BLOODY IWO

[Music] SP [Music] in the Autumn of 1944 America's newest air weapon the powerful super Fortress was used with great effect in raids over Japan on these missions the be 29s were exposed to attack by Japanese Fighters without fighter cover the huge bombers were vulnerable to these persistent attacks by the Japanese Fighters just halfway between the b29 bases and the Marianas and the target Japan the island called iojima was in an ideal position for use by the us as a base from which to launch fighters to accompany the b-29s on their missions in late 1944 the US High command decided that iojima must be seized and preparations were made for the assault against that Island Fortress beginning in October American b-24s made Regular pre-invasion bomb runs to [Music] ewo the US 7th Air Force bombed eima almost daily for 72 days in late 1944 and early 45 at us bases in the Pacific Marines of the third fourth and fifth divisions prepared for The Assault The Invasion troops were accompanied on the trip to the objective by great quantities of material the machines of 20th century war with the assault forces aboard ship the task force moved northward toward the island Target in mid-February in waters so close to the enemy Homeland it was no longer possible to capitalize on the element of surprise the Marines who were to make the assault were briefed on the enemy and his defenses no punches were pulled the men were told that IO was the closest thing to a fortress in the Pacific Ocean at least they knew what to expect there was nothing further the commanders could do to change the complexion of the headon assault before the men stormed ashore to seize the island Fortress a last blessing was given by The Troop chaplain the final Divine services on shipboard were attended by many of the assault Marines who welcomed the opportunity to rededicate their efforts to God the warships opened up on the island at 6:40 on D-Day morning an interested Observer aboard the flagship was Secretary of the Navy James forestal who said at that time this target like taraa leaves very little except to take it by force of arms character and courage Mount saachi which dominated the island was a prime target for Navy gunners the preliminaries to the actual Landing went off smoothly H hour had been set at 9:00 a.m. and everyone was intent on making it on schedule trained to razor sharpness the Marines took to the boats early on dday morning some 10,000 men of the fourth and fifth Marine divisions left the transports to make the initial assault on that faintly chilly February morning the sea was calm many of the Marines were Veterans of other campaigns some had never been in combat before men like private first class Harold wers I tried to figure out what time it was in St Louis my hometown this operation had all the year marks of being a real fight at a time like this you felt all keyed up inside the blood coursing through your veins so fast your fingertips [Music] tingled you wanted to get ashore quick and start getting some of those guys who are firing at our ships and scoring a hit every now and [Music] then it seemed like ours getting to the beach it began to get rougher but my outfit the first Battalion 28th Marine regiment made it okay we landed on schedule it seemed weird knowing how many Japs there were getting set to let you have it but not being able to see a one of them pretty soon you knew for sure they were there on the beach it got really rugged I never expected it to be this rough some companies were cut down to half strength that first morning half their men knocked out more men were landed including the rest of my regiment the 28th [Music] Marines we had to hang on to that beach head whatever [Music] [Music] happened what made it even tougher was the slow going in that volcanic sand it slowed us down and it slowed the equipment down the fight for the beach head at EO was a real nightmare I don't think any of us will ever forget it that first morning about a third of the men in our company got hit but we kept on fighting for that tow hole EO didn't get any more comfortable at any time during those first few days the Corman had their hands full they were busier than any of us a lot of our equipment got bogged down in loose sand and was knocked out by the enemy and an awful lot of Marines gotted on the beach at EO on the evening of D+ 2 the US ships offshore were attacked in a heavy air raage [Music] the Gunner scored hits on some of the Japanese suicide planes in the Furious 3-hour long battle the US lost one carrier and had another damaged 15 of the kamakazi were knocked [Music] down from Mount saachi the Japanese poured their fire on on the landing beaches below no spot on the US Beach head was protected from enemy fire as long as the Japanese held sorachi the job of bringing additional troops ashore under that heavy pounding was a delicate operation and just as important as the added Manpower was the material which was so necessary in the drive to reduce the enemy's Fortress it