_Marine half-track scores a hit on a Japanese strongpoint with its 75mm
gun._]
Kuribayashi was particularly pleased with the quality of his artillery
and engineering troops. Colonel Chosaku Kaido served as Chief of
Artillery from his seemingly impregnable concrete blockhouse on a
promontory on the east central sector of the Motoyama Plateau, a lethal
landmark the Marines soon dubbed “Turkey Knob.” Major General Sadasue
Senda, a former artillery officer with combat experience in China and
Manchuria, commanded the _2d Independent Mixed Brigade_, whose main
units would soon be locked into a 25-day death struggle with the 4th
Marine Division. Kuribayashi knew that the _204th Naval Construction
Battalion_ had built some of the most daunting defensive systems on
the island in that sector. One cave had a tunnel 800 feet long with 14
separate exits; it was one of hundreds designed to be defended in depth.
The Japanese defenders waiting for the advance of the V Amphibious
Corps were well armed and confident. Occasionally Kuribayashi
authorized company-sized spoiling attacks to recapture lost terrain
or disrupt enemy assault preparations. These were not suicidal or
sacrificial. Most were preceded by stinging artillery and mortar
fires and aimed at limited objectives. Kuribayashi’s iron will kept
his troops from large-scale, wasteful _Banzai_ attacks until the last
days. One exception occurred the night of 8 March when General Senda
grew so frustrated at the tightening noose being applied by the 4th
Marine Division that he led 800 of his surviving troops in a ferocious
counterattack. Finally given a multitude of open targets, the Marines
cut them down in a lingering melee.
For the first week of the drive north, the Japanese on Iwo Jima
actually had the attacking Marines outgunned. Japanese 150mm howitzers
and 120mm mortars were superior to most of the weapons of the landing
force. The Marines found the enemy direct fire weapons to be equally
deadly, especially the dual-purpose antiaircraft guns and the 47mm
tank guns, buried and camouflaged up to their turrets. “The Japs could
_snipe_ with those big guns,” said retired Lieutenant General Donn J.
Robertson. The defenders also had the advantage of knowing the ground.
[Illustration: _The drive north by the 3d Battalion, 28th Marines,
enters rugged terrain. Under heavy Japanese fire, this attack netted
only 200 yards despite supporting fires._
Department of Defense Photo (USMC) 111988
]
Not surprisingly, most casualties in the first three weeks of the
battle resulted from high explosives: mortars, artillery, mines,
grenades, and the hellacious rocket bombs. _Time_ correspondent Robert
Sherrod reported that the dead at Iwo Jima, both Japanese and American,
had one thing in common: “They all died with the greatest possible
violence. Nowhere in the Pacific War had I seen such badly mangled
bodies. Many were cut squarely in half.”
Close combat was rough enough; on Iwo Jima the stress seemed endless
because for a long time the Marines had no secure “rear area” in which
to give shot-up troop units a respite. Kuribayashi’s gunners throughout
the Motoyama Plateau could still bracket the beaches and airfields.
The enormous spigot mortar shells and rocket bombs still came tumbling
out of the sky. Japanese infiltrators were drawn to “softer targets”
in the rear. Anti-personnel mines and booby traps, encountered here on
a large scale for the first time in the Pacific, seemed everywhere.
Exhausted troop units would stumble out of the front lines seeking
nothing more than a helmet-full of water in which to bathe and a deep
hole in which to sleep. Too often the men had to spend their rare
rest periods repairing weapons, humping ammo, dodging major-caliber
incoming, or having to repel yet another nocturnal Japanese probe.
General Schmidt planned to attack the Japanese positions in the north
with three divisions abreast, the 5th on the left, the 3d (less the 3d
Marines) in the center, and the 4th on the right, along the east coast.
The drive north officially began on D+5, the day after the capture of
Suribachi. Prep fires along the high ground immediately north of the
second airfield extended for a full hour. Then three regimental combat
teams moved out abreast, the 26th Marines on the left, the 24th Marines
on the right, and the 21st Marines again in the middle. For this
attack, General Schmidt consolidated the Sherman tanks of all three
divisions into one armored task force commanded by Lieutenant Colonel
William R. “Rip” Collins. It would be the largest concentration of
Marine tanks in the war, virtually an armored regiment. The attack plan
seemed solid.
The Marines soon realized they were now trying to force passage
through Kuribayashi’s main defensive belt. The well-coordinated attack
degenerated into desperate, small-unit actions all along the front. The
26th Marines on the left, aided by the tanks, gained the most yardage,
but it was all relative. The airfield runways proved to be lethal
killing zones. Marine tanks were bedeviled by mines and high-velocity
direct fire weapons all along the front. On the right flank, Lieutenant
Colonel Alexander A. Vandegrift, Jr., son of the Commandant, became a
casualty. Major Doyle A. Stout took command of the 3d Battalion, 24th
Marines.
During the fighting on D+5, General Schmidt took leave of Admiral Hill
and moved his command post ashore from the amphibious force flagship
_Auburn_ (AGC 10). Colonel Howard N. Kenyon led his 9th Marines ashore
and into a staging area. With that, General Erskine moved the command
post of the 3d Marine Division ashore; the 21st Marines reverted to its
parent command. Erskine’s artillery regiment, the 12th Marines under
Lieutenant Colonel Raymond F. Crist, Jr., continued to land for the
next several days. Schmidt now had eight infantry regiments committed.
Holland Smith still retained the 3d Marines in Expeditionary Troops
reserve. Schmidt made the first of several requests to Smith for
release of this seasoned outfit. The V Amphibious Corps had already
suffered 6,845 casualties.
[Illustration: