In fact, neither of Sledge’s two battles, despite their ferocity and the brutal eventual American victories—being in obscure, distant places and in the so-called second theater—garnered the public attention of Normandy Beach or the Battle of the Bulge. In the case of Okinawa, the savagery was overshadowed, first, by the near simultaneous death of Franklin Roosevelt on April 12, and the May 8 German surrender in Europe; and then later by the dropping of the atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki (August 6 and 9), just over five weeks after the island was declared finally secured on July 2.
