19 Feb 1945 Operation Detachment ....... Marines invaded Iwo Jima

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wm
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19 Feb 1945 Operation Detachment ....... Marines invaded Iwo Jima

Post by wm »

The 36-day Iwo Jima assault resulted in more than 26,000 American casualties, including 6,800 dead. Iwo Jima was the only U.S. Marine battle where the American casualties exceeded the Japanese, although Japanese combat deaths numbered three times as many as American deaths. Two wounded US Marines were captured during the battle, neither of whom survived their captivity. The US Navy lost CVE USS Bismarck Sea (loss of 318 men}, the last U.S. aircraft carrier sunk in World War II.
3leggedturtle
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Re: 19 Feb 1945 Operation Detachment ....... Marines invaded Iwo Jima

Post by 3leggedturtle »

Thanks for the reminder. Todd
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piller
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Re: 19 Feb 1945 Operation Detachment ....... Marines invaded Iwo Jima

Post by piller »

There were a bunch of reasons, including the caves and other forms of cover, for the Japanese being so difficult to defeat on Iwo Jima. However, the Marines never gave up and got the job done. With the politicians of today, the losses would have been considered too costly, and the politicians would have pulled out.
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Ray Newman
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Re: 19 Feb 1945 Operation Detachment ....... Marines invaded Iwo Jima

Post by Ray Newman »

In the office I worked in, one of the lawyer's father landed on Iwo Jima. She said his B-29 bomber was hit on a bombing raid over Japan and headed back after dropping its bomb load. The "successfully" crash landed "belly woped" on the air strip that the Marines and Seabees captured and rebuilt shortly before. Her father told he that the Seabees simply bull dozed the plane off the run way as more shot up bombers were arriving for landing.

To his dying day, her father said that if it was not for the Iwo Jima airfield, he and his crew would not have made it back.

It was said of the Marines on Iwo Jima uncommon valor was a common virtue.
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daisygordoninc
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Re: 19 Feb 1945 Operation Detachment ....... Marines invaded Iwo Jima

Post by daisygordoninc »

I was born in July of 1945, my dad was in the Pacific but not at Iwo Jima. That battle was so significant and what a sacrifice for so many.
Thanks for the reminder. My dad didn't come home until the war was over and able to get on a ship to come home. Some of those ships
had thousands of men sitting on the top deck, as was the case with my father. I was 1 and 1/2 years when he got home and saw me for
the first time. He almost never talked about his time in the war there, I sure wished I had asked him more about it. I do have about 50
letters he wrote to mom while he was there. They were all headed to Japan had the bombs not been dropped. I have a picture of my
dad standing against the Eola Gay, just shortly before it dropped the bomb. I wished our school kids were being taught about these things
in school, but they are not. My granddaughters are college graduates and they know next to nothing about America's greatness. What
they learned about Abraham Lincoln could be put into a thimble, they have no appreciation for America what so ever. How can this be ?
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