by Toland, John
Kusaka had himself transferred to Nagumo’s cabin. “Are you too planning suicide?” he asked and began lecturing the little admiral on his duty to Emperor and nation. Nagumo admitted that he could see his point but questioned its application to “the commander of a fleet.” Kusaka reacted so vehemently at this that Nagumo relented and assured him he would do nothing rash, adding characteristically, “Daijobu”—“Don’t worry.”
On Yamato, Yamamoto’s staff was desperately looking for some way to inflict serious damage on the enemy and compensate for the loss of four carriers. Spruance had not risen to the bait and the most impractical schemes were considered. Captain Kuroshima, for example, suggested that they shell Midway with all battleships.
Chief of Staff Ugaki coldly remarked that this was “stupidity.” The battleships would be sunk by air and submarine attacks before they could move in close enough to use their guns. Furthermore, another air strike should be postponed until the Aleutian force joined them. “But even if that proves impossible and we must accept defeat, we will not have lost the war. There are still eight carriers in the Combined Fleet. We should not lose heart. In battle as in chess, it is the fool who lets himself be led into a reckless move out of desperation.”
“How can we apologize to the Emperor for this defeat?” asked one staff officer.
Yamamoto had been listening quietly. “I am the only one who must apologize to His Majesty,” he said and instructed Watanabe to send orders to Kondo and Nagumo to withdraw. Choked with emotion, Watanabe sat down to write out the distasteful orders and managed to compose them without using the word “withdraw.”
The remnants of Kido Butai began to turn back, but the fires on both Hiryu and Akagi were raging out of control. Akagi’s captain requested permission to scuttle her. The idea was unthinkable to most of Yamamoto’s staff. Ugaki called them “old women,” but Kuroshima argued that the Americans would seize the ship and “exhibit it in San Francisco as a museum.” There were tears in Yamamoto’s eyes. Years before, he had skippered the carrier. He said evenly, “Have destroyers torpedo Akagi.”
The pragmatic Ugaki went off and wrote in his diary: “Emotion must not be mixed with reason.” He was more concerned with the fact that the enemy had somehow been forewarned about the Midway operation. Perhaps an American submarine had discovered Nagumo en route or a Russian ship had sighted the Aleutian force. Either that or the fleet code itself had been broken.
Hiryu’s skipper, Captain Tomeo Kaku, didn’t have to radio Combined Fleet for permission to scuttle. Admiral Yamaguchi, who had commanded the two light carriers from Hiryu, took on the responsibility and ordered the destroyer Kazagumo to sink the flaming wreck. At 2:30 A.M., on June 5, Yamaguchi summoned the crew topside and told the eight hundred survivors that he alone was responsible for the loss of both Hiryu and Soryu. “I shall remain on board to the end. I command all of you to leave the ship and continue your loyal service to His Majesty.” They all faced the Imperial Palace. The admiral led them in three cheers for the Emperor.
Yamaguchi gave his senior staff officer, Commander Seiroku Ito, his last message. It was to Nagumo, his wrestling antagonist, and typically, called for “a stronger Japanese Navy—and revenge.” The staff drank a silent toast in water. Yamaguchi handed Ito his black deck cap and asked him to give it to Mrs. Yamaguchi. Then he turned to Captain Kaku, who would share his fate, and said, “There is such a beautiful moon tonight. Shall we watch it as we sink?”
Even Admiral Kondo’s fleet was not to escape intact. Two heavy cruisers, Mogami and Mikuma, victims of a night collision, lagged so far behind the retiring forces that Spruance’s planes were able to catch up with them early on June 6. Mikuma was sunk but Mogami, though hit six times, limped safely off.
The only real success won by the Japanese came too late to influence the battle. That same day Lieutenant Commander Yahachi Tanabe sighted the crippled Yorktown from the bridge of I-168. The submarine slipped under the ring of covering destroyers and launched two torpedoes into the carrier and one into the destroyer Hammann. The destroyer went down in four minutes, but Yorktown, veteran of the first two carrier battles in history, died hard. She sank the following day just after dawn with all battle flags flying.
