1943 (Kirov Series Book 27)

by John Schettler

  — LtC. John McCrae

  Chapter 22

  They had come a long way from that last night in San Francisco. Sergeant Wilson still remembered getting into a brawl at a bar and throwing a beer bottle at a sailor who was riding him about good old home country, Texas, the Lone Star State. The Navy man was a New Yorker, and kept insisting the only things to ever come out of Texas were steers and queers. Wilson showed him that a good right hand and some muscle behind it came out of Texas that night too, and put that whitecap down for the count.

  Yet the sailor wasn’t too far off the mark with his jibe, for the Sergeant was one of a very special breed assigned to an odd throwback unit that was supposed to be headed for Fiji to join Patch and the Pacifica Division. It was the 112th Cavalry Regiment, Texas National Guard, one of the few still intended to mount up on real live horse flesh—an oddball Army unit for Pappy Patch and his green quilt on Fiji. Most of the regular Army infantry, thought it odd to have a mounted cavalry unit these days, and so the handle got stuck on the 112th. They were the ‘Queers on Steers.’

  All they had done up until this point in the war was mount a watch on the Mexican border. Patch had them on Fiji for a time after that long 21-day ride to the South Pacific on the President Grant. Wilson remembered how they had tramped up the gangplank in San Francisco in his khaki uniform, trousers tucked into those high black leather boots, saddlebags thrown over the shoulders of the men, who mostly wore their felt hats. They still had the old steel WWI style helmet slung over their backpack, rattling with the traditional cavalry saber, and canteen.

  Fully equipped, he thought, but the Army forgot just one thing—the horses. Where were the goddamned horses?

  “Don’t worry about it,” said the Lieutenant at the top of the gangplank when Wilson stepped aboard the ship. “They’ll have horses for all of you when you get where you’re going.”

  “Yeah? Where’s that?”

  “You’ll find out soon enough,” said the Lieutenant. “Come on, move along. The line’s a mile long.”

  So Wilson was logged in and stepped aboard. Hours later they slipped under the massive industrial orange steel span of the Golden Gate Bridge, and put out to sea. When they finally arrived in Fiji, they had done a bit of scouting, a little work on the flanks, but it was the infantry that was getting all the real combat duty, and the misery that came with all that glory, hand in glove. Then the 112th got word that they were shipping out again, but no one knew where. Wilson got wind of it, overhearing a couple officers talking about a White Poppy, but nobody seemed to know what that was all about. MacArthur had asked for them personally, and many were now still trying to figure out if that was good news, or bad.

  This time the horses would board along with them, and they switched Presidents to the Samuel Taylor. Their mounts had come all the way from Australia, a special breed called ‘Whalers,’ because they were born and bred in New South Wales. The men called them the ‘Range Broncos’, and they were an ornery bunch; not cooperative at all, so it took two long weeks on Fiji to simply get them to take a saddle, and let a man mount up. Yet once a Whaler agreed to carry you, he would prove to be a trusty and loyal friend, and a hard worker.

  White Poppy was code for Noumea, and that’s where they were headed. The biggest island in the region, it was once the home of an aggressive tribe of 70,000 natives, many prone to cannibalism. It took the French military some time to root that out, though it was said that there were still groups of wild cannibals in the high wooded mountains that ran down the spine of the island, nearly 250 miles long. Now it was home to over 17,000 French civilians, along with an 800-man garrison force, the Battalion d’infantrie colonial de la Nouvelle-Caledonie. When the Japanese came, and the island remained under Vichy control in these altered states, the French Colonial Governor in Saigon shipped in one more Battalion of from the Tonkin Division.

  The Japanese coveted the island for many reasons, for it was rich in resources, home to 20% of the world’s supply of nickel, and many other strategic metals like chrome, cobalt, iron, manganese, lead, coal and copper, not to mention gold and silver. There were already a thousand Japanese civilian workers on the island when the war started, mostly near the Goro nickel mines in the south, and at the chrome mine near Koumac in the north. Then, while the US was trying to rush troops to that island, the Ichiki Detachment that had once been slated to invade Midway was instead diverted to Noumea when Operation FS was chosen.

