation of the League of Nations mandate for Australian administration forbade the construction of coastal defences.

The island, very isolated geographically, was not under constant surveillance by the Australian navy, and was out of reach of aerial patrols; however, before the outbreak of hostilities in the Pacific theatre, Nauru did not appear to be under direct threat.

[5] The Empire of Japan became firmly established in the vast area north of Nauru as a result of the South Seas Mandate of the League of Nations, and aggressive development of plantation agriculture in the islands was often facilitated by the use of Nauruan phosphate.

[6] The Second World War first reached Nauru in early December 1940 when two German armed merchantmen disguised as civilian freighters targeted the island.

On 27 December, Komet returned to Nauru, and though again unable to land a shore party, severely damaged the mining facilities and exposed loading jetties with gunfire.

[9] The first attack took place on 9 December; three planes flying from the Marshall Islands bombed the wireless station at Nauru,[10] but failed to cause any damage.

[8] The ship met with the BPC freighter Trienza, which was camouflaged in the bay of Malekula in the New Hebrides islands, loaded with 50 tons of supplies bound for Nauru.

On 13 July, Captain Hisayuki Soeda arrived to replace Takenouchi as commander of 67 Naval Guard Force, a position he held until the end of the war.

The creation of the airstrip on the narrow coastal belt led to the expulsion of many natives from the districts of Boe and Yaren, where the best lands of the island were located.

[17] A few days after their landing on 29 August 1942, the occupiers brought in 72 employees of the Nanyo Kohatsu Kabushiki Kaisha (South Sea Development Company) to assess the condition of the mining facilities sabotaged by the Australians before their departure.

Wrote historian Samuel Eliot Morison, "it seemed unwise to leave an island with an airfield only 380 miles from Tarawa in enemy hands.

For Nauru is a solid island with no harbour or lagoon, shaped like a hat with a narrow brim of coastal plain where the enemy had built his airfield, and a crown where he had mounted coast defence artillery.

"[22] Although spared a pitched battle, Nauru would be subject to regular aerial bombardment, while Allied warships made it increasingly difficult for supply ships to get through to the island.

Shortly after the arrival of the last military convoy, the Japanese called together a Nauruan council and made the announcement of the deportation of some of the islanders under the leadership of Timothy Detudamo.

[17] Just before departure, Nakayama, second in the military hierarchy of the island, gave Detudamo a letter bearing the seal of the emperor Hirohito, indicating that the Nauruans were under his protection.

[17] Following this departure, the Japanese committed what is considered their worst war crime on Nauru: the massacre of 39 lepers,[25] who lived in a colony built by the Australians in Meneng.

On 11 July 1943, the 39 lepers – having been told they were to be transferred to a colony on Ponape – were placed aboard a fishing boat, which was then towed out to sea by the Japanese picket-boat Shinshu Maru.

[25] A new contingent of 1,200 soldiers[25] arrived 6 August 1943, and the same day, another group of 601 Nauruans, mainly women and children led by the two Catholic priests, Alois Kayser and Pierre Clivaz [fr], were sent into exile.

This prevented the Japanese from completing their plan of removing the entire Nauruan population and allowing only uprooted people without specific land rights to remain on the island.

[29][30] Still lacking sufficient output, they created pumpkin plantations, using half drums filled with night soil[28] which had been collected from the population by forced Chinese workers.

[29] This method turned out to be extremely productive in Nauru's tropical weather, but as a result, dysentery spread, killing several people.

Men would go up the cliffs hunting black noddy, a local small bird, while women were collecting sea food in the reefs; everyone was fishing as much as possible.

The Nauruan exiles had been relocated to Tarik, Tol, Fefan, and other islands in the Truk archipelago (modern Chuuk in the Federated States of Micronesia).

[33] The executives of the BPC surveyed the island to determine the extent of war damage to mining infrastructure, and found the phosphate factory totally destroyed.

It was too well-defended to invade, yet its airfield and strategic location made it too threatening to ignore; thus the Americans had to divert considerable effort and resources to keep it neutralised.

Wrote historian Nancy J. Pollock: First, determined to control their own lives after having been pawns in a major war, they rejected the British Phosphate Commission's offer to relocate them.