5.Japanese Carriers Launch A

Summary Background The East Indies was one of Japan's primary targets if and when it went to Initially, the Japanese forces launched air strikes on key areas and gained war because the colony possessed abundant valuable resources, the most air superiority. Following the airstrikes, landings were made at several important of which were its rubber plantations and oil fields; the colony locations targeting airfields and other important points in the area. In was the fourth-largest exporter of oil in the world, behind the U.S., Iran, addition to the landings at Miri, the Japanese forces made landings at and Romania. The oil made the islands enormously important to the Seria, Kuching, Jesselton and Sandakan between 15 December 1941 and Japanese (see below), so they sought to secure the supply for themselves. 19 January 1942. After these main objectives in Borneo were completed, They sent four fleet carriers and a light carrier along with the four fast the Japanese forces planned a three-pronged assault southward using battleships of the Kongō class, 13 heavy cruisers and many light cruisers three forces named Eastern Force, Center Force and Western Force. The and destroyers to support their amphibious assaults in addition to aim of this assault was to capture the oil resources in the East Indies. The conducting raids on cities, naval units and shipping in both that area and Eastern Force was to advance from Jolo and Davao and move on to around the Indian Ocean. capture Celebes, Amboina and Timor, while protecting the Center Force's flank. The Center Force was to capture oil fields and airfields in Tarakan Access to oil was one of the linchpins of the Japanese war effort, as Japan Island and Balikpapan. Both these forces would support the Western has no native source of oil; it could not even produce enough to meet even Force, which was to attack and capture the oil refineries and airfields in 10% of its needs, even with the extraction of oil shale in Manchuria. Japan Palembang. The Japanese forces launched the assault on 11 January and quickly lost 93 percent of its oil supply after President Franklin D. landed at Tarakan. Roosevelt issued an executive order on 26 July 1941 which froze all of Japan's U.S. assets and embargoed all oil exports to Japan. In addition, the Dutch government in exile, at the urging of the Allies and with the support of Queen Wilhelmina, broke its economic treaty with Japan and joined the embargo in August. Japan's military and economic reserves included only a year and a half's worth of oil. As a U.S. declaration of war against Japan was feared if the latter took the East Indies, the Japanese planned to eliminate the U.S. Pacific Fleet, allowing them to overtake the islands; this led to the attack on Pearl Harbor. Declarations of war On 8 December 1941, in a public proclamation, the Netherlands declared To coordinate the fight against the Japanese, the American, British, Dutch, war on Japan. and Australian forces combined all available land and sea forces under the American-British-Dutch-Australian Command (ABDACOM or ABDA) Force Z banner. This command was activated on 15 January 1942, with the overall In December 1941, as a deterrent to Japanese territorial expansion which commander being British Field Marshal Sir Archibald Wavell. The was recently demonstrated by the invasion of French Indochina, it was command structure had the American Army Air Force Lieutenant General proposed that a force of Royal Navy warships be dispatched to the Far East George Brett as deputy commander, the British Lieutenant General Henry with a view to providing reinforcement for Britain's possessions there, Royds Pownall as chief of staff; under them were the American Admiral most notably Singapore. First Sea Lord Sir Dudley Pound represented that Thomas C. Hart as naval commander, the Dutch Lieutenant General Hein Singapore could only be adequately defended if the Royal Navy sent the ter Poorten as ground forces commander, and the British Air Chief Marshal majority of its capital ships there, to achieve parity with an estimated force Sir Richard Peirse as the air commander. Although the forces were of nine Japanese battleships. However, dispatching such a large British combined, they had differing priorities: the British believed the defense of force was impractical as the British were at war with Nazi Germany and the territory of Singapore and the eastern entrances to the Indian Ocean Fascist Italy. Nevertheless, Prime Minister Winston Churchill appeared (the route to British Ceylon and British India) to be paramount, the optimistic about the improving situation in the North Atlantic and Americans and Australians did not want a total penetration of Southwest Mediterranean; he advocated sending two capital ships along with an Asia that would deprive them of bases necessary for