Japanese air attacks on the Mariana Islands 1945. While the attacks on Iwo Jima damaged the island's airfields, the Japanese managed to keep at least one of them operational at all times, and none were closed for more than a single day. The need to repair damage to the airfields forced the Japanese garrison on Iwo Jima to divert labor from building defensive positions, however. The combination of heavy losses over Saipan and damage to the airfields on Iwo Jima caused the Japanese to break off their attacks against the Marianas on 2 January. Few Japanese aircraft visited Iwo Jima starting in January, and due to their
Internment of Japanese Americans trade and immediately began to arrange a second exchange of non-officials for February 1944. This exchange would involve 1,500 non-volunteer Japanese who were to be exchanged for 1,500 Americans. The US was busy with Pacific Naval activity and future trading plans stalled. Further slowing the program were legal and political "turf" battles between the State Department, the Roosevelt administration, and the DOJ, whose officials were not convinced of the legality of the program. The completed October 1943 trade took place at the height of the Enemy Alien Deportation Program. Japanese Peruvians were still being "rounded up" for shipment to the