Original subtitles

In 1945, Allies are closing in \h\h\h\h\h\h\h\h\h\h\hon Japan

\h\h\h\h\hDAVID: We used bazookas, flamethrowers,

and it was a slaughter.

\h\h\h\hNARRATOR: Americans find a bloodbath on Okinawa.

Australians move in on Borneo.

And rescued POWs reveal a nightmare in Thailand.

\hREUBEN: In almost no time we have become skeleton men.

\h\h\hNARRATOR: With rare behind the scenes film...

and color combat footage...

\hhear the voices, and feel the fight.

ENS AITKEN: We knew that we were going to be in for trouble.

We just knew it.

[♪ theme music ♪]

♪ ♪

NARRATOR: General Douglas MacArthur is coming home.

This is Corregidor in the Philippines,

\h\hwhere MacArthur made his last stand

before defeat three years ago.

\h\h\h\hNow he’s back to address the paratroopers

that just helped liberate it.

The battle is so fresh,

the chutes are still blowing in the trees.

\hGEN MACARTHUR: The capture of Corregidor

\his one of the most brilliant operations in military history.

\hNARRATOR: Prone to overstatement,

MacArthur is also prone to emotion.

\hThe Philippines are flying the American flag once more.

\hGEN MACARTHUR: I see the old flagpole still stands.

Have your troops hoist the colors to its peak,

\h\hand let no enemy ever haul them down.

♪ ♪

NARRATOR: But the flag is flying over a territory in tatters.

The grand city of Manila is gutted.

\h\hOfficial buildings are reduced to rubble.

Neighborhoods are razed.

But weeks after liberation, \h\hManila is on the mend.

♪ ♪

\h\h\h\h\h\h\h\hBritish war journalist William Courtenay

tours the city on a horse drawn carriage

\h\h\h\h\hand captures the sights with his own camera.

Filipinos are on the rebound.

Between bombed out buildings

\h\h\h\his a sure sign that war has moved on.

The USO has moved in.

\h\h\hCourtenay’s camera rolls as Hollywood stars

\h\h\h\hand servicemen and women meet face to face --

7,000 miles from home.

\hComedian Joe E. Brown has come to boost their morale.

\h\h\h\h\h\h\hHis comic rubber-faced expressions

\htranslate all the way to the back row.

\h\h\h\h\h[servicemen laughing, applauding]

♪ ♪

Throughout the Pacific, the USO brings laughter

\hto places that only recently knew horror.

\h\h\hTouching down on this dusty airstrip on Tarawa --

another celebrity.

\h\hBy now Bob Hope has logged over 30,000 miles

across the Pacific.

At every stop he and his troupe

\hare escorted to thousands of fans

\h\h\h\heagerly awaiting "the show of a lifetime."

EMCEE: Here he is -- Bob Hope!

[men cheering]

NARRATOR: By now, Hope knows the reality of life in the Pacific

almost as well as the men.

\hBOB HOPE: Thank you. How do you do, ladies and gentlemen?

\h\h\h\h\hThis is Bob Mosquito Network Hope.

I hope you enjoy our show today.

We have a nice show with Frances Langford, Jerry Colonna,

\h\hTony Romano, Patty Thomas and Bonnie Dean.

I know you’ll enjoy the girls.

You remember girls.

[audience cheers]

Yes, they’re doing very fine.

\hOn some of these islands these girls

have been the first to land. \hWon’t Eleanor be mad, huh?

[audience laughing and cheering]

♪ ♪

\h\hNARRATOR: Hope is not the only one

\h\hputting smiles on American faces.

♪ ♪

There are plenty of big stars

\hand thousands of lesser known names.

They perform show after show

\hfor homesick troops all over the Pacific.

\h\h\hWherever there’s a USO show, war has passed.

\h\h\hBut in these pre-dawn waters, it’s only beginning.

\h\hHere, the stage is set for a very different show.

No laughter. Just a nervous silence.

It’s Easter Sunday, 1945.

Many of these men think it might be their last day on earth.

\h\h\h\h\hThe morning light reveals a stunning sight --

\h\hthe largest amphibious assault of the Pacific War.

A line of steel almost eight miles wide is closing in --

on Okinawa.

ENS AITKEN: I have never in my life seen so many Navy ships.

\h\hThe aircraft carriers were lined up as far as I could see.

NARRATOR: Fifteen hundred ships. Half a million men.

