The Battle of Okinawa: 70 Years Later, No End in Sight for the UXO Problem

By UXO Guest Writer, LTC Danny M. Johnson, (USA Ret)

The Battle of Okinawa was part of the Ryukyus Campaign. Code named "Operation Iceberg," it was the largest amphibious landing in the Pacific theater of World War II. It also resulted in the highest casualties with over 100,000 Japanese casualties and 50,000 casualties for the Allies. Some called the battle for the Island of the "typhoon of steel" because of ground combat, naval ships, aviation, and air corps units all raining destruction throughout Okinawa.

On September 29, 1944, B-29 bombers conducted the initial reconnaissance mission over Okinawa and its outlying islands. On October 10, 1944, nearly two hundred of Admiral Halsey's planes struck Naha, Okinawa's capital and principal city, in five separate waves. The city was almost totally devastated, yet the bombing continued. From April 1 to June 22, 1945, 287,000 troops of the U.S. Tenth Army battled 130,000 soldiers of the Japanese Thirty-second Army. At stake were air bases very important to the anticipated invasion of Japan. Losses were extremely heavy on both sides.

The Battle of Okinawa landing is recognized for its sheer strength of the fighting and the quantity of munitions that were expended. Out of the countless ordnance fired on and onto the island of Okinawa, some failed to explode and resulted in unexploded ordnance (UXO) dormant in the earth for years. It is unknown how many tons of UXOs were removed by the U.S. military between the end of World War II and 1972.

In his 2013 article, "The Land of Unexploded Bombs," James Simpson describes how the "Battle of Okinawa left the southern island chain littered with the largest density of UXOs accounting for some five percent of the 200,000 tons of ordnance dropped on the island not counting man-portable items such as mortars, grenades, and other ammunition." Simpson went on to say that when the U.S. occupied Okinawa from the end of the war to 1972, "the Japanese Self-Defense Forces and U.S. military disposed of approximately 5,500 tons, and had discovered an additional 1,500 tons by 2000." Of the 3000 tons remaining, approximately 50 tons of munitions are currently being discovered each year. At this rate, EOD detachments will likely be performing disposal operations for at least another 60 years.

It is also unknown how many unexploded munitions remain buried on Okinawa in coastal waters, according to the 15th Brigade Okinawa of the Japanese Ground Self-Defense Force. As of July 12, 2014, some 1,708 tons had been recovered and detonated by the Self-Defense Force since the island prefecture was returned to Japan in 1972.

U.S. Forces and the people of Okinawa work and live on a WWII battlefield," said Senior Master Sgt. Loren Green, 18th Civil Engineer Squadron Explosive Ordnance Disposal flight chief, and according to Staff Sgt. Amber Jacobs, 18th Wing public affairs spokeswoman, it's not uncommon to unearth or randomly find UXOs. "With an estimated 1 million UXOs still in and around the island, the remnants of the battle exist around all of us each and every day," Green adds. All UXOs located on US bases are the responsibility of Okinawa's U.S. forces EOD units. The Japanese Self Defense Force has an EOD program that protects the local population when instances are reported off base.

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