Sea of Fire

Chapter 34

The Japanese situation on Fiji was much more serious than even Yamamoto knew. The 1st USMC Division had moved aggressively north against the Sakaguchi Detachment. That was bringing three full combat ready regiments against one, even though Sakaguchi could rightfully say he was commanding a relatively strong brigade. He had an engineer battalion attached to his three battalion regiment, and there were also two battalions of SNLF Naval Marines under his command.

The Japanese were not entirely aware of the full strength of their enemy, or that Vandegrift’s division now had four full regiments, the 1st, 5th, 7th and 11th Marines, (the latter being artillery). Two more were in theater at Pago Pago from the 2nd Marine Division. This force was more than a match for Sakaguchi, and the sharp meeting engagement at the edge of the heavy jungle soon checked his advance, and then pushed him into a stubborn withdrawal.

It was lack of adequate supply that was hindering his operation more than anything. He had sent the three infantry battalions and one SNLF battalion off lightly supplied, intending to quickly storm into Suva from the north. Now he had been stopped cold and pushed back, and his men were tired and hungry, with many companies almost completely out of ammunition. The Japanese had no choice but to continue their retreat in that sector, and by the 8th of May, the US Marines had pushed to within 15 kilometers of the small port of Tavua and the airfield about five klicks inland.

Further south, the Abe Detachment, and Kimura’s Recon Regiment had better luck. They doggedly pursued the withdrawal of the New Zealand troops, pushing them off a temporary holding action along the Singatana River leading down to Nayawa on the coast. Weary after the long march from Nandi, the Kiwis needed rest, supplies and fresh ammo of their own. General Patch therefore sent first the 164th Regiment of his Pacifica Division, and then the 182nd, both marching along the Queens Road that followed the coast.

By the time they stabilized the line, and relieved all the Kiwis, the Japanese had nearly overrun the makeshift airstrip at Korolevu. With both regiments finally formed up, and with the full division artillery behind them, Patch was confident he could hold the line.

The situation the Japanese soon found themselves in was now far from satisfactory. Abe and Kimura had been stopped, Sakaguchi pushed back, and the long awaited reinforcements in the Tanaka Regiment were still far to the east near Noumea where they had been held in place pending the outcome of the naval battle. Now that the Kido Butai was withdrawing, the only Navy presence would be the flock of planes and pilots that had come fluttering in to Nandi and Tavua fields, unable to land again on their carriers, which was somewhat ominous in itself.

General Tsuchihashi of the 48th Division had adequate supply near the two landing sites, but little or no transport. It was only after he received the report that Sakaguchi had failed to make the sweeping maneuver against Suva, that he now contemplated his situation in a darker light. Somehow, the enemy had achieved parity, he thought.

There may have been more enemy troops here than we believed, and now the navy is withdrawing. Those planes and pilots that landed here will most likely not remain long as well, for the Admirals will want their pilots of the Misty Lagoon back directly. Thus far, 4th Air Fleet has sent nothing but bombers to Noumea, but no land based fighters. The range was so far from there that any practical use of those planes was prohibited until the runways could be expanded on Fiji to accommodate them. It appears that we are in for a bit of a siege here. Under the circumstances, I must suspend further offensive action until Tanaka arrives… if he arrives at all.

Thus far we have swept all before us, except for that brief delay on Singapore, most likely due to Nishimura’s foolishness. My division bested the Americans in the Philippines easily enough, and the Dutch were no match for us. Yet I really have no more than half my division here, and Sakaguchi’s troops were not as good as my men. So we wait for Tanaka, and hopefully it will not be necessary to request further reinforcements.

If wishes were horses… It was going to be necessary, and sooner than the general believed, for a new war had begun there on that island. In Fedorov’s history it began somewhere else, in the fetid, humid jungles of Guadalcanal. This time it was Viti Levu, though as the naval battle was being fought, engineers and elements of the 3rd SNLF had also landed at Lunga on the island of Guadalcanal. They were surveying the ground along the north coast for good airfield sites, and the place looked very promising. Whether the long, grueling struggle there would ever repeat itself remained to be seen. For the moment the center of the gyre was Fiji, where both sides were now arm wrestling to gain the advantage.

