Fortress Rabaul (40 page)

Although the exact cause of the disaster was never determined, a widely supported theory suggests that it began when a fuel dump in the eastern part of Rabaul caught fire. Accumulated spillage that had seeped into the drainage ditches subsequently flared up, sending a river of flames toward the waterfront. The expanding fire touched off the ammunition stockpile, and the mayhem began. In this instance, heavy explosions rocked the township for the next twelve hours. At daybreak, while touring the scene of devastation at the waterfront, Ugaki vowed to punish the people who should have safeguarded the munitions.

IN AUSTRALIA, meanwhile, General Kenney had come to the conclusion that high-altitude bombardment, at least in its present form, was not working in the Southwest Pacific. There simply weren’t enough bombers available to effectively blanket any given target. He was especially disappointed with the results of anti-shipping strikes and gave more consideration to low-level attack methods. Recently, Douglas A-20s of the 3rd Bomb Group had used parafrag bombs against the airdrome at Buna
with excellent effect, but blowing up parked planes was much easier than hitting a moving ship. Furthermore, it took a heavy bomb to cause significant damage to a warship. Convinced that the answer lay in skip-bombing, Kenney released Major Benn from duties as his aide and sent him to Torrens Creek, a new airfield in Queensland, where a squadron of B-17s fresh from the States had recently settled.

Kenney planned to activate the 43rd Bombardment Group (Heavy), whose ground personnel had arrived in March aboard HMS
Queen Mary
. The group lacked aircraft and flight crews until mid-August, when a dozen B-17Fs landed at Torrens Creek. Pulled from submarine patrol duties in the Panama Canal Zone, the crews had picked up new bombers in California and were assigned to the 63rd Bomb Squadron, temporarily attached to the 19th Bomb Group for combat training. They were still serving that function when Benn reported to Torrens Creek in late August.

Lieutenant Roger E. Vargas, a navigator in the squadron, recalled his first meeting with Kenney’s erstwhile aide. “
I happened to be the officer-of-the-day
when Major Benn arrived at Torrens Creek. He came in and asked me where I was from. I told him we had come from Panama, and mentioned to him that we had new B-17s and well-trained crews but we were not being used properly. He said, ‘I’m going to be taking over your squadron, and we’ll be doing things differently.’”

Just how differently was soon revealed, as Benn began to train his crews in the art of skip-bombing. He had tried it in a B-26 at Fiji, but taking the huge, four-engine B-17 down to mast height was a radical departure from anything the men had tried before. “
He talked us into all kinds of things
,” remembered one pilot. “After Benn got there, we never flew above seven or eight thousand feet except to get over the Owen Stanley Mountains. He really had a lot of different tactics to hit shipping.”

Benn had inherited a squadron of eager crews. His star pupil was Capt. Kenneth D. McCullar, a hotshot pilot from Courtland, Mississippi, who possessed in spades the qualities writer Tom Wolfe would later call the “right stuff.” The aggressive McCullar was handsome, marvelously skilled at flying, and popular with his men. He also loved gambling, to the point that when he picked out his new B-17 in California, he selected one based on the last two digits of its serial number—21. Naturally he named it
Black Jack
.

THREE WEEKS AFTER Benn took over the 63rd Bomb Squadron, General Kenney arranged to watch a demonstration of skip-bombing at Port Moresby. Benn had worked out the physics, and the crews practiced with inert bombs on the SS
Pruth
, a British merchantman that had run aground on a reef almost twenty years earlier. Much of the ship’s superstructure was gone, salvaged for scrap, but the rusting hulk provided an excellent target. Partially awash yet impossible to sink, it withstood repeated hits while the crews perfected their techniques.

On this occasion, Kenney watched as McCullar brought his Fortress down to just two hundred feet above the wave tops. A single bomb dropped from the belly of the B-17, skipped off the water “like a stone,” and smacked into the side of the ship. Kenney was thoroughly impressed as McCullar made nine more runs against the
Pruth
, tallying a total of six hits.

