Explore the horrors and history of the Battle of Iwo Jima, learn why it became a major dispute between the United States and Japan, and why Japan became the only country to be nuclearized.
Let's look back at that history of challenges and tribulations.
Let's start with the supreme commander of the battle: on the American side, it was Holland Smith, who is known as the "father of modern amphibious warfare." On the Japanese side, it is Lieutenant General Tadamichi Awabayashi, who is a rare "American expert" in the Japanese army.
The two armies assembled, but they did not know that this battle would be the most tragic battle of the Pacific War, and it was also the only battle in which the American army surpassed the Japanese army. Why Iwo Jima?
The reason is that after Japan's surprise attack on Pearl Harbor, the United States declared war on Japan and officially joined the Allied camp, and the Pacific Naval War was about to break out.
After the outbreak of the Pacific Naval War, the US military quickly seized the initiative on the battlefield by virtue of its huge firepower superiority. After the Battle of the Philippine Sea, the Japanese Navy suffered a devastating blow.
At the same time, the Caroline Islands and the Marshall Islands were also controlled by the U.S. military, which allowed the U.S. military to use Saipan to bomb the Japanese mainland. However, because there is a small island between Saipan and Tokyo, which is only 8 kilometers long and 4 kilometers wide, Iwo Jima, every time the U.S. military sorts out bombers, the Iwo Jima garrison will detect it and warn the mainland.
To make matters worse, the Japanese even set up airfields on Iwo Jima, where fighter jets could rise to the air at any time to disperse the American fleet. Therefore, the battle to recover Iwo Jima became inevitable.
The Battle of Iwo Jima, originally planned to begin at the end of 1944, was delayed until January 1945 because the participating troops had to wait for the end of the Battle of Luzon to fully assemble.
Since January 3, the U.S. military has been bombing Iwo Jima indiscriminately, not only dispatching fighter jets, but also naval artillery groups in the Pacific Ocean to participate, and according to statistics, the U.S. military dropped more than 24,000 tons of artillery shells and bombs before landing on Iwo Jima.
The bombing volume of 24,000 tons is equivalent to the "replace Li Yunlong with five tons of shells!" mentioned in the bright sword! "Fifty thousand times. Iwo Jima is a small island, but it is under tremendous pressure that it should not have shouldered.
However, the Japanese commander of Iwo Jima, Tadamichi Awabayashi, was also a valiant general, and he laid out fortifications, bunkers, and fortresses in advance to deal with the indiscriminate bombing by the American army.
During the Battle of Iwo Jima, Awarin-chundo originally planned to build a 28-kilometer-long tunnel to connect the various positions, but in the end, due to lack of time, only 18 kilometers were completed, less than 70%.
What is even more worrying is that there is no connection between the Oribayama position and the Wonsan position, which makes the fighting facing the US military even more tragic. Fortunately, the enemy did not complete the fortifications according to the original plan, which greatly weakened the connection between the Oribayama and Wonsan positions.
Coupled with the fact that the ratio of U.S. and Japanese forces was 11:2, the outcome of this battle was already doomed. However, despite this, many unexpected things happened in the Battle of Iwo Jima.
The Battle of Iwo Jima began on February 16, 1945, when the Japanese lost control of the sea and air, and Tadamichi Awabayashi chose to put up symbolic resistance. The U.S. intelligence department mistakenly believed that the Japanese troops had no ability to resist and began to land on February 19, but in fact, within the range of the Japanese artillery, the Japanese suddenly moved out the hidden large-caliber heavy artillery, and the American troops were taken by surprise, and the number of killed and wounded accounted for 8% of the total number of people landed.
Although the losses did not look serious, the losses of the American troops were still not small in the case of completely one-sided firepower.
Awabayashi Tadamichi rejected the traditional Japanese tactic of mass charge, believing that this method of attack was tantamount to suicide in terms of firepower and troops. Despite the stubborn resistance of the Japanese troops in the tunnels and bunkers, the 4th Marine Division of the US Army, under the cover of strong firepower, successfully captured the No. 1 airfield and cut off the connection between the Japanese forces in the south of the island and the Wonsan position.
In addition, on the first day of the attack, the U.S. army had already cut off the Oriba Mountain position, and the Japanese army had been divided and surrounded at this time, and the outcome of defeat was inevitable. However, even in such a desperate situation, the Japanese showed amazing tenacity, fighting for every inch of land, fighting from morning until dusk, advancing only one hundred and eighty meters.
The fierce fighting did not stop until the heavy rains on February 22.
