Seconds later the forward turrets fired, the smoke fuming out of the guns, the heavy shells chased by fire and smoke. This weather is only now beginning to clear, and it prevented our float planes from getting up earlier this morning, he thought. So we come like two men with canes, tapping our way forward. Yet our new radar has proved to be very useful….
“Sir, Hiraga now reports that Amagi is burning badly aft and is nearly dead in the water. She must have severe engine damage.”
It was much worse than that. The American cruisers, with 32 6-inch guns between them, had pummeled the ship from two directions in the intense gun duel. Amagi had lost her port side torpedo mount, but before the fires made it impossible, she fired her starboard tubes and put three long lance torpedoes in the water. One would strike the San Diego, causing so much hull damage and flooding that the ship could not be saved. But now it appeared that Amagi herself was going down at the stern. Her forward turrets were still firing, but she would not likely survive this encounter, having only the satisfaction of taking two enemy ships with her to the bottom of the sea, and damaging a third enough to force it to break off.
It was time for the battleships to settle the matter, but Kurita was beginning to surmise that he was at a considerable disadvantage here. His radar now showed three prominent contacts, all throwing large caliber rounds at his ships. Kagami was trailing him, with shorter range guns, so that ship would not get into action until he was already heavily engaged. Hiraga was coming about in a very wide loop, but temporarily out of the action as well. Satsuma was alone, and facing the wrath of what he believed to be three enemy battleships.
In fact, only two had directed their weapons against his ship, South Dakota and Indiana. The Washington had the range on the battlecruiser Kagami, and was directing its fire there. Kurita gave an order to put on all possible speed and come about in 15 degree increments, turning away north. All the while he directed his fire at the South Dakota, and as Kagami drew closer, it followed suit. Kurita’s ship had taken three heavy rounds, and one of his turrets was now reporting damage, its guns silent as the crews fought fires breaking out on the foredeck.
In the course of the engagement, Captain Glen Davis on the Washington had stayed right in the wake of South Dakota, and so when that ship turned to port, he followed it closely, the two ships steering first through 270, and then further through 250 southwest. Lee, however, was still steady on at 270 west, and about three miles north of Washington. It seemed that the Admiral was about to get himself into a private little war. The action was now at about 10 nautical miles, all of 20,000 plus yards, and Lee was firing by radar. Seeing what the other two battleships were doing, he gave the order to come to 245 and turned his broadside to the enemy.
This maneuver was going to see Satsuma slip off to the north, but both Kagami and now Hiraga were still in the fight, the latter having finally completed the extremely wide loop it made after breaking off from Amagi. They directed their guns on South Dakota, and Kagami scored a number of hits with her smaller 152mm guns that had little effect.
Lee’s aim was as true as his sharp shooting that day. As the other two battleships turned south, he could see that both enemy ships still in contact were doubling down on South Dakota. He directed Washington to take on the battlecruiser, and then went after the last enemy battleship, getting by his count, at least four good hits with his forward main guns. His own ship took several hits, but the damage was not serious.
Ten minutes later, Hiraga had followed Kurita north. It had been like two knights jousting, each one denting the other’s armor and drawing blood, but neither scoring a fatal blow. Lee had just encountered ships that never were, scratching his head as he tried to discern their identity. As he saw the enemy recede over the horizon, he had the strong feeling that this would not be the last time he would lead his battleships into harm’s way, and he was very correct in that assessment.
Chapter 26
Far to the north, at the distant home of the Japanese Combined Fleet, another dark knight was approaching the wide cobalt blue expanse of Chuuk Lagoon. Called Truk in the war, it was a small group of islands, the largest no more than five miles wide, and all surrounded by a ring of coral reefs extending nearly 40 miles across, in roughly the shape of an irregular triangle. Within it were some 820 square miles of lagoon surrounding eleven major islands. It was the calm center of the Japanese war in the Pacific, the eye of the storm. The protective reef had several breaks that permitted the safe passage of ships into the lagoon, where numerous anchorages presented themselves.
In the west, the Plaanu Pass allowed for two ship channels to the north and south of the large island group of Poto, Polle, and Tol. There was also a north pass, one in the south and one to the northeast of the main island, which was Weno, also called Moen, where the largest anchorage lay off its western shore. The principle airfield was also on that island, a busy field nearly 4000 feet long that had over 90 planes, nearly half of them A6M2 Zero fighters for defense and carrier fleet replenishment.
On this day, there were 14 warships in the anchorage, which included the main fleet headquarters aboard the battleship Musashi, the light carrier Zuiho, six destroyers, a patrol boat and five submarines. At other scattered anchorages, there were five AK cargo ships, the fleet oiler Notoro, troopship Hikawa Maru, three more fast APDs, a pair of smaller merchantmen and two heavy tankers, one loading to make a scheduled oil delivery to Rabaul.
There were two logistic supply routes leading to the Japanese possessions in the South. One went through Manila, and then into the Dutch East Indies, though ship soften delivered fuel to Momote it the Admiralty Islands and Rabaul as well. The second outer route ran past Iwo Jima, through the Marianas to the Carolines, where Truk sat like a castle at the center of a web of many scattered islands. In effect, Truk was the main defensive base supporting all the Japanese outposts seized in the Marianas, Marshall, and Gilbert Islands, and was the principle rallying point for the Combined Fleet carrier groups before they would sally forth through that coral reef castle wall and out onto the wide Pacific. It was Japan’s Pearl Harbor, and it was about to become the target of an attack every bit as surprising as the one Nagumo had led against the American base.
Kirov had been hastening south, slipping through the Marshall Islands where the Japanese had spotted a lone ship, sending the Shadow Fleet to investigate. Yet their planned intercept never happened. They were too far off the mark, reaching Tarawa when Kirov was still about 600 nautical miles to the north approaching Wotje. When Kirov moved south to Majuro, the Shadow Fleet, seeing nothing of the lone raider, had moved southeast of Naruru bound for the New Hebrides.