I'm an old Hispano from New Mexico, my father joined The US Navy Dec 8th, 1941, was a CeeBee in the Marinas and saw heavy action, followed the Marines setting up aid stations etc. on the beaches. My good friends father was on a Navy destroyer on picket duty in the Marinas and was under Kamikaze attacks. People don't know this but US casualties were over 400,000. More than all the causualites of all the allied forces combines than D day on the beaches of Normandy. It happened after Victory in Europe , so most Europeans don't know the extend of the dead on Iwo Jima.
So this wasn't the D-Day you're thinking of, which was the allied invasion of Europe. This was the D-Day (meaning day 1 of an invasion or major operation) of Iwo Jima, which was one of the bloodiest battles in the entire war and one of the highest American casualty rates of any operation. The worst American casualty rate of any battle in WWII was the battle of Okinawa, which surprise, is episode 9. The next episode is regarded as probably one of the hardest episodes of any tv show to watch.
It's D-Day on the island of Iwo Jima (an island in the Pacific). The term D-Day is a generic term for the first day of any invasion. The invasion of Guadalcanal had a D-Day (first day of the invasion), same with the invasion of Peleliu and North Africa, etc., etc.
John Basilone was a real person. A real national hero. Everybody knew of him, everyone loved him, every guy wanted to be him, every woman adored him. And when he was killed at Iwo Jima the nation mourned as if it were a personal loss to them.
D-day is a commonly used term in the military for tefering to an unspecified day, (usually due to secrecy, in planning and prior to execution of a strategy. ) you don't want to reveal the day of your invasion or operation so you refer to it as D-day which means the 'day of days'. They also do this with other units of time H-hour, M-month, Y-year Etc.
John basilione was the reason why I joined the marines. His actions in the movie from Guadalcanal to imo Jima were all true and his leadership was beyond amazing by all accounts of his men.
D-day is the first day of invasion. An invasion is scheduled to happen at D-day, H-hour. This is the D-day for the Iwo Jiwa island campaign. The D-day of Normandy remained to be The D-day in normal speech, due to the scale of the landings and Eisenhowers D-day message that was even recorded for radio afterwards. So in common speech, D-day is Normandy, and every other D-day is specified where, like February 1945/D-day Iwo Jiwa when the war action begins.
The term green is an old agricultural expression. It refers to fruit or vegetables that are picked too soon, while they are still green. Until they age and get ripe, there is not much they can be done with them. So a green Soldier or Marine, you can't do much with them until they are trained and have some experience and become "ripe". This is the most common belief. One other story is that green refers to a new recruits clothing. When first issued they are very green. As they go through training their clothing get sweated through and washed many times and becomes less green, so people with more experience are less "green."
Lena Basilone received the news of John's death on her 32nd birthday. Personally, I can't think of a worse birthday present to receive. And Lena never remarried, saying: "When you've had the best, who wants the rest?"
Liiv back on The Pacific!! Yep, Captain Haldane, the kind commander in last episode! He is worthy, John Basilone, and I think he understands that but I also think and they share it in this episode that he’d rather be fighting and active rather than parading at home.
The reason why they have a full episode on what happened to John Basilone is because it's so critical to the story and his story is tragic but 100% true
Lots of D days, this on Iwo Jima ... had lots of Japanese soldiers underground ... 20,000 of them. Aerial and naval bombardment had hardly hurt them. That is where the Marines famously raised the flag. The son of my grandmother's second husband, died there. The rest of the Jarheads ... are going to Okinawa ;-(
Pretty Green means - not trained, no experience, needs more experience. Let me explain the analogy -- When a tree grows the early/new branches a green inside. They are new trees and new branches and new plants tend to be very green. As a tree or branch ages it tends to get more brown and the green fades away. So, bringing it back to a person, if you were to say that person is pretty green, what's being implied is that they have no experience/they are new. The term is used all the time when someone is new to a task. When someone is hired at a company and the boss is talking about the new people, often the term - they are green is is used. I'm almost 100% sure you have the analogy in the UK. Have you ever heard it?
So D-day was the allied landings in the European theatre on the beaches of Normandy against the Nazi's, what you just watched was the island hopping campaign in the pacific theatre against the Japanese.
