[gura]

That's just an excellent book. If I remember correctly our invasion fleet at Okinawa numbered around 1700 ships. The Japs weren't even able to launch twice that many kamikaze attacks against that fleet.

Still it makes no sense why they dribbled them out a few at a time instead of one mass attack to overwhelm our defenses.

[xone]

The video is an amalgamation of kamikaze attacks. With that many planes attacking one ship, filming the attacks would quickly become a non-essential job. The Japs did launch ten major attacks, and the number of individual attacks during the battle of Okinawa exceeded the number of ships in the invasion fleet.

The question as to why not just one big attack? Having more planes in the same area, wouldn't have necessarily meant more success. There is only so much airspace, more planes equals more targets. More planes means less manuevering ability per plane. Tougher coordination for the Japs as it would have to be on-site.

At Iwo Jima, the Japs had changed their defensive strategy to be one of more attrition for the invader. The Jap CG forbade banzai attacks because of their proven lack of success earlier in the island hopping campaign, and after the attack, the Americans were able to swiftly root out the remaining defenders due to the lack of defensive depth.

Had the Japs gone for one mass kamikaze attack, the resulting difficulties in coordination and control would have likely ended in less favorable results. Defensive measures are more effective in a target rich environment, If the battle unfolded slowly, fuel then becomes another factor. They also were thinking ahead to the looming invasion of the home islands and didn't want to expend their reserves.