I recently commented that once we win in Iraq, I won't mind all the books that will claim we could have done better if we hadn't made some specific mistake. When you win, such debates can be enlightening or just entertaining depending on the distance from the events in question.
We still debate World War II, for example (tip to Strategypage email updates). This article disputes the idea that capturing Iwo Jima at such a high cost still saved lives by providing an emergency landing strip closer to Japan:
[O]nly 2,148 B-29 crewmen were killed in combat, including those stationed in India and China as well as theMarianas. “The emergency landing theory,” Burrell notes, “claims that an additional 24,761 airmen from the Marianas alone would have died without the use of Iwo Jima. In other words, the theory claims that over eleven times the number of airmen actually lost in combat were saved simply by offering an alternative landing field between [the Marianas] and Tokyo.”
What, then, if Nimitz had heeded King’s admonition that Iwo Jimawas a“sink hole” not worth the effort? Earlier in the war American forces had bypassed the Japanese fortresses at Rabaul on New Britain and Truk in the Caroline archipelago, successfully neutralizing each through a combination of air strikes and a naval blockade. The same could have been done with Iwo Jima.
Had Iwo Jima been bypassed, the Pacific War would have ended at much the same time and in much the same way as it did. True, the American photo album would have been somewhat impoverished, for it would not have included the famous Joe Rosenthal shot of the dramatic flag-raising ceremony onMount Suribachi. But more substantively, the three marine divisions used in the capture of Iwo Jima would have been available to support the invasion of Okinawa. (Although originally scheduled for that assignment, the horrific battle for Iwo Jima left them too badly damaged to do so.) Moreover, the successful defensive tactics employed by Lt. Gen. Tadamichi Kuribayashi, the commander of Iwo Jima’s garrison, would not have been available as an example to be emulated by Okinawa’s commander, Lt. Gen. Mitsuru Ushijima, who used them to advantage in the actual struggle for that island.
The battle for Iwo Jima, although a high point for American valor, was a low point for American strategy.
If my point isn't obvious enough, have you noticed any Congressional interest in impeaching Franklin Roosevelt or opening an inquiry into the military decisions and intelligence that led to the invasion of Iwo Jima?
War is not perfection. Even the simplest of maneuvers is done as if moving through water. That is true even in a desert.
