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In 1945 Japanese generals construct a network of defences and tunnels on Okinawa, creating a devastating killing ground for American troops.
In 1945 Japanese generals construct a network of defences and tunnels on Okinawa, creating a devastating killing ground for American troops.
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00:00Hidden beneath the Pacific island of Okinawa are the remains of one of the most deadly
00:07defensive structures of the Second World War.
00:11More than 60 miles of tunnels on Okinawa.
00:15It's a complete honeycomb.
00:18Fortifications designed by the Japanese to turn the island's landscape into a killing
00:23zone.
00:25It's literally death trap, death trap, death trap, death trap that the Americans have to
00:29advance through.
00:31Concealed bunkers.
00:33Subterranean headquarters.
00:36Impenetrable artillery placements.
00:41And a fanatical army intent on fighting to the death.
00:48This strategy is going to make the Americans fight for every square inch of this island.
00:55This is the story of the Japanese Super Fortress.
01:07The biggest construction projects of World War II.
01:11Ordered by Hitler and his Japanese allies to secure world domination.
01:18Now the ruins survive as dark reminders of their fanatical military ambition.
01:25These are the secrets of the Nazi megastructures.
01:33The first of April, 1945.
01:36The Pacific island of Okinawa.
01:45Twenty-four year old Hajime Kondo is sheltering in a warren of tunnels beneath the island.
01:52As the shells of a massive allied invasion fleet rain down.
01:56The tunnel is holding.
02:02They can't get to us down here.
02:10He's one of thousands of hidden Japanese troops lying in wait for the unsuspecting Americans.
02:18Hey, look. They are here.
02:26Their tanks came first and then the infantry companies followed.
02:33Kondo has been ordered to hold his fire until the enemy are right on top of him.
02:40The future of Japan will be decided here.
02:56Evidence of this vast subterranean labyrinth can still be found beneath the surface of modern day Okinawa.
03:09Conflict archaeologist Tony Pollard is exploring the Mida Escarpment.
03:14A ridge line the Americans would dub Hacksaw Ridge.
03:36I'm just inside the opening to a Japanese tunnel system.
03:43And it disappears off beneath my feet.
03:49But already I can see the work that's gone into this.
03:53This almost squared off tunnel.
03:57What the Japanese are doing is using the island as a form of defense.
04:05What they're hoping is that the island is going to win the battle for them.
04:14The story of the defense of Okinawa begins in 1942.
04:20Imperial Japanese forces have swept across East Asia.
04:24Capturing vast stretches of territory and hundreds of islands reaching out across the Pacific.
04:36But they've been beaten back by American forces.
04:42By June 1944, after a series of increasingly ferocious battles,
04:47the Japanese know they must soon make a last stand if they're to stop the Americans invading Japan itself.
04:59An emergency meeting is called at Imperial headquarters in Tokyo.
05:05Among those present is Chief Operations Officer for the 32nd Army, Colonel Hiromichi Yahara.
05:14So far, we have deployed too few ground troops too late.
05:24One island after the other.
05:28Each have fallen.
05:32We must now select an island we think the U.S. will attack and defend it to the hilt.
05:40Yahara's interesting because unlike a lot of senior staff officers and Japanese commanders,
05:45he's actually traveled the world a little bit.
05:48He's served on the staff college in the United States.
05:51He's a realist. He's a pragmatist.
05:54You know, there are a few people who have a slightly more realistic view of things,
05:58and Yahara is definitely one of those.
06:02Yahara's garrison is stationed 350 miles south of the homeland, on the Japanese island of Okinawa.
06:11He believes that to the Americans, it would be the ideal staging post for any invasion,
06:16the last step for mainland Japan.
06:20It's make or break. They must hold the Americans here.
06:28Japanese reinforcements are quickly sent to bolster Yahara's forces on Okinawa,
06:32and Imperial headquarters issue clear orders for how the island should be defended.
