Okinawa Peace Memorial Park

The battle began when American forces landed in the Kerama Islands on 26 March 1945 and came ashore between Yomitan and Chatan on 1 April. The Japanese 32nd Army fought a war of attrition from underground positions to buy time for mainland Japan, and civilians were caught in the middle of it. When Shuri fell in late May the army withdrew south to these cliffs, and refugees from Naha and the centre of the island crowded into the same ground. Organized fighting ended when the commander Ushijima took his own life on 23 June, which some accounts put on 22 June. The prefecture's relief division counted 200,656 dead, and 122,228 of them were people from Okinawa, about 94,000 of them civilians.

The Cornerstone of Peace was unveiled in 1995, fifty years after the battle. Its polished gabbro panels stand like folding screens in arcs that spread out from the Peace Plaza toward the Pacific, and they carry the name of everyone who died in the Battle of Okinawa without distinction between soldier and civilian or between nations. As of 23 June 2026 the panels hold 242,659 names, among them 149,703 people from Okinawa, 78,365 from other prefectures, 14,012 Americans, 381 South Koreans and 82 Britons. The flame in the centre joins fire taken from Aka Island, where the Americans first landed, with flames from Hiroshima and Nagasaki. The main path runs toward the point where the sun rises on 23 June.

The Prefectural Peace Memorial Museum stands in the park and prepares peace-learning material for schools across the prefecture. Its permanent galleries take the last visitors at 16:30, and photography inside them is not allowed. On Irei-no-Hi the museum opens free from 9:00 to 18:00 and screens films about the battle in the afternoon, while the Okinawa Memorial Service for All War Dead takes place in the park.