became obvious on the first day that sorachi would have to be taken as quickly as possible elements of the 28th Marine regiment were assigned the job of seizing sorachi including private first class wers unit we gave the hot rock everything we had [Music] [Music] [Music] after that opening you'd have thought we could have walked right up the side of the mountain we gained a little ground but the enemy kept letting us have it we picked up a few yards here and there but we had a long way to go so many men got hit there weren't enough Navy cormen to go around and they took heavy casualties too we kept pushing ahead making every clip count but it was tough going they kept pouring it down on top of us it seemed like Greeks just fighting for the land around the base of the rock finally on what they tell me was the fourth day on EO we began to pick our way up the slope on the way up we ran into some Japs but they didn't give us too much trouble this was no place for anybody with a week's coming the Marines of the 28th regiment spent 4 days in getting to the crest of the 556 ft high mountain once again the Marine Spirit had been a prime factor in the capture of this difficult objective against Great odds on February 23rd 1945 the Marines raised the US flag at top mount sorachi as a signal to the Troops below that the mountain was one that flag was seen around the world during those first 5 days on EO the Marine Corps suffered 6,845 casualties of that number 5,284 were wounded and a great many of those men were saved most of the Wounded were surgical cases some of the casualties were suffering badly from shock the men who took sorachi were able to appreciate why it had been so tough the enemy had been solidly entrenched the Japanese on eo's Mountain had fought one of the most determined defenses of the war but it had proved fruitless hundreds of dead Japanese soldiers were strewn about the slopes of Mount sorachi after the battle the situation was reversed the US forces now dominated the southern end of the island the original us Beach head was littered with wrecked equipment but though a considerable amount of material had been rendered useless to the US fighting men on EO other machines and weapons in impressive quantities had been successfully brought ashore and put to use against the enemy Ground Forces Commander Marine General Holland Smith was anxious to have the area cleared of enemy mines and rendered safe for the landing of additional reinforcements and supplies for use in the Drive North on the island third Marine Division combat troops which had been held in reserve landed on EO with third Marine Division headquarters and attached units the two regimental combat teams of the third Marine division now on the island were to be used in the center of the Drive North the reinforcements too were surprised by the difficult footing in the loose volcanic sand Vehicles designed for use on any terrain bogged down hopelessly ano metal mats were essential for the movement of many vehicles Inland from the beaches the invading Marines had not expected to have so much trouble with eo's soil but they overcame the problem in short order nevertheless before the concerted attack against the enemy for the northern section of the island some Marines attended religious Services only a short distance from enemy positions to the north one of the Marines most pressing Supply problems was the lack of water on the island after the southern end of the island had been secured the Marines installed distillation units which converted the seawater and signaled the end of limited water rationing which had prevailed since the morning of D-Day with sorachi and the southern end of eo1 the US forces GED themselves for the conquest of the northern section of the island the three Marine divisions which would fight that campaign were well prepared some of the men who had battled the enemy on Mount zachi took a few moments off to clean up before going back into action US forces controlled the southern end of the island but still had to seize the broader Northern section General Holland Smith and his staff were faced with the problem of taking that territory from a welld disciplined enemy force of considerable size the Marines campaign against the enemy on the northern part of the island which had been begun on the second day picked up momentum after sorachi had been taken and all the Marine units on the island could be concentrated on the final sweep to the north that drive called for the perfect coordination of the troops of the three Marines divisions working smoothly together under difficult conditions the success of the Marine Drive to the northern tip of EO depended in large measure on the performance in action of US tanks some 150 Shermans were employed on EO to Pace the advance of marine ground forces in the Drive North this phase of the battle for Io was much tougher than the fight for saachi for a solid week fourth division Marines fought for a series of ridges surrounding Hill 382 less formerly