Kirov III-Pacific Storm (Kirov Series) (7 page)

“I cannot say I disagree. But Admiral
Yamamoto…”

“Yes, Yamamoto. Always ready for a
decisive engagement yet ever the reluctant admiral when it comes to the real
necessities of strategic warfare.”

At this Nagano raised an eyebrow, and
Yamashita was quick to sweeten his remark. “I mean no disrespect, of course.”

“Of course… but you must be careful,
Yamashita. Tojo was not pleased to see you in the limelight after your Malaya
Campaign. He wanted to get rid of you and send you to useless garrison duty in
Manchukuo. It was Tojo who issued those travel orders to prevent your rightful
welcome as a hero in Japan, and it was he who prevented your audience with his
Imperial Highness.”

“I am well aware of
Tojo’s
opposition, both to these plans and to me
personally.”

“Then you must realize that you can
ill afford another enemy—particularly Yamamoto!”

“I understand…” Yamashita shook his
head, lamenting his long rivalry with Tojo ever since the fateful
Ni-
niroku
jiken
,
or 2-2-6
Incident as it was now called—the ‘deplorable incident in the capital’ that had
seen an attempted coup. His appeal for leniency for the officers involved was
not looked on kindly by the Emperor and, ever since, Yamashita had been skating
on thin ice. Yet his military prowess was undeniable, and compensated for his
failure in the more personal power squabbles involving army personnel.

“That said,” Yamashita moved on, “if
Yamamoto could be persuaded to use your current naval advantage with this
operation, I will deliver Darwin as the icing on the cake. I have the troops I
need now. Just give me two carriers to cover the invasion, and enough
transport, and I can take Darwin within a week. Please convey this to him,
Admiral. Only you have the standing and authority to make this argument in a
most convincing manner. I implore you. If we can convince Yamamoto, and the
Navy can stand fast, then the Army will give us enough troops for the limited
operations we propose. With two divisions, three at most, we could isolate
Australia and perhaps even knock them out of the war.”

“A worthy goal,” Nagano agreed.

“Yes! The Americans will see this as
surely as I do now, and they will fight. They tried to stop our Port Moresby
operation and lost a carrier for it. The
Lexington
is at the bottom of
the Coral Sea. Thankfully Shigeyoshi Inoue had the backbone to press the
invasion home in spite of the American counter operation. Now we have Port
Moresby, neh? Now the Americans are denied a base from which their B-17 bombers
would be pounding Rabaul. Soon we can also have Darwin and deny them that base
as well. The Americans will see the noose tightening around Australia, and
believe me, then Yamamoto will have his decisive engagement, I can assure you.”

Nagano breathed deeply, nodding his
assent. “I will present your proposal at the next meeting of the Imperial
General Staff. Captain
Tomioka
in the planning
division has also argued that we could take Australia with a token force. You
are not alone in your views.”

“
Tomioka
has
a good head on his shoulders. Remember the Army-Navy agreement earlier this
year which determined the strategic importance of Papua New Guinea and the
Solomons in the first place. We must deprive the Allies of key positions they
will most certainly use in their counter operations, and Australia is the
foundation of their whole defense in this region. This plan is merely an
extension of those same ideas. But do not say we will ‘take’ Australia. Argue
that we will secure vital bases to defend Indonesia while isolating Australia
at the same time and forcing the Americans to a decisive engagement here, where
we have adequate resources and land based air power to support our carrier
operations—not at Midway, a thousand miles east on an axis that leads us
nowhere. This whole operation can be done with two divisions. Throw in one
more, or even a few brigades for the Fiji-Samoa operation and we will have a
decisive advantage in the Pacific for years.”

“Very well, General. It is at least
encouraging that someone in the Army is willing to side with the Navy and see
the big picture. If the Tiger of Malaya says these things can be done, perhaps
others will be convinced as well.”

“Do not flatter me, Admiral. Just
support me.”

