Protecting these invasion forces was the most formidable fleet the world had ever seen. At its core were new American aircraft carriers. Named after the first of its kind, the Essex class carriers were big ships, and fast. They displaced 27,100 tons and carried ninety aircraft. Each of the fourteen that saw action in the Pacific required a crew of more than three thousand sailors. By tradition U.S. Navy carriers were named after American military victories or previous naval vessels. Hence, the carriers included the Ticonderoga, the Bunker Hill, the Intrepid, and the Wasp. The navy also named several of the Essex class ships after American patriots: for example the Hancock and the Franklin. This last vessel, nicknamed Big Ben by her crew, was ripped apart by enemy bombs in March 1945, at the cost of 724 men killed and 256 wounded. But she did not sink. Badly battered, Big Ben sailed home under her own steam.
From late 1943 on, American carrier task forces attacked Japanese bases across the Pacific. These raids severely reduced the number of ships and planes the enemy could muster. Off Saipan, in what became known as “the Marianas Turkey Shoot,” U.S. naval aircraft decimated their Japanese counterparts. This helps explain why, four months later in the Battle of Leyte Gulf, the four IJN carriers had few airplanes aboard.
Airfields in the Marianas enabled the United States to mount a strategic air offensive against the Home Islands of Japan. Carrying out the aerial offensive was a brand-new bomber, Boeing’s B-29. With a crew of eleven, this four-engine machine could deliver forty 500-pound bombs to Tokyo, a round-trip flight of more than fourteen hours. That the 29’s power plant, the Wright Cyclone R-3350, occasionally caught fire made the missions even more eventful.
Initial operations with the B-29 were not successful. High winds, bad weather, inexperienced crews, and Japanese defenses plagued the American bombers. Then General Curtis LeMay, one of the B-29 commanders, made a surprising decision. Instead of high-altitude bombing as the plane’s design and air force doctrine mandated, the B-29s, stripped of guns and gunners to save weight, would go in low. Their payload, moreover, would include not just high-explosive bombs, but incendiaries. Japanese cities were full of wooden structures, and LeMay intended to burn them to the ground, which is exactly what the B-29s did.
The most devastating American attack took place on the night of March 9, 1945. LeMay sent 279 B-29s to Tokyo. They were loaded with incendiaries, and coming in low and fast, they leveled sixteen square miles of the city. Approximately eighty-three thousand people were killed. Had the Japanese been rational, they would have surrendered there and then. But they were not. The slaughter continued. During the ten months of the Marianas air campaign the B-29s flew 190 combat missions, the last one occurring on August 14, when 828 B-29s struck north of Tokyo. By then, LeMay and his airplanes were running low on priority targets.
Initially, the B-29s were based in China. Logistical support there was difficult, so the move to the Marianas was welcomed by all. China itself was a major theater of operations in the Second World War (as was, for the British, Burma). Japan had invaded China in 1937. Chinese forces opposing the Japanese were split. There were the Nationalists led by Chiang Kai-shek and the Communists led by Mao Tse-tung. Chiang and Mao despised each other, and each man intended, once the Japanese were disposed of, to eliminate the other. Franklin Roosevelt thought China to be important and was a strong supporter of Chiang, and so much American energy—and treasure—were expended in aiding the Chinese Nationalists.
When the Japanese cut the Burma Road, the principal route for supplies going to China, American aid to Chiang was delivered by air. Aircraft took off from fields in India, crossed over the Himalayan Mountains, and landed in Kunming. The planes employed were unarmed twin-engine transports. Extremely dangerous, the route was called “the Hump.” Beginning in mid-1943, huge amounts of supplies were flown into China, but at a high price. More than fifteen hundred American aviators were killed flying the Hump.
In charge of the U.S. military mission to China was General Joseph W. Stilwell. He also served as chief military advisor to Chiang. Stilwell was in an impossible situation. The area for which he was responsible, China, Burma, and India (known as the CBI) was not an American priority, despite Roosevelt’s enthusiasm for China. Making Stilwell’s job even more difficult was the Chinese Nationalist leader himself. Chiang Kai-shek was a military leader of little skill who often ignored Stilwell’s advice. What Chiang most wanted to do was horde the American equipment he received so it could be used later against Mao. “Vinegar Joe” Stilwell did not succeed in China, but given the circumstances, no American commander could have.
