The Final Campaigns of WWII

February 1945: Iwo Jima
In February of 1945 an armada of American ships and planes unleashed an unprecedented three-day barrage against the first piece of Japanese soil to be invaded in 4,000 years: Iwo Jima. It was the longest, most intensive shelling of any Pacific island during the war. Nearly 5,000 tons of ordinance were expended before sending the first of the 70,000 American soldiers that took part in the invasion.

Yet one in three Americans were killed or wounded during the next 36 days, against only 22 to 27 thousand Japanese soldiers that were dug into the lava rock of the tiny 8-square-mile island. Historians described U.S. forces' attack against the Japanese defense as "throwing human flesh against reinforced concrete."

1 April 1945: Okinawa
The greatest naval armada in history was assembled for the Battle for Okinawa, code named Operation Iceberg. It consisted of over 1,300 ships including 40 aircraft carriers, 18 battleships, 200 destroyers, 365 amphibious craft and hundreds of assorted support ships. Preceding the landing an unprecedented naval barrage was 3,800 tons of shells at Okinawa during the first 24 hours which one island survivor described as tetsu no bow -- the "storm of steel". It was the Pacific's bloodiest battle:

More ships were used, more troops put ashore, more supplies transported, more bombs dropped, more naval guns fired against shore targets than any other operation in the Pacific. More people died during the Battle of Okinawa than all those killed during the atomic bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Casualties totaled more than 38,000 Americans wounded and 12,000 killed or missing, more than 107,000 Japanese and Okinawan conscripts killed, and perhaps 100,000 Okinawan civilians who perished in the battle.

At least 1,465 kamikaze flights were flown against the American fleet, which lost 34 ships and crafts with another 368 damaged. Navy casualties were tremendous, with nearly 5,000 dead and a ratio of one killed for one wounded as compared to a one to five ratio for the Marine Corps.

Over 182,000 troops were tasked with taking the island away from the 100,000 soldiers of the Imperial Japanese Army (IJA). The Japanese were out manned almost 2 to 1 and outgunned 10 to 1, yet they managed to mount an effective defense for 10 weeks.

12 April 1945: Death of a President
From the White House biography:

During his few weeks as Vice President, Harry S Truman scarcely saw President Roosevelt, and received no briefing on the development of the atomic bomb or the unfolding difficulties with Soviet Russia. Suddenly these and a host of other wartime problems became Truman's to solve when, on April 12, 1945, he became President. He told reporters, "I felt like the moon, the stars, and all the planets had fallen on me."

Indeed, when Truman became President the intense Battle of Okinawa was ongoing and U.S. casualties were averaging more than 900 a day.

Truman had a choice: attempt to end the war by dropping the bomb or executing Operation Downfall which itself consisted of two separate, massive military campaigns, Operations Olympic and Coronet.

Operation Olympic
Slated for 1 November 1945, it called for fourteen combat divisions of soldiers and Marines to launch an amphibious assault against the heavily fortified and defended Kyushu, the southernmost of the Japanese home islands, after yet another "unprecedented naval and aerial bombardment".

The Japanese had correctly forecast that Kyushu would be the target of invasion, just as they had known Iwo Jima would have to be defended (hence the heavy fortifications and extensive tunnel system). In March of 1945 there was a single combat division in Kyushu. Over the next four months the Japanese Army transferred forces from Manchuria, Korea, and northern Japan, while raising other forces in place. By August there were 14 divisions and three tank brigades, totaling over 900,000 men. In addition they had 40% of all ammunition available in the homeland:

Historian Edward Drea describes the situation: "It was as if the very invasion beaches were magnets, drawing the Japanese forces to those places where the Americans would have to land and fight their way ashore. It was also very clear in those messages that the Japanese intended to fight to the bitter end."

There is little doubt that taking Kyushu would have been expensive in terms of American lives.

