The USS Enterprise in the Solomons Campaign

[Art]

This will be a two parter.

It is important to know that even after Midway the Japanese had an advantage in the numbers of carriers and their aircraft.

I posted a series of threads on the WWII carrier war in the Pacific, yup, I'm real interested in that. There are some great contemporary videos of the "Big E" in action against Japanese aircraft at the battles of The Eastern Solomons and The Santa Cruz Islands. The Eastern Solomons film is especially dramatic.

The Eastern Solomons, Aug 24-25 1942, was part of a Japanese effort to re enforce their forces on Guadalcanal using conventional transports. As part of that effort Carrier Division 5 consisting of the two best carriers in the fleet, Shokaku and Zuikaku which had not made the trip to Midway provided cover augmented by the light carrier Ryujo. US Carriers in the area were the Enterprise and Saratoga. Ryujo was detached and directed to launch a strike in coordination with G4M Betty twin engine land based bombers, The Betties didn't make the trip due to bad weather and Ryujo's strike did no significant damage. However a strike from Saratoga sank Ryujo. During all this a Japanese scout located Saratoga and Enterprise and an immediate strike of 27 D3Y Val dive bombers escorted by 15 zeros were launched. They found Enterprise and due to effective screening by the Zeros and poor coordination of the Combat Air Patrol (CAP) by the the Americans the dive bombers began their runs unscathed. However American anti aircraft fire and maneuvering were very effective and all of the bombs from the first division missed. The second division was a different story. The first hit was by a 550 pound "Ordinary" semi armor piercing bomb that hit near the aft elevator (it landed just before the video starts) which penetrated three decks before exploding, killing 35 men, wounding 70 more and creating a breach in the hull below the waterline. The second was a 530 pound high explosive "Land Bomb" (these bombs were dropped to suppress anti aircraft fire) which landed near the aft starboard 5" 25 cal. anti aircraft battery, starting a furious fire and killing 35 men. The third was another "Land Bomb" that landed just aft of the island and blew a 10 foot hole in the flight deck but caused no casualties (no the photographer wasn't killed.) Near misses, the geyser of water from which cascades over the deck, buckled hull plates, punched splinter holes in the hull and caused some flooding.

For the Japanese the battle was a total failure, they lost a light carrier, 70 aircraft to all causes and the resupply effort was a total bust.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yfJ7rEjcaLY

[Art]

OK, here's part two, the battle of the Santa Cruz Islands.

The Japanese had determined to make a maximum effort to kick the Marines off Guadalcanal. In this effort the Japanese Combined Fleets mission was (1) to prevent US carrier aircraft from interfering with the Japanese land efforts and (2) to inflict as much damage on the American naval forces as possible. In what was the Japanese Navy's only clear cut win in a carrier engagement they accomplished both goals but at a cost that had long term repercussions in the war. The Japanese lost almost 150 carrier aircrewmen that simply could not be replaced. Added to the losses in previous carrier battles this meant that over half of the men who attacked Pearl Harbor were dead.

The Americans had 2 fleet carriers carrying 136 planes, one battleship, three heavy cruisers, three light cruisers and 12 destroyers. To oppose them the Japanese committed 4 fleet carriers, one light carrier, two battleships, four light cruisers, 8 heavy cruisers and 25 destroyers in three separate units. One of the Japanese fleet carriers had to turn back with electrical problems, but the Japanese strength was still overwhelming.

The carrier Hornet was heavily damaged by Japanese airstrikes and unsalvageable. She was later scuttled by Japanese surface Units. The Enterprise was hit by 2 530 pound high explosive "land bombs" and suffered from near misses that not only caused fresh damage but re opened seams that hat been shored up in repairs after the Battle of the Eastern Solomons. She was out of action for months leaving the US with only the Saratoga which was returning after repairs from a submarine torpedo attack. We wound up borrowing a carrier from the Brits for a few months. In exchange the fleet carrier Shokaku was heavily damaged (she was never a lucky ship) and the light carrier Zuiho was also hard hit. A heavy cruiser also suffered heavy damage and there was superficial damage to a destroyer.

There are three films from the Santa Cruz battle. These individually are not necessarily in chronological order.

This first one again shows the Enterprise in action against dive bombers. A bomb hit forward of the camera sends an SBD bouncing into the 20 mm guns on the starboard side. The battleship seen steaming at high speed near the end of the film is South Dakota

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BhlXaqS67GE

This second film starts with flight operations then shows Enterprise in action against torpedo bombers. She turns had to starboard to comb the torpedo tracks. At about 2:39 of the video a B5N "Kate" can be seen climbing away after having launched its torpedo.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x8n3wTIrx4Q

Finally we have Enterprise in action against dive bombers and torpedo planes. The plumes of smoke on the water in all the videos are from the carcases of downed Japanese aircraft.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3i9DyEBtAHA

[barretcreek]

While IJN had more carriers seems they had to defend a larger area whereas we could focus our attacks.

[Art]

While IJN had more carriers seems they had to defend a larger area whereas we could focus our attacks.

Santa Cruz was the last stand of the Japanese "A Team" Pilots. After that they were mostly assigned to land bases and were ground up in air battles in the South Pacific. Their advantage in numbers of carriers didn't last long either and it didn't help that our carriers carried more planes, in most cases a lot more planes. In June 1944 at The Battle of the Philippine Sea the US had 15 fast carriers (7 CV, 8 CVL) and 900 embarked aircraft to 9 (5 CV, 4 CVL) and 450 for the Japanese. By this time also our aircraft were generally better and our pilots were a lot better. After The Philippine Sea Japanese carrier based aviation ceased to exist as an effective entity. Asked about the quality of Japanese naval aviation as the war progressed Adm. Ozawa, the last commander of the Japanese fast carrier strike force, stated "the planes got better, the pilots got worse."

A p.s. - you are right about the pre Midway situation, the vast areas of the pacific made it much easier for the hit and run raids by the American carrier forces.

[dogtag]

Yeah, the Japanese sure did awaken a sleeping giant,
that was really pissed off.

Great synopsis Art.

[Allen]

Yeah, the Japanese sure did awaken a sleeping giant,
that was really pissed off.

And now we are back asleep while the rest of the world makes their plans against us.

[dogtag]

And now we are back asleep while the rest of the world makes their plans against us.

It's little wonder seeing as how our leader is sleepwalking us into God knows what.