In referencing the two airstrips in Mount Suribachi, I'm also identifying possibly the most important strategic region why the Americans would want to actually take the island, and take the island at the time they did. America during the Second World War, with the exception of Hawaii, was largely untouched by direct warfare. If you think about the continental United States, it is not threatened throughout the entire 20th Century directly, with the possible exception of the Cuban Missile Crisis. And in the Cold War, the reach of long, long range intercontinental ballistic missiles. When it comes to the Second World War we are still talking about bombing, and bombing using predominantly conventional weaponry and piston engine aircraft. Now the B-17 flying fortress along with the B-24 liberator was the main stay of the United States Army air force throughout most of the Second World War. However, in 1940 the eh, if you like, the Army Air Corps started to look for specifications of a much longer range aircraft. Now that manifested itself in 1944 and 1945. In the Bo in the Boeing B-29 Superfortress possibly the most advanced multi engine aircraft of its age, and also a technical feat in its own right. Now I probably lecture more about the economics of the First and Second World War than the events themselves. In considering what happens with expenditure, a point which is quite important when we come back to some of the uses of the flag raising of Iwo Jima photograph. When it comes to expense, we might think of the Manhattan Project and the creation of the atomic bomb as being if you like pushing resources to the nth degree. In dollar terms, that project cost about $2 billion during the Second World War. From the German side if you're looking for an equivalent expenditure. The revenge weaponry, particularly the V2. Those projects in total cost around about the same as the atomic bomb. And if you want to do an analysis about the uses of an expenditure, then you can see that the ability to project a 100 sorry, project a ton of weaponry with a ballistic missile from Northern Europe to Britain as oppose to the devastating effects of the atomic bomb, gives you an idea of how effectively that expenditure was conducted. The B-29 bomber project actually cost 50% more than the Manhattan Project in its entirety. And in fact General Curtis LeMay was reassigned to the Pacific Theater India. And initially to make the operation of the B-29 bombers something that could be brought into mainline service. Given the amount that had actually been spent on it. But also, the advantages that it gave. High flying self defended, and also pressurized. Quite an important consideration to try and evade enemy defenses. Now, the B-29 had an outstanding range but, if you look at the, it it's range to and from the targets, and particularly bombing the main islands of Japan. Iwo Jima was quite, it was quite strategically important as I mentioned. Because you could set up a, a base and take aircraft from there and return them while hitting the main islands of Japan. Now the figures or at least a range of figures that I've, I've picked up, suggest that perhaps 2,400 B-29s at one point or another used Mount Suribachi. And at one point that, I, I thought was quite interesting, that Derrick Wright raise was then in fact that it was a recovery base. If a bomber was in crisis going back to it's main main air strips after raid, Mount Suribachi was somewhere that it could actually land. So, as well as being a forward base initially, there's also the case that it was if you're like a safety net base, when air craft are working to the extent of their range. So just, just bear in mind what we have here is an ability for America to have a long reach and actually attack Japan directly. Now Admiral Chester Nimitz in reviewing the overall commitment of the American troops Marines and Navy, in this particular engagement around Iwo Jimo, used the phrase uncommon valor, common virtue. And it's talking about the fact that in an environment where the opposition, the enemy is prepared to and I'm just thinking of the number of clichés I can put in here. The last man, last ditch effort, etc, etc. It's very difficult to actually put into perspective the cultural importance to the troops. To defend Iwo Jima because of its status within the Japanese territories. Now I mentioned earlier it was intended to be a short incisive battle. That sounds familiar, that of course was the objective of the incursion on the third of October, 1993 which became The Battle of Iwo Jima. That's not a criticism of American forces and their planning, but just simply the nature. You can plan, but when you actually get there you have to deal with the environment that you find. And in this case, a General Tadamichi Kuribayashi, and I apologize to anyone who has Japanese as a language for what I have just said, okay. Maintained the commitment of his troops to the degree that we can talk about fighting almost to the last man. So I can't put it very much more strongly than this. If you can imagine modern warfare before we have long range distance high precision guided ammunition, then this was as challenging as anything we've seen in the Second World War. Whether it be the eastern front, whether it be D-Day, whether it came to any direct engagement between infantry or one side and infantry the next. [BLANK_AUDIO]
