Battle of Peleliu 1944 / Part 4 - Bloody Nose Ridge 

I think those people for each day they spent fighting in the front should be given three months of life so they can enjoy a longer life.

21:04, he gives the finger.

Thank you!

@@FromtheBattlefields You're more than welcome. Thanks again

While I was making this video, I came across information that the 1st Battalion, 1st Marines had left the island with only 47 uninjured men. I didn't include that in the video, as I couldn't confirm that information in any other source. If that is true, then Gunny was right.

Unfortunately … it didn’t help my fathers brother out. He was KIA on the first day… RIP

and thats a fact use it up!!!

Sledge who fought on Guadalcanal?

"The Old Breed" is about the best WWII book that I have ever read. I highly recommend it to all.

Thank you!

24:31 Also, that's not true actually. The first battle where Japanese attrition tactics were encountered was during the invasion of Biak four months prior to Peleliu. Granted the fatality rate wasn't as bad as it was on Peleliu, but the defenses were just as sophisticated and the terrain just as nightmarish for the attackers.

Thanks for the info.

Rupertus was an ass for not taking his fellow General's request.

I think it was two things, first Marines don't like working with the army they feel they're the best and didn't need the army bailing them out. And the second thing, Rupertus hated that Geiger passed over him and became the Corp Commander.....

I got that same impression, when other officers came to help him and they had success with using siege tactics. He was still trying to send our guys on assaults right into the teeth of the Japanese defenses.

Thanks!

Yes, the UK production series has an unfortunate habit of ignoring conventional pronuciations from documentaries made decades earlier in favor of using ridiculously awkward 'sounding outs' of names of both islands and personnel that make me grind my teeth with irritation...or as they might say, "eyerightation."

UK production. Thanks! BTW, I'm from Croatia and the narrator is a robot 😀👾

So was my dad!

Thanks!!!

Excellent analysis and you are absolutely right. They underestimated the enemy/military objectives time after time, never learning a thing. Telling the Marines it would take a few days to take Peleliu couldn't have been more crazy. Battle went on for what, over 2 months?

@@OnYouGlenn You are so right! And Guadalcanal-6 months! Crazy. They didn’t even know the climate and the navy and Marines which are the same branch were too protective-especially the Navy! ‘Uh oh, we’re getting shot at! Sorry we’re outta here!’ I could see that but they never came back with the other half of the supplies! Good thing the Japanese underestimated us too or we might still be fighting today! 😆😆😆

Thank you very much! I completely agree with you; a different breed of men back then.

Don't let your blood boil too hard...hindsight and all that. Imagine 1940's intel. Although, it does seem that there was some ego involved not letting the Army take over earlier (coming from a Marine/Army Reservist)

Thank you very much!!!

Thank you very much!

+@@FromtheBattlefields No, please, thank YOU!

Peleliu was Nimitz's baby, not MacArthur's.

@@redaug4212 Uh.... huh?! Mac demanded the invasion. The fact everyone else did the fighting and suffering compounds his crime. Don't pass the buck onto those who had to pull off his crazy ideas.

@@finallyfriday. No... Mac did not demand an invasion of Peleliu or the Palau Island group. That is a misconception. Operation Stalemate II was wholly a Navy plan and greenlit by Navy leaders. MacArthur could have cared less about a coral rock several hundred miles away from his area of operations. His only focus was putting boots on the Philippines. The fact that the invasion of Peleliu corresponded with the Navy's capture of Ulithi should give you an idea regarding the actual purpose of the operation.

@@redaug4212 You're the only place I ever heard that. Read from many sources that MacA wanted to "protect his flank" when invading Philippines. As if those soldiers could get over there from Peleliu.

@@finallyfriday. It's referenced by numerous histories that Nimitz was the one who greenlit the invasion despite suggestions from Halsey to bypass the island in favor of diverting the Marines to Leyte in support of MacArthur's invasion there. MacArthur himself had zero authority on whether or not Peleliu was invaded, and would have certainly accepted the offer to incorporate the III Amphibious Corps into his own army. The fact that you know how absurd the "protecting the flank" narrative is should tell you that there is a missing part of the story; and that missing part is Ulithi.

Thanks again!

Thanks!

1:20 Thanks!

@@FromtheBattlefields Makes me happy you used them. Is the one at the end mine also? I wish I knew you were going to include Ngesebus, I have some pictures from there also. Good job.

Ah no. That was actually WW1.

@@coloradomountainman8659 Both are correct. There is a painting with that name of a soldier from the Peleliu battle.

Thanks!!! 😁

@@FromtheBattlefields You're welcome and looking forward to your next one!!!!

Thanks!

Thank you!

Thank you!!!

Welcome!

Thanks!

5 battlewagons, 4 heavy cruisers, 4 light cruisers, and planes from multiple aircraft carriers bombed and shelled the Bejezuz out of the island for three days before the landings with almost no effect on Japanese fortifications. The exact same result occurred prior to the landings on Iwo Jima. If the enemy is underground, you can turn everything above ground to smoldering slag, leaving him unscathed and ready to fight you when you come ashore.

