World War II on a Paradise Island

Rare color photographs of a moment lost in time, faraway from home in a tainted paradise. Buried in the bowels of the LIFE archives, this unique glimpse into the island life of American soldiers stationed on the Tawara Atoll, located in the Gilbert Islands of the Pacific Ocean. Captured by photojournalist J. R. Eyerman in 1944, the year before the war’s end, we find ourselves taking a tour of the sun-drenched island in the aftermath of the Battle of Tarawa fought against the Japanese; an island torn between paradise and war…