06:38The original Japanese plan for Okinawa is, as the American and allied fleets get closer,
06:43they're going to sort a huge air flotilla.
06:46The whole point was to catch the American fleet at sea and destroy them before they land.
06:59For the plan to succeed, Okinawa needs to become one massive air base.
07:06So the Japanese set to work building a string of six airfields across the island.
07:14Tony Pollard has been granted special access to explore one of them.
07:20Today, Kadena is a US Air Force base.
07:26But it's still littered with evidence of its wartime Japanese origins.
07:38This structure's really interesting.
07:41What they've done here is they've mounded up earth and then poured the concrete onto the top of it.
07:47And when the concrete's set, they've come in and they've removed, dug out all of that dirt.
07:53It's almost like a reverse jelly mold.
07:58These structures are aircraft hangars, cut back into the hillside
08:03and covered in jungle to be invisible to American aerial reconnaissance.
08:08Building these airfields is a huge undertaking.
08:12And with little access to heavy machinery, the Japanese army conscripts 25,000 local Okinawans.
08:21Overseeing Okinawa's defence with Yahara is his immediate superior, Major General Isamu Cho.
08:33But these two men could not be more different.
08:37I'm going to teach you army tactics that will assure victory.
08:44Cho is a totally different kettle of fish.
08:47He's ultra-nationalistic. He buys into all the old samurai thinking.
08:52He's very, very gung-ho.
08:54When you're thinking of your sword-wielding Japanese commanders, that's Cho.
09:01These two men frequently clash over strategy.
09:05But on one thing, they're in total agreement.
09:09Imperial Headquarters' insistence upon building these airfields is a total fantasy.
09:15We can't rely on the promise of aircraft.
09:20I doubt we'll have the aircraft to even defend the airstrips.
09:26They will just be taken over by the Americans.
09:31Aware of the threat, the Japanese commander decides to attack.
09:37Aware of Japan's dwindling resources and America's growing air superiority,
09:43they believe airfields alone won't be enough.
09:47Cho and Yahara realise that very soon they're going to be on the front line,
09:52and Okinawa needs to be made safe against the threat of US invasion.
09:58And that means building defences.
10:02Yahara and Cho begin fortifying the island.
10:08Starting with the coastline.
10:15The Japanese expected the Americans to land on beaches in the west, which is here, or further to the south.
10:22And they'd prepared the ground because the plan was to destroy them on the beach.
10:29And over there, nestled under a rock overhang, is a concrete pillbox.
10:36The soldiers would have been entirely unaware of it until it opened up on them.
10:42Construction of a string of defences begins around the island.
10:46The aim? To stop the Americans setting foot ashore.
10:51But this plan will be short-lived.
10:55Yahara's superiors will soon force him to rethink.
10:59If he's to defeat the Americans, he'll need to wage a different kind of warfare.
11:08August 1944.
11:11On the island of Okinawa, the building of fortifications to defend airfields and beaches is progressing.
11:24The island continues to be flooded with reinforcements.
11:28Like 24-year-old Hajime Kondo.
11:43But Kondo's vision of paradise will not last long.
11:48The war is going increasingly badly for the Japanese.
11:52They've already suffered a crushing defeat in the Mariana Islands, and the US fleet draws closer.
11:59Okinawa will soon be in the firing line.
12:05And then, in November 1944,
12:08Yahara receives orders from Japan that throw his entire plan into turmoil.
12:23Imperial headquarters have issued orders for our finest division to be redeployed to the Philippines.
12:29The 9th Division. But we are relying on them to defend the beaches, are we not?
12:35Yes. 25,000 men, and the best we have.
12:39How exactly do they suppose we should defend this island?
12:45The 9th Division is the best trained of all the divisions in 32nd Army.
12:50And this is a hammer blow.
12:55Cho and Yahara now believe US troops will far outnumber them.
12:59And, worse, there's no sign of the aircraft promised to the defense of the island.