On the American side of the equation, both Patch and Vandegrift thought they could win this one. Their enemy would be stalwart and it would be a difficult battle, but they believed they had the sheer mass to do the job. If the two divisions they already had on Viti Levu were not enough, the entire 37th Division was on the big adjacent island of Vanua Levu, and there were two more in Australia the 32nd and 41st, much closer to Fiji than any reinforcements the enemy could call upon.

While Halsey had held off the powerful Japanese Navy, he was now under strict orders not to engage with the last two carriers the US possessed. He wouldn’t have to. Yamamoto was gone, and he had free reign in the Fijis now, and a good base at Pago Pago that had been receiving plenty of fuel via tankers. There was no way the enemy could pull a Pearl Harbor, for Allied air units in the Fijis would surely spot any attempt to attack Samoa.

For now, the fighting Admiral would find he had 123 operational planes between Enterprise, Wasp and Shiloh. The Antietam would be repaired this week, and add another 20 more, so the raw naval aviation available to either side in the theater was a dead wash. The US was getting in more ground aviation support, a couple Seabee Battalions to work on putting more airfields into use, particularly on the adjacent island of Vanua Levu.

Unless strongly supported by carriers, Halsey believed that he could prevent any strong reinforcement of the Fiji position by the Japanese. But developments further up the chain of islands leading all the way back to Rabaul were somewhat foreboding. The Japanese now had a magnificent anchorage at Tulagi, and had landed on Guadalcanal. They had Espiritu Santo in the Santa Cruz Islands linking the Solomons to the New Hebrides, and were masters of the Solomon Sea. They had airfields building up at Lae, Port Moresby, Buka and a seaplane base in the Shortlands.

While none of these bases were really well established yet, they would be developed over time. Halsey proposed that he return to the fast raiding style that had seen him open this campaign in the Gilberts. He sent a message to Nimitz asking for permission to raid the New Hebrides, and all these other bases once he could rest assured there was no additional ground force being aimed at Fiji. Nimitz gave him that leeway, but stressed that he was not to engage in any situation where he might now find himself facing significant enemy naval air power.

Weakened by the heavy losses to their carriers in the Coral and Koro Seas, where Halsey had fought that last desperate battle, the US could not really consider any further offensive moves against other Japanese held territory until they received more carriers. Unfortunately, only one might be expected soon, the first in a series of twelve Essex class carriers that were now building. Halsey knew that his enemy had further resources in their Home Islands, and still had a much stronger carrier fleet. It had taken the loss of three fleet carriers to blunt the Japanese attack into Fiji, and unhinge Operation FS. Their lance pierced the US shield before it broke, and the enemy was well established in the Fiji Group. The only question now was whether they would return soon with reinforcements, or whether the small advantages the US now possessed based on position, logistics, and their “ground game” would win through for them.

Nimitz was very worried now, and afraid that one more big loss in the South Pacific could set back the US war effort there for a full year. “It would take us that long to build up our strength again,” he said to Admiral King. “Particularly in the carrier arm of the fleet. Oh, Halsey fought well down there, but we just can’t let him put either Enterprise or Wasp at risk now. I’m calling him home to Pearl.”

“What for? Just because he’s a fighter? We need men like that down there.”

“True, but Halsey is exhausted. He’s carried our entire war on his back, fought the Japs hard, but the man needs rest. That skin condition that’s been bothering him is now much worse. I’m ordering him hospitalized.”

“Who’s taking over? You aren’t going to hand those last to flattops back to Fletcher, are you?”

“Ray Spruance.”

“Well hell, he’s another Black Shoe Admiral. Wasn’t he on the Mississippi?”

“And he did a fine job there. He’s on the Northampton, and I’m flagging him for the duty today. Halsey is flying out to Canton Island and taking a destroyer to Pearl. Spruance can hold things together until he gets back.”

“Fletcher won’t like it.”

“He had his chance in the Coral Sea and we lost two good ships there. So Fletcher stays with that battleship squadron.”

And that was that. Nimitz knew Halsey was as good as they came, but not in this situation, not with him weary, hurting, stung by the loss of so many good ships and men, and down with medical problems. Like the ships he fought, he needed refit and replenishment too. The Fighting Admiral would return soon enough, when the Essex was ready, but for now Ray Spruance was in charge of the South Pacific Fleet.

