The Rising Sun: The Decline and Fall of the Japanese Empire, 1936-1945 (Modern Library War)

by Toland, John

  3.

  Early in the morning on October 26, Nagumo and Kusaka stood anxiously on the bridge of the carrier Shokaku. Kusaka’s prediction that they would be discovered was borne out at two-thirty; a communications officer reported that a plane, probably a B-17, was nearby. For twenty minutes Nagumo stood silent, his face “like stone,” staring up at the black sky. His vigil was ended by a sudden explosion, and then another. Two huge columns of water geysered near the flagship.‡

  Nagumo turned to his chief of staff. “What you said before was true. Reverse course, full speed.”

  Hiding his indignation, Kusaka told the helmsman to head north at 24 knots. He also ordered twenty-four search planes to fan out to the south; he would not be caught as he was at Midway.

  The Japanese fleet had been found and it was up to Halsey in Nouméa to determine what to do about it. Obviously a strong enemy force was coming down toward Guadalcanal and it was equally obvious that it was stronger, at least in carriers, than Kinkaid’s task force. Just before dawn Halsey made the decision that most Americans in the Pacific were hoping for. He radioed all combat commands: ATTACK REPEAT ATTACK. The United States Navy was at last going on the offensive.

  Kinkaid headed toward Kido Butai and had no sooner sent out search planes than he himself was discovered by one of the aircraft long since dispatched by Kusaka: ONE CARRIER AND 15 OTHER SHIPS BEARING NORTHWEST. For weeks Kusaka had avoided battle, but with the enemy 250 miles away he unhesitatingly ordered an attack wave to take off at once.

  At seven o’clock eighteen torpedo bombers, twenty-two dive bombers and twenty-seven fighters began lifting off Kido Butai’s three carriers—Shokaku, Zuikaku and little Zuiho—and before the last planes left the decks, Kusaka ordered a second wave to follow as soon as possible. Never before had he fussed during a battle, but today he was so conscious of the mistakes of Midway that he kept shouting impatiently from the bridge for Shokaku’s deck officers to move faster. Through his glasses he could see that things were going even slower on Zuikaku. He stamped a foot angrily and told the flagman to signal: “What’s the delay?”

  He ranged around the bridge until the last of the dozen torpedo bombers, twenty dive bombers and sixteen fighters of the second wave were airborne. From his window he shouted to hose down the decks and prepare for enemy attack. Not a single fighter was left to protect the two big carriers and Zuiho, but Kusaka, now that he was committed to battle, was so agitated that he did not care. “Bring spears, enemy,” he muttered to himself. “Anything!”

  The first American strike group left almost half an hour after the initial Japanese wave, and by eight-fifteen there were seventy-three dive bombers, torpedo bombers and fighters winging toward Kido Butai. The Japanese and American strike forces passed within sight of each other. For some time neither side broke formation and kept driving on to its own destination, but a dozen Japanese fighters could resist the temptation no longer and swung back. They caught up with a group of nineteen Enterprise planes and knocked down three Wildcats and three torpedo bombers at a cost of three of their own planes.

  The first Japanese dive bombers were less than fifty miles away when Kinkaid received radar verification. He controlled all fighters from his flagship, Enterprise, but until this moment his experience had been confined to battleships and cruisers, and he hesitated momentarily before sending up the Wildcats to intercept. Before they could gain altitude, the Japanese had begun their attack on Hornet—Enterprise was ten miles away, hidden by a local rain squall. At nine-ten the Aichis nosed over, plummeting down on the carrier. One bomb hit near the flight deck, two barely missed but battered the hull. The squadron commander purposely dived at the stack. His plane caromed off and plunged into the flight deck, where its two bombs exploded.

  Nakajimas were already sweeping in low. Two torpedoes ripped into the engineering space, exploded and shook the entire ship. Hornet staggered, came to a stop. As she lay helpless in the water, another group of Aichis began boring in, recklessly raking the smoking ship from stem to stern with half a dozen more bombs. Within ten minutes the Japanese were heading back for home, and Hornet, listing 8 degrees, was covered with flames.