  It was as far from a forsaken place like Guadalcanal as one could imagine, with banana plantations, farmland growing tobacco, cotton, maize, and fruits, an active timber industry, fishing resources, and the excellent deep water port at Noumea, the capital. In addition to this plentiful food and relatively mild climate, the island had developed hydroelectric power in the larger towns, a small rail line, good coastal roads, and absolutely no malaria.

  That was both good news and bad, for while conditions for the average soldier were far better than they might have been on Guadalcanal, it also meant the enemy would not suffer attrition due to food shortages and disease, factors which had as much to do with the Japanese defeat there as anything else. Like Fiji, it was a place where the two sides could have a long protracted fight, and the unusual elongated shape of the island was going to figure heavily in the strategy of that upcoming battle. The US objectives would be in the south, at Noumea, and the airfield at Tontouta, about 33 miles northwest.

  The Port of Noumea on Moselle Bay had three good berths, a solid quay and a facility known as the ‘Nickel Dock’ where the ore ships could load. It was scaled to handle 24 ships per month, but the bay itself could provide an anchorage for over 80 vessels. The one good airfield at Tontouta was ready to receive military planes, and the Japanese had made small improvements since they occupied the place.

  Yet as MacArthur had asserted, the American landings had come as a great surprise. Only one battalion had been at Noumea, the second at Tontouta, and the third at the nickel mines of Goro. The entire 41st Infantry Division was committed to this attack, a force the Japanese could not hope to repulse at the landing sites. The irregular southwest coast of the island was cut by 15 to 20 bays spanning the distance of 35 kilometers between the airfield and harbor. Troops could come ashore in any of them, and it was simply too much ground for the Japanese to cover. So MacArthur was going to get his 41st Division ashore, and then have a very good prospect of seizing his first key objective—Noumea, but it would not end there.

  The huge island pointed northwest to the Solomon Sea, and the Japanese could easily land reinforcements in the north, far from the American center of gravity in the south. Once there, they could move down the long coastal road to contest their enemy, and now there would be three battles underway, forcing both sides to supply three separate garrisons, Fiji, Efate, and New Caledonia. Each side had advantages and disadvantages, and now it would fall to the commanders to sort them out.

  The cards were dealt; the game was afoot. MacArthur got his war after all. Now he simply had to win it, and against a battle-hardened enemy who would rather accept death than retreat. He had seen the cruelty of the Japanese on offense. Now he would see how tenaciously they would fight to hold the ground they had taken, and the ugly face of the Pacific war would soon loom over the scene like the sickly smell of burning human flesh being consumed by a flame thrower.

  Sergeant Wilson with the 112th Cavalry had no idea where he was going that night, but he would soon find out. The 41st Infantry Division had arrived from Brisbane, the ships approaching Noumea through three openings in the long wall of coral reefs that protected the island, eclipsed in size only by Australia’s Great Barrier Reef. Halsey had broken off cruisers Quincy, Minneapolis, Chicago and five destroyers to support the landings, and he had swept the skies over the port area clean by sending over 60 fighters.

  The Japanese had only 14 Zeroes on the island, along with 12 Vals, 12 more Nells, six Kates and a number of float planes. This time, Halsey cancelled the planned airfi
eld strike by Enterprise, realizing that they would want to take it with as little damage as possible.

  What Halsey did not know was that an undetected force was approaching from the northeast of the long island—the Shadow Fleet. That was territory that had been scouted earlier by the light escort carriers, but Hara had dispatched them days ago, and the blind spot that created was now covered with shadow. To make matters worse, Admiral Hara had raced home towards Rabaul, until he received a message indicating something was afoot at Noumea. Only his destroyers were low on fuel, and Yamamoto had wisely moved an oiler along Hara’s planned return route. So now King Kong turned about, taking his 3rd Carrier Division south with plans to approach Noumea from the northwest side of the island.

