WASHINGTON NAVY YARD – Naval Historical past and Heritage Command (NHHC) introduced the discharge of a brand new publication, “On the Verge of Breaking Down Fully”: Surviving the Kamikaze off Okinawa, 1945, on-line, Sept. 21, 2023.
The brand new e book, written by Man Nasuti, a historian at NHHC, explores the kamikaze assaults that passed off throughout the battle of Okinawa and the influence these assaults had on the sailors who fought throughout the battle.
Throughout the Battle of Okinawa (1 April–22 June 1945), American sailors confronted their most harmful enemy of the Pacific Warfare: the kamikaze of the Imperial Japanese Particular Assault Corps. Over the course of what rapidly grew to become the deadliest engagement ever fought by the U.S. Navy, American naval officers and their crews developed new ways to counter the brutal onslaught of a suicidal enemy whose sole goal was to demoralize the U.S. fleet and inflict as many casualties as potential. With Japanese hopes for a negotiated peace fading, the nation’s navy leaders considered the kamikaze as their final hope to forestall U.S. forces from reaching the house islands and compelling Japan’s unconditional give up. Certainly, for the primary time within the conflict, the variety of U.S. sailors who perished was better than the variety of American troopers or Marines who died preventing to safe the island.
Drawing on the accounts of enlisted sailors, this research sheds new gentle on the determined wrestle off Okinawa and supplies recent perception into the terrifying ordeal of males underneath the relentless assault of suicide assaults. Finally, American sailors’ tenacity and skill to adapt to be able to win throughout World Warfare II ought to function enduring inspiration to these serving within the U.S. Navy immediately.
“These males had been exhausted and offended on the Japanese for killing their buddies and hitting their ships”, mentioned Nasuti. “They persevered in all that they did and continued preventing till Japan surrendered.”
To obtain a 508-compilant PDF model of the e book please go to: https://www.historical past.navy.mil/analysis/publications/publications-by-subject/on-the-verge-of-breaking-down-completely.html
To take a look at different publications from NHHC, go to: https://www.historical past.navy.mil/analysis/publications.html