  Hornet’s own Dauntless dive bombers were getting some measure of revenge on Chikuma, a cruiser running interference for Nagumo’s carriers. A bomb plunged into the bridge. Captain Keizo Komura, standing starboard of the compass, was knocked backwards by the blast. Almost everyone else on the bridge was dead. Komura staggered to his feet, his head roaring; his eardrums were broken. Through the voice tube he ordered the ship to change course. Another bomb hit the bridge. “Jettison torpedoes!” he shouted and someone made a hand signal. Seconds after the last one was released, a bomb exploded in the empty torpedo room.

  Another group of Dauntlesses sighted Shokaku. Ignoring heavy flak, they dived on Nagumo’s flagship in single file. Kusaka felt the ship shudder as the first 1,000-lb. bomb struck. There were more explosions—he lost count. The flight deck was in flames. Was this another Midway? He called the engine room by voice tube and was told there was no damage there. “We can go thirty-two knots, sir.” But communications were out and Kusaka decided to transfer the flag to a destroyer. He ordered the helmsman to reverse course and head out of danger. She was followed by Zuikaku, a 50-foot hole in her flight deck; she had been put out of action by audacious attacks from two passing American search-plane pilots—Lieutenant Stockton Strong and Ensign Charles Irvine.

  Several hundred miles away, forty-three Japanese dive bombers and torpedo bombers were heading for Kinkaid. The dive bombers came first and were picked up by radar at a distance of fifty-five miles. But again Kinkaid hesitated to send up fighters from Enterprise to intercept them. Completely unopposed, the Aichis started to dive, and it looked as if America’s last carrier in the Pacific would go the way of Hornet. Then antiaircraft gunners from Enterprise and her screen opened up. The fire was concentrated and accurate—particularly from the battleship South Dakota and the cruiser San Juan—and only two bombs hit the carrier; a third exploded so close to the hull that a main turbine bearing was damaged. Within minutes, however, fires were contained, machinery adjusted and holes patched, and by the time the Japanese torpedo planes appeared, the big flattop was able to dodge everything fired at her.

  More Japanese raiders were less than a hundred miles away and fast approaching—a strike force from Junyo, the single carrier in Kondo’s Advance Force. It was made up of seventeen dive bombers and escorted by a dozen fighters under Lieutenant (s.g.) Yoshio Shiga, the amateur artist who had distinguished himself at Pearl Harbor. The sun was almost directly overhead, and below he could see whitecaps on the blue sea. At eleven-twenty he spotted a large carrier, pushing forward “with a bone in its teeth.” It looked alive but the decks seemed to be empty. Then two fighters took off. (There were other Wildcats hidden in the squall clouds above.)

  Until that moment Shiga had been repeating to himself, “Leave some for us,” but now his anticipation turned into anxiety. Had the first Japanese wave been knocked down without scoring any hits? The bombers were already forming up for the attack. The fighters were ordered to escort them in their dive, one with one. However, there were more Aichis than fighters, so Shiga signaled that he would protect the first two—a job no fighter pilot relished. Just before leaving Junyo, Shiga had cautioned his inexperienced young pilots to stay with the bombers and not be drawn off into duels with enemy fighters. “Don’t separate. That’s an order.” But as he got into position behind Lieutenant Masao Yamaguchi, leader of the bombers, he noticed several of his Zeros lured out of line by the Wildcats in the clouds. It was too late to call them off and Shiga followed Yamaguchi, who was diving directly at Enterprise through bursts of ack-ack. At 9,000 feet Yamaguchi lowered his flaps to check speed. Shiga’s Zero had no flaps, and to keep from passing Yamaguchi, he had to pull the stick to his stomach and go into a tight loop. He was pressed against the back rest and almost blacked out before coming out of the loop. He glanced aroun
d to see if there were any enemy fighters near and to make sure he wasn’t blocking the next dive bomber.

  Flak blossomed on all sides and he went into a second tight loop, and a third, continually losing altitude. He looked around but couldn’t find Yamaguchi. His escort duties were over and he searched for enemy interceptors. Two stubby fighter planes were just ahead. They must be Grumman Wildcats! He had heard awesome stories of their fire power and indestructibility. As he approached they split apart and he banked after the leading one. Strangely, it took no evasive action, and just as he was about to shoot, the other Wildcat came in fast on his tail. This was why so many of his comrades had been shot down lately! He tried to isolate one of the Americans time and again, but the other always darted in on the attack.

