Today marks the 67th anniversary of the flag raising on Iwo Jima. The invasion started on the 19th and it took the next 4 days to make it up the mount Suribachi. I won't go through all the details as I think everyone knows them. Here are some images:

The first flag raising by SSGT Louis R. Lowery,

The USMC Memorial in DC - I had my 2ndLt bars pinned on there at the monument in Dec 1999

The stamp

The current memorial on Suribachi

The Picture

Mt Suribachi in the distance

"Smashed by Jap mortar and shellfire, trapped by Iwo's treacherous black-ash sands, amtracs and other vehicles of war lay knocked out on the black sands of the volcanic fortress." PhoM3c. Robert M. Warren, ca. February/March 1945. 26-G-4474