All language subtitles for The.Pacific.War.in.Color.S01E06.720p.Web.x264.AAC.2ch.ESub.S420

NARRATOR: In late 1944,

the Pacific War is
building to a brutal climax.

One island swallows an
entire Marine regiment.

PVT SLEDGE: We were in
a death trap on Peleliu.

NARRATOR: Another
becomes a beacon of bravery.

PVT MENDEZ: Iwo Jima
was 36 days of pure hell.

NARRATOR: Japan
fights with ferocity.

America fights with fire --

igniting the
war's deadliest day.

MG LEMAY: It was as though Tokyo

had dropped through
the floor of the world.

NARRATOR: With
rare home movies ...

and front line stories ...

hear the voices ...
and feel the fight.

PVT SLEDGE: My heart pounded as
we churned toward that inferno.

♫ ♫

Brought to you by Sailor420
!!! Hope you enjoy the film !!!

♫ ♫

PVT SLEDGE: I became part
of a proud, high-spirited,

elite outfit.

NARRATOR:
Twenty-year-old Eugene Sledge

is just joining the 1st Marines

as they train in
the Pacific in 1944.

The division was
gutted in battles

for Guadalcanal
and Cape Gloucester.

They are full of
replacements like Sledge.

Eighty-five
percent are not yet 21.

PVT SLEDGE: The veterans
taught the replacements

all the ins and outs of
combat with a ruthless foe.

NARRATOR: They're on a
tropical South Pacific island

called Pavuvu. It
sounds like paradise.

The 1st Marines
think it's a hellhole.

PVT SLEDGE: We led
a Spartan existence.

Warmed-over C-rations and
stale coffee passed for chow.

NARRATOR: Space is so tight
they have to march in circles.

Every drill is a
battle with bugs.

Some joke that they'll
welcome a return to combat.

Until they're loading
up for their next battle.

PVT SLEDGE: We, not being fools,
were all scared to death.

The veterans, because
they knew what to expect.

The new men, because we didn't.

♫ ♫

I hung weakly to
the side of the tractor

and prayed that I
would do my duty, survive,

and not wet my pants.

NARRATOR: Sledge inches
closer to his first combat.

The scene before
him is pure hell.

PVT SLEDGE: The
beach was a sheet of flame

backed by a huge
wall of black smoke,

as though the
island was on fire.

(artillery fire and explosions)

NARRATOR: The beach
is already smoldering

with twisted metal and blood.

PVT SLEDGE: My heart pounded as
we churned toward that inferno.

We got to the beach
amid erupting shell bursts

and the rattle of
enemy machine gun bullets

against the steel Amtrac.

NARRATOR: Within an
hour, casualties number

in the hundreds ...

... while the advance
is measured in yards.

The 1st Marines are
taking it on the chin.

Americans want
Peleliu in case it interferes

with a bigger invasion on
the way -- the Philippines.

Japanese film
shows them overrunning

the American territory
in 1941, taking control

of 16 million Filipinos
and 7,000 American POWs.

Ever since, Army
General Douglas MacArthur

has been itching
to take it back.

At every opportunity,
he repeats his mantra:

"I shall return."

He makes the promise;
America makes the plan.

It includes sending Marines

to take the small
airfield at Peleliu,

which could be a nuisance to the
Army's Philippines offensive.

This isn't lost on the troops,

who dub themselves
"MacArthur's Marines."

PVT SLEDGE: We were ordered
to capture the airfield,

and we started across at
a trot in the searing heat.

The ground rocked and
swayed from shell concussions.

And streams of machine-gun
tracers streaked past our ears.

NARRATOR: Within hours,
the wounded start piling up.

(artillery fire)

The Japanese are
lobbing their repelling fire

from this craggy
jumble of peaks.

The 1st Marines nickname
it "Bloody Nose Ridge."

One of the officers
approaching the ridge

is New Yorker George Haggerty.

LTN HAGGERTY: When
my company went in

we were 250 strong
with six officers.

A few days later I
found my commander,

and he said, "You and I
are the only officers left.

And we only have about 20 men."

NARRATOR: Down
to a skeleton unit,

the commander sends
Haggerty and six others

to find a hidden
Japanese emplacement

that already
bloodied much of the company.