“Now then,” said Nimitz. “What do you make of this Siberian adventure up north?”

“Damn interesting,” said King. “Their head honcho over there has been making overtures about opening up airfields for us on Kamchatka. I’m not sure it would do us any good to put B-17s up there—the weather is horrible. But we’ve opened talks with the Siberians along those lines. I think we should take advantage of this.”

“What would you suggest?”

“I think we should see about sending them a couple Seabee battalions to help improve those airfields. We could put DC-3s in there at Petropavlovsk on Kamchatka, and then hop them over to Northern Sakhalin, and on to Irkutsk—set up a nice little air bridge to the Siberians and offer them supplies and aviation support. That’s what they’ve been asking for. We also ought to get some kind of outpost in the Aleutians, a good link to Kamchatka. But what’s all this talk I’ve been hearing about this Siberian battleship?”

“Your guess is as good as mine. But something bushwhacked the Japs on their way home from Pearl.”

“HYPO has been picking up some real strange signals traffic whenever the Siberians operate. But this is one code they just can’t crack. That said, whenever they do get these signals, we later learn there’s been some trouble with the Japanese fleet. In fact, we now think the Siberians might have had something to do with the sinking of that carrier limping home from Pearl.”

Nimitz frowned. “I thought it was a submarine.”

“It would be nice if it was, but it wasn’t one of ours. HYPO says they got a lot of this odd signals traffic just before that ship went down.”

“Well radio waves don’t sink ships,” said Nimitz.

“Something did, and now we think the Siberians have a big battleship up north supporting these operations. HYPO’s picked up a new code word the Japs are using about it—Mizuchi. There was some kind of scrap during those landings on Kamchatka, and we think they Japs got the worst of it.”

“Must be one hell of a battleship, but where in hell did the Siberians get the damn thing? You know they can’t build anything like that.”

“No, it had to come from the Soviets. I think Sergie Kirov is trading off with the Siberians in exchange for troop support. God knows, he needs all the help he can get, and the Siberians need naval support. But we should look real hard at this situation. What we’ve got here is the fledgling makings of a second front against Japan in the North. If the Siberians mean business, and that can be developed, we ought to support them any way we can. I’m going to recommend that we sneak quietly into the Aleutians and at least set up good observation posts there. An airfield would be even better. Then those DC-3s could hop from Seattle to Dutch Harbor, or even Adak, and on to Petropavlovsk. This is an opportunity we shouldn’t over look.”

“It’s a thousand miles from Petropavlovsk to the nearest big Japanese city. That would be Sapporo on Hokkaido, and our B-17s couldn’t even get there and back with a typical load of 1000 pound bombs.”

“Which is why this situation shaping up on Sakhalin Island is interesting,” said King. “It’s only 700 miles to Sapporo if we get a base up there near where the Siberians have landed. Now imagine if they have what it takes to push on further south.” King pulled out a map, Pointing to the center of Sakhalin. “If we could get airfields here, then all of Hokkaido is easily within range of our B-17s, and when we get the new B-29, we could strike any city in Japan from there. How long would it take us to fight our way close enough to Japan from the South Pacific? Suppose we take Guam back, or Tinian. That’s still over 1400 miles from Tokyo. Only the B-29s could make that, but from central or southern Sakhalin, we could hit Tokyo with B-17s.”

“Air Force talk,” said Nimitz. “Leave that to them.”

“Yes, but the Navy has to get them the bases they’ll need for the job. That’s on our watch. Now, we can slug it out with the Japs from one island to the next down there, and it could take us a couple years to get close enough for that fight to matter. Yet at this very moment, we’ve got the Siberians over there putting troops on Sakhalin and showing every intention of pushing south to reclaim that entire island.”

“The Japanese will fight like hellcats to prevent that. If we can see this, they can see it too.” Nimitz leaned back, thinking. “Yet I agree that we ought to support them any way we can. When do you go to the President with this?”

“Next week. In the meantime, you keep an ear to the ground on what’s going on over there for me. Tell your boys in HYPO to listen real good for this signals traffic they say they’ve picked up. If we can get some subs up there to have a good look around, all the better. This could be bigger than we think. We need to sit up and pay attention.”

