Iwo Jima 1945

One of the decisive battles of the Second World War in the Pacific, Iwo Jima was described as - The most savage and most costly battle in the history of the Marine Corps. It was a titanic struggle that eclipsed all that had gone before. Situated halfway along the B-29 Superfortress route to the Japanese mainland, the island was of major strategic importance to the US Air Force, but also to the Japanese, 20,000 of whom were deeply entrenched in the island. This book provides a definitive account of the battle, from its origins to its hard-fought conclusion. This book shows that despite overwhelming American superiority in arms and numbers, a tremendous and bloody battle broke out, with severe casualties on both sides. Even though the Japanese defeat was assured from the start, and with their combat deaths numbered three times the number of American deaths, uniquely in the Pacific War, American total casualties (dead and wounded) exceeded those of the Japanese; This was largely due to the effective tactics of kuribayashi. This book, as usual with the Campaign series, analyse commanders, the planing, equipments and the armies, before and during the battle and it tells the story from both sides, attacker and defender. Full color 3-D ‘bird’s-eye-views’, battle scenes, soldiers or equipment drawings and maps as well as black and white photographs that support's the text.