LTN HAGGERTY: He
said, "When you get there,

signal to me and we'll come up."

(distant artillery fire)

We crawled our way up the field.

(explosion)

Some of the grenades we threw
up, they threw back down at us.

NARRATOR:
Haggerty gets close enough

to signal his
commander for reinforcements.

LTN HAGGERTY: We signaled and
signaled, and nothing happened.

Instead, our own
armored LVTs came up

and starting firing at us.

(artillery fire)

They thought we were Japanese.

NARRATOR: Haggerty stumbles
back with shrapnel wounds

from enemy and friendly fire.

♫ ♫

(explosion)

LTN HAGGERTY: I went
back to look for my commander

and ask him why he hadn't
brought the reinforcements.

I found him with a
little hole between his eyes

and the whole back
of his head blown off.

That was the end of
the war for my battalion.

We didn't have
any more troops left.

NARRATOR: From the air,
Peleliu looks like the moon.

Underneath, there's an
old network of mining tunnels

that the Japanese transform
into a front unto itself.

PVT SLEDGE: There never
was a front line on Peleliu.

The whole island
was a front line.

NARRATOR:
Japanese are everywhere,

but nowhere to be seen.

Americans end up shooting
blindly into the ground.

They think they win a hill,
only to smell Japanese cooking

wafting up from below ground.

The subterranean maze
is so confounding that

the Americans resort to blasting
shut any hole they see ...

whether they think
anyone's inside or not.

It takes two bloody
weeks to secure the airfield,

and they're uncertain
it was ever a real threat.

The 1st Marines'
overall strength

is down by nearly 60 percent.

MacArthur's
Marines are fading fast.

With Bloody Nose
Ridge surrounded

and the main airfield secure,

Americans turn to
the smaller airfield

on the islet of Ngesebus.

They don't know what
lies across the shallow reef

dividing the islands.
So they don't tiptoe.

They bring all the
might they can muster.

♫ ♫

A textbook landing
goes off without a problem.

But -- there's no payoff.

The airfield is useless --

with unfinished
runways made of soft sand.

The battle for the rest
of Peleliu will drag on.

But with both airfields secure,

the invasion of the
Philippines is about to begin.

(artillery fire)

NARRATOR: Pre-dawn bombardment
illuminates MacArthur

on the day he's
been waiting for.

♫ ♫

The choreography of an
invasion is now well-rehearsed.

But each man knows the
Philippines are different.

The size of the islands.

Sixteen million civilians.

Thousands of allied prisoners.

And the
half-million Japanese defenders

waiting somewhere
behind the veil of smoke

now rising from the coast.

Americans land first on
Leyte, hoping to win it

before invading Luzon
and the capital of Manila.

Unlike Peleliu, the
beach is not heavily defended.

By afternoon,
MacArthur wades ashore.

As the news cameras roll,

he swaggers onto the
sand without a helmet.

There may be no
combat on the beach,

but there is some dark comedy.

The scale of the invasion
strains the supply chain.

On the first day,
107,000 tons come ashore.

But not in the right order.

In the rush to
unload, urgent supplies

are buried under
less important ones.

And ... it's the rainy season.

Captain John
Hanna takes home movies

of the muck his
unit has to navigate.

It's thick.
Slick. And inescapable.

Though the water
buffalo don't seem to mind.

Back on his ship, Hanna films
locals approaching in canoes.

They're looking for
safe harbor in the shadows

of American ships that
now blanket Leyte Gulf.

But so many ships in one place
make an irresistible target.

American carriers provide

the only air
support for the invasion.

If Japan can
disable this lifeline,

they could isolate
the Americans on land.

The Imperial Japanese
Navy decides to attack.

♫ ♫

American ships buzz to life.

The Battle of Leyte Gulf

will decide the
future of the Philippines.

Naval battles often boil
down to pilot versus pilot.

In the air, Americans
continue to dominate.

(explosion)

As Japanese fighters
fall away, an American

gets a clear shot at an
enemy ship. He doesn't miss.

Out of desperation,
Japan changes tactics.

Their planes dive
closer to American ships.

Hidden in the smoke, this
one punches through staccato

anti-aircraft fire, flying
lower than anyone expects.