“Alright, Rey” said Nimitz. “I’ll see what I can do. If the Siberians can help take the pressure off us down south, all the better.”

Chapter 35

Admiral Kurita had every reason to believe he would soon be returning to the South Pacific. After all, the Siberians had no navy to speak of, and surely all these rumors about a demon ship, Mizuchi, were exaggerated. Yet, when Yamamoto had selected him for command here, the senior Admiral had given him a foreboding warning.

“What I will tell you now is known only to a very few,” he said. “Hiryu was not sunk as a result of damage sustained in the Pearl Harbor attack. It was sunk by the Siberians.”

“The Siberians? How is that possible? They have no navy. Was it a submarine?”

“A rocket attack—fired from a ship we have yet to set eyes upon. This is the same ship that damaged Mutsu and Chikuma, and when you get to the Home Islands, I order you to personally inspect the damage put on those ships.”

“I do not understand. A rocket attack? Then the rumors flying about the fleet are true? Mizuchi is real?”

“Very true, and very real, though I do not encourage fear mongering. We do not know how they came to possess such a ship, but the fact that it exists is enough.” Yamamoto would, of course, never reveal the whole truth concerning the existence of that ship, for he could still scarcely believe it himself. “Its primary weaponry is rocketry, and they are fast, lethal, and have a very long range. They can strike your ships from well beyond the range of your battleships’ biggest guns, and well over the horizon—and from what we have seen, these rockets have deadly accuracy—they never miss their targets.”

That was very sobering talk, particularly when coming from the Fleet Admiral, and Kurita took a moment to let it settle. Then he set his jaw, determined. “What are my orders?” he asked.

“First do as I have instructed. See the damage on Mutsu. You are being promoted from 7th Cruiser Division to commander of the 1st Battleship Division. That division will now be composed of our two newest ships, Satsuma and Hiraga. They are presently at Urajio, but will move to Sapporo as the heart of the close escort force for the 7th Division troop transports. Those troops are going to Karafuto to deal with the Siberians that have landed on the northern end of that island. Adequate cruisers and destroyers will be added to support this mission.”

“It should pose no difficulties.”

“Unless Mizuchi appears. You must be very diligent. Scout well, and to aid that effort, I am attaching a very special ship to your task force, the cruiser Takami.”

Kurita inclined his head. “I know most every cruiser in the fleet, Admiral, but I have not yet heard of this one.”

“That is because it is a very secret ship, something entirely new. Do not think that the Siberians and Russians are the only ones who have developed this new rocket technology….”

“I see. This Takami also has such weapons?”

“It does, though it was designed as a fleet defense ship. Most of its rockets are meant to be used against enemy aircraft, or against the rocket weapons this Mizuchi flings against your ships.”

“Ah! Then it can shoot down the enemy rockets?”

“This is what we hope. But Kurita, this is very secret. It will be the first time Takami enters combat, the first real test of its capabilities. Nothing is to be said about this ship. Understand? It will operate well ahead of your fleet, beyond your forward horizon. Keep it there, and do not interfere with its operations. You will receive encrypted communication via the special radio set that has been transported to your flagship. A member of Takami’s crew will operate that equipment, and report directly to you. Coordinate carefully with Takami. It is commanded by a Captain Harada, and I ask you to heed his experience and judgment. He is specially trained in the use of these new weapons.”

“Another secret project,” said Kurita. “A pity this ship was not with you in the Koro Sea…” Kurita realized he probably should not have said that, but Yamamoto raised a hand, as if to say all was well.

“That was my responsibility—my fault. Hara fought well, but we should not be surprised that the American Navy fares better than its Army did on the Philippines. There they were taken by complete surprise, yet they endured four months, unlike the British in Hong Kong and Singapore, or the hapless Dutch colonies. Do not underestimate the Americans—they will be our fiercest and most capable opponent in this war, and each and every battle holds the possibility that we will lose good men, planes, and even ships. Last December, when we sailed for Pearl Harbor, we had six fleet carriers, six more light carriers, and the two scout carriers. We lost both of those in the Gilberts, and now we have lost half our fleet carriers and a third of our light carriers. This is war, but thankfully, we have also done much harm to the enemy. We destroyed their battleships at Pearl Harbor, for what they were worth, and we have also sunk at least four of their best fleet carriers.”

