Hegseth joins WWII memorial service on his first trip to Japan

Pete Hegseth visits Iwo Jima to honor WWII veterans, highlighting the strong U.S.-Japan alliance against regional threats.

U.S. Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth praised on Saturday (March 29, 2025) the friendship and trust that his country and Japan have developed while attending a memorial service on Iwo Jima to honor those who died in battle during World War II.

Japan is Mr. Hegseth's second stop after the Philippines on his first Asia trip. His visit comes as Beijing has been showing increasingly assertive actions in the disputed South China Sea and following threats by President Donald Trump to impose trade tariffs on the East Asian country, a key U.S. ally.

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Mr. Hegseth landed on the Japanese island of Iwo Jima, now known as Iwoto, where Japanese and American soldiers faced off in one of the war's fiercest battles. He joined several American veterans who survived the battle and Japanese bereaved families, as well as his Japanese counterpart, Gen Nakatani, Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba and other officials at Saturday's Reunion of Honor event.

“Iwo Jima embodies our shared warrior ethos, our shared devotion to the nation, and to duty and our shared reverence for the men of valor who preceded us,” Mr. Hegseth said in front of the cenotaph built in 1985 marking their first joint memorial.

“The U.S.-Japan alliance shows ... how yesterday’s enemy has become today’s friends,” Hegseth said. “Our alliance has been and remains the cornerstone of freedom, prosperity, security and peace in the Indo-Pacific.”

Most of those who fought on the tiny island are gone but their hallowed memory lives on, he said, and expressed appreciation for the six veterans aged about 100 who attended the memorial.