Turn in toward them?
No… run straight ahead. All our guns can bear while only their forward guns can fire in reply.
“Flank speed, bearing 260 degrees!” he ordered.
The heavy fourteen-inch turrets ponderously shifted, swinging about fore and aft, shifting to port, barrels depressing as the range finders aloft called down to the fire control center with the range and bearing of the rapidly closing targets, ordering ammunition loads switched to armor piercing.
It took a very long two minutes, a very long two minutes, but at last number one turret fired back.
Ward
01:29 hrs
THE FLASH FROM the guns of their secondary batteries was blinding, burning out his night vision as he was focused on the ship.
“Range… seven thousand one hundred yards …”
The geyser of water blew two hundred yards forward of the destroyer to his port side, the column of water soaring a hundred feet into the air, seconds later the charging destroyer, pitching and rocking, slashing through the wake of the blast and the cascades of sea water showering down.
More flares were erupting above them. Suddenly a blinding spotlight clicked on, and then another, from the Japanese cruiser to the west of the battleship, the spotlight sweeping back and forth.
The flashes from his own single four-incher were blinding as well, so that he let his binoculars drop.
Eight bursts of light, as brilliant as the sun, fired in sequences of two, each sequence spaced a couple of seconds after the next from the battleship straight ahead, joined a few seconds later by the second battleship, which had been running a mile astern of his target. Their heavy guns were opening up at last.
My God, here it comes.
And it came, the fourteen-inch shells raining down, one striking directly between Ward and the destroyer to port, and then in a second his portside companion was gone, just simply gone, caught amidships, three quarters of a ton of armor-piercing slicing through the hull just above the water line.
The destroyer escort to his starboard side had taken a similar hit, but luck had held for her. The armor-piercing shells were designed for a plunging strike into an enemy cruiser or battleship, designed to slice through eight, ten inches of armor and then to keep on punching down before finally detonating. For the starboard-side destroyer escort, it had simply gone through the paper-thin superstructure of the bridge, killing four men, turning the ship’s captain into a pulplike spray, and then punched through the starboard side to strike the sea a quarter mile away before exploding.
But for the ship to port, the shell had angled into the engine room, hitting a steam turbine which was encased with high-grade steel, and blown, the explosion breaking the back of the ship, tearing off the entire aft end, the flash bursting into the aft magazine for the five-inchers, igniting half a dozen tons of powder.
Another shell burst in the ocean seventy-five yards off the portside bow of Ward. Not a killing blow, though the overpressure underwater ruptured plates, and shrapnel eviscerated the crew of the forward antiaircraft gun, which had started to open up as well, silencing their brave but futile efforts.
“Range six thousand, five hundred yards!”
He looked over at the captain of the Ward. The lad stood not saying a word. Draemel smiled inwardly. Best damn tradition of Annapolis on display here. His boys were doing OK, and he was proud of them—but how many of these kids would die in the next few minutes, how many were already dead? He had heard some unsettling rumors. Suppose after all this their torpedoes weren’t effective, suppose they just bounced off the armor siding of that thirty-six-thousand-ton monster straight ahead? If so, he hoped everyone on the damn ordnance board responsible fried in hell. He was pitting well over two thousand young men on this gamble. It had better be worth it.
He could not let his fears show now. There was only one order left to give, when to turn and launch torpedoes, and he prayed to God his nerve would hold long enough to do that—and that he lived long enough to do it right. He had seen the destruction in Pearl. It was payback time, and he wanted in on that first strike back.
There was a momentary eye contact between him and the young captain, illuminated by the flash of the Japanese guns. Both forced a smile, said nothing, but the look expressed a thousand words about fears, courage, the realization of what had to be done, and the realization of the price that job would require.
They were well within torpedo range now, almost suicidally close. But the farther out with his torpedoes, the slower the speed for the weapon once launched. At this range, to reach their target, speed would have to be set at under thirty knots. Hell, this old destroyer moved faster than that. He wanted them in damn close for a highspeed launch at maximum torpedo speed of forty-five knots. It was rumored the Japs could fire theirs from ten thousand yards or more away, but no, he wanted to be right on top of the sons of bitches and spit in their eye before he’d cut loose, to make sure they put her on the bottom of the sea.
Hiei
01:34 hrs
THEY WERE UP to flank speed at last, running full out at over twenty-two knots, burning more fuel in a minute than they would cruising for a half hour at ten knots.
Another four miles and they would clear the west coast of the island and could turn northward and away.
Damn Yamamoto! He should have assigned all the destroyers with me, I’d have then had a protective screen to portside to intercept this unexpected attack, Nagita thought bitterly.
“Their range is four thousand meters!”
They must have launched by now, he thought. It would be suicide to come any closer. Already two of the attacking ships were gone.
He spared a quick glance to the charts. They had five miles of sea room to starboard. Should he turn in but then have no maneuver room, or race straight on?
He hesitated.
Ward
01:36 hrs
“RANGE FOUR THOUSAND, six hundred yards!”
Another salvo, another destroyer hit, bow shearing off, the ship for a second looking as if it would actually dig in bow first and upend over.