♪ ♪

Tarawa. Saipan. Iwo Jima.

\hAll had beaches covered in blood.

Now Americans are wiser and wearier.

\h\hThey expect an 80 percent casualty rate.

\hAmong the faces is David McFadden,

a kid from Ohio who remembers the fear.

\h\hLT MCFADDEN: There were hundreds of boys.

The only thing you could hear was the ship’s organ

playing "Nearer, My God, to Thee."

And boy, don’t you think there weren’t

a lot of them thinking that.

Young boys, really young.

NARRATOR: This is the last stop

in the island-hopping campaign toward the Japanese mainland.

\h\h\hFrom Okinawa, Americans can stage

\h\h\h\h\h\h\h\ha massive invasion of Japan itself.

It is 70 miles long.

In square mileage it’s no bigger than the city of Los Angeles.

Its terrain features craggy clusters of small mountains,

\hincluding ridgelines that run east to west,

\h\h\h\h\hcreating a natural barrier to southward travel.

Americans have limited intelligence going in.

\h\h\h\h\h\h\h\h\h\hAerial reconnaissance is lacking.

They can only guess at what lies ahead.

This Japanese film offers clues.

\hFor three years, Americans have been

\hpushing them back across the Pacific.

Okinawa is their last stand.

The Allies expect a final showdown.

[cannon fire]

\h\h\hNARRATOR: Before the invasion, the United States

unleashes ferocious firepower.

\h\h\h\h\h\hAerial and naval bombardment shreds the island

to soften defenses.

\h\hThe Japanese nickname it "the typhoon of steel."

It is three months of solid pounding.

[explosions]

\h\h\hInvasion day, Easter Sunday, is nicknamed L-Day.

MAN: Go! Go! Go!

NARRATOR: The men coming ashore expect the worst.

LT MCFADDEN: I was thinking,

well, maybe in an hour from now

\hI won’t have to worry about anything anymore.

\h\h\h\hNARRATOR: But instead of enemy fire,

they meet an eerie silence.

\h\h\h\h\h\h\h\h\h\hThey move cautiously, expecting a trap.

\h\hBut there’s no sign of the enemy.

[radio chatter]

\h\hSome wonder if they’ve landed on the wrong island.

\hFirst Lieutenant Charles Kilpatrick

is as surprised as anyone.

LT KILPATRICK: We were expecting the usual welcome committee

\hfrom the Japanese, and it didn’t happen.

We didn’t hear a shot fired.

\h\h\h\hNARRATOR: The only Japanese soldiers they see

are already dead, usually lying near a bomb crater.

Word gets back to the fleet -- there is no one to fight.

♪ ♪

Subsequent waves of troops come ashore.

They calmly grab their gear and walk upright onto the beach.

\h\h\h\h\hWithin hours, thousands of men unload

a city’s worth of infrastructure onto the beaches of Okinawa.

♪ ♪

Inland, things move as smoothly as a training exercise.

Many keep their guns stowed, and never have to dig a foxhole.

The invasion presses forward.

In the first few days, Marines march unimpeded

\h\h\h\h\h\hthrough the midsection of the island

and secure it coast to coast.

♪ ♪

\h\h\hThey tick off military objectives

like a grocery list --

\hall while enjoying a fine stretch of weather

on a subtropical island.

One general says to the press,

\h\h\h"I don’t know where the Japs are,

\hand I can’t offer you any good reason

\h\h\h\hwhy they let us come ashore so easily."

\h\h\h\hAmericans think 100,000 Japanese are defending Okinawa.

The question is -- where?

\h\h\h\hFor troops that expected to be in hell,

Okinawa feels like heaven.

\hInstead of an invasion, it seems like a vacation.

\h\h\hSoldiers pick ripe tomatoes along the road.

\h\hThey commandeer local horses and take joyrides.

They avail themselves of the local livestock

\h\hand try to one-up each other’s barbecue.

\h\h\h\h\h\hOne soldier recalled such a cookout

\h\h\hto be one of the best meals of his life,

\hon what was supposed to be the battlefield of his death.

So far, the battle of Okinawa is a cakewalk.

In charge of the invasion

\h\h\his General Simon Bolivar Buckner Junior.

\h\h\h\hHe is straight from central casting --

\h\h\h\h\h\h\h\h\h\h\h\h\htall, silver-haired, and no-nonsense.