Despite the success of the static demonstration, Kenney realized that Benn’s squadron was not quite ready to attempt low-level attacks against the Japanese. In the meantime, he shared ideas with Ken Walker on how to improve the results of anti-shipping strikes. It was all too apparent that the odds of hitting a moving vessel from high altitude were practically zero. The Japanese ship-handlers merely had to observe the bombs as they tumbled from the aircraft and then turn out of the way. Even the near misses seemed to have little effect on the enemy. Kenney believed the problem was the result of using delayed-action fuses. With a delay of as little as 1/10 second, the bomb plunged too deep to be effective. An instantaneous fuse detonated the bomb on impact with the water, sending shards of steel in every direction. Kenney was certain “that an instantaneous explosion near a vessel, up to perhaps fifty yards away, would push fragments into it, killing Japs, cutting steam and fuel lines and maybe setting fires.” Walker did not agree with the idea, but Kenney ordered him to “try it for a while” so that they could gauge the results.

Walker’s objection underscored a widening chasm between the two generals. Both men worked tirelessly to defeat the Japanese, but they differed personally as well as professionally. Walker had all the attributes of an officer and a gentleman. Above average in height, athletically built, he dressed with style, entertained with flair, and was an accomplished dancer. Not surprisingly, women found him attractive. He was twice divorced, with two sons from the first marriage and one from the second. Kenney,
in contrast, was a head shorter than Walker and more of a bulldog, both in appearance and personality. He was also a combat veteran of World War I, unlike Walker, who was considered something of an outsider because he had neither attended West Point nor flown in France. Those who had were cliquish. The army’s upper establishment was the domain of West Pointers, so Walker pushed himself, working harder and longer than his peers. And, like many compulsive workers, he became moody and impatient when conditions were stressful.

But there was also a positive element to Walker’s situation, for he could empathize with the frustrations of the lower ranks. In many ways he became their champion. Ordered to Port Moresby to run the Advanced Echelon for a few weeks, both to gain experience and give Whitehead a rest, Walker made a point of improving the men’s living conditions. Personable with the troops, he dressed down by wearing an open-neck khaki uniform, frequently typed his own reports, and habitually waited with the men in long chow lines. Such actions were beneficial for morale, but what truly made a difference was Walker’s habit of accompanying crews on combat missions. He averaged almost a mission per week, including several over Rabaul, and was recognized for his efforts with the receipt of a Silver Star in August. The citation read, in part: “The large amount of first-hand information gained by General Walker has proved of inestimable value.”

IN LATE SEPTEMBER, as the dual battles for control of New Guinea and Guadalcanal raged eight hundred miles apart, a meeting of Allied commanders was arranged at Noumea, near the southern tip of New Caledonia. Kenney flew from Brisbane accompanied by Richard Sutherland, who represented MacArthur for the high-level conference. Ghormley and Nimitz were also in attendance, while the army contingent numbered half a dozen generals including Hap Arnold. The agenda focused on the continuing crisis on Guadalcanal, which meant that Kenney would be asked again to help. “The Navy wanted me to make mass raids on Rabaul airdromes and shipping as a primary mission,” he later confirmed. Kenney agreed to “try to burn the place down,” but he also reminded the attendees that his air units were already stretched thin while “knocking off Jap convoys to Buna, maintaining air control over New Guinea, and helping out our ground forces.”

The enemy advance on the Kokoda Trail had been halted by Australian infantry, and the half-starved Japanese were in full retreat back toward Buna. But the high command was not giving up. Convoy after convoy departed from Rabaul with reinforcements, and most reached Buna unscathed thanks to a seasonal pattern of heavy storms over the Coral Sea. The lousy weather not only protected the convoys en route to New Guinea, it gave the Japanese an opportunity to increase the tempo and volume of shipping in Simpson Harbor.

This was a matter of necessity. The Japanese were being beaten on Guadalcanal as well as on New Guinea, and the surviving forces desperately needed reinforcements and supplies. Thus, in addition to the convoys sent to Buna, heavily armed cruisers and destroyers were dispatched almost daily to Guadalcanal. They sped down the natural passage through the Solomon Islands known to Americans as “the Slot,” timing their arrival at Guadalcanal for soon after nightfall. The warships would unload “
rice, bullets, and soldiers
” and then shell the marine positions before heading back to Rabaul. The nocturnal actions were so regular that an American correspondent referred to the convoys collectively as the “Tokyo Express.” Although a misnomer, the nickname caught on.