“Sir?”
It was the captain of the Ward, trying to sound calm, in spite of the hurricane of noise.
“One mile out,” Draemel shouted, voice nearly drowned out by the bark of the lone four-inch gun forward. “I want it so close we can’t miss! We’re almost under their big guns, they’re shooting flat trajectory, their heavy rounds passing over us now,” and even as he spoke the bridge was rattled by the howl of a fourteen-inch shell shrieking past them, so close the concussive blast of the passing bolt was actually felt. It was followed a few seconds later by a strike from a six-inch shell, hitting the smokestack astern, blowing it apart. He could hear screaming from down on the deck.
“Aye, aye sir. One mile it is.”
Hiei
01:38 hrs
“TURN TO BEARING 300!” Nagita shouted.
The Americans were insane. They were closing straight in! He could not help but be filled with a certain awe. Four of their ships were definitely hit, what appeared to be a cruiser farther out engulfed in flames. Kirishima, apparently not the target of this mad charge, was concentrating her fire on the larger target. Tone was racing out on a bearing of 220 degrees, angling across the western flank of their attack, her guns engaging the American cruiser as well. Idiots! It was the destroyers now that were the real threat. The cruiser could have waited.
Ward
01:40 hrs
“RANGE TWO THOUSAND nine hundred yards!… she’s turning sir, turning away!”
He didn’t need his binoculars to see it… the battleship’s silhouette was shifting, turning in toward land, running obliquely away.
He ran a quick calculation: running speed of torpedoes, target angling away at forty-five degrees now from their attack, it would lengthen the run. Give it two more minutes.
He hoped the torpedo officer aboard this ship was trained well and knew his settings. They were onl
y going to get one shot to launch from starboard.
“In two minutes we turn hard to port, and launch. Radio that order, in the clear, to the other ships.”
Pearl Harbor
01:41 hrs
JAMES AND THE others in the radio shack stood silent. The bombardment had lifted once the insane charge of the destroyers had started. There had even been a scattering of cheers both in the shack and from outside along the docks.
But they had been able to hear every word of command, broadcast in the clear: the distress calls from destroyers crippled and falling out of the attack, and also the sudden silences, which spoke volumes.
“This is Ward. All ships, on my mark, prepare to turn in sixty seconds to bearing 280 degrees, and then launch torpedoes. Mark!”
“Fifty seconds …”
And then the radio just went silent.
Ward
01:42 hrs
HE WAS STILL alive—at least he thought he was. The six-inch shell had slashed into the forward turret, a torrent of splinters and shrapnel washing up over the bridge, piercing the tissue-thin skin of the so-called splinter shield, glass of the bridge shattering behind him.
His left side was numb. He felt nothing, he tried to reach around with his right hand to feel it, but couldn’t find anything to grab hold of. In the flashes of light he caught a glimpse of a petty officer, staring at him in shock, and then he looked down in amazement.
His left arm was gone just below the shoulder, blood pouring out in a pulsing stream. The Ward’s young CO was on the deck by his side, at least what was left of his decapitated body.
He felt Ward begin to heel over hard. They were turning, preparing to launch. The petty officer was by his side, saying something about sick bay. He snarled at the man to stand fast and remain at his post.
The battleship was visible before him, now impossibly big, flashes of light, guns of every caliber firing, a torrent of shells slashing into the Ward, which was beginning to lose way even as it turned.
Damn it, God, give me a few more seconds, just a few more seconds!
“Torpedoes away!”
He turned and saw the splashes as the eight torpedoes, launched by pneumatic bursts of high pressure air, hit the water, one after the other. Looking back to port, it was hard to see, but it seemed that at least one other destroyer was still in the fight, turning, launching as well…
“OK, you bastards, now it’s your turn to get some,” he gasped.
Hiei
01:44:30 hrs
“SIR—TORPEDO WAKES INBOUND!”
He held his breath, scanning the waters. Searchlights swept back and forth, one stopped, focused on a white, bubbling wake coming straight amidships.
Closer, it was racing in… too late to order evasive maneuvers. They were going to take this one!
He stepped back and away from the railing. The flash could roast a man alive. He prepared to shield his face with his arm.
Something hit, he could feel it… but nothing, no explosion.
By all the gods! He almost wanted to laugh… It was a dud.
And then a cry that more torpedoes were coming in.
Ward
01:45 hrs
WARD WAS DYING. The engine room was reporting flood. He could barely hear it, he could barely hear anything now as he stood braced against the shattered splinter shield, hanging on with his one hand.
The petty officer, ignoring his protests, was bracing him up.
“I’m taking you to the doc now, sir!”
“Another minute,” Draemel gasped. “They should have hit by now!”
“Goddamn torpedoes,” someone was screaming, “Goddamn torpedoes! Duds, we’re firing Goddamn duds!”
He felt an infinite weariness. My God in heaven, after all this, please God no. Don’t let these men die in vain.
