Its total land area is 14.9 square kilometers (5.8 sq mi) making it the second largest of the Marshall Islands after Kwajalein.

The British merchant vessel Rolla sighted several islands in the Ratak and Ralik Chains.

In the early 19th century, Mili and Knox Atolls were designated the Mulgrave Islands by Adam Johann von Krusenstern.

In 1823 the mutinous crew of the whaler Globe, out of Nantucket, Massachusetts, brought their ship to Mili Atoll.

The infamous blackbirder Bully Hayes owned Tokowa Islet on Mili during the late 19th century and used it as a base for his operations.

Mili housed a radio direction finding beacon and a weather station and the atoll was fortified by the Japanese military.

Between mid-1943 and August 1945, Mili was bombed by United States Navy carrier-based aircraft and shelled by warships.

[11] Following the end of World War II, Mili Atoll came under the control of the United States as part of the Trust Territory of the Pacific Islands.

Examples include Japanese Mitsubishi A6M Zeros and a North American B-25 Mitchell bomber sitting in just several feet of water.

The ground is still covered with craters created by the artillery campaigns that lasted 30 days to "prep" the island for the Allied invasion.