by gerald hall
Sigismund Von Braun happens to work in the Foreign Service. Our Australian friend wanted to talk to Werner when he made contact during a trip to Paris.” Canaris informed the others.
“Then Sigismund should be instructed to make contact with Herr Cavill at the first opportunity. I’m sure that there are neutral locations where this can be accomplished. In any event, Herr Cavill would be the perfect vehicle for the negotiations. A producer of weapons for the Commonwealth as an advocate for peace talks. It would be a delicious irony for everyone involved.”
“But let’s not simply use one avenue to make our intentions known. We have had neutral businessmen attempt to arrange peace talks earlier. I suggest that we do this also. I would hate to make it appear that Herr Cavill was a collaborator for the Nazi Party and therefore destroy his usefulness to us. Going through him alone could very well do that unfortunately.”
Chapter Fourteen:
Imperial Government Headquarters
Tokyo, Japan
March 4, 1943
The leader of the Japanese government was bemused as he read the document that had just been handed him by his Minister of Foreign Affairs, Masayuki Tani.
“You say that this information came from the Soviet Ambassador?” General Tojo asked.
“Yes, Sir. He was very specific about it, in fact.”
“Why would he want us to target someone who is allied with his country against Germany? It would seem be to be against his best interest unless he has another agenda in mind. In spite of our current non-aggression pact, Russia and Japan have fought against each other several times in the past century. “
“I cannot speak to his motivations, Sir. But in the document, he strongly inferred that if we eliminated the facilities located here in Northwestern Australia and particularly this Harold Cavill, that our war efforts were benefit greatly from it.”
“The Soviets must be particularly confident then of their ability to defeat the Germans. Did they give a particular reason why they thought the removal of this particular gaijin and his factories would benefit us?”
“The Russians seemed to believe that he was building some sort of secret weapon there for the British. This does have some basis because of the aircraft carrier that Cavill’s shipyard built in secret for the Australian Navy. Our own intelligence has reported that Cavill has somehow been involved in the technical improvement of numerous key warships and aircraft used by the British and the Australian militaries. The new automatic rifles being employed by the Chinese and Australians are also being produced in Harold Cavill’s factories as well.” Minister Tani explained.
“Then we must not merely attack those factories. We must land troops there. If we can establish a foothold there, we will use those factories ourselves to build those new weapons for the Empire. If we cannot hold the area, then we will take home with us all that we can acquire for our scientists to study and emulate. As we leave, we will also destroy everything and everyone associated with the gaijin’s factories so that no one will be able to pick up where he left off.
Can we be sure that the Americans will not interfere with this operation?”
“Our decision to not attack the American Pacific Fleet at their base in the Hawaiian Islands appears to have been very wise. The Americans lack the political will to engage us decisively in the Pacific now, especially after the devastation of their fleet near the Philippine Islands. Their President was politically weakened by our victory. He still is attacking us, but not with any decisive force. He uses his submarines to attack our warships and our transports. His surviving aircraft carriers conduct some raids against our island outposts. The Americans are also launching bombing attacks using heavy bombers launched from Alaska. However, none of these are particularly effective except for the submarines. Submarine attacks have inflicted substantial losses to our merchant shipping in addition to inflicting a major percentage of the current losses to our naval forces.
What I want to know is who has been sending soldiers to attack our island outposts and bring supplies to the bandits in the Philippine Islands?”
“Our spies in Southeast Asia have told us that this gaijin Harold Cavill is also the man responsible for the attacks upon our island outposts. The flying boats that he built for transporting passengers and cargo are being used to bring bandits at night to murder our soldiers as they sleep. Then they fly out before we can find them and take our vengeance.
We have tried to catch the enemy flying boats to shoot them down. But the gaijin pilots and soldiers are very skillful in avoiding us, in spite of the large size of their aircraft.”
“So the Russians have given us an opportunity to catch these bandits in their lair and destroy them, once and for all?” Tojo asked.
“Hai. This is the place where those damned flying boats have been operating from. They have made our operations in the Philippines much more difficult with the supplies that they have brought in for the bandits and the raids that they have made upon many of our important outposts. We need to lay waste to everything at this place or seize it to be of service to the Emperor instead.”
“What do we know about the defenses around this area?” Kaigun-taishō Shigetarō Shimada, Minister of the Navy asked.
“Even with the industrialization of the past twenty years, this is located in a relatively remote part of Australia. The King Sound is most noted for its extreme tidal waters. We could face some opposition from the Australian military base in Darwin. But there are few forces actually available there. Otherwise, our biggest threat will still be the Allied naval and air forces based in Singapore and Haiphong.
We will have to conduct deception operations against those other threats to ensure that our attack will not be interfered with. They can draw away the enemy’s major naval units from Australia. Then we can move in the real invasion force. By the time that the enemy realizes our true intent, we will have tens of thousands of troops in place. This part of Australia is so sparsely populated that they will not be able to mount a successful counterattack before we can set up an effective defense. Once there, the enemy will never be able to dislodge us.
