Hellcats

by Peter Sasgen

  Edge ran the Bonefish parallel to the target’s track while he waited for the escort to go by. When it did, he swung the sub’s nose toward the tanker.

  Edge directed the attack from the bridge, where he could see the ships, dark, blocky shapes darker than the Zamboanga peninsula behind them. He bawled orders into the bridge speaker to the attack team below in the conning tower. “Left full rudder!” The Bonefish heeled onto a new course. “Steady as she goes!” Arrow straight, bow pointed directly at the tanker’s side looming up ahead, the Bonefish bored in.

  “Fire One ...! Fire Two ...! Three ...! Four ...! Left full rudder! All ahead flank!”

  Torpedoes fired, the partially awash Bonefish rose from the sea as her howling low-pressure blowers forced water out of flooded ballast tanks. Retrimmed for high-speed cruising on the surface, she wheeled around and pulled away. In her wake four white bubble trails converged on the tanker.

  Looking aft, Edge counted down the seconds. The fish should be there by now.... A miss! Another miss! And another! ... What about number four ...? He saw a small flash erupt at the tanker’s waterline, then a white geyser taller than her bow. A hit! A signal lamp on one of the ships began to flash an indecipherable message to the rest of the convoy. If it was a warning, it came too late.

  Edge had little time to savor his work. An aircraft contact on SD radar forced the Bonefish down. Passing a hundred feet, the sonar watch reported a distant explosion—one of the torpedoes that had missed the tanker had probably exploded when it hit the beach or sea bottom at the end of its run. Edge hoped to hear breaking-up noises from a sinking tanker. Instead, as the explosion faded away, sonar reported only distant screw noises and long-range depth charging.

  Edge was deeply disappointed by his failure to sink the tanker, not just for himself but also for his crew. He was painfully aware that all of those tension-filled hours of tracking, plotting, and sweating had resulted in damage to only one ship. He could have blamed his failure on erratic torpedo performance that continued to curse the Bonefish. But Edge being Edge, he was as tough on himself as he was on the enemy. He vowed to make amends the next time he had a Japanese ship in his sights.

  The next day the Bonefish ran through a large area of floating wreckage—oil drums, lifeboats, splintered lumber, life rings—possibly from one of the ships she’d torpedoed earlier or from another victim of a U.S. submarine that had been in the area before the Bonefish’s arrival. The coast of Mindanao had become a graveyard for Japanese marus.

  Patrol at an end and headed home via the Lombok Strait east of Bali, the Bonefish exchanged recognition signals and information with the northbound submarine USS Flier (SS-250). The Bonefish was likely the last submarine to make contact with the doomed ship. On August 13 the Flier struck a Japanese mine while transiting the Balabac Strait south of Palawan and sank in less than a minute. With help from Philippine guerrillas eight Flier survivors, including her skipper, were rescued by the USS Redfin (SS-272).

  Admiral Christie noted in his endorsements to the patrol report Edge submitted after his return to Fremantle that the new skipper had conducted the patrol in an aggressive and thorough manner. He concurred with Edge’s assessment of sinkings and damage: one freighter and one oiler sunk, another oiler damaged. He noted too that Edge’s report was well written and filled with operational details on Japanese antisubmarine tactics and convoy routines that would be useful to other skippers assigned to patrol the same area.

  Edge’s narrative provided Admiral Christie with an exceptionally clear and accurate picture of the action that had unfolded day by day, hour by hour, minute by minute aboard the Bonefish. Christie surely found the report, with Edge’s colorful personal observations inserted into the narrative, as lively and exciting as a fast-paced short story. For his outstanding performance, Edge received the Bronze Star, the Bonefish her fourth unit commendation.

  In an undated letter written during the long, arduous days of patrolling in enemy waters, Lawrence told Sarah in words carefully chosen to avoid censorship that he’d just concluded his first patrol as skipper of the Bonefish . He also dropped a hint that before too long the Bonefish might return to the States for an overhaul. He also explained his reasons for fighting in a war that seemed it would never end.

  Dearest, most lovely of all sweethearts, I love you, I love you, I love you....