“Speaking of that,” said Kurita, “will I have naval air cover for this mission, or rely on our land based aircraft?”

“Both. Admiral Kakuta is being given command of the 2nd Carrier Division—Kaga and Tosa. Between those two you will have 150 naval aircraft, and at least three more squadrons operating from airfields on Hokkaido. Think of this Mizuchi as if it were an enemy aircraft carrier, not a battleship. Consider its rocket weapons as determined pilots—so dedicated to bringing harm to their enemies that they would pilot their planes directly into your ship to be certain they scored a hit. That is what you will be facing. Hopefully, our new fleet defense cruiser Takami will prove its worth, but you must also be prepared to strike the enemy in any way you can.”

“I promise you I will find this demon, and slay it.”

“I would never doubt your skill or heart for battle, but be cautious, Kurita, be very cautious. You must allow Takami to take a position in the vanguard of your fleet. It has advanced radar systems that can find the enemy for you, and scout aircraft as well. I have also spoken to Vice Admiral Kakuta and ordered him to keep his carriers well behind your main covering force with the cruisers and battleships. That is your second mission—protect those two carriers! The loss of Zuikaku and Shokaku dealt us a very hard blow. We must preserve all the fleet carriers that remain, and thankfully, Tosa is now ready for operations with Kaga. Remember what I have told you. Hiryu was struck by just one of these deadly enemy rockets, and it set off all the ready ammo, fuel, and combat loaded planes in the hangar deck. The fires were terrible. Remember that.”

“Do not worry, Admiral, our pilots are every bit as capable as those rockets may be.”

“That may be so, but this Mizuchi also has smaller rockets designed to shoot down our aircraft. That was why there was no air cover over Kazantochi when the Siberians surprised us there. Again, all of this is my fault. I was so preoccupied with our operations in the south that I overlooked the threat in the north. That will not happen again, which is why I now send you, our most promising and dedicated Admiral. Fight well, Kurita, but use your head.”

“You can rely on me, Admiral.”

“Good… One thing I have told Kakuta is that he must disperse his strike wave into individual Shotai. No more than three planes must be in close formation, and even they are to disperse at the first sign of enemy rocket fire.” This was something Lieutenant Commander Fukada had tried to impress upon Yamamoto, and he passed the lesson on. “Another thing,” Yamamoto continued. “Takami must first do all it can to stop the enemy rocket attacks aimed at your fleet. That is why it stands in the vanguard. Kakuta’s carriers should only strike after the signal to do so is received from Takami.”

“And what if we were to lose that ship?”

“Then you must use your best judgment in deciding how to proceed, but do as I have ordered and walk the decks of Mutsu. Preserve those fleet carriers, and also realize that, while you will command our two newest battleships, Mutsu did not suffer that damage simply because it was old. After considering that, if you can kill this demon, you will do the Emperor, and your nation, a very great service.”

Kurita bowed, a gleam in his eye, and was soon on his way.

DDG-180 embarked on the long voyage north with Kurita’s cruiser squadron, while the outcome of Operation FS was being decided in that hot carrier duel in the south. Fukada had been restless the whole time. He had been unhappy with Yamamoto’s decision to send the ship north. In spite of the fact that the history was already quite different, the battle in the south, was one he could at least grasp and easily understand. While Operation FS had actually been planned before it was eventually cancelled in the history he knew, the situation in the north was entirely different. It was a history that had never happened, and there was no safe harbor for his thinking and planning, no way to understand what was really going on—at least not in terms of the Second World War.

“Face it,” said Harada. “We have to look at this situation as if it were happening in our own time now. We’ve drilled maneuvers in the Sea of Japan for decades. The Bear was always our presumed adversary, along with China. So this is going to be a simple fleet defense operation. That’s the only way we can look at it.”

“It’s going to be dangerous,” said Fukada. “We’ve gamed out maneuvers against the Red Banner Pacific Fleet, but that was when their toughest capital ship was an old Slava class cruiser—and we always had the American 7th Fleet watching our backs.”