known as the meat grinder and for a week they were driven back then the drive northward on the right flank continued [Music] once its Rockets were fired the vulnerable rocket launchers quickly left the area casualties grew heavier as the Marines pushed the Frantic enemy into a smaller and smaller corner of the island in some areas the territory had to be taken Ridge by Ridge [Music] the drive for the capture of the third airfield on EO was executed by third division Marines who led the advance up the island at the point of the wedge shaped offensive in crashing through the enemy strong defensive line the men of the third division took quite a beating [Music] the men of the two regimental combat teams of the third Marine Division broke the back of the enemy's main stand in the north of EOL [Music] [Music] [Music] the enemy force on the island was rapidly being whittel down but even though the main defense belt had been penetrated the weary Marines still had some territory to seize from the stubbornly resisting enemy the US Force had suffered the loss of much equipment and thousands of fighting men but iojima only 750 mi from Tokyo was almost entirely an American possession no longer would enemy planes take off from io's strips on missions against US forces in the heart of Japan's inner Defense Zone The Campaign on eima had several noteworthy aspects from a medical standpoint one was the employment of whole blood and Plasma on a scale never before attempted with gratifying results it had been estimated that casualties would total 31% of the entire force actually casualties amounted to almost 33% of us Manpower participating in the operation on the island the Navy operated an evacuation Hospital which began functioning on the island on the 9th day of the battle all the necessary facilities were available to Navy doctors and cormen working only a mile or two from the front with the opening of several evacuation hospitals on EO it was possible for all initial surgery to be performed on the island itself the most difficult cases were operated on as quickly as possible often less than an hour after the wound had been sustained and the lives of thousands of fighting men were saved starting on the 13th day of the battle for EO many of the casualties were evacuated by air at certain times this method provided the only means of evacuation from the island because of unfavorable sea conditions or lack of facilities afloat during the last 3 weeks of the battle on EO about 100 casualties a day were put aboard planes and flown off the island [Music] by March 16th the Marines had won all of EO except for a small area near the northern tip of the island Japanese who had been taken prisoner were used to appeal to their brothers in arms to surrender but in most cases the appeals were not as successful as other methods of persuasion some prisoners were taken on EO but they represented only a handful of the 22,000 troops who had fought the carefully executed defense of the island only 27 prisoners were taken 159 of them Japanese as on other Pacific Battlegrounds the soldiers who surrendered spoke readily about the location of their positions the Marine were eager to clean out the Last Enemy [Music] pocket the Marines who were engaged in seizing The Last Enemy area had been fighting on EO for almost 4 weeks it was slow exact [Music] work finally by March 25th the men completed the job in the battle for the last pocket some of the enemy soldiers had held out until the very end in EO Jima the enemy lost one of its most vital defensive bastions after 36 Days of the most bitter fighting American forces had ever known the US had all of EO for that 8 square mile heap of volcanic ash jutting out of the Pacific the US had paid an exorbitant price the lives of 5,563 Marines and 982 Sailors in addition to the Dead the casualty figure showed some 19,000 men wounded in the Battle For iojima Tons of shell cases gave evidence of the important role played by artillery in the 5-we long campaign US forces in the Pacific had decided that EO must be taken at any cost and they had thrown themselves into the struggle with all the power available with the job successfully accomplished the top priority assignment was the extension of one of the airfields so that it could accommodate America's newest heavy bombers Marine engineering units and navy construction battalions accomplished their job in miraculously short order The Field's Great Value to the US lay in its use as an emergency base for crippled b29 unable to return all the way to their Mariana's bases more than 850 damaged b29 landed safely at EO during the following 3 months in addition EO strips provided a perfect base for us fighter planes now capable of making it to Japan and return with fighter cover the raids on Japan were less hazardous after the victory at ewo okanawa was the next major enemy Island on the US schedule an assault force of soldiers and Marines made The Invasion on Easter Sunday [Music] [Applause] 1945 for andice for [Music] in [Music]