by Toland, John
The reinforcements comprised the advance guard of the 38th Division. With them was another good friend of Tsuji’s, Colonel Takushiro Hattori. The newcomer from Tokyo, looking spruce in a brand-new uniform, exuded his usual confidence. As long as this man is alive, Tsuji thought, we don’t have to worry. The two shook hands fervently.
The following day General Kawaguchi left the island in disgrace, “feeling as if my intestines were cut.” He nursed more hatred for his countryman Tsuji than for the enemy.
* The diameter of their barrels was slightly over 14 inches.
† After the war Maruyama and Hyakutake blamed each other for failing to notify Sumiyoshi in time. The latter said it had been Maruyama’s responsibility to keep Sumiyoshi informed of the final postponement. The former claimed that Hyakutake had overestimated the progress of the march and had directly ordered the Sumiyoshi attack on the twenty-third.
‡ The attack came not from a B-17, but from two lumbering PBY’s carrying torpedoes and bombs.
17
The End
1.
On the night of November 9, the commander of the 38th Division, Lieutenant General Tadayoshi Sano and his Headquarters detachment arrived at Tassafaronga Point to join the advance guard units. They had come safely down the Solomons passage in five destroyers, but the main body of the division and other reinforcements for General Hyakutake—some 12,000 men and 10,000 tons of supplies—were still at Shortland Island. It was decided to send them all in one convoy—eleven transports and cargo ships escorted by a dozen destroyers. They would be preceded by a Raiding Group—a force of two battleships, one light cruiser and fourteen destroyers—whose mission it was to neutralize Henderson Field by bombardment, after which the convoy could safely make the run to Guadalcanal.
The Raiding Group, under the command of Vice Admiral Hiroaki Abe, started down toward Guadalcanal on the morning of November 12, and by late afternoon was one hundred miles north of Savo Island. The Americans had known of its presence for hours and surmised it was coming either to shell Henderson or to attack an American transport convoy that was anchored off Guadalcanal with 6,000 troops, ammunition, 105-mm. and 115-mm. howitzers, and rations. By dusk the last of these troops had been disembarked, and the transports and cargo ships, with two thirds of the supplies still in their holds, started hastily withdrawing to the south.
They were escorted to the open sea by Task Group 67.4, commanded by Rear Admiral Daniel J. Callaghan, a deeply religious, close-mouthed man. Once the transports were safely on their way to Nouméa, Callaghan turned back and headed along the north coast of Guadalcanal toward Savo. His mission was to stop Abe and he had to do it with two heavy cruisers, three light cruisers and eight destroyers. He would be outgunned by the oncoming Japanese but his was the sole American naval force in the area.
He had recently taken over command from Norman Scott, a classmate at the Academy, and he did what Scott had done at the Battle of Cape Esperance—put his ships in a single line with four destroyers in the lead and four bringing up the rear. It was easier for a column to navigate in such dangerous waters. He rode in the heavy cruiser San Francisco, despite its ineffective search radar—perhaps for sentimental reasons, since he had been her skipper and had such a close relationship to the crew that they still called him “Uncle Dan”—though not to his face.
The last thing Admiral Abe expected was any night action. There were no American battleships in the area, and cruisers wouldn’t dare attempt to stop him. His two battleships, with Hiei in the lead, slipped past the tip of Santa Isabel Island and continued south toward Savo with six destroyers and a light cruiser screening, and with destroyers on either flank to fend off any torpedo boats.
Their course led them into a heavy rainstorm northwest of Savo, but Abe did not reduce speed; the squall would hide them from air, surface and submarine attacks. The storm did not let up, however, and when Abe learned that the weather over Guadalcanal was just as bad, he ordered all ships to make a simultaneous 180-degree turn and reduce speed to 12 knots. Half an hour later the rain stopped, and though Abe had just received a report of Callaghan’s presence somewhere in Ironbottom Sound, he ordered another countermarch toward Savo.
It was well past midnight by the time the cone of the little island reared up. The mountains of Guadalcanal beyond were a dim mass. Ground observers on the island radioed they could see no enemy ships off Lungga Point and Abe decided to make his bombardment run. He ordered the thin-skinned Type 3 shells loaded in all main batteries of the two battleships.
