Chapter 18 first "coin"

In late September 1943, Caolu dispatched fast barges to transport the garrison troops from Kolombangara Island to Bougainville Island one by one under the cover of darkness. The U.S. military has long anticipated this move and has been on alert.Moosbrugger and his destroyers came and went, treating the Japanese transport fleet as a bunch of live targets.As of October 4, a total of 40 landing barges were sunk, accounting for about one-third of the Japanese barges. The gunboats and some light ships escorted by the Japanese army also became funeral objects. Since the U.S. Army failed to completely seal off Kolombangara Island, three-quarters of the more than 10,000 Japanese troops on the island were still able to evacuate safely. While defending La La Vera Island, the "Tokyo Express" had to be ordered to be restored.

On the evening of October 6, six Japanese destroyers sailed into the waters northwest of Vela Lavela Island.After receiving the report from the night plane, the four nearby US destroyers immediately intercepted it. Since the Weila Bay naval battle, the Japanese surface fleet generally did not dare to take the initiative to engage the US ships, but this time the Japanese ships have the upper hand, and they are ready to give it a go. I don’t know if it’s because the Weila Bay naval battle caused a psychological shadow on the Japanese ships. In the past, the extremely flexible Japanese ships were all restrained when fighting. Turning, blocking part of his own artillery fire.

The performance of the US destroyers in the battle was obviously more confident than before. They fired a total of 14 torpedoes. At the same time, they carried out heavy shelling on the nearest Japanese ship.The hapless Japanese ship was almost completely exposed to the fire of the American fleet, and was soon sunk due to heavy damage. The U.S. military, which was on the rise, also made mistakes.After they changed into battle formation, they should have made zigzag movements to prevent Japanese torpedo attacks, but in order to improve the shooting effect of naval guns, the ships still maintained their original course.After all, night battles are the housekeeping skills of the Japanese navy. If you slack off for a while, you will create opportunities for him. As a result, the bows of the two US ships were blown up by the "Lance" torpedoes. One could no longer be repaired and had to blew up and sunk by itself.

If there were no three U.S. destroyers to come to support and force the Japanese ships to withdraw from the battle, the U.S. naval battle would likely be staged a show that stumbled.Taking the opportunity of the American ship to salvage the crew, the Japanese ship took the opportunity to sail to Vela Lavela Island and quietly transported away the Japanese troops on the island. So far, the US military has completely occupied Kolombangara Island and Vela Lavela Island. They have four forward airfields on these two islands. The next attack target, Bougainville Island, has naturally entered the combat radius of the US aircraft. Inside.

While Halsey was slowly advancing in the Central Solomon Islands, MacArthur was doing another experiment with "leapfrog tactics" on the east coast of New Guinea. According to the "leapfrog tactic", on June 30, MacArthur took the lead in capturing Woodlark Island and Kiriwina Island off the east coast of New Guinea. It can allow troops in the Southwest Theater to gain experience in amphibious landing operations. Occupy the island and build an airport immediately.Two weeks after the U.S. Army landed on Woodlark Island, the first aircraft were accepted.Due to continuous rain and poor management, the construction of the airport on Kiriwina Island was delayed for a while, but it was put into use after more than a month.

On the same day, the 41st Division of the US Army stationed in Buna dispatched about 1,000 people. Under the cover of night, they rushed to the beach in torpedo boats and landing craft, and landed on an island called Nassau Island. Nassau Island is located between Buna and Saramoa, where the Japanese defense in New Guinea is relatively weak. There are only 150 Japanese soldiers on the island.Ten U.S. troops fought one, and after paying a small price for the death of 18 people, they quickly captured the island. Utilizing the airports on Woodlark and Kiriwina Island can effectively weaken the resistance and morale of the Japanese army. Occupying Nassau Bay can not only provide a forward base for short-range aircraft, but also pass through this ideal port to resupply the attacking troops. Taste.

The base areas for jumping to Lae and Salamoah have been established, and everything is ready, only the east wind is missing. Of the two goals, Lae and Salamoah, Lae is the most strategically important.It was the capital of New Guinea at that time. After the Japanese occupation, an airport, a port and a large number of warehouses were built, making it one of the main advance bases for the Japanese army to attack south.If it can be occupied, it can be used as an air base for attacking Rabaul and even the northern coast of New Guinea in the future. This is on the one hand. On the other hand, although the Japanese army deployed 10,000 defenders in the area from Lae to Salamoa, the main force was concentrated in Salamoa, and the defense of Lae was relatively weak.

