Tuesday, March 19, AD 2024 12:48am

Iwo Jima: Valor Was a Common Virtue

 

 

Seventy years ago the battle of Iwo Jima was under way.  The ferocity of the fighting can be gauged by this stark fact:  there were 82 Medals of Honor earned by Marines during the entire war in the Pacific, 22 of them were awarded for heroism on Iwo.  Here, chosen at random, is the citation for the Medal of Honor earned by Sergeant Darrell Cole.  Prior to serving on Iwo he had fought on Guadalcanal, Kwajalein, Tinian and Saipan.  At twenty-four, his entire adult life had been spent fighting in the Pacific.  Here is his citation:

 

 

For conspicuous gallantry and intrepidity at the risk of his life above and beyond the call of duty while serving as Leader of a Machine-gun Section of Company B, First Battalion, Twenty-Third Marines, Fourth Marine Division, in action against enemy Japanese forces during the assault on Iwo Jima in the Volcano Islands, 19 February 1945. Assailed by a tremendous volume of small-arms, mortar and artillery fire as he advanced with one squad of his section in the initial assault wave, Sergeant Cole boldly led his men up the sloping beach toward Airfield Number One despite the blanketing curtain of flying shrapnel and, personally destroying with hand grenades two hostile emplacements which menaced the progress of his unit, continued to move forward until a merciless barrage of fire emanating from three Japanese pillboxes halted the advance. Instantly placing his one remaining machine gun in action, he delivered a shattering fusillade and succeeded in silencing the nearest and most threatening emplacement before his weapon jammed and the enemy, reopening fire with knee mortars and grenades, pinned down his unit for the second time. Shrewdly gauging the tactical situation and evolving a daring plan of counterattack, Sergeant Cole, armed solely with a pistol and one grenade, coolly advanced alone to the hostile pillboxes. Hurling his one grenade at the enemy in sudden, swift attack, he quickly withdrew, returned to his own lines for additional grenades and again advanced, attacked, and withdrew. With enemy guns still active, he ran the gauntlet of slashing fire a third time to complete the total destruction of the Japanese strong point and the annihilation of the defending garrison in this final assault. Although instantly killed by an enemy grenade as he returned to his squad, Sergeant Cole had eliminated a formidable Japanese position, thereby enabling his company to storm the remaining fortifications, continue the advance and seize the objective. By his dauntless initiative, unfaltering courage and indomitable determination during a critical period of action, Sergeant Cole served as an inspiration to his comrades, and his stouthearted leadership in the face of almost certain death sustained and enhanced the highest traditions of the United States Naval Service. He gallantly gave his life for his country.

 

Admiral Chester Nimitz, Commander in Chief Pacific Forces, put it succinctly:  By their victory, the 3rd, 4th and 5th Marine Divisions and other units of the Fifth Amphibious Corps have made an accounting to their country which only history will be able to value fully. Among the Americans serving on Iwo island, uncommon valor was a common virtue. 

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Steve Phoenix
Steve Phoenix
Sunday, February 22, AD 2015 6:27pm

My late father was in US Army (6th Army) logistics and artillery and working in the “Pineapple Pentagon” 1945, and was privy to the multiple daily dispatches coming back from Iwo Jima that detailed the unbelievable hellish fighting and the correspondent casualties. He used to say he was almost overwhelmed — by the madness of the Imperial forces’ leadership on the one hand, and by the heroism that was not uncommon of the US Marine personnel at Iwo, at Okinawa, at Tarawa, at Saipan.
We all should be awed by them—I am—and it is another moment of peace to participate in the traditional Latin Mass to offer for them, the expiatory sacrifice for the living and the dead (see TLM prayer, “Suscipe, Sancte Pater” at start of the Mass of the Faithful). They are all present there, even now.

Ernst Schreiber
Ernst Schreiber
Monday, February 23, AD 2015 12:53am

According to Wikipedia 12 of the 22 Medals were awarded posthumously.

Sergeant Cole is also the namesake of the U.S.S. Cole, 56 of whose crew were early casualties in our present war against militant Islam.
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Excuse me, I meant victims of a man-caused disaster that has nothing to do with religion because causing disasters is a perversion of religion.
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Or so we’ve been repeatedly told lo these many years.

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