“Having a few regrets now about the side we picked in this fight?” asked Harada. Sure, it was always reassuring to know the US fleet was out there with us, but not this time. We’ve got to internalize this another way. Assume it’s 2021. The 7th Fleet is mustering near Guam and intending to intervene in the Taiwan thing. We’re left up here and get word the Russians have crossed the demarcation line on Sakhalin. Takami is ordered north to accompany a couple of our helo carriers and show the flag. We’ve converted them to light strike capable carriers with the F-35s aboard, again, thanks to our old American friends.”

“Don’t rub it in,” said Fukada. “Alright, the one common denominator in both situations is the incontrovertible fact that Russia is our adversary. This time they mean business, and there’s a Kirov class battlecruiser in the Sea of Okhotsk supporting their Air/Sea reinforcement of Sakhalin. We’re to support Kurita’s task force, which will include two carriers, and assure the transport of two regiments to Sakhalin.”

“That’s job one,” said Harada. “And I think we can handle that easily enough, unless Kirov intervenes directly. Then we’ve got a real fight on our hands. My advice is that we ask Kurita to play a defensive role here, but suppose he decides to get more offensive minded?”

Fukada shrugged. “Those two carriers won’t have much real offensive punch against a ship like Kirov,” he said. “If they could get through their SAM defenses, then yes, they could deliver 250 KG bombs that would hurt that ship easily enough. But they won’t get through. You and I both know that.”

“And we haven’t the SSM inventory to put any real pressure on Kirov’s SAM umbrella. Our eight Type 12 Anti-Ship Missiles would all have to be fired in a big salvo to have any chance of even one getting through, and that is a slim chance at best. Could we time a salvo like that to coincide with a strike from those two carriers?”

“We might, but remember, Kirov is packing S-300s. They can engage any formation of carrier aircraft well before they ever have a chance to close on the target. Those men won’t know what hit them. I stressed this with Yamamoto, and asked him to order the pilots to fly widely dispersed patterns on approach.”

“Can’t we counter those S-300s?”

“We’d have to use the SM-3s. Face it, the Russian missile tech is second to none. That S-300 is damn fast. Later versions can get to 5000 meters per second velocity, and that is well beyond the capability of even a missile like the Patriot for an interception. Perhaps our only solace will be the fact that they will have that missile in limited numbers, but even their mid-range SAMs can fire out at least 80 kilometers. They’ll fire in large salvos, and we won’t be able to stop them. Our best bet is to use our own SAMs to stop any SSMs they direct against our ship or the carriers we’re defending. Their P-900s will be easy to catch—they’re subsonic until terminal mode. The Moskit IIs only haul at Mach 3, and we should handle them as well.”

“So we play defense for those carriers against the SSMs,” said Harada. “But we can’t really help them get through Kirov’s SAM defense, not unless we throw every SSM we have at them at just the right time.”

“It will be difficult to predict that outcome,” said Fukada. “But if we do go offensive, I’d use our Type 12s against other shipping. That’s what they were originally conceived for. Our 5th Anti-Ship Missile Regiment at Kumato was going to use them to target Russian Amphibious vessels.”

“That means we’d have to be within 120 Klicks of the target. Getting that far north with Takami could be a problem. They won’t be landing down south.”

“No argument there,” said Fukada. “And we won’t want our carriers up that far either. My thought was that we could take this loaf in slices. Stand east of Korsakov for phase one operations. That will put us in a good position to interdict any move the Russians make towards our reinforcement operation.”

“What about the carriers?”

Fukada shook his head. “Frankly, we’d be better off on our own. If Kurita moves up there with us his carriers will just be a magnet for Russian missiles. We won’t attract too much attention alone if we stay passive on the electronics. We lie in wait….” Fukada had a strange look on his face, as if he was trying to see the battle that was coming. “They won’t expect us here, and they’ll likely be radiating like there’s no tomorrow. Otani will pick them up, and then we get a very brief window to decide what to do. What we need is for someone to wiggle a left jab in their face. Then we hit them with a good right cross—all eight Type 12 missiles—all or nothing.”

“So you’ve changed your tune about using them against the transports.”

“You were right—we’d never get that far north without being detected and challenged, and we don’t want Kurita up there.”