13:05Yahara faces an uphill struggle to win this battle.
13:11He needs new tactics to engulf the American advance in a brutal war of attrition.
13:21This realization is given credence by events on the other side of the world.
13:26Japan's German allies had built a massive defensive wall to prevent an allied invasion of mainland Europe.
13:36This extraordinary line of concrete bunkers and coastal gun batteries
13:41stretches over 3,000 miles from Norway to the Spanish border.
13:47But on D-Day, the allies breach the line in a matter of hours.
13:58Yahara will take a completely different approach.
14:03His audacious plan is to abandon some airfields and many of his coastal defenses.
14:09He'll let the Americans land unopposed and defend in depth,
14:14setting a trap that will slaughter the enemy as they venture inland.
14:19This is about holding off the Americans for as long as possible
14:23to give the home islands of Japan the greatest possible chance that they can.
14:28You just keep the Americans fighting and fighting and fighting and you don't give an inch.
14:33By December 1944, Japanese forces have been unable to hold the American advance through the Philippines.
14:41Yahara must act fast.
14:47His plan is to take his entire army, more than 100,000 men, underground.
14:58The rock itself is perfect for the task.
15:01This is a coral limestone and it's very strong but it's porous.
15:07And all of the little air pockets in it give it shock-absorbing qualities.
15:11So as far as protection from bombardment is concerned, it's just as, if not better, than concrete.
15:20The bedrock provides Yahara with the solution to a major problem.
15:25Attacks on shipping have meant concrete and steel are scarce.
15:30He makes each unit responsible for their own series of tunnels.
15:36It forces troops like Kondo to dig deep.
15:50There were so many of us determined to make a stand.
15:54For by defending Okinawa, we were defending Japan.
16:07This is all hand-cut, incredibly hard work.
16:13They didn't have any machines for this job.
16:16And knowing while all that work's going on, the purpose to which it's going to be put, it's not happy days at all.
16:27Despite the hardships, the Japanese succeed in building highly complex front-line tunnel systems.
16:35They commonly have firing positions to the front, side passages and exits to the rear,
16:41as well as chambers for storage and accommodation.
16:51This really opens out here.
16:54Oh, look. What's this? Oh, wow.
16:59Pushed away in the corner.
17:02These are carrying cases for fuses, for shells.
17:06Looking at the size of them, they're probably anti-tank rounds.
17:11The position itself where this gun was located isn't in here,
17:16but the fuses may have been stored in here for transport elsewhere.
17:20Because the point is, if you're going to use a gun,
17:26because the point is, look up there.
17:29Look, there's another passageway.
17:31This is a network of tunnels.
17:38Yahara describes his scheme as sleeping tactics.
17:43The Japanese will dig in and wait for the Americans to come to them.
17:51This isn't just digging a hole and hiding in it.
17:54This is bringing the battle underground.
17:56And it's this system, this strategy,
17:59which is going to make the Americans fight for every square inch of this island.
18:13December, 1944.
18:16With American forces getting closer every day,
18:19the construction of miles of underground fortifications continues under Okinawa.
18:26Colonel Yahara believes the Americans are most likely to land on beaches to the north.
18:32So he sets out his defences in a series of lines spanning the island,
18:37each one able to support the next,
18:40and ending with the main Shuri line,
18:43running for eight miles from coast to coast.
18:47And it's from here, at Shuri Castle,
18:49that Yahara and Cho will command their army.
18:56Beneath the 14th century fortress,
18:59now rebuilt following its destruction during the war,
19:02are the remains of the army's main headquarters.
19:06This tunnel system's been cut through the rock beneath Shuri Castle,
19:10but it's got the added finesse of these massive concrete bulwarks.
19:16Now, unfortunately, I can't get in,
19:19because they're blocked for the most part.
19:22But it was from here that the defence of the entire Shuri line was controlled,
19:27and that's why it's called Shuri Castle.
19:31But it was from here that the defence of the entire Shuri line was controlled.