\h\h\h\h\h\hHe is surprised things are going so smoothly

\h\hand wonders what the enemy is thinking

in a letter to his wife Adele.

\h\h\h\h\h\h\h\hGEN BUCKNER: Everything is now going well,

\hand so far my opposing general has not displayed

\hany noticeable degree of military brilliance.

I hope he keeps this up.

NARRATOR: Buckner’s Japanese counterpart

\h\h\h\h\h\his Lieutenant General Mitsuru Ushijima.

He is respected by his men --

cut right from the Samurai tradition.

\h\h\h\h\h\h\hA tradition that includes fighting to the death.

GEN USHIJIMA: Do not suffer the shame of being taken prisoner.

You will live for eternity.

\hNARRATOR: The Japanese will soon reveal their strategy --

suddenly, and lethally.

By the third day of the invasion,

there is still no sign of the enemy.

Commanding General Simon Buckner

sends a message to the Marines.

\h\hGEN BUCKNER: All restrictions removed

on your advance northward.

\h\h\h\h\hNARRATOR: Men and materiel move up the island

and into the Motobu Peninsula, \ha mountainous no-man’s land.

They approach a high, craggy mass called Mount Yae-Take.

[gunfire]

\h\h\h\hSuddenly, fire comes from everywhere.

[gunfire]

♪ ♪

\hAmericans are pinned down by mortars and machine guns

no matter where they go.

\hCompanies get split up running for cover.

\h\hThey barely know where to return fire.

After days of easy and rapid advance,

\h\hcasualties pile up by the hundreds.

\h\h\h\h\hAnd just as this reality hits on the ground,

a fury comes from the sky.

\h\hApril 6th dawns quiet in the waters off Okinawa.

\h\h\h\h\hThe calm did not comfort Ensign Doug Aitken.

ENS AITKEN: We knew that we were going to be in for trouble.

We just knew it.

\h\h\h\h\h\hNARRATOR: On the nearby islands, the Japanese

\h\h\h\h\hhad been gathering every usable plane and pilot

remaining in their arsenal.

Some are inexperienced, \hbut no less devoted.

They call this mission Kikusui, or "floating chrysanthemum."

♪ ♪

They take off in waves --

and begin a kamikaze spree

\h\h\h\h\h\h\hthat dwarfs anything before or since.

In the next two days, over 350 enemy planes

wreak absolute havoc.

American pilots try to stop them in roller-coaster dogfights.

Navy gunners try to derail them

\h\hin white-knuckle high-speed combat --

\h\hsometimes close enough to see each other’s faces.

\h\h\h\h\hOn April 6th alone, three ships are sunk outright.

Another 15 are hit and damaged.

[explosion]

The attacks leave a flotsam of twisted steel and blood.

\h\hBut it’s only the beginning of Kikusui.

In the midst of this nightmare, news reaches the front lines.

\hARCHIVAL NARRATOR: The flag flies at half staff

\h\has a grief-stricken nation mourns the death

\hof Franklin Delano Roosevelt, President of the United States.

\h\h\h\h\h\hNARRATOR: For 12 years, he steered the nation

\hthrough some of its darkest hours.

\h\h\h\h\hThe troops on Okinawa grieve publicly.

Many of them are so young

\h\h\h\hthat Roosevelt is the only president they remember.

\h\h\hSSGT WELLMAN: You’d see grown men crying like babies,

\hbecause we had lost somebody who was a father figure to us.

ROY: We also wondered, now what?

Roosevelt was our man. Who is this guy Truman?

NARRATOR: Back at Mount Yae-Take

\h\hit’s been week of uphill fighting,

\h\h\h\h\h\hand there is little to show for it --

besides blood and bandages.

It is an uphill slog

against what one officer calls "a phantom enemy."

\hFor four more days, they slowly move up the mountain

under withering fire.

[gunfire]

♪ ♪

\hThen, Marines finally take the top of Mount Yae-Take --

and take a look around.

Two thousand Japanese bodies

\h\hlitter the peaks, trenches, and tunnels.

\hAlmost to a man, they had fought to the death.

This one mountaintop cost the Marines almost a thousand men.

It is their first test

\hagainst the Japanese defenses on Okinawa...

and they wonder if they’ve only scratched the surface.

\h\h\h\hThere have to be more Japanese somewhere.

Americans move cautiously.

\h\h\hSuddenly, near the village of Shuri,

troops come under intense fire.