Navy man Charles Ripper is
shocked at what he sees next.

SN RIPPER: Coming towards
us was a Japanese plane,

just skimming over the
water. We jumped for cover.

NARRATOR: It
lands a suicidal blow.

♫ ♫

(explosion)

These are the first
organized kamikaze attacks

of the Pacific War.
They will not be the last.

Over four days,
America loses six warships,

but Japan loses 26.

The seas around the Philippines
are now American waters.

The ground war will be
bloody, and Manila awaits.

But only one side will
have air and sea support.

The other will slowly choke.

Back on Peleliu, the 1st Marines

have to finish
what they started.

They fire grenades with rifles.

They throw Molotov cocktails.

And they deploy a new weapon

called the Navy
Mark One Flamethrower.

It shoots a blazing laser
of napalm up to 150 yards.

PVT FOX: We were limited by not
being able to use poison gas.

Other than that,
just about anything went.

NARRATOR: Americans also
drop napalm from the air.

It's a new tactic getting its
first big tryout on Peleliu.

They hope to scorch
Japanese they can't see.

They provide powerful fireworks,

but they have little effect
on deep Japanese positions.

Killing the enemy from
a distance isn't working.

It's going to take close combat.

PVT FOX: As a
private first class,

your war lies
within 15 feet of you.

It's kinda like Gettysburg.

NARRATOR: Fred Fox
is an Army infantryman

attached to the 1st Marines.

His entire World
War II combat career

is 48 hours on
Peleliu -- at age 18.

PVT FOX: I was
only in one battle.

But the two days that
I fought at Peleliu ...

marked my life more
than anything else.

NARRATOR: Here, a
medical evacuation

gets burned into memory.

(explosion)

Three lie wounded.

Enemy fire pins down two
corpsmen just yards away.

Five lives hang in the balance.

PVT FOX: A thousandth of a
second, a hundredth of an inch,

and that's the difference

between whether
I was dead or not.

NARRATOR: The corpsmen struggle
to carry the stretcher case.

The other two combine whatever
strength they have left

to get themselves out.

The scene is
repeated over and over,

as the war plays out on
the tiny stage of Peleliu.

PVT FOX: You're
talking about an island

that's about two miles wide,

and you get
maybe 11,000 Japanese

and 28,000
Americans mad at each other?

NARRATOR: The 1st
Marines are trapped

on this cage of an island

that seems
determined to swallow them all.

PVT FOX: Some
mention a premonition

of when they're gonna die.

One sergeant in
the tent with me,

been through
Guadalcanal and New Britain.

On Peleliu he said, "I
don't want to go out there.

I'm not gonna make this."

And he didn't.

He didn't make it two minutes.

NARRATOR: In their
third year of war,

and sixth week on Peleliu,

the 1st Marines are in no
mood to play by the rules.

PVT SLEDGE: We
never took prisoners,

even when some tried to give up.

We routinely shot both dead

and wounded in the head,
to make sure they were dead.

♫ ♫

NARRATOR: By the end of
October, it's still not over.

But it is for the 1st Marines.

Almost a third of their
men are dead or wounded.

MacArthur's Marines load up

and leave Peleliu
for the Army to finish.

It will take another month.

Peleliu becomes one of
the enduring question marks

of the Pacific War.

Eighteen hundred dead.

Eight thousand wounded.

All for some dusty airfields

that may not have
been a threat after all.

PVT SLEDGE: All too many young
Americans were sent to Peleliu,

and into oblivion. Before
they had ever really lived.

NARRATOR: In the
march toward Japan,

America seems lost in
the Southwest Pacific.

In the Central Pacific,
the path is more clear --

island-hop toward Japan

with daring and
distant amphibious assaults.

Americans have advanced as
far as the Mariana Islands.

Saipan, Guam and Tinian
are all recently captured,

and at the mercy of
American machinery.

They are paving the way
for a brand new aircraft --

the B-29 Superfortress.

But from the
factory to the flight line,

it's plagued with problems.
Deliveries are delayed.

In Kansas,
Raymond Halloran's crew

has been training on
other aircraft instead.

LTN HALLORAN: We had 11
people in our B-29 crew.

