Iwo

On the beginning of the 60th anniversary of the battle for Iwo Jima, the Sun-Sentinel interviews veterans who fought there:

"It helped me appreciate what I have, define who and what I am, that you never fear living or dying," said Coster, an engine designer at the Sparrows Point shipyard who was among the 70,000 Marines to fight for a desolate, but strategically important, Pacific isle. "After Iwo, what could be worse than that?"

The Philadelphia Inquirer also has an article on the anniversary, this one with veterans' very intense memories of the landing itself:

Other troops followed. Myers, part of the fourth wave, recalled the tension in the landing craft.

"We were only kids - 18 and 19 - and there was no cutting up, no carrying on," said Myers, 79, a retired Pennsylvania welfare caseworker. "I remember a sailor hollering insults at us. We said, 'What the hell is the matter with this guy?' I think he was trying to make us angry so we would take it out on the Japanese."

Myers saw an amtrac next to his take a direct hit from a mortar shell. "I saw four or five Marines floating," he said. "The rest went down with the amtrac. After that, the guys were praying."

Jumping from his amtrac, Szostek said, he immediately saw "five or six dead Marines lying in the sand" and was soon shooting back at the Japanese, including four - all on fire - as they charged from a pillbox. One, an officer, was "waving a sword and hollering, 'Banzai!,' " Szostek said.

By the end of the first day, 30,000 Marines had landed. Part of an airfield was captured, and Mount Suribachi was isolated.

"It was 40 or 50 degrees in the day, and cold and damp at night," Perry said, also recalling a heavy rain on the second day that added to the misery. "I started to cry because it was so disheartening, and this fellow with me hit me with a helmet and told me, 'You son of a bitch. You better not crack up on me.' That saved me."

Some of them seem to think nobody remembers Iwo Jima. I don't think that's something they need worry about. When you think of the American warrior, it's this image that comes to mind:

Posted by floridacracker at February 18, 2005 12:57 PM