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Another dark part of the war was Iwo Jima. More than 25,000 men died in the battle of Iwo Jima (18,000 Japanese and 7,000 US), which is a tiny island of less than 10 sq miles in area near Japan. It served no strategic purpose for the rest of the war. Although it was supposed to be the landing site of the B29 bomber Bockscar after it dropped its nuke on Nagasaki, however it did not have enough fuel to reach Iwo Jima and instead landed on US controlled Okinawa. Making the capture of the island almost useless from a tactical and strategic standpoint (meaning almost 25,000 men died for nothing more than a shooting contest). Most of the nearly 7,000 US Marines KIA on Iwo Jima are still buried there.