“Who wiggles the jab?”

“We have to have some air power in lower Sakhalin. Once we locate Kirov, we vector them in. A nice little bomber strike would be enough to fix their attention west toward the island. Then we launch all eight Type 12s in sea skimmer mode. I just wish the damn things were faster. The Type 12 runs just a whisker below the speed of sound. If we fire at anywhere near our maximum range, and we’ll want to, then we’re looking at five minutes to target on those missiles.”

“Right…. And the Russian Moskit IIs move at Mach Three. So while we’re sitting here looking at our watches and waiting out those five minutes….”

“I get the picture, but I don’t see any other option. Five minutes sounds like an eternity when the other fellow can throw back something that fast. Who knows, maybe they’ll get stupid and counter with their P-900s.”

“Don’t bet on that,” said Harada. “This Karpov knows what he’s doing. No. All we have going for us if we attack is those few minutes of shock and uncertainty. They won’t know what’s coming at them, unless they have some kind of wizard on their sensor suite. So I’m betting on that little interval of confusion while they try and convince themselves that the Japanese of 1942 suddenly have a near speed of sound missile.” The Captain shrugged, his arms folded, thinking. “All or nothing. We let that punch fly and see if we get lucky.”

Fukada nodded. The great risk they were taking here was very apparent to him now, but even as he felt this, another idea occurred to him, though he said nothing about it to Harada. All or nothing…

Chapter 36

It was an odd place for a crucial turning point in the war to be found, and few who worked there knew that the project they were now undertaking would become one of the most secret and most significant of the entire war. There, at the new Applied Physics Laboratory of Washington's Carnegie Institution, a team of scientists and civilian workers were attempting to solve a frustrating problem for the military—how to defeat enemy aircraft.

Since the end of WWI, the modern aircraft had been the bane of military defense planners and the chosen method of first strike on offense. Swarms of bombers, dive bombers, and fighters would lead any major assault on land. For the Navy, the hard lesson that control of the sea depended on control of the skies above that sea was taught over and over, from Pearl Harbor to the carrier duels that preceded the struggle for vital Pacific island outposts. It was the aircraft that was the true King of the battle space, not the lumbering battleships, and the value of a carrier rested solely in the fact that it could bring those aircraft to the fight.

For the last year there had been rumors throughout the US defense establishment of a new weapon that now threatened to upset the long steel reign of the military aircraft. Though the British had been very closed mouthed with intelligence on the matter, word had leaked through about the efficacy of rockets as an AA weapon.

Up until that time, rocketry was an arcane science, the province of physicists and engineers like Robert Goddard in the United States, who built liquid fueled rockets as early as 1926, achieving 34 successful launches before America’s war began in late 1941. Like Germany’s Wernher von Braun, Goddard was a true pioneer in the development of rocket technology. As a young boy Goddard had first dreamed of designing a device that could take humanity into space, as far away as Mars, all in the muse of his young 17-year-old mind while he was staring at the skies from the top of a cherry tree in 1899. He called it the moment of his first great inspiration, and celebrated it every year as a kind of anniversary on October 19th.

So when rumors began to fly that the British had a rocket weapon that could track and hit a speedy flying aircraft, the matter eventually found its way to Goddard’s design table. In Fedorov’s history, the Army had not come calling on physicists and aeronautical engineers until 17 August, 1944, when they issued a memorandum asking for a radar guided missile that could shoot down enemy strategic bombers. Bell Labs would take up the challenge, which would soon become the Nike Ajax Rocket project, but it would be seven long years before the first successful interception of a drone occurred in 1951.

The little demonstration witnessed by Admiral Yamamoto in Davao Bay was therefore quite ground breaking, and did much to shock him into embracing these two strange officers that had come to him, seemingly out of nowhere. Now he had sent these men, and their amazing ship, off to defend his northern fleet against the demonic powers of yet another interloper with awesome new weapons of war, the ship they called Mizuchi.

Rocketry was already plying its deadly craft, right there in the 1940s, in both the Atlantic and Pacific. Despite that fact, little was really known about the ships that used these weapons, and what was known was kept in the closely guarded circles of military intelligence organizations. Even as work began on this idea of hitting an aircraft with a rocket, the technical challenges were seen to be truly daunting. First they needed a stable and effective rocket, reliable and consistent performance, an engine that could propel it to desired altitudes, and a means of tracking and guiding it to the target. While history would record that all these challenges would be overcome, it would take time to accomplish that, and enormous resources.

