Bloody Pacific : American Soldiers at War with Japan

Based on countless diaries and letters, Schrijvers recounts American GIs' experiences in Asia and the Pacific. From the daunting spaces of the China-India theatre to the fortress islands of Iwo Jima and Okinawa, he brings to life their struggle with suffocating wilderness, devastating diseases, and Japanese soldiers who preferred death over life.

Bloody Pacific tells the real story of the attitudes and behaviour of American fighting men in the war against Japan, revealing much about the nature of this terrifying conflict that has until now remained unknown. Based on years of research and using countless unpublished diaries and letters, Schrijvers sweeps across the battlefields, from the desperate stand at Guadalcanal to the tragic sinking of the USS Indianapolis, and from the daunting spaces of the China-Burma-India theatre to the fortress islands of Iwo Jima and Okinawa. In a manner that is often unsettling, Bloody Pacific brings to life the GIs'' epic struggle with suffocating wilderness, debilitating diseases, and Japanese soldiers choosing death over life. Amid the frustration and despair of this war, American soldiers abandoned themselves to an escalating rage against nature and man - and prayed for the bombs that would wipe away Hiroshima and Nagasaki.