On Iwo Jima the battle ground forward, slowly, bloodily but steadily. According to Japanese custom, the enemy garrison, now estimated at an original 20,000, was fighting a rear-guard action with no hope of reinforcement or relief.
According to American custom, the battlefield had been isolated. Throughout the bombardment and invasion of Iwo, air strikes from carriers in Admiral Raymond Ames Spruance's Fifth Fleet kept Japanese heads down on Chichi Jima in the Bonins, where a single airstrip had a potential nuisance value. Last week, for the second time, Vice Admiral Marc Andrew...
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