Cold Open

It’s 10 AM, on February 19th, 1945, in the Pacific Ocean, 750 miles south of Mainland Japan.

21-year-old Francis Pierce narrows his eyes against the wind as his landing craft powers through the surf toward the tiny island of Iwo Jima.

Just over three years ago, a Japanese surprise attack on the American naval base at Pearl Harbor dragged the United States into World War Two. Now, American forces are grinding out a slow offensive against Japan in the Pacific, fighting their way from island to island. Iwo Jima is the most important step in the campaign yet—it’s perfectly placed as a base to strike at Japan itself. But standing in the Americans’ way is a well-equipped and highly fortified Japanese garrison on the island. This morning, Francis is one of thousands of American soldiers who are storming the beaches of Iwo Jima during an amphibious assault—only Francis isn’t here to fight. He’s a medic, trained to save lives, not take them.

Francis grabs the side of the landing craft to steady himself as it nears a beach. He exchanges a glance with one of the young soldiers crammed into the boat beside him. They’re almost there.

Then the hull grinds against the sandy beach and the landing craft lurches to a halt. All at once, the men on board rush to get out. Francis leaps over the side and wades ashore through the surf.

Hundreds of other American troops are already ahead of him, but their advance is stalled by a natural feature at the top of the beach: a fifteen-foot-high bank of soft black volcanic sand.

Francis slogs up the beach toward the slope, his boots sinking beneath him with every step.

And all around him, the black sand erupts as gunfire peppers the beach. Japanese defenders on the mountain overlooking the landing site have opened fire. Francis ducks down - but knows he has to keep moving.

Artillery shells begin to rain down on the beach too. As American soldiers scramble for cover, Francis forces himself on, scurrying toward the sandbank. Finally, he throws himself forward against the slope, relieved that he’s made it across the beach, and survived the first challenge—but Francis doesn’t have time to rest. The Battle of Iwo Jima has only just begun.

US Navy medic Francis Pierce will eventually be awarded the Medal of Honor for his bravery in rescuing his comrades under fire during the Battle of Iwo Jima. But Francis cannot save everyone, and by the time the island is finally under American control, almost seven thousand US servicemen and seventeen thousand Japanese troops will have lost their lives.

The Battle of Iwo Jima will be remembered not just for the bravery and sacrifice of those who fought there, though, but also for a single photograph taken in the heat of battle—when a photographer finds himself in the right place at the right time to capture the most iconic image of the entire war on February 23rd, 1945.

Introduction

From Noiser and Airship, I’m Lindsay Graham and this is History Daily.

History is made every day. On this podcast—every day—we tell the true stories of the people and events that shaped our world.

Today is February 23rd, 1945: Marines Fly the US Flag over Iwo Jima.

Act One

It’s December 7th, 1941, at the White House in Washington, DC; three years before American troops will land on Iwo Jima.

President Franklin D. Roosevelt chats with his chief policy advisor over a working lunch and tries to ignore the telephone ringing on his desk. But after continues ringing incessantly, Roosevelt gestures to an aide to answer the call and take a message.

Two years ago, war broke out in Europe. Britain and France stepped in to try to stop Adolf Hitler’s Germany aggressively expanding its borders, and now the entire continent is being torn apart. But it’s not just Europe that is aflame. In the East, Hitler’s ally, Imperial Japan, has been fighting in China for years and is now eying the Pacific territories of European powers.

As these conflicts have raged on, the United States has remained on the sidelines. Though President Roosevelt is sympathetic to the British and French cause, his efforts to intervene have been stymied by domestic politics. Many Americans view the crisis in Europe and the Pacific as someone else’s problem. And Neutrality Acts have been passed by Congress, designed to keep America out of the war. With his hands tied like this, President Roosevelt is today focused on matters closer to home, and his advisor is outlining the President’s domestic agenda for the coming year.

But that planning is interrupted by the aide who answers the phone when he whispers in his ear of the President that the Secretary of the Navy needs to speak to him as a matter of urgency.

Roosevelt grumbles as he guides his wheelchair to the desk—but he immediately snaps to attention when the Secretary explains why he’s called. Japanese forces are attacking the US Naval base at Pearl Harbor in Hawaii.