any serious aircraft carrier to defend Malaya, Borneo and the Straits Settlements. counterattack, and the Dutch considered Java and Sumatra, their "second homeland where [they] had been trading and living for over three centuries", to be the most important place to defend. Even the combined forces could not stop or even slow the Japanese advance due to their much greater numbers; to face the Japanese attacking naval forces, the ABDA command had a conglomerate of ships drawn from any available units, which included the U.S. Asiatic Fleet (fresh from the fall of the Philippines), a few British and Australian surface ships, and Dutch units that had previously been stationed in the East Indies. Major forces included two seaplane tenders (USS Langley and Childs), two heavy cruisers (USS Houston and HMS Exeter), seven light cruisers (HNLMS De Ruyter, Java and Tromp, USS Marblehead and Boise, HMAS Hobart and Perth), 22 destroyers, and, perhaps their greatest strength, 25 American and 16 Dutch submarines (although the Dutch submarines were old and The objective of Force Z, which consisted of one battleship, one short of spare parts). Being based on Java, these ships had to take on the battlecruiser and four destroyers, was to intercept the Japanese invasion central and western prongs of the three-headed Japanese assault; the fleet north of Malaya. However, the task force sailed without any air central force's combat ships, the light carrier Ryūjō, the seaplane tenders support, which had been declined by Admiral Sir Tom Phillips, the Sanyo Maru and Sanuki Maru, three light cruisers and 16 destroyers, while commander of Force Z, in favor of maintaining radio silence. Although the the western force contained five heavy cruisers, and seven destroyers. In British had a close encounter with Japanese heavy surface units, the force addition, four fleet carriers (Akagi, Kaga, Hiryū and Sōryū) and the four failed to find and destroy the main convoy. On their return to Singapore Kongō-class battleships. they were attacked in open waters and sunk by long-range medium bombers. The Battle of Balikpapan The Japanese forces were using Tarakan airfield as a forward airbase by 17 Campaign January, and Balikpapan was also captured a week later. However, the General Hisaichi Terauchi, commander of the Southern Expeditionary Dutch garrisons had destroyed the oil fields before they were captured by Army Group, began the campaign with attacks against Borneo: on 17 the Japanese in both cases. December, Japanese forces successfully landed on Miri, an oil production center in northern Sarawak, with support from a battleship, an aircraft In the afternoon of 23 January, nine Dutch Martin B-10 bombers— carrier, three cruisers and four destroyers. escorted by 20 Brewster Buffaloes from 2-VLG-V and 3-VLG-V—attacked the Japanese convoy. The transport ship Tatsugami Maru was damaged and Nana Maru sank. Near Balikpapan, the Dutch submarine HNLMS K XVIII under Lieutenant Commander van Well Groeneveld, attacked and sank the transport Tsuruga Maru and reportedly damaged the patrol boat P-37 by midnight, but was later damaged itself by depth charges and forced to withdraw to Surabaya. While the Japanese invasion force was landing at Balikpapan, on the early morning of 24 January the 59th U.S. Navy Destroyer Division under Rear Admiral William A. Glassford and Commander Paul H. Talbot, acting on orders from Admiral Hart, attacked the Japanese navy escort led by Rear Admiral Shoji Nishimura for about four hours. The U.S. Destroyer Division composed of USS Paul Jones, Parrott, Pope and John D. Ford attacked the 12 transport ships and three patrol boats escorting them. The Japanese destroyer escorts were undertaking a search for the Dutch submarine which had been sighted earlier. At least four transport ships—Kuretake Maru, Nana Maru, Sumanoura Maru and Tatsukami Maru—and patrol boat P-37 were sunk in torpedo attacks. Two other transports were damaged by gunfire or torpedoes. The battle was the first surface engagement in southeast Asia that the U.S. Navy had participated in since As the Japanese landing force approached Sumatra, the remaining Allied the Battle of Manila Bay in 1898. The raid was too late to stop the capture aircraft attacked it, and the Japanese transport ship Otawa Maru was sunk. of Balikpapan. Hurricanes flew up the rivers, machine-gunning Japanese landing craft. The Battle of Makassar Strait However, on the afternoon of 15 February, all Allied aircraft were ordered An ABDA fleet under Schout-by-nacht (Rear Admiral) Karel Doorman was to Java, where a major Japanese attack was anticipated, and the Allied air on its way to intercept a Japanese invasion convoy reported as bound for units had withdrawn from southern Sumatra by the evening of 16 Surabaya, (its destination was actually Makassar) when it was attacked by February 1942.

Load more