How was the island-hopping strategy used to fight the japanese in the pacific? a. allied forces avoided the pacific islands completely by hopping over them in order to place troops on the japanese mainland. b. allied forces captured a few strategic pacific islands from the japanese and then used those reclaimed islands as bases from which to advance to the remaining targets. c. allied forces moved across strategic pacific islands starting from japan and working their way out to the rest of the empire. d. allied forces moved across each and every pacific island to force the japanese back to the mainland.