The Pacific (55 page)

AUSTIN "SHIFTY" SHOFNER GRADUATED FROM THE USMC COMMAND AND STAFF School on June 14. During the previous months of training, he also had attended the public functions requested by his superiors. The corps meantime completed its calculation as to his back pay. It had sent him $4,531 in back pay, along with several pages of accounting. Shifty no doubt examined the dates and pay grades carefully. Through it all, he had received very high marks in his Officer Fitness Reports, particularly in the category of "Loyalty." The corps had seen fit to promote him to lieutenant colonel. Yet on the final fitness report, his marks in the areas of "attention to duty, cooperation, intelligence and judgment and common sense" had dropped into the average range. Worst of all, his commander had indicated that he did not "particularly desire to have him," nor would he be "glad to have him"; he would be "willing to have him" serve in his unit in combat. It was not a glowing report.

The report did not slow him down, though. On June 15, Lieutenant Colonel Shofner began his journey back to the Pacific. Halftime had ended.

INTERCEPTS OF JAPANESE COMMUNICATIONS DETAILED THE ENEMY'S INTENTIONS and these were passed on to Clark's task group. The enemy had sent a great number of airplanes to the airfield on Iwo Jima to form the basis of a strike on the Fifth Fleet off Saipan. Eliminating Japan's offensive military capability meant destroying those planes as well as the radar and communications installations at Chichi Jima. Word reached
Hornet
on June 14 that the enemy fleet carriers had been sighted. They were steaming toward the Marianas to stop the invasion. The pilots of Bombing Two worried they would miss a big carrier battle shaping up to the south. Admiral Clark apparently agreed, because Task Group 58.1 sped up. It was announced that the fighter sweep would launch a day earlier than scheduled. The weather turned bad on June 15, but the attack proceeded. The deck's catapult threw off the CAP and ASW patrols first. At one thirty p.m., about 135 miles from Iwo Jima, a fighter sweep took off to catch the enemy by surprise. A strike of twenty-two Helldivers, twelve torpedo planes, and seven fighters followed quickly. The heavy seas had the deck pitching and rolling, so each takeoff had to be timed so that the plane arrived at the bow at the same moment that the bow pointed upward. A wind of fourteen to eighteen knots helped.

Mike waited it out with the others in the ready room. The scouts returned, excited to have flown north of Chichi Jima and therefore very close to Japan itself--unlike their earlier strikes at the other enemy redoubts, like Truk,
Hornet
pilots were blazing the trail to Tokyo. The Hellcats' sweep had gone so well, it had created a rare phenomenon, the Ace-in-a-Day. Lieutenant Lloyd Barnard had five confirmed kills in the one action.
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The dive-bombers returned with tales of a difficult afternoon. The squall lines had intimidated Campbell, who had led his wing on a bizarre flight around and up and down as he flew around the worst parts of the storm. The flight to Chichi Jima had taken two hours. Once there, the AA guns had given them a hot reception. Diving through the cloud cover had thrown off their aim--they claimed a few hits on the seaplane base and on Omura Town, but the eight to ten ships moored in Futami Ko Harbor had been missed. One Helldiver, Dan Galvin's, had been shot down. The sortie returned to find a flight deck that looked like it was pitching thirty degrees in the waves.
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The skipper reported that "the fatigue occasioned by the flying at the extreme range of the plane through bad weather and over rough seas cannot be overstated."
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The next morning the gale still blew as the flattops steamed toward the targets. At about noon, Task Group 58.1 turned east and found some clear sky. Mike got his chance. He would lead Bombing Two's strike on Iwo Jima. While squadrons from the other flattops attacked the villages of Motoyama and Minami, and the other airfields under construction, he sortied for the main airfield, Motoyama Number One. In the squadron's room, word came that U.S. submarines had spotted the enemy's carrier fleet steaming through the Philippine Islands on their way to Saipan. The key carrier battle might happen without them. They also heard that the airplanes from the other carrier task group, Admiral Harrill's 58.4, would not participate in this mission because of foul weather.

