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00:00It's official name was the DUKW, to the American G.I.s in World War II, it was the duck.
00:30This ungainly lumbering truck would never hit the headlines or win any prizes for its looks, but it had a special talent which made it a vital part of the Allied amphibious victories from Omaha Beach to Iwo Jima.
00:46The duck could swim. Whenever there was water to cross, this machine did it.
00:53It crossed rivers. It ferried stores in harbor.
01:00It went to sea.
01:05It carried cargo.
01:08And it carried men.
01:11It did weight lifting and climbing.
01:14The only thing it couldn't do was fly, although it tried.
01:17I don't see how you could knock the duck anywhere it is, because there's no place that duck's not good. I mean, there's no place you can put it that it won't work.
01:28To me, it was a marvelous vehicle. It was a pleasure to drive it.
01:32If you couldn't handle it, it could kill you.
01:35If you hit the beach, you'll grab me on sand.
01:39If that ocean gets deep, you'll say, come on, I'll go. Come on. Come on, I'll go. Come on, get going. Oh, yeah.
01:48But it could also save your life.
01:53You got the feeling you were kind of special because you were depended on by so many.
01:58Using archive film and color reconstructions, Battle Stations tells one of the most unlikely success stories of World War II.
02:06The story of the duck amphibian.
02:20Trying to land an army on a beach has always been one of the toughest military operations.
02:25It takes a lot of planning and a lot of luck to pull it off.
02:29During World War I, the British attempted to put an army ashore in Turkey and Gallipoli.
02:41It was a disaster. Casualties were appalling, with more than 23,000 killed and 88,000 wounded.
02:50After nine months of clinging to a few worthless strips of sand, the British withdrew.
02:55Gallipoli demonstrated that an amphibious assault is arguably the most difficult single operation of war.
03:06And it's particularly hard if you're coming in against a defended beach.
03:12You need some way to bridge the gap between the water and the land.
03:18Some amphibious assets which are going to help your people actually get ashore.
03:23In the late 1930s, special infantry landing crafts were developed in America.
03:31But for landing supplies, the military really needed a machine that could climb out of the water,
03:36and out the beach to safety, before unloading its cargo.
03:40It sounded like a good idea.
03:43The only problem was, nobody knew how to do it, and there was no great sense of urgency about finding a solution.
03:48In 1940, Germany unleashed its Blitzkrieg on Western Europe.
03:59America hoped to remain neutral, but the issue was decided by the Japanese,
04:03who dreamed of imperial expansion in the Pacific.
04:06On a quiet Sunday morning in December 1941, Marine Sergeant Arthur Wells was passing the time of day with a friend on board the battleship Pennsylvania,
04:13at the American naval base in Hawaii, Pearl Harbor.
04:16You heard an explosion, someone made the remark, well that's just like the Army, the whole gunnery practice on Sunday.
04:23And someone else yelled, Japs are attacking.
04:24From his battle station, high on the main mast, Arthur Wells watched as wave after wave of Japanese torpedo planes
04:29launched their low-level attack.
04:30The Japanese torpedo planes launched their low-level attack.
04:31The Japanese naval base, the Japanese naval base in Hawaii, Pearl Harbor.
04:32You heard an explosion, someone made the remark, well that's just like the Army, the whole gunnery practice on Sunday.
04:38And someone else yelled, Japs are attacking.
04:45From his battle station, high on the main mast, Arthur Wells watched as wave after wave of Japanese torpedo planes launched their low-level attack.
04:55I could see into the cockpits, I could see the expression on the Japanese pilots' faces, and I could see the instrument panels,
05:04and then when they'd pull out, well then I was literally eyeball to eyeball with the rear gunners.
05:10And I watched the Oklahoma roll over, I watched the West Virginia get the side torn out of her,
05:17and the torpedo after torpedo hit her.
05:25So all we could do was just watch.
05:31The Japanese attack on its Pacific fleet instantly catapulted America into World War II.
05:39Most Americans wanted to avenge the victims of Pearl Harbor.
05:43But Japan was allied with Adolf Hitler's Germany, which meant America would also have to fight a European war.
05:49The British and American allies took stock of the situation.
05:56To defeat Hitler would mean invading North Africa and mainland Europe.
06:02Germany's fascist ally Italy would also have to be attacked.
06:05A whole series of invasions would be needed to dislodge the Japanese from the island chains of the Pacific.
06:14And all these territories would have to be taken from the sea.