Operation Coronet Assuming that the invasion of Kyushu was successful, the southern island was to serve as the staging area for launching a spring offensive (1 March 1956) against the main island of Honshu and the Tokyo Plain, code named Operation Coronet. 25 allied divisions were slated for the invasion, mainly American but with some Commonwealth support consisting of British, Canadian and Australian troops.

There were 65 divisions in the main islands, although equipment was becoming scarce and with the buildup in Kyushu, there wasn't enough ammunition left on Honshu for 20 divisions.

Japanese Response: Ketsu-Go Although the impressive military might of Japan had been depleted by the war, the IJA was pulling everything back to the homeland to defend native soil. Fewer than 2,000 kamikaze planes had defended Okinawa, but there were 10,000 available for defending the main islands. In addition, the Japanese navy had 100 Koryu-class midget submarines, 250 smaller Kairyu-class midget submarines, and 1,000 Kaiten manned torpedoes. The Japanese Army had 800 Shinyo suicide boats.

Out of the 107,000 Japanese troops on Okinawa fewer than 5,000 were captured. The fanaticism of the Japanese soldier was driven by culture and propaganda, two factors that were just as ingrained in the Japanese civilian population. The Japanese military planners knew that Japan would lose the war and had only one final goal: to stave off unconditional surrender.

Japan still had 3 million soldiers. Its plan to repel the Allied invaders -- Ketsu-Go, Operation Decision -- also called for the sacrifice of up to 25 million civilian defenders. As one Japanese staff officer put it:

Furthermore, when the enemy actually lands, if we are ready to sacrifice a million men we will be able to inflict an equal number of casualties upon them. If the enemy loses a million men, then the public opinion in America will become inclined towards peace, and Japan will be able to gain peace with comparatively advantageous conditions.

That, then, was the plan: to fight for every inch of Japanese soil by any means necessary:

As Japan embraced a suicidal policy of denial, a People's Volunteer Army wielded bamboo spears, pitchforks and axes to fight off the Allied invaders. The propaganda too has a familiar ring. "The barbaric tribe of Americans," wrote a Tokyo magazine, "are devils in human skin."

From Richard B. Frank's Downfall

One mobilized high school girl, Yukiko Kasai, found herself issued an awl and told, "Even killing one American soldier will do. ... You must aim for the abdomen."

Butcher's Bill
Truman approved Operation Downfall on 18 June 1945. There was wide disagreement as to what an invasion and subduing of the population would take in terms of human lives. Casualty estimates exceeded a million killed and wounded:

But Army medical people looked at the figures from Okinawa and figured that for Coronet alone, the butcher's bill would be 147,500 Americans killed in action and 343,000 wounded.

Such estimates fed Truman's fear of "another Okinawa from one end of Japan to the other."

So Truman approved the use of the atomic bomb.

All's Fair in Love and War
When faced with a culture willing to sacrifice up to 25 million civilians in order not to win a war, but merely to obtain more favorable terms of surrender, one has to wonder how anyone can say that Truman's decision to drop the bomb was not justified.

Far more interesting is the question of stopping a monstrous society by engaging in a monstrous act. Would dropping the bomb have been justified merely on the basis of putting a stop to the atrocities that the Japanese were and had been engaged in?

Japanese war crimes include:

• The infamous Unit 731 was tasked with perfecting biological weapons and did so with monstrous cruelty, infecting prisoners and then performing live vivisections without anesthesia. Unit 731 is believed to have killed, maimed or poisoned more than a million mainly Chinese, Russian and Korean civilians by contaminating their water supply and showering towns and villages with pathogens.
• From 1940 to 1942 the Japanese released seven pathogens, including the plague and anthrax, in the Chinese province of Zhejiang. Over 300,000 people were infected with 50,000 dying in the Quzhou area alone. One researcher puts the total number of deaths at 700,000.
• Unit 731 also carried out other types of medical experiments on humans:

  ... studies of dehydration, starvation, frostbite, air pressure - some inmates had their eyes blown out - transfusions of animal blood to humans and others. Even children and babies were destroyed this way. Other ghoulish experiments included cutting off a prisoner's hands and sewing them back on to the opposite arms to gauge what happened.