\h\hThey answer with volleys of their own.

[gunfire]

But when the Japanese charge

with machine guns and flamethrowers,

Americans have to retreat.

\hSoon after, another company endures a hailstorm of mortars

\hcoming in at more than one per second.

They lose 45 men.

US forces find themselves pinned down by unrelenting fire.

\h\h\hThey have run into the Shuri Line,

\h\h\h\ha defensive colossus built into a mountain range.

It is a masterstroke of military design.

The Japanese are entrenched \h\hon the reverse slope --

\h\h\h\h\hinvisible to approaching Americans.

\h\h\h\h\h\hEvery Japanese position supports another.

\hEvery American is caught in crossfire.

[gunfire]

\h\h\hMount Yae-Take was a single hill --

and it took a week to conquer.

The Shuri Line is an eight-mile-wide

coast-to-coast killing zone.

The worst elements of Pacific warfare

\h\hall rolled into a single nightmare.

\h\h\hThis is where America realizes the brutal truth --

\h\hthe Japanese are no longer fighting to win.

They only want to turn the conquest of Okinawa

into a drawn-out bloodbath --

and give America second thoughts about invading mainland Japan.

As April turns to May, it’s working.

What started as a cakewalk has become a meat grinder.

\h\h\h\h\h\hThe Shuri Line has stalled the American advance --

\h\h\h\h\h\hand spilled rising amounts of blood.

\hSo far there are 20,000 casualties.

\hMore than Tarawa & Saipan combined.

Medical units scramble to treat every injury.

\hBack home, officers escorted by chaplains

will knock on countless doors.

\h\h\hOkinawa is becoming the Pacific theater’s black hole.

\h\h\h\h\h\h\h\hThen, from the European theater, news breaks.

♪ ♪

[crowd cheers]

\hNEWSREEL NARRATOR: Throughout the world

\h\h\hthrongs of people hail the end of the war in Europe.

NARRATOR: The world celebrates.

\h\hHitler is dead, Germany surrenders,

and Europe is at peace.

\hBut on the other side of the world, Japan still won’t budge.

♪ ♪

The battle for Okinawa has already dragged on

longer than Iwo Jima or Saipan.

\hThe war seems endless. Combat fatigue spreads like a disease.

\hSome units are on the front lines for

\h\halmost four straight weeks -- under constant bombardment.

\h\h\h\h\hThrough May, nearly 14,000 troops are pulled back

\h\h\hwith what the military calls "non-battle" injuries.

\hLT KILPATRICK: We had a lot of people

who had what we call a "thousand-yard stare."

\hJust looking off and not thinking anything.

\h\h\h\hWe lost a few that were just completely gone.

\h\h\h\h\h\h\hNARRATOR: First Lieutenant Charles Kilpatrick

sees one officer hit the wall.

LT KILPATRICK: And he just broke down.

He said, "I can’t do it anymore.

\h\h\h\hI can’t send any more boys out there to get killed."

NARRATOR: Until they crack the Shuri Line,

\h\hthey’re trapped in a slaughterhouse.

Overlooking the city of Naha is a close triangle of small peaks

-- Horse Shoe, Half Moon, and the now infamous Sugar Loaf.

♪ ♪

\h\hOn May 12th, a company of Marines starts to climb.

\h\hThe higher they get, the more fire they take.

Half the company is wounded or killed on the first day.

\h\hThey retreat -- though Marines like Thomas Durham

claim not to know that word.

\h\h\h\hPVT DURHAM: The Marines didn’t retreat.

\h\hWe made a rapid advance to the rear.

\h\hThose Japs are damn good fighters,

\h\h\h\hand they were ready to meet their honorable ancestors.

We were not.

\h\h\hNARRATOR: The Americans realize that Sugar Loaf is the

western anchor of the Shuri Line -- the defensive wall

they’ve already been pounding for a month.

They can’t break through until they win this hill.

♪ ♪

\h\h\h\h\hOn Okinawa, civilians can’t escape

\h\h\h\h\h\h\h\hthe armies torching their home island.

\h\hTheir lives are turning into ashes.

♪ ♪

Seeking shelter from the storm of combat,

\h\h\h\h\hthey stream into burgeoning refugee camps --

sometimes more than 1,000 a day.

\h\h\h\h\h\h\hThey have no kinship with the Japanese,

no loyalties to the Americans,

\hand no idea how to get through it alive.

