The Filipino people struggled for three years to free their land from Japanese occupation. Hundreds of thousands resisted, while most did their best to just survive, providing what support they could to the resistance. A few Americans, civilian and military, also remained behind and formed a leadership cadre around which Filipinos could coalesce. Theirs was a lonely existence until the first fragile contact was established with Allied forces in Australia. First, they fought to survive. Next, they fought for recognition from MacArthur’s Southwest Pacific Area headquarters, which would bring with it legal protection, promotions, supplies, arms, equipment, money, and prestige. Finally, they often fought one another, sometimes as a matter of ideology but more often for power. The resistance grew on the back of Japanese atrocities that turned the Filipino people firmly against the occupation of their homeland. Slowly, steadily, inexorably, American and Filipino leaders formed the framework for a robust guerrilla struggle against Japanese occupation that morphed into one of the great resistance movements of World War II.