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Home : Media : News : News Display

Battles Like Iwo Jima Must Never Happen Again, Milley Says


By David Vergun
Defense.Gov

Seventy-five years ago today, about 70,000 Marines and sailors, backed up by about 400 ships, made the assault landings on Iwo Jima, a Pacific island that is only several square miles in size.

It was the bloodiest campaign in American history per square mile, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff said.  

Inscription on stone wall of memorial.
Memorial Wall
A quote from Navy Adm. Chester W. Nimitz is inscribed on the wall of the National World War II Memorial in Washington. Nimitz was the theater commander during the battle of Iwo Jima.
Photo By: David Vergun, DOD
VIRIN: 200219-D-UB488-003

"They slugged it out, inch by inch, yard by yard for the next 36 days," Army Gen. Mark A. Milley said, resulting in almost 50% of the battle's participants being killed or wounded. 

Of the 22,000 Japanese defenders, only about 1,000 survived the battle, he added.

Milley noted that his father, Alexander Milley, was a Marine who fought in Iwo Jima and other campaigns during the war.

The chairman was the keynote speaker at a commemoration marking the 75th anniversary of the start of the battle of Iwo Jima at the National World War II Memorial in Washington.

Army Gen. Mark A. Milley, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and special guests participate in a ceremony and wreath presentation at the National World War II Memorial in Washington, D.C. to mark the 75th anniversary of the Battle of Iwo Jima. The 36 day-battle was part of a U.S. amphibious assault to capture the Japanese-held island of Iwo Jima, and resulted in a hard-fought American victory. Gen. Milley’s father, a Navy Corpsman with 4th Marine Division, was among the Marines who fought in the Battle of Iwo Jima.
CJCS meets with Iwo Jima veterans
Army Gen. Mark A. Milley, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and special guests participate in a ceremony and wreath presentation at the National World War II Memorial in Washington, D.C. to mark the 75th anniversary of the Battle of Iwo Jima. The 36 day-battle was part of a U.S. amphibious assault to capture the Japanese-held island of Iwo Jima, and resulted in a hard-fought American victory. Gen. Milley’s father, a Navy Corpsman with 4th Marine Division, was among the Marines who fought in the Battle of Iwo Jima.
Photo By: Navy Petty Officer 1st Class Dominique A. Pineiro
VIRIN: 200219-D-PB383-1010

Army Gen. Mark A. Milley, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and special guests participate in a ceremony and wreath presentation at the National World War II Memorial in Washington, D.C. to mark the 75th anniversary of the Battle of Iwo Jima. The 36 day-battle was part of a U.S. amphibious assault to capture the Japanese-held island of Iwo Jima, and resulted in a hard-fought American victory. Gen. Milley’s father, a Navy Corpsman with 4th Marine Division, was among the Marines who fought in the Battle of Iwo Jima.
CJCS meets with Iwo Jima veterans
Army Gen. Mark A. Milley, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and special guests participate in a ceremony and wreath presentation at the National World War II Memorial in Washington, D.C. to mark the 75th anniversary of the Battle of Iwo Jima. The 36 day-battle was part of a U.S. amphibious assault to capture the Japanese-held island of Iwo Jima, and resulted in a hard-fought American victory. Gen. Milley’s father, a Navy Corpsman with 4th Marine Division, was among the Marines who fought in the Battle of Iwo Jima.
Photo By: Navy Petty Officer 1st Class Dominique A. Pineiro
VIRIN: 200219-D-PB383-1024

Last year, Milley visited Iwo Jima with his counterpart from the Japan Self-Defense Forces. "It's an incredibly humbling experience to walk through that island … trying to imagine what hell on earth was like, and that was Iwo Jima," he said.

From 1914, the start of World War I, to 1945, the end of World War II, the world was engaged in two of the biggest wars that have ever been fought in the history of humanity, Milley said.

But those who fought in the wars fought for something — they fought for a better peace, he noted. At the end of 1945, he said, that greatest generation bequeathed a set of freedoms and a world order that has held good since then.

This is the 75th year of no great-power war, and that is what World War II veterans, including those at today's event, fought for, the chairman said.

Today, the United States is in a great-power competition with China and Russia. "It is incumbent upon all of us to make sure that great-power competition of today stays at great-power competition and great-power peace and doesn't yet again turn into great-power war," he said.

"Let us resolve once again to never let it happen again," Milley said. "Let us resolve that we're not going to have another great-power war, because the slaughter that is involved is beyond the imagination. It's beyond the pale."

 

Army Gen. Mark A. Milley, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and special guests participate in a ceremony and wreath presentation at the National World War II Memorial in Washington, D.C. to mark the 75th anniversary of the Battle of Iwo Jima. The 36 day-battle was part of a U.S. amphibious assault to capture the Japanese-held island of Iwo Jima, and resulted in a hard-fought American victory. Gen. Milley’s father, a Navy Corpsman with 4th Marine Division, was among the Marines who fought in the Battle of Iwo Jima.
CJCS meets with Iwo Jima veterans
Army Gen. Mark A. Milley, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and special guests participate in a ceremony and wreath presentation at the National World War II Memorial in Washington, D.C. to mark the 75th anniversary of the Battle of Iwo Jima. The 36 day-battle was part of a U.S. amphibious assault to capture the Japanese-held island of Iwo Jima, and resulted in a hard-fought American victory. Gen. Milley’s father, a Navy Corpsman with 4th Marine Division, was among the Marines who fought in the Battle of Iwo Jima.
Photo By: Navy Petty Officer 1st Class Carlos M. Vazquez II
VIRIN: 200219-D-WD757-0509

Army Gen. Mark A. Milley, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and special guests participate in a ceremony and wreath presentation at the National World War II Memorial in Washington, D.C. to mark the 75th anniversary of the Battle of Iwo Jima. The 36 day-battle was part of a U.S. amphibious assault to capture the Japanese-held island of Iwo Jima, and resulted in a hard-fought American victory. Gen. Milley’s father, a Navy Corpsman with 4th Marine Division, was among the Marines who fought in the Battle of Iwo Jima.
CJCS meets with Iwo Jima veterans
Army Gen. Mark A. Milley, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and special guests participate in a ceremony and wreath presentation at the National World War II Memorial in Washington, D.C. to mark the 75th anniversary of the Battle of Iwo Jima. The 36 day-battle was part of a U.S. amphibious assault to capture the Japanese-held island of Iwo Jima, and resulted in a hard-fought American victory. Gen. Milley’s father, a Navy Corpsman with 4th Marine Division, was among the Marines who fought in the Battle of Iwo Jima.
Photo By: Navy Petty Officer 1st Class Dominique A. Pineiro
VIRIN: 200219-D-PB383-1008

Everyone who wears the uniform is committed to maintaining the great-power peace, he concluded.

Watch the entire ceremony:

Read more from Defense.Gov on commemorating World War II.

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