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Battle of Okinawa: The Bloodiest Battle of the Pacific WarWorld War II | Single Page | 7 comments | Print This Post | Email This Post
Typical was the 96th's attack against Kakazu Ridge, a 280-foot elevation that housed 1,200 defenders and controlled movement along Ushijima's western flank. On April 9, Colonel Edwin T. May's 383rd Regiment assaulted the ridge. Hoping to catch the Japanese by surprise, May launched the attack without artillery preparation and sent his men without tank support because of a deep gorge that guarded the approaches to Kakazu. GIs scurried to the ridge's crest in the pre-dawn charge against little opposition, but at daylight a tremendous artillery and mortar barrage smacked into May's units. Japanese troops attacked headlong through their own fire to drive the Americans off the 25-yard-wide crest. Private First Class Edward J. Moskala of Company C miraculously silenced two machine guns by rushing straight at them from 40 yards. As the Japanese closed in, he and a small group served as a rear guard while others pulled back down the slope. Firing his weapon nonstop, Moskala ran forward to drag a wounded comrade to safety. While attempting to retrieve a second soldier, Moskala was hit by Japanese fire and killed. For his stirring actions, in which he killed 25 Japanese while protecting other Americans troops, Moskala was posthumously awarded the Medal of Honor. In spite of heroic actions like Moskala's, May's units had to withdraw from Kakazu's crest late that afternoon after absorbing horrendous casualties. Only 3 of 89 men in Company L avoided death or injury; the regiment lost 23 killed, 47 missing, and 256 wounded in that single day. The Americans had learned a costly lesson–it was suicidal to launch an attack on frontal slopes when mortars placed on reverse slopes could create such destruction. The only way to get at those damaging mortars, however, was to neutralize the frontal positions. Army units could do little else but attack frontal slopes and hope for the best. The next day, American artillery combined with naval guns to inundate Kakazu Ridge before the next American attack jumped off. Two regiments of the 96th charged up the ridge with high expectations of holding the crest, but Japanese emerged unhurt from reverse slope positions and laid down a withering blanket of fire that stopped the advance. All along the Machinato Line, Ushijima's men repelled practically every attempt by the 96th Division in the west and the 7th Division in the east to seize a ridge or hill in that bloody second week of April. On April 14 General Buckner came ashore and told his commanding officers in no uncertain terms that he expected the American line to advance immediately. To speed up the offensive, he brought in the 27th Infantry Division to handle the Machinato Line's western segment, shifted the 96th toward the middle, and retained the 7th along the east coast. After the most concentrated artillery bombardment of the Pacific War ended–19,000 shells fell on Japanese positions–the three divisions moved out on April 19 but failed to gain much terrain by nightfall. Defenders on Kakazu Ridge mauled the 27th Division and knocked out 22 of its 30 tanks, while other Japanese soldiers halted similar drives by the 96th at the UrasoeMura escarpment and the 7th in hellish 'Rocky Craggs.' The first ray of hope for the Americans emerged the next day, when elements of the 27th crossed the Machinato Inlet and dashed five miles south, in effect flanking the Machinato Line. The Army's slow progress worried Navy leaders. Admiral Chester Nimitz, commander in chief of the Pacific Fleet, flew to Okinawa to share his branch's concerns with General Buckner about keeping combatant and supply vessels off Okinawa to aid the stalled land drive. Each day on station subjected the ships and crews to kamikaze attacks. Nimitz suggested that an amphibious assault behind enemy lines might break the logjam, but Buckner believed his method of attacking straight at the objective was more practical. Nimitz reluctantly agreed, but reminded his subordinate: 'I'm losing a ship and a half a day. So if this line isn't moving within five days, we'll get someone here to move it so we can all get out from under these stupid air attacks.' Constant pressure against Japanese positions finally split open the Machinato Line in late April. Elements of the 7th Division seized Kochi Ridge and other key positions. The 27th snared Item pocket, and the 96th cleared the Maeda escarpment. In one attack against the Maeda escarpment, Pfc Desmond Doss earned the Medal of Honor without firing a weapon. A conscientious objector whose beliefs precluded the use of arms, Doss focused on patching up the wounded and comforting the dying. In the midst of heavy fire, Doss crawled from wounded to wounded, dressing their injuries and dragging them to the cliff's edge, where they could be lowered to medics below. Hit by grenade fragments during one night attack, Doss refused to endanger another medic and dressed his own wounds. He continued to help those in need, even when a Japanese tank approached. When another enemy bullet shattered his arm, Doss patched it up and crawled 300 yards through enemy fire and explosions rather than expose anyone else to further danger. Subscribe Today
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7 Comments to “Battle of Okinawa: The Bloodiest Battle of the Pacific War”
i am a sailor currently stationed on okinawa and as i read this i am reminded of my history class in high school, several television specials on okinawa, and many "battlesites" tours i have taken. i take into account the typical weather around here (hot and muggy) and rationalize in my head that i cannot fathom how it must have been to be here 60(ish) years ago.