"This is D-Day???" Every invasion is labelled "D-Day" which stands for "Decision Day". The Invasion of Normandy on June 6, 1944 just happens to be the most famously labelled one. This is Iwo Jima, February 1945.
Just an FYI -- almost all Medal Of Honor recipients and in your country The Victoria Cross - all of them feel like they don't deserve it. When you ask any of them they say I was just doing my job. It's a completely normal attitude.
You have to understand that Basilone being a MoH recipient and still fit for duty puts him in an incredibly small group. The vast majority of recipients are awarded the Medal posthumously. The next most frequent category of recipients are too damaged to return to duty. The Marines wold have had long discussions about allowing Basilone to return to combat duty. Training stateside was one thing, but exposing him to combat was incredibly problematic. From a public relations perspective, as bad as losing him in combat, incredibly bad, wouldn’t have been as bad as having Basilone captured. The Marines would fear feared John being ceremoniously beheaded on film by the Japanese even worse than him dead on a battlefield. It’s an interesting phenomenon, the creation of ‘heroes,’ known and promoted by name and story to publicize the war, sell war bonds, promote the notion of victory, etc. Much as we build them up, they’re just people with a bit of luck on their side, just as fragile as anyone else in the horrors of modern war. Writers for thousands of years have noted how the good, brave men, eager to follow orders, win the war, what have you, are the first ones killed. It’s simply true, but the guys who hangs back, keeps his head down, avoids volunteering or acting aggressively are the ones who survive. Soldiers acting as bravely and aggressively as Basilone tend to die at a much higher rate. Building up their legend for PR purposes serves a purpose for the organization but the frequent distaste those rare individuals have for being called ‘heroes,’ is easily understood by those individuals’ feelings that “the real heroes didn’t make it back, like I did. I’m not a ‘hero,’ I’m a lucky fluke.”
Consider for a moment the idea of publicity. Even you, Dearest Liiv, must have some experience as a public persona. When the media machine worked to build the image of Basilone, the Japanese would have been no less aware of him. Can you imagine the public relations coup for the Japanese of getting their hands on him. The message “we killed your big hero on Iwo Jima” was bad enough. Imagine, for just a moment, the image “We’ve captured him and will display him humbled to the world,” up to and including “……and here’s his severed head on a stick!” Only slightly less injurious to his image would have been, “Gunnery Sergeant John Basilone drowned after falling off a cargo net in some port on the way to combat” or “Gunnery Sergeant John Basilone was killed by a drunk driving a jeep he had stolen on his way to combat.”
@@MrSmithla That would be correct in general, but for Iwo Jiwa specifically that is not the case. Every Japanese soldier died on the island, it was only way later that they knew he was there. It was a big public relations coup when the Germans captured Stalins son, and Stalin then left him to die in a concentration camp
Yekouri I’ve served in the Army and, though I certainly wasn’t present and am making some educated guesses, the decision cycle on Basilone, the decision tree, would have been “Do we let him serve in combat? Yes/No Where would that be?” before the decision, specifically, to send him with his unit to Iwo Jima. Again, pure supposition that this is true, but if it is, the consideration of any MoH recipient being captured, tortured and humiliated would have been had. The Army Air Corps lobbied for and got the right to promote the enlisted crews of their bombers to senior sergeant status given that the Germans housed prisoners in varying status based on rank. We’re given the historical reality of pimply faced 19 year old crewmen of B-17s and B-24s wearing ranks it would normally take decades of service to attain simply to give any who survived a shot down bomber a little better life in captivity. My point is this is in line with the institutional thinking of the services.
Yekouri I hear and understand your argument, that Iwo, like many of the specks of volcanic soil that became battlefields in the Pacific, was completely isolated by air and sea. Any American made prisoner weren’t going anywhere else. However, that would raise the stakes of Basilone being summarily executed, whether that execution could be publicized or not. Certainly, though, you’d agree that the image of a Medal recipient, generally speaking, trussed up, paraded and humiliated, is one that would give military propagandists nightmares? I’m reminded of accounts of the US’ top ace, who also served in the Pacific, Richard Ira Bong as he neared his penultimate score of, from memory, 40 or 41 kills. It’s a wonder to note the disparity of kill tallies between the German and Japanese aces against the rather paltry totals scored by the Americans. Reading Bong’s account is humorous and gives some insight into the mindset of a fighter pilot. He was most concerned about outscoring a fellow US pilot whose name escapes me. The Brass wanted to send him stateside, concerned about losing our top scoring ace in combat. Bong wanted to keep going up to stay ahead of his nearest rival. The higher his total, the more losing him becomes a concern to Command.