  Enterprise successfully dodged all of Yamaguchi’s bombs, but South Dakota and San Juan, which had helped save the carrier earlier, came in so close to throw up flak that both were hit. One bomb exploded on the battleship’s No. 1 turret and another pierced the cruiser, exploding near the ship’s bottom.

  A second wave of fifteen planes from Junyo found Hornet in tow behind the cruiser Northampton, and six Nakajimas swept across the water toward the crippled carrier. The cruiser captain ordered the towline cut so that his ship could evade torpedoes. This left Hornet almost dead in the water, and without fighter cover. The declining efficiency of Japanese pilot replacements was evident: five torpedoes missed the almost stationary target. But the sixth ripped into the starboard side; there was a sickly green flash followed by a hissing, then a dull rumble. The deck on the port side “seemed to crack open” and fuel oil erupted, flinging sailors down the slanted deck. The after engine room began flooding as the starboard list increased to 14 degrees. The word went out to prepare to abandon ship. Six high-level bombers, also Nakajimas, came over in a perfect V formation. One bomb hit the flight deck just as the Americans began scrambling down lines to the water.

  By now Shiga and his fighter pilots had returned to Junyo with a report that the carrier seemed “very much alive” when they left her. He recommended another strike. An operations officer asked if he could return in the dark.

  “It’s not a question of returning,” said Shiga. He had expected to die at Pearl Harbor and felt he was living on borrowed time. “It has to be done. If possible, send out a homing signal.” Some carrier captains didn’t like to reveal their positions this way. “If you don’t send it out, I’ll come back anyway. Then watch out!” It was half joke, half threat.

  Only one officer among the dive bombers had survived the first attack, a plump, baby-faced youngster, Shunko Kato. This had been his first mission and when Shiga awakened him and said they were going to attack again, Kato’s face drained of color. “This is a battle to avenge your squadron leader,” said Shiga. “That’s war.”

  Kato sat up in his bunk. “Let’s go.”

  Shiga summoned the five fighter pilots he felt could make it back in the dark, and the five men who would pilot the dive bombers. “This is the last attack,” he said. “You helldivers do everything Yamaguchi taught you. Get in as close as you can to the target before releasing your bombs.” He turned on his own pilots. “Don’t you fighter planes ever separate from me again. If you do, I’ll shoot you down.”

  With Shiga in the lead, the eleven planes took off. In the setting sun he thought he saw something way down. Several minutes later, he discerned ships through the cloud patches, one a carrier. It was the wrong ship, Hornet, and was already dead in the water. Kato and his dive bombers hurtled down. This time Shiga managed to stay with Kato until he saw his bomb plunge into the hangar deck. Shiga banked and swept back over the carrier. To his puzzlement there were few figures on the flight deck. It was a dead ship.

  His problem now was to return to Junyo. He gathered his planes like a mother hen and headed back under darkening skies. Would there be a homing signal? He located the proper cycle on his radio. At first he heard nothing, then came a welcome series of beeps. Junyo was transmitting!

  Dinner that night for Shiga and his men was grim. There were empty chairs all around the tables, with plates of food standing uneaten. There was no boasting or elation over the triumphs of the day.

  The reports of the fliers were so impressive that Kondo’s entire Advance Force, as well as Vanguard Group, was sent out to engage the enemy in a night battle. The two intact carriers, Zuikaku and Junyo, were to follow in case another strike could be launched. The Vanguard Group came upon Hornet, her entire length ablaze. She was still afloat despite nine torpedoes from her screening destroyers, which fled at the sight of the enemy. The Japanese, in turn, sent four torpedoes of their own into the abandoned hulk, and finally, at one thirty-five, October 27, the ship that had launched the first planes to bomb Tokyo, plunged out of sight. The rest of the American fleet could not be found. The Battle of the Santa Cruz Islands was over.

  An hour before dawn Nagumo and his staff transferred from the destroyer to Zuikaku. From reports of pilots and crews Nagumo and Kusaka estimated that at least two cruisers, one destroyer, one battleship and three carriers had been sunk. Midway had been avenged and the Japanese Navy at last ruled the seas around Guadalcanal.

