Night of the Battleships
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NIGHT OF THE BATTLESHIPS THE SECOND NAVAL BATTLE OF GUADALCANAL WAS A PIVOTAL MOMENT IN A TURNING POINT CAMPAIGN. RICHARD H. WAGNER (Originally published in The Log, Navy League of the United States, New York Council, Winter 2005) t the Battle of Midway, the action. It was not until the battleship United States Navy stopped the action that Japanese hopes of retaking Aforward advance of the Empire the island were ended. Moreover, the of Japan. However, by that time, the battleship action was a desperate gamble Japanese had conquered a great deal of that involved risking the last heavy territory and were poised to resume their surface force in the Pacific in a way that march. It was not until the Guadalcanal was contrary to established doctrine and campaign (August 1942 - February in a type of fighting that the Japanese 1943) that the Americans began to retake had shown themselves to be masters. territory and put the Japanese on the defensive. The bitter fighting on that island is legendary. However, there was also a series of naval actions off Guadalcanal that played a crucial role in the campaign. These were not what is USS WASHINGTON (BB 56) commonly thought of as the typical World War II naval action. Air power DISPLACEMENT: 41,000 full load only played a supporting part. The tons actions centered upon fierce night LENGTH: 729 feet surface actions in confined waters. BEAM: 108 feet The decisive naval actions of the SPEED: 28 knots campaign took place during the period POWER PLANT: Steam turbine 12 November to 15 November 1941. ARMAMENT: Nine 16 inch 45 These actions are called by a variety of caliber: names but the most common Twenty 5 inch 38 caliber; nomenclature is to call the Sixty 40mm; cruiser/destroyer action on the night of Thirty-six 20mm 12-13 November, the First Naval Battle CREW: 1,880 of Guadalcanal and the battleship action COMMISSIONED: 15 May 1941 on the night of 14-15 November, the DECOMMISSIONED: 27 June 1947 Second Naval Battle of Guadalcanal. While popular histories have tended to focus on the cruiser/destroyer action, this article will focus on the battleship 1 Copyright Richard H. Wagner All rights reserved. This article may only be used by permission. The Campaign the airfield was completed it would pose a threat to the line of communication uadalcanal is the largest island in between the United States and Australia. the Solomons chain. It lies Moreover, it could be used to launch a Gsouth of the equator in the Coral new thrust towards Port Moseby, New Sea, southeast of New Guinea and Guinea - - the objective the Japanese had northeast of Australia. The Solomons been prevented from taking in the Battle are arranged in a loose column of twos of the Coral Sea. heading northwest from Guadalcanal Although the bulk of American toward Rabaul. The water lying resources was being sent to the European between the columns was nicknamed Theater, an amphibious assault force was "The Slot" by the Americans who fought quickly scraped together and on 7 in the Solomons campaign. At the August 1942, the First Marine Division Guadalcanal end of The Slot is another was landed on Guadalcanal and Marine body of water with an American Raiders on Tulagi where the Japanese nickname. It is bounded by Guadalcanal had built a seaplane base. The Marines on the south, Savo Island on the west, captured the Guadalcanal airfield the and Tulagi and Florida islands to the next day, renaming it Henderson Field north. The name for it is "Ironbottom after a Marine flyer killed at Midway. Sound." Then, things started to go bad. Prior to 1942, no one took much Upon hearing of the invasion, Vice interest in Guadalcanal. It was Admiral Gunichi Mikawa, IJN, led a discovered by Spanish explorers in the force of cruisers and destroyers from the 1560s but nothing came of their plan to large Japanese base at Rabaul down The colonize the island. The French Slot to attack the American ships rediscovered it in the 1700s but the supporting the invasion. His force malaria-ridden island was so devoid of entered Ironbottom Sound shortly after natural resources and inhabited by such midnight achieving complete surprise. cantankerous natives that no one wanted Four Allied heavy cruisers and a it. At the end of the 19th Century, the destroyer were sunk and another heavy European powers divided-up the Pacific cruiser and two destroyers damaged. Islands and Britain agreed to take However, concerned that his force might Guadalcanal. A few missionaries and be attacked by carrier-based aircraft if it coconut planters from Australia came to was still off Guadalcanal when daylight the island. However, with its over- broke, Mikawa decided to return to base powering smell of rotting vegetation, without attacking the defenseless dense jungle, swamps, meadows with