You need to watch the extras about this series, especially "Profiles Of The Pacific" which is on disc six if you have the set. In Profiles of the Pacific there are interviews with the Marines who were still alive. It also has interviews with the families of the Marines depicted in the Movie including the wife and children of Bob Leckie, Eugene Sledge and others.
Now you know why once you are awarded the Medal of Honor they won't let you back into combat ever again. The reason why the Marine at the Gate saluted Basilone is everyone must Salute a Medal of Honor winner. Even Generals. When you report in to a new unit and a medal holder you need to specify whether or not you want Honors Rendered aka do you want everyone to salute you. They always go with no on the honors rendered. I worked with two MoH winners over the years. They are just normal people.
@@catherinelw9365 Sorry for my ignorance. All those years in the Army taught me nothing, I guess. 😁 But instead of the Congressional Medal of Honor we called it "Coffin with Metal Handles" since they are awarded posthumously about 90% of the time .
Just post this again in case you haven't noticed: th-cam.com/video/PzZnLNCCsXI/w-d-xo.html Ep 1 intro: 00:00 Ep 2 intro: 02:52 Ep 3 intro: 05:34 Ep 4 intro: 07:53 Ep 5 intro: 10:22 Ep 6 intro: 12:58 Ep 7 intro: 15:00 Ep 8 intro: 17:14 Ep 9 intro: 19:48 Ep 10 intro: 21:47
The term "green" is also used in a non military sense referring to someone completely inexperienced at something. Example: Rick is very green as a driver.
No he's not resentful. What they are trying to show is the lack of intensity that now exists at this location and how surprised Basilone is as to why it's so "lackadaisical"
I do believe he was considered for a second Medal of Honor for his actions on Iwo Jima. His leadership and bravery here were definitely understated in this episode. Unfortunately the Marine Corps only awarded him the Navy Cross, which is the second highest decoration for valor for the Marines. (Not 100 percent sure)
@@catherinelw9365: Yes, The Medal of Honor is bestowed by Congress but the process to award the Medal starts with the recipients base unit, such as his company, then Battalion, then Brigade or Regiment, then Division and then on to Branch. The independent Secretaries of each Branch send the nomination to the Defense Secretary for the final approval. This is unfortunately why it takes years for the Medal to be conferred. It can be stopped or downgraded to a lessor award at any time.
Just to be clear D-Day is just beginning of major operation/landing, so there were multiple "D-Day"s during war
I'm an old Hispano from New Mexico, my father joined The US Navy Dec 8th, 1941, was a CeeBee in the Marinas and saw heavy action, followed the Marines setting up aid stations etc. on the beaches. My good friends father was on a Navy destroyer on picket duty in the Marinas and was under Kamikaze attacks. People don't know this but US casualties were over 400,000. More than all the causualites of all the allied forces combines than D day on the beaches of Normandy. It happened after Victory in Europe , so most Europeans don't know the extend of the dead on Iwo Jima.
So this wasn't the D-Day you're thinking of, which was the allied invasion of Europe. This was the D-Day (meaning day 1 of an invasion or major operation) of Iwo Jima, which was one of the bloodiest battles in the entire war and one of the highest American casualty rates of any operation. The worst American casualty rate of any battle in WWII was the battle of Okinawa, which surprise, is episode 9. The next episode is regarded as probably one of the hardest episodes of any tv show to watch.
It was the only land battle where American casualties exceeded the Japaneses’.
It's D-Day on the island of Iwo Jima (an island in the Pacific). The term D-Day is a generic term for the first day of any invasion. The invasion of Guadalcanal had a D-Day (first day of the invasion), same with the invasion of Peleliu and North Africa, etc., etc.
John Basilone was a real person. A real national hero. Everybody knew of him, everyone loved him, every guy wanted to be him, every woman adored him. And when he was killed at Iwo Jima the nation mourned as if it were a personal loss to them.