The domestic policy meeting is instantly abandoned. President Roosevelt instead spends the next few hours trying to piece together a sketchy picture of exactly what’s happening at Pearl Harbor. And it soon becomes clear that this Japanese attack merits a forceful American response. Roosevelt needs to persuade his public to get off the fence and renounce the policy of neutrality. So, the following day, the President addresses Congress. He keeps his remarks brief and to the point. Toward the end of his short speech, Roosevelt demands that Congress give its backing to retaliatory military action against the Japanese.

"ROOSEVELT: I ask that the Congress declare that since the unprovoked and dastardly attack by Japan on Sunday, December 7, 1941, a state of war has existed between the United States and the Japanese Empire."

When Congress votes on President Roosevelt’s resolution, only one Congresswoman casts a dissenting vote, making it clear that the United States is now at war with Japan.

America’s efforts in the Pacific theater don’t get off to a good start, though. The United States is not on a war footing. It takes time to ramp up weapons production and deploy soldiers and equipment where they’re needed. Before the United States is in a position to offer much resistance, a number of Asian territories fall to swift and brutal Japanese invasions, including the Philippines, Hong Kong, and Singapore.

But the momentum of the war begins to turn in June of 1942. US intelligence officers decode Japanese communications and they learn that they plan to attack an American base in the Midway Islands. This breakthrough means that, unlike Pearl Harbor, the US Navy is not caught by surprise when the Japanese set sail. Instead, American planes quickly detect the Japanese flotilla, and a four-day battle ensues in the middle of the Pacific Ocean. When it’s over, the Japanese limp back home having sustained ten times more casualties and lost far more ships and planes than the Americans.

The US Navy uses this victory at the Battle of Midway as a springboard to go on the attack. Over the next eighteen months, American forces island-hop across the Pacific, liberating occupied territory and getting closer and closer to the Japanese mainland.

By early 1945, the United States has been at war for more than three years, and the next island in line is Iwo Jima. The island is tiny, just eleven square miles and intelligence reports suggest the Japanese forces there won’t be able to resist long in the face of a mass assault. And so, in the early hours of February 19th, 1945, an armada of five hundred American ships approaches Iwo Jima under the cover of darkness to begin the attack.

But the Japanese defense of the island will prove much more stubborn than the Americans ever expected, and the Battle of Iwo Jima will descend into a bloody and brutal slog before the Stars and Stripes are hoisted above the island’s dark sands.

Act Two

It’s February 23rd, 1945, on Iwo Jima, four days after the beginning of the US Navy’s amphibious assault on the island.

First Lieutenant Harold Schrier squints against the sunlight as he scans the sides of Mount Suribachi for the enemy. At 554 feet, the peak is the highest point on the otherwise flat island—and in the next hour, First Lieutenant Schrier is expected at the top.

It’s been days since American troops first landed on Iwo Jima, and the island is proving far harder to capture than first thought. The Japanese have prepared well, with heavily fortified positions and a network of tunnels. But it’s the more natural obstacle of Mount Suribachi that stands in the way today.

Lieutenant Schrier grabs his pack and orders his men to begin climbing the mountain. They scramble up a rocky trail, littered with dugouts and caves, any one of which could be hiding a Japanese sniper. Lieutenant Schrier is soon breathing hard, beads of sweat running down his back as he continues to scan the surroundings for any signs of danger.

But he and his men encounter little resistance on their way to the top. When Lieutenant Schrier reaches the summit, he takes a moment to look down and watch the battle playing out across the island beneath him.

Lieutenant Schrier hopes that the men below can see him too, because he has a surprise for them. From his backpack, he pulls out an American flag and allows it to flutter in the wind for a moment. Confident that there are no Japanese troops around to disturb them, Lieutenant Schrier has his men search around for something they can use as a flagpole. One Marine locates a length of pipe, and after Lieutenant Schrier secures the flag to it, they plant the makeshift pole in the ground. Cheers echo from the American soldiers on the battlefield below as they see their Stars and Stripes on the mountaintop. Lieutenant Schrier poses with his men while a sergeant uses a camera to record the achievement. But this proud moment is soon interrupted. A group of Japanese soldiers has been alerted by the sound of cheering and storm out of a nearby cave. Under fire, the Marines drop to the ground and quickly put an end to the Japanese assaults. But when the Marines climb back to their feet, the sergeant with the camera holds it ruefully in the air—the lens shattered as he hit the deck.