this was a very well written piece and yet it still barely scratches the surface of what the battle for okinawa truely was. keep in mind there was much more to it than that of the american soldier. there was the japanese side. and the okinawan civilian side…so many storys.
this is the kind of thing every serviceman fears.
By Billy on Jun 27, 2008 at 3:58 pm
THE WORST THING WE HAD TO BATTLE WAS THE RAIN. IF IT WASN'T FOR THAT, IT WOULD HAVE BEEN A PIECE OF CAKE. I WAS A MEDIC AND THE WOUNDED WOULD PILE UP BOGGED DOWN WITH THE MUD.
SUPPLIES HAD TO BE HAND CARRIED TO THE FRONT, WHEREVER THAT WAS. THE ELEMENTS SUPERCEDED THE JAPANESE AS THE PRIMARY ENEMY AND LENGTHENED THE OPERATION. THIS NOT BEING ENOUGH, WE HAD TO STRUGGLE WITH A TYPHOON THAT RAISED HELL WITH THE NAVAL TASK FORCE IN BUCKNER BAY.
By PETER VARDILOS on Aug 19, 2008 at 7:23 pm
Because of western ethnocentrism, I think the second sino Japanese war had been forgotten.
Because the Russian-German conflict was officially classified as the Eastern Front of world war two, the second Sino-Japanese war would inevitably be relegated to the Pacific war. Now here's where things get interesting.
Okinawa wasn't the bloodiest battle of the Pacific War, not by far, even if you forget everything but the American-Japanese battles. The Phillipines recapture by the US was far bloodier, some four hundred thousand would be casualties. In te actual Pacific front in it's complete theater, China would account for some 16 million deaths, of which perhaps two and a half million are counted as military deaths, not even casualties. There are several that are much bloodier than Okinawa. Nanjing, Wuhan, Shanghai, etc etc. I know you guys may not care for this, but I do, so I'd feel better if you'd at least acknowledge the possibility of this. Thanks
By Zhanran Wen on Jan 20, 2009 at 3:58 pm
Regarding Mr Wen's comments.
As far as I know, China was not part of the Pacific Theater for the American Military but was the China India Burma Theater, totally different.
I believe that this "bloodiest battle" also also refers to combatants fighting each other, not civilian casualities ie Manila or Nanjing.
China sufferered horrendeous civilian casualited at the hands of theJapanese, up to 20 million, but nearly as many died as did Chinese under Mao.
By Lee Kai Wen on Mar 10, 2009 at 2:52 am
Please help me learn how my cousin Louis a US Navy Man in WWII was killed at Okinawa or did he die after illness there and was buried at sea. I must know to complete a paper I am writting for a college class, I dont know what happened.Call 765-716-4319 and I will answer.
By Judy DeLaurelle on Nov 29, 2009 at 9:55 pm
I was stationed on Okinawa from 2 Feb 1963 to 11 Jan 1965, with the Army. Another man in my Unit shared my interest in the history of the battle, and together, we spent over a year of our free time examining the contested areas.
The battle-areas were just as they had been left when the fighting ended. The civilian population on Okinawa had still not rebounded to the pre-battle level, so there was little encroachment. The vegetation had regrown, however, and combined with the terrain, made access to (and navigating through) most of the areas, fairly difficult and slow. But we had military maps of the entire area which had been put together by Army Intelligence after the battle, and these were highly detailed topo maps which also showed every road, trail, and streambed, every Japanese position of any kind, and the type of weapons that were situated there. We were therefore able to navigate to anywhere on the maps and to the scenes of the heaviest fighting. We were even able to locate the exact position in which Sgt Buford Anderson had won the Medal of Honor. On one occasion, while working, we were in a jeep on highway 5 in the flat area south of Nishibaru Ridge. I happened to have the maps with me, and saw there had been a Japanese 47mm antitank gun position about 50 yards from the road. Looking at the terrain and the topo map, I triangulated and told the driver where to pull over. We walked out into the tall grass, and sure enough, there was the position. The gun was gone, but the stacks of 47mm AP rounds were still in the gun pit, along with other Japanese equipment.