  The US carriers had search planes out, but most were looking northeast in the region between New Caledonia and Efate. That was where Halsey had been operating, and where he expected the Japanese would advance if they had any intentions of challenging him after he made his first raid on Noumea. But Ltc Lindsay off the Enterprise could smell more in the wind than the light rain blowing up from the southeast. He was still flying an older Douglas Devastator, but was the first to spot trouble northeast of the island. The signal he sent jangled the nerves of the command staff aboard Essex, and Halsey scratched his head.

  “Mother of God,” he said. “This can’t be right—six carriers, two battleships, and two large cruisers accompanied by five destroyers? That would be damn near everything they have out here.”

  “If it is right,” said Captain Douglas, “then there’s the reason Wasp didn’t make it home. They may have combined all their groups into one big formation again.”

  “The goddamned Kido Butai,” said Halsey. “Well, here we sit with four big fleet carrier decks. Our planes are thinning out a bit, but we still have enough for one good flight. That sighting is too far off to hit at the moment. We should move east. In a few hours, we can come about and get turned into the wind.”

  Lindsay had it chapter and verse, there were six carriers on that group sighting, though not a single Japanese fleet carrier was among them. Halsey was also correct in saying the Japanese were coming at him with everything they had—they were. For off to the northwest, emerging from the Coral Sea, the elusive Admiral Hara was creeping up with the real muscle when it came to Japanese carrier power. He had Akagi, Taiho, Tosa, and two light carriers Junyo and Hiyo. Hara had a lot to consider here, for behind him, in the Coral Sea, a transport group was carrying the 79th Regiment of the 20th Division to reinforce the French on Efate.

  Thinking he was long gone to Rabaul, Halsey had no idea he was there. This unexpected turnabout was going to figure heavily in what happened, and it was lack of good intelligence that would decide the day. He had no idea the Shadow Fleet even existed—six carriers, all hybrids, all the ships that Lindsay had spotted and called out in that latest sighting report. So he naturally assumed that Hara had turned, getting the matter half right, but convinced his enemy was east of New Caledonia.

  The Admiral was squinting at his nautical charts and deciding what to do. His calipers marched across the chart, their steel legs pacing out the distance in hundreds of miles. He smiled. That sighting report would put the Kido Butai too far off to intervene in the upcoming landings. Damn if MacArthur was right with his assessment that they could steal a march on the Japanese and get into Noumea before they could react.

  If I move east now, he thought, I can get into position to block their advance and cover the transports. The prevailing winds were from the south east, and his ships were already turning on the new heading he wanted. It was taking him to a position where he could easily lock horns with the Shadow Fleet, but while he bravely guarded the front door, Hara was already over the back fence and into the yard behind him.

  The clever Japanese Admiral had a good idea where Halsey was, for the new addition to the Shadow Fleet, the Saiun long range recon planes, had been able to find him as he moved east. The Japanese pilots were elated with this plane, for it could fly higher and faster than anything the American had, and even outrun their fast fighters if threatened. They had spotted four fleet carriers, and so Hara decided to throw out a light attack, probing to make certain of the enemy location. He could see what he thought the Americans were doing, moving to confront Nagumo and the Shadō Butai, so he would tap them on the shoulder before they could throw a punch.

  As he had done so successfully before, he threw out his longer-range torpedo planes, 32 B5N Kates and 10 of the newer B6N Tenzan “Heavenly Mountain” torpedo bombers, the plane the Allies would call “Jill.” Unfortunately, only 9 Zeroes had drop tanks fueled and ready to accompany them, and they would run into a hailstorm of enemy fighters over the American fleet.

  Halsey had split his fighters 30/70, with most assigned to CAP duty to protect his ships, and the others running with his strike wave. He had over 80 planes available for CAP, and they would tear into Hara’s planned sucker punch, getting two Zeroes, 19 Kates and seven of the ten Jills. Only 16 planes survived to get low enough to make their attack runs, and not one scored a hit.

  “Hot damn, we broke up that attack and then some,” said Halsey. “But those planes came out of the northwest.” His bristling brows were lost beneath the broad white helmet he wore whenever he was on the weather deck.

  “Maybe they were off target and had to correct their approach,” suggested Duncan. “After all, we’ve been moving east for the last few hours, they probably thought we were west of our present position.”

