The FReeper Foxhole Revisits Iwo Jima - February 18th, 2005

http://www.angelfire.com/wa/redwoodsigns/iwojima.html ^

[snippy_about_it]

Lord,

Keep our Troops forever in Your care

Give them victory over the enemy...

Grant them a safe and swift return...

Bless those who mourn the lost.
.

FReepers from the Foxhole join in prayer
for all those serving their country at this time.


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The FReeper Foxhole Revisits

The Costliest Operation
in Marine Corps History

On Monday, February 19, 1945, U.S. Marines hit the sands of Iwo Jima.

The battle for Iwo Jima can be described in many ways.

Most simply, 70,000 Marines routed 22,000 Japanese in a 36 day battle. It bore little resemblance to today's modern warfare. It was a fight of gladiators. Gladiators in the catacombs of the Coliseum fighting among trap doors and hidden tunnels. Above ground gladiators using liquid gasoline to burn the underground gladiators out of their lethal hiding places.



The Marines had overwhelming force and controlled the sea and air. The Japanese had the most ingenious and deadly fortress in military history.

The Marines had Esprit de Corps and felt they could not lose. The Japanese fought for their god-Emperor and felt they had to die fighting.



The Marines were projecting American offensive power thousands of miles from home shores with a momentum that would carry on to create the Century of the Pacific. The Japanese were fighting a tenacious defensive battle protecting the front door to their ancient land.

The geography, topography and geology of the island guaranteed a deadly and bizarre battle. The large numbers of men and small size of the island ensured the fighting would be up close and vicious.

Almost one hundred thousand men would fight on a tiny island just eight square miles. Four miles by two miles. If you're driving 60 miles an hour in your car, it takes you four minutes to drive four miles. It took the Marines 36 days to slog that four miles. Iwo Jima would be the most densely populated battlefield of the war with one hundred thousand combatants embraced in a death dance over an area smaller than one third the size of Manhattan island.



From the air the island looked like a bald slice of black moonscape shaped like a porkchop. All its foliage had been blown off by bombs. The only "life" visible on the island were puffs of "rotten egg" stinking sulphur fumes coming from vents that seemed connected to hell. Correspondents in airplanes could see tens of thousands of Marines on one side of the island fighting against a completely barren side of stone.

On foot it was a morass of soft volcanic sand or a jumble of jagged rock. The Marines sought protection in shell holes blasted by the bombardment. Foxholes were impossible to dig, either the sand collapsed in on you or your shovel failed to dent the hard obsidian floor.

Bullets and mortars would come from nowhere to kill. The Marines would come across a cave or blockhouse and shoot and burn all its defenders to death. They would peer into the cavern and assure themselves no one was left there to hurt them. They'd move on only to be shocked when that "dead" position came alive again behind them. The Marines thought they were fighting men in isolated caves and had no idea of the extensive tunnels below.



A surgeon would establish an operating theater in a safe place. With sandbags and tarp he'd build a little hospital and treat his patients away from the battle. Then at night when he lay down exhausted to sleep he'd hear foreign voices below him. Only when his frantic fingers clawed through the sand and hit the wooden roof of an underground cavern would he realize he had been living atop the enemy all along.

The days were full of fear and nights offered terror. The Marines were sleeping on ground that the Japanese had practiced how to crawl over in the darkness, they knew every inch. Imagine sleeping in a haunted man- sion where the owner is a serial murderer who knows the rooms and stairways and trapdoors by touch and you are new. Then you can imagine the tortured sleep of the Marines.

Experienced naval doctors had never seen such carnage. Japanese tanks and high caliber anti-aircraft guns hidden behind walls of rock and concrete ensured that the Marines would not just be cut down, but cut in half or blown to bits.

A seventy five year old veteran of Iwo Jima would still reflexively open his bedroom window in 1999 after dreaming of the battle once again. Fifty four years after the battle the stench of death still filled his nostrils.



The bodies lay everywhere. Young boys who had never been to a funeral became accustomed to rolling another dead buddy aside. Kids full of life worked on burial duty unloading bodies from trucks stacked with death.

Mothers back home would tear open the ominous telegrams with trembling fingers. The survivors would remember sailing away and seeing the rows and rows of white crosses and stars of Davids. Almost seven thousand. Today there are still over six thousand Japanese dead still entombed under the island, dead where they fell in their tunnels and caves. Recently two hundred sixty were excavated, some mummified by the sulphur gases, their glasses sitting straight atop preserved noses, hair still on their heads.

Military geniuses predicted a three day battle, an "easy time." Some of the nicest boys America would ever produce slogged on for thirty six days in what would be the worst battle in the history of the US Marine Corps.

Generals conferred over maps while tanks, airplanes, naval bombs and artillery pounded the island. But it was the individual Marine on the ground with a gun that won the battle. Marines without gladiator's armor who would advance into withering fire. Marines who would not give up simply because they were Marines. A mint in Washington would cast more medals for these Iwo Jima heroes than for any group of fighters in America's history.