06:19It would mean an increasingly important role for America's elite force of seaborne soldiers, the U.S. Marines.
06:35On street corners throughout the United States, colorful posters beckon young men to the adventure, romance, and opportunity of the Marine Corps.
06:44I saw a picture of the Marines in the blue uniform in a drugstore, about normal tall.
06:50And I fell in love with the uniform, and that was it. I knew nothing about the Marines.
06:54And the section of the country I came from, of course, their jobs were very few.
06:58In fact, the matter, I got a dollar a month raised when I joined the Marine Corps.
07:02Well, I grew up on a farm in eastern Colorado, and we were pretty much at home.
07:08Then I saw this big billboard that said they need another good man, and so I thought, well, I might just do that job, you know.
07:15The recruit gets his hair cut military style, and marks the first step in his transition from a civilian into a first-class fighting man.
07:25And during boot camp, you're not a Marine, you're a boot, and that's the way they put it.
07:35It's just the training they put in you, the tremendous skills they teach you, and you get proud.
07:41And each day it gets harder to work and harder to do it, and you get more proud, and you do it faster.
07:48And when you graduate from boot camp, they say, now you are a Marine, and you are a Marine.
07:56I felt very strongly that if I could live in a beautiful country like we live in,
08:03and have all the rights that we have, that it was also my obligation to defend this country if it need be.
08:08With major amphibious operations required on every battlefront,
08:14the problem of landing an army on a beach moved to the top of the agenda.
08:18A research committee was set up by the American government to investigate new ways of fighting an amphibious war.
08:24In 1937, the racing yacht Ranger won the prestigious America's Cup.
08:34It was the work of yacht designer Rod Stevens.
08:39Early in 1942, he was asked by the government research committee to help develop an amphibious vehicle for the American army.
08:47Yacht design is all about creating elegant and streamlined hull forms that cut through the water at high speed.
08:57Now, Stevens would produce one of the slowest and least lovely vessels ever to put to sea.
09:03But it would prove to be his most important achievement, and a triumph of American ingenuity.
09:09You ever try floating a truck across water? It needs a whole platoon of men.
09:25A big tarpaulin tucked up over the sides and she's floated across.
09:28Rod Stevens knew that obsolete ideas like this were not going to win a modern war.
09:34He began designing a seagoing version of the standard American army truck.
09:39In 1941, the General Motors Corporation had introduced their 2 1⁄2 Tonner,
09:47a reliable six-wheel drive truck, which became the universal American supply vehicle throughout the war.
09:53GMC would eventually mass-produce some 600,000 of these trucks at the rate of one every three minutes.
10:03We used to haul coal and stuff from GMC 2 1⁄2 Tonner trucks.
10:08They were a workhorse. They were tough. Great engines, six-cylinder engines, but tough.
10:14On the 30th of April 1942, Rod Stevens and his tiny group of just four GMC engineers began working night and day,
10:25converting a standard GMC chassis into an amphibian.
10:30They had to create a hull, which would contain the engine and the drivetrain to all six wheels.
10:37It needed to be seaworthy, with watertight seals on all bearings.
10:41A rudder was needed to steer it in water and, of course, a propeller to make it go.
10:52In just 38 days they had made it.
10:58The new machine was rolled out into the light of day for the first time.
11:01The strange beast had no name except its GMC code letters.
11:10They were D, indicating 1942 its year of manufacture, U for amphibian, K, front-wheel drive, and W, rear-wheel drive.
11:25The best that the American GI could make of the unpronounceable D-U-K-W was Duck.
11:35And that was the name that stuck.
11:37This machine was like nothing the Army had ever seen, and there were plenty who said it would never work.
11:45But early tests suggested they were wrong.
11:49In and out of the water the Duck performed well, and hopes were high.
11:54The design was cautiously adopted by the Army, but production would be limited to 2,000 units.
12:00The Duck may have taken to water, but it soon became obvious that the military establishment had not taken to the Duck.
12:14There were no immediate plans to use the amphibians or to increase the order.
12:19And as the new machines came off the production line, most went straight into storm.
12:33Some generals were convinced that the amphibian would always be a compromise.
12:38Neither a good boat, nor a good truck.
12:40They believed it could actually become a liability on the battlefield, and should not be used in combat zones.
12:50War spawns new inventions, and they in turn demand new techniques.
12:56But the military mind is quite often conservative.
13:00And in a way, rightly so, because nobody wants to take a gamble with people's lives.
