Word: okinawa
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...stiffest, ablest defense yet made by the Japs was put up on Okinawa. By last week, many a citizen and many a Pacific soldier saw significance in that fact when it was coupled with another. The second fact: on Okinawa more Jap soldiers surrendered than had ever surrendered before...
...Guam, Saipan and other islands long conquered by the U.S., Jap soldiers holed up in the hills still surrender by twos and threes, only occasionally by squads. But on Okinawa, even before the battle had ended, there were some surrenders in platoon strength, a few in greater numbers. Japanese prisoner compounds were populated by the hundreds...
...narrow ledge overlooking the sea at the southern end of Okinawa the two Generals whispered to each other. They knelt side by side on a patchwork quilt covered by a white sheet (the color of death). Ushijima's aide stepped forward, bowed, handed each General a gleaming knife. The knives had been half covered with white cloth, so that the aide did not touch the sacred metal...
...Navy last week totted up its losses off Okinawa: 4,907 men killed or missing, 4,824 wounded-nearly 20% of its total casualties in all oceans for the entire war. Okinawa was also the war's costliest operation for ships, according to the Navy's own figures: 33 ships sunk, more than 50 damaged...
...fiercely. But across the world's biggest ocean the U.S. was bodily moving its fighting manpower and an unprecedented mass of weapons for the kill. Vast areas of industrial Japan were in ruins from bombing. A more & more hermetic blockade from sea and air was closing in. In Okinawa the U.S. forces were only 325 miles from the home archipelago. From Siberia fell the lengthening shadow of Russia. Cried Premier Kantaro Suzuki: Japan's crisis "is the greatest since the Mongolian invasion...