God bless the memory of all of those who fought to conquer Okinawa.
The casualty figures are staggering.
But even more staggering is the contrast between American casualties and Japanese casualties. Not only were ours half of the enemy’s, ours were heavily weighted to the wounded, while almost all of theirs were made up of the dead. Ninety thousand. My God.
The Japs really did believe that such iron will was unconquerable. And against just about anyone but the Americans, they probably would have been correct.
One of the most amazing clashes of iron wills in history.
But our iron was stronger than their iron. And there was a lot more of it.
Good point. One thing I've been considering reading these articles is, knowing the American Way of War places so much emphasis on artillery firepower, just how much ordinance did we expend in those 82 days?
Keep in mind that every Japanese target on Okinawa was within reach of naval artillery. For shore bombardment, nothing on land can match the power of battleship or cruiser guns. The most common heavy artillery is the 155mm, and medium artillery was the 105mm gun. A battalion of such guns was three batteries of four guns, or 12 guns to a battalion. A 105mm gun translates to roughly four inches, while 155mm is roughly a six-inch gun.
So a battalion of 105mm guns = 12 four inch guns, which is less firepower than three destroyers, each with four or five 5" guns. A 155mm battalion is roughly equivalent to a light cruiser. And one advanage the ships have over the land batteries is their mobility, and most importantly, their rate of fire. A ship is not just the guns, but all of the complex shell storage and ammunition hoists to feed those guns from the shell rooms. That firing system yields a rate of fire that cannot be duplicated on land.
Add to it the fact that NOTHING on land could duplicate the nine to twelve 12" to 16" guns of an American battleship. Not in terms of gun size, range, accuracy, concentration and rate of fire.
For those 82 days, the fleet stood off Okinawa pounding away. I wonder the tonnage of steel and high explosive rained down on Okinawa.