13:05But the problem is this.
13:08Nobody will take a new invention seriously until it's been proven in battle.
13:13But it can't get proven in battle until it's been taken seriously.
13:18In a bid to keep the Duck project afloat,
13:21Rod Stephens persuaded the Army to let him demonstrate its ability
13:25in a series of sea trials off the New England coast.
13:28It looked like his last chance to sell the idea to an unenthusiastic military establishment.
13:36Four days before the trials, a violent storm hit the area.
13:42A Coast Guard vessel was wrecked on a sandbar offshore.
13:46When all attempts at a rescue had failed,
13:49a duck was sent out and managed to save the seven-man crew.
13:54A few hours later, the wreck had vanished.
13:56Two days later, President Franklin Roosevelt was informed that an Army truck had gone to sea,
14:07and staged the dramatic rescue of a Navy crew.
14:10It was the breakthrough that Rod Stephens needed.
14:15Suddenly, everybody, from the President down, thought his machine was a great invention,
14:21and just what the Army needed.
14:22The United States Army calls its newest mobile weapon the duck.
14:32Amphibious two-and-one-half-ton trucks.
14:35They operate on land or in water.
14:37Navigating rough seas like Navy barges, the ducks are the last word in mechanized equipment.
14:42And who better to take the duck to sea than the Marine Corps?
14:47Special duck operating companies were formed, which quickly became known as the Quack Corps,
14:56and led to some confusion in the ranks.
15:00He says, well, I don't know anything about them, but it's a duck company.
15:04And so I asked him, he says, what the hell is the Marine Corps going to do with ducks?
15:10In training schools along the American seaboards, men are learning how to operate and service ducks.
15:15Training is tough, but interesting.
15:18A driver must be a combination truckman, stevedore, seaman, and mechanic.
15:22Once seated in the cab, the novice duck driver found himself surrounded by a bewildering array of levers, pedals, dials, and written instructions.
15:37It is not difficult.
15:39It's putting gear just like you would a car or truck.
15:42There's a lever to pull on your propeller to make it go.
15:46It was built for whatever you're going to use it for, whether it be land or sea.
15:55You didn't have to worry about where you're going. You know you'll get there.
15:59But overconfident truck drivers soon found that going to sea was not as easy as they thought.
16:06The king of the road could soon find himself out of his depth.
16:10My maintenance officer overloaded one of them.
16:14He overloaded this one with equipment and tools and whatnot, parts, and it went clear to the bottom of the ocean.
16:21On land, too, the duck driver could find himself in trouble.
16:27With the wrong tire pressure, sand is a trap, as this demonstration will clearly show.
16:35The duck on the left has tire pressure for road driving, the one on the right for sand.
16:41The hard tires make narrow, deep tracks, while the deflated tires splay out like a camel's foot, giving good traction.
16:50The driver with the hard tires might have gotten through on level ground, but now he's in a spot, with his wheels digging in deep.
17:00But the duck had a whole range of special equipment for awkward situations, just like this one.
17:06Lesser vehicles might need the help of a tow truck, but the duck could winch itself out of trouble using a ship's anchor, also provided as part of the standard kit.
17:16It's just simple engineering, when you get down to it.
17:20It may seem complicated to some people, but in theory, most of it is simple.
17:25What you can't do, this guy can, and that just keeps going.
17:29There's always a way, no matter what.
17:32After five weeks of learning to drive, navigate, tie knots, operate winches, handle cargo, and a score of other tasks, the crews were ready to go into combat.
17:43I was born and raised in the hills of Kentucky.
17:48There, all you saw was a horse and wagon and buggy, and I wasn't too impressed with it either.
17:54I never saw how we'd go anywhere.
17:56And when I got out of Kentucky, I could see there is a way.
17:59A new world that I never knew was out there.
18:03So that's what the duck company and the Marine did for me.
18:07Showed me a new world.
18:09As they set sail for the battlefront, the crews of this novel machine were venturing into the unknown.
18:15Rod Stevens felt sure it was a winner.
18:18But the duck had not yet proved its ability in combat, and many of the senior military chiefs still doubted if it was up to the job.
18:25Some called it a lame duck, others said it would be a sitting duck, and a few predicted it would quickly become a dead duck.
18:34Now they would find out who was right.
18:37It's become more and more apparent that our strategy from now on in calls for the landings on lots of beaches and in lots of places.
18:50Invasion from the sea.