D-day is a commonly used term in the military for tefering to an unspecified day, (usually due to secrecy, in planning and prior to execution of a strategy. ) you don't want to reveal the day of your invasion or operation so you refer to it as D-day which means the 'day of days'.
They also do this with other units of time H-hour, M-month, Y-year Etc.
Also makes planning easier - at D+1 this happens, by D+7 we should be here, etc
I had two uncles in the Iwo Jima invasion. One of their brothers had just been killed in the v battle of the bulge.
John basilione was the reason why I joined the marines. His actions in the movie from Guadalcanal to imo Jima were all true and his leadership was beyond amazing by all accounts of his men.
The machine gun Basilone burned his hands on was water-cooled; the one he uses a in this episode was air-cooled. But both can get really hot.
This D Day happened on the island of Iwo Jima.
D-day is the first day of invasion. An invasion is scheduled to happen at D-day, H-hour. This is the D-day for the Iwo Jiwa island campaign. The D-day of Normandy remained to be The D-day in normal speech, due to the scale of the landings and Eisenhowers D-day message that was even recorded for radio afterwards. So in common speech, D-day is Normandy, and every other D-day is specified where, like February 1945/D-day Iwo Jiwa when the war action begins.
The term green is an old agricultural expression. It refers to fruit or vegetables that are picked too soon, while they are still green. Until they age and get ripe, there is not much they can be done with them. So a green Soldier or Marine, you can't do much with them until they are trained and have some experience and become "ripe". This is the most common belief. One other story is that green refers to a new recruits clothing. When first issued they are very green. As they go through training their clothing get sweated through and washed many times and becomes less green, so people with more experience are less "green."
Lena Basilone received the news of John's death on her 32nd birthday. Personally, I can't think of a worse birthday present to receive. And Lena never remarried, saying: "When you've had the best, who wants the rest?"
She was an incredible woman and he was incredible man, I honestly think there’s never been a pair more meant for each other
Liiv back on The Pacific!! Yep, Captain Haldane, the kind commander in last episode! He is worthy, John Basilone, and I think he understands that but I also think and they share it in this episode that he’d rather be fighting and active rather than parading at home.
To this day, there are roads and Navy ships named in honor of John Basilone!!
Weekend without Liv's reaction video is NO weekend at all. GGs once more Liv fantastic job again
D-Day is any such landing. This one is on the Pacific Island of Iwo Jima. The most famous D-Day (What you were thinking of?) was the one in Normandy.
The reason why they have a full episode on what happened to John Basilone is because it's so critical to the story and his story is tragic but 100% true
Lots of D days, this on Iwo Jima ... had lots of Japanese soldiers underground ... 20,000 of them. Aerial and naval bombardment had hardly hurt them. That is where the Marines famously raised the flag. The son of my grandmother's second husband, died there. The rest of the Jarheads ... are going to Okinawa ;-(
this was a really nice episode. and a nice reaction Liv . thank you Liv. sad we lost john the way we did.
He was VERY worthy!!!!
Pretty Green means - not trained, no experience, needs more experience. Let me explain the analogy -- When a tree grows the early/new branches a green inside. They are new trees and new branches and new plants tend to be very green. As a tree or branch ages it tends to get more brown and the green fades away. So, bringing it back to a person, if you were to say that person is pretty green, what's being implied is that they have no experience/they are new. The term is used all the time when someone is new to a task. When someone is hired at a company and the boss is talking about the new people, often the term - they are green is is used. I'm almost 100% sure you have the analogy in the UK. Have you ever heard it?
Liiv, basically the entire Pacific war was a series of D-Days. It was called island hopping.
So D-day was the allied landings in the European theatre on the beaches of Normandy against the Nazi's, what you just watched was the island hopping campaign in the pacific theatre against the Japanese.
D Day is just a designation for the day of attack. Re-used many times for various operations. June 6th 1944 wasn’t the only D-Day. One of many
"This is D-Day???"
Every invasion is labelled "D-Day" which stands for "Decision Day". The Invasion of Normandy on June 6, 1944 just happens to be the most famously labelled one. This is Iwo Jima, February 1945.
Just an FYI -- almost all Medal Of Honor recipients and in your country The Victoria Cross - all of them feel like they don't deserve it. When you ask any of them they say I was just doing my job. It's a completely normal attitude.