Nagano smiled. “Between the two of
us,” he said “we can hardly muster a single handful of hair, but our heads may
prove to be of some use to the empire after all.”

Chapter
5

Admiral
of the Fleet Isoroku Yamamoto sat in
his private cabin aboard the Battleship
Yamato
, and considered. His eyes
played over the map, thoughts moving from one island to another in the long chain
of the Solomons, imagining the position he would have three months from now,
six months, a year. And always as he considered, it was the establishment of
vital air bases that was uppermost in his mind. He had been a strong proponent
of the Naval Air Arm for decades, opposing the construction of large unwieldy
battleships like the one now serving as his headquarters—‘Hotel
Yamato
,’
the men called it, for the ship had done little in the way of real fighting
thus far in the war.

Now, as his eye strayed east to the
tiny islet of Midway, he still pictured the great ship leading a long line of
battleships, the heart of the fleet, but to what end? The carriers were tasked
with finding and destroying the enemy fleet, not his battleships. If he took
the big ships east what would they do beyond burning up enough fuel to run the
entire navy for the next three months? Did he really expect the Americans to
sortie with their battle fleet at Pearl Harbor? Those old battleships were
already obsolete, he knew. They could not find his fleet, nor could they catch
it if they did.

No… It was the carriers that would
decide this war. He had been wrong about Pearl Harbor and was inwardly glad the
operation had been deemed unnecessary. Was he wrong about Midway now? The more
he considered, the more Nagano’s arguments began to make sense to him. It was
the carriers, the carriers, the
carriers
. Every operation conceived by
the navy thus far had begun with the assignment of the vital carrier division
to be responsible as both a primary strike force and defensive covering force.
And where were the American carriers now? Were they east at Midway? Were they
in Pearl Harbor? Intelligence answered both these questions with a certain
negative.
No
. They were operating southeast of the Solomons, from Noumea
on New Caledonia and Suva Bay in the Fiji Islands. He wanted a decisive
engagement, but where would he find it, in the east against Midway and Pearl
Harbor, or right here in the Solomons?

He had three carrier divisions at his
disposal now—right here, right now. There were at least three enemy carriers
operating in these waters—right here, right now. To launch his Midway operation
he would have to take all these ships home to Kure and other bases in Japan to
refuel and rearm for the long sea voyage east. Yet he could launch this
operation “FS,” as it was now being called, from his present position, right
now. And Yamashita’s plan for Darwin was also correct, he knew, though he could
not condone any further attempt to occupy the vast Australian mainland. But
Darwin could be taken easily enough, particularly with Yamashita in command.

He sighed…What was he waiting for?
They called him the ‘Reluctant Admiral’ behind his back, though no man would
ever dare such disrespect to his face. In some ways it was true, he knew. He
had vigorously opposed the useless invasion and occupation of Manchuria, and
strongly argued against war with the United States. These were positions that
made him a very unpopular man, so unpopular at one time that he had been informed
of plots against his life. So the Navy sent him off to sea, away from the
mainland, and believed in his promise that if war ever did come, he would raise
hell…for six months…for a year he had told them, and then he could guarantee
nothing more.

Of course they did not wish to hear
that last bit. But thus far it was the American Navy that had been most
reluctant to engage him. When Pearl Harbor was wisely canceled, he thought the
attack on the Philippines would immediately trigger their War Plan Orange, and
was surprised to see that the Americans did not rush boldly in as so many
believed they would. Nimitz and Halsey had been crafty, and very elusive.
Instead they began to build a center of gravity in the southeast, on New
Caledonia, Fiji and Samoa. They had begun moving vast amounts of equipment and
supplies to Australia, and avoided major engagements until the recent
‘Operation MO’ had forced them to fight for Port Moresby. And now he realized
that this was the only way to bring them to battle—by threatening a key base of
operations that they dearly wanted to retain.