19:41The tunnels stretch for around 1,300 feet,
19:44a maze of code rooms, conference rooms and officers' quarters.
19:49160 feet down at their deepest point,
19:52the Japanese anticipate they'll be totally bomb-proof.
19:57But commanding the coming battle from underground will create a new challenge.
20:02The Japanese know that to stand a chance,
20:05they'll need to carefully coordinate distant front-line units,
20:09who are also hidden in miles of tunnels.
20:12Effective communication will be vital.
20:16Tony Pollard has discovered more caves behind the front lines
20:20that reinforced this defensive web with deadly firepower.
20:29I mean, it looks very rough and ready, but it's quite a feat of engineering.
20:34There's a lot of work going in here.
20:37There's an opening here into a side chamber.
20:43And a ramp running up to daylight up there.
20:51Down here, in this open area, there would have been a gun.
20:56But there's no gun.
20:58And there's no gun.
21:01And there's no gun.
21:05There would have been a gun.
21:08And the gun is probably pointing into the cave.
21:11It's not pointing outside.
21:13They would wheel it out into the courtyard...
21:20..crank it up and fire it over the top of the ridge.
21:24So this is indirect fire from a reverse slope position.
21:30These are artillery caves.
21:33Deciding which way the enemy are likely to advance
21:36and then positioning guns on the reverse slopes,
21:39they're kept out of view from the enemy and protected by the ridge.
21:44On receiving coordinates by communications
21:46or from spotters in a cave on the forward slope,
21:50the artillery would fire a small number of rounds
21:53before being wheeled back into the cave for protection.
21:59This so-called sniping technique
22:02is effective in keeping the Japanese army's big guns hidden and protected.
22:10While in another part of the tunnel system,
22:13other smaller artillery pieces would be trained directly on the US forces.
22:21It'll be interesting to see what the view tells us
22:25about the function of this place.
22:32This opening gives an incredibly good view
22:36over the flat ground below.
22:39There's a river crossing, which I can see clearly from here.
22:43This opening has been carved deliberately
22:46to give a view down onto that road and that crossing.
22:49And it's likely, given the small size of this opening,
22:53we're looking at an anti-tank gun
22:55that would be designed to hit mobile armour and knock it out.
23:00And you can see the trouble they've gone to.
23:03This isn't natural rock here.
23:05They've smeared concrete over the opening of the cave
23:08to give it extra strength because it's going to be creating shock.
23:11So they need to make sure they don't get rock falls
23:14and there are impressions in the concrete in the side.
23:17So they've also been adding extra protection
23:20with timber set into this concrete.
23:24And over that distance, anything down on that road, really,
23:28it's a floating duck as far as this position's concerned.
23:36By the end of March 1945, Yohara's trap is set.
23:41The island's labyrinth of 60 miles of tunnels, bunkers
23:45and fortifications is ready just in time.
23:48Off the coast, almost 1,500 Allied ships are bearing down on Okinawa.
23:54They have no idea what lies in wait.
23:59April 1, 1945
24:02The 1st of April, 1945. 0530 hours.
24:20Hajime Kondo and 100,000 other Japanese soldiers
24:23take cover beneath the bedrock
24:26as the first salvos of a massive onslaught reign in on Okinawa.
24:36Just off the coast, the Allied fleet,
24:38the biggest ever assembled in naval history,
24:41has launched Operation Iceberg.
24:45A relentless pre-landing bombardment
24:48throws more than 100,000 shells and rockets at Okinawa
24:52over a three-hour period.
24:57They drop over 4,500 tons of ordnance on that beach.
25:01It's the heaviest preparatory bombardment
25:03for an amphibious invasion in world history.
25:16The tunnel is holding.
25:27They can't get to us down here.
25:32In the initial bombardment,
25:34they're just hurtling over vast numbers of shells.
25:39But the Japanese are in their tunnels.