  Again a patrol is nearly over ... there are things I want to tell you—so many that the censor will not let me tell—and most of the others just adding up to the fact that I love you two and miss you so terribly much that I can hardly bear dwelling on it.... What we are doing each day is, of course, our part in the war, be it big or small, and as such I can’t tell you. The nearest thing to a diary allowed on board is the ... patrol report.

  Just recently, I’ve read a little article in last January’s Readers Digest, a letter of an Army doctor to a friend telling ... his thoughts, feelings, and experiences during 60 days of the heaviest fighting in New Guinea. Luckily, I have not had to go through all the terrible experiences he had in that bitter jungle warfare, but much of what he says I know to be true—and none more so than his last paragraph:

  “But most of all I know that the best thing on earth is the love of a man’s wife, and the sustaining strength of a man’s family at home.”

  In the last analysis, I’m sure that that is what most of us are really fighting for in our hearts—for our country, the place where our wives and families are, the place which we want to keep safe and happy for you, so that we can eventually return to you there and live the kind of life with you that both you and we believe is the best the world has yet to offer....

  As for me ... I’ve won no medals this time, certainly [his Bronze Star had not yet been awarded]. But I’m not complaining very bitterly. Our luck in many ways was very good indeed ... insofar as damage done to the enemy is concerned. Yes, it has ... earned another star for my combat pin. In fact I guess it was somewhat more successful than the last patrol I was on. And I’m not nearly as tired out or whipped down this time as last, either. In practically all respects, too, my job this time has continued to be the best one I’ve yet had in the Navy. But that doesn’t mean I won’t really be glad when this war is over and I can be with you two once more....

  Lawrence concluded with news he’d heard that the war in Europe might be over by early 1945. And he took as a sure sign that the Navy’s drastic reduction of its submarine building program meant victory in the Pacific wasn’t too far off either. It also meant that Lawrence would probably not receive a new-construction submarine of his own to command, which every combat skipper hoped to achieve. Yet as he always did, Lawrence delighted in the bounty of his life instead of dwelling on his misfortunes.

  Anyhow [the Bonefish] has to go back to the yard [on the West Coast] eventually. That won’t be [for] as long or as good [as taking command of a new submarine], but I guess I have no just cause for complaint ... if that should be the worst thing to befall me.

  CHAPTER FIVE

  The “Magic” Behind the Mission

  It had been a bitter and bloody fight in the Pacific. American forces had suffered terrible casualties in their island-hopping campaign against the Japanese. Starting in March 1942, the Japanese had completed their capture of Java. In May the last Philippine bastion, Corregidor, fell, and with it the remnants of organized U.S. and Filipino resistance. The Japanese army seemed invincible. Yet their defeat at the Battle of Midway in June 1942 marked a turning point in the war. For Japan, the loss of four aircraft carriers (the U.S. lost one carrier), with their planes and pilots, marked the beginning of the end. Yet even as the Japanese fell back across the Pacific in the face of ever more powerful American advances, Japanese soldiers chose to fight to the death rather than surrender. And though America and her allies had taken the initiative, it was clear that the Pacific war was not going to end suddenly, and that it was going to consume more and more lives on both sides. Worse yet, an invasion of the home islands, a d
readed possibility, would likely require five million soldiers, sailors, marines, and airmen, and incur perhaps a half million casualties.d Even though facing defeat, the Japanese still had the capacity to inflict heavy losses on an invading army. At risk, too, were the thousands of Allied prisoners of war and civilian detainees. Therefore, any military operation that might speed Japan’s collapse and lessen the need for an invasion would receive serious consideration and likely gain approval from Admirals Nimitz and King. They had already approved a naval blockade of the home islands and air strikes on industrial targets across Japan. But no one knew if they would be effective, or, if they were, how long it would take for their effect to end the war.

  Looking back after the war Lockwood realized that the operation he’d envisioned for a submarine raid targeted against Japan had had its genesis during the visit he made to the laboratories of UCDWR at San Diego, California, in April 1943, where he’d had his first glimpse of FM sonar. Given his enormous responsibilities and all the issues relating to submarine combat operations vying for his attention, the idea that FM sonar might provide the means to penetrate the minefields guarding the Sea of Japan had taken a while to germinate. When it did it reignited Lockwood’s determination to once again make that sea a theater of operation for his subs.