General Buckner writes:

\h\h\h\h\h\hGEN BUCKNER: A few Okinawans had been given guns.

\hThey don’t know either how to fight or how to surrender.

\h\h\h\hThey shoot a few rounds and go into caves

\h\hbut won’t come out and have to be killed.

[explosion]

\hNARRATOR: The only life they ever knew has been blown apart.

They are shell shocked.

Children are most vulnerable.

\h\h\h\hIf they aren’t directly injured, they are malnourished,

\h\h\h\h\h\hand surely confused and terrified.

\h\h\h\h\hIn one instance, Americans come upon a girl

\h\h\h\h\h\h\hwho refused to retreat with Japanese troops.

\h\h\h\hAs punishment, they cut off her foot.

\h\h\h\hIt will take a long time for Okinawans

\h\hto recover from having their island

turned into a killing field.

\h\h\h\h\h\hElsewhere in the Pacific, Americans have help.

\h\h\hOn Borneo, Australians lead the invasion of Labuan.

♪ ♪

It’s a big Japanese supply hub.

\h\h\hFrom here they’ve been shipping local oil and rubber

back to Japan.

\hJournalist William Courtenay is filming

\h\hfrom the open hatch of an Australian bomber.

Gunners inside take aim.

They target the ships first.

\h\hHere a long plume of black smoke pours from an oil tanker.

\h\h\hThe waist gunner tries to finish it off, tracers blazing.

[artillery fire]

\hThey leave dozens of Japanese transports burning on the beach.

\hThen, 90 American and Australian ships

get into position.

\hWith one signal, the barrage begins.

[rocket fire]

Rockets arc into the beachhead.

\h\hTwenty-millimeter shells pierce the air.

LEO: We blasted the island

\h\h\h\h\hwith everything we could possibly throw at them.

\h\hNARRATOR: Yankee gunners clear the way

as Aussie troops brace themselves for combat.

TED: To say we were scared would be an understatement,

but we were joking amongst ourselves,

which steadied our nerves.

\h\hNARRATOR: Finally, they land -- unopposed.

\h\h\h\h\hThe pre-landing bombardment does its job.

\h\h\h\h\h\hThe Australian troops stroll onto Labuan.

\h\h\h\h\h\h\hIt’s like Okinawa, an eerie calm.

\h\hJust hours later, two commanders come ashore --

\h\h\h\h\h\h\h\hAustralia’s Lieutenant General Morshead

and America’s General MacArthur.

MacArthur never likes to be seen breaking a sweat.

On Borneo in June, he relents.

They survey the scene -- including dead Japanese.

Most, they learn, are dug in further inland.

\h\hIt will be up to the Aussies to dislodge them.

\h\h\hThey heave shells into the rugged interior

with a British field gun.

It’s a start, but they know

\hthey’ll have to go in themselves.

[shells exploding]

\h\h\h\hWhen they do, they pay the price --

\h\h\h\h\h\h\hmostly from landmines and booby traps.

♪ ♪

The Japanese fight to the end, preferring death to capture.

\h\hOnly 200 survive out of 2,000 troops.

\h\h\h\h\hBut civilians carry the biggest scars.

Under Japanese occupation, they were neglected, if not abused.

\hNow they welcome Australian troops,

hoping the big men in the funny hats signal better days ahead.

\h\h\h\h\hThe boys from down under are taking back Borneo

and bringing back peace.

[explosion]

\h\hOn Okinawa, peace is still a pipe dream.

Americans are throwing their biggest hardware

at the Shuri Line -- Japan’s \hcolossal line of defense.

\hIt’s an unknown underground maze.

\h\h\h\hA surprise attack could come from anywhere,

\h\h\h\h\hso Americans don’t take any chances.

[explosions]

Explosions stun anyone inside.

Often, the enemy stumbles out.

Other times, it is civilians.

\h\h\hFrom Sugar Loaf Hill all the way across the Shuri Line,

progress is agonizingly slow.

\h\hOne general estimates there are 70,000 Japanese

holed up underground.

\h\h\h"I see no way to get them out", he says,

"but to blast them out yard by yard."

\h\hThe sluggish pace of the ground war on Okinawa

doesn’t make things easy at sea.

As the weeks drag on, Admiral Chester Nimitz

increasingly views his fleet as sitting ducks.

\h\hThe pressure of war takes its toll.

And kamikazes keep coming.