However, there was one American general who enjoyed a modicum of success in China. He was an aviator by the name of Claire Chennault. Resigning from the U.S. Army Air Corps, he had gone to China to help Chiang fight the Japanese. Recruiting American pilots, Chennault established the Flying Tigers, three fighter squadrons that, in 1942, did well against Japanese aircraft (the pilots, in fact, were mercenaries who received a bonus of $500 for each enemy plane destroyed). When the United States started to aid the Chinese, Chennault was brought back into the U.S. Army. He then commanded the Fourteenth Air Force, which conducted aerial operations against Japan.
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Roughly halfway between the Marianas and Japan lies the small island of Iwo Jima. At its southern tip, but dominating the landscape, lies Mount Suribachi, a dormant volcano. Early in 1945, twenty-three thousand Japanese soldiers manned the island’s defensives. Understanding that no reinforcements or additional supplies would be delivered, these soldiers expected to die on the island. They were determined to make the Americans pay a high price for Iwo Jima.
American commanders wanted the island as a base for fighter aircraft that then would escort the B-29s on their raids on Japan. More important, the island’s airfields would provide Superfortresses returning home to the Marianas a place to land in case of emergencies. Either battle-damaged or with an engine on fire, numerous B-29s were ditching in the ocean, well short of their airfields in the Marianas. In time, once Iwo Jima was in U.S. hands, B-29s would utilize this safe haven more than two thousand times.
To seize Iwo Jima, the Americans assembled the largest formation of United States marines ever to conduct a single operation: three divisions, totaling 70,647 men. The landings took place on February 19, 1945. They were preceded by seventy-three days of aerial bombardment. As was the routine, U.S. Navy warships then pounded the island.
The defenders fought tenaciously. So did the marines. Men were killed on practically every square yard of the island. When the battle was over, on March 19, the Americans had paid a high price. Marine deaths totaled 6,812. The number wounded was 19,217. Very few Japanese, a few hundred perhaps, survived. These numbers reflect the extraordinary level of violence the battle produced. A number that illustrates the courage of the Americans on that island is 27. That was the number of Congressional Medals of Honor awarded to marines and naval medical personnel of the black sands on Iwo Jima.
One remaining piece of the story about Iwo Jima needs to be told. It concerns a photograph, a very famous photograph, one that in the United States became the best known image of the Second World War. Early in the battle, U.S. marines reached the summit of Mount Suribachi. Several of them then raised a small American flag. Other marines cheered and the ships offshore blew their whistles in celebration. Later, wanting a larger flag and hoping to keep the small flag for posterity, six men—five marines and a naval medical corpsman—planted a larger flag. Standing nearby was an Associated Press photographer, Joe Rosenthal. He saw what was happening and snapped a picture. The resulting photograph won a Pulitzer Prize. Much later, the image was reproduced in sculpture form to serve as the official memorial to the United States Marine Corps.
In addition to incendiaries and high-explosive bombs, the B-29s based in the Marianas dropped aerial mines into the waters off Japan. As intended, these took a toll on Japanese vessels. An island nation with f
ew natural resources, Japan depended on its merchant marine for delivery of supplies. Were the Americans able to stop the flow of shipping to Japan, the empire would be brought to its knees.
To do just that, the Americans employed a weapon that proved decisive in the Pacific War. The weapon was the submarine. Operating from bases in Australia and Hawaii, American submarines roamed the Pacific. After a slow start due in part to faulty torpedoes, the U.S. Navy’s submarine force scored success after success. In 1944 alone the boats (U.S. submarines are “boats” not “ships”) sank six hundred enemy ships. Men such as Slade Cutter, Richard O’Kane, and Howard Gilmore are today unknown to the American public. But these three submarine skippers and many others—seventy-six submarine captains sank five or more enemy vessels each—brought about the defeat of Japan. After the war, Admiral William Halsey, in ranking the tools of war most responsible for the victory over Japan, listed the submarine first. This victory, however, came at a price. Fifty-two U.S. submarines failed to return.