  Sometime after the Wahoo’s loss in October 1943, an intelligence report arrived at ComSubPac challenging Lockwood’s belief that the Wahoo had been sunk by a mine in the Sea of Japan. Lockwood had clung to that idea absent an official announcement by the Japanese that their antisubmarine forces had sunk the Wahoo. To Lockwood the lack of an announcement by the Japanese indicated that, unknown to them, the Wahoo had struck one of their mines. Support for this idea came from submarines operating around Japan, whose skippers reported an increase in the number of floating mines that had broken loose of their moorings and gone adrift, sometimes into traffic lanes used by the Japanese themselves. The dangers they posed to submarines as well as surface ships were all too real, as evidenced by the sinking of the Flier.

  The intelligence report Lockwood received indicated that Japanese antisubmarine forces had attacked and sunk a submarine in La Pérouse Strait on October 11, 1943.e Why the Japanese hadn’t made an official announcement to that effect was a real mystery, given their penchant for exaggerating reports of attacks on U.S. subs. There was no denying that the submarine in question was the Wahoo. Lockwood mulled over what he knew for sure. The Wahoo had gone in there twice. Other subs had too and had gotten out. Only the Wahoo had been sunk, and apparently not by a mine. If a mine hadn’t sunk her, did that mean the Sea of Japan wasn’t impregnable after all? Did it mean that the minefields guarding the sea weren’t as formidable as Lockwood and Voge had thought? Could they be penetrated—somehow—without incurring the loss of men and ships?

  Lockwood realized that UCDWR had unintentionally created the tool that would make it possible to attempt a mission that he believed would keep his submarines in the fight. The war was evolving into a naval air campaign just as the submarine war of attrition against Japanese shipping was slackening for lack of targets. His force was on the brink of going out of business. Lockwood’s mission would sink the Japanese empire once and for all, and in the bargain avenge Morton and the Wahoo.

  A big-picture man, Lockwood envisioned a mission that had three main objectives: One, penetrate the minefields guarding the Sea of Japan to prove that submarines could do it. Two, show the Japanese that they were virtually isolated and defenseless against submarine incursions. Three, cut off the imports of rice, coal, and iron ore from East Asia that Japan needed for survival. Lockwood’s submarines would accomplish these objectives by sinking every last ship still afloat in the Sea of Japan. Another important goal coming into focus as a result of America’s sometimes difficult collaboration with the Russians, though not articulated by Lockwood, was to demonstrate to the leaders of the Soviet Union that the United States Navy’s powerful submarine force would have a role to play in the implementation of America’s strategic objectives in the postwar world.

  In early 1944, after several follow-up visits to UCDWR’s labs to see what progress had been made on FM sonar, Lockwood came away convinced that the new device had the potential to become the secret weapon the sub force needed to wipe out the remains of Japan’s merchant marine. He was more determined than ever to get the sonar units into full-scale production and to get one installed in a submarine for trials as soon as possible.

  Lockwood outlined for Admiral Nimitz what he’d learned about FM sonar. Impressed by what he heard, Nimitz approved Lockwood’s request to have the first available sonar unit installed aboard a submarine. His approval also allowed Lockwood to set in motion an almost continuous rotation of civilian scientists and instructors between UCDWR in California and the sub base at Pearl Harbor and, later, at Guam. At both California and Pearl Harbor, the scientists would supervise the installation and repair of FM sonar units in subs, and the training of the submarine personnel who would operate them. This cooperative effort would give the scientists an opportunity to experience the hot, humid, and rugged environment of a submarine, where the sonar equipment would have to operate without malfunctioning. It would also provide an opportunity for the submariners undergoing training to become acquainted with the difficulties inherent in the development and manufacture of extraordinarily complex and temperamental equipment, as well as its operation and maintenance. From the beginning, and despite all the problems imposed by rush schedules, stress, short tempers, and nagging production bottlenecks, the collaboration between scientists and submariners turned into a successful partnership that continued beyond the end of the war. Lockwood couldn’t have been more pleased, then, when the first working FM sonar unit showed up in Pearl Harbor in June 1944 installed aboard the USS Spadefish (SS-411).

