The last years of the naval battle in Guadalcanal.

The last years of the naval battle in Guadalcanal.

1943 65438+1At 20: 00 on October 4, after seven transport ships arrived in Guadao, three light cruisers "Nashville" (CL-43), "St. Louis" (CL-49), "Helena" (CL-50) and two destroyers "Frey"

This is the first time that the US Navy's surface naval forces have done this. The mission of this formation, commanded by Major General Ainsworth, is to shell the runway of the Japanese airport in Monda at night. Major General ainsworth made a careful plan for this mission: a PBY "Catalina" seaplane nicknamed "Black Cat" equipped with radar scouted in front of the formation; Other pbys are equipped with observers to indicate the targets of shelling ships; Seaplanes ejected from cruisers provide flank reconnaissance (to some extent, carrier-based seaplanes often catch fire on catapults after the first round of shelling, which makes it more valuable for them to take off and cover their flanks). The submarine "Grey Whale" (SS-208) plays the role of "navigation mark" in the unknown and dangerous waters around New Georgia Island.

From the night of1October 5 1: 02, three light cruisers and two destroyers of the US army poured about 4,000 rounds of 6-inch and 5-inch shells on the Japanese airstrip, and it took the Japanese army two hours to put the airport back into use in the morning. In the subsequent air counterattack, the Japanese plane found the shelling formation of the Ainsworth, which was meeting with other allied cruisers near Guadalcanal Island and was in a fragile state of recovering seaplanes. Japanese dive bombers launched a close attack on the light cruiser "Honolulu" (CL-48), which severely damaged the New Zealand light cruiser "Achilles" and blew up the third main turret of the ship.

Two Japanese warships were shot down in the battle, one of which was shot down by a 5-inch anti-aircraft gun with a new VT fuse, which was also the first enemy plane killed by a VT fuse. This kind of "variable time" fuse was developed in extreme secrecy. It uses a battery-powered radio transmitter. When the receiving device on the shell detects the echo, and the echo intensity is large enough (at this time, the drone is within the effective killing range of the shell), the shell will be detonated. This innovation has greatly improved the air defense operational effectiveness of the US Navy's 5-inch advanced dual-purpose gun.

65438+1October 1 1, eight Japanese destroyers once again launched the "Tokyo Express" replenishment operation. This time, they successfully avoided the attention of the allied coastal observation posts, so they did not encounter the "routine" attack launched by the US military aircraft on Guadalcanal at dusk. That night, nine American torpedo boats engaged with Japanese destroyers near Guadalcanal.

When the PT-43 boat was preparing to launch a torpedo, a torpedo tube on the boat suddenly broke, and the ignited gunpowder flashed, which immediately attracted the Japanese fire. Three people were killed on board, and the torpedo boat was also hit hard by the Japanese army.

The next day, the PT-43 boat was forced to be sunk by a New Zealand frigate to prevent it from drifting to the Japanese-controlled area.

PT-40 and PT- 1 12 both launched torpedoes, and both claimed to have hit the destroyer "Chufeng". (Actually, the ship was hit by a torpedo), but later the Japanese counterattacked and sank the PT- 1 12 boat (the crew did not lose). The injured destroyer Chufeng fled to safe waters, but only about 250 supply barrels reached the shore in this operation. 65438+ 10 14, the Japanese army launched another "Tokyo Express" replenishment operation. The bad weather of the day provided excellent cover for the Japanese army, and the Japanese seaplane responsible for air cover near Guadao also repelled the American torpedo boats.

However, at dawn the next day, the American plane taking off from Guadalcanal caught up with nine Japanese destroyers on its way back, injured two destroyers and shot down several American planes. In this air raid, the US military dispatched the B- 17 bomber. Although the accuracy of high-altitude horizontal bombing is almost ineffective for destroyers, their fierce self-defense weapon fire shot down five Japanese seaplanes trying to protect destroyers (the Japanese always dispatched 10 seaplanes that day).

654381October 20th, a Japanese H8K II boat in western Sichuan attacked St. Espiritu Island far behind the allied front. The attack coincided with the arrival of a group of people, including Navy Ministers Frank Knox and Nimitz, on St. Espiritu Island.

The next day, on the evening of June+10/October 2 1 June 65438, Frank Knox and Nimitz and his party were attacked by land for 9 times. There is no evidence that the Japanese intelligence department knew the itinerary of this senior US military team in advance, but these two attacks did greatly improve some habits and practices of the US Navy in communication security.

In the last ten days of 65438+ year 10, the US military radio intelligence department monitored the flight-related information from Kelon Bangala, and the subsequent aerial reconnaissance found an airport under construction and a supply ship assembling anchorage.

