On April 1, 1945, Allied forces invade the island of Okinawa and engage the Japanese in the bloodiest battle of the Pacific War.

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On April 1, 1945, the U.S. 10th Army under Gen. Simon Bolivar Buckner began the invasion of Okinawa, a Japanese-held island in the Pacific considered the final stepping stone in an advance toward the Japanese mainland. Two days into the invasion, a news report relays the story of the U.S. Army's fast-paced advance.

The USS Laffey engages in a heated battle against 22 kamikazes off the coast of Okinawa in the most concentrated kamikaze attack of World War II.

Learn more about the Battle of Guadalcanal, the Allies' first major offensive - and a decisive victory - in the Pacific theater during World War II.

In a live recording, Sgt. Fred Walker gives a blow-by-blow description of a battle with Japanese forces as he lands on one of the Marshall Island atolls in the Pacific with the Marines Fifth Amphibian Corps in 1944.