America would embrace these heroes, but they were enthralled by an image of heroism, by a photo. Millions of words would be written in the US about 1/400th of a second no one on Iwo Jima thought worthy of remark at the time. Thousands would seek autographs from three survivors who felt "we hadn't done much." Battles would be fought over that image, some dying early because of their inclusion, some living bitterly because of their exclusion.

But that would all come later. After two battles were fought on Iwo Jima, one for Mt. Suribachi and the southern part of the island the other for the northern part. And after one hundred thousand individual battles, personal battles of valor and fear, of determination and dirt.

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FReeper Foxhole Armed Services Links

[snippy_about_it]

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The Heroes Of Iwo Jima

Three days after that (the flag raising), the war was over for Easy Company.

Easy's original total force on Iwo Jima was 310 young men, including replacements. On March 26, Captain Severance led his 50 survivors on a tour of the newly dedicated 5th Division cemetery. And then they traveled by a small boat to the transport, the Winged Arrow, for the trip back home. They had to climb a cargo net to get aboard. Many were so weak that they had to be pulled over the rail by sailors.

When I asked Severance, many years later, exactly how it finally ended, he thought for a moment and then replied: "We had all the real estate."



Severance was the only one of six Easy Company ofhcers to walk off the island. Of his 3rd Platoon, the one that first scaled Suribachi, only Harold Keller, Jim Michaels, Phil Ward, and Grady Dyce came through the battle untouched. Easy Company had suffered eighty-four percent casualties.

Of the eighteen triumphant boys in Joe Rosenthal's "gung-ho" (1st) flag raising photograph, fourteen were casualties.

The hard statistics show the sacrifice made by Colonel Johnson's 2nd Battalion: 1,400 boys landed on D-Day; 288 replacements were provided as the battle went on, a total of 1,688. Of these, 1,511 had been killed or wounded. Only 177 walked off the island. And of the final 177, 91 had been wounded at least once and returned to battle.

It had taken twenty-two crowded transports to bring the 5th Division to the island. The survivors fit comfortably onto eight departing ships. The American boys had killed about 21,000 Japanese, but suffered more than 26,000 casualties doing so. This would be the only battle in the Pacific where the invaders suffered higher casualties than the defenders. The Marines fought in World War II for forty-three months. Yet in one month on Iwo ]ima, one third of their total deaths occurred. They left behind the Pacific's largest cemeteries: nearly 6,800 graves in all; mounds with their crosses and stars. Thousands of families would not have the solace of a body to bid farewell: just the abstract information that the Marine had "died in the performance of his duty" and was buried in a plot, aligned in a row with numbers on his grave. Mike lay in Plot 3, Row 5, Grave 694; Harlon in Plot 4, Row 6, Grave 912; Franklin in Plot 8, Row 7, Grave 2189.



When I think of Mike, Harlon, and Franklin there, I think of the message someone had chiseled outside the cemetery:

When you go home
Tell them for us and say
For your tomorrow
We gave our today

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Today's Educational Sources and suggestions for further reading:

The FReeper Foxhole Remembers Iwo Jima - Feb. 19th, 2003

[snippy_about_it]

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Final Analysis of the Battle



The Naval bombardment of only 3 days leading up to the invasion was far short than what was required. The Marines had requested 13 days of prelanding bombardment but were denied this request because of commitments to MaCarthur's campaign in Luzon.

The U.S. had underestimated the Japanese strenght on the island by as much as 70 percent.

The change in Japanese tactics was not ever contemplated because of earlier invasions on Saipan, Tarawa and Peleliu. These all had early Banzai attacks that were easily defeated and turned the tide of each invasion. This would not be the case with Iwo Jima. The nature and the difficulty of the soil on the island was never examined before the invasion.

The estimates made on the U.S. casualties was underestimated by 80 percent. 23,000 Casualties out of 70,000 Marines. Over third of the total Marines who participated in the invasion were either Killed, Wounded or suffered from Battle Fatigue.

This would be a strong warning of what was to come with the invasion of Okinawa.



Total Losses

U.S. personnel 6,821 Killed 19,217 Wounded 2,648 Combat Fatigue Total 28,686
Marine Casualties 23,573

Japanese Troops 1,083 POW and 20,000 est. Killed

Q: I have a relative who served on Iwo Jima. How can I learn about his past?"

A:
1. Get his service record from:

Military Records Facility 9700 Page Avenue St. Louis, Missouri 63132-5100 NAVY and MARINE CORPS (314) 538-4141 NARA Facilities

2. From that record you can determine his unit. Just as your identity goes from general to specific--ie, Country, State, City, Street--your Marine or Corpsman was identified by his Division, Regiment, Battalion, Company and then Platoon designation.

3. Send that information to one of the following Divisions, asking for people who knew your relative:

Third Marine Division Association PO Box 297 Dumfries, VA 22026

Fourth Marine Division Association PO Box 595 Laurel, Fl. 34272

Fifth Marine Division Association Dean F. Keeley PO Box 44250 Lafayette, LA 70504-4250

Q: I am looking for a list of those KIA on Iwo Jima?

