The next campaign was to be the decisive battle that strategists on both sides had planned for almost half a century, the drive into the Marianas and the resulting naval battle of the Philippine Sea. Led by the legendary General Holland M. "Howlin Mad" Smith in the spring of 1944, the joint Marine/Army amphibious force took Saipan, Guam, and Tinian in just a matter of weeks. This gave the Americans bases to launch B-29 strategic bombers against Japan, less than 1,500 nm/2,750 km away. From these bases, the war was taken to the Japanese homeland in an intense firebombing and mine-laying campaign. It also provided the bases that launched the atomic bomb strikes that ended the war.
More than the other services, the Marine Corps clearly saw its mission in World War II, and developed appropriate technologies and skills to accomplish its critical task of amphibious assault. This is in sharp contrast to the Army Air Force, which saw strategic bombing alone as the key to victory[4], and the Navy, which thought their battleships' guns would win the war.[5] The Corps understood that war is a joint operation — if we were going to win, all the services were needed — and this vision has continued into the postwar era. Always innovators, since the end of World War II the Marines have been leaders in the developments of helicopters, air-cushioned landing craft, and other technologies.
Iwo Jima: The Defining Moment
Following the mainly Army-led invasion of the Philippines in late 1944, the Marines were ready to begin their drive towards the home islands of Japan. They would need to be ready, because the next battle in the Pacific would be the toughest yet: Iwo Jima. A tiny pork-chop-shaped island (just eight square miles) in the Bonin chain just 670 nm/1,225 km from Japan, it was a vital link in the drive on the Japanese homeland. In February 1945, 71,245 Marines hit the volcanic ash beaches of Iwo Jima. There were 21,000 Japanese dug in, determined to fight to the death. They did. Over the next month, Marine and Navy casualties were almost 27,000, and virtually every Japanese on the island was killed. The American lives were not wasted, however, for the island runways began to save the lives of B-29 crewmen even before the fighting ended.
These dry facts are all well and good. But beyond them is a deeper reality: The battle of Iwo Jima was the single defining moment in the history of the Corps. Iwo Jima was an impregnable fortress if there ever was one, far tougher than anything along Hitler's vaunted "Atlantic Wall." The Japanese had spent over a year fortifying the island, including over eleven miles of tunnels which were dug mostly with hand tools! Japanese leaders clearly understood that its loss would put even American P-51 Mustang fighters within range of the home islands. For the Marines, Iwo Jima was going to be the last all-Marine invasion of the war, and they needed to take it, both for what it meant to the war effort and for what it meant to the image of the Corps. Iwo Jima was their island, and they meant to take it whatever it cost. They got their wish.
From the moment that they hit the black sand beaches, Iwo Jima was the hell of every Marine's nightmare, with death and horror behind every rock and in every hole. But tough as the Japanese and their island fortress was, the Marines and their Navy support offshore were tougher. Yard by yard, rock by rock, the Marines cleared the island. And in so doing, they wrote a unique page in American military history. In front of the full view of the wartime press, Marine units advanced against suicidal Japanese forces, taking everything that was thrown at them. Twenty-four Marines won the Medal of Honor on Iwo,[6] more than at any other battle in history.
Lastly, Iwo Jima gave the Corps and America its most famous and enduring World War II image, the raising of the American flag atop Mount Suribachi. When the flag was raised at 10:20 A.M. on February 23rd, 1945, Secretary of the Navy James Forrestal, watching from one of the offshore ships, turned to General Holland "Howlin' Mad" Smith and said, "General, the raising of that flag means a Marine Corps for the next five hundred years." Now memorialized with the magnificent memorial overlooking the Potomac River in Rosslyn, Virginia, this was the defining moment of the Marine Corps. More than any other aspect of the Marine ethos, the indomitable spirit of the Corps at Iwo Jima tells who they are. It says there is nothing Marines won't try if ordered to do so, and no cost they will not pay to accomplish that mission. Later, at Chosin Reservoir, Khe Sanh, and the Beirut barracks, Marines remembered the sprit of Iwo Jima, dug in, and accomplished their missions, no matter what was asked of them. That is the Marine ethos defined.
"Send the Marines"
Following the war, the Corps endured the same downsizing as the other military services. The hollow shells of just two divisions remained: the 1st at Camp Pendleton, California, and the 2nd at Camp Lejeune, North Carolina. The year 1950 saw a rapid Marine response to the outbreak of war in Korea. Once President Truman committed ground troops to help the beleaguered South Koreans, Marines were among the first reinforcements to arrive. Unfortunately, after the brilliant landing at Inchon (September 15th, 1950) by Marine and Army forces and the drive to the Yalu River, the Marines settled down to a miserable routine of trench warfare. They spent the next twenty-two months fighting as "leg" infantry alongside the other UN forces. This misuse of the Marines' unique amphibious capabilities made a deep impression on the leadership of the Corps, who determined it would never happen again. Their response to the problems of Korea was a new organizational doctrine, the Marine Air-Ground Task Force (MAGTF). The idea was to keep the air, land, and logistical elements of Marine units together, as an integrated team. In this way, Marines on the ground would not have to depend upon the Air Force for close air support (CAS) or the Army for supplies. They would be able to shape their own tactics and doctrine. Half a century later, Marines always go to fight in MAGTFs.
The election of Dwight D. Eisenhower as President brought a new respect for the capabilities of the Marine Corps. Eisenhower and his successors began a tradition of sending highly mobile MAGTFs to trouble spots around the world for pacification, peacekeeping, or plain old-fashioned gunboat diplomacy. Some, like the landing operation in Beirut in 1958, were highly successful. Others, like the 1965 Dominican Republic operation, were widely viewed as repressive mistakes. Direct U.S. military intervention in Vietnam in 1964 began as a series of landings designed to prop up the government of South Vietnam. Marines served in Vietnam from the first to the very last in 1975, usually assigned to the I Corps area in the northern sector of South Vietnam.
For the Corps, the tendency of Presidents to "send the Marines" simply affirms their "first to fight" reputation, as well as the inherent flexibility of the MAGTF concept. Willingness to move first and fast, and being ready to do so, is part of the Marine ethos — when you want something done right, give the job to the Corps!
4
Airpower zealots believed that daylight precision bombing, using the top-secret Norden bombsight, would quickly cripple the German war effort. It turned out that the accuracy of bombing had been overestimated by several orders of magnitude, and most of the bombs dropped on Germany were wasted.
5
Navy submarines sank far more enemy shipping in WWII than the cherished and vastly expensive battleships, despite the handicap of scandalously unreliable torpedoes during the first year of the war.
6
Twelve of these awards were posthumous. Several Navy medics serving with Marine units on Iwo Jima were also awarded the Medal.