He would lead his small task force out from Tjilatjap, along the southern coast of Java, and strike through the enemy landing site like an arrow. At the same time, the remainder of his forces at Surabaya on the north coast, would sortie with RNN light cruiser Tromp, and USN destroyers Stewart, Parrott, John D. Edwards and Pillsbury. If he was able to drive the Japanese off with his own group, they would then run right into this second force coming into the Badung Strait east of Bali from the north.
Admiral James Somerville had not yet arrived on HMS Formidable, diverted by the hunt for a pair of German raiders near the Cape Verde Islands. This left the carriers Illustrious and Indomitable as the nucleus of the Eastern Fleet he was to command, now under the capable hands of another rising star in the fleet, Captain and Lord Louis Francis Albert Victor Nicholas Mountbatten. Men of his ilk tended to stack up names like that, and medals along with admission to select orders and societies to go with their titles.
The squadron had been well out in the Indian Ocean to conceal their presence from the Japanese, lingering in low rolling fog and clouds. As soon as they received word from Doorman that he had detected the Japanese fleet and was ready to sortie into the Java Sea, Mountbatten turned northeast running towards the Sunda Strait on the southern tip of Sumatra. Unfortunately, Doorman received word that the British fleet would not arrive in time to support him, and so he undertook to engage the enemy with this daring pincer attack.
He would be opposed that day by four Japanese destroyers of the 8th DD Division, Asashio, Oshio, Arashio and Michishio, escorting the Kanemura Detachment aboard two troop transports, Sasago Maru and Sagami Maru. Doorman would be late to the party, and the Japanese landing would already be underway when his southern pincer approached through the low clouds threatening rain, a little before midnight on February 25th. Cruiser Java led the way, followed by Doorman in his flagship and the three destroyers. They caught the Japanese still lingering near the sandy coast of Sanur at 22:20.
Doorman was squinting through his field glasses, frustrated by the darkness and looming presence of the island of Bali. Then he heard the cruiser Java open fire ahead, and the entire scene was soon illuminated when the Japanese fired off star shells to see what they were up against. A confused action resulted, with both sides opening up in a high speed dual that came to nothing. Strangely, Doorman decided to barrel right through the strait heading north where he expected to find his second task force.
The Japanese, however, turned away to the south, where they found the three allied destroyers that had been about 5500 yards behind Doorman’s cruisers. Captain Jan Chompff on the Piet Hein saw them coming, got rattled, and executed a sharp turn to come around to the south, firing his deck guns and launching torpedoes as he did so. It was then that an unaccountable thing happened. A crewman on the bridge of that destroyer lost his footing in that turn and fell onto a button that controlled the ‘Make Smoke’ command. Thick smoke poured from the funnels, and completely obscured the scene, frustrating the gunners on the American destroyers behind Piet Hein. Putting on speed to try and break through the smoke, the US destroyers emerged just as the Japanese returned torpedo fire against the Dutch DD.
They were firing the dread Long Lance, and its fabled accuracy, range, and power would not fail the Japanese that night. Piet Hein was struck a fatal blow, and peppered by accurate naval gunfire as she rolled to one side. The two remaining American DDs swapped gunfire with the Asashio in a brief five minute duel before Captain Jacob Cooper on the Ford began to also make smoke. They had already fired off their port side torpedoes, hoping to hit the transports, but failing to do so. So now Cooper came about in an attempt to get his starboard tubes into play, and this brought him right across the bow of the Destroyer Oshio, and into heavy gunfire.
Destroyer Pope fired off five torpedoes, all missing wildly in that action, and Ford swung around behind her, still making smoke. In spite of that, the sea around them was erupting with shell splashes that were close enough to wet the decks on both destroyers, and they decided trying to turn back north to follow the Dutch cruisers as ordered would be most unwise. The Americans broke off, running south in the confused action that saw the Japanese opening fire on each other at one point, with the Captains of two of their four destroyers claiming kills that never happened. It was all too typical of night actions, and the high speed in those restricted waters led to the haphazard results.
With his train of supporting destroyers now out of the action, Doorman was alone with his two light cruisers, though help was not far off. This time the four American destroyers of the northern pincer led the way with orders to charge in and attack the Japanese anchorage. They made a brave torpedo run, confronted by a pair of bulldogs when Asashio and Oshio came around to challenge them. The Japanese gunfire was again very accurate, and the American torpedo strike a miserable failure. Of 21 torpedoes fired, fifteen would miss, four would fail to explode and two would be jammed in the launch tubes.
The US flotilla had the enemy outgunned with their combined sixteen 4-inch guns to only twelve 5-inchers on the two Japanese DDs, but simply could not get hits. In the meantime, the Japanese saw the thin illuminating beams of searchlights from one of the American ships, slowly fingering the darkness. This gave them a perfect target, and they quickly put two hits on the USS Stewart, damaging her engines and forcing Captain Harold Smith to break off and turn back to the northeast.
As the remaining US destroyers came about to follow, Parrott and Pillsbury nearly ran into one another, and that near miss also forced the Edwards to make a sharp turn to avoid a grand pileup. The whole mess lurched north, with the Japanese running parallel between those ships and the Dutch cruiser Tromp. Though they brought another six 5.9 inch guns into play, the Dutch could not get hits either, but the two Japanese destroyers had a field day.
Captain Jan Balthazar de Meester on the Tromp decided to make the same mistake the American destroyer Stewart had made, switching on her bright searchlight to try and find the enemy in the heavy darkness. As the flashing light searched about, it clearly revealed the position of the cruiser to the enemy, and both Japanese destroyers opened fire.
Asashio pummeled the bridge and conning tower of the Dutch cruiser, her guns firing rapidly, the shell casings careening off the forward deck. The experienced gunners would get no less than eleven hits in a brief, hot engagement that was going to put Tromp out of the action, and lay her up in Australia for months after for repairs. Thus far, these two intrepid Japanese destroyers had been attacked by three cruisers and seven Allied destroyers, and come off the better. Now the odds would shift even further in their favor when Arashio and Michishio came up to join the fray.