Okinawa

Campaigns across New Guinea and the Marshall Islands carried American and Allied forces steadily toward Japan itself, and Okinawa was chosen as the staging ground for an invasion of the home islands. Dug-in Japanese defenders turned the island into one of the costliest fights of the Second World War. The battle lasted eighty-two days and claimed more than 100,000 Japanese soldiers, roughly 50,000 American and Allied troops, and over 100,000 civilians.

The book follows the campaign from Operation ICEBERG, the landing on Okinawa, through the wider operations across the Ryukyu Islands, ending with the fall of Shuri. Its account rests on the firsthand recollections of four U.S. Army combat historians, whose reports preserve the experience of the men who fought there.

Readers will see how American forces bombarded Japanese positions before the landings, and how supply lines, evacuations, and base construction were organized. Other chapters convey what combat itself felt like for soldiers on the ground.

More than 200 black-and-white photographs, along with charts and maps, accompany the text. The volume is written for readers who want a detailed, grounded picture of the final major battle in the Pacific theater.