It was small compensation for the loss of four carriers and the flower of the Japanese naval air force. One of the greatest sea battles of all time was at last over and America had gained control of the Pacific. The outcome had been determined by Japanese overconfidence, a code broken by a few men in a basement, and the resolution of men like Waldron, McClusky and Gallaher. In every battle luck plays a part. At Midway it went against the Japanese; the half-hour delay of the Tone search plane led to catastrophe. In war there is a time for caution and a time for boldness. Yamamoto conceived the Midway operation too recklessly and his commander fought it too carefully. On the other hand, Spruance was bold at the right time—by launching his strike early and with all available planes—and prudent when he should be—by refusing to accept Nagumo’s challenge for a night encounter. Spruance, however, would not have had his chance but for the wisdom of a man more than a thousand miles from the battle area; Chester Nimitz had made all the right decisions before a shot was fired.
“The Navy has made a great mistake,” General Moritake Tanabe whispered to Tojo at a party for members of the German and Italian embassies.
“At Midway?” asked the tight-lipped Tojo.
“Yes, they have lost four carriers.”
Tojo couldn’t resist remarking that the Navy had gone into the operation against the advice of the Army, then said, “The news must not leak out. Keep it a complete secret.”
The following day Tojo reported to the Emperor but said not a word about Midway.† Later at a restricted session of Imperial Headquarters, the Prime Minister recommended that attention be diverted from the naval debacle by publicizing the Aleutian operation. The force which had steamed toward Midway to help Admiral Nagumo had been ordered to return north; on June 7 the small but strategic islands of Attu and Kiska were occupied without a casualty.
In America, Midway was already a household word and the battle was celebrated as the turning point of the war in the Pacific. Nimitz himself, though some criticized his considered words as premature, said in his communiqué of June 6:
Pearl Harbor has now been particially avenged. Vengeance will not be complete until Japanese sea power is reduced to impotence. We have made substantial progress in that direction. Perhaps we will be forgiven if we claim that we are about midway to that objective.
On June 7 the Chicago Tribune jeopardized the secret that had made victory possible—the breaking of the Japanese fleet code. The strength of the Japanese forces at Midway, it revealed, was well known in American naval circles several days before the battle began. The Navy, upon learning of “the gathering of the powerful Japanese units soon after they put forth from their bases,” had guessed that “Dutch Harbor and Midway Island might be targets.”
The dispatch carried no byline, but it had been sent from the Pacific by war correspondent Stanley Johnston. It went on to describe the composition of the Japanese forces in detail, and named the four carriers of the Striking Force and the four light cruisers supporting the Invasion Force. The Navy feared that the release of such accurate information would alert the Japanese to the fact that their code had been broken.
The fear was groundless; the Japanese Navy, convinced their fleet code was unbreakable, attributed the rout at Midway to overconfidence. Kusaka held himself responsible for the debacle. He should not have allowed Genda to send out so few search planes. On June 9, still in winter uniform, he was rolled up in a bamboo mat, lowered in a cutter and taken alongside Yamato. He was picked up like a parcel and set on the deck. He gave Yamamoto and his staff a personal report of the battle, adding a request that the Navy, which occasionally issued false communiqués, tell the people the whole truth, since this was a war involving every citizen.
Once they were alone, Kusaka told
Yamamoto that Kido Butai would take all the blame for the defeat. “If you want someone to commit hara-kiri as a token of responsibility, let me do it.” But he said that he really hoped instead to be Nagumo’s chief of staff with a new carrier force that could avenge Midway. “I would like you to give it consideration.”
“I understand,” Yamamoto answered huskily. Kusaka was excused and Yamamoto took to his bed with severe stomach pains. The chief surgeon diagnosed it as “roundworm” but Steward Omi was sure it had been caused by the disastrous events of June 4.
In Japan, Tojo’s orders to conceal the defeat were carried out. Survivors of the sunken ships were isolated, and the truth about Midway was withheld from leading officials as well as the public. Imperial Headquarters announced on June 10 that Japan had at last “secured supreme power in the Pacific” and that the war had been “indeed determined in one battle.” To celebrate the victory the enthusiastic people of Tokyo staged a flag procession and a lantern parade.