They were from 11
different states.

It was sort of Americana.

The gunner was from Michigan,
radarman from Oklahoma.

You wonder where these
kids are all coming from.

One day, we came
out to this ramp,

and out there was a
brand-new, silver B-29.

What a beautiful thing!

That was going to be
ours to take overseas.

We were so excited.

NARRATOR: For the first time,
they are flying untethered

from a training script,
unsupervised by superiors.

Halloran is 21 years old.

LTN HALLORAN: We
were going alone.

It was crystal clear.

We climbed to about
20,000 feet, moving west.

NARRATOR: They fly over the
familiar landscape of home,

heading toward a
distant, abstract war,

somewhere in the
direction of the setting sun.

LTN HALLORAN: There was
very little said for a while.

Then we got out
over the Pacific.

There wasn't a sound
in the plane -- nothing.

Nobody said a thing.

I had a definite feeling that
I'm leaving everything behind --

my mother and
father, and my training --

and I am going into combat.

I think on that evening, at
that time, at that altitude,

I converted from
youth to manhood.

I could do the job of a man.

NARRATOR: Also on
the way to the Marianas

is General Curtis LeMay.

These are his home
movies from the war,

which have never
been broadcast before.

He's arriving from
India, where his bombing group

had trouble striking
Japan from such a distance.

He hopes the Marianas will
change the B-29 equation --

if he can whip
his men into shape.

MG LEMAY: We had
crews that weren't trained,

and we had outfits
that weren't organized.

Everything was wrong.

NARRATOR: As he comes in for a
landing at his new headquarters,

LeMay's reputation is already
circulating on the ground.

LTN BRADEN: We
called him "Old Iron Pants"

because he was a tough cookie.

He was the George
Patton of the Air Force.

NARRATOR: In the winter of 1944,
hundreds of brand new B-29s

begin streaming
into the Marianas

like giant migratory birds.

MG LEMAY: We had just
six weeks to move the B-29s

to bases in the Marianas,

fly a few shakedown flights,

and launch an operation.

NARRATOR: American
air power is building up

like a storm cloud
in the Central Pacific.

Japan can only guess when
it will thunder overhead.

NARRATOR: Japan is rattled.

Americans are
encroaching dangerously close.

A Japanese film
shows a geography lesson

turning into a dire warning.

The teacher
pinpoints the Marianas

and draws an arc
that includes Tokyo.

Air raid drills
signal a tense new reality.

In public, one admiral

describes the defeat
in measured language.

ADM KURIHARA: Our garrison
on Saipan fought bravely.

All of them died a heroic death.

NARRATOR: In private,
another admiral is more blunt,

saying simply:
"Hell is upon us."

ANNOUNCER: Bombs are wheeled up

to a B-29
Superfortress on Saipan Island.

It is only the beginning

as these mighty bombers prepare
for the first raid on Tokyo

in two and a half years.

NARRATOR: American newsreels
paint the B-29 as a savior.

But it can barely soar.

♫ ♫

They labor to take off
with 10,000 pounds of bombs.

This one almost
runs off the runway.

MM EARP: When they
picked up that B-29,

you could almost
see it screaming.

NARRATOR: In January of 1945,
B-29s begin raids on Japan.

The entire
rationale for island hopping

will now be put to the test.

En route, crews
review their targets ...

what little they
know about them.

MG LEMAY: We didn't really
know anything about Japan.

We didn't have any secret agents

creeping around
sending us information.

NARRATOR: But an even bigger
problem looms at 25,000 feet --

a roaring tailwind.

LTN BRADEN: We were
scooting across Tokyo

at 500 miles an hour.

NARRATOR: Bombs drop
into this lashing wind --

and scatter like feathers.

LTN BRADEN: We not
only missed the target --

I'm not even sure we hit Tokyo.

NARRATOR: Americans try flying
the missions into the wind.

LTN BRADEN: One
plane tried that one day

and they found
out they were going

three miles an hour backwards.

NARRATOR: The
B-29 was built to bomb

from the safety
of high altitude.

No one imagined its payload

splashing
harmlessly into the sea.

ANNOUNCER:
Heading back to Saipan,

the first Superfortress mission
over Tokyo is a success.