Hornet
and her three accomplices put up seventy-six aircraft: Helldivers, Hellcats, and Avengers. Lieutenant Micheel led his strike in from the north, and as they got close, he gathered speed by descending from sixteen thousand to ten thousand feet. Visibility improved and he could see the small island with the volcano at its tip. Mike's mistrust of the Beast led him to wonder, as he peeled over in his dive and felt gravity pull him, what would happen if his dive brakes failed to open. The AA flak did not get bad until his plane passed through eight thousand feet.
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The strike leader took his team all the way down to two thousand feet before releasing their bombs. His thousand-pounder scored "a direct hit on a large enemy hangar" just off the southern end of the runway at Motoyama Number One.
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The wingmen scored confirmed hits on other parts of the airfield. The wolves noticed a lot of aircraft on the ground that had survived the air battle. Mike led his guys on some strafing runs. The 20mm cannon burned through targets like a buzz saw, but aiming it meant pointing the plane at the ground. Flying at two hundred knots below a thousand feet, Mike strafed by making quick little dips and triggering quicker little burps. Back in the ready room, the skipper praised their work. Word was the other task group, 58.4, had started south without them.

June 17 dawned with better flying weather. The early sortie comprised twenty planes flying a huge search sector of 150 degrees to 240 degrees, or "the area generally west of the Marianas," with the mission "to detect the approach of the suspected enemy fleet."
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Attacks on "the Jimas" had ended and everyone knew why. The Fifth Fleet, still stationed off the Marianas to protect the marine landing on Saipan, needed Task Group 58.1 to return for the battle with the approaching enemy fleet.

Admiral Clark had
Hornet
fuel up all of his escorts in preparation for battle before ordering full speed ahead. U.S. submarines had reported nine Imperial Japanese carriers, six battleships, thirteen cruisers, and twenty-seven destroyers churning toward Saipan, in the Marianas. Airfields in the Philippines held hundreds of more enemy aircraft. A carrier battle as big as all the others put together looked to be on the horizon. Later that day some pilots would have caught a whiff of "hot dope," or inside information. Admiral Clark had discussed the idea of steaming more west than south in order to place his task group and Harrill's 58.4 in a position behind the Imperial Navy.
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Yorktown
's captain endorsed the idea; Admiral Harrill rejected it and had continued to steam south toward the other carriers, well ahead of
Hornet, Yorktown
, and their comrades.

Apparently Clark decided not to take on the enemy's fleet of nine aircraft carriers on his own, because at ten thirty-two the next morning, Task Group 58.1 rejoined 58.2, 58.3, 58.4, and 58.7 on a line running just west of Saipan. The U.S. flattops carried a total of 950 planes, in the midst of six hundred ships and submarines. An armada such as the world had never seen, the Fifth Fleet eagerly awaited a showdown. The scouts flew search sectors of 350 miles to prevent surprises and to provide the United States the opportunity to launch the first sortie. The scouts returned empty-handed and the radar screens picked up only the occasional bogey. A submarine reported sinking an enemy flattop, so they were out there, somewhere. Admiral Jocko Clark and many of his naval aviators concluded the moment had come to steam west and find them. The Fifth Fleet, though, turned east at dusk, into the wind to catch their last scouts, away from the enemy, and much to the consternation of eager naval aviators.

The adrenaline of expectation started pumping early the next day. A few bogeys rose from airfields on Guam, less than a hundred miles away from the U.S. carriers. Their presence came as a surprise. Obviously they had come from the Philippines the previous day and they were heard to report the U.S. fleet's position. An early flight of navy fighters found lots of enemy planes on Guam and another eight Hellcats were dispatched at nine fifty-three a.m. A report of a "large group of bogeys at 250deg, 110 miles" was received at ten fifteen a.m. These had been launched from the enemy carriers. Hal Buell, set to lead a strike of fourteen dive bombers accompanied by twelve Hellcats and seven Avengers, got the order to "clear flight deck of aircraft and neutralize Guam airfields." With enemy inbound, the admiral wanted the deck ready for fighter operations. The deck crews had been so busy with Hellcats they had not completed arming Buell's planes. Most of them left without a bomb in their bay.

Out on the horizon, the screening ships fired black clouds of AA flak into the air at intervals throughout the day. The fighter strikes came and went hour after hour, with the first rumors of victory beginning to resound in passageways belowdecks.
Hornet'
s radar picked up the third wave of bogeys just before one p.m., when Buell's planes began returning. A cruiser off the carrier's port quarter cut loose with a barrage of flak. In the debriefing, Buell admitted that most of his planes had simply circled overhead. They had planted four bombs on the airfield of Agana, Guam's largest city.