In Tennessee, Ensign Kazuo Sakamaki, the only survivor of the midget submarine attack on Pearl Harbor and for some time the sole Japanese prisoner of war, saw no reason to celebrate. He believed what he read about Midway in American newspapers. On his long journey to Tennessee he had seen countless factories and endless fields and he knew that tiny Japan had yet to feel the full might of the United States. Midway was just the beginning of the end of Japan’s hope of conquest.
* Rear Admiral (Captain at the time) Keizo Komura, skipper of the cruiser Chikuma at Midway, revealed in 1967 that a typographical error in the orders had sent the submarines to the wrong positions. Combined Fleet attempted to conceal the blunder, but Komura learned of it soon after the battle from an officer on Yamamoto’s staff.
† The Emperor was usually apprised of the performance of his fighting forces; in fact, there was a “hot line” to his military aide which was open at all hours in case important news was received by Army Headquarters in the middle of the night. It is safe to say that the Emperor’s information about Japanese fortunes of war was as accurate as Roosevelt’s or Churchill’s about their own, and much better than Hitler’s on the German battles. The announcement about the defeat at Midway was probably withheld from His Majesty at this time because of shock and in anticipation of confirmed details.
PART FOUR
Isle of Death
14
Operation Shoestring
1.
Gen Nishino was a slight man of thirty-seven, about five feet tall. He looked frail and sensitive—and was—but had already survived arduous months in China reporting that disjointed war for his newspaper, the Mainichi. Several months after Pearl Harbor he was ordered to cover the campaign in the south. His greatest concern was not for his life but for the $25,000 worth of yen he would be carrying for expenses. His city editor wished him bon voyage, gave him an amulet for good luck and said, “Don’t get killed.”
Nishino, who headed a team of eight newsmen, set sail for Davao, the main port of southern Mindanao, but it was not until June 7, a week after their arrival, that he learned his group was going to ship out with the 17th Army for New Caledonia (this was part of the operation to cut off Australia). However, the Nishino party never got there. Three days later they were caught up in the excitement that swept the Japanese Empire when the victory at Midway was announced. They joined officers in the dining room of their hotel for an impromptu celebration. Even a severe earthquake failed to dampen the enthusiasm. One young officer joked that San Francisco was the center of the quake and all America had collapsed.
Nishino couldn’t shake a nagging doubt after reading newspaper accounts of the battle; they were suspiciously vague. He left the party and went up to his room, where there was a shortwave radio. He turned the dial slowly until he heard a Strauss waltz; then a woman’s voice announced that this was Radio San Francisco and that America had won a tremendous naval victory. It seemed like the usual propaganda until the newscaster confidently listed details of the various units involved at Midway and named the four Japanese carriers that had been sunk.
Nishino couldn’t escape the feeling that this was the truth. Yamamoto had been crushed. Down below he could hear the jubilant clink of beer bottles above the din and felt a wave of pity for the young officers so innocently celebrating a spurious triumph. He thought of telling them what he had heard but knew it would be a mistake. They wouldn’t believe him and he’d be arrested by the kempeitai.
His suspicions were finally confirmed two months later when the 17th Army and the Mainichi group set off—not for New Caledonia but for an island in the Solomons that didn’t appear on their maps. Its name was Gadarukanaru.
In English it was called Guadalcanal and American interest in this remote island evolved from a bitter debate between the Army and the Navy over which should have the dominant role in the Pacific. In March two separate commands had been set up by the Joint Chiefs of Staff. From Melbourne, Douglas MacArthur commanded the Southwest Pacific Area, comprising the Philippines, the South China Sea, the Gulf of Siam, most of the Netherlands East Indies, Australia and the Solomons. The Pacific Ocean Areas—the rest of the Pacific, including the Marshalls, the Carolines and the Marianas—were under the control of Admiral Nimitz in Pearl Harbor. Out of this divided command, from the very first, came almost as much diffused effort and conflict as those existing in Tokyo.
