In the Battle of the Pacific, the Battle of Okinawa was undoubtedly impressive. The war was the most tragic clash between the U.S. and Japanese forces. Because in the Battle of the Pacific, all the remaining sea and air power was assembled in this war. Moreover, the Ryukyu Islands are a natural island chain of the Japanese mainland, Korea, and northeast China. Once the Ryukyu Islands fell into U.S. hands and the United States built airports there, American aircraft could fly into Japan, northeast China, and North Korea without hindrance.
It can be said that this war was won in one battle, the Pacific War can continue, and if it loses, Japan can only rely on its own military strength to defend against the Allied landings. The United States and Japan knew the importance of this war, so the Japanese army gathered 100,000 troops in this battle, plus the locals who signed the Okinawa Islands, the strength of more than 100,000 troops. The U.S. military has assembled 240,000 people, counting the navy and air force supported by the Philippine islands, and the strength of the navy and air force is more than 400,000.
Before the war began, the supreme commander of the Japanese army, Ushijima, believed that the Japanese army could not build a defensive line to hold all of Okinawa, and that it was impossible for the Japanese army to hold the Okinawa Islands. Therefore, the strategic goal set by Ushijima Man at the beginning was to shrink the defensive line to the south, rely on the army to prevent the landing of american troops, and rely on the navy and air force cover. In this way, the advance of the U.S. military was slowed down, thus buying time for the Japanese mainland to establish a defensive line.
But Ujima man obviously lacked a big picture view, and while he was still preparing for okinawa, the United States bombed Japan. Among them, American Major General Curtis LiMei caused the famous "LiMei Barbecue" incident and launched a continuous bombing operation against many Japanese cities. As a result, Japan's industrial production capacity was greatly reduced, and the Japanese mainland could no longer support the Okinawa region.
Subsequently, in less than a month, the U.S. army annihilated the naval forces all over Udo Island, leaving the Japanese troops on Okinawa islands to become turtles in an urn, relying only on the Army to deal with the encirclement of the U.S. Navy, Army, and Air Force, and relying on the Air Force to launch some sporadic attacks on the U.S. Army. By April 1, 1945, the U.S. landing operation on Okinawa officially began.
After the start of the war, because the Japanese defenses in the north of Okinawa were very weak, american troops quickly landed from the north. After the landing, the U.S. army divided the Japanese army into two parts, the north and south, and divided and encircled it. However, the stubbornness of the Japanese resistance surprised the American army, and when the battle was at its most intense, the American army paid the price of thousands of casualties, but the position could only advance a few meters.
The stubborn resistance of the Japanese army on Okinawa brought two results, the first was the unusually heavy casualties of the Japanese army. In this war, the two sides invested hundreds of thousands of troops, the American army lost 20,000 people, but the Japanese army was almost all killed, and in the end only more than 7,000 people were captured alive, leaving only the corpses of the Japanese army on okinawa.
The second is that the United States used atomic bombs. The Battle of Okinawa was simply a re-enactment of the Battle of Iwo Jima, only on a larger scale and with a greater death toll. The war made the American hierarchy realize that Japan would never surrender if they did not use atomic bombs. So a few weeks after the Battle of Okinawa, the United States dropped atomic bombs on Japan.