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28th Marine Regiment (United States)
Encyclopedia
The 28th Marine Regiment (28th Marines) is an inactive infantry
regiment of the United States Marine Corps
. They fought during the Battle of Iwo Jima
in World War II
and some of its members were immortalized in the famous photo of the flag raising
on top of Mount Suribachi.
battalion
s and one headquarters battalion:
, California
. Many of the first members of the regiment had previously been members of the recently disbanded Raiders
and Paramarines
. The regiment was initially staged at Tent Camp 1 in the Las Pulgas Valley on Camp Pendleton. Upon completion of their training in late September-early October they boarded troop ships in San Diego, California and sailed to Hilo, Hawaii where they would eventually call Camp Tarawa
home. They remained their for the next four months training for their first mission.
The regiment was originally scheduled to assault Yap
in the Caroline Islands
in the fall of 1944 but a change in strategy at higher levels would allow for a few more months of training and planning
for the next mission. On October 19, 1944, Colonel Liversedge received tentative plans for the invasion of Iwo Jima
and would set in place two more months of intensive training preparing his men for the amphibious assault upon the volcanic island. The plan created by the efforts of the V Amphibious Corps
in November and December 1944 called for the 28th Marines to land at Green Beach which was on the far left of the landing zone, just at the base of Mount Suribachi. The 1st and 2nd Battalions were to drive across the 750 yard neck of the island and cut off the mountain from the rest of the island. The 3rd Battalion was placed in reserve for the initial assault.
The 28th Marines embarked upon amphibious transports in late December and after a few days liberty in Pearl Harbor
they set sail heading west on January 7, 1945. They stopped at Eniwetok on February 5, conducted a practice landing on Tinian
on February 13 and arrived off the coast of Iwo Jima on February 16.
From 19–23 February, the regiment fought to secure Mount Suribachi. Progress was initially slow and measured in yards as they had to fight their way through hundreds of layered and mutually supporting Japanese pillboxes, blockhouses, spiderholes and strongpoints. By the morning of 23 February, Suribachi had been encircled. Col Liversledge called for a reconnaissance patrol to scale the mountain a find a path to the top if possible. Chosen for the mission was the 3rd Platoon, Echo Company, 2nd Battalion, 28th Marines
. These men reached the summit at approximately 1020 and proceeded to raise a small American flag. It was the raising of this flag that led the then Secretary of the Navy, James Forrestal
, to comment that "...the raising of that flag on Suribachi means a Marine Corps for the next five hundred years.". Fearing that the flag would be taken by higher-ups, Lt Col Chandler Johnson from 2/28 ordered a second patrol to the top of the mountain to replace the flag with a larger one that could later be given to any senior ranking personnel that wanted it as he intended for the first flag to remain with the battalion. It was the raising of this second flag that was caught on film by Joe Rosenthal
and would become the iconic photo
of the battle.
. Upon the Japanese surrender they sailed for mainland Japan
where they landed at the port of Sasebo
on September 22, 1945 becoming part of the American occupation force. Three months later they set sail again this time for Marine Corps Base Camp Pendleton, California. The regiment was deactivated on January 23, 1946 as part of the post-war drawdown of forces.
Infantry
Infantrymen are soldiers who are specifically trained for the role of fighting on foot to engage the enemy face to face and have historically borne the brunt of the casualties of combat in wars. As the oldest branch of combat arms, they are the backbone of armies...
regiment of the United States Marine Corps
United States Marine Corps
The United States Marine Corps is a branch of the United States Armed Forces responsible for providing power projection from the sea, using the mobility of the United States Navy to deliver combined-arms task forces rapidly. It is one of seven uniformed services of the United States...
. They fought during the Battle of Iwo Jima
Battle of Iwo Jima
The Battle of Iwo Jima , or Operation Detachment, was a major battle in which the United States fought for and captured the island of Iwo Jima from the Empire of Japan. The U.S...
in World War II
World War II
World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...
and some of its members were immortalized in the famous photo of the flag raising
Raising the Flag on Iwo Jima
Raising the Flag on Iwo Jima is a historic photograph taken on February 23, 1945, by Joe Rosenthal. It depicts five United States Marines and a U.S. Navy corpsman raising the flag of the United States atop Mount Suribachi during the Battle of Iwo Jima in World War II.The photograph was extremely...
on top of Mount Suribachi.