"American forces failed to anticipate that the Japanese would prepare a complex and deep defense, much like on Peleliu in the fall of 1944 (...)" "(...)Maj. Gen. Harry Schmidt, commander of the Marine landing force, requested a 10-day heavy shelling of the island immediately preceding the mid-February amphibious assault. However, Rear Adm. William H. P. Blandy, commander of the Amphibious Support Force (Task Force 52), did not believe such a bombardment would allow him time to replenish his ships' ammunition before the landings; he thus refused Schmidt's request. Schmidt then asked for nine days of shelling; Blandy again refused and agreed to a three-day bombardment. This decision left much hard feeling among the Marines. After the war, Lieut. Gen. Holland M. "Howlin' Mad" Smith, commander Expeditionary Troops (Task Force 56, which consisted of Schmidt's Fifth Amphibious Corps), bitterly complained that the lack of naval gunfire had cost Marine lives during the entire Allied island campaign.(...)" - Wright, Derrick (2004) [2001]. Iwo Jima 1945: The Marines Raise the Flag On Mount Suribachi. Oxford: Osprey Publishing

They did use battleships Heavy Crusiers and bombers, about all they killed was vegetation.

For no purpose. MacArthur said he wanted to protect his flank to the Philippines. As if the troops on Peleliu would swim hundreds of miles to attack Lyete.

The Navy considered it necessary in order to protect their new anchorage at Ulithi.

Admiral Halsey wanted to bypass the Island but it didn't happen, Admiral Nimitz and General MacArthur and President Roosevelt decided it had to be taken before the invasions of the Philippines.

Yes, that was what Admiral Halsey suggested but was rejected by Nimitz, MacArthur and President Roosevelt. So it probably wasn't considered a viable option. My Father was there with the 1st Marine Division, A battery 5th Marines 1st Marine Division Fire Direction Control Man.

@@kennethcaine3402 Thank you Mr Caine. It hit home to me seeing the cemetary in Manila. Thousands upon thousands on neat white headstones to the fallen and one little wooden box on which to offer prayers. One felt insignificant and staggered by the huge losses. God bless our seniors.

Not really fair to compare a battle such as Iwo Jima to Normandy or the Battle of the Bulge. Having been an infantryman in both the Marines and the Army, there's not much difference in the training or capabilities of the individual fighting man or small unit besides maybe some numbers and organization. But on a large scale, they are very different, with very different jobs, as one can see by studying their actions in WWII. The Army excels at large scale maneuver warfare. The USMC isn't and never was intended for that. It's an extension of the Navy, which does the maneuvering. Once the Marines are ashore, it's hey-diddle-diddle, straight up the middle. If the island is a hard target, once it's selected for taking, that's it. No room to maneuver. The Army fought a different type of warfare in Europe and North Africa. On large islands such as New Guinea and in the Phillipines, the Army was able to maneuver around hard targets to "hit 'em where they ain't". On smaller atols and islands that the Army fought on, their results were pretty much on par with what was experienced by the USMC. The only notable exception would be the Gilbert Islands. At the same time the 2d Marine Div. hit Tarawa, the 27th Infantry Div. hit Makin. Tarawa was far more heavily defended than Makin. Tarawa was taken in 76 hours. The 27th Infantry tried to use tactics more typical of Army fighting against 400 Japanese defenders, and finally took the island in four days, killing just about all the Japanese defenders at a cost of 66 Army soldiers. But on the last day of battle, the Navy, tied down supporting the invasion of Makin and unable to maneuver, lost an aircraft carrier, making the battle of Makin the only battle in the offensive against Japan in which more Americans died than Japanese. On the islands where Marines and Army fought side by side (think Guam, Saipan, and Okinawa), the Army did no better or worse than the Marines. I don't think it's worth criticizing the 27th Division at Saipan; they had to take Purple Heart Ridge in the center of the island, sort of like the Bloody Nose Ridge of Peleliu, while the Marine Divisions fought close to the coasts. I don't believe three Army divisions would have had any easier time taking Iwo Jima than the three Marine divisions there had. It still would have been a slaughterhouse. I don't think they'd have done any worse either.

@@jwaller1327 yeah,fair enough.

@@jwaller1327 Great reply. Two different types of forces fighting two different types of wars. Of course there is the age old argument of who is better, volunteers or draftees. Just esprit de corps alone made them elite. I think it was generally recognized that the Airborne divisions, volunteers, were probably the best outfits in the U.S. Army. The Marines, for most of the war, were all volunteers. As I said above, the Pacific war was much different than the European war. The differences in environments alone were extreme. The Pacific environment was almost as vicious as the enemy. How many European theater Army troops had to battle malaria, dysentery and the general stink of unburied dead bodies going foul in hours, in 100 degree heat, like Peleliu and 100 degree humidity on some islands for example. These are a little exaggerated but not by much. Also, the enemy the Marines fought was different. The Japanese were as much a death cult as a fighting force. That was a good point about the 27th division on Saipan. What a terrible spot Gen. Holland put them in. Freaking stupid. Would the Marines have just stopped like the Army did or would they have carried on? Who knows, but if they did, they would probably have disappeared like the 1st Marine division did on Peleliu. On a personal note, being pro Marine as I am, if I was Gen. Ralph Smith of the 27th and Gen. Holland Smith had attacked me personally and called me and my men cowards and relieved me of command, by a Marine no less, I would have at least punched him out, if not pull my .45 on him. Heck, his career was shot at that point anyway.

But regardless, you watched almost all of my videos and I thank you for that.

The narrator is an AI-generated voice - robot. If he starts to learn, I think we're in big trouble.