On another occasion, we found a Japanese 150mm field gun by accident. We were navigating on foot along a hillside, when we looked over at an adjacent hill and saw some 'unnatural' growth patterns of vegetation (you kind of develop a sense for that). We went down, and up the other hill. There was a short shelf of rock, and under the vegetation, some railway tracks that led about 20 feet to a tunnel. Sitting on the tracks at the rear of the tunnel, was the gun. A lot of direct fire had been poured into the tunnel, much of it.50 caliber, apparently from the slope we had just come from. The gun was in tatters, the muzzle was full of deep gouges and the length of the barrel was covered with bullet 'sideswipes'. the traverse and elevating controls had been sheared away, and the rack&pinion gears were shattered. When I opened the breech. the inside of the breech face itself was seen to have been impacted by numerous bullets. The rear wall of the tunnel behind the gun was thoroughly cratered out, with pockmarks in the pockmarks.
There was unexploded ordnance everywhere, both Japanese and American – grenades, mortar and artillery rounds, demolition charges (usually Japanese), etc. As fuse malfunctions are relatively uncommon, that attests to the huge volume of fire delivered by both sides during the battle. There were areas which had been shelled extremely heavily, to the point that shrapnel was so thick on the ground that the ground itself could not be seen. On the forward upper part of Love Hill, situated near Conical Hill, spent .30 caliber bullets constituted about 50% of the topsoil. This particular hill must have been saturated with machine gun fire day and night. On a ridge's razorback which extended down from Conical Hill, we found a stack of six or seven BAR magazines next to a large rock, apparently just as a BAR man had left them. That guy knew his weapon: every magazine still contained between one and three rounds.
The discovery of skeletal human remains was also very frequent, both in the open and in caves, tunnels, and pillboxes. From helmets, shoes, or the type of ammunition or equipment carried, all were Japanese. We considered these areas to be, effectively, gravesites, and we did not disturb them.
Often, positions which had been blasted shut during the battle had gradually opened up again by the settling of the collapsed material, which formed a crescent-shaped gap at the top, and we were able to access the interiors. Many of these were very sophisticated positions. We got into the Maeda Escarpment through our discovery of what appeared to be a vent shaft at the base of the backside, not far from a natural spire of rock structure at the East end. This shaft went down at about a 45-degree angle, and when I slid down it, I dropped out of the other end about four feet to the floor of a tunnel. This tunnel led to a main tunnel which had branch tunnels that exited at the face of the escarpment, and ramped tunnels which led to levels of gun positions both above and below it. Some tunnels were blocked by collapses. The top of the escarpment was a sheet of fissured lava rock, still covered with spent shrapnel. There was the anomaly of an 81mm mortar round still wedged into one of the cracks, tail sticking out, which had missed impacting on its fuse. One of the more interesting positions was a small tunnel that led in from the reverse slope of West Kakazu Ridge, which went up and to the right, getting smaller as it progressed. I was finally forced to do a low crawl, but I could see natural light coming from the right, and finally arrived at the light-source, a hole in the side of the ridge that was no more that about eight inches across. From this hole, most of the draw between Kakazu West and Kakazu Ridge proper, could be observed – and taken under fire. There were many other positions there, but this one would have been virtually undetectable. I unfolded my handkerchief and put it outside of the hole, and than went back out and around into the draw. There was my handkerchief, about halfway up Kakazu West, just below a small dark spot which was indistinguishable from dozens of other dark spots that were formed by natural rock shadows. That position was the result of much ingenuity and hard work, evidence of just how well-planned the defenses were.
In reading the details of the battle and then being able to find the places that were described, I became very glad that it was my lot to be there in the 1960's, and not in 1945. At times I felt actually small, being at a place where so many brave people, Americans, Japanese, and Okinawans too, had suffered so monstrously. I shouldn't admit it, but at one point I felt like becoming reverently conversant with some skeletal remains. What began as an interest in military history somewhere morphed into deep respect and regret. It was hallowed ground, profoundly.
By Dennis Moran on Dec 12, 2009 at 1:13 am
My dad was one of seven that came down from sugarloaf hill.I have read many stories about the battle and they are just like he told me.I am now looking for where the monument is for those men.I hear they are in naha at the shuri castle . Does any one know ?It saddens me to read so many stories of these battles.All the lives lost and shattered.Maybe someday we will learn to live in peace?
By louise on Mar 3, 2010 at 3:15 pm