Subordinate units
The Regiment comprised three infantryInfantry
Infantrymen are soldiers who are specifically trained for the role of fighting on foot to engage the enemy face to face and have historically borne the brunt of the casualties of combat in wars. As the oldest branch of combat arms, they are the backbone of armies...
battalion
Battalion
A battalion is a military unit of around 300–1,200 soldiers usually consisting of between two and seven companies and typically commanded by either a Lieutenant Colonel or a Colonel...
s and one headquarters battalion:
| Battalions |
|---|
| Headquarters & Service Company 28th Marines |
| 1st Battalion 28th Marines (1/28) |
| 2nd Battalion 28th Marines 2nd Battalion 28th Marines The 2nd Battalion, 28th Marines is an inactive infantry battalion of the United States Marine Corps. They were part of the 28th Marine Regiment and 5th Marine Division and fought during the Battle of Iwo Jima in World War II... (2/28) |
| 3rd Battalion 28th Marines 3rd Battalion 28th Marines The 3rd Battalion 28th Marines is an inactive infantry battalion of the United States Marine Corps. They were part of the 28th Marine Regiment and 5th Marine Division and fought during the Battle of Iwo Jima in World War II... (3/28) |
Formation and preparation for combat
The 28th Marine Regiment was activated on February 8, 1944 at Marine Corps Base Camp PendletonMarine Corps Base Camp Pendleton
Marine Corps Base Camp Pendleton is the major West Coast base of the United States Marine Corps and serves as its prime amphibious training base...
, California
California
California is a state located on the West Coast of the United States. It is by far the most populous U.S. state, and the third-largest by land area...
. Many of the first members of the regiment had previously been members of the recently disbanded Raiders
Marine Raiders
The Marine Raiders were elite units established by the United States Marine Corps during World War II to conduct amphibious light infantry warfare, particularly in landing in rubber boats and operating behind the lines...
and Paramarines
Paramarines
The Paramarines was a short-lived specialized unit of the United States Marine Corps, trained to be dropped by parachute. The first Paramarines were trained in October 1940, but the unit was disbanded in 1944...
. The regiment was initially staged at Tent Camp 1 in the Las Pulgas Valley on Camp Pendleton. Upon completion of their training in late September-early October they boarded troop ships in San Diego, California and sailed to Hilo, Hawaii where they would eventually call Camp Tarawa
Camp Tarawa
Camp Tarawa was a training camp located on the big island of Hawaii constructed and used by the 2nd Marine Division during World War II. The grounds of the camp were situated between the volcanic peaks of Mauna Kea and Mauna Loa. Marines were sent straight from the bloodly Battle of Tarawa to the...
home. They remained their for the next four months training for their first mission.
Yap
Yap, also known as Wa'ab by locals, is an island in the Caroline Islands of the western Pacific Ocean. It is a state of the Federated States of Micronesia. Yap's indigenous cultures and traditions are still strong compared to other neighboring islands. The island of Yap actually consists of four...
in the Caroline Islands
Caroline Islands
The Caroline Islands are a widely scattered archipelago of tiny islands in the western Pacific Ocean, to the north of New Guinea. Politically they are divided between the Federated States of Micronesia in the eastern part of the group, and Palau at the extreme western end...
in the fall of 1944 but a change in strategy at higher levels would allow for a few more months of training and planning
Planning for the Battle of Iwo Jima
In anticipation of the Battle of Iwo Jima, Lieutenant General Tadamichi Kuribayashi prepared a defense that broke with Japanese military doctrine. Rather than defending the beaches, Kuribayashi devised a defense that maximized enemy attrition...
for the next mission. On October 19, 1944, Colonel Liversedge received tentative plans for the invasion of Iwo Jima
Iwo Jima
Iwo Jima, officially , is an island of the Japanese Volcano Islands chain, which lie south of the Ogasawara Islands and together with them form the Ogasawara Archipelago. The island is located south of mainland Tokyo and administered as part of Ogasawara, one of eight villages of Tokyo...
and would set in place two more months of intensive training preparing his men for the amphibious assault upon the volcanic island. The plan created by the efforts of the V Amphibious Corps
V Amphibious Corps
The V Amphibious Corps was a formation of the United States Marine Corps and was composed of the 3rd, 4th and 5th Marine Divisions during World War II. They were the amphibious landing force for the United States Fifth Fleet and were notably involved in the battles for Tarawa and Saipan in 1944...
in November and December 1944 called for the 28th Marines to land at Green Beach which was on the far left of the landing zone, just at the base of Mount Suribachi. The 1st and 2nd Battalions were to drive across the 750 yard neck of the island and cut off the mountain from the rest of the island. The 3rd Battalion was placed in reserve for the initial assault.
The 28th Marines embarked upon amphibious transports in late December and after a few days liberty in Pearl Harbor
Pearl Harbor
Pearl Harbor, known to Hawaiians as Puuloa, is a lagoon harbor on the island of Oahu, Hawaii, west of Honolulu. Much of the harbor and surrounding lands is a United States Navy deep-water naval base. It is also the headquarters of the U.S. Pacific Fleet...
they set sail heading west on January 7, 1945. They stopped at Eniwetok on February 5, conducted a practice landing on Tinian
Tinian
Tinian is one of the three principal islands of the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands.-Geography:Tinian is about 5 miles southwest of its sister island, Saipan, from which it is separated by the Saipan Channel. It has a land area of 39 sq.mi....
on February 13 and arrived off the coast of Iwo Jima on February 16.
