Retiree News

The life, death and afterlife of Oahu’s World War II-era military installations

The work of protecting the best ports on the most isolated archipelago in the Pacific started long before World War II. Oahu’s deepwater harbors were important to whalers and traders before President William McKinley annexed the Islands for the United States in 1898. The Russians and British built forts to stake claims on various islands. Most have succumbed to time and tide, but remnants remain, little more than ruins. Anyone exploring the Islands, even by car, is bound to come across enigmatic structures in out-of-the-way places: Concrete bunkers poking out of a hillside, graffitied “pillboxes” perched on ridgelines and, sometimes, an entry leading into a dark labyrinth of disused tunnels. As a history buff and former US Marine, I’ve always kept an eye out for signs of such places, some of them abandoned and neglected, others creatively repurposed and some requiring special permission to access. Why were they built? Why were they abandoned? Why are they still here? I’ve spent years delving deeply into these places and their stories, these bunkers of “Fortress Oahu.”

Kapolei, the growing second city to Honolulu, lies in the shadow of a former military facility. City courts and healthcare facilities have popped up around the mostly intact remnants of Fort Barrette, overlooking Kapolei District Park. In ancient times this was called Puu o Kapolei, a heiau (temple) and landmark for travelers. Now covered in introduced kiawe (mesquite) trees, the concrete ramparts, barely visible from the city streets, are remnants of a fortress once housing two cannons that fired sixteen-inch explosive shells designed to destroy battleships.

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