"Pretty green" means pretty new. Green, fresh, straight off the tree.
You have to understand that Basilone being a MoH recipient and still fit for duty puts him in an incredibly small group. The vast majority of recipients are awarded the Medal posthumously. The next most frequent category of recipients are too damaged to return to duty. The Marines wold have had long discussions about allowing Basilone to return to combat duty. Training stateside was one thing, but exposing him to combat was incredibly problematic. From a public relations perspective, as bad as losing him in combat, incredibly bad, wouldn’t have been as bad as having Basilone captured. The Marines would fear feared John being ceremoniously beheaded on film by the Japanese even worse than him dead on a battlefield. It’s an interesting phenomenon, the creation of ‘heroes,’ known and promoted by name and story to publicize the war, sell war bonds, promote the notion of victory, etc. Much as we build them up, they’re just people with a bit of luck on their side, just as fragile as anyone else in the horrors of modern war. Writers for thousands of years have noted how the good, brave men, eager to follow orders, win the war, what have you, are the first ones killed. It’s simply true, but the guys who hangs back, keeps his head down, avoids volunteering or acting aggressively are the ones who survive. Soldiers acting as bravely and aggressively as Basilone tend to die at a much higher rate. Building up their legend for PR purposes serves a purpose for the organization but the frequent distaste those rare individuals have for being called ‘heroes,’ is easily understood by those individuals’ feelings that “the real heroes didn’t make it back, like I did. I’m not a ‘hero,’ I’m a lucky fluke.”
Consider for a moment the idea of publicity. Even you, Dearest Liiv, must have some experience as a public persona. When the media machine worked to build the image of Basilone, the Japanese would have been no less aware of him. Can you imagine the public relations coup for the Japanese of getting their hands on him. The message “we killed your big hero on Iwo Jima” was bad enough. Imagine, for just a moment, the image “We’ve captured him and will display him humbled to the world,” up to and including “……and here’s his severed head on a stick!” Only slightly less injurious to his image would have been, “Gunnery Sergeant John Basilone drowned after falling off a cargo net in some port on the way to combat” or “Gunnery Sergeant John Basilone was killed by a drunk driving a jeep he had stolen on his way to combat.”
The list of people who were still fit for duty in the same war after being a MoH recipient is less than 5 people
@@MrSmithla That would be correct in general, but for Iwo Jiwa specifically that is not the case. Every Japanese soldier died on the island, it was only way later that they knew he was there. It was a big public relations coup when the Germans captured Stalins son, and Stalin then left him to die in a concentration camp
Yekouri I’ve served in the Army and, though I certainly wasn’t present and am making some educated guesses, the decision cycle on Basilone, the decision tree, would have been “Do we let him serve in combat? Yes/No Where would that be?” before the decision, specifically, to send him with his unit to Iwo Jima. Again, pure supposition that this is true, but if it is, the consideration of any MoH recipient being captured, tortured and humiliated would have been had. The Army Air Corps lobbied for and got the right to promote the enlisted crews of their bombers to senior sergeant status given that the Germans housed prisoners in varying status based on rank. We’re given the historical reality of pimply faced 19 year old crewmen of B-17s and B-24s wearing ranks it would normally take decades of service to attain simply to give any who survived a shot down bomber a little better life in captivity. My point is this is in line with the institutional thinking of the services.
Yekouri I hear and understand your argument, that Iwo, like many of the specks of volcanic soil that became battlefields in the Pacific, was completely isolated by air and sea. Any American made prisoner weren’t going anywhere else. However, that would raise the stakes of Basilone being summarily executed, whether that execution could be publicized or not. Certainly, though, you’d agree that the image of a Medal recipient, generally speaking, trussed up, paraded and humiliated, is one that would give military propagandists nightmares? I’m reminded of accounts of the US’ top ace, who also served in the Pacific, Richard Ira Bong as he neared his penultimate score of, from memory, 40 or 41 kills. It’s a wonder to note the disparity of kill tallies between the German and Japanese aces against the rather paltry totals scored by the Americans. Reading Bong’s account is humorous and gives some insight into the mindset of a fighter pilot. He was most concerned about outscoring a fellow US pilot whose name escapes me. The Brass wanted to send him stateside, concerned about losing our top scoring ace in combat. Bong wanted to keep going up to stay ahead of his nearest rival. The higher his total, the more losing him becomes a concern to Command.