Howard Gilmore’s story warrants a few words. During a night action, his boat, the USS Growler, collided with a Japanese warship. Gunners aboard the ship fired down on Growler’s bridge, killing two men and wounding Gilmore. Apparently unable to move but fully conscious, Gilmore gave the command that sealed his doom, but saved his boat. It is an order that still resonates with the United States submarine service: “Take her down!” Posthumously, Howard Gilmore was awarded the Congressional Medal of Honor.
American submarines did more than just sink ships. They also saved lives.
B-29s and other U.S. aircraft, either damaged or out of fuel, often ditched in the sea. Prospects for rescue seemed bleak. Imagine then the airmen’s relief when an American submarine surfaced and hauled them aboard. On lifeguard duty in the Pacific, U.S. boats rescued 504 airmen. One of them was a young naval aviator by the name of George H. W. Bush.
Having captured Iwo Jima and taken control of the Philippines, American strategists set their sights on Okinawa, an island just three hundred miles from Japan. For the United States, Okinawa would be the last stop on the road to Tokyo. Once Okinawa was secured, the next attack would target Kyushu, the most southern of Japan’s five major islands. Aware of what the loss of Okinawa portended, Japanese military leaders intended to make the Americans pay an extremely high price for the island.
On April 1, 1945, U.S. forces landed on Okinawa. Commanded by Lieutenant General Buckner (who no doubt was glad to be far from the bitter cold of Alaska and the Aleutians), the force eventually numbered some 169,000 men. Designated the U.S. Tenth Army, Buckner’s command included two U.S. Marine divisions in addition to four divisions of the army. It was a large force (the landings at Normandy involved five divisions), one that faced approximately seventy-six thousand Japanese troops. These troops were aided by an additional twenty-four thousand men in support roles, many of whom were native Okinawans.
The Japanese were well prepared. Most of them were deployed in well-protected caves and tunnels on the southern part of the island. The fight to remove them was both difficult and fierce, but making good use of tanks and flamethrowers, the U.S. troops took control of the island, killing most of the Japanese. The battle for Okinawa, the last campaign of the Pacific War, lasted eleven weeks. While the outcome never was in doubt, the cost to the Americans was high, just as the Japanese had wanted. On Okinawa, U.S. dead numbered 6,319. Americans who were wounded totaled 32,943. Among those killed was General Buckner, who was struck down by enemy artillery fire. He thus joined Lieutenant General McNair as the highest ranking American officer killed in action during the Second World War.
As American forces got closer and closer to Japan, U.S. commanders noticed that the Japanese defenders fought with increased determination. Indeed, as the battles for Iwo Jima and Okinawa indicated, the Japanese were fanatical in their efforts to halt the American advance. Nowhere was this more evident than with the kamikaze. These were suicide strikes in which Japanese pilots deliberately crashed their bomb-laden aircraft into enemy ships.
The kamikazes brought a new form of terror to the war on the Pacific. Eventually, they killed more than three thousand Americans. Their appearance off Okinawa and the Philippines, moreover, was not the result merely of a few crazed aviators. Kamikaze attacks were the result of deliberate decisions made by Japan’s senior commanders. Nor were the kamikazes few in number. Nearly four thousand Japanese pilots met their death in such attacks. Many more were waiting to take off when the war ended.
Helping to reduce the number of aircraft available to the Japanese was the newly arrived British Pacific Fleet. Once the war in Europe was over, the British were anxious to have the Royal Navy take part in operations against the Japanese. They wished to repossess Singapore and Hong Kong and, in general, to restore British influence in the region. Moreover, they wanted to avenge the loss of HMS Prince of Wales and the Repulse. Admiral King had no desire to see the British share in America’s victory, but he was overruled. By April 1945, British warships had sailed from Ceylon, attacked oil refineries in Sumatra and Java, and after refitting in Australia, had arrived off Okinawa. The fleet consisted of four large aircraft carriers, two new battleships, and a number of cruisers and destroyers. It was a formidable force, the most powerful Britain had ever put to sea. Yet it was but a fraction of the immense array of warships assembled by the United States. The task of the British ships was to intercept Japanese aircraft being ferried from Formosa to Okinawa. Employing mostly American-built aircraft, the British Pacific Fleet destroyed in total ninety-six of the enemy’s planes. While not a particularly large number, it represented a useful contribution to America’s victory at Okinawa.