Iwo Jima
The first portions of the 28th Marines landed on Iwo Jima at Green Beach just after 9:00 AM on 19 February 1945. 1/28 and 2/28 were first ashore and within 90 minutes of hitting the beach small units from these battalions had reached the west coast of the island. 3/28 was fully ashore by 1300 that afternoon, having taken heavy casualties in the water and while crossing the beach. By late in the afternoon the regiment had isolated Mount Suribachi and began to commence its attacks south against the defenders of the island redoubt. The 28th Marines were the only of the four regiments that landed on D-Day to achieve their objectives.From 19–23 February, the regiment fought to secure Mount Suribachi. Progress was initially slow and measured in yards as they had to fight their way through hundreds of layered and mutually supporting Japanese pillboxes, blockhouses, spiderholes and strongpoints. By the morning of 23 February, Suribachi had been encircled. Col Liversledge called for a reconnaissance patrol to scale the mountain a find a path to the top if possible. Chosen for the mission was the 3rd Platoon, Echo Company, 2nd Battalion, 28th Marines
2nd Battalion 28th Marines
The 2nd Battalion, 28th Marines is an inactive infantry battalion of the United States Marine Corps. They were part of the 28th Marine Regiment and 5th Marine Division and fought during the Battle of Iwo Jima in World War II...
. These men reached the summit at approximately 1020 and proceeded to raise a small American flag. It was the raising of this flag that led the then Secretary of the Navy, James Forrestal
James Forrestal
James Vincent Forrestal was the last Cabinet-level United States Secretary of the Navy and the first United States Secretary of Defense....
, to comment that "...the raising of that flag on Suribachi means a Marine Corps for the next five hundred years.". Fearing that the flag would be taken by higher-ups, Lt Col Chandler Johnson from 2/28 ordered a second patrol to the top of the mountain to replace the flag with a larger one that could later be given to any senior ranking personnel that wanted it as he intended for the first flag to remain with the battalion. It was the raising of this second flag that was caught on film by Joe Rosenthal
Joe Rosenthal
Joseph John Rosenthal was an American photographer who received the Pulitzer Prize for his iconic World War II photograph Raising the Flag on Iwo Jima, taken during the Battle of Iwo Jima. His picture became one of the best-known photographs of the war.-Early life:Joseph Rosenthal was born on...
and would become the iconic photo
Raising the Flag on Iwo Jima
Raising the Flag on Iwo Jima is a historic photograph taken on February 23, 1945, by Joe Rosenthal. It depicts five United States Marines and a U.S. Navy corpsman raising the flag of the United States atop Mount Suribachi during the Battle of Iwo Jima in World War II.The photograph was extremely...
of the battle.
Post-Iwo Jima and deactivation
After tha Battle of Iwo Jima the regiment sailed back to Hawaii and Camp Tarawa where they began to refit for the planned invasion of Japan. They were tasked with being part of Operation Olympic, the planned invasion of KyushuKyushu
is the third largest island of Japan and most southwesterly of its four main islands. Its alternate ancient names include , , and . The historical regional name is referred to Kyushu and its surrounding islands....
. Upon the Japanese surrender they sailed for mainland Japan
Japan
Japan is an island nation in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean, it lies to the east of the Sea of Japan, China, North Korea, South Korea and Russia, stretching from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea and Taiwan in the south...
where they landed at the port of Sasebo
Sasebo
Sasebo or may refer to:* Sasebo, Nagasaki, a city in Japan and a base of the Imperial Japanese Navy in the city, later of the Japan Maritime Self-Defense Force* United States Fleet Activities Sasebo, a post-WWII United States Navy Base in the city...
on September 22, 1945 becoming part of the American occupation force. Three months later they set sail again this time for Marine Corps Base Camp Pendleton, California. The regiment was deactivated on January 23, 1946 as part of the post-war drawdown of forces.
See also
- Flags of our FathersFlags of Our FathersFlags of Our Fathers is a New York Times bestselling book by James Bradley with Ron Powers about the five United States Marines and one United States Navy Corpsman who would eventually be made famous by Joe Rosenthal's lauded photograph of the flag raising at Iwo Jima, one of the costliest and...
- History of the United States Marine CorpsHistory of the United States Marine CorpsThe history of the United States Marine Corps began with the founding of the Continental Marines on November 10, 1775 to conduct ship-to-ship fighting, provide shipboard security and discipline enforcement, and assist in landing forces. Its mission evolved with changing military doctrine and...
- List of United States Marine Corps regiments