[explosions]

\h\h\h\hAt their peak, attacks kill an average

of 30 sailors per day.

There is no end in sight.

\h\hA zero is filmed heading straight for

.

[explosion]

\hSix hundred are killed or injured.

She has to retreat from duty.

\h\h\h\h\h\h\h\h\h\h\h\h\h\h\h\h\h\h\h\h\h-- a hospital ship -- also gets hit.

\h\hThe plane rips through three decks

and explodes in the surgery bay,

\h\hkilling doctors, nurses, and patients.

For sailors like Howard Jones,

\h\h\hthe horror is burned into memory.

\hSN JONES: The smoke went down in the ship

and so many guys suffocated.

\h\h\hSN CLEMENTSON: Seeing the dead didn’t bother me too much,

but the wounded,

\h\h\h\h\h\hwhen they’re lying there suffering and moaning...

that’s what really hit me.

I just couldn’t take that.

NARRATOR: Japan intentionally \h\h\h\hcrashes 1,900 planes

in suicide dives around Okinawa --

the most intense kamikaze attacks

of the entire Pacific campaign.

\hThey sink 26 ships and damage 164 more.

\h\h\h\h\h\h\h\hThe Japanese consider it noble sacrifice.

\h\h\h\h\h\h\h\hThe Americans consider it inhumane warfare.

SN JONES: The next day... the worst part of my life was...

\h\h\hwe all had to get all these guys together

in, you know, the bags.

\h\h\hENS AITKEN: You can’t identify people.

The right thing to do is bury at sea.

NARRATOR: It is the greatest concentration of Navy losses

since Pearl Harbor.

Since the first failed attacks,

\h\h\hOkinawa’s Sugar Loaf Hill has become a massacre.

\h\h\hWith Japanese holding the other two hills nearby,

there is crossfire no matter where the Americans charge.

\h\h\hTwo days into it, Marines charge up again.

[shouting and gunfire]

After 48 hours of nonstop fighting,

\h\h\hthey are back where they started -- less 400 casualties.

♪ ♪

They try again, this time with 1,200 men.

Same result.

\hBy now, the equivalent of two full regiments have attacked --

and gotten nowhere.

\h\hFor days on end they fight over the same hill.

♪ ♪

\h\h\h\h\h\hMarines throw grenades from one side...

and take incendiary fire from the other.

At times their trenches are only 25 yards apart.

\h\hOn a single day, the crest of the hill

changes hands 11 times.

\h\h\h\h\h\hAs dead and wounded are carried off,

new troops rush in with no idea what they are in for.

\h\h\hDavid McFadden remembers the chaos.

\h\h\h\hLT MCFADDEN: They commandeered as many boys

as they could muster.

\h\h\h\hInstead of a company or battalion,

they threw them all together,

\h\h\h’cause they didn’t have enough to go around.

NARRATOR: But the enemy has no replacements, no supply lines.

\h\h\h\hEventually, the Marines wear them down.

After 10 days, Americans finally climb Sugar Loaf Hill --

and hold it.

\hThey stand on the shoulders of more than 9,000 fallen comrades.

\h\h\hA military historian would later call the battle

\h\h\h\h\h\h"unmatched for closeness and desperation."

\h\hSome regiments lose two-thirds of their men.

\h\h\h\h\hIt is one of the costliest pieces of ground

in Marine Corps history.

LT MCFADDEN: We didn’t have much celebration.

They just wanted to go home, and you couldn’t blame them.

\h\h\hNARRATOR: With the Shuri Line about to fall,

the exhausted Americans hope

\hthey are nearing the end of combat.

But just when Americans think the Japanese are on the run,

\h\h\hrain soaks Okinawa -- almost 12 inches in 10 days.

\h\h\h\hGEN BUCKNER: Heavy rain has stopped our tanks

\h\h\hand is impeding supply just at a time

\h\h\h\h\h\h\h\hwhen rapid progress is most desirable.

\h\h\h\hNARRATOR: What is already difficult terrain

becomes nearly impassable.

Roads become rivers.

Camps become swamps.

And war becomes impossible.

\h\hLT KILPATRICK: The mud got so deep

\h\h\h\hthat suddenly we stopped getting supplies.

\h\hWe weren’t getting any shells, any hand grenades,

any food, any water.

\h\h\hEven bulldozers would sink as much as

\h\hthree feet down in the mud, so they couldn’t haul it to us.