It was not until 1:24 A.M., November 13—a Friday—that the Americans discovered Abe. The TBS (Talk Between Ships) on San Francisco’s bridge began squawking: “Contacts bearing 312 and 310, distant 27,000 and 32,000 yards.” It was Helena. She had picked up Abe’s horseshoe screen and the two battleships. Callaghan turned his columns north to try to cross the T.
The range between the two forces closed fast. Five minutes passed, then ten, as Callaghan anxiously kept calling over TBS for further information. Radar was not serving him well, for at 1:41 lookouts on his leading destroyer saw two Japanese destroyers unexpectedly materialize out of the darkness. The destroyer Cushing swung hard left to avoid collision, and caused a violent chain reaction down the column.
The cruiser Atlanta swerved sharply and Callaghan, on the ship behind, demanded, “What are you doing?”
“Avoiding our own destroyers,” replied the cruiser’s captain.
There was almost as much confusion on Abe’s bridge. On sighting the enemy he had ordered the Hiei and Kirishima gunners to replace the incendiary shells with armor-piercing rounds. In a stampede, every available man on Hiei rushed to stack the Type 3 shells on the deck. There was chaos in the dark and each minute seemed interminable. One enemy round landing in the lines of incendiary shells would make a torch of the big ship.
Four more minutes passed. At 1:49 Hiei’s searchlight stabbed through the darkness and found the bridge of Atlanta, some 5,000 yards ahead. The American ships reacted quickly and a dozen water spouts rose in front of Hiei. Her own 14-inch guns blasted. A salvo of one-ton shells crashed down on Atlanta. The bridge disintegrated. Admiral Scott and all but one of his staff were dead.
Only then did Callaghan order, “Odd ships commence fire to starboard, even ships to port.” But his column had become intermingled with the enemy and each ship began firing at anything in sight. A spread of torpedoes from one of Abe’s destroyers slammed into Atlanta, almost lifting her from the water. She settled but was helpless, out of the battle.
Hopelessly entangled, the two forces went at each other at close quarters in the most tempestuous melee of the war.
“Cease firing own ships!” Callaghan ordered, and as the shelling momentarily ceased, Kirishima commenced pumping her huge shells at the San Francisco. At least four other Japanese ships converged on the American flagship.
“We want the big ones!” Callaghan called to all his ships. “Get the big ones first!”
A shell exploded on San Francisco’s bridge killing everyone except the captain, who was mortally wounded, and Lieutenant Commander Bruce McCandless. He was appalled by the sight—bodies, limbs, gear littered the deck. A siren moaned as water poured down from the deck above. McCandless conned the wounded ship through the reckless traffic, toward Guadalcanal.
At 2 A.M. Abe’s flagship, battered by fifty topside hits, turned to port, and accompanied by Kirishima, steamed north. The battle had lasted for less than half an hour, but Ironbottom Sound was ablaze with burning wrecks. Only one American ship escaped injury, and Atlanta and two destroyers were going down. One Japanese destroyer had been sunk and another was drifting, and Hiei was so slowed that it seemed likely she would be unable to get out of range of American planes before dawn.
Callaghan’s headlong plunge into the enemy had saved Henderson Field from a devastating pounding—at the cost of hundreds of lives, including Admiral Scott’s and his own.
The rising sun revealed seven c
rippled ships off Guadalcanal—five American and two Japanese. Some were burning hopelessly, some were abandoned, and one—Portland—was so bent that it kept circling. Nor was the ordeal over. As the five surviving American ships left the scene of battle and made for the New Hebrides, just before 11 A.M., the captain of I-26 sighted one of them, San Francisco, and loosed a spread of torpedoes. They skimmed harmlessly by the damaged cruiser, but one crunched into the port side of Juneau. From San Francisco, McCandless saw the ship blow up “with all the fury of an erupting volcano.” A huge brown cloud boiled up, followed by a thunderclap. When the cloud lifted the cruiser was gone. It was awesome.
Captain Gilbert Hoover on Helena, who as senior officer was in command of the little American flotilla, feared that other ships would probably be sunk if he stopped to pick up survivors. And so the four intact vessels raced off without leaving lifeboats or rafts, and some seven hundred men—almost the entire crew of Juneau, including the five Sullivan brothers—perished.*
The slow-moving Hiei could not escape either. Since dawn she had successfully been fighting off planes until a bomb disabled her steering mechanism and she began to circle helplessly. In the next few hours the big ship was battered by Flying Fortresses and torpedo planes from Henderson Field. Two torpedoes finally left Hiei dead in the water. Her cfew was transferred to destroyers and moments later she plunged out of sight, stern first.
