273. The Battle of Okinawa: Part 1 - The Invasion

Battleground

Goalhanger Podcasts

History

4.6 • 703 Ratings

🗓️ 2 April 2025

⏱️ 39 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

In this first of a two-part special, Saul David is joined by Roger Moorhouse to dissect the first phase of the Battle of Okinawa. They explore the island's crucial role in the Pacific theater, the immense scale of the fighting, and the unique challenges faced by both Allied and Japanese forces. From the initial landings to the fierce defence of the inland, and a dive into the strategic rationale behind the invasion of Japanese territory, this episode looks at a battle that shaped the final months of World War II. If you have any thoughts or questions, you can send them to - [email protected] Producer: James Hodgson X: @PodBattleground Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Transcript

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0:22.8	entrepreneurs like you. Sign up for your $1 a month trial at Shopify.com slash setup. Hello and welcome to Battleground 45 with me, Roger Morehouse,
0:47.5	and today I'm joined, of course, by Saul David, our long-term presenter,
0:52.0	to discuss over two episodes, the battle for Okinawa in the spring and early summer of 1945.
0:59.0	And this was a huge engagement, as our listeners will know, that was described as one of the last great battles of World War II and certainly one of the largest set pieces of the Pacific War.
1:09.9	Hello, Saul. How are you? Yeah, very good, Roger. And
1:12.5	welcome back from your trip. You've just come back from Poland, haven't you? I have. Thank you.
1:16.4	Yeah. I'm very interested to get stuck into Okinawa today with you. I know we've talked about
1:21.1	it before and you've of course written a brilliant book on the subject. But just tell us a bit, you know, the campaign starts first of April
1:27.8	of 1945 with the American landings. Just tell us a bit about Okinawa itself and its significance.
1:33.5	And then the sort of wider, before we go into the weeds of it, the sort of wider strategic
1:38.0	significance of what the Americans think they're doing by, uh, invading the island.
1:43.2	Yeah. Well, the first and most important thing to note, Roger, is that Okinau is actually
1:48.4	part of Japan proper. So it's not one of the home islands, as they are called.
1:53.7	And those geographically, of course, are all very close together, Kyushu, Honshu, Hokkaido.
1:58.6	But it is part of the wider Japanese administrative sphere. So it is one of the
2:04.2	prefectures. And it's the most southerly. Its location is 400 miles south of Kyushu, which is the most
2:10.9	southerly of the home island. So geographically, it's separated, but it is part of the administrative
	...

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