NARRATOR: Curt LeMay
knows it really isn't.

The B-29 still isn't landing

the knockout
punch it was made for.

In Guam, this one doesn't
even make it off the runway.

General LeMay films
the wreckage himself,

and he can feel the
heat -- in every way.

MG LEMAY: They said if you don't
get results, you'll be fired.

If you don't get results,

it'll mean a mass
amphibious invasion of Japan.

NARRATOR: One way
to improve results

is to keep more B-29s
from crashing along the way.

Americans look for a
place to land a broken B-29

between the Marianas and Japan.

There's only one
choice. Iwo Jima.

Raymond Halloran's
crew, fresh from Kansas,

gets its very
first combat orders.

LTN HALLORAN: The
mission was to go to Iwo Jima,

650 miles away,
to bomb the runway.

NARRATOR: By now,
the Army Air Force

is trying to prove the value
of the B-29 any way it can.

LCDR ANDERSON: The Air
Force wanted to come in

and saturate every
square inch of Iwo Jima,

because there were no civilians.

Then all we'd have to
do is walk on the beach,

put up the flag,
and bury dead Japanese.

NARRATOR: From above,
the island looks lifeless.

Halloran quickly
finds out otherwise.

LTN HALLORAN: They opened
up with anti-aircraft fire.

NARRATOR: Japanese
footage reveals guns

aiming straight up at
the incoming bombers.

LTN HALLORAN: I
didn't know they were

going to be shooting at us.

We had a few little holes in
our plane when we came back.

How proud we were of that.
It proved we were in combat.

NARRATOR: Halloran's crew

gets a little
nicked up over Iwo Jima.

Americans hope the ground
invasion is just as harmless.

For centuries, Mount Suribachi

crowned a barren
island of little value.

But in 1945, two
armies want it badly.

Japan is using it to
attack B-29s passing overhead.

America sees it as an
emergency landing strip.

They will both now use
it as a slaughterhouse.

(explosions)

ST BRUNTON: I went topside just
about the time we were leaving,

and I saw that rock.

It was the most desolate
looking piece of real estate

I ever saw in my life.

NARRATOR: As landing craft
circle waiting for the signal,

Americans fear the enemy
will fight back with fire --

and explode barrel
bombs of fuel on the beach.

Marines smear their faces
with white anti-flash cream

to guard against burns.

♫ ♫

At 9:02 a.m., the
first wave hits the sand.

MAN: Everybody
out. Move, move, move.

NARRATOR: The beach
is steep and loose.

They struggle in
the fine volcanic ash.

But resistance is light.

There are no
barrel bombs of fuel.

But as more waves come ashore,

more men and machines
get stuck in the sand.

PVT LIBERTY: You were walking in
mush almost up to your knees.

It was a struggle.

NARRATOR: Soon, the crowd on the
beach reaches critical mass.

That's when the
Japanese open up.

(explosions)

CPL SHERRILL: I could
look up from my foxhole

and it was just 20, 30
mortars in the air at a time.

NARRATOR: By 9:20 a.m.,

it's an unceasing,
ear-splitting barrage.

No Japanese are
on the beach itself.

Most are entrenched
on Mount Suribachi.

Inside the mountain is a maze of
tunnels and monster pillboxes

with walls up to
four feet thick.

The Japanese can pummel
the entire beach with lead.

Marines are trapped within
yards of where they landed.

There's no place
to go except down.

SGT GRAY: We decided
we'd clean out a shell hole

and make it a little
deeper for a shelter.

And we hit something down there.

When we uncovered
it, it was a Marine.

NARRATOR: Bodies are buried ...

trapped ...

and torn apart.

Suribachi is
like a hunting stand,

and Americans are easy prey.

The barrage
continues into the night.

Here, the Japanese score a hit

on an American
ammo dump on the beach.

(explosions)

LCDR ANDERSON: It was bullets
and all kinds of ammunition

exploding all around.

It was like Chinese fireworks.

NARRATOR: The first
day on Iwo Jima ends

with the beach on fire and
supplies going up in smoke.

Americans resolve to
turn the tide the next day --

by scaling Suribachi.

NARRATOR: The assault
on Mount Suribachi begins

by punching it
from the air and sea.