Halsey instructed Major General ainsworth to shell the new airport, which required warships to pass through New Georgia Island at night and enter the enclosed Kula Bay.

On October 23rd, 65438 10, American planes bombed Monda Airport to distract the Japanese, but in the afternoon, the Japanese reconnaissance plane found the formation of Major General ainsworth. Therefore, Major General ainsworth immediately ordered a change of course, pretending that he would bomb Monda again. There is no doubt that the Japanese were fooled and sent out the "surprise" that had been prepared for the US military for a long time: the elite 70th1and 705th Air Corps of the Navy, both of which were equipped with land attacks and explored effective tactics for torpedo attacks in the air at night. When the Japanese army found nothing near Monda, they felt very depressed.

Just as the Japanese turned a blind eye to everything, under the cover of darkness, the formation of American cruisers under the command of Major General ainsworth resumed its voyage to Kula Bay. With the support of PBY Black Cat, light cruisers Nashville and Helena, as well as destroyers Nicholas (DD-449), Dehaven (DD-469), Radford (DD-446) and o'bannon (DD

In this shelling, the US military only fired about 3,500 6-inch and 5-inch shells, which caused much more damage than the previous shelling of Monda Airport. In addition, when the Japanese army began to repair the airport at dawn, 59 planes of the "Saratoga" carrier-based flight brigade (these planes took off from Guadalcanal Airport) attacked the airport again, which caught the Japanese army off guard.

65438+1On October 25th, the Japanese navy launched its first large-scale daytime air raid on Guadao since June 1942+065438+ 10. In this air raid, the Japanese army used land-based aircraft including 18, and was escorted by 76 zero fighters (including 18 zero fighters).

In fact, the first land attack was just a bait thrown by the Japanese army. They turned around and left before 53 Zero Fighters broke into Guadalcanal for sweeping operations. Only the 14 fighter successfully took off. Surprisingly, the U.S. military did not lose a plane in the air raid that day, probably because the bad weather disrupted the Japanese plan.

The next day, 65438+1October 26th, it was the turn of the Japanese army to play (this was the first time that the Japanese army launched an air raid in the south of Solomon Islands alone), and nine 99-99 double-glow cannons (Kawasaki Ki-48, nicknamed "Lily" by the allied forces) and at least 74 I-type fighters of the Sixth Flight Division were detected by two hundred-type divisions (Mitsubishi Ki-46). In the fierce battle that broke out in the air on Guadalcanal Island, the Japanese army shot down seven American planes and lost six World War I planes. As for the third large-scale air raid, it was originally scheduled for 65438+129 October, but it was later postponed.

On the night of October 29th, 65438/KLOC-0, the Royal New Zealand Navy corvettes "Kiwi Bird" and "Fear Bird" anchored in the designated sea area, waiting for the appearance of Japanese submarines.

According to the detailed information obtained by the allied forces from the intercepted radio communication, this Japanese submarine will surface in the waters near Guadalcanal Island at 2 1 pm on the 29th. At 2 1: 05, the sonar of kiwi detected the echo of submarine I-1. While the latter was on the periscope, the kiwi launched a deep-water bomb very close to the Japanese submarine.

Then, "Kiwi" rushed to the submarine "I-1" and slammed into it. It also opened fire on the ship with machine guns, and the Japanese captain was killed on the spot. The supply barge carried on the back deck of the submarine also began to catch fire, and the Japanese personnel on board dived to escape. The gunner of "I-1" fired two shells with the deck gun on the submarine before being knocked down by the kiwi's machine gun. Facing the Japanese artillery fire, kiwi first got off the bus, then crashed into I-1 again, followed by the third impact, forcing the Japanese submarine to dive underwater, even though many crew members on the deck were shooting at kiwi with rifles.

A Japanese officer (Captain Fumei Sakai, the chief sailor of the "I-1") holding a mountain city even tried to jump on the deck of the kiwi, but only grabbed a railing on the side of the kiwi's hull (Note: It is reported that Captain Fumei Sakai was captured in this battle, but in fact he was rescued with other crew members and later served as ".

At this point in the battle, the "fear bird" didn't fire a shot, because the face-to-face close combat between the "kiwi" and "I-1" lasted for 90 minutes, and the "fear bird" was worried about accidentally injuring its own people. Subsequently, "I-1" tried to run aground and sank in the shallow reef area. Survivors on board desperately destroyed and buried confidential information, but only took the new password book because they were busy running for their lives.

Later, Japanese planes tried to sink "I-1" into deeper water, but failed. It is said that American navy divers later found about 200,000 pages of secret documents and password information in "I-1", which seems to be wrong because it cannot be confirmed in American archives.

Rao,1June, 943, an Australian journalist exposed this action to the world, and the Japanese side also confirmed that the US military seized a large number of sensitive materials.