I do not necessarily endorse any of the "embedded" ads.
If you would like to be informed as to when
this page is updated and or you'd like to send it to a friend ..
just click above boxes... thank you very much!!

PLEASE be patient..
I use many graphics therefore loading is SLOW!!
Thank you.

"She is ever watchful....
and her talons are treacherous!!"

[Graphic by my son Ray...thanks hon.]

Joseph Petrovics
Iwo Jima Memorial Monument Sculptor

Battle for Iwo Jima - World War II
February 19 to March 16,1945
Approx. 650 miles south of Tokyo, Japan.
Approximately 2 miles wide, 4 miles long; 8 square miles.

Iwo Jima was the fist native Japanese soil invaded by Americans in W.W.II. Approximately 60,000 Americans and 20,000 Japanese participated in the Battle.

The American Flag Raising on Mt. Suribachi took place on February 23, 1945 - the fifth day of battle. The Battle continued with increased intensity for a month more. Almost 7,000 Americans were killed in action at Iwo Jima - more than 20,000 American casualties.

Approx. one-third of all Marines killed at Iwo Jima - the worst Battle in Marine Corps history.
Twenty-seven Congressional Medals of Honor were awarded in the Battle - more than were awarded to Marines and Navy in any other Battle in our country's history.

Three of the men who raised the flag in the Joe Rosenthal photo were killed before the Battle was over.

After the capture of Iwo Jima, more than 30,000 American Airmen's lives were saved when more than 2,400 disabled B-29 bombers were able to make emergency landings at the Iwo Jima Airfield after making bombing flights over Japan.

Approximately 132 Americans killed at Iwo Jima were unidentifiable and listed as unknown.
Many 4th Division Marines died of wounds aboard ship and were buried at sea.

The U.S. government returned the Island of Iwo Jima to the Japanese government in 1968, after the bodies of the men in the 3rd, 4th, and 5th Division cemeteries were removed to the United States.

NOTE: Five Marines and a Navy hospital corpsman raise the flag on
Mount Suribachi, Iwo Jima, using a piece of Japanese pipe as a mast, February 23, 1945.
Three of the flag raisers were later killed as the fighting raged on.
By March 16, when Iwo Jima was declared secured, 6,821 Americans and
21,000 Japanese (the entire force) had died.
The flag raising photo and subsequent statue came to symbolize being a Marine.

[Above graphics by my son Ray...thanks hon.]

FLYING TIGERS

The "Flying Tigers" was the name for the very popular American aviator volunteer group, who became widely known as one of the most colorful groups of WWII. Each of its P-40's airplanes had the mouth of a tiger shark painted on it. These pilots were recruited by Col. Claire L. Chennault to fight the Japanese in Burma and China during 1941-1942. One of their most memorable raid was on March 24, 1942.... The pre-dawn silence was broken at a small grass airstrip in China, lit only by the dim headlights of an old military truck.... A small group of shark-mouthed American P-40's bearing the Chinese national insignia roared off into the darkness.

Their mission: Destory the enemy squadrons massed at the Southeast Asian headquarters of the Japanese Air Force at Chiang Mai, Thailland, before they have a chance to get off the ground! The very survival of this famous group depended on the success of this extremely dangerous low-level strafing mission. In less than ten minutes, this intrepid band so incapacitated the enemy forces at Chiang Mai that it indeed became one of the Flying Tigers' most memorable raids.

U.S. troops surrender to the Japanese at Corregidor in the Philippine Islands, May 6, 1942. A total of 11,500 Americans and Filipinos became POWs, including the commander, Lt. Gen. Jonathan Wainwright. POWs from Corregidor and Bataan were among the worst treated. Unmerciful tortures, deprivation of food and medical treatment were just a few of the atrocities inflicted upon them. Starvation and untreated Malaria were the cause of countless deaths.

The photographs below were all captured from the Japanese when we took over the 'horrible, inhumane camp that many of our POW's (men and women alike) were sent to...if they indeed survived "The Death March".

THE BATAAN DEATH MARCH

The March of Death. Along the march on which these prisoners were photographed they had their hands tied behind their backs. "The Death March" was about May, 1942, on the Bataan Pennisula.