25:41It's unpleasant, the ground is shaking,
25:43there's lots of damage on the surface,
25:45but in actual fact, in terms of how it affects them as a fighting force,
25:49it has very little impact at all.
25:56Deep behind their heavily defended ridges at the main shuri line,
26:00Japanese commander, recently promoted Lieutenant General Isamu Cho,
26:04and his superior,
26:06watch the first wave of American troops come ashore.
26:15It is difficult to watch them land unopposed.
26:20But they will soon know we're here.
26:26This is one of the biggest amphibious operations of the entire war.
26:30I mean, on D-Day in Normandy, the Allies land six divisions.
26:34On Okinawa, they land seven.
26:36So there's actually a division more than in Normandy.
26:41All the troops have been warned to expect fierce, fierce opposition.
26:47And they get onto the beaches and nothing happens.
26:52I mean, just imagine how tense you'd be feeling.
26:55Suddenly, they start to get their confidence,
26:57they realise that they're unopposed.
27:01And they start moving inland, and before the end of the day,
27:04they've got a bridgehead of some three miles.
27:06And then they move on and take the airfields,
27:08and the airfields are largely undefended,
27:10and everyone's thinking, God, this is going to be a cakewalk after all.
27:16Over the next few days, the Japanese allow US Marines to strike north,
27:21where they encounter only sporadic resistance.
27:26But as the invasion force heads south towards the Shuri Line,
27:30everything's about to change.
27:35The 8th of April, a week after the landings,
27:38the Japanese see Americans approaching Yahara's first major defensive line,
27:42at Kakazu Ridge.
27:48Exploring it is historian Mark Waycaster.
27:52This right here is one of a series of pillboxes
27:55that would have sat here on Kakazu Ridge.
27:59This would be a finished-out wall, covered in dirt, camouflaged in.
28:04They would have never known it was here.
28:07You can see these firing slits.
28:09You have one here, and then a second one here.
28:12This gave the Japanese a wide arc of fire
28:15to cover the valley floor in front of them.
28:19And this is just one of a string of pillboxes and hidden firing ports
28:24stretching right along Kakazu Ridge.
28:27Behind them, a network of tunnels.
28:31Their elevation at the top of the slope
28:33gives the Japanese a huge advantage over approaching Americans,
28:36and they're laid out to form a gridwork of interlocking fire
28:40that creates devastating kill zones.
28:44It narrowed the approaches for the Americans into certain paths.
28:48Here at Okinawa, it turns this ridge line into a bloody mess.
28:54Hey, look. They're here.
29:00In his bunker, Kondo spots the Americans.
29:05Their tanks came first,
29:08and then the infantry companies followed.
29:12The soldiers looked as though they came for a picnic.
29:16As the Americans are approaching, the Japanese have been ordered
29:19to just hold their fire to the last minute.
29:22They've literally got to see the whites of their enemies' eyes
29:25before they open fire.
29:29This has to be nerve-wracking for them.
29:31They see their enemy advancing.
29:33He's well within rifle shot.
29:38But they have to hold.
29:40They have to hold.
29:42They have to hold.
30:07The first line of defense works well for the Japanese,
30:10stopping thousands of U.S. troops in their tracks
30:13and inflicting heavy casualties.
30:20But for those like Kondo,
30:22fighting from their confined positions is a truly terrifying experience.
30:29Life for the Japanese in this bunker as the Americans advance
30:33would have been nerve-wracking.
30:35You can see the pounding on the inside that this bunker has taken.
30:40You've got pieces of rebar that are jetting out here,
30:43and the original aperture would have set here.
30:46Rounds would have been falling along this entire ridge line
30:49to screen the advance of the Americans,
30:52and then once the rounds themselves start landing here,
30:55it must have been horrific for these men.
31:06Fire!
31:11During the fight, Kondo is hit in the shoulder.
31:15But the tunnels allow him to escape to an underground field hospital.
31:19Help him!