What did they prize now? Where were
they building strength? Midway was said to have no more than a single battalion
and a few old fighters and seaplanes in garrison. Yet at Noumea the enemy
strength was building day by day. What would he use that force for? The answer
was obvious: they would begin a drive northwest into the Solomons aimed at
eventually reaching Rabaul. From there they would be able to outflank our new
bastion at Port Moresby, and our positions at Buna and Lae in Papua New Guinea
as well. From Rabaul they would have a strong air base to strike this very
place where he sat in Hotel
Yamato
, pouring over his maps—the island of
Truk, Japan’s chief naval base in the Pacific.

The longer he considered it, the more
he saw the truth in Nagano’s words, and the wisdom in Yamashita’s plan as well.
Yamamoto was a gambler in his heart, and had once remarked that ‘people who
don’t gamble aren’t worth talking to.’ He had embraced his Midway operation for
its daring element of surprise, and the risk inherent in the operation was a
cherry he savored at the top. Yet even as initial preparations were being made
for the operation he knew he would get if he wanted it, joint staff planning
for ‘Operation FS’ continued as well. Imperial General Headquarters Army and
Navy Section orders, were already being formulated, and he had the initial
drafts in hand.... ‘
Carry out the invasions of New Caledonia and the Fiji
and Samoa Islands; destroy the main enemy bases in those areas, establish
operational bases at Suva and Noumea; gain control of the seas east of
Australia, and strive to cut communications between Australia and the United
States….’

Now he saw that the safer play, the
wiser play, was to push his chips out onto the Solomons, and beyond, as these
orders envisioned. His Midway operation would be nothing more than a grand
distraction and a waste of valuable fuel, and above all, a waste of precious
time. If he moved east he might find and destroy anything the Americans sortied
against him from Pearl Harbor. If he moved south—he would find and destroy
their carriers. It was now so obvious to him that he was amazed at his own
bull-headedness in not seeing it sooner. And so he decided, with a heavy sigh,
and let go of his dreams of landing on Midway and threatening Hawaii.

The enemy is right here, and I will
fight him here, he thought, as he pushed the map aside, reaching for the bell
to summon his personal attendant. It was time to write his letters, a ritual
that he kept to every night, and tonight he would spend time in his mind and
heart with his friends and family back home, and with his dear
Chiyiko
, the Geisha that waited for him in Tokyo.

I will give this to my Chief of
Operations tomorrow, he thought. Kuroshima will know what to do. Let him seal
himself in his quarters for a week in a fog of incense and cigarette smoke and
he will deliver a plan worthy of our efforts. In the meantime I will tell
Yamashita to get his men ready for Darwin, and the stubborn mules in the Army
can go to hell. I am Isoroku Yamamoto, Admiral of the Combined Fleet! What I
put my will to, and name to, will be done. But first…the plan….the operation.
It must be honed and sharpened like the finest sword, and balanced and timed
like the workings of a clock. Yes, the operation.

*
* *

Weeks
later Yamashita had what he wanted.
Nagano informed him that the Navy’s 5th carrier Division, would be dispatched
by Combined Fleet to support a limited operation to seize Darwin and deny the
Allies that vital base as part of an overall plan aimed at isolating Australia.
Reconnaissance as far south as Katherine would be permitted, but no further.
The Army had been pacified with assurances that no attempt would be made to
seriously occupy the continent, but they had been finally convinced that the
occupation of Darwin would both anchor the defensive line that stretched all
the way back to Singapore, and also provide a base from which Japanese bombers
could pound and neutralize most other enemy holdings in the Northern
Territories of Australia. Yamashita’s boast, that he could take Darwin with
troops he already had in hand, was called. There would be no further troop
assignments for the Darwin operation unless they came from the 18th Army on New
Guinea. But they reluctantly released the Nagoya 3rd Division,
Ko-heidan
,
the Lucky Division as it was
called. One of the oldest veteran formations in the Imperial Army, it had a
long record of achievement as far back as the first Sino and Russo-Japanese
wars, and it had served with distinction in Manchuria.