• Unit 516 was tasked with developing chemical weapons. Japan produced at least 7 million chemical munitions of which 4 million are still unaccounted for. So many were developed that stockpiles are still being unearthed in China today.
• In 1937 the Nanking Massacre (aka "The Rape of Nanking") took place over 8 weeks in which Japanese soldiers raped, looted and murdered the population of Nanking leaving 300,000 men, women and children dead. Estimates of the number of women raped run from 20,000 to 80,000. Says one former Japanese soldier:

  The more I killed, the more I enjoyed it. In the winter the soldiers would start a roaring bonfire, and warm themselves at it by bringing a baby and throwing it into the fire.

  We'd all stand around and laugh.

  There was a young woman in the village, and I raped her. After I did her, I killed her.

  It then occurred to me that we had no meat. And I could give the troops this meat. I cut her up, taking the best parts, and fed them to the men. It tasted better than pork.

  According to another:

  "No matter how young or old, none of the women we rounded up could escape being raped. Each one was allocated to 15 or 20 soldiers for sexual intercourse and abuse."

  Afterwards "we always stabbed them and killed them. Because dead bodies don't talk."

• The IJA kidnapped over 200,000 women, some as young as 12, and used them as sex slaves for their troops and naval personnel.
• There was the Banka Island massacre in which about 100 British soldiers and 21 nurses were machine gunned, leaving a single survivor.
• There was the Bataan Death March where about 16,000 American and Filipino soldiers died on a 100 kilometer trek from one camp to another.
• The Massacre on Wake Island resulted in the murder of 98 American construction workers who were shot while bound hand and foot.
• Of the more than 2,500 Australian and British prisoners at the Sandakan camp, only six survived the slave labor and death marches.
• Prisoners were used as slave labor until they starved to the point when they became useless, so they were shot:

  A "cage" was placed near the big tree facing the guard house. It was made of wood, 130cm by 170cm with iron bars all around the outside, it was just high enough to sit in. During the first week of being "caged", no food was allowed. At 5pm the prisoners were let out for physical exercise this was always accompanied by a beating from the guards. The allied cook used to put the scraps out at this time in a trough knowing the prisoners were about, the caged prisoners fought the dogs to obtain a scrap of food.

• Some 13,000 prisoners died building the "Death Railway" made famous by the movie The Bridge on the River Kwai: 38 dead for every kilometer of rail.
• Stories of the hell endured at the over 70 Japanese POW camps and the Hellships that transported them there are very well documented.
• Stories of cannibalism were widespread although there are some that doubt them.
• One in three prisoners in Japanese care died. For comparison, only one in a hundred died while a captive of the Nazis.
• Worse yet, orders were transmitted five days after unconditional surrender ordering the execution of all prisoners of war in an effort to cover up evidence of war crimes.
• The Japanese navy was equally culpable, sinking the hospital ship Centaur and dive-bombing the hospital ship Manunda. There are frequent reports of life rafts and swimmers being machine gunned after a ship had been sunk.

None of this implies that the Japanese civilians deserved to have an atomic bomb dropped on them. However, monstrous means can be justifiable when it is the most effective and efficient method of putting a stop to monstrous behavior. The question is, was it truely necessary?

Anything less than an unconditional surrender would not have dismantled the societal structures and military machine that controlled Japan. Unconditional surrender and the subsequent occupation rebuilt more than just the infrastructure of the nation; it transformed the very culture of the Japanese to the point where they had to amend the constitution to send troops to Iraq to aid in rebuilding that shattered country.

Am I glad the bomb was dropped, not once, but twice?