The waves of enemy fighters had been handled easily by the Hellcats. Hundreds of Zeros, or "Zekes," "Vals," and "Kates" of the Imperial Japanese Navy had gone down in flames. Denying the few enemy survivors access to the airfields on Guam would drive another stake into the heart of the Japanese carrier fleet. Micheel walked out on the flight deck just after two p.m. to lead fourteen Helldivers against Guam.
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His Ouija Board held the details for the destruction of Orote airfield and his plane had been loaded with one thousand pounds of TNT. Being first to launch meant getting the shortest deck. The twenty-foot drop off the bow forced Mike to pucker until the ungainly Beast gained flying speed.

Twelve Hellcats and seven Avengers accompanied Mike's sortie. They flew through heavy clouds. The target lay a shade less than a hundred miles distant. The ships would steam east behind them, making Point Option, where they would meet back with their flattop, closer. He took them in from the south. The Japanese fired a thunderous chorus of AA guns. He flipped over into his dive and went down, watching the target become clear. On the end of the airfield a large phony airplane had been erected. He aimed for a large battery of AA guns and toggled the release higher than usual, at five thousand feet. Mike pulled out and swung around to watch. As strike leader he had to report. Six explosions ruined the runway and five others detonated near the batteries of big guns.

They returned about two hours later to find their carrier furiously moving aircraft. Mike and half of his striking force landed. They and their planes were hustled below. Another wave of bogeys had just appeared on
Hornet
's radar screen. The cruiser off their carrier's port quarter began firing AA guns. A wave of fighters landed. The ship's deck catapult threw a sortie of Hellcats off; then Buell led fourteen wolves aloft. In the ready room, more reports of a massive victory filtered in. The fighters were shooting down enemy planes by the hundreds, if the initial reports were to be believed. The remainder of Micheel's strike landed with bad news. One of his group was MIA. Another pilot reported that he had lost his rear seat gunner. AA fire had hit his plane and set it afire. He had ordered the gunner to jump out, which the airman, Arne Ulin, promptly did. It looked like Arne's parachute had come down at least two miles from the island and not far from the rescue sub. The pilot had decided he could fly his plane back and had done so.

The big day ended with the Hellcats of Clark's Task Group 58.1 accounting for one-fourth of the 402 "confirmed" kills for the entire task force.
^y
More fighter pilots became Aces-in-a-Day. The United States lost thirty-one aircraft, although some of the pilots had been rescued, and a few dozen sailors on those few ships the enemy had managed to reach. The Helldiver pilots must have felt some disappointment not to have had more of a role. They received good news: the task forces, led by 58.1, were going to churn westward all night long and hunt down the enemy flattops in the Philippine Sea. The fighters had had their turn; now the dive-bombers wanted to finish the job. At long last, the wolves would get a chance to fulfill the mission for which their dive-bombers had been created. They were heartily sick of bombing airfields.

The phone rang in each of the pilots' staterooms at four thirty a.m. When a pilot answered it, he would hear: " This is the Duty Officer. GQ in twenty minutes."
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He got dressed and climbed the ladder to Ready Room Four before the alarm sounded general quarters and all hands reported to their battle stations. Twenty minutes later, the catapults threw off eight fighters and four Helldivers--their bomb bays empty to increase their range--for a 325-mile search pattern covering sector 285 degrees to 325 degrees. Hours later Search One returned. No carriers had been sighted. Search Two took off after lunch. The presentation of medals to some of the Hellcat pilots, who had scored the great victory the day before, enlivened the long day's wait. At three forty-nine p.m.
Hornet
"received report of enemy fleet at Lat. 15deg 00' N, Long. 135deg 25' E, course 270deg, speed 20 knots."
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Moments later, Jocko ordered his air group to take off. A deckload of planes had been prepared: fifteen Hellcats, eight Avengers, and fourteen SB2C Helldivers. Commander Campbell, who had always led the first strike against new targets, led this one with Buell in charge of the second division. Working through their navigation, the wolves realized this mission required them to fly close to their maximum range and return at dusk or beyond. They talked a lot about how to conserve their fuel. Instead of circling the ship after takeoff, Campbell would fly the heading to the target at a minimum speed to allow his men to catch up. The first plane launched at four nineteen p.m.