Iwo Jima Battle Analysis

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The iconic photograph of five Marines and a U.S. Navy corpsman raising the American flag on Iwo Jima seen on billboards around the world. It represents the American victory and the sacrifice that many Soldiers, Sailors, Marines, and Airmen made to ensure an American victory. The battle fought during World War II between February and March of 1945, between the Japanese Imperialist Army and the United States, resulted in U.S. forces defeating the Japanese. The purpose of this analytical paper is to analyze the battle of Iwo Jima and determine how to alter the outcome of the battle through the use of Intelligence and resources. Through analysis, I will describe the background that led to the battle, its strategic need, key events, and how those …show more content…
This strategy worked well, as the Navy conquered the Gilbert and Marshall Islands, in 1944 (Samuel, 2001). However, with two services fighting in the same area of operations, it led to some political infighting between General Douglas MacArthur (commander of the South West Pacific) and Admiral Chester Nimitz (commander of the Pacific fleet). At the time, they could not agree on a battle plan to conquer the islands. General MacArthur was heavily involved in fighting in the Philippines and wanted to advance to Taiwan. Admiral Nimitz’s strategy was to take Okinawa in order to gain access onto the Japanese mainland, but settled for Iwo Jima, as a preliminary target. During this time, U.S. forces captured Caroline and Mariana Islands, which they used as staging areas for B-29 and B-24 bomber missions in Japan. The distance between Japan and the Mariana Islands proved to be a problem for the bombers, and the Japanese planes on Iwo Jima caused problems as well. After months of infighting, the Joint Chief of Staff decided to take Iwo Jima in order to eliminate Japanese planes on the island and make the trip shorter for the B-29 and B-24 bombers to reach Japan. The Japanese Imperialist Army, aware of the importance of Iwo Jima, knew that it had to reinforce in order to fend attacks on the Japanese mainland. The Japanese’s approach to …show more content…
troops continued to attack island after island in order to make their way through the pacific. Which resulted in the loss of thousands of men and the lack of resources that they were getting did not help the situation. Once the battle begins again, the morale went up. On the other hand, Japanese forces dealt with a decline in morale across the force due to the losses that they were sustaining throughout the region.
Command and Control
The battle of Iwo Jima was the objective of Admiral Chester Nimitz, but he assigned another General to lead troops during the assault. The Joint Expeditionary Force led by Vice Admiral Kelly Turner and Major General Harry Schmidt led the Fifth Amphibious Corps of marines. A few dozen different elements were subordinate to these forces during that period. The Japanese forces on Iwo Jima were commanded by Lieutenant General Tadamichi Kuribayashi (Cowley, R. & Parker, G., 2009).
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