The loss of a battleship was a serious blow to Yamamoto, but he did not waver in his determination to get the convoy of eleven transports safely to Guadalcanal. And that meant Henderson Field had to be temporarily put out of action. That night there was another run of the fearsome “Tokyo Express”; cruisers and destroyers scudded down The Slot full speed and bombarded the airfield for thirty-seven minutes. It was a terrifying experience for the Marines, but only eighteen planes were destroyed and the runways were operational by the next morning.
The eleven transports, escorted by a dozen destroyers, under the command of the redoubtable Rear Admiral Raizo Tanaka, were already halfway to Guadalcanal, and they continued down the narrows even after two dive-bombers from Enterprise discovered them at 8:30 A.M. Three hours later, thirty-seven Marine and Navy planes from Henderson swept in and severely damaged two transports. Still, Tanaka refused to withdraw; Hyakutake had to have the reinforcements and supplies. With destroyers belching out a black smoke screen, convoy and escort continued south on a zigzag course. All through the day the attacks continued and the Henderson fliers were joined by Flying Fortresses from Espíritu Santo and by bombers and fighters from Enterprise. Tanaka transferred troops from sinking transports to destroyers which then returned to Shortland, but kept his other ships moving ahead. Before the sun set, six transports had been sunk and one disabled. The last four transports, accompanied by the remaining four destroyers, drew closer to Guadalcanal in the growing darkness.
Yamamoto ordered Admiral Kondo to lead an attack personally down the Solomons passage with the battleship Kirishima, two heavy cruisers, two light cruisers and a destroyer squadron. Such a force under such a commander should be able to blast Henderson Field into oblivion.
This time, however, the Japanese would be opposed by battleships. Task Force 64—two battleships and four destroyers—had been detached from Kinkaid’s carriers and rushed ahead to save Henderson. Halsey would have done this earlier had he not been reluctant to leave Enterprise (the last operational carrier in the Pacific) unprotected during daylight hours.
Task Force 64 had been hiding all day about a hundred miles southwest of Guadalcanal. Early that evening its commander, Rear Admiral Willis A. (“Ching”) Lee, brought it up the west coast of the island. The four destroyers, followed by the battleships Washington and South Dakota, continued north, past Cape Esperance and Savo. At 10:52 P.M. the column turned to starboard. Washington’s radar picked up a ship coming down The Slot. It was Kondo’s lead vessel, the light cruiser Sendai.
Lee waited for twenty-four minutes before ordering his captains to fire. Sendai hurriedly retired, but other Japanese ships moved forward in a resolute attack. By 11:35 all four American destroyers—two of them sinking—were out of action, and South Dakota, crippled by power failure, had become the target for Kirishima and the two heavy cruisers. The Japanese were so absorbed that they failed to notice Washington 8,000 yards off. She rapidly flung seventy-five 16-inch shells at Kirishima. Nine smashed home, as did numerous 5-inch shells. The great battlewagon’s top structure was aflame and she kept turning in a circle, out of control. The captain slowed the ship in an attempt to steer with the engines, but it was useless.
At 12:25 A.M. Kondo, aboard the heavy cruiser Atago, ordered a withdrawal. Lee had prevented him from attacking Henderson and had given him a tactical beating as well. Imagining he had won the battle, Kondo retired to the north under cover of smoke, leaving Kirishima and a disabled destroyer behind. Kirishima’s captain was finally forced to scuttle his ship. He transferred his crew to a destroyer which returned for that purpose, and ordered the Kingston valves opened. The battleship sank northwest of Savo.
Standing off a few miles to the north, Tanaka witnessed the action with concern. He had already sent three of his destroyers to help Kondo, and now decided to make a run for Tassafaronga Point with his last destroyer and the four transports. There was not enough time to unload the troops before dawn by landing craft and he radioed Rabaul for permission to run the transports aground. Rabaul turned down the request but Kondo told him to go ahead. So much time had elapsed that gray light was already showing in the east as the four big transports ploughed into a beach near Tassafaronga Point.