18:52America's fighting a modern war, so it takes the GI truck, adds a little American ingenuity, and you got the duck.
19:01The duck's in full production now, and every day more of them show up around the world.
19:05In Great Britain, stories began to circulate among the army transport drivers of a strange new breed of vehicle.
19:13Deep in the heart of North Wales, there were reported sightings, in the narrow country lanes from the wide deserted beaches, of trucks that drove straight into the ways and went out to sea.
19:24It sounded like just another wartime rumour, but driver John Geldart soon discovered it was true.
19:34They took us out and showed us, this is what they call a duck, they said.
19:39We thought it was a tank or something like that.
19:42Then we could see the rubber wheels on it like that.
19:46What is this, a wagon or something like that.
19:49And of course, they told us that it goes out to sea.
19:52I couldn't believe it like I thought it was a wagon.
19:57The first main memory I had is when we first went to town in North Wales for training.
20:02And that was the real time when we were introduced to the duck and what it could do and what we had to do.
20:10As they examined their new toy, the British drivers found that every compartment and locker seemed to contain some new gadget.
20:22Clearly, this was no ordinary army truck.
20:25But like their American allies, the British soldiers soon adopted the duck and developed an affection and a growing respect for this extraordinary example of Yankee ingenuity.
20:37Oh, fantastic, yeah, great. You were king of the road like, huh?
20:41A fantastic invention. It was great.
20:45I've got to hand it to the Americans for that.
20:49First and foremost, we had to learn seamanship.
20:56When we were out at sea many a time, I was seasick many a time. Most of us were.
21:01Tides and currents could play tricks on an unwary driver, particularly when trying to mount the ramp of one of the big tank landing ships known as LSTs.
21:12When you placed your front wheels onto the ramp, you'd find that the back, which was still afloat, would be pushed to the left and you'd be facing across the ramp, which is a bad thing to be.
21:21But you eventually got to gauge how the current was running and things like that and enter in such a way that you ended up with your four wheels straight.
21:31But to me, it was a marvellous vehicle. It was a pleasure to drive it.
21:35The duck's first combat test came with the invasion of Sicily.
21:43Now this was designed to knock Italy out of the war and to do very serious damage to the Germans.
21:50And it brought the Allies to the very edge of mainland Europe.
21:55It was clear that much would depend not merely on getting troops ashore, but then on keeping them supplied.
22:02And this time, the duck was in the spotlight.
22:07The Allies planned to mount a two-pronged amphibious attack.
22:11The Americans would land in the southwest, and the British would land on the southeast coast.
22:16The invasion fleet carried more than 900 ducks to ferry men and supplies ashore.
22:23On the 10th of July 1943, the attack was launched.
22:27While some men waited ashore, others had the pleasure of landing in ducks.
22:43Their amphibious half landing craft, half lorry.
22:46The landings mostly went well.
22:48But another new invention, the big tank landing ships, ran into serious problems.
22:57Many beached on sandbars well away from the shore.
23:02By evening, the weather was deteriorating, and began to threaten the whole operation.
23:07But the ducks were able to mount a shuttle service, braving the rough seas to deliver the goods ashore.
23:20As the weather improved, the Allies secured the beachhead.
23:27But during the critical early days of the invasion, 90% of all supplies came ashore by duck.
23:33Some senior officers believed that the ducks had actually saved the entire operation from failure.
23:40Considerably easing the supplies problem, the amphibious vehicles, affectionately called ducks,
23:46have delivered the goods as required all along the east coast advance of the 8th Army.
23:51Once safely ashore, the ducks operated as regular army trucks,
23:57transporting troops and supplies along the narrow mountain roads.
24:00Many Sicilians saw the Allies as liberators.
24:04But the Germans put up stiff resistance, and the going was tough.
24:21At last, they reached the Straits of Messina, and the ducks took to water once more,
24:26for the short swim to the Italian mainland.
24:30The battle for Sicily had been won.
24:33The Supreme Allied Commander, General Eisenhower, was profoundly impressed by the ducks' performance.
24:40He reported to Washington,
24:42Amphibious truck, two and one half ton, commonly called DUKW, has been invaluable.
24:50Suggest commendation for officer responsible for its development.
24:54Nobody wanted to admit to Ike that the Army's chief contribution to the duck project
25:00had been a determined attempt to sink it.
25:01But for Rod Stevens, it was a triumph.
25:08His ugly duckling had finally won its spurs.