The flag the men raised is still flying, though. And a few minutes later, another photographer gazes up at the peak of Mount Suribachi from the beach.

33-year-old Joe Rosenthal is a correspondent for the Associated Press, and he immediately recognizes the symbolic significance of the American flag flying over the island. Despite the danger, Joe decides he must get a shot of the flag at the summit. As a civilian journalist, he isn’t allowed to carry a weapon, so he enlists the help of two soldiers to escort him to the top.

On the long climb up, Joe passes a group of Marines who said they put the flag up, and Joe notes with disappointment that one of them has a camera. When he realizes he’s been beaten to the shot, Joe considers turning back, but the Marine photographer assures him that the summit is a great location to take wide, panoramic shots of the battle. So, Joe decides to continue.

After a long and tiring trip, Joe finally arrives at the summit—where he’s surprised to see a new group of Marines pulling the flagpole down and stripping off the Stars and Stripes. Joe asks why, one Marine answers that they’re replacing the flag with a bigger one, one that can be seen from further away.

Joe can’t believe his luck. He pulls out his camera and gets in position next to a Marine with a lightweight motion picture camera. The Marine asks whether he’s in Joe’s way, and Joe turns his head to answer. But just as he’s momentarily distracted, the other Marines begin to raise the flagpole back into place. Joe doesn’t even have time to look through the viewfinder of his camera. Instead, he just points the lens and snaps blindly.

Joe takes several other more posed shots before returning down the mountain. But with no means of developing the film on Iwo Jima, he can only send it by plane to Guam and hope for the best.

Later that same evening, a technician will process Joe’s film—and he will be struck by one photo in particular. This shot captures six Marines straining to spear an improvised flagpole into the ground while the Stars and Stripes ripples in the breeze overhead. This photo will be transmitted to the United States headquarters of the Associated Press, and it will be on the front pages of almost every newspaper in America the next day. Soon, Joe’s instantly iconic photograph will come to symbolize not only victory at Iwo Jima but the heroic efforts of all US Marines who serve their country.

Act Three

It’s November 10th, 1954, at Arlington Ridge Park in Virginia, nine years after the Battle of Iwo Jima.

Joe Rosenthal removes his hat and places his hand against his chest as a military band plays “The Star-Spangled Banner”, beginning the festivities to dedicate a new monument.

Three years ago, Congress approved the construction of a memorial to all Marines who had died in service of the United States since 1775. With such a long history to choose from, the Marine Corps League decided to commission a sculpture based on the most famous image of Marines in action: Joe Rosenthal’s Pulitzer Prize-winning photograph of the Stars and Stripes being raised over Iwo Jima. Today, a 32-foot-high bronze sculpture depicting the iconic moment is finally ready to be unveiled—and Joe is among the guests of honor.

Joe takes his seat along surviving veterans, including President Dwight D. Eisenhower and several Marines who served on Iwo Jima. Among them are three of the six men who raised the flag in Joe’s image—the other three Marines all died on the island. Several dignitaries give speeches to mark the occasion, and Joe’s photograph is mentioned more than once. But ever since it was printed, Joe’s felt a little uneasy that a war photo made him famous. He usually responds to questions with a simple phrase: “I took the picture, but the Marines took Iwo Jima.”

Joe’s photograph may have only been one moment in a much larger battle, but it came to symbolize everything the Marine Corps stood for. The raising of the Stars and Stripes over Iwo Jima is one of the most reproduced images of all time, sealing a place in history for photographer Joe Rosenthal and for the six brave Marines who pushed the flagpole into the ground at the summit of Mount Suribachi on February 23rd, 1945.

Outro

Next on History Daily. February 26th, 1995. One of Britain’s oldest and most prestigious banks collapses after suffering billion-dollar losses on secret investments made by its employee Nick Leeson.

From Noiser and Airship, this is History Daily, hosted, edited, and executive produced by me, Lindsay Graham.

Audio editing by Muhammad Shahzaib.

Sound design by Matthew Filler.

Music by Lindsay Graham.

This episode is written and researched by Rob Scragg.

Edited by Scott Reeves.

Managing producer, Emily Burke.

Executive Producers are William Simpson for Airship, and Pascal Hughes for Noiser.