A: I know of no complete listing. The most complete I'm aware of is at: http://www.geocities.com/mbackstr2000/dead/dead.htm

[snippy_about_it]

'Among the Americans who served on Iwo Jima, uncommon valor was a common virtue.'

-- Admiral Chester Nimitz

[snippy_about_it]

"FALL IN" to the FReeper Foxhole!



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[snippy_about_it]

Veterans for Constitution Restoration is a non-profit, non-partisan educational and grassroots activist organization.

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Actively seeking volunteers to provide this valuable service to Veterans and their families.

Thanks to quietolong for providing this link.

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We here at Blue Stars For A Safe Return are working hard to honor all of our military, past and present, and their families. Inlcuding the veterans, and POW/MIA's. I feel that not enough is done to recognize the past efforts of the veterans, and remember those who have never been found.

I realized that our Veterans have no "official" seal, so we created one as part of that recognition. To see what it looks like and the Star that we have dedicated to you, the Veteran, please check out our site.

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NOW UPDATED THROUGH JULY 31st, 2004




The FReeper Foxhole. America's History. America's Soul

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[SAMWolf]

Goodnight Snippy.

[alfa6]

Sulphur Island Bump for the Freeper Foxhole

Only 5.75 hours left, yippeee

Regards

alfa6 ;>}

[endthematrix]

Hey Snippy! I met a guy who claimed he was at Iwo and that he also marched in Bataan (or that he was POW there) He was a quite feisty man and with a short stature. He hated the Japs still with a passion. He was a Marine "Raider" and talked of exploits of demolition with dynamite and they also had used flame throwers. He said NO ONE wanted to use one, very dangerous. I was standing in awe of him. It was several years ago and I was 28 or so. I shook his hand and he crushed mine!

Off hand I forgot his unit. Could he of been in both Iwo and Bataan?

[Brad’s Gramma]

THAT is invaluable information!!! THANK YOU SO MUCH!

[radu]

Good morning y'all!

To all our military men and women past and present, military family members, and to our allies who stand beside us
Thank You!

[Iris7]

There were maybe three Marine regiments on Luzon when the Japanese invaded. Possibly your acquaintance said he had been, had fought, in Bataan, where the Americans and Filipinos made a last stand. Several hundred American wounded were evacuated by PT boats and then submarines. After Bataan fell some hundreds of Americans escaped capture by sea, using local fishing boats and such.

Some of the death march guys escaped during the march, I understand. There was some escape from the Japanese POW camps.

The resistance had submarine contact with the US Navy from late 1942, as I recollect, and a lot of men went in and out.

So it could be your old Marine was on the level. The short and feisty ones are some of the most ferocious of the breed.

My desire, from my heart, is to say: Believe him.

[endthematrix]

I do. I did't know if the dates jived. He was quite familiar with jungle rot as a POW and the use of dynamite. They sent him into the caves. I had a Vietnam vet coworker (Green Beret who was an escaped POW) who had the same hate of the enemy after all those years. Both saw heavy combat.

[Aeronaut]

Good morning Snippy.

[Poundstone]

I went to Iwo Jima for the 50th anniversary of the battle, in March 1995. It was my second visit to the island. It's a spooky place.

I'm going back next month for the 60th anniversary.

[GailA]

Good morning

[Professional Engineer]

Good morning ladies. It's Friday!

Giant sucking sound size

[Chieftain]

Every Devil Dog knows their heritage is attributed to these heroes.

[The Mayor]

February 18, 2005

Hearing And Doing

Read:
James 1:19-27

Be doers of the Word, and not hearers only, deceiving yourselves. -James 1:22

Bible In One Year: Numbers 4-6

I read about a man in New York City who died at the age of 63 without ever having had a job. He spent his entire adult life in college. He had acquired so many academic degrees that they looked like the alphabet behind his name.

Why did this man spend his entire life in college? When he was a child, a wealthy relative died who had named him as a beneficiary in his will. It stated that he was to be given enough money to support him every year as long as he stayed in school. And it was to be discontinued when he had completed his education.

The man met the terms of the will, but by staying in school indefinitely he turned a technicality into a steady income for life-something his benefactor never intended. Unfortunately, he spent thousands of hours listening to professors and reading books but never "doing." He acquired more and more knowledge but didn't put it into practice.

This reminds me of what James said: "Be doers of the Word, and not hearers only" (1:22). If we read the Bible or listen as it is taught but fail to put to work what we have learned, we are as bad as that man with his string of degrees. His education was of no practical benefit to anyone.

Hearing must be matched by doing. -Richard De Haan

We take delight to read God's Word
And say, "Oh, yes, it's true!"
But it's of little use to us
Unless we hear and do. -D. De Haan

Open your Bible prayerfully, read it carefully, obey it joyfully.

FOR FURTHER STUDY
Can I Really Trust The Bible?

[Recovering Ex-hippie]

With heartfelt thanks to you and ALL the Devil Dogs for our freedom and peace. Know that even in this day and age of obscene liberals with loud mouths and mainstream media megaphones, there is an underbelly of patriotic Americans
who know the truth....and "the truth shall set you free!".

[E.G.C.]

Good morning Snippy and everyone at the foxhole.