Customer Reviews

Operation Iceberg : The Invasion and Conquest of Okinawa in World War II

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My father was a member of the 77th Division which fought in the Pacific. He never talked about the war and I have always been interested in learning more about how he survived. This book is a MUST read for anyone whose father fought in the Pacific, especially on Okinawa. It is not a history lesson as other books are, but actual memoirs of the soldiers who fought there. You are even given their names and brief biography. You hear and read so much regarding the D-Day invasion and how terrible that was but after reading Operation Iceberg, you will come to understand how much worse the fighting in the Pacific was. I find it hard to believe that anyone came home unwounded from those battles, but they did, including my father. My knowledge of World War II has been greatly expanded after reading Mr. Astor's book. Thank you, Mr. Astor, for writing this book and for giving me some insight into what my father lived through.

This is a great book about a great and important battle. Astos is a master of oral history. This book will make you think you are on the battlefield. If you like military history, this is a book for you. If you want to know why we used atomic bombs on Japan, then you need to read this book.

Operation Iceberg is a masterwork of the oral history approach to telling a story. Astor ably edits and arranges the various oral accounts into a quick-paced, yet comprehensive account of a rather complex and important battle. Astor has collected inputs from Marines, Sailors, Soldiers, and Airmen who were there and made victory possible. But the accounts would be nothing if they weren't arranged into a pattern that the reader could follow. Astor does that, and provides his own brief narrative to fill in any gaps that the oral accounts have left. As a result, the book becomes a text on the Battle for Okinawa and not just a collection of personal reminisces.

I have read only a few books on the battle of Okinawa. One of my favourites is "Tennozan" by George Feifer, however "Operation Iceburg" is just as good and gives you a insight into the life and death struggle of the combat soldier. A great book, easy to read and one that reminds you of the hell that men went through during WWII.

Gerald Astor's book on Okinawa is, again, one of the better oral histories I have read on WWII. He delicately weaves the stories as told by the servicemen with his own narratives. What works with this is a great "you are there" feel to the book. The soldiers give harrowing accounts of the fighting with the Japanese and how they would infiltrate the foxholes at night only for the Marines to see the daylight battlefield scattered with the corpses of the Jap soldiers.

I knew from other books and TV documentaries how savage the Japs were; and this book confirms it with the soldiers stories. Astor concludes this book with his analysis on the battle and how the dropping of the atom bomb took place shortly thereafter. He skillfully analyses the Okinawan/Iwo Jima fighting with Truman's reasoning for using the bomb.

The only drawback of the book (my '95 paperback copy) were not enough maps of Okinawa (only one small map in the beginning of the book).

At any rate, definitely worth a read and an addition to your library.

This is a great book to read, but I found that it is very heavy reading. This book is incredibly interesting, and is full of amazing anecdotes,as well as some shocking ones. I found that i could only read a chapter or two a day to fully appreciate and understand what was written, but nevertheless it is a great book!

1st of all, I'm not too big into the Pacific Theater of WWII (My main interest is the European Theater). This is the 1st book I have read about it. With that in mind; I found this book interesting. It is mostly personal stories of G.I's and there wild stories of fighting the Japs. It was very interesting to learn about the Japs tatics that they used, usually at night & also about how feared the Japanese locals & Jap military were deathly afraid to fall into the hands of the Americans. This is part of the reason that 99% of the Japs fought to the death. The book covers fighting on land and at sea. The book also covers the death of Ernie Pyle.

More people died during the Battle of Okinawa than during the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki just six weeks later. This is where correspondent Ernie Pyle (made an appearance in Knoxville, TN to interview a local personage at a small cafe) was killed by a sniper shot just a couple of weeks after the landing by our troops. This was the most bloody close-quarters of land fighting in WWII with 12,520 American casualties from the various branches of our enlisted men, Marines, airmen, sailors and soldiers.

'Operation Iceberg,' as it was known had the fiercest attack of kamikazes (named after the 'divine wind' which had reputedly saved Japan from a Mongol invasion. They were first seen in action against HMAS 'Australia' and 'Taffy1" earlier in the war. The kamikaze pilots were proud (and crazy) to become the ultimate sacrifice for their country. On Christmas Eve, 1942, the troopship 'Mauertania,' went on a convoluted course to safely deliver five hundred German POWs, thousands of wounded Allied soldiers, twenty-five civilians (women and children) home to USA for Christmas. By Christmas Eve, two months after sailing from the Persian Gulf, they'd had to evade the submarines and the kamikaze planes. With the occasional weaving of the boat to confuse enemy sub pursuit, the weary travelers clung to the railing wondering if they would ever see America again. Just six months earlier, in June 1942, the Japanese defeat at the Battle of Midway and Guadalcanal in August caused the ferociousness of the kamikaze attacks had increased and the cruier 'Helena' had been destroyed. Altogether, the Americans had lost over thirty vessels and 368 ships had major damage from these suicide bombers which went on to sink 34 Allied ships.

On the 'Mauretania,' the civilians reached out to the prisoners by descending into the lower recesses of the ship to sing "Silent Night" ('Stille Nacht') written by a German composer. It was an emotional event for all as they stood there, unable to speak. The seven-year-old girl who wrote an account of it 57 years later said she crawled into bed that night, tingling with happiness, certain there had never been a Christmas Eve like this one. There was a world war raging, an enemy to fight, just the beginning of the Japanese reign of terror as they rained down a deadly barrage of kamikazes. Early in the war, Japan had a series of military successes; after the attack on Pearl Harbor, they attacked U. S. air bases in the Phillippines.

This book was written by Gerald Astor (with the aid of historian Leckie) on the fiftieth anniversary of 'Operation Iceburg" for eighty-three days from April to June. It gives personal accounts of hand-to-hand combat, flame-thrower and ambush attacks with nowhere to run for cover, with entire companies of U.S. men killed by the brutality and ferociousness of the enemy. The battleship 'USS Tennessee' covered the landing area by firing salvos onto the beaches at Okinawa. Winston Churchill and President Roosevelt had met with Chiang Kai-Shek and Madam Chiang in Cairo to no avail. Churchill himself later wrote, "The decision whether or not to use the atomic bomb to compel the surrender of Japan was never even an issue." On August 6, 1945, the Enola Gay dropped "Little Boy" and three days later, the plutonium bomb, "Fat Man," on Nagasaki. One hundred twenty people died as a result of the two blasts.

It was General Douglas MacArthur, my hero, himself who insisted that, for political and prestige reasons, all the Japanese troops be forced to surrender in the Phillippines. He kept his word, and "did return" to that island as he had promised. On September 2, 1945, he officially received the Japanese surrender on the battleship 'Missouri' in Tokyo Bay. This account brings it to the reader on a personal level, not like a history textbook. The victory in Europe and the Pacific caused us to have two memorial days, V-E Day on May 8 and V.J Day on August 14. This is a reminder of a Christmas long ago, told as if it had happened only yesterday -- gone into the past, but not forgotten.

I Enjoyed The amazing storys of the veterans of this conflict.The Sgt.Moll and Earl Rice experiences.Earl`s second night in combat ect.

I was reading this book primarily for details to add to a genealogy project. This book supplied me with an amazing amount of the basic information about the invasion. Price is OK for a paperback.