And then, as if in answer to his final prayer, it happened. A brilliant flash, so close he could feel the concussion as it raced through the water after hitting the Jap battleship amidships, and then, five seconds later, a second flash, far astern. Something told him that had to be one of his, one from the Ward, one from this crew.
“You did it, boys,” he gasped, “by God you did it! Proud of you!”
The world was darker now. He could barely see the flash; everything was drifting out of focus.
“Proud of you, sir.” It was the petty officer, laying him down on the blood-soaked deck. “You did it.”
But Draemel no longer heard him as he drifted off, some memory floating for a moment, strange, not here. The grandkids, God, I’ll miss them growing up….
He was already gone when seconds later a direct hit from one of the Hiei’s six-inchers burst in the forward magazine, delivering the death blow to a gallant ship and all but twenty of her hands.
Hiei
01:47 hrs
“I WANT A damage report now!” Nagita shouted, looking back at his wide-eyed staff.
Phones in the bridge were ringing, but he didn’t need to be told that they were losing headway and the ship was no longer answering the helm.
His senior damage control officer was on one of the phones, talking rapidly, and yet still maintaining a sense of calm. Nagita knew he too had to regain control of himself.
The officer finally hung up the phone and turned back to face his admiral.
“One torpedo amidships, port side, detonating in a fuel bunker. Damage can be contained, but we’ll lose most of the fuel. Transfer pumping has started.
“The second, though, sir. It struck portside astern. Possible damage to portside screw, and the rudder is not responding to the helm, sir. It’s either gone or bent. We don’t know yet.”
Nagita took it in, saying nothing.
Yamamoto’s foolishness, he thought bitterly, and now this. He looked to starboard. The enemy coast was little more than four miles away, shoreline bright with fires.
“The enemy?”
“All ships apparently destroyed, sir, or retiring.”
He nodded.
“Foolhardy,” he whispered, “but valiant. I never expected such courage from them. They could have launched from twice, three times the range but did not.”
No one spoke.
“Signal our destroyers to prepare to take us into tow. We must clear these shores before dawn.”
He walked back out onto the open bridge and leaned over the railing to look aft along the port side. Even in the dark, illuminated now by the burning hulks of two of the enemy destroyers, he could see where the water was darker and flattened out. They were hemorrhaging their precious oil and with each passing second slowing down, even as Hiei started into a uncontrolled turn to starboard, now listing as well. Back on the bridge he could hear his chief engineer taking control of the situation, ordering counterflooding to balance out the list, and to prepare a harnessed diver to go over the side to examine the rudder.
It was not yet two in the morning local time. In a little more than three and a half hours, the eastern horizon would begin to glow—and they would indeed be bait for the American carriers, if they were out there. He now wondered if that was Yamamoto’s intent all along, a damaged battleship that the American aircraft carrier commanders could not resist attacking, and thus reveal themselves. If so, and he survived, he would take this to the Naval Board, the government, if need be even the Emperor. To toss aside a battleship for their flimsy carriers was criminal and must be punished.
Chapter Three
Enterprise
210 miles south-southwest of Oahu
December 8, 1941
1:55 hrs local time
THE RADIO IN the CIC had been silent for over ten minutes, no one speaking, many still looking at the loudspeaker as if somehow it would come back to life.
My God, Halsey thought, Draemel had guts. An inner voice whispered to him that the man was dead. It’d be like him to go out like that.
He inwardly raged at the silence. There had been one garbled transmission from one of the destroyers, uni
dentified, reporting two hits on the Jap battleship, but no follow-up as to extent of damage.
One of those monsters, bigger than anything the Navy now had afloat, could take three or four torpedoes and keep right on going… but then again, one crucial hit, like the legendary shot on the Bismarck … she just might be crippled!
He looked over at the plot board, illuminated by the dull red glare of the lighting in the CIC, a seaman first class standing with grease pen poised, ready to mark the latest position.
All they had were two Jap battleships. Where the hell were the carriers?
What was their admiral doing? Who was it? With this aggressiveness, it felt like Yamamoto.
They had to have at least four carriers out there, maybe six, perhaps even their entire known fleet of eight. If so, his sense of pride and honor would most likely mean that Yamamoto had sailed with them. He had read everything he could on the man. He’d been the topic of conversation more than once since word was revealed of his promotion. Several had met him, saying he was one helluva poker player, a master of the bluff, the audacious move, ready to gamble all on the throw of a card and yet with a razor-sharp mind, instantly calculating the odds. He was, as well, a man who seemed to be blessed with that rare gift, luck, the throw of the card usually going in his favor. If that was indeed him leading out there, from the front, in the tradition of Nelson, Farragut, and John Paul Jones, it showed him to be a man of guts.
He could have pulled a raid and by now be hundreds of miles away. No, he was hanging on—and his desire? Perhaps an invasion itself, but something told Halsey that wasn’t the case. CIC had been monitoring reports for over eighteen hours now. The Japanese were hitting everywhere at once, across nearly a sixth of the earth’s surface. They had to be spread thin when it came to logistics, transports, troops, the nuts and bolts of staging an invasion and then holding an island like Oahu. Perhaps the gambler Yamamoto was going for that.
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