  That made perfect sense, and Halsey still had every reason to think these were all planes off the main body Lindsay had sighted, which was really but a shadow of the Kido Butai that morning. Then the radio came alive with the chatter of pilots in the heat of combat. Halsey’s strike had found the Shadow Fleet, and his boys were giving them hell.

  Nagumo had already sent his own strike southwest to look for the Americans, but he still had 38 Zeros up on defense when Halsey’s pilots found him. Thinking he was up against steep odds again, Halsey had thrown everything he had at the enemy, 75 dive bombers and another 32 torpedo bombers escorted by 23 fighters. Then the report he had hoped he would never hear again came in the breathy shouts over that squawk box.

  “Rockets! Rockets! What they hell are they throwing at us?”

  Halsey looked at Duncan, who had his eyes riveted on the Squawk Box speaker as if he was trying to see through the grill to the battle crackling on the airwaves. “More Rockets.” He gave Halsey a sullen look.

  “The rumors were dead on,” said Halsey. Nimitz had told him that Allied intel had coast watchers at Davao months ago who reported what they believed was a demonstration of a new anti-aircraft rocket being tested by the Japanese. It had also been used against B-17s shortly thereafter, and scuttlebutt had it that the Japanese had used it again up north. Thus far the only other use had been against the planes off Vicksburg and Gettysburg in that first encounter some weeks ago. Nothing had been seen of the new weapon since January 11th—until now.

  Chapter 23

  When Otani reported the strike wave coming in, Captain Harada shook his head in dismay. There were 130 enemy planes coming at them, and there he was out on forward picket duty calling out the warning to Nagumo, and with 42 missiles, which included the 12 SM-3s he was holding in reserve. He also had 10 RUM-139 ASROC missiles, but they were no good against planes. Now he had a decision to make. He could fire everything he had, and probably take a good bite out of this strike wave, but that would reduce him from the level of a fighting AA defense destroyer to the lowly realm of an ASW defense and early warning radar picket. Something in him wanted to hold on to his power just a little longer, but he had to do something, or be thought of as a paper tiger.

  “Signal Nagumo and tell him we will make a limited air defense strike to attempt to shock the Americans. Then vector in his CAP. Mister Honjo, give me a dozen SM-2s.” That would leave him with 30 missiles, 18 SM-2s and 12 SM-3s. Every time he took a bite out of th
e enemy, he lost teeth, and unlike the shark that he seemed, there were no serried rows of replacement teeth in reserve.

  They would knock down seven Wildcats and five dive bombers, damaging two others. Then the Japanese Zeroes arrived, their white wings painted with those red fireball suns. They swooped in and would damage or drive off another 26 strike planes, but too many would get through. Halsey’s strike wave flew right over Takami, ignoring the ship as the forward light cruiser picket it seemed to be. His men wanted to get at those flattops and big battleships, and they did.

  Two bombs straddled the light carrier Kitsune, causing minor damage and buckling a hull plate aft to start a little flooding. Two more struck her sister ship Okami, blasting through the flight deck and causing heavy damage in the hangar area. Gozo Kiryu would take three hits; Gozo Kaya would be skewered by a single torpedo. Both the battleships also got a lot of attention. Satsuma would take four hits, Hiraga five, but now the strength and toughness of the new Japanese ships would save the day.

  Many of those hits had been on the deck armor, and did not even penetrate to do any serious damage below decks. One struck the number two turret on Hiraga, but it was like throwing an egg at a metal box. The concussion rattled ears and heads, shaking men off their feet, but the heavy turret armor was not penetrated, or even seriously compromised. Two more were side armor hits that did little more than blacken the hull of the ships. In effect, the battleships were simply shrugging off the hits, with some cost in human casualties, but little damage of any significance to the ships.

  Neither of the two fast super cruisers were hit, though Amagi had to pour on the power and maneuver smartly to avoid the wakes of two torpedoes. Some miles behind the forward body, the last two carriers were covered by low clouds, and so neither Ryujin nor Kinryu would get a scratch, the Dragon’s brood living to fight on another day.