\h\hNARRATOR: Troops have to lug ammunition to the front by hand.

\h\h\hWounded have to be carried all the way back

to rear medical units.

Sanitation measures break down.

Morale sinks.

The Japanese could retreat into

\h\h\h\h\hthe relative comfort of their caves.

The Americans could only wait \hit out in cold, wet misery.

\h\hLT KILPATRICK: As it rained, the foxhole

\h\h\h\h\hwould start filling up with water.

Everybody smelled.

\h\h\hYou had blood on you and parts of bodies on you.

\h\h\h\hEverybody got diarrhea or dysentery.

NARRATOR: For more than a week, it appears to be a standoff.

\h\h\hBut the Japanese are not standing still.

\h\h\h\h\hWhen the weather finally breaks on Okinawa,

the Americans mobilize.

\h\hThe Japanese defenses on the Shuri Line are crumbling.

US troops have been pounding away at this one ridgeline

for two bloody months.

\h\h\h\h\h\h\hSo far 20,000 Americans have been wounded

\hand 50,000 Japanese killed -- just to crest its heights.

\h\hNow they are closing in on the enemy’s headquarters

at Shuri Castle --

\h\h\h\hwhere they hope General Ushijima himself

\h\his holed up for the final showdown.

\h\hThey find the castle blown to bits by American artillery.

LT KILPATRICK: They must have shot a million dollars’ worth

\hof shells into that thing just kicking it up in dust.

\h\hNARRATOR: Troops find it unrecognizable, undefended...

and abandoned.

\h\h\h\hThe Japanese have vanished. Again.

American troops raise a flag, \hbut the victory is hollow.

\h\hBy now they realize the enemy is building up

another line farther south,

\hto extend the war as long as possible.

For the soldiers on Okinawa,

\hJune is an exhausting slog to the bottom of the island.

♪ ♪

The Americans slowly advance against weakening resistance.

[gunfire]

\h\h\h\h\hThe retreating soldiers are being killed

at a rate of one thousand per day.

\hYet they manage to make Americans

pay for every mile they gain.

\h\h\hCave defenses are still a threat.

\h\h\h\hAmericans fire streams of liquid flame

to incinerate anyone inside...

\hthen use explosives to seal the cave shut.

[explosion]

\hGeneral Buckner calls this method

"blowtorch and corkscrew."

\hOkinawa is now about killing, not capturing.

At sea, it’s the same equation.

Kill first, take prisoners later.

Far from Okinawa in the South China Sea,

\h\h\h\h\h\h\h\hUSS patrols the area

\hafter torpedoing two distant Japanese ships.

\h\hFour days later they spot desperate survivors

clinging to floating wreckage.

\h\h\h\h\hThe submarine commander gets a shock.

\h\h\hLCDR DAVIS: They were speaking English.

\h\h\h\hK.L.: My eyes were paining with oil,

\h\hbut we got a rope and were taken aboard.

NARRATOR: These men are

\h\h\h\h\hAustralian and British prisoners of war.

♪ ♪

\h\h\hLCDR DAVIS: We had a devil of a time

trying to get them on board.

They were too slick to pick up.

\hNARRATOR: Two thousand of them were crammed onto

two Japanese cargo ships,

\h\h\h\h\h\hwhen they were torpedoed by the Americans.

Most of the POWs are dead -- sunk by their own side.

\h\h\hThe lucky ones survive -- barely --

after four days on the open sea.

\hOne hundred and fifty are rescued.

\hLCDR DAVIS: They were very thankful.

They said, "You bloody Yanks,

\h\hyou sink us one night and pick us up the next."

\hBut they said they were darn glad they were sunk,

and that they would cheer every time hit their ship,

\h\h\hbecause they wanted to see the sons-of-guns go down.

\h\h\h\h\h\hK.L.: Can you imagine the shock we got?

\h\h\hWater, tomato soup and crackers --

\h\hsomething that we never had in two and a half years.

\h\h\hLCDR DAVIS: The crew gave them clothes

and wrote letters for them.

\hIt was amazing to see their brotherly spirit.

\h\h\h\hNARRATOR: As the survivors gain strength,

\h\h\h\h\hthey unspool a story that defies belief.

\h\hThey come from a secret prison camp deep in Thailand

with enough POWs to fill a city --

a quarter of a million men,

including 60,000 British, Australians, and Dutch --

and at least 1,000 missing Americans.

