Remembering: Iwo Jima

On February 23, 1945 United States Marines of the 3rd Platoon, E Company, 2nd Battalion, 28th Regiment of the 5th Division, took the top of Mount Suribachi, on Iwo Jima, and placed an American flag.

Later in the day, other Marines went up with a larger flag. The picture of the second raising has become one of the most memorable of American history, and is the most reproduced picture in all of history.

The island was a crucial air base, only seven hundred miles from Japan, and both sides new the value of it. The Japanese, under General Tadamichi Kuribayashi, had spent months making the island into one big underground fortress.

On February 19, 1945 Marines followed three days of air and naval bombardment of the island with invasion. On the island were twenty-two thousand Japanese who no intent of surrender what so ever. On March 26, the last Japanese were wiped out. Only two hundred of the defenders were taken alive. Over six thousand Americans died taking the island, with more than seventeen thousand wounded.