We can use it as a staging area to attack the enemy supply lines and launch air attacks upon the rest of Australia and French Indochina.” Admiral Yamamoto explained.
“Do we have sufficient forces for both the deception effort and to support the invasion?” asked Kaigun-chūshō Nagumo Chūichi.
“Hai. We can use the battleships Haruna and Hiei to screen the carriers Shokaku and Zuikaku of Carrier Division Five in an operation located in the South China Sea to draw out the enemy capital ships. All of these enemy ships have been recently refitted and repaired. Their sailors will be eager to go on the attack.
When the enemy battle line has been drawn out, then we will send the battleship Yamashiro along with four smaller carriers and sufficient escorts to provide support for twenty or more transports sailing for the real objective. The enemy knows that our Kongo-class fast battleships always screen our most important carrier forces. So that will lend credence to the importance of that particular force, especially with the losses that we have suffered within the Kido Butai over the past few months.
We will use the smaller aircraft carriers because their presence will not be as readily noticed as being a significant strike force as our larger carriers would be. This will make our deception force all the more effective in drawing away enemy heavy units from our real target.
Once the beachhead has been established, the deception force can also move in to provide additional support for the expansion of the beachhead. “
“We will have to act quickly. If we do not deal with this threat, the enemy will continue to slowly bleed us to death. We will then not have the opportunity to truly go back on the offensive and take the resources that we need for the Japanese people to reach their manifest destiny.”
“Yes, I concur. We must act quickly. If we do not establish a position that is beyond anyone’s ability to overcome,
either the Americans will finally decide to put full resources into the fight against us or the British will be able to end their European campaign and shift their forces to the Pacific. Then we will surely be destroyed as a people by a powerful and vengeful enemy.” Yamamoto grimly predicted.
US Navy Pacific Fleet Headquarters
Pearl Harbor, Hawaii
April 5, 1943
“We’ve just decoded another Japanese message, Sir. Things look like they are going to get a bit rough for the Aussies in the near future.” Lieutenant Jack Sommers reported to his supervisor at the Naval Intelligence office in Pearl Harbor.
“Why do you say that, Lieutenant?” Captain Allen Morrison asked.
“The Japs are moving a lot of ships and troops towards Australia, Sir. Based on the composition of the force and the focus of their scout planes, I am certain that they are going to mount a major amphibious assault on the northern Australian coast. I would place odds that they are going to hit somewhere around King Sound.”
“Sounds about right, Lieutenant.” Captain Morrison answered back, his teeth firmly clamped around the stem of his pipe.
“Are we going to let the Australians know what is coming their way, Sir? Obviously, they need to have a chance to prepare for the Jap attack.”
“No, Lieutenant. We have our instructions from Washington to keep all of our information that we uncover available only to US forces. They barely allow us to even provide that information to Admiral Hart’s headquarters. I’m not sure that they completely trust him for some reason.”
“Aren’t the Australians and British our allies out there, Sir?” Lieutenant Sommers asked in frustration.
“Yes, but we don’t want to accidentally let the Japanese know that we have broken their latest code. Besides, there are more than a few people back home on the mainland who want to keep our involvement with the Brits and Aussies to a bare minimum. They feel that any interaction with them will just lead to us getting back involved with another war in Europe. So, they want us to mind our own business as much as possible.”
“You are talking about the ‘America First’ folks, aren’t you, Sir?”
“Among others, yes. But our business isn’t about politics. We just follow our orders and do our jobs the best that we can. Understood, Lieutenant?”
“Aye, aye, Sir.”
It still sickened the young Naval Intelligence officer to be forbidden to send some kind of warning to the Australians. Maybe they were already aware of the threat. But what if they weren’t? They were fighting the same enemy that had utterly destroyed the Pacific Fleet battle line little more than a year earlier. There were also American ships still operating with them, survivors of the Asiatic Fleet and the force that attempted to relieve the American garrison in the Philippines. But they weren’t going to get the information either, it was clear.
Only two days earlier, the Naval Intelligence Center had also intercepted radio messages from the Allied Headquarters in Singapore ordering the heart of the Allied fleet in the southwest Pacific to sortie against a possible Japanese invasion force heading for the northern tip of Borneo and then towards Singapore. The powerful Allied force would consist of the battleship HMS Prince of Wales, the battle cruisers HMS Repulse and FFS Strasbourg, the aircraft carriers HMS Indomitable, HMS Hermes and HMAS Melbourne, six cruisers and over a dozen destroyers.
The Japanese were indeed moving a heavy force in the South China Sea under the command of Kaigun-chūshō Takeo Takagi. This force consisted of two Kongo-class fast battleships; the fleet aircraft carriers Shokaku and Zuikaku and a small force of cruisers and destroyers. But the Americans already knew that this force was not going anywhere near Singapore. It was strictly intended as a diversionary force for another more important operation.
