At present, the Marine Corps Base Hawai‘i (MCBH) on Mōkapu peninsula at Kāne‘ohe Bay maintains and operates the airfield and other training facilities in support of the readiness and global projection of DoD and military operating forces. (MCBH)
The Base has trained countless carrier pilots for combat, provided logistical support for naval aviation forces throughout the Pacific, and supported airborne early warning and antisubmarine patrol operations. (Marines)
But the Marines weren’t there first, and they aren’t alone. Let’s look back …
On February 6, 1901, the US Army artillery corps divided into separate field and coast artillery components by General Order 9, War Department, implementing the Army Reorganization Act (31 Stat. 748), February 2, 1901.
Tactical artillery districts, each consisting of one or more forts and accompanying mine fields and land defenses, were established by General Order 81, War Department, June 13, 1901, to protect the Atlantic and Pacific coasts of the United States and the coasts of Hawai‘i and Puerto Rico. (US Archives)
In January 1905, President Teddy Roosevelt instructed Secretary of War William H Taft to convene the National Coast Defense Board (Taft Board) “to consider and report upon the coast defenses of the United States and the insular possessions (including Hawai‘i.)”
In 1906 the Taft Board recommended a system of Coast Artillery batteries to protect Pearl Harbor and Honolulu. Between 1909-1921, the Hawaiian Coast Artillery Command had its headquarters at Fort Ruger and defenses included artillery regiments stationed around the Island.
The Army mission in Hawai‘i was defined as “the defense of Pearl Harbor Naval Base against damage from naval or aerial bombardment or by enemy sympathizers and attack by enemy expeditionary force or forces, supported or unsupported by an enemy fleet or fleets.”
Renamed Headquarters Coast Defenses, following World War I and until the end of World War II additional coastal batteries were constructed throughout the Island.
President Woodrow Wilson’s signing of Executive Order No. 2900 established a military reservation on July 2, 1918 and set aside 322 acres of public land on the Mōkapu peninsula for military use. The first name for the Army installation on the east side of the Mōkapu peninsula was Kuwa‘ahohe Military Reservation.
In 1927, the Oahu contingent of the Army’s Coast Artillery Corps, based at Fort Kamehameha since 1908, established a coast defense position at Ulupau.
It began after WWI, when the Army expanded its ideas of how the Coast Artillery units of Fort Kamehameha should be protecting Pearl Harbor. Army planners realized that in addition to providing protection against a naval bombardment of Pearl Harbor, it was also necessary to prevent enemy forces from landing anywhere on Oahu.
This was to thwart a possible land attack on the naval base. In 1922, upon the signing of the Washington Naval Treaty, the US diverted twelve 240mm howitzers to Hawai‘i from shipments originally bound for the Philippines.
Article XIX of the treaty prohibited new fortifications or upgrading of coastal defenses of US, British, and Japanese bases in their small island territories in the Pacific. The treaty allowed expansion at the US bases in Hawai‘i, Alaska, Panama Canal Zone, and the mainland. (HABS 311-P)
Between WWI and WWII, ranchers leased some portions of the Kuwa‘aohe Military Reservation. Army usage at Kuwa‘aohe began to increase in anticipation of war. Although the Army did not man the former 240mm howitzer battery, they formed various coast artillery batteries and activity increased at the installation.
From 1940 to 1941, the military reservation had a different Hawaiian name – Camp Ulupau. The change in 1942 to Fort Hase honored Major General William Frederick Hase. He was the Chief of the Army Coast Artillery Corps from 1934 until his death. He received the Army Distinguished Service Medal for his service in France during WWI.
Fort Hase was the headquarters for the Army’s Harbor Defenses of Kāne‘ohe Bay (HDKB), created about 1940 to defend NAS Kāne‘ohe. Prior to and during World War II, Fort Hase grew from a humble beginning as a defense battalion to a major unit of the Windward Coastal Artillery Command.
About this time, Navy planners began eyeing the Mōkapu peninsula as the home of a strategic seaplane base. They liked the isolated location, the flat plains for an airfield and the probability of flights into prevailing trade winds.
The Navy acquired 464 acres of the peninsula for use by the PBY Catalina Patrol seaplanes [PB representing ‘Patrol Bomber’ and Y being the code assigned to Consolidated Aircraft as its manufacturer] for long-range reconnaissance flights. One year later, the Navy owned all of the Mōkapu peninsula except for Fort Hase. (Marines)
The Kāne‘ohe Naval Air Station was established following a recommendation by the Hepburn Board in 1938 to develop a base for squadrons of seaplanes to support the Pearl Harbor fleet. Construction of NAS Kāne‘ohe started in September 1939. By the end of 1941 the air station had approximately 90 permanent and 60 temporary buildings. (HABS 311-M)
The initial design for NAS Kāne‘ohe was to support five seaplane patrol squadrons. The first work was dredging seaplane lanes and using the spoils to fill shallow bay areas (about 280 acres total of filled land) for building sites.
