Japanese Rename Iwo Jima, Reverting To Prewar 'Iwo To'

By HANS GREIMEL The Associated Press

Published: Jun 21, 2007

TOKYO - Japan has returned to using the prewar name for the island of Iwo Jima, the site of one of World War II's most horrific battles, at the urging of its original inhabitants, who want to reclaim an identity they say has been hijacked by high-profile movies such as Clint Eastwood's "Letters from Iwo Jima."

The new name, Iwo To, was adopted Monday by the Japanese Geographical Survey Institute in consultation with Japan's coast guard.

Surviving islanders who were evacuated during the war praised the move, but others said it cheapens the memory of a brutal campaign that is inextricably linked to the words Iwo Jima.

In 1945, the small, volcanic island was the vortex of the fierce World War II battle immortalized by the famous photograph by Joe Rosenthal of The Associated Press showing Marines raising the American flag on the islet's Mount Suribachi.

Retired Marine Maj. Gen. Fred Haynes, who was a 24-year-old captain in the regiment that raised the flag on Mount Suribachi, was surprised and upset by the news.

"Frankly, I don't like it. That name is so much a part of our tradition, our legacy," Haynes said.

Haynes, now 87, heads the Combat Veterans of Iwo Jima, a group of about 600 veterans that travels to the island every year for a reunion. He is working on a book about the battle called "We Walk by Faith: The Story of Combat Team 28 and the Battle of Iwo Jima." He doesn't plan to change the name.

"It was Iwo Jima to us when we took it," Haynes said. "We'll recognize whatever the Japanese want to call it, but we'll stick to Iwo Jima."

Before the war, the isolated spit of land was called Iwo To - pronounced "ee-woh-toh" - by the 1,000 or so people who lived there. In Japanese, that name looks and means the same as Iwo Jima - Sulfur Island - but it has a different sound.

The civilians were evacuated in 1944 as U.S. forces advanced across the Pacific. Some Japanese navy officers who moved in to fortify the island mistakenly called it Iwo Jima, and the name stuck. After the war, civilians weren't allowed to return, and the island was put to exclusive military use by both the United States and Japan, cementing its identity.