transports unloading at the beachhead. seven foot tall grass that can cut through The Battle of Savo Island was thus a clothing, and steep mountains, the island humiliating defeat but at least it was not went undeveloped. a complete disaster. In July 1942, aerial Ironically, Mikawa need not have reconnaissance detected that the worried. Rear Admiral Frank J. Fletcher, Japanese were constructing an airfield USN, had withdrawn the three aircraft on Guadalcanal. This information carriers that had covered the landings on required immediate action because when the grounds that his fighter strength had 2 Copyright Richard H. Wagner All rights reserved. This article may only be used by permission. been greatly reduced as a result of of action by a torpedo in the same operations and that his ships were engagement. starting to run low on fuel. Since after On the night of 11 October, a the Savo debacle there was practically force of cruisers and destroyers under nothing left to defend the transports, the command of RADM Norman Scott, they were withdrawn on 9 August after USN, intercepted two Japanese cruisers unloading only half their cargoes. and two destroyers, which were on the Consequently, the Marines were left way to bombard Henderson Field. In the holding a small area around the airfield Battle of Cape Esperance, one Japanese with very little supplies. cruiser was sunk and the other badly Using captured Japanese damaged at the cost of one destroyer construction equipment, the Marines sunk, and a light cruiser and a destroyer finished the airfield in early September damaged. and an assortment of Marine, Army, and Two nights later, however, the Navy aircraft were flown in. "The battleships KONGO and HARUNA Cactus Air Force," named for the code appeared in Ironbottom Sound and name for Guadalcanal, gave the bombarded Henderson Field destroying Americans air superiority. However, the 48 aircraft. Although determined attacks campaign stalemated. Each side by PT boats made the battleships so funneled in reinforcements, the nervous that they went away, cruisers Americans by freighter during daylight, carried on the bombardment the next two the Japanese by the "Tokyo Express" - - nights. primarily destroyers that would speed Another carrier engagement took down The Slot at night bringing supplies place on 26-27 October, when and reinforcements. Still, despite heavy ENTERPRISE and USS HORNET (CV fighting, the Americans (including Army 8) encountered four carriers sent to cover troops landed in October) could not a major land offensive directed at advance and the Japanese could not retaking Henderson Field. Two retake the airfield. Japanese carriers were knocked out of Meanwhile, offshore, the fighting commission but HORNET was sunk in was similarly intense. On 24 August, a the Battle of Santa Cruz Islands. This force built around USS SARATOGA left the damaged ENTERPRISE as the (CV 3), USS ENTERPRISE (CV 6), and only operational carrier in the Pacific. USS NORTH CAROLINA (BB 55) engaged a force centered around three The Barroom Brawl Japanese carriers and sank the carrier RYUJO. Shortly after the Battle of the y early November, the Japanese Eastern Solomons, SARATOGA was realized that two conditions had torpedoed by a submarine and rendered Bto be met in order to win on out of action for three months. USS Guadalcanal. First, the Japanese had to WASP (CV 7) was not as lucky. She significantly outnumber the Americans was torpedoed and sunk while escorting on the ground. This would require a a group of transports to Guadalcanal. large-scale reinforcement of the NORTH CAROLINA was also put out garrison. Second, Henderson Field had to be neutralized so as to give the 3 Copyright Richard H. Wagner All rights reserved. This article may only be used by permission. Japanese control of the air and the seas. relief force would not arrive in time and The Cactus Air Force was shooting that defending the island was up to the down Japanese planes at a ratio of 10 to convoy escort ships. one. Accordingly, between 2 November After thwarting an attack on the and 10 November, 65 destroyer loads of transports by Japanese bombers on the troops landed on the island tipping the afternoon of 12 November, Callaghan scale so that the Japanese outnumbered took the transports to sea. After dark, the Americans for the first time. the escort ships broke away from the Furthermore, on 11 November, the transports and formed into a line of Japanese assembled eleven transports battle to wait for the Japanese in loaded with 13,500 troops and supplies. Ironbottom Sound. Unfortunately, This convoy would be supported by a Callaghan had little experience with battle group centered upon the radar and put the ships with the best battleships HIEI and KIRISHIMA. In radar, USS FLETCHER (DD 455) at the addition to escorting the convoy, this end of the column.