an Okinawa War Story

As I posted, Dad was on the LST 758.  They participated in the landings at Okinawa.  They had just unloaded and had backed off the beach.  This being the 3rd or 4th day of the landings, they had only been expecting kamikase attacks.

So you can imagine the surprise when, out of the jungle appeared one of those tiny 2 man Japanese tanks armed only with a heavy machine gun.  [commonly called "soupcans"] "All of a sudden, I heard slugs ratteling off the gun director.  I saw this dumbass litlle tank out there and all we had up from the mag. was Airburst.  No AP or HE.  So I opened up on him anyway.  Twin Bofors when in sync. are deadly accurate weapons.  I was hitting him all the way up the beach, and when  he turned, all the way back down the beach.  I knew I couldn't penetrate his armor, but I'll bet those poor bastards never heard anything again".