Ahoy - Mac's Web Log

Introduction.
Okinawa is the most important island in the Ryukyu Group, only 360 miles from Kyushu. If Iwo Jima may have seemed tough for the US Navy, when compared to the invasion of Okinawa it was a Sunday School picnic. Here, Japanese Kamikaze Aircraft held command, they killed almost 5,000 Navy personnel, the greatest number to die in a single Pacific Battle. 34 Allied ships sunk, another 368 damaged, in the main, at the hands of the deadly Kamikaze. It was the last, and bloodiest battle of the whole war in the Pacific.

The task force off Okinawa under Kamikaze attack

The enormous scale of the logistics at Okinawa.
When one considers the scale of the logistics at Okinawa it was simply just more of anything that had obtained in any other Pacific engagement, eg. in troops used and landed, supplies provided, naval bombardment, bombs dropped, ships used, ( 1,300 ) Japanese aircraft destroyed ( 7,800 ), 16 ships sunk, and more people killed than were killed by the dropping of the two US Atomic bombs.

The US Fleet lost 763 aircraft, the Navy had just on 5,000 sailors killed, the Army close to 8,000 dead.

US ship badly damaged by a Kamikaze attack, off Okinawa

The Japanese and Okinawan conscripts, something of the order of 107,000 dead, plus 100,000 civilian civilians slain, the mind boggles at the scale of death and destruction, all in the space of only 62 days started from the 1st. of April 1945.

Admiral Raymond A. Spruance. USN.
in overall command of the Fleet at Okinawa

April Fool's Day 1945.
It was certainly no joke when 60,000 from 4 Divisions, two Marine and two US Army were given the "GO SIGNAL" to land on the morning of the 1st. of April 1945, and they stormed ashore. The Japanese General Ushijima had 100,000 troops from the 32nd. Japanese Army dug into caves and tunnels mainly on the high ground where the Naval bombardment was largely ineffective.

Yet another Hill to conquer on Okinawa

The battle to clean out the dug in Japanese forces started on the 6th. of April, and it took until the 21st. of June for US troops to win that fight.

The rugged terrain in the south of Okinawa

The Kamikaze Campaign.
Over the 6th./7th. of June, the first massed attacks from formation of hundreds of Japanese Kamikazi aircraft started, named KIKUSAI, or FLOATING CHRYSANTHEMUM, after the Imperial symbol of Japan. The US Navy off Okinawa was in dire peril.

The use of suicide aircraft to attack the bombarding and escort Naval ships during a seaward invasion had its inception at Letye in October of 1944, with the Australian heavy cruiser HMAS Australia their first victim. At the Lingayen Gulf landings the following January, the Fleet was to suffer many of these vicious attacks over several weeks, I was to witness many of these episodes in HMAS Shropshire, indeed a very frightening experience, very sapping of morale, it became a matter of shooting down the diving Kamikaze or collect it on board, and we despatched some 15 Japanese aircraft to fortunately remain immune from having any aircraft as unwelcome guests inboard.

I can still recall the sheer terror of seeing a Japanese aircraft diving out of the sun at the bridge of Shropshire when I was her Officer of the Watch, and thinking my time had come.

By the time this campaign had run its course, 1,485 Kamikaze flights out of Kyushu had attacked the US Fleet, sinking 30 ships and damaging 164 others.

Pacific Map showing Okinawa relative to Japanese mainland

Japanese Battleship Yamato sent to Okinawa.
The huge 72,000 ton Japanese battleship Yamato on the 6th. of April was despatched to Okinawa on a one way ticket, not having enough fuel to return home, she was escorted by the light cruiser Yahagi, plus eight destroyers. Her orders, beach yourself at Okinawa, and fight to the finish. Hackleback, the US Submarine tracked her movements, and alerted carrier borne bombers.

The mighty 72,000 ton Japanese Battleship Yamato
blows up on the 7th. of April 1945

Vice Admiral Marc Mitcher in his carrier Task Force at 1000 ( 10AM ) on the 7th. of June launched air strikes, and planes from USS Bennington claimed the first hits upon Yamato. Aircraft from USS San Jacinto with both bombs and torpedoes accounted for the Japanese destroyer Hamakaze, the light cruiser Yahagi, stopped dead in the water by bombs.

Over the next two hours, the Japanese naval force was under constant attack, Yamato taking 12 bombs and seven torpedoes, and this was all too much, she blew up and sank.

Three destroyers were too badly damaged to save and were all scuttled, the remaining four could not return to Japan. From the crew of 2,747 in Yamato, only 23 officers and 246 sailors survived, The cruiser Yahagi had 446 killed, Asashimo lost 330, and the remaining destroyers another 391 men.

It was a total decimation of these Japanese naval ships, the US losses light by contrast, 12 men and 10 aircraft. Japan was not to fight at sea again in WW2.

US Major General Lemeul C. Shepherd
studies a map of the area on Okinawa

The Big E collects a Kamikaze.
On the 13th. of May off Okimawa, the Big E, the carrier USS Enterprise just after 0700 ( 7 AM ) was hit by a diving Japanese bomber on her flight deck just aft of the forward elevator, the impact sent this 15 ton elevator skywards some 400 feet, 12 men were killed and 72 wounded. The carrier was withdrawn from service on the 16th. never to fight again.

Two major events during the Okinawa struggle.
On the 12th. of April the US President, Franklin Delano Roosevelt died, and on the 8th. of May the war in Europe came to a conclusion.

Conclusion.
Okinawa was the scene of death on a huge scale, in another 2 months the war was over, in hindsight was the campaign really necessary? The immense loss of life on both sides seems hardly justified.

A Marine knee deep in water prepares for a shave on Okinawa