MacArthur warned time and again that the Japanese were converging most of their power in his area and that there would be a disaster unless he got more men and matériel than Nimitz. Then came Midway and MacArthur saw it as an opportunity for quick victories. He radioed Washington an optimistic plan: he would overrun New Ireland and New Britain in a few weeks, “forcing the enemy back to his base at Truk.” Besides his own three infantry divisions MacArthur would need “one division trained and completely equipped for amphibious operations and a task force including two carriers.”
General Marshall, Army Chief of Staff, was impressed enough to write Fleet Admiral Ernest J. King, his opposite number, an urgent request to lend MacArthur several Marine units and two or three carriers. But before this letter could be delivered, Marshall received one from King curtly disposing of the MacArthur plan. The Navy was already considering operations against the same objectives and they would be “primarily of a naval and amphibious character supported and followed by forces operating from Australia.” In other words, the Navy would do the job with MacArthur’s assistance.
This, of course, was completely insupportable to MacArthur. He and he alone should lead the assault, since it lay within his domain. The Navy agreed that one man should be in charge, but not a general; a landlubber might place their precious carriers in jeopardy in the dangerous waters around the Solomons.
Marshall backed MacArthur and the argument stretched on until King reached the end of his patience. He warned Marshall that he was going to start an offensive “even if no support of Army forces in the Southwest Pacific is available.” The Army Chief of Staffs first impulse was to answer in kind, but he decided to hold off a reply until he regained his composure.
Not so MacArthur. He lost his temper and radioed Washington:
IT IS QUITE EVIDENT IN REVIEWING THE WHOLE SITUATION THAT NAVY CONTEMPLATES ASSUMING GENERAL COMMAND CONTROL OF ALL OPERATIONS IN THE PACIFIC THEATER, THE ROLE OF THE ARMY BEING SUBSIDIARY AND CONSISTING LARGELY OF PLACING ITS FORCES AT THE DISPOSAL AND UNDER THE COMMAND OF NAVY OR MARINE OFFICERS.…
It was, he charged, all part of a master plan for “the complete absorption of the national defense function by the Navy” which he had “accidentally” uncovered when he was Chief of Staff.
… BY USING ARMY TROOPS TO GARRISON THE ISLANDS OF THE PACIFIC UNDER NAVY COMMAND, THE NAVY RETAINS MARINE FORCES ALWAYS AVAILABLE, GIVING THEM INHERENTLY AN ARMY OF THEIR OWN AND SERVING AS THE REAL BASES OF THEIR PLANS BY VIRTUE OF HAVING THE MOST READILY AVAILABLE UNITS FOR OFFENSIVE ACTION.
While Marshall agreed in spirit with MacArthur, he realized that the best so
lution was a fair compromise. He asked King to meet him and work out the problem amicably. They sat down face to face, and it was a measure of King’s own maturity that the gruff and bleak admiral was equally willing to make concessions. In many respects Marshall found it easier to deal with King than with MacArthur, who was “supersensitive about everything” and “thought everybody had ulterior motives about everything.”*
During the next few days the men hammered out a general plan for the ultimate objective—seizure of the New Britain–New Guinea area—by dividing the offensive into three separate parts. Task One, under Nimitz, was the assault about August 1 on the Japanese seaplane base at Tulagi, the tiny Solomon island twenty miles north of Guadalcanal, while MacArthur would be responsible for Tasks Two and Three, the seizure of the rest of the Solomons, the northwest coast of New Guinea, and the key base of Rabaul on New Britain.
The recent fall of Tobruk to Rommel had already brought a sense of impending disaster to Washington. Then on July 2—the same day the operation in the Pacific was approved by the Joint Chiefs of Staff—two alarming bulletins arrived: Sevastopol, in the Crimea, had collapsed, and in North Africa the British Eighth Army had been forced to retreat to the gates of Alexandria. What if the German forces in Russia broke through to the Caucasus and linked up with Rommel? Then it would only be a question of time before an even more ominous link-up with the Japanese. Added to all that was the rising toll of Allied merchant shipping losses in the Atlantic. In June alone, more than 627,000 tons had been sunk and the rate was rising.
It was, thought Marshall, “a very black hour.”