In the Pacific theater, Allied forces under General Douglas MacArthur waged a succession of hard-fought but ultimately successful campaigns. On 5 August 1943, during the New Georgia campaign, Allied troops took the stronghold of Munda, a prelude to victory in the entire campaign, which was achieved on 10 October 1943. MacArthur issued a communiqué marking Munda's capture, shrewdly taking the opportunity to highlight what he considered to be the continuing shortfall of men and equipment in his command.

We are doing what we can with what we have. Our resources are still very limited, but the results of our modest but continuous successes in campaigns have been cumulative to the point of being vital. A measure of their potentiality can be obtained by imagining the picture to have been reversed, with the enemy capturing Guadalcanal and besieging Port Moresby rather than we in possession of Munda and at the gates of Salamaua. Such a contrast might well have meant defeat for us in the war for the Pacific.

The margin was close but it was conclusive. Although for many reasons our victories may have lacked in glamorous focus, they have been decisive of the final result in the Pacific. I make no predictions as to time or detail, but Japan on the Pacific fronts has exhausted the fullest resources of concentrated attack of which she was capable, has failed, and is now on a defensive which will yield just in proportion as we gather force and definition. When that will be I do not know, but it is certain.

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Further Reading
Charles A. Willoughby et al., eds., Reports of General MacArthur: The Campaigns of MacArthur in the Pacific, 2 vols. (Washington, DC: U.S. Government Printing Office, 1966), 1: 118–120. .