This is the regular Pacific Combat Zone reenactment of the Battle of Tarawa at the National Museum of the Pacific War in Fredericksburg, Texas. This reenactment was in March of 2012. All newsreel footage and audio accredited to Castle Films and United Newsreels.

The reenactment is only a small part of a top-notch program wherein the history of the rise of the Japanese Empire is laid out and its eventual clash with the West, and all the weaponry of both sides are demonstrated and discussed in the fullest detail. If you can make it out there, be sure to visit both the Combat Zone and the excellent Museum.

As with all my videos, I try to do something different from my previous work, but something that is always reverent to, and focused on, the human experience. Largely, the sound and feel of a video is instinctual, and I felt it was best and appropriate for this reenactment to be edited without music, which is also something I haven't done yet. The consequence is that the video is not as abstract and as focused on bigger ideas as are some of my other films - it is a much more literal translation. Yet, even though I have sacrificed sublimity for an admittedly much more realistic and gritty soundtrack, I nonetheless hope it is just as good and as clear a reflection of the nature of the combat that was seen in the Pacific and of the greater experiences of American, British, Australian, and Japanese soldiers alike.