MacArthur named the operation of clearing the Japanese strongholds one by one as "Operation Coin". After comprehensive evaluation, he decided to throw the first "coin" to Lae. Lae is a port city suitable for amphibious landings, but MacArthur's Southwest Navy does not have so many amphibious landing craft and escort cruisers and destroyers. At this time, the Pacific battlefield has been divided into three major theaters, namely MacArthur’s Southwest Pacific Theater, Halsey’s South Pacific Theater and Nimitz’s Central Pacific Theater. Very busy.MacArthur has already brought Halsey, and he can no longer touch Nimitz's cheese. Although Halsey is under MacArthur's command, the progress is extremely slow. If you take a little, there may be a fire stop there.

Unable to move, MacArthur had to be self-reliant and make ideas on the existing army and air force. In July 1943, Allied forces in Nassau Bay marched overland and pointed directly at Salamoa.At the same time, the Southwest Air Force commanded by Kenny was dispatched to carry out a cruise flight of "search barges" along the coast of New Guinea. All Japanese barges heading for Lae and Salamoa were blown up without discussion. Reinforcements could not be transported by sea, so Imamura could only transfer troops from Lae to reinforce Saramoa from the land south. In this way, there would be even fewer defenders in Lae.

Of course, all of this was what MacArthur expected. What he had to do was "to lure the enemy out of Lae and lure his troops and supplies to move south."While MacArthur tricked Rabaul's Imamura, he kept track of his opponent's movements through the "Caster" code-breaking team. Deciphering codes is still an indispensable and important means for MacArthur and Nimitz to command operations.After Yamamoto was shot and killed, the U.S. had been successfully concealing the fact that the Japanese army’s code had been deciphered. Halsey was ordered not to leak the inside story of the matter to the press. Therefore, the truth was not announced until after the war.

Of course, the Japanese are not fools. They listed this incident as a "Grade A incident" for investigation, and suspected that the code had been deciphered, so they deliberately sent a telegram that Cao Luren was about to inspect the front line.Who knows that Nimitz is more shrewd, he immediately saw through this little trick, and did not send any planes on the time and route mentioned in the telegram, but a US plane was ordered to do "routine patrol" over the place where Yamamoto was ambushed ", in order to give the opponent the illusion that Yamamoto's ambush was purely accidental. The Japanese army was really fooled. They really regarded Yamamoto's death as an accident. Apart from thanking their passwords for being absolutely safe and reliable, they blamed Yamamoto himself for being ill-fated and happened to meet the "routine patrol" of the American plane. So the password was used as it was, and "Caster" broke it.MacArthur took Imamura's secret telegrams as an important basis for decision-making, and specially called in two Japanese language experts to enhance "Caster"'s ability to decipher. On August 17, after several days of radio monitoring and analysis, "Caster" sent MacArthur an important piece of information.According to intelligence, when the U.S. military "attacked Salamoah", Imamura had transferred more than 200 aircraft to Wewak Air Force Base in order to provide more air protection for the defenders. Wewak was within the strike range of the Southwest Air Force, and MacArthur did not hesitate to order Kenny to carry out an air strike.The fighter planes that had already been prepared roared out like arrows leaving the string. They formed a huge formation in the air and rushed straight towards the Japanese base. The U.S. Fifth Air Force invented a "parachute bomb", which is a high-explosive bomb with an external parachute, which is carried by the modified B-25 and A-20.After the bomb is dropped at a low altitude, its delayed fuze can ensure that the aircraft has enough time to escape from the explosion range, and the fragments and air waves generated by the air explosion of the high-explosive bomb are enough to sweep away all people and objects on the airport. August 17 was the "bad day" for Japanese aircraft in New Guinea. In less than a day, all the aircraft parked at the Wewak base were destroyed, and Japan's air power in New Guinea was devastated.When the news came, MacArthur was very relieved, and he commented on his wonderful pen: "This is a well-timed blow, and there is nothing more powerless than a plane staying on the ground." MacArthur cannot forget that just ten hours after Pearl Harbor was attacked, Japan launched the "Clark Sneak Attack" and almost blew up his fighter planes at Clark Airport in the Philippines. Now it is finally time to settle accounts after autumn. The Japanese air force, which could have been short and long, had only six planes left to protect Lae, so planes could only be dispatched from Rabaul for long-distance air support.By seizing air supremacy over the New Guinea battlefield, MacArthur removed the biggest obstacle to capturing this port town.