25:12It's not built for beauty. It's built to take the people in, the artillery and the ammo and the stuff we did.
25:19The sick back to the ship. Anything you want to put on it, you can haul. That's why it was beautiful.
25:28With ducks to do the job of getting it ashore, it gets done in a hurry.
25:32Invasion's the order of the day.
25:35An American skill is right there to meet its requirements.
25:38But the duck also had its share of front loops.
25:46It required constant lubrication and maintenance to resist the destructive combination of salt water and sand.
25:55The men are thoroughly grounded in maintenance work, which is highly important in a truck that goes to sea.
26:00Every vital part should be serviced at regular intervals.
26:03Every day, lubrication is checked and rechecked.
26:06The need to stop and increase the tire pressure for road driving after a beach landing was also a major drawback.
26:13The crew engages the tire pump, using the control in the driver's cab, and gets out the air hose.
26:19All six tires should register 40 pounds.
26:23Inflating and deflating as driving conditions change may take a little time,
26:27but it prevents injury to tires and keeps the driver from getting stuck.
26:31And in a combat area, that's essential.
26:36The answer to the tire pressure problem was an ingenious system of pipes and valves,
26:41which automatically fed air to the hubs of all six wheels from the compressor on the engine.
26:47In the cab, signs told the driver which pressures to use for a whole range of conditions.
26:54High pressure for paved highways.
26:59Lowest pressure for soft sand.
27:03Soon, the duck would be experiencing them all.
27:07From the sharp coral spikes and soft volcanic ash of the Pacific Islands,
27:12to the firm sand of the Normandy beaches, and the hard road to Berlin.
27:24This is the day for which free people long have waited.
27:28This is the day.
27:30The day.
27:32At the beginning of June 1944, the Allies prepared to launch Operation Overlord.
27:38The invasion of Normandy.
27:40It was the greatest amphibious operation in history.
27:445,000 vessels.
27:4611,000 aircraft, tanks, trucks, jeeps, and 2,000 ducks.
27:52With a mixed cargo, duck driver Stanley Dobson headed for Juno Beach.
28:04Three hours after the start of the invasion, on June the 6th.
28:08D-Day.
28:10I've been dropped somewhere in the region, three, four miles from the shore.
28:13Our ducks were all loaded up with stores.
28:22A little of each.
28:24The idea, of course, of being one of the first ducks onto the beach,
28:27was that we had something for everybody.
28:29We had petrol and rations and ammunition, tank shells, things like this.
28:34We had a little bit of everything.
28:36It was amazing, I think, the organization that went into that.
28:39Nobody told you what it was going to be like when you got there.
28:51And I presume if they had told us what was likely to happen,
28:55we maybe wouldn't have done what we did.
28:57Not take the chances and things like that, which some people did.
29:00I mean, I remember looking over the sand dunes at the time of unloading the duck
29:04and saw the infantry actually fighting to take a cottage.
29:07I heard this, what I thought was the sound of the bees,
29:13and suddenly realized if it was machine gun bullets coming up,
29:18there was no one at the top of it.
29:24I suddenly realized, oh, what am I doing here?
29:30Until harbor facilities were established,
29:32the ducks formed a vital bridge between the supply ships and the invasion beaches.
29:38Forty percent of all the tonnage brought ashore was carried by duck.
29:45The sheer scale of the Normandy operation beggars belief.
29:48By the end of D-Day, the Allies had put 130,000 men ashore in Normandy.
29:55By the end of June, they had landed 850,000 men,
30:00150,000 vehicles and 500,000 tons of supplies.
30:06This was a tremendous logistic undertaking.
30:08It was rather like trying to supply the population of a very small country or a decent sized city.
30:15It was estimated that every fighting man would need up to 30 pounds of fresh supplies every day.
30:26A ton for every hundred men.
30:29Ten tons for a thousand.
30:31Thousands of tons to shift in boxes of every shape and size,
30:36each one labeled and listed, checked and signed for.
30:39Canned goods, cannons, machine guns, rifles, pistols, ammunition, bombs, hand grenades, mines, mortars, uniforms, clothing, medicine, bandages, ointment, plasma,
31:10Soon the ducks were also performing another vital role.
31:15After unloading their cargoes, they became floating ambulances,
31:19able to evacuate the wounded straight from the battlefield to the hospital ship in one operation.
31:25What the drivers did was pick up anyone on the shore,
31:29take him there, get him aboard ship, get him to the sick bay or whatever,
31:34do what they could for them.
