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The Evolution of the US Navy Into an Effective The Evolution of the U.S. Navy into an Effective Night-Fighting Force During the Solomon Islands Campaign, 1942 - 1943 A dissertation presented to the faculty of the College of Arts and Sciences of Ohio University In partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree Doctor of Philosophy Jeff T. Reardon August 2008 © 2008 Jeff T. Reardon All Rights Reserved ii This dissertation titled The Evolution of the U.S. Navy into an Effective Night-Fighting Force During the Solomon Islands Campaign, 1942 - 1943 by JEFF T. REARDON has been approved for the Department of History and the College of Arts and Sciences by Marvin E. Fletcher Professor of History Benjamin M. Ogles Dean, College of Arts and Sciences iii ABSTRACT REARDON, JEFF T., Ph.D., August 2008, History The Evolution of the U.S. Navy into an Effective Night-Fighting Force During the Solomon Islands Campaign, 1942-1943 (373 pp.) Director of Dissertation: Marvin E. Fletcher On the night of August 8-9, 1942, American naval forces supporting the amphibious landings at Guadalcanal and Tulagi Islands suffered a humiliating defeat in a nighttime clash against the Imperial Japanese Navy. This was, and remains today, the U.S. Navy’s worst defeat at sea. However, unlike America’s ground and air forces, which began inflicting disproportionate losses against their Japanese counterparts at the outset of the Solomon Islands campaign in August 1942, the navy was slow to achieve similar success. The reason the U.S. Navy took so long to achieve proficiency in ship-to-ship combat was due to the fact that it had not adequately prepared itself to fight at night. Fortunately for the United States, President Franklin Roosevelt appointed two highly competent officers to lead the navy during the war – Admiral Ernest J. King (Commander in Chief of the U.S. Fleet) and Admiral Chester W. Nimitz (Commander in Chief of the Pacific Fleet). With amazing insight these two men and their staffs consistently diagnosed many of the navy’s problems and circulated their findings throughout the fleet. Unfortunately, the time needed to adequately assess past operations often led to the distribution of these combat analyses months after subsequent encounters had already taken place. Moreover, the naval tradition of endowing task force commanders with freedom of action prompted King and Nimitz to refrain from issuing specific instructions iv to task force commanders, often leading to the repetition of past errors and continued tactical defeats. Of course, the U.S. Navy did eventually transform itself into an effective night- fighting force. Much of the credit for this evolution was due to the emergence of new commanders who heeded the lessons of the past and devised new tactics. When combined with better training and improvements in weaponry, the operational effectiveness of the U.S. Navy increased dramatically. By the end of 1943, the U.S. Navy dominated the nighttime seas of the South Pacific. Approved: _____________________________________________________________ Marvin E. Fletcher Professor of History v ACKNOWLEGEMENTS I would like to thank the following people for their assistance in this project. First and foremost, I am grateful to Dr. Marvin Fletcher, who, as my advisor, read and critiqued my chapters as I completed them. Because of him, this dissertation is better than it would otherwise have been. Dr. John Brobst, with an acute knowledge of naval matters, provided me with some helpful suggestions when I began this dissertation, including recommendations on secondary source materials worthy of investigation. Dr. Steven Miner identified several noteworthy points of interest in my dissertation that I had overlooked and encouraged me to expand it into a book. I would also like to thank the various archivists who helped me find the materials I sought. Barry Zerby and Nathaniel Patch at the National Archives in College Park, Maryland spent many months tracking down documents on my behalf. Timothy Petit did likewise at the Naval Historical Center at the Washington Navy Yard. And Dr. Evelyn Cherpak aided my inquiries into the records held at the U.S. Naval War College in Newport, Rhode Island. I would also like to thank Dr. David Rosenberg for helping me obtain material on Captain Arleigh Burke, which had initially proven difficult to access. Lastly, I would like to thank my sister Kristen, who graciously hosted me in her Washington, DC apartment for several months while I conducted my research at the National Archives, Naval Historical Center and Library of Congress. vi TABLE OF CONTENTS Page ABSTRACT ……..………...…………………….………………………………..……..iv ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS …………………….………………………………….……vi LIST OF TABLES ……...…………………...….………………………..………..…...viii LIST OF MAPS ………...…………………….