Battle of Okinawa

BelligerentsGround forces:

United States
Naval forces:

CanadaJapanCommanders and leaders

Units involved

Ground units:
Tenth Army

Naval units:
Fifth Fleet

Task Force 50
- Task Force 58
- Task Force 57
Joint Exp. Force

Ground units:
32nd Army

24th Infantry Division
28th Infantry Division
62nd Infantry Division
44th Mixed Brigade
45th Mixed Brigade
59th Mixed Brigade
60th Mixed Brigade
27th Tank Regiment

Naval units:
Combined Fleet

2nd Fleet

Strength

United States Navy

Royal Navy

Royal Australian Navy

4 destroyers

Royal New Zealand Navy

2 light cruisers

Royal Canadian Navy

1 light cruiser

Ground forces

~541,000 in Tenth Army
~183,000 combat troops rising to ~250,000

Imperial Japanese Navy

1 battleship
1 light cruiser
8 destroyers
1815 aircraft (of which 1050 were kamikazes)

Imperial Japanese Army Air Service

850 kamikazes

Ground forces

~76,000+ Japanese soldiers
~40,000+ Okinawan conscripts and boeitai

Casualties and losses

American personnel:
Battle casualties:
~50,000, including ~12,500 dead
Army: 19,929
Navy: 10,007 at Okinawa, 1,294 on USS Franklin
Marines: 19,460
Non-battle casualties: 26,211 to 33,096 (all causes)
British personnel:
Battle casualties:
119 killed
83 wounded
228 aircraft lost
4 fleet carriers damaged in kamikaze strikes

Total casualties: ~76,000 to 84,000
Materiel:
375 tanks damaged, disabled, or destroyed
13 destroyers sunk
15 amphibious ships sunk
8 other ships sunk
386 ships damaged
763 aircraft lostJapanese personnel:
Battle & non-battle casualties:
94,136 soldiers and sailors dead (all causes)
4,037 dead from Yamato task force
7,401 captured (by 30 June)〜16,346 captured（by the end of November）
Total casualties: ~105,000 to 110,000
Materiel:
1 battleship sunk
1 light cruiser sunk
5 destroyers sunk
9 other warships sunk
1,430 aircraft lost
27 tanks destroyed
743–1,712 artillery pieces, anti-tank guns, mortars and anti-aircraft guns lost 40,000–150,000 civilians dead

Battle of Okinawa (Pacific Ocean)

The Battle of Okinawa (Japanese: 沖縄戦, Hepburn: Okinawa-sen), codenamed Operation Iceberg, was a major battle of the Pacific War fought on the island of Okinawa by the United States Army and United States Marine Corps forces against the Imperial Japanese Army. The initial invasion of Okinawa on 1 April 1945 was the largest amphibious assault in the Pacific Theater of World War II. The Kerama Islands surrounding Okinawa were preemptively captured on 26 March 1945 by the U.S. Army 77th Infantry Division. The 82-day battle on Okinawa lasted from 1 April 1945 until 22 June 1945. After a long campaign of island hopping, the Allies were planning to use Kadena Air Base on the island as a staging point for Operation Downfall, the planned invasion of the Japanese home islands, 340 mi (550 km) away.

The United States created the Tenth Army, a cross-branch force consisting of the U.S. Army 7th, 27th, 77th and 96th Infantry Divisions with the 1st, 2nd, and 6th Marine Divisions, to secure the island. The Tenth Army was unique because it had its own Tactical Air Force (joint Army-Marine command) and was supported by combined naval and amphibious forces. Opposing the Allied forces on the ground was the Japanese Lieutenant General Mitsuru Ushijima's Thirty-Second Army, a mixed force consisting of regular army troops, naval infantry and conscripted local Okinawans. There were about 100,000 Japanese troops on Okinawa at the onset of the invasion. The battle was the longest sustained carrier campaign of the Second World War.

The battle has been referred to as the "typhoon of steel" in English, known in Japanese as "tetsu no bōfū". The nicknames refer to the ferocity of the fighting, the intensity of Japanese kamikaze attacks and the significant volume of Allied vessels and armored vehicles that assaulted the island. The battle was the bloodiest and fiercest in the Pacific Ocean Theatre, with some 50,000 Allied and around 100,000 Japanese casualties, also including local Okinawans conscripted into the Japanese Army. According to local authorities, at least 149,425 Okinawan people were killed, died by coerced suicide or went missing.

In the naval operations surrounding the battle, both sides lost a considerable number of ships and aircraft, including the Japanese battleship Yamato. After the battle, Okinawa provided the victorious Allies with a fleet anchorage, troop staging areas, and airfields in close proximity to Japan as they planned to invade the Japanese home islands.