The battles
of Iwo Jima, along with other similar battles like that on Saipan, influenced the US decision to
drop the atomic bombs because they convinced the Americans that an invasion of the Japanese home
islands would be horrifically costly in terms of human life. In part because of these battles,
the US decided that using the bombs would save huge numbers of lives by ending the war without
an invasion.
Iwo Jima and Okinawa were Japanese islands, with Iwo Jima being
a very small island with few people. Neither island was part of the home islands that had
always been seen as part of Japan. Even so, when the Americans invaded these islands the cost
in casualties was tremendous. When the US invaded Iwo Jima, it involved about 70,000 men. Of
those, over 6800 were killed and over 19,000 were wounded. Okinawa was a much larger island and
about 18,000 men participated in that invasion. More than 12,500 were killed in combat and
close to another 39,000 were wounded. In both cases, the Japanese fought essentially to the
last man, with 90% or more of their soldiers being killed.
What this showed
was that an invasion of the Japanese home islands would be horrible. The Japanese military and
even civilians could be expected to defend the islands even more vigorously than they had
defended Okinawa or Iwo Jima. Planners estimated that as many as 1 million Americans might get
killed and wounded. These calculations made dropping the bombs seem like a much better approach
to ending the war.
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