and Allied combat vessels during the campaign, sinking 20, and killing at least 1,400 Sailors. The fanatical resolve of Japanese pilots turned their aircraft into human guided missiles, which struck or damaged 130 U.S. Although hints about adopting suicide tactics had been picked up before then, their use on a wide scale came as a surprise. Japan initiated kamikaze attacks in response to the invasion of the Philippine Islands by U.S. Despite the precipitous decline of its remaining airpower relative to increasing American aerial advantages in skill, technology, and numbers, however, Japan’s desperate resort to kamikaze (“divine wind”) aerial suicide tactics proved grimly effective. Navy had decisively defeated Japanese naval airpower and seapower in the battles of the Philippine Sea (June 1944) and Leyte Gulf (October 1944). Fifth Fleet naval and amphibious forces, under the command of Admiral Raymond Spruance, prepared to execute Operation Iceberg, the invasion of Okinawa, in early 1945, the land-based air forces of the Imperial Japanese Army (IJAAF) and Navy (IJNAF) posed the primary threat they faced.

Navy radar world war 2