\h\h\hThey were brought here to build a railroad

from Thailand to Burma across the river Kwai.

The men are beaten and tortured, forced to live as slaves.

Reuben Kandler -- a British POW -- describes the horror:

REUBEN: The appalling conditions have made us dangerously thin.

We have no beds, inadequate \h\hshelter, atrocious diet

and no sanitation.

\hWe have lost all our clothes, shoes,

and have taken to wearing our shirts as loincloths.

\h\hIn almost no time we have become skeleton men.

\hNARRATOR: Nearly one third of the POWs die in captivity.

Survivors have no end in sight.

\h\hAll they see are their own comrades wasting away.

Back on Okinawa, exhaustion \his crippling both sides.

\h\h\hLess than a third of the Japanese Army is left,

\h\h\hand they form a last line of defense by the sea.

\h\h\hIt’s not nearly as strong as the Shuri Line.

\h\hBut this is where General Ushijima makes his last stand.

GEN USHIJIMA: The present position will be defended

\h\h\h\hto the death, even to the last man.

\h\hNeedless to say, retreat is forbidden.

\h\h\h\h\h\h\hNARRATOR: The Japanese are running out of

soldiers, ammunition, and land.

\hThey have their backs to the sea.

\hAmericans try to persuade civilians

to surrender rather than die.

\h\hIn one case, they lure 600 Okinawans out of a single cave.

\h\h\h\h\hThey are less forgiving to the enemy.

\hSome refuse to take any Japanese prisoners at all,

\h\h\h\h\hkilling them on sight, white flag or not.

\hBy June 17th, the Japanese on Okinawa

\h\hhave only eight square miles left, with few places to hide.

Americans can see the coast,

and they are burning their way to the sea.

[explosions]

\h\hJapanese leaders are huddled in seaside caves.

\h\hIt is so cramped that General Ushijima

cannot stretch out his legs.

\hHe receives a message from General Buckner --

\h\h\h\h\han offer to enter negotiations for surrender.

\h\h\h\h\h\h\hGEN BUCKNER: You understand as clearly as I that

the destruction of all Japanese resistance on the island

is merely a matter of days.

NARRATOR: Ushijima laughs if off and does not reply.

Soon after, a cameraman captures General Buckner

\h\h\h\h\h\h\hvisiting a forward observation post

to see the final days for himself.

♪ ♪

\h\h\h\hMinutes after this footage is taken,

\ha shell explodes on a rock right next to him.

\h\h\h\h\hA piece of it tears through his chest.

\h\hIn just 10 minutes, General Buckner is dead.

He drifts off to sleep

\h\has a Marine private holds his hand, saying,

"You are going home, General. \h\hYou are homeward bound."

As Americans approach the coast,

\h\hGeneral Ushijima sends his final message to Tokyo.

\hGEN USHIJIMA: We are about to deploy

\h\h\h\h\h\h\h\hall surviving soldiers for a final battle --

\hin which I will apologize to the Emperor with my own death.

NARRATOR: On a ledge overlooking the sea,

\h\h\hUshijima performs the Samurai ritual of hara-kiri,

\h\hplunging a saber into his own stomach.

\h\h\hThe battle for Okinawa is the only contest of the Pacific

\h\hto cost the lives of both commanding officers.

♪ ♪

Eighty-two days after L-Day --

\h\h\hwhen Americans came ashore to wrestle Okinawa

from an unseen enemy --

they can finally declare victory.

The island is theirs.

\h\h\h\h\h\h\h\hDAVID: In Okinawa, the war was over.

\h\h\h\h\h\h\hAnd there wasn’t anything easy about any of it.

NARRATOR: There is much to celebrate.

But also many to mourn.

The United States loses 12,520 lives in Okinawa.

More than 36,000 are wounded.

The Japanese toll is astounding.

Americans count more than 100,000 bodies,

\h\h\h\hwith the actual number probably higher.

\hAnd about a third of the Okinawan people are dead --

another 100,000 --

\h\hunable to survive two vast armies warring on their island.

♪ ♪

America is now at Japan’s doorstep.

But the body count on Okinawa \hmakes the military shudder

\h\hat the thought of invading Japan itself.

They increase their casualty estimate for the invasion --

to a million men.

\h\h\hPresident Truman will have to weigh those numbers

against a new option --

\h\h\h\hone that will forever change the course of warfare.

♪ ♪