thedrifter
11-15-05, 02:53 PM
November 21, 2005
The Lore of the Corps
‘Zippo’ tanks, assault squads key to Iwo Jima
By Charles A. Jones
Special to the Times
Joe Rosenthal’s famous photographs depicting the flag raising atop Mount Suribachi captured an important moment in the historic battle of Iwo Jima. However, the photographs did not show the individual tactics Marines used to successfully capture the island.
According to World War II veteran Luther “Luke” Crabtree, a key tactic Marines employed in the 1945 battle was using the assault squad — which was not a squad but rather a small group of Marines formed specifically to destroy Japanese caves, pillboxes and other fortifications blocking infantry progress.
Assault squads included a demolitions man, a flamethrower man, a bazooka man and a bazooka loader.
Needless to say, the work was dangerous.
Crabtree, who was with Dog Company, 2nd Battalion, 26th Marines, was a demolitions man.
His assault squad usually attacked an objective by first having the bazooka man fire one or more shots. The flamethrower man and demolitions man could then eliminate the target by using a satchel charge.
Other Marines would cover the squad using small-arms fire while it was working, protecting it from Japanese rushing from the objective, flanks or rear.
Toward the end of the battle, Crabtree’s company was at the north end of the island near Kitano Point. There, tactics changed as the demolitions jobs got closer and caves became the primary objective. The squad was then working in such close quarters that Crabtree occasionally moved only 10 yards from cover to reach objectives.
With the squad so close to the objective, it could not use its bazooka; it relied on demolitions and flamethrowers. At this point, bulldozers had to clear the way for the assault squad to reach the caves.
Crabtree noted that Sherman tanks equipped with flamethrowers — shooting flames from tubes replacing their gun barrels — were a welcome addition. Nicknamed “Zippo” tanks, they were more effective than the heavy, bulky flamethrowers Marines carried on their backs. Also, Marines carrying flamethrowers were prime targets for Japanese fire.
Crabtree praised Zippos. “We’d never have taken Iwo without flamethrower tanks,” he said.
Crabtree was on Iwo during the entire battle and earned the Silver Star for his actions. On March 13, while the company was “held up by rifle and grenade fire from a series of caves to the front,” he ran forward of the front lines and “destroyed two cave positions.” On March 15, he disregarded enemy machine-gun fire from caves to the company’s front and destroyed three cave positions with satchel charges, “making possible the advance of the company.”
Reflecting on the battle, Crabtree said he was “in a fog most of the time. I was so busy trying to stay alive that one day blended into another.”
When asked what made victory possible, he credited 5th Marine Division’s composition based around experienced former Marine Raiders and paratroopers.
“If we had sent raw recruits in there, we would have been annihilated,” he said.
The writer is a lawyer and Marine Corps Reserve colonel in Norfolk, Va.
Ellie
The Lore of the Corps
‘Zippo’ tanks, assault squads key to Iwo Jima
By Charles A. Jones
Special to the Times
Joe Rosenthal’s famous photographs depicting the flag raising atop Mount Suribachi captured an important moment in the historic battle of Iwo Jima. However, the photographs did not show the individual tactics Marines used to successfully capture the island.
According to World War II veteran Luther “Luke” Crabtree, a key tactic Marines employed in the 1945 battle was using the assault squad — which was not a squad but rather a small group of Marines formed specifically to destroy Japanese caves, pillboxes and other fortifications blocking infantry progress.
Assault squads included a demolitions man, a flamethrower man, a bazooka man and a bazooka loader.
Needless to say, the work was dangerous.
Crabtree, who was with Dog Company, 2nd Battalion, 26th Marines, was a demolitions man.
His assault squad usually attacked an objective by first having the bazooka man fire one or more shots. The flamethrower man and demolitions man could then eliminate the target by using a satchel charge.
Other Marines would cover the squad using small-arms fire while it was working, protecting it from Japanese rushing from the objective, flanks or rear.
Toward the end of the battle, Crabtree’s company was at the north end of the island near Kitano Point. There, tactics changed as the demolitions jobs got closer and caves became the primary objective. The squad was then working in such close quarters that Crabtree occasionally moved only 10 yards from cover to reach objectives.
With the squad so close to the objective, it could not use its bazooka; it relied on demolitions and flamethrowers. At this point, bulldozers had to clear the way for the assault squad to reach the caves.
Crabtree noted that Sherman tanks equipped with flamethrowers — shooting flames from tubes replacing their gun barrels — were a welcome addition. Nicknamed “Zippo” tanks, they were more effective than the heavy, bulky flamethrowers Marines carried on their backs. Also, Marines carrying flamethrowers were prime targets for Japanese fire.
Crabtree praised Zippos. “We’d never have taken Iwo without flamethrower tanks,” he said.
Crabtree was on Iwo during the entire battle and earned the Silver Star for his actions. On March 13, while the company was “held up by rifle and grenade fire from a series of caves to the front,” he ran forward of the front lines and “destroyed two cave positions.” On March 15, he disregarded enemy machine-gun fire from caves to the company’s front and destroyed three cave positions with satchel charges, “making possible the advance of the company.”
Reflecting on the battle, Crabtree said he was “in a fog most of the time. I was so busy trying to stay alive that one day blended into another.”
When asked what made victory possible, he credited 5th Marine Division’s composition based around experienced former Marine Raiders and paratroopers.
“If we had sent raw recruits in there, we would have been annihilated,” he said.
The writer is a lawyer and Marine Corps Reserve colonel in Norfolk, Va.
Ellie