You need to watch the extras about this series, especially "Profiles Of The Pacific" which is on disc six if you have the set. In Profiles of the Pacific there are interviews with the Marines who were still alive. It also has interviews with the families of the Marines depicted in the Movie including the wife and children of Bob Leckie, Eugene Sledge and others.
It’s called survivors guilt. I’ve also never met a warrior that enjoyed even a modicum of celebrity. It’s endured as a burden.
6:21 One of my favourite scenes from the whole show.
the us navy just names a destroyer after him
Being green means they need time to get ready. Think of bananas. When they are green, they aren’t ready yet.
Iwo Jima was the only island in the Pacific Campaign where American forces suffered more casualties than the Japanese did.
War is just so brutal. Everything lost in a split second.
Now you know why once you are awarded the Medal of Honor they won't let you back into combat ever again. The reason why the Marine at the Gate saluted Basilone is everyone must Salute a Medal of Honor winner. Even Generals. When you report in to a new unit and a medal holder you need to specify whether or not you want Honors Rendered aka do you want everyone to salute you. They always go with no on the honors rendered. I worked with two MoH winners over the years. They are just normal people.
"Recipient", not "winner".
@@catherinelw9365 Sorry for my ignorance. All those years in the Army taught me nothing, I guess. 😁 But instead of the Congressional Medal of Honor we called it "Coffin with Metal Handles" since they are awarded posthumously about 90% of the time .
Basilone was killed on the first day of the battle of Iwo Jima. The entire operation lasted almost a month.
When a guy is green it means he’s fresh he hasn’t been out of trading for too long
Now Basilone has ships bearing his name and if necessary loaded with Marines.
Take a breath & prepare for Episode 9.
Just post this again in case you haven't noticed: th-cam.com/video/PzZnLNCCsXI/w-d-xo.html
Ep 1 intro: 00:00
Ep 2 intro: 02:52
Ep 3 intro: 05:34
Ep 4 intro: 07:53
Ep 5 intro: 10:22
Ep 6 intro: 12:58
Ep 7 intro: 15:00
Ep 8 intro: 17:14
Ep 9 intro: 19:48
Ep 10 intro: 21:47
Liv: I hope the last episodes of the series will be easier to watch...
*monkey looking away meme*
To be Green means to be a new guy. No experience.
About time Liv.lol wel wishes.
A.A. Haldane was “Skipper,” Sledge’s Lieutenant whose father made the Marine’s blankets
Haldane was a Captain.
Erik Lehman Of course, I stand corrected. My mistake
Iwo Jima was a meat grinder.
he was just doing his job not to be thought of as a hero
Oh boy, the next episode is the hardest to watch.
React to TOP GUN MAVERICK, it's a MASTERPIECE
That Iwo Jima not D-day! Brace for episode 9!
D-Day is ANY invasion in either theater.
Green means brand new and know almost nothing and Gunny is short for Gunnery Sergeant his rank.
The term "green" is also used in a non military sense referring to someone completely inexperienced at something. Example: Rick is very green as a driver.
wait till you see the next episode Okinawa is more brutal
No he's not resentful. What they are trying to show is the lack of intensity that now exists at this location and how surprised Basilone is as to why it's so "lackadaisical"
I do believe he was considered for a second Medal of Honor for his actions on Iwo Jima. His leadership and bravery here were definitely understated in this episode. Unfortunately the Marine Corps only awarded him the Navy Cross, which is the second highest decoration for valor for the Marines. (Not 100 percent sure)
The Medal of Honor is bestowed by Congress, not the Corps.
@@catherinelw9365: Yes, The Medal of Honor is bestowed by Congress but the process to award the Medal starts with the recipients base unit, such as his company, then Battalion, then Brigade or Regiment, then Division and then on to Branch. The independent Secretaries of each Branch send the nomination to the Defense Secretary for the final approval. This is unfortunately why it takes years for the Medal to be conferred. It can be stopped or downgraded to a lessor award at any time.
Green = inexperienced.
Please watch Snatch 😊