31:22Deep behind the lines.
31:26The 24th of April, back at Kakezu Ridge.
31:30After nearly three weeks of vicious fighting,
31:33the Americans finally take the hill.
31:37But they find the tunnels have given the enemy an escape route.
31:42The Japanese soldiers have slipped away.
31:47But only as far as the northern part of the Kakezu Ridge.
31:51But only as far as the next line of killer fortifications.
31:56Kakezu Ridge is just one of several that they must take
31:59before even reaching the inner shuri line.
32:02The next is what the Americans dub Haksor Ridge.
32:12From up on Haksor Ridge,
32:14you can see how strong the Japanese positions are.
32:17It looks back to the north, to the first line of defence,
32:20coming around to Kakezu there.
32:23From up here, once they fall back,
32:26they can actually shoot down onto that first line
32:29as the Americans start to take it.
32:31And I would not like to be an American soldier
32:33cresting Kakezu Ridge with guns firing from here.
32:36Over in the back, though, you get this stunning perspective
32:39because you can see just how every piece of high ground
32:42is peppered with these caves and tunnels.
32:45And indeed, over there, they're doing construction work
32:48and they've cut a slice through the hill
32:50and I can see loads of entrances and even tunnels behind them.
32:54It's an absolutely astounding battlescape.
32:59Ultimately, when you're up against that kind of enemy,
33:02which is dug into the hillside,
33:04which has got 60 miles of tunnels to play with,
33:07there's only one way to do this,
33:09and this is by capturing every foot, every yard,
33:13capturing every foot, every yard,
33:15killing every Japanese soldier you come up against.
33:18And that's an incredibly traumatic, brutal and vicious way of fighting a war.
33:27The Japanese are determined to defend Okinawa,
33:30one tunnel at a time.
33:39The 26th of April, 1945.
33:43Four weeks after the US landings on Okinawa.
33:48Japanese troops fighting from their tunnels on Haksor Ridge
33:51halt the American advance again.
34:01Tony Pollard is exploring the labyrinth of tunnels beneath the ridge.
34:07Oh, look at this.
34:10That is all that's left of a Japanese soldier's weapon.
34:16It's the muzzle end of a rifle.
34:21The Japanese troops here at Haksor Ridge
34:24would use their tunnels to devastating effect.
34:29Time and time again, the Japanese launch surprise attacks
34:33that repel every American attempt to take the ridge.
34:40But they soon come up against a brutal weapon
34:44that will come to dominate the battlefield.
34:49Here in the mouth of one of these tunnels,
34:52you can already see evidence of combat.
34:55The rock has been blackened,
34:57and this is because it's been licked with liquid fire.
35:02This is the result of a flamethrower attack.
35:07The Americans have two kinds of flamethrower.
35:10Small, hand-held units.
35:15And flame tanks.
35:18Capable of shooting deadly napalm up to 300 feet.
35:24But the Japanese knew they'd face this threat
35:27and had built a defence into the structure of the tunnels.
35:32One of the few defences that the Japanese could come up with
35:36were right angles,
35:38because they could see right through the tunnel.
35:41They could see right through the tunnel.
35:44They could see right through the tunnel.
35:47They could see right through the tunnel.
35:50One of the few defences they could come up with were right angles,
35:54because those flames might be able to shoot down a passage,
35:57but they can't shoot round corners.
35:59So here we have a very good example of that,
36:02a quite acute right angle,
36:04despite the jagged nature of the rocks.
36:06So if an American soldier with a flamethrower is here,
36:09all I have to do is dodge around here,
36:11give myself a little bit of distance,
36:13and hopefully I'll survive that blast of liquid fire.
36:17This may not always work against the more powerful flame tanks.
36:40But it gives them a fighting chance.
36:44The complex tunnel networks allow the Japanese on Haksal Ridge
36:49to hold out against overwhelming American force for ten days.
36:55But it's also down to another Japanese tactic.