………………………..………..……....ix INTRODUCTION ………...…………………….………………………..………..…….x CHAPTER ONE: BAPTISM OF FIRE IN SAVO SOUND ..............................................1 CHAPTER TWO: THE STRUGGLE FOR GUADALCANAL ………………..…….. 42 CHAPTER THREE: SOLOMONS INTERMISSION …………………...………..…..172 CHAPTER FOUR: TACTICAL DEFEATS IN THE CENTRAL SOLOMONS ……..195 CHAPTER FIVE: ENTER THE DESTROYERMEN ……………………………..…251 CHAPTER SIX: CONCLUSION ……………………………………………………..337 BIBLIOGRAPHY: ……………………………………………………………...……..352 vii LIST OF TABLES Page Table 1. Warships Lost in the Guadalcanal Campaign ……………..………………....168 Table 2. Warships Damaged in Surface Combat in the Guadalcanal Campaign ……...169 viii LIST OF MAPS Page Map 1. The Solomon Islands ………………………..…………..……………………...20 Map 2. The Battle of Savo Island ……………………………………………………....23 Map 3. The Battle of Cape Esperance …………………………………….…………....51 Map 4. The Naval Battle of Guadalcanal (Part One) ….…………………………….....74 Map 5. The Naval Battle of Guadalcanal (Part Two) ………………………………....103 Map 6. The Battle of Tassafaronga ….………………………………………………...137 Map 7. The Central Solomons …………………………………………………….......196 Map 8. Admiral Merrill’s Bombardment of Vila ……………………………………...200 Map 9. The Battle of Kula Gulf ………………………………………………….…....214 Map 10. The Battle of Kolombangara ………..……………………………………….223 Map 11. The Battle of Vella Gulf …………………………………………..………....270 Map 12. The Battle of Vella Lavella ………….……………………………………....290 Map 13. The Battle of Empress Augusta Bay (First Phase) ……………..…………....308 Map 14. The Battle of Empress Augusta Bay (Second Phase) ………………………..313 Map 15. The Battle of Cape St. George ..……………………………………………...327 ix INTRODUCTION Historically, American soldiers begin wars poorly. In 1776 they were routed and driven out of New York City, surrendered at Detroit in 1812, broke into a panicky retreat at Bull Run in 1861 and suffered a sharp riposte in their first clash against the Wehrmacht at Kasserine Pass in 1943. In the Pacific war against Japan, the army’s sister service was no different. In the navy’s first major surface action of World War II, a Japanese squadron virtually annihilated an Allied cruiser force on the night of August 8-9, 1942 at the Battle of Savo Island. This was, and remains today, the U.S. Navy’s worst defeat at sea. However, unlike America’s ground and air forces, which began inflicting disproportionate losses against their Japanese counterparts at the outset of the Solomon Islands campaign in August 1942, the navy was slow to achieve similar success. With a couple of exceptions, American naval units suffered greater losses than their enemy did during the nighttime surface battles of the Solomon Islands campaign of 1942-43. In fact, the navy continued to suffer tactical defeats for a year after its humiliation at Savo Island. Not until the end of 1943 did the U.S. Navy finally come to dominate its adversary in the South Pacific. The reason the U.S. Navy took so long to achieve proficiency in ship-to-ship combat in the Solomons campaign is primarily two-fold. First, the navy had not adequately prepared for the type of warfare (i.e. night fighting) it found itself forced to engage in. Instead, the navy spent the prewar years preparing to fight what the service’s great theorist Alfred Thayer Mahan had called the “decisive battle” – a grand daylight fleet action. x Second, because the U.S. Navy expected a war with Japan to be decided by a Jutland-like encounter between battle fleets, it lacked an applicable doctrine capable of guiding commanders in the Solomons battles. When confronted with nighttime warfare in confined waters between cruiser-destroyer task forces, U.S. commanders simply adopted a modified version of their daytime doctrine. A small initial success in an atypical circumstance two months after the Battle of Savo Island prompted subsequent commanders to replicate this formula, with poor results. Although the U.S. Navy was ill-prepared to engage the Imperial Japanese Navy in nighttime combat, it was fortunate to have two highly competent officers in charge. Shortly after the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor President Franklin Roosevelt (in consultation with Secretary of the Navy Frank Knox) appointed Admiral Ernest J. King to the resurrected post of Commander in Chief, U.S. Fleet and (in March 1942) Chief of Naval Operations, with his headquarters in Washington, DC. The President also tapped the relatively junior Rear Admiral Chester W. Nimitz to be the Commander in Chief, Pacific Fleet and (in March 1942) Pacific Ocean Areas, based in Pearl Harbor. With amazing insight these two men and their staffs consistently diagnosed many of the navy’s problems and circulated their published findings for the edification of the officer corps. Unfortunately, the time needed to adequately assess past operations
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