Whirlwind - Barrett Tillman [102]
They rushed to accept.
The final campaign against the Imperial Navy began on July 18 when carrier squadrons swept over Yokosuka Naval Base. Just south of Tokyo, Yokosuka (pronounced Ya-kus-ka) harbored a small armada including the battleship Nagato.
Though hailed as the world’s first 16-inch-gun ship, Nagato’s twenty-four-year career had been unremarkable. Following bomb damage off the Philippines, she had been laid up at Yokosuka since November 1944. Nevertheless, Halsey considered her a prestige target: she had been Admiral Yamamoto’s flagship.
Recon photos showed Nagato moored pierside beneath one of the largest cranes in Japan, providing the Americans an excellent reference point. In a vain attempt to hide her bulk, the Japanese removed the top third of her mast and funnel to lower the silhouette, but not even bow-to-stern camouflage netting concealed her 42,000 tons. With her boilers idle she had a minesweeper alongside to provide power.
Nagato’s position in port, with nearby mountains, limited dive approaches, while the shallow harbor precluded torpedoes. Consequently, preliminary air strikes focused on beating down the defenses, estimated at 250 antiaircraft emplacements around the harbor.
The afternoon target coordinator was Essex’s Commander Harmon T. Utter. He directed his bombers onto the battlewagon while fighters strafed AA guns. Leading the Helldivers was Lieutenant Commander David R. Berry, a 1942 hero with three Navy Crosses.
Following the skipper, Ensign Ernest E. Hutto jinked his way through bursting flak, looking for the target. Ernie Hutto was a rare bird: he had dropped out of Annapolis, citing physical abuse, and applied for flight training. A year later he was flying missions over Japan.
Abruptly Berry dived, leaving Hutto with Lieutenant James T. Crawford and Lieutenant (jg) Larry Gordon. Lacking time to reduce throttle or extend his dive brakes, Hutto could only open his bomb bay before nosing over. He recalled, “I passed the other two planes in a blur.”
With only seconds to line up the target, at 2,500 feet Hutto placed his sight on the bridge and pressed the red button on the stick grip, releasing his half-ton bomb. Then he pulled hard. Under heavy g-force, his Helldiver’s nose came level with the horizon about 1,000 feet over the harbor. He asked his gunner, Radioman Jim Reynolds, “What did it look like?” Reynolds, groggy from the high-g pullout, had not seen the bomb strike.
Simultaneously, Crawford and other pilots dived from other directions, compounding the enemy gunners’ problems.
One bomb—likely Hutto’s—was precisely aimed, exploding on the bridge, wrecking the wheelhouse. It killed thirteen of the eighteen-man bridge crew, including retired Rear Admiral Miki Otsuka, who had been recalled to duty in 1939. Location of the hit was symbolic: it was where Yamamoto had issued the order for the Pearl Harbor operation.
Another heavy bomb, possibly Crawford’s, exploded against the base of Nagato’s number three turret, killing twenty-five AA gunners and destroying four 25mm mounts. In all, Essex aviators claimed six hits while losing two aircraft.
Amid a deluge of bombs and rockets, some were bound to fall wide of Nagato. One struck the minesweeper tied alongside, blowing it apart. Other strikes sank an aged cruiser (veteran of the 1905 war with Russia), an incomplete destroyer, a submarine, and five lesser vessels. In exchange, the Yokosuka attackers sustained five losses. At least twenty-one aircraft were lost in other missions. Especially hard hit was Bennington’s Air Group 1, which left seven planes at Kure Harbor, while Hancock wrote off four aircraft in a landing accident.
After the attack Nagato’s AA guns were removed for more profitable use elsewhere.