The bodies of Japanese soldiers who died in the Battle of Okinawa at the end of the Pacific War were left unburied with no one to mourn for them. The fighting in the Battle of Okinawa was intense, and it usually took place at close range.

　　The bodies of Japanese soldiers who died in the Battle of Okinawa at the end of the Pacific War were left unburied with no one to mourn for them. (US Army Signal Corps, National Archives and Records Administration, NARA-2) The back-and-forth artillery battles between the American and Japanese forces shook Okinawa day and night. The 10th U.S. Army fired 1.1 million rounds of 105mm howitzers during the battle, the largest artillery barrage of the war. The fighting in the Battle of Okinawa was intense and usually took place at close range. The U.S. and Japanese forces engaged on the slopes of many hills, and fought in caves, trenches, foxholes, pillboxes, etc. From April 1 to June 22, 1945, the US military waged a merciless battle in the Battle of Okinawa to control approximately 1,660 square kilometers of the Ryukyu Islands, which are located just 550 kilometers from mainland Japan.

　　On April 1st 1945, the US 10th Army invaded Okinawa, and the last amphibious landing operation of the Pacific War was carried out. The US 10th Army, which consisted of four US Army divisions and three US Marine Corps divisions, carried out Operation Iceberg in order to occupy the main island of Okinawa in preparation for an invasion of the Japanese mainland. American soldiers and marines fought for 82 days, battling the Imperial Japanese Army, and on the way they learned of the end of the European front on May 8th 1945, Victory in Europe Day (VE Day). The Americans finally captured Okinawa on June 22nd 1945, and almost completely destroyed the remaining Japanese resistance forces.

　　The Battle of Okinawa was one of the most intense battles of the Pacific War. It was called the “typhoon of steel” in English and “tetsu no ame (steel rain)” or “tetsu no bōfū (steel storm)” in Japanese. The nickname symbolized the intensity of the fighting, the ferocity of the Japanese kamikaze attacks, and the huge number of Allied warships and armored vehicles that attacked Okinawa Island.

　　The Battle of Okinawa was one of the bloodiest battles of the Pacific War, resulting in the deaths or injuries of more than 50,000 Allied troops, 84,166 to 117,000 Japanese troops, and approximately 160,000 Japanese civilians, including members of the conscripted defense force who were wearing Japanese military uniforms. In the Battle of Okinawa, 7,374 American soldiers were killed and approximately 31,807 were wounded.Approximately 149,425 Okinawans died, committed suicide, or went missing, accounting for about half of the pre-war population of 300,000. The number of Japanese soldiers who died in the Battle of Okinawa was estimated at 94,208, with approximately 94,000 Okinawans and 12,520 Americans also killed.