Seventy years ago, Ralph Hite was a 17-year-old U.S. Marine who had no idea why the Corps had sent to a tiny Pacific island named Iwo Jima.
Fresh from fighting on Guam but with no briefing about their mission, he and his fellow Marines arrived Feb. 21, 1945, in a landing craft on Green Beach about 500 yards northeast of the foot of Mount Suribachi.
Just two days later, a photograph of five Marines and a Navy corpsman raising an American flag on Suribachi's summit became arguably the most famous picture of World War II.
More than 70,000 Marines and Navy personnel participated in the massive invasion. Counting Japanese defenders, at one point there were more than 100,000 people battling on an island smaller than Manhattan.
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