The most spectacular kamikaze attack of the Pacific War involved not Japanese aircraft but a battleship, a very large battleship. The ship was the Yamato. She displaced 69,500 tons and carried 9 eighteen-inch guns (the most powerful American battleships—the Iowa class—weighed in at 45,000 tons and was armed with sixteen-inch guns). Yamato’s final sortie took place on April 6, 1945. With fuel sufficient for but a one-way trip to Okinawa, the massive vessel hoped to smash American warships in one last glorious engagement. The mission was suicidal. It also was a complete failure. American carrier-based aircraft put ten torpedoes into her well before she reached her destination. When she slipped beneath the waves, so did three thousand Japanese sailors. In sinking the Yamato the U.S. Navy lost twelve airmen. No doubt the Americans thought it a fair exchange.
Well before U.S. forces appeared off Okinawa, American strategists were planning the invasion of Japan. The plan consisted of two parts. The first was to have the U.S. Sixth Army, some six hundred thousand men commanded by General Walter Krueger, land on the southeastern coast of Kyushu. This was to be called Operation Olympic and take place on November 1, 1945. The second part, Operation Coronet, was scheduled for March 1, 1946. In this attack, two additional armies were to land on Honshu, near the port city of Yokohama. In overall command of all the armies would be Douglas MacArthur, a command he relished.
Of course, neither Olympic nor Coronet ever took place.
On August 6, 1945, a B-29 nicknamed Enola Gay left the Marianas bound for Japan. In the plane’s bomb bay was an atomic bomb. That morning, Hiroshima became the recipient of the first nuclear bomb dropped in anger (the first atomic explosion had taken place earlier on July 16, on American soil, in the desert of New Mexico). When the destruction of Hiroshima failed to secure the surrender of Japan, a second bomb was dropped on Nagasaki. Even then, Japan’s military commanders wanted to continue the war. They hoped to so bloody the Americans on the beaches of Japan that the United States would seek a negotiated end to the war, an end more favorable to Japan than the one likely to result from surrendering unconditionally. Fortunately for all concerned—Japanese as well as Americans—Emperor Hirohito took the unprecedented step of personally intervening in his government’s decision-making. On August 9 Hirohito said it was time to end
the war and spare the people of Japan further harm. Reluctantly, Japan’s generals and admirals bowed to his wishes.
And so the Second World War came to an end. On September 2, 1945, representatives of the Japanese government and of the Japanese military signed the document of surrender. General MacArthur signed on behalf of the Allied Powers. Signing for the United States was Admiral Nimitz. The ceremony took place aboard the USS Missouri, one of the four Iowa class battleships. That day, she was anchored in Tokyo Bay, along with more than 250 other Allied warships. Today, decommissioned, she sits at rest in Pearl Harbor. Close by lies the wreckage of the Arizona, a battleship destroyed on December 7, 1941. For Americans, these two vessels mark the beginning and the end of the great war that took place in the Pacific years and years ago.
Why did Japan declare war on the United States by attacking the American fleet at Pearl Harbor?
In the 1930s, Japan hoped to expand its influence well beyond the Home Islands. Governed by zealots and convinced of its citizens’ racial superiority, Japan, by 1941, had subjugated Korea, seized Manchuria, invaded China, and taken control of what is now Vietnam. Japan also wanted its empire to include the petroleum-rich Dutch East Indies. The Americans opposed Japan’s imperial ambitions. In response to the Japanese actions, the United States froze Japanese assets in the United States. It also forbade the sale of oil to Japan, a step the Japanese considered tantamount to a declaration of war. Further, as both a precautionary measure and as a signal to Tokyo, President Roosevelt transferred the home base of the U.S. Navy’s Pacific Fleet from the west coast of America to Hawaii.
The two nations were on a collision course. To prevent a clash of arms, Japan would have had to reverse its policy and recall the troops, especially those fighting in China. But Japan could not do so without losing face, a step inconceivable to the military commanders running the government. If the United States would not peacefully step aside, so the commanders reasoned, it would have to be made to do so. Hence, with little dissent, Japan’s leaders chose to go to war.
America at War: Concise Histories of U.S. Military Conflicts From Lexingtonto Afghanistan Page 25