Battle of Okinawa

Battle of Okinawa
	Part of the Volcano and Ryukyu Islands campaign of the Pacific Theater (World War II)
	; 1st Marine Regiment during fighting at Wana Ridge during the Battle of Okinawa, May 1945
Date	1 April – 22 June 1945; (2 months and 3 weeks)
Location	Okinawa Island and Prefecture, Ryukyu Islands, Empire of Japan26°30′N 128°00′E
Result	Allied victory
Belligerents
Ground forces:; United States; Naval support:; United Kingdom; Australia; New Zealand; Canada	Japan
Commanders and leaders
Simon B. Buckner Jr. †; Roy Geiger; Chester W. Nimitz; Raymond A. Spruance; William Halsey Jr.	Mitsuru Ushijima †; Isamu Chō †; Hiromichi Yahara (POW); Minoru Ōta †; Seiichi Itō †
Units involved
Ground units:; Tenth Army III Amphibious Corps 1st Marine Division; 2nd Marine Division; 6th Marine Division; ; XXIV Corps 7th Infantry Division; 27th Infantry Division; 77th Infantry Division; 96th Infantry Division; ; 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
~541,000 in Tenth Army ; ~183,000 combat troops rising to ~250,000	~76,000+ Japanese soldiers; ~40,000+ Okinawan conscripts
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); Total casualties: ~76,000 to 84,000; Materiel:; 153 tanks destroyed ; 13 destroyers sunk; 15 amphibious ships sunk; 8 other ships sunk; 386 ships damaged; 763 aircraft lost	Japanese 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); 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
	40,000–150,000 civilians dead
	Location within Japan Battle of Okinawa (Pacific Ocean)

The Battle of Okinawa (Japanese: 沖縄戦, Hepburn: Okinawa-sen), codenamed Operation Iceberg,^: 17 was a major battle of the Pacific War fought on the island of Okinawa by 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 by the 77th Infantry Division. The 82-day battle lasted from 1 April until 22 June 1945. After a long campaign of island hopping, the Allies were planning to use Kadena Air Base on the large island of Okinawa as a base 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 fight on the island. The Tenth Army was unique in that 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 Thirty-Second Army. The Battle of Okinawa was the single 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 sheer numbers of Allied ships and armored vehicles that assaulted the island. The battle was the bloodiest and fiercest of the Pacific War, with some 50,000 Allied and around 100,000 Japanese casualties,^{: 473–474} 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 considerable numbers of ships and aircraft, including the Japanese battleship Yamato. After the battle, Okinawa provided a fleet anchorage, troop staging areas, and airfields in proximity to Japan for US forces in preparation for a planned invasion of the Japanese home islands.

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