Lieutenant Sommers knew that this would leave Australia wide open to attack with only a few cruisers and destroyers left to defend its coastline. But there was nothing that he could personally do to help.
Chapter Fifteen:
IJN Nagato
Manila Bay, Philippine Island
April 12, 1943
The enemy will doubtlessly have ships and aircraft patrolling the seas between the Philippines and Australia. What will we do to prevent our invasion force from being detected prematurely?” Captain Kamani asked.
“Our decoy force will draw away much of the enemy’s patrol forces from their normal areas. This will make is possible for our ships to pass around the western part of New Guinea, then swing south at night so that they will be in position along the northwest coast of Australia by sunrise. At that time, we will attack.” Admiral Nagumo confidently responded.
“Then we should be victorious over our enemies. Long live the Emperor. We shall forever bring him glory through our sacrifice. Banzai!”
But not all of the scouts were drawn away from the western coast of New Guinea by the Japanese deception efforts. Four days later, the Japanese invaders were detected by a patrolling Australian light cruiser.
“The scout plane from HMAS Sydney spotted a big Japanese fleet heading around the southwest corner of New Guinea and heading directly our way. Before the scout plane was shot down by a Zero fighter, it reported dozens of transport ships with a heavy escort force. Sydney is moving southwest at flank speed to avoid a direct confrontation with the Japanese escorts since she has no available support.” A courier from the Derby militia main command post reported.
Major Burke and Harold had been visiting the shipyard when the courier caught up with them.
“We have to assume that we are their target since there is nothing else of value anywhere around here. The first thing that we have to do is get our civilians to safety. We also have to immediately mobilize all elements of the militia and get all of our unarmed Cavalier’s flown out to safe areas. The armed Cavaliers need to be loaded with bombs and torpedoes to assist with the defense.” Major Burke calmly said.
“I wonder who Admiral Phillips and his force are chasing then?” Harold asked.
“I don’t know for sure, Sir. It could be a force designed to divert our capital ships away from the real target of the Japanese. The Japs have frequently been known to use decoy forces to distract their enemies from the real objectives. If this is the case here, then our people in Singapore and Hanoi have fallen for it.”
“Should we tell Singapore about our suspicions?”
“No. At least not right now. It is entirely possible that the decoy force is the one that we believe is heading to attack us. But we have to be prepared for either possibility. Until then, we wait for confirmation and continue with our mobilization.” Major Burke replied.
“I need to be back to my office to check on the status of any new production that could potentially be pressed into service.”
“I need to get back to the command post now.” Major Burke finally said before heading out to his truck. Harold quickly followed behind him.
Derby Militia Headquarters
Derby, Western Australia
April 17, 1943
The Derby militia kept an office during normal circumstances in the same building that Harold’s own office was maintained near the center of Derby. Major Burke and a small staff worked out of that office whenever he was not out in the field or directly involved in training. Ever since the beginning of the war, Harold had someone manning the radios and phones at the militia office, twenty-four hours a day.
This afternoon, the duty non-commissioned officer, Staff Sergeant Richard Oswald, was on duty when he got a radio message from one of the local coast watchers, George Baines, stationed on the southwestern corner of New Guinea. After confirming the message, SSgt Oswald immediately picked up the phone and called Major Burke since it would be a couple of hours before the latter would be at the office.
“Sir, we just got a call from Mister Baines.”
“He sighted some Japanese ships, hasn’t he?”
“Yes, Sir. A whole bloody lot of them; cruisers, destroyers and transports.
He says that he has even seen a battleship, probably a Fuso-class along with four small aircraft carriers. I’ve got the numbers here from his report.”
“Well, we have our confirmation on HMAS Sydney’s report now. We will have to let Admiral Phillips know what we have discovered. Unfortunately, I think that his ships are going to be too far out of position to be able to give us any help for several days.
Besides, I think that he is still too eager to hunt down and kill those fleet carriers. So we are going to be on our own for a while, I’m afraid.”
“You are going to let Mister Cavill know what is happening, Sir?”
“Yes, I will. But for now, I have a few other things to take care of like getting the word out to everyone in the militia. The war is coming to Derby.”
Cavill Industries Main Office
Derby, Western Australia
April 18, 1943
Derby’s air raid sirens started to go off for the first time since the beginning of the war. But the threat was far more than merely an air attack. The word quickly spread that the Japanese were going to invade near the town. The flurry of activity was a portent of things to come.
“Make sure that everyone knows that our underground facilities have their doors open for use as air raid shelters, regardless of whether or not you are an employee of mine.” Harold told someone over the telephone from his office as he watched the activity below.
As he looked out the window, Harold saw a pickup truck painted in Derby militia camouflage colors race up and stop in front of his office. A lanky man in uniform with red hair showing from under his bush hat and five militiamen quickly jumped out and ran into the building.
“Mister Cavill, we wanted to be sure that you got to a safe place before the Japanese hit this place.” Major Burke quickly said.