31:36A lot of people had their legs shot off, a lot of things.
31:40For designer Rod Stevens, it had been a long, hard battle persuading the military to adopt the duck.
31:47But by now, even the most hidebound commanders had learned to appreciate the value of the floating truck.
31:53Its versatility had been proved beyond any doubt, and its lumbering shape became a familiar and welcome sight on every battlefront.
32:02You got the feeling you were kind of special because you knew that you were depended on by so many.
32:09I and most of the men fell in love with the thing.
32:13Pretty quick, because we could just do so many things so well.
32:16It's built to take the people in, the artillery in, and then now what are we going to do?
32:26We got to have some ammo, so we got to go back to the ship, get another load of ammo and bring it back.
32:30Now we got to have food for the men, so we got to do that.
32:35And you just constantly go back and forth.
32:37That ship was sitting out there full of everything.
32:40If they need something heavier, they'll go get it, and that was it.
32:43Well, I think as far as the duck's concerned, if they hadn't had the duck, we wouldn't have had Normandy.
32:50It's as simple as that.
32:52I don't think that the Normandy lands would have been successful without them.
32:58On June the 12th, six days out of the invasion,
33:02Prime Minister Winston Churchill became the first of three very important passengers
33:07to arrive on the Normandy beaches by duck.
33:09Next, it was the turn of France's future president, General de Gaulle.
33:16For the French nation, his first step onto the newly liberated soil of France
33:21remains a truly historic moment.
33:26It was hardly a dignified entrance, but thanks to the duck, at least he kept his feet dry.
33:33Two days later, the duck again helped to make history.
33:37On the 16th of June, just ten days after the opening of the invasion,
33:41His Majesty King George VI paid a visit to the fighting front in Normandy.
33:46The king went ashore in one of the now famous amphibious vehicles known as ducks.
33:51The duck had finally achieved the ultimate status.
33:55It really was a vehicle fit for a king.
33:58Normandy was another triumph for the amphibians, but it was not their toughest assignment.
34:10That would come on the other side of the world, in the Pacific.
34:20No great port facilities in the savage jungle lands of the Far Pacific,
34:27and barrier reefs of coral blocking off 85% of the tropical shores from boat landings.
34:35But the ducks can ride over barrier reefs, which suggests how large a part they will play in future operations in this part of the world and elsewhere.
34:43Pacific islands could scarcely have been more different than Normandy beaches.
34:49Sometimes there were barrier reefs offshore.
34:52This meant that your landing craft couldn't actually get to the beach.
34:55And although the Germans always fought very hard, the Japanese fought with unprecedented ferocity.
35:01Unwounded prisoners were almost never taken.
35:10This was a very different war against a very different enemy.
35:16The attack on Saipan was launched on June the 15th, 1944.
35:23All the ships, as far as we could see, were shelling the land.
35:26And it was a sight that you'll never see anywhere else.
35:31It was beautiful, still it was horrifying, you know.
35:36And that's when you're proud of the Navy, because they're blowing those people off that island.
35:40And you're just a little man down there, a little duck.
35:44And you said, I hope they get them all.
35:48Shortly after the 1st Infantry had landed on Saipan,
35:51the Marine Corps duck crews had the dangerous task of delivering the assault artillery.
36:01I think you fear it more when you're on ship.
36:04See, I'm going to be there in a few minutes.
36:06I've got to go out there.
36:08And I see what's going on out there.
36:10I see those fish jumping out of the water.
36:12Only they're not fish. They're mortar shells.
36:14And I see they're only a few inches apart.
36:16There's millions of them.
36:17And I see it's going on all the way from the beach to the ships.
36:28Well, the Japs turn loose on us with the rockets and the mortars.
36:32And if the ocean got so rough, you could hardly stay in your duck.
36:35And finally, you just weather the storm.
36:39The ones that don't get knocked out just go on in.
36:42That's the way we did it.
36:44You hit the beach, you're glad to be on sand.
36:47Because that ocean gets deep.
36:53As the Japanese resistance intensified,
36:56the battle for Saipan grew more bitter and more deadly.
37:00The Marines suffered heavy casualties.
37:03When we went in, you know, the first wave had already been in.
37:05And so there were obviously a lot of bodies lying everywhere, you know.
37:10I mean, it was quite a horrifying sight.
37:13But that's what war is, I guess.
37:18Do you hate to see that?
