Had the honor and privilege of making the Trip to Iwo with the Stephen Ambrose Pacific Battlefields Tour in 2018. The visit, for the annual Reunion of Honor, held one day only every year, was hosted by the Japanese Government and the US Marine Corps. It was a life-changing experience to walk across Iwo from the sole Airfield to the summit of Mount Suribachi, then traverse back to the airfield across the Black Sand Invasion Beaches captured in this film. It was a truly humbling experience to walk this hallowed battlefield landscape. And this film series triggered some great memories of the Trip to Iwo. An interesting statistic: More people have submitted Mount Everest than have summited Mount Suribachi over the past 75 years. That is how remote Iwo is and how limited and restricted the opportunities are to visit this most historic WWII Battlefield represents. If you want an unforgettable Bucket List item, add a trip to Iwo Jima to your List. And find a way to make it happen. Worth every bit of the effort. A day in your life you will never forget.
i'd like to say this was the marines in their finest hour, but you look at tarawa, peleliu, and okinawa...everytime the marines were in combat was their finest hour.
My grandfather was in the 3rd Marine Division. They landed on Iwo on day 4 or day 5 (records conflict) Anyways, he took a very surreal photo of his unit unloading their landing craft. At that point the beach wasn't being targeted heavily but it's odd because in the photo there are guys just standing around very casually. He survived the war but that photo landing on Iwo was the last he took. He didn't talk about WWII much and he passed away in the late 70's. We assume he lost his camera or his camera broke on Iwo. It's also possible his CO didn't want him taking photos & took the camera. We just don't know but whatever the story behind it, it's an odd photo of people standing around casually on day 4 or 5. I just wouldn't expect that but I guess there were times when the fighting wasn't so intense and there were areas of relative safety.
They had dug in deep and prepared to make the Marines bleed for every inch of that island, fighting till the last bullet and the last man. Surrender was prohibited and considered a great dishonor to their god emperor. It was a mistake to conduct a head on, classic full invasion of that island. Clearly bad intelligence and bad planning from the Admiralty.
Never really thought about all the sulfur that had to be there because of the volcano... damn, that'd suck. I tip my cap to all of the men and women who have, and still do, serve this country so we all can call ourselves "free." My heartfelt thanks.
4 года назад
at 5:44 is that artilleryman wearing a tricorn hat? like American revolution era headgear, sure looks like it.
I remember when the US gave Iwo and Chi chi Jima back to Japan for the cost to take them. It is better that Japan had control of those islands than we tried to keep them.
I have never seen the other side of the island. It must not have been a desirable place to land. And would it have been possible to come ashore farther away from My.Suribachi ?
@@vivians9392 Yeah, you must be right about that. If I was the commanding general TODAY facing an island with 20,000 of the enemy waiting for a fight, I wouldn't send a single Marine ashore, but I'd saturate that island from end to end with enough napalm to keep it burning non-stop for a whole month. Maybe then I'd send an outfit to reconnoiter what's left. With what we know today, we would not be sending beautiful American Marines to their deaths by the thousands in order to capture a worthless 8 mile island. This same mistake took place in the European theater of operations during WW2 at the Hurtgen Forest, where thousands upon thousands of wonderful GIs were slaughtered unnecessarily. We could've flanked the Germans with fire bombs ( which were already in use ) , up one side of the woods and down the other, and cut them off from retreat by saturating the entire area behind them, as well, and the only way they could've escaped the fire, would have been to flee directly into our guns. Fifty square miles of forest would grow back again, but you can't grow back your troops, once they are gone. Some WW2 veterans resent guys like me who think they know what should've been done, when they weren't even there. Nevertheless, I do believe, that I would've done exactly what I said. It was entirely possible at the time and I don't understand why it wasn't done.
Read strong men armed War in the pacific Then you know What they felt and saw Everyday day in day out Hoe did they ajust to normal life Respect for all
The sword guys of Japan have been doing this for 1000 of years! They were prepare for the new American soldiers! They knew just what America was going to do! Just saying.
Today people are more concerned with A Slap at a awards show. It’s really pathetic of society and the people’s lack of knowledge or respect. Those Americans who trample the flag are the most ignorant in society.
@@stephencarpenteri2223 No. 1 pirate manning the gun! Quite a sense of humor in such a tense situation, but then I remember they were mostly young guys!
Bombarded it for how long..? By supposedly superior fire power haha..yet the little yella fella give the yanks a shock thinking they could have a picnic on the beach lmao..good job England and Russia won the war thats all i can say