Extensive dredging of Kāne‘ohe Bay and its entrance channel enabled ships and seaplanes to utilize the bay, and, of equal importance, provided the large amount of fill needed to enlarge the buildable area of Mōkapu peninsula. (HABS HI-311-P)
On December 7, 1941, the Imperial Japanese Navy attacked the air station minutes prior to the attack on Pearl Harbor. Of the 36 Catalinas stationed at the base, 27 were destroyed, six others were damaged, and 18 sailors perished in the attack.
The first Japanese aircraft destroyed in action were shot down at Kāne‘ohe, and Aviation Ordnanceman Chief Petty Officer John Finn, stationed at Kāne‘ohe Bay, was awarded one of the 1st Medals of Honor for valor on that day. (Marines)
The naval air station’s Search and Rescue Crash Facility (SAR) was responsible for the rescue of any boats in distress in Kāne‘ohe Bay, or any planes which might crash into these waters. Their charge was to save lives and attempt any possible salvage.
By August 1946 the SAR at Kāne‘ohe Naval Air Station managed twenty one boats, including three crash boats, each 63 feet long. Crews were responsible to check the permits of privately owned boats in Kāne‘ohe Bay waters. (HABS 311-M)
The first permanent Coast Guard aviation unit in Hawai‘i became reality in 1945 when a unit was located at the Naval Air Station Kāne‘ohe. The Coast Guard Air detachment was established to provide air-sea rescue services.
Coast Guard Air detachment runs went from Kāne‘ohe to Hickam Field, then Johnson Island, Majuro, Kwajalein, Guam, Sangley Point to Japan and then back through Wake, and Midway. The trip took between 20 and 28 days.
In 1949 the Navy decommissioned the Kāne‘ohe air station and the Coast Guard air detachment moved to NAS Barbers Point on the west coast of O‘ahu and was established as a Coast Guard Air Facility. (Coast Guard Aviation Association)
After WWII ended, Fort Hase “became a skeleton outpost” for the Army. It remained under Army jurisdiction until 1952 when the land became part of Marine Corps Air Station Kāne‘ohe. (HABS HI-311-P)
The Marine Corps assumed control of both Fort Hase and the air station after landowner, Mr. Harold K. Castle, refused to take back the property in 1951. Castle believed it was important to maintain a military base on the windward side of Oahu for defense and economic continuity. (MCBH)
On January 15, 1952 the Marine Corps re-commissioned the idle airfield Marine Corps Air Station Kāne‘ohe Bay, making it a training site for a combined air/ground team.
Following the reactivation of the Mōkapu installation in 1952 as a Marine Corps Air Station, the Crash Boat operations were manned by an all-Navy unit, and organizationally was attached to the Airfield Operations Department as a Waterfront Operations Branch.
Station Operations and Headquarters Squadron supported flight operations until June 30, 1972, when Station Operations and Maintenance Squadron (SOMS) was created to take its place.
SOMS served until it was disbanded on July 30, 1994. Marine Corps Air Facility, Kāne‘ohe Bay was formed on that date. Following the Base Realignment and Closure Committee’s decision to close NAS Barbers Point, the Kāne‘ohe base acquired 4 Navy P-3 patrol squadrons and one SH-60 Anti-Submarine squadron in 1999.
Under the 1994 Base Realignment and Closure the Marine Corps consolidated all of its installations and facilities in Hawai‘i under a single command, identified as Marine Corps Base Hawai‘i (MCBH); Marine Corps Air Facility (MCAF) and Headquarters Battalion (HQBN) are subordinate commands. The 1st Marine Expeditionary Brigade was also deactivated. (MCBH)
On May 22, 2009, a redesignation ceremony was held renaming Marine Corps Air Facility to Marine Corps Air Station Kāne‘ohe Bay and the commemorative naming of the Airfield to Carl Field in Honor of Major General Marion Eugene Carl USMC.
Major General Carl, the Marine Corps’ first air ace who downed 10 enemy aircraft during the battle for Guadalcanal, was twice awarded the Navy Cross, and who finished World War II with 18 kills to his credit, was killed June 28, 1998 during a robbery at his home in Roseburg, Oregon.
A Memorandum of Agreement between MCBH and Coast Guard Sector Honolulu calls for MCBH to provide rescue vessels and waterfront operation resources, and to coordinate with the Coast Guard Sector Honolulu’s Command Center (SCC) for SAR efforts in the vicinity of MCBH / Windward Oahu. (MCBH)
Known today as the Marine Corps Base Hawai‘i (MCBH), Kāne‘ohe Bay, this facility occupies virtually the entire peninsula and houses thousands of military personnel and their dependents. (HASS HI-311-C) Today there are almost 10,000 active-duty Navy and Marine Corps personnel attached to the base.