37:23People with their arms and their heads blowing off.
37:25And that's hard to take.
37:27But you keep going.
37:28And then the diesel ships would come in onto the shoreline.
37:36And so mixing the smell of the bodies and the diesel, I couldn't stand diesel smell for years after I got out.
37:43It was just obnoxious to me.
37:46And every time I'd smell it, I'd get the same picture of all these fellas laying there.
37:51Out of the grime and blood of Saipan emerges America's greatest single victory in the Pacific.
37:59Control of the Marianas.
38:01Saipan cost 15,000 American casualties.
38:05But the Jap garrison of 20,000 was virtually wiped out.
38:11One Japanese survivor told his captors that it was the sight of the amphibians climbing over the barrier reefs
38:16and coming up the beaches, which convinced him that the island was lost.
38:26By the start of 1945, the Americans have scored a string of victories in the Pacific.
38:32But the attack on Iwo Jima was quite unlike the others.
38:37The largest American naval force ever assembled in the Pacific
38:40heads for one of Japan's strongest defenses, the island of Iwo Jima.
38:43Iwo Jima is dominated by the dormant volcano, Mount Suribachi.
38:50The beaches of this desert island are composed not of golden sand, but of soft, black, volcanic ash.
39:00Iwo Jima is only 660 miles from Tokyo.
39:04The American Marines were ordered to capture the island as a base for air operations
39:09against the Japanese mainland.
39:13After a heavy naval bombardment, the Marines went in just after 9 a.m. on the 19th of February 1945.
39:26As the first waves landed, there was little opposition, and it looked as if the operation might be fairly easy.
39:39But then the Japanese opened up a murderous barrage of crossfire from their well-defended positions, and the Marines were soon suffering heavy casualties.
39:52It began to look like another Gallipoli.
39:55When the ducks reached the shore, many became stranded, their wheels spinning in the soft ash.
40:04That black sand, it was hard to breathe. That was hard on them.
40:08And you couldn't walk through it hardly. You couldn't get your vehicles through it hardly. It was tough.
40:12Only by lowering their tire pressures to a mere five pounds were they able to clamber out at a few points where the beach sloped more gently.
40:22All around them, Japanese gunfire kicked up the ash, and many machines were knocked out.
40:27And then Mount Suribachi's standing there looking at you down your throat, and that was tough.
40:33It took them three days to get up to the top of that thing.
40:39Those three days were long and treacherous.
40:42Those men laying there just eating bullets as fast as they could.
40:46Rockets, artillery shells, everything the Japs had, they threw them at them.
40:50At last the summit was reached, and the American flag was raised.
41:02Iwo Jima had been won, but the experience had left many in a state of numbed shock.
41:096,821 Americans were dead.
41:14Of more than 20,000 Japanese defenders, barely 200 survived to be captured.
41:20The suicidal determination of the Japanese, and more horrific casualties taking the island of Okinawa, convinced the Allies that an invasion of the Japanese mainland would mean slaughter on an unacceptable scale.
41:39It was decided to unleash the ultimate weapon.
41:43On August the 6th, 1945, an atomic bomb was dropped on the Japanese city of Hiroshima.
41:54After a second bomb devastated the city of Nagasaki, a Japanese delegation boarded the American battleship Missouri, and signed the formal surrender document on the 14th of August 1945.
42:07The war was over at last.
42:11The Allied victory was won by military force and mass production.
42:17It was won by the fighting machines, the tanks, battleships and bombers, and by the unarmed machines, the transport planes, trucks and landing craft.
42:34It was also won by the ingenuity, imagination and determination of men like Rod Stevens.
42:43These were the qualities which hatched his ugly duckling, which so nearly didn't make it to the battlefield, but managed to prove its critics wrong.
42:52Without your ingenuity, where would you be?
42:53Without your ingenuity, where would you be?
42:54Without your ingenuity, where would you be?
42:55Without your ingenuity, where would you be?
42:56It's just something that's installed in us.
42:58I think it's great.
42:59The duck, great.
43:00It was a privilege to drive it and work it.
43:01I know it was under awkward times to drive it and use it.
43:02But I enjoyed it.
43:24I don't really know how I would have done it without it, to tell you the truth.
43:37It was quite the machine.
43:39Invasion's the order of the day.
43:43An American skill is right there to meet its requirements.
43:46So it takes the GI truck, adds a little American ingenuity, and you got the duck.
43:52So I'll leave that in the corner.
Recommended
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