Today in History：February 23
February 231945: US flag raised over Iwo Jima
February 23
US troops have raised the Stars and Stripes but the battle is not over
1945: US flag raised over Iwo Jima
England have
US troops have raised the Stars and Stripes over Iwo Jima four days after
landing on the Japanese-held volcanic island.
The 28th Regiment of the 5th Marine Division took Mount Suribachi at 1030
local time.
The extinct volcano offers a strategicvantage pointfor the ongoing battle
for control of the island.
Lying in the north-west Pacific Ocean 650 miles (1,045 kms) from Tokyo, Iwo
Jima would serve as a useful base for long-range fighters to cover B-29
Superfortresses in a bombing campaign against the Japan's capital.
Although the Stars and Stripes are flying over the island the battle is far
from over and the Japanese are reported to be defending every inch of the island
using elaborate underground defences.
The battle for Iwo Jima has been described as the toughest fight in US
Marine history by the commander of the Marines in the Pacific, Lt-General M
"Howling Mad" Smith.
On 19 February, after four days of naval and air bombardment had pounded
the beaches and weakened Japanese defences, the 4th and 5th Marine Divisions
landed on the south side of the island under the overall command of Vice-Admiral
Richmond Kelly Turner.
After a day of little resistance, the enemy fought back in earnest.
Hidden in fortified caves and pillboxes linked by a series of tunnels they
relentlessly attacked the Americans with artillery fire, grenades and other
explosives as well as from the air.
The last 24 hours have seen the fiercest fighting yet with every step of
the way up the mountain defended by the Japanese.
But by 1035 local time the Marines had reached the summit of Mt
Suribachi.
Reporting from the US base in Guam, Admiral Chester W Nimitz said so far
the battle had cost 5,372 casualties, including 644 dead, and that US
carrier-based aircraft flying over the Bonin Islands north of Iwo Jima had
destroyed three enemy planes.
Reuters news agency also reports Marines have finally reached the Japanese
fighter-plane base in the centre of the island, which lies just 700 yards (640m)
from the bomber airfield taken by the Americans two days ago.
The hijackers planted bombs on the plane
1972: Hostages freed by Lufthansa hijackers
Artificially 1969:
The A group of Palestinian hijackers who took over a Lufthansa jet in the
skies over India two days ago has released the crew and surrendered to Yemeni
authorities.
All the 172 passengers were freed yesterday after painstaking negotiations
with Yemenis and West German officials.
The five Palestinians had demanded an undisclosed sum of money and the
release of three Jordanians under arrest in West Germany after a shooting took
place in Cologne on 6 February.
Women and children were released first from the New Delhi-Athens Boeing 747
and flown to Frankfurt.
It was followed this afternoon by a Lufthansa Boeing 707 carrying all the
male passengers.
The men had had to wait in the second Boeing for three hours parked near
the hijacked plane while talks with the guerrillas continued.
As the Palestinians were led away, 14 crew members emerged tonight from the
aircraft looking tense after their two-day ordeal but still smart in their black
and gold uniforms.
Explosives experts then boarded the plane to defuse charges planted on the
aircraft.
Among the hijacked passengers was 19-year-old Joseph Kennedy, son of the
Senator Robert Kennedy who was assassinated by a Palestinian, Sirhan Sirhan, in
1968.
On his release he told journalists he did not think he was the target
behind the hijacking.
"I do not think the plane was hijacked because of me. I was not certain I
was going to be aboard," he said.
According to one stewardess, Karin Bode, released earlier because of health
problems, they had at first ordered the plane to land at a desert airstrip near
Amman in Jordan.
But the pilot had talked them out of this saying the plane was too large to
land there and flew the plane to its intended destination - Aden in the
Yemen.
Dawson's Field airstrip has been used before to land hijacked aircraft.
Vocabulary:
vantage point : 有利位置;优势地位
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