Elsewhere, the Japanese retreat from the Owen Stanley Mountains was good news for V Bomber Command. For the first time since the Pacific war began, Port Moresby was deemed safe enough to house B-17s full time. Most squadrons remained in Australia with their maintenance units, but a handful of Fortresses from 30th Bomb Squadron moved up to Fourteen Mile airdrome for temporary duty. The new field was dusty, primitive, and plagued with mosquitoes, and the living conditions were terrible, especially the food. Nevertheless the physical demands on aircraft and crews alike were greatly reduced thanks to the shorter duration of the missions. After just a few weeks, the contingent from the 30th was relieved by the 63rd Bomb Squadron. Major Benn thought his crews were nearly ready to try skip-bombing in Simpson Harbor, but the squadron had been experiencing chronic trouble with its delayed-action fuses. When the next mission was scheduled, Benn tried a different tactic.

Six Fortresses took off from Port Moresby in the wee hours October 2 and reached Rabaul before sunrise. Throttling back to reduce noise, they descended to 2,500 feet or less, then separated and went after individual targets. There were plenty of vessels to choose from. Lieutenant James T.
Murphy, flying a B-17F named
Pluto
(naturally with a depiction of the Walt Disney pooch adorning the nose), aimed for what he later described as “the biggest ship I had ever seen.” After a twenty-second attack run, during which Japanese antiaircraft fire became intense, the bombardier released four 1,000-pounders. “The bombs went exactly as we’d hoped—one hit the ship directly, with the other three very close to it,” Murphy wrote. “Major fires broke out all over the ship.”

Three other pilots attacked shipping with similar results, according to Murphy. Captain Folmer J. Sogaard hit a “destroyer,” while Ken McCullar and Capt. Byron L. Heichel each hit smaller merchant vessels. “The results were fantastic,” Murphy later wrote. “At 2,000 feet, we just couldn’t miss! Four ships were sunk that night.” Murphy’s enthusiasm evidently got the better of him, for the 43rd Bomb Group’s official history states only that two merchant ships were set afire and a direct hit was scored on a destroyer, and stops short of claiming any vessels as sunk. Furthermore, the exhaustive postwar analysis conducted by the Joint Army-Navy Assessment Committee (JANAC) revealed that no damage was sustained by any noncombatant ships on October 2. But the Fortresses did achieve something. The old cruiser
Tenryu
, launched in 1918, was hit by a bomb and suffered thirty dead.

Three days after the anti-shipping strike, elements of the weary 19th Bomb Group were back over the airdromes at Rabaul. Six Fortresses of the 30th Bomb Squadron took off from Port Moresby on the afternoon of October 5 to hit Vunakanau, and the 28th Bomb Squadron sent eight B-17s to attack Lakunai. Despite the promising number, only three of the latter group actually reached Rabaul due to poor weather. The target area was obscured by clouds, and results of the attack were not observed.

South of Rabaul, the Fortresses of the 30th Bomb Squadron fared even worse. Finding Vunakanau obscured by clouds, the B-17s made one orbit to set up a second bomb run and were jumped by more than two dozen Zeros. The Japanese pilots, among the most aggressive yet encountered, made repeated and well-coordinated attacks against the front of the formation, where the B-17s’ defensive fire was weakest. After fighting off the first wave of fighters, the Fortresses released their bombs over Vunakanau and were turning southward when a second wave of Zeros hit them. Bullets and cannon shells pierced several bombers. The B-17 flown by Lt. Earl L. Hageman had its right inboard engine knocked out, then
lost the left inboard engine when the next wave of Zeros struck. Diving from the formation, Hageman was last seen headed for some clouds with eleven Zeros in pursuit. Neither he nor his eight crewmen were ever heard from again.

The other five B-17s “took a beating,” with several casualties among the crews. The worst case was Plt. Off. Allan J. Davenport, a twenty-two-year-old RAAF navigator whose leg was nearly severed, evidently by a 20mm shell. Unfortunately the crew got lost for hours in the awful weather, and soon after they landed at Port Moresby, Davenport died.

In Brisbane, Kenney “got his dander up” after hearing about the mission. Not only had the effort been costly in exchange for minor damage to the enemy, there were reliable reports that Ken Walker had been aboard one of the B-17s. “I can always hire a 10 dollar a week man to sweep the floors,” Kenney chastised. “No more combat missions.”

The following day, MacArthur called Kenney into his office to discuss another big effort against Rabaul, again in support of Guadalcanal operations. Kenney later recalled: “I had already planned to do something about that place. For the past couple of weeks the Japs had been unloading supplies and troops there. They might be building up for a reinforcement of their forces in the Solomons or maybe around Buna. The shipping had not been a good target, as the Jap vessels had been coming in just before dark, unloading at night, and leaving before daybreak. The airdromes in the Rabaul area were well beaten up and the Jap air strength was low.”