Almost simultaneously eight Marine dive bombers from Henderson, led by Major Joe Sailer, swept in, evaded eight float Zeros and hit the transports with three bombs. They were followed by more Marine Dauntlesses and a succession of Navy torpedo planes. By early afternoon the carnage was so grisly that some American aviators vomited at the sight of the bloody waters covered with fragments of bodies.
Of the 12,000 troops and 10,000 tons of supplies that had left Shortland, only 4,000 shocked men and 5 tons of supplies were safely beached. The three-day naval battle for Guadalcanal was at last over, and it had ended in catastrophe for the Japanese Navy, with 77,609 tons of shipping sunk—two battleships, one heavy cruiser and three destroyers, plus eleven ships of Tanaka’s convoy. Hyakutake’s hopes for a final great offensive were crushed.
General Vandegrift, who had been the victim of Navy timidty since his landing, for the first time expressed unqualified approval of that branch of the service in an ecstatic message to Halsey:
WE BELIEVE THE ENEMY HAS SUFFERED A CRUSHING DEFEAT—WE THANK LEE FOR HIS STURDY EFFORT OF LAST NIGHT—WE THANK KINKAID FOR HIS INTERVENTION YESTERDAY—OUR OWN AIRCRAFT HAS BEEN GRAND IN ITS RELENTLESS POUNDING OF THE FOE—THOSE EFFORTS WE APPRECIATE BUT OUR GREATEST HOMAGE GOES TO SCOTT, CALLAGHAN AND THEIR MEN WHO WITH MAGNIFICENT COURAGE AGAINST SEEMINGLY HOPELESS ODDS DROVE BACK THE FIRST HOSTILE STROKE AND MADE SUCCESS POSSIBLE—TO THEM THE MEN OF CACTUS LIFT THEIR BATTERED HELMETS IN DEEPEST ADMIRATION.
Roosevelt was just as jubilant. Within a few days the Allies had scored four notable victories: the successful landings in North Africa, Montgomery’s triumph over Rommel at El Alamein, the gallant Russian stand at Stalingrad—and now Guadalcanal. “For the past two weeks we have had a great deal of good news,” he told the New York Herald Tribune Forum, “and it would seem that the turning point in this war has at last been reached.”
In Tokyo the Army General Staff was still resolved to retake Guadalcanal and made a drastic realignment of forces. Hereafter Hyakutake’s entire 17th Army would concentrate on the Solomons while the 18th Army took over its duties in eastern New Guinea, and both operations would be under the command of Lieutenant General Hitoshi Imamura. One of the most respected men in the military service, Imamura had succeeded in taking Java with dispatch as well as quickly establishing order throughout the Netherlands East Indies with a minimum of force. His li
beral methods, however, had brought on his head so much criticism from powerful forces in the General Staff itself that for a time his career was in danger.
Imamura began his occupation by releasing Achmed Sukarno from his prison cell. Sukarno, the most influential revolutionary leader in the Indies, was brought to Imamura’s official residence, an elegant structure recently occupied by the Dutch governor. “I know that you’re not the kind of man who would just obey my orders,” said Imamura. “Therefore I won’t give you any. I won’t even tell you what to do. All I can promise is that I can make the Indonesians a happier people under our occupation if they learn our language. Anything further will have to be done by the Japanese government. I cannot promise independence.”
In addition to promoting the Japanese language, Sukarno helped set up a committee of fifteen Indonesians and five Japanese to listen to local grievances. Complaints of Imamura’s liberalism reached his immediate superior in Saigon, General Terauchi. He passed them on to Tokyo, and Generals Akira Muto and Kyoji Tominaga of the War Ministry were sent to Batavia to investigate. Imamura was aggressive in defense of his policy. “I am merely carrying out the Emperor’s instructions,” he said. “If you find that my administration is not successful, relieve me. But first see the results.” They were impressed by what they saw. In their report they advised Prime Minister Tojo and Chief of Staff Sugiyama to give Imamura a free hand.
Now Imamura was to command an Army Group, comprising the 17th and 18th Armies, but his assignment was the most difficult facing any Japanese officer. In Tokyo he went to the Imperial Palace to receive his orders from the Emperor. As the general was bowing himself out, His Majesty said, “Imamura! I understand that my soldiers are suffering terribly on Guadalcanal. Go as soon as you can and save them. Even one day is important.” Imamura saw tears glisten on his imperturbable face.