Since February 23, the US ** team launched an all-out attack on the No. 2 airfield and the main position of Oriba Mountain, and after four days and nights of fierce fighting, they finally occupied the top of Oribo Mountain and raised an American flag.
The morale of the American soldiers at the foot of the mountain was greatly boosted when they saw the national flag, and the US military command saw this effect and decided to replace it with a larger national flag. American war correspondent Joe Rosenthal managed to capture this moment, and this image was later widely circulated around the world.
Interestingly, this ** was later questioned. The main reason for the skeptics was that at that time the U.S. troops had already taken control of the Oriba Mountain position, and there was almost no resistance from the Japanese army, but the soldiers in the ** seemed to have erected this flag in the rain of bullets.
The game between the great powers is truly impressive.
After the U.S. troops conquered the main position on Oriba Mountain, they thought that the battle was over, but in fact, more tragic battles were still to come. In the battle for the 382nd Heights, every step required a bloody price, and the 4th Marine Division** was as high as 50%, or even more.
Veterans were lost, and front-line officers and enlisted men had to take temporary positions in large positions. It was not until March 7 that the American forces took Heights 362 by surprise by quietly approaching the Japanese positions.
However, the resistance of the Japanese army did not end. Awabayashi Tadamichi began to lead the supply lines and logistics of the US army, although the effect was not great, but due to the intensive firepower of the US army, the Japanese army was large **, but still insisted on resisting.
The loss of Iwo Jima meant that Tokyo, the capital of the Japanese army, was completely exposed to U.S. air raids. At this point, what choice will Su Lin Zhongdao face? Despite the fact that he was at the end of his crossbow, he decided to fight the trapped beasts, sent a final telegram to Tokyo, and decided to lead all the officers and soldiers to commit suicide en masse.
This history reflects the fact that Japanese soldiers were reduced to war machines under the influence of the so-called bushido spirit. In the following week of fierce fighting, the remnants of the Japanese army were finally trapped in a small area of about 2,100 square meters north of Iwo Jima.
Awabayashi Tadamichi led the assault team to attack the US troops in the early morning of March 26, but due to the ruthless strangulation of the US troops, Awabayashi Tadamichi finally chose to commit suicide by caesarean section. At 9 o'clock that day, the American army declared the end of the campaign, but in fact, the remnants of the Japanese army continued to fight until the end of April.
In addition, two Japanese soldiers, Mitsufuku Yamen'in and Toshio Matsudo, did not choose to surrender until 1949. After the U.S. military occupied the entire island of Iwo Jima, they hid on the island and lived by eating crabs, rats, and stealing U.S. food.
Later, after occasionally reading the magazines left behind by the American army, they learned that the war was over, and in frustration, they decided to surrender.
In 1951, Mitsufuku returned to Iwo Jima to find the diary he had buried to add more material to his memoir, but found nothing. In desperation, he committed suicide by jumping into the sea on Origa.
Interestingly, during the construction of the Iwo Jima expansion air base in 1968, the diary of Mitsufuku Yamayoshi was discovered. In the end, the American army lost more than 6,800 killed, more than 20,000 wounded, successfully annihilated more than 20,000 Japanese troops, and only about 1,000 were captured or surrendered.
In the case of obvious superiority in troops, the U.S. military paid a huge price to control Iwo Jima, providing perfect support for the future bombing of the Japanese mainland.
The Battle of Iwo Jima was one of the most tragic battles of the Pacific War, and the sacrifices of soldiers on both sides were heartbreaking. This battle made the US military deeply feel the stubborn resistance of the Japanese army, and foresaw that the landing on the Japanese mainland in the future would face greater challenges.
It was this kind of ** that prompted the United States to finally carry out a nuclear attack on Japan, which also made Japan the only country to suffer a nuclear attack. The brutality of the war cannot be described in words, and whether it is the American or Japanese army, charging in the Battle of Iwo Jima is tantamount to suicide.
During World War II, the distribution of firepower on both sides was very scientific. The U.S. military, with its powerful firepower, always has the upper hand. The Japanese army used hundreds of pillboxes, secret tunnels and fortresses to build a tight network of firepower, but the soldiers still fell under the muzzle of the guns in rows.
After the end of World War II, the United States took control of Japan, which became one of their great advantages in the Korean War. They can use Japan as an air base to bomb the Korean battlefield at any time, or they can take wounded American soldiers to Tokyo for the best surgical treatment.
In "Shuimen Bridge of Changjin Lake" released during the Spring Festival, the steel frames airlifted by the US military made every audience feel extremely heartbroken, and those steel frames were transported from Tokyo.
Here, I would like to say: Long live the Chinese People's Volunteers! May the mountains and rivers be safe and the world peaceful.