NRA-Chuck

I'm Red, White, & Blue to the hilt, but at the same time, I believe the US military's operations at Iwo Jima & D-Day were stupid military plans.

So many lives were thrown away at IJ & DD it is sickening. For what? Yes, we had to deliver the knock out punch to Imperalistic Japan & Nazi Germany, but why did the US military leaders allow so many young people to get killed so easily? The leaders who make such decisions claim their decision was so tough. Yeah right, it's tough for the poor sap who is hitting the beaches, not the generals sitting on some flagship smoking a pipe.

Iwo Jima --- What was the hurry to get an Air base close to Japan? Instead, just naval blockade or bypass it. Starve them out, wait for the nuke program. Japan wasn't going anywhere. Or how about land somewhere else? Say, on the mainland of Asia? There had to be a better plan than getting all those guys wasted on Iwo Jima.

D-Day --- What the heck kind of plan is it to shove all your troops on a beach to get shot at? Those generals knew thousands were going to get killed without a chance! Why not do another plan? Why not just bomb the bastards to Kingdom Come! We were going to bomb Japan into submission, why not do the same to Germany?

Don't get me wrong, I'm Red, White, & Blue, but I believe there had to be some beter military plans. If I was a general, I would not sacrifice so many troops on Iwo Jima & Normandy beaches.

Anon

The people that were planning and executing the war had NO CLUE of the existance of nuclear weapons.

Iwo Jima was siezed to provide an airbase for direct B-29 raids on the home islands.

Operation Overlord was going to be a blood-bath one way or another, but it had to be done to re-establish a foothold in France.

dalem

I know a bit about the ETO in WWII, less so about the PTO. My advice would be to see D-Day through a bigger lens than "bloody Omaha".

Utah Beach, the other U.S. beach, went pretty much as planned with extremely light casualties on D-Day.

-skipping Omaha for now-

The BritCan beaches, Gold, Juno, and Sword, went very well with respect to the immediate landings. The Brits didn't try to swim their DD tanks in from too far out and employed proper engineering and assault vehicles (Hobart's "Funnies").

The U.S. errors were tactical - risky weather (sinking the DD tanks) and long bombs and refusals to accept the Brit's offer of proper engineering assault vehicles - not conceptual. And the casualties incurred were far less than anticipated.

Overall Overlord has to be considered a tremendous success, and would be so even if casualties had been twice as high. A foothold in Hitler's "Fortress Europa" had to be carved out somewhere.

As far as the PTO, Iwo Jima had to be taken for the airfields mentioned. I don't see what a viable alternative would have been.

-dale

Anon

The only other alternative for the B-29 strikes was the airstrip in China we were working on, but i think that was completed several months after the strip at Iwo Jima was ready, so it would've meant a delay in the intiaition of the aerial bombing campaign of Japan.

Anon

OK, i looked into this issue a bit, and i can give you a more complete answer now, and correct the mistakes i already posted(lol).

The B-29 bases in the marianas/solomons could reach Japan, but disabled or damaged bombers would often not make it back to the bases in the solomons and were forced to ditch in the sea on the return leg, usually at the cost of many dead.

Iwo Jima was half again as far from Japan as the existing bases, so it allowed B-29s and other allied aircraft to divert to Iwo Jima in case of mechanical or battledamage issues.
From the time the airbase was opened at Iwo Jima, some 2000 US aircraft safely diverted there, aircraft that otherwise would've probably been lost(along with their pilots). Since the crew of a B-29 was ten men, and most of the diverted aircraft were B-29s, you're talking about more than 10,000 airmans lives saved.

Also, the USAAF stationed P-51D Mustangs on Iwo Jima, which allowed US B-29s to be escorted all the way to Tokyo and back.

Finally, the large airstrip at Iwo Jima meant that bypassing the Island would leave a large and functioning enemy airbase in the US rear....not a good thing at all.

So it's pretty obvious looking at those factors why Iwo Jima was such an important target.

NRA-Chuck

Thanks for the responses. Yes, I agree that Iwo Jima was a valuable piece of dirt close to Japan to be used as an airstrip. Yes, I agree that D-Day ended up with the Allies coming ashore in Europe. I've just always thought, wasn't there a better plan? Iwo Jima seems like you could starve them out with a naval blockade. Slow, but could have saved lives. D-Day could have actually gone worse. If Germany would have released some Panzers at the moment of truth. When people celebrate those victories, something in me is rather sad. We left alot of young lives, for what?

dalem

Well, you're asking a good question - knowing what they knew, were better plans possible? I suggest the answer is No.

Blockading the Home Islands would have meant millions of dead Japanese from starvation - they were NOT going to surrender anytime soon. Blockading Iwo Jima? No. Never would have surrendered, and you prosecute a war as fast as you can to keep the enemy down and running.

And as far as "for what"? We stopped and helped stop two Evil Empires. Pretty good on the resume if you ask me.

-dale

Anon

The estimates i've seen for the death toll had the US instituted a full naval blockade on Japan in an effort to starve them out range from 5,000,000 all the way up to 15,000,000 dead.

There is also the matter of the 3,000 to 30,000(depending on source) Kamakaze aircraft the Japanese had husbanded for their final defense.

At the marianas alone 27 US warships were sunk by Kamakaze attacks.

dalem

Yeah. And we have morons now that cry and whine about the two piddly nukes we used on Japan as they try to re-write history. Imagine the squealing now if we had chosen to starve the Japanese into submission over a 5 year period. "But Truman could have ended the war for good in August '45 by dropping two small atomic bombs and only killing a few tens of thousands of people! He's a vile war criminal for prolonging the suffering of the poor Japanese people!"

Fecking idiots.

-dale

Officer of Engineers

Three Evil Empires. The USSR would have expanded to the Atlantic and China would have become a puppet state (say what you want about Mao but he was no puppet).

__________________
Chimo

Beaugeste93

We already were effectively blockading japan. Our subs killed many more merchies than IJN combatants and very little stuff was coming into japan by 1945. That being said, they were training schoolkids with pointed sticks to defend against our landing when it came (OLYMPIC). The B29 offensive shortened the war by months, possibly years, saving american and japanese lives in the long run.

__________________
Rule 303

dalem

Yeah, I originally had three in there but I didn't want to confuse the point.

-dale

griftadan

D-Day wasnt that bad. infact, it could have gone much, much worse. it could have gone better, maybe if our shelling touched omaha beach and our paratroopers were dropped where they were supposed too, but you need to expect thiese things to happen in war. iwo jima was just bad inteligence. luckily, the landing went well

__________________
"I'm against picketting, but i dont know how to show it"

NRA-Chuck

If I was a military leader, my main concern is for my troops & my civilians. Nuking Japan was a very smart move. They died, we didn't, that's the job of a military leader. I don't find pleasure it that, but after Pearl Harbor things like that will happen.

As I age, I have become more of a Nationalist and Isolationist. Avoid war, but if you decide to fight, kick their ass.

G-Unit!

THE GERMANS WERE NOT EVIL!!!!! howcome we did not know about the holocaust when it first started (1941)? there was also a German general, that was a traitor, if the holocaust was 100% true then howcome he didn't report back to allied hq b4 the allied invasion of europe and the ruskies entering ever closer into europe. I am not saying that the holocaust wasnt real, I'm simply saying that somewhere along the lines of a few thousand people (jews, homosexuals etc..) were killed, I think the whole thing was blown out of proportion. THE GERMANS HAD NO INTEREST in north america. the Germans btw are to b highly respected for their valour and courage, it just sucks they had such a dumb leader. Rommel and all the other generals were very smart, just that hitler wasnt smart enough to listen to them.