Three hours after takeoff the Enola Gay, laden with the "Little Boy" on the way to Hiroshima, flew over Iwo Jima where my father stood on volcanic rock taken at a fantastic price: more than 1 marine killed for every acre of rock. General James L. Jones, 32nd Commandant of the Marine Corps, once said:

The valor and sacrifice of the Marines and Sailors who fought on Iwo Jima is, today and forever, the standard by which we judge what we are and what we might become.

May we never have to set that standard higher.

And God bless the men of the Enola Gay and Bockscar for making certain my father was not among those that would have to do so in taking Kyushu and the Tokyo plain.

When you go home
Tell them for us and say
For your tomorrow
We gave our today
— From the book by James Bradley, "Flags Of Our Fathers", pp 246-7

Left to Right,
Standing:
Lt. Col. John Porter, ground maintenance officer (not on board)
Capt. Theodore J. Van Kirk, navigator
Maj. Thomas W. Ferebee, bombardier
Col. Paul Tibbets, pilot and 509th Group CO
Capt. Robert A. Lewis, copilot
Lt. Jacob Beser, radar countermeasure officer
Kneeling:
Sgt. Joseph Stiborik, radar operator
SSgt. George R Caron, tail gunner
Pfc. Richard H Nelson, radio operator
Sgt. Robert H. Shumard, assistant engineer
SSgt Wyatt Duzenbury, flight engineer. Not shown:
Navy Capt. William "Deak" Parsons, Manhattan Project Scientist
Lt. Morris R. Jeppson, bomb electronics test officer

Flight Crew: Major Charles W. Sweeney, commanding officer of the 393rd Squadron, Pilot
Captain Charles D. Albury, copilot
Lieutenant Frederick J. Olivi, third pilot
Captain James F. Van Pelt, Jr., navigator
Captain Kermit Beahan, bombardier
Staff Sgt. Abe M. Spitzer, radioman
Staff Sgt. Edward K. Buckley, radar operator
Staff Sgt. Albert T. DeHart, central fire control gunner
Master Sgt. John D. Kuharek, flight engineer
Staff Sgt. Raymond G. Gallagher, mechanic/gunner.

Not part of the normal flight crew but added for this mission:
Lt. Cmdr. Frederick L. Ashworth, U.S. Navy, the weaponeer in charge of the bomb;
Lieutenant Phillip M. Barnes, assistant weaponeer
Lieutenant Jacob Beser, radar-countermeasures specialist

Other sources:

• Global Security, Battle of Iwo Jima
• Combined Arms Research Library, Pastel: Deception in the Invasion of Japan
• PBS, Japan's Plan for the End of the Pacific War
• World War II in the Pacific, Operation Downfall
• What War Means by Harold Timperley, The Nanjing "Murder Race"
• Pacific War Historical Society, Japanese War Crimes
• The Other Holocaust
• The Rape of Nanking: An Undeniable History in Photographs
• Princeton University, Nanking 1937 Commemorative
• Omaha World Herald, An Invasion Not Found in the History Books
• Prisoner of War Camp #1: An Insight into Life and Death at a POW Camp in War-time Japan
• Ace Pilots: Paul Tibbets

Other bloggers that have bomb anniversary posts:

• One Hand Clapping: The Bomb
• baldilocks: Ambivalent Anniversary
• Blood & Treasure: burnt offerings
• The Moderate Voice: Hiroshima and Nagasaki: The power of memory and forgetting
• JunkYardBlog: Remarkable Perspective and Understanding
• Dr. Sanity: War and Renewal
• Don't Let Me Stop You: Looking Back at Hiroshima
• Small Dead Animals: The Ruins Of War
• Dean's World: 60 Years Ago Today
• WhitePeril.com: Hiroshima bombing anniversary [HT to Dean's World]
• UK Commentators - Laban Tall's Blog: Holiday ....
• Right Wing Nut House: Robert Oppenheimer and the Politics of the Atomic Bomb
• Right Wing Nut House: Some Other Things the “Peace Bell” Should be Tolling For

Blog post #5330 in category Military Stuff
posted 9 August 05

 

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