Americans make the dormant
volcano seem alive again.

Then, Marines start to climb up.

Soon, blood starts to flow down.

(explosions)

One unit supported by
tanks pushes up for six hours,

advances only 200 yards, and
tallies 162 dead and wounded.

As usual, Americans
rarely see the Japanese.

So they pour
fire into every hole.

(explosions)

After four days of
relentless fighting,

a handful of
Marines get to the top.

They plant a small flag
tied to some old Japanese pipe.

A few hours later, a
larger flag goes up.

Gilberto Mendez can see
it from his troop ship,

and his emotions
go into overdrive.

He's about to come
ashore to join the fight.

PVT MENDEZ: My heart was beating
a thousand times a minute.

My skin was like chicken skin.

I lost my fear.

If those guys made it, I could.

But it was false, that feeling,

because the good
stuff hadn't started yet.

NARRATOR: This is home movie
footage of pre-war Manila.

As the capital of
a U.S. territory,

it's infused with
American style --

from western clothes ...

to neon glitz.

♫ ♫

But when the Allies return

to wrestle it back
from the Japanese,

it's a different city.

Now ashen and hollow,
it's the bombed-out backdrop

for the biggest urban
battle of the Pacific War.

(explosions and artillery fire)

MacArthur prohibits air strikes,
trying to spare civilians.

It takes street-by-street
guerrilla warfare.

American tanks roll into the
University of the Philippines.

The campus is under siege.

Here, University
Hall becomes a gun nest.

Japanese rifles
crack from the top floor.

(gunfire)

Allies fire back, taking chunks
out of the colonial facade.

The Pacific War is
turning Manila to dust.

Finally, the city goes quiet.

♫ ♫

Civilians are in survival mode.

American POWs enjoy
their first taste of freedom

in more than two years.

Kneeling over this body
is serviceman Dan Rocklin.

He films the horrors
that now litter Manila.

But he also captures Filipinos
striving for normalcy.

Rocklin's film has
never been broadcast before.

His footage reveals
a blossoming hope --

that the storm of war
may finally be passing.

Almost a week into the
battle for Iwo Jima ...

... fresh troops come ashore
to reinforce depleted units.

PVT MENDEZ: As replacements,
we were a nobody group.

We went wherever we were
needed. I didn't know anybody.

NARRATOR: But Gilberto
Mendez gets to know Iwo Jima

in a hurry.

PVT MENDEZ: The first
days I was on the ground,

I urinated in my
pants because I thought

if I dropped my rifle
to pee I would be killed.

NARRATOR: The flag already
flying on Mount Suribachi

is the enduring
symbol of Iwo Jima.

But the north is the
where Marines have to win it.

The Japanese have abandoned

Banzai charges and
costly counterattacks.

Now they simply wait to
ambush advancing Americans.

(explosion)

Including Gilberto Mendez.

PVT MENDEZ: I
saw something shine.

It was a
Japanese officer's sword,

and he was leading
his men out of a cave.

The bullets were flying.

(gunfire)

When I saw below his
neck, I pulled the trigger,

one shot after another.

They found
thirteen holes in his body.

I made hamburger out of him.

NARRATOR: More and more bodies
litter the volcanic landscape.

In Japanese, Iwo Jima
means "sulfur island."

The steam smells
like rotten eggs.

Freshly dug foxholes
are too hot to get into.

PVT MENDEZ: You couldn't
stay 15 minutes in one place

because your boots
would get too hot.

NARRATOR: One Marine
even tries on the boots

of a dead Japanese soldier,

hoping they might keep
his feet from burning.

Combat is close.

(explosion)

Fiery.

And exhausting.

Two weeks into the battle,

nearly 10,000 American
wounded have been evacuated.

Including Gilberto
Mendez, with a head injury.

PVT MENDEZ: An
explosion picked me up

and I hit the ground again, with
a terrible ringing in my ear.

I was choking on my own tongue.

A corpsman tried
to pull my tongue out

by piercing it
with a big safety pin.

NARRATOR: Under tents
and inside hospital ships,

doctors and nurses tend to
injuries beyond description.

And some beyond repair.

But soon, the reason for all
this carnage comes into view.