  Yamamoto’s evaluation was even more favorable. His chief of staff, Admiral Ugaki, radioed Tokyo that four flattops and three battleships had been sunk. He could not sleep and strolled in the moonlight along the decks of Yamato, reveling in the fact that the great victory had come on America’s Navy Day. He retired to his cabin and wrote three haiku poems:

  After the battle I forget the heat

  while contemplating

  the sixteen-day moon.

  Contemplating the moon.

  I mourn

  the enemy’s sacrifice.

  Beneath the moon

  stretches a sea at whose bottom

  lie many ships.

  The Japanese had won a decided tactical victory without losing a ship, but the Americans had gained valuable time and thwarted the enemy’s ambitious combined operations to retake Henderson Field. In addition, sixty-nine Japanese planes had failed to return to their carriers, and another twenty-three were lost in emergency landings. It would take months to replace these planes and crews.

  But in Tokyo the victory was considered so momentous that the Emperor wrote an imperial rescript praising Yamamoto for the “brave fight” put up by the Combined Fleet. In it His Majesty did predict that the situation in the Solomons would “become more and more difficult.” As he presented the rescript to Navy Chief of Staff Nagano, he said, “I add my personal wish to the latter part of the rescript, that is, regarding the struggle for Guadalcanal. It is a place where a bitter fight is being waged between forces of Japan and the United States and is, moreover, an important base for the Imperial Navy. I hope that the island will be recovered by our forces as soon as possible.”

  By now, however, Yamamoto and Ugaki had privately concluded that it would be next to impossible to retake Guadalcanal. Three times the Army had failed. With the Americans strengthening their garrison almost daily, how could a fourth attempt possibly succeed?

  On Guadalcanal, Hyakutake’s chief of staff, Colonel Konuma, had been forced almost to the same conclusion. He was hoping that the Americans would not learn that Maruyama’s division had been virtually annihilated; if they did, they might launch an attack of their own that would no doubt wipe out the entire Japanese force on the island.

  Colonel Tsuji was on his way back over the Maruyama Trail with a firsthand report of the condition of the 2nd Division. En route he found battalion commander Minamoto lying at the side of the trail, the lower half of his body soaked in blood. “Hold on,” Tsuji told him. “We’ll have someone come back for you.”

  “I haven’t eaten since day before yesterday,” said Minamoto in a weak voice.

  From his hango, Tsuji put two chopstickfuls of rice in the wounded officer’s mouth. Minamoto pointed feebly to a group of his men lying nearby. They opened their mouths like baby sparrows as
Tsuji went to feed each one of them.

  It took Tsuji five days to reach the coast and 17th Army headquarters. He ordered rice sent to the front and dispatched a radiogram to Army Chief of Staff Sugiyama in Tokyo:

  I MUST BEAR THE WHOLE RESPONSIBILITY FOR THE FAILURE OF THE 2ND DIVISION WHICH COURAGEOUSLY FOUGHT FOR DAYS AND LOST MORE THAN HALF THEIR MEN IN DESPERATE ATTACKS. THEY FAILED BECAUSE I UNDERESTIMATED THE ENEMY’S FIGHTING POWER AND INSISTED ON MY OWN OPERATIONS PLAN WHICH WAS ERRONEOUS.

  He said he deserved “a sentence of ten thousand deaths” and requested permission to stay on Guadalcanal with the 17th Army. The answer came on November 3:

  YOUR APPLICATION FOR TRANSFER TO 17TH ARMY IS NOT APPROVED. RETURN HERE TO REPORT ON BATTLE SITUATION.

  Late that afternoon Colonel Ichiji Sugita (who had interpreted for General Yamashita at the surrender of Singapore) turned up at 17th Army headquarters exhausted, his uniform scarcely recognizable. He had been supervising the diversionary action of General Sumiyoshi’s troops on the Mataniko River. His face was pale, his eyes strangely bright as he reported that the Americans had broken through the 4th Regiment, the infantry unit holding the bulk of the line on the east bank of the river. “The regimental commander is going to make a last attack with the remaining hundred and fifty men and the regimental flag. I am going with them!”

  “Don’t be so rash, Sugita,” said Tsuji. “There will be no attack. Put the regimental colors in the center and have the men dig in around them. The enemy will never charge; besides, in the jungle out there, artillery and bombing isn’t too effective. It’s merely a question of holding out another day or two.” Reinforcements were already landing. Sugita, leaning on a piece of bamboo, hobbled back toward the Mataniko River.