  The Spadefish was a new-construction boat out of the government building yards at Mare Island, California. Her skipper was a veteran ship sinker, the mustachioed Commander Gordon W. Underwood. After her fitting out, shakedown, and crew training at Mare Island, shipfitters installed a handcrafted FM sonar chassis, sonar head, and associated accessories in her forward torpedo room. After installation the Spadefish moved south to San Diego, where UCDWR technicians installed and tested the FM sonar unit’s electronics package. Lockwood, anxious to know how the work was progressing, received regular updates on the installation and also on the effort by technicians to rid the Spadefish’s unit of the bugs that kept it from performing as it should. Though these problems were eventually solved, they foreshadowed what was to come.

  The physical installation itself consisted of several components. They included two soundheads, one of them a transmitting projector, the other a receiving hydrophone. Both were mounted on a rotating, retractable shaft enclosed in a thirty-one-inch-long, twelve-inch-diameter rubber sleeve filled with castor oil.1 In the Spadefish, the shaft from the forward torpedo room ran through the ship’s pressure hull on the port side up to the main deck. She was the only sub to have a deck-mounted unit. Later, experience dictated that FM sonar soundheads mounted below a submarine’s keel provided better signal propagation out ahead of the sub, which enhanced the sub’s ability to locate mines. It also allowed for the use of FM sonar when the sub was running on the surface.

  Another component consisted of a four-foot-tall equipment stack inside a steel box mounted to the forward torpedo room deck against the ship’s curved hull. The stack contained an FM oscillator, a power amplifier, a receiver, and an analyzer. Another component, a hoist-training mechanism, turned, raised, and lowered the soundhead. A plan position indicator—or PPI scope—mounted in the sub’s control room had a circular cathode ray tube similar to a radarscope. Like a radarscope, the PPI scope had a long persistence screen that inhibited image ghosting, a sweep-around circuit, and the necessary power controls to turn it on and off. Distances and relative bearings necessary to navigation were scribed on the face of the PPI scope. A loudspeaker mounted in the conning tower ab
ove the FM sonar operator’s position sounded a bell-like tone that warned of impending contact with mines. There were also various junction boxes and the necessary connective cabling between the conning tower and forward torpedo room.

  Aboard a sub feeling its way through a minefield, FM sonar displayed the returning sonar echo from a mine contact on the PPI scope as a bright green spot of light shaped like a pear.2 The sharper the pear, the closer the mine. The pearlike display was augmented by the aforementioned bell tone, the volume and clarity of which were directly proportional to the distance from the sub to an actual mine. The bell tone, dubbed “hell’s bells” by submariners, and the display of green pears gave the sonar operator a bird’s-eye view of the position and range of each contacted mine relative to the submarine. Unlike standard sonar gear, with its individual and discontinuous pulses of sound that often required up to eight minutes for a full 360-degree scan, FM sonar, with its continuous modulated signal, could conduct a 360-degree scan in only eight seconds. In addition, FM sonar’s ability to rapidly sweep an area for targets made it difficult for the Japanese to detect its pulse via their conventional single-channel listening gear.

  In tests FM sonar sweeps from as far away as eight hundred yards gave good returns from dummy mines in the form of bright green pears and clear, pure bell notes, while poor returns from, say, kelp or schools of fish usually gave off an indistinct green pear and a mushy bell tone, a result of their indefinite shapes. The combined visual display and audio warning allowed a sub to find gaps between rows of mines swaying at the ends of their anchor cables. Or so the theory went. The trick was to thread this forest of mine cables while submerged, no easy feat. After all, mines that are surrounded by cubic miles of seawater are relatively small objects that give off correspondingly weak echoes that can be masked by sound reverberations caused by shallow water, an uneven seabed, and, up above, rough seas. Tests conducted on dummy mines and on triplanes—underwater devices equipped with three perforated sound-reflecting “wings”—revealed just how temperamental the gear could be and how much time and patience it took for the UCDWR scientists to fix problems both mechanical and electronic.