♫ ♫

CPL WALKER: Those planes were
coming back shot full of holes,

and tore all to pieces.

NARRATOR: On March
4th, the first B-29

comes in for a forced landing.

Hundreds more will sputter into
Iwo Jima from raids in Japan.

This one is so crippled it
can't even make the runway.

But the crew will be spared.

Even with Iwo
Jima as a life raft,

B-29 raids into
Japan are failing.

The overall game
plan still isn't working.

So Curtis LeMay
changes the rules.

MG LEMAY: We weren't going
to be able to defeat Japan

using high
altitude precision bombing.

I had to do something radical.

NARRATOR: The entire
premise of island hopping

now rests on
Curt LeMay's command.

So he designs a drastically
different kind of mission.

David Braden
remembers the briefing.

LTN BRADEN: We were going
to fly in at 5,000 feet --

a surprise attack,
probably around midnight.

NARRATOR: LeMay thinks going
in low will solve the problem

of high winds
and blinding clouds.

But that's not the only change.

LTN BRADEN: We were to carry
10 tons of incendiary bombs.

NARRATOR: Until now,
America's use of napalm

has been specific to a target
-- a cave, or a jungle hideout.

Now, LeMay has
something bigger in mind.

MG LEMAY: Tokyo
would be our target.

The primary target.

The secondary target.

And the only target.

NARRATOR: Three
hundred and twenty-five B-29s

take off in the
afternoon skies --

double the number ever
used in a single raid before.

They fly in groups,
at night, lights off.

Flying in low, the big slow
planes could be easy targets.

Crews fear they're
on a suicide mission.

LTN BRADEN: We were saying,

"We are going to be
the American kamikazes

and they are going to
shoot us down like crazy."

NARRATOR: Then,
Tokyo appears below.

The first of more than three
million pounds of firebombs

drop into the night.

LTN BRADEN: A firestorm started.

The updrafts from
the heat of the fires

threw the
airplanes all over the sky.

It was frightening.

There'd be an
aircraft right next to you

and you didn't even
know the guy was there.

NARRATOR: The air is
swirling with ashes,

and crews can smell
burning flesh at 5,000 feet.

MG LEMAY: The firestorm
consumed so much oxygen

that those who did not die by
the flames simply suffocated.

NARRATOR: The next
morning, Japan is in shock.

♫ ♫

MG LEMAY: It was as
though Tokyo had dropped

through the floor of the world
and into the mouth of hell.

NARRATOR: Sixteen square miles
of central Tokyo are in ashes.

An estimated 100,000 are
killed -- mostly civilians.

It's the single deadliest
day of the Pacific War.

Neither atomic bomb will kill
this many on the day it drops.

To LeMay, it's an
unqualified success.

He draws up plans to
firebomb other cities,

bring Japan to its knees,

and force surrender.

MG LEMAY: We had
stockpiled enough incendiaries

to follow the Tokyo raid

with just about all the
major urban areas in Japan.

NARRATOR: For LeMay,
the fire is only starting.

NARRATOR: By
late March, Iwo Jima

is finally under
American control.

Supplies drop down that
will help turn this arid rock

into a
full-fledged military base.

♫ ♫

Japanese troops will keep
pouring out of this underworld

for months.

They too are exhausted,
but unwilling to quit.

♫ ♫

Here, Americans liberate Koreans

who had been toiling
at Japanese gunpoint.

They report Japanese are still
inside, and won't surrender.

Once all the Koreans are out,

a demolition team
seals the cave shut.

(explosion)

Iwo Jima is now
an island of tombs.

Some 20,000 Japanese and
7,000 Americans are dead.

PVT MENDEZ: We were
told the whole operation

would take only
three to four days.

It turned out to be
36 days of pure hell.

(explosions)

NARRATOR: Japan can sense the
pressure coming from all fronts.

Ships from the sea.

Boots on the ground.

And fire from the sky.

The Japanese Empire is
on the verge of collapse,

but there is no
sign of surrender.

Americans have one
more island to take

before invading Japan itself.

Survivors of Peleliu and
Iwo Jima are on their way --

to Okinawa.

Don't ask them
which one is worse.

LTN HAGGERTY: I
can't answer that.

How do you compare hell to hell?