36:58They've harnessed traditional samurai codes of honour
37:02to instil a willingness to fight to the death.
37:06It becomes absolutely the central focus of military discipline
37:12within the Japanese army, and it's incredibly effective.
37:18Japanese troops are also told the Americans are monsters
37:22who torture and kill them if they're taken alive.
37:26But Hajime Kondo, recovered from his injuries
37:29and now fighting to hold the main shuri line,
37:32realises the Americans are not so different.
37:37I saw several people die in the war.
37:40The Japanese soldiers' last word was usually mother.
37:45When we shot Americans, we also heard them calling for their mothers.
37:50We talked about it, how when they were dying,
37:53they said the same thing as us.
38:01By mid-May 1945, after seven weeks of vicious fighting,
38:06the edges of Yahara's main shuri line finally begin to crumble.
38:15Hidden in their underground headquarters,
38:17Yahara and Cho know they can't hold out much longer.
38:21The Japanese are about to make their last throw of the dice.
38:30The 27th of May, 1945.
38:35Yahara realises the Americans are close to breaking through his main shuri line.
38:41He orders the army to abandon its shuri headquarters
38:44and retreat to the far south of the island
38:47in an attempt to draw out the battle yet further.
38:53But by the night of the 21st of June, 1945,
38:56the Japanese army commanders are cornered in a cave,
39:00with the Americans just 400 yards away.
39:06With the realisation that the battle is lost,
39:09Cho orders Yahara to try to escape.
39:14Cho will remain on the island.
39:18For future generations, you will bear witness to how I died.
39:36Before the following dawn,
39:38Cho and his commanding officer commit seppuku,
39:42ritual suicide,
39:45self-disembowelment,
39:47followed by swift decapitation.
40:01With organised Japanese resistance disintegrating,
40:04US troops try to coax petrified civilians and soldiers from their caves.
40:10They don't always succeed.
40:12Many choose to commit suicide,
40:17while others, like Kondo and what remains of his battalion,
40:20decide they'll go down in a final banzai attack.
40:26It was suicidal behaviour,
40:28but I believe that death will be a kind of relief for us.
40:35EXPLOSIONS
41:01But Kondo is captured.
41:05He expects to be shot.
41:13But instead, he's helped to recover.
41:18He's one of a lucky few to survive.
41:23The harsh reality is that almost all of those Japanese
41:27that have fought on Okinawa,
41:29at the end of it, nearly all of them are dead.
41:35More than 12,000 Americans are killed during the battle,
41:41and over 77,000 Japanese soldiers.
41:48Around 150,000 Okinawan civilians also perish,
41:53some conscripted, but most just caught up in the fighting.
41:58Looking at these characters on this marble
42:01really drives home just how shocking this battle was.
42:06There were no rules of war here.
42:09This really was a battle of annihilation.
42:14And to be quite frank, words don't really do it justice.
42:22Okinawa's vast network of underground fortifications
42:25and the Japanese determination to fight to the death
42:29provokes the Americans into their next move,
42:33to use a mega-weapon of their own making.
42:42The terrible destruction of two atomic bombs
42:45persuades Japan to surrender on the 15th of August, 1945.
42:51The war is over.
42:54Colonel Yahara is captured, hiding among Okinawan civilians.
42:59He's later released, but as the only senior commander to be taken alive,
43:04he's considered by many in Japan to be a disgrace to his country.
43:11Hajime Kondo survives and returns to his home in Japan.
43:16He will dedicate much of his life to telling others of his experience.
43:20He will dedicate much of his life to telling others of his experience
43:23and the horrors of war.
43:28Yahara's tunnels were an extraordinary tactical success,
43:32allowing his troops to hold out for ten weeks against overwhelming forces.
43:38But in the end, they were no match for the mighty American war machine.
43:45The tunnels' grim legacy
43:48that they forced a battle of unrivaled brutality
43:51that killed more people than both atomic bombs combined.