While all this was going on, that frustrating problem of how to defend against enemy aircraft continued to be a sore thumb on the mailed fist of all armed services. Some argued that the best and only defense was yet another aircraft, but others looked for ways to improve the existing ‘low-tech’ defense approach being used—the venerable anti-aircraft gun. A man named Merle Anthony Tuve was another of those brainy PhDs tinkering at the edge of technologies that would soon combine to become lethal weapons of war.

He was exploring the use of radio waves to measure the height of the atmosphere, and it soon became apparent that radio waves could be used to measure other things as well. The fledgling technology that came to be known as ‘Radar’ would be one thing that emerged from that observation. One day, considering the problem of those bothersome aircraft, Tuve theorized that AA guns might be made much more effective if their shells could ‘see’ enemy planes. The way to give them those eyes would lie in his tinkering with radio waves, but his colleagues thought it would be too difficult to try and mount delicate radar technology on something subject to violent forces like an AA gun shell.

“No,” said Tuve. “Just use the radar as an early warning system on the ground, or something to help the gun get pointed in the right direction. What I’m talking about is just something that can tell the shell its target is near. You know, those shells have quite a blast radius for fragmentation shrapnel when they explode, but right now, they only do so on contact. Most AA shells just fly right past a target unless they score a direct hit, or explode at the fixed altitude set by their fuse. What I’m talking about is a kind of proximity fuse that can set off that shell when it gets anywhere near an enemy plane.”

Tuve became the founding director of the Applied Physics Laboratory, now at John Hopkins University, and there he set about to develop his idea, much to the delight of the Army. It took as many as 25,000 rounds fired from an AA gun for each hit obtained when Tuve started his project. During the Battle of Britain, the British estimated they fired an average of 18,500 rounds at German aircraft for each one they actually destroyed. When Tuve finished, he had cut that down to between 30 and 60 rounds, and this would improve as the war progressed. That was a staggering leap forward in the precision and effectiveness of AA guns, and it would become one of the most closely guarded technologies of the US war effort, as secret as the Manhattan Project, and in many ways more significant in its impact on the war effort in general.

Both the British and Germans had looked at the idea in 1940, but deemed it impossible to achieve. Tuve proved them wrong. What the team created was a miniature radio device that could simply bounce radio waves off any target it was approaching. Well before the development of the transistor, radios of that day all relied on very fragile vacuum tubes. How in the world would the team fit a glass tube into an artillery shell, and have it survive the violence of being fired from a gun?

The answer would come from another man, Dr. James Van Allen at the University of Iowa. He met Merle Tuve at the Carnegie Institute, and became a member of the National Defense Research Committee, the same group that would spawn the Manhattan Project. Van Allen had been working on creating more durable vacuum tubes for special rugged duty. He had learned that a small company was also involved with miniaturizing the tubes so they could fit inside a hearing aid. Those two attributes, ruggedness and miniaturization, would become key factors in the successful design of Tuve’s radio proximity fuse.

Materials were found to shield and cushion the glass, prevent the fragile tungsten elements inside the tubes from being damaged, and allow the vacuum tube to survive the shock of being fired from a gun—20,000 G-forces. Van Allen’s solutions helped the team deliver its first shock-proof tube by January of 1942 in Fedorov’s history. But the question of how to advance this technology had come earlier in these Altered States, another odd effect of Kirov’s influence on events. It was June of 1941 when the first fuses were tested here, and six months later, as many as 5000 proximity fuses had been produced and installed in AA gun rounds. That was largely due to Tuve’s tremendous organizational ability, and the team he coordinated to solve the problem. He believed in Napoleon’s first principle of war: “I can make up for lost ground, but never lost time.”

So Tuve insisted his personnel forget about saving money or resources, and focused entirely on saving time. It didn’t have to be perfect, it just had to get done, and before the enemy developed the same thing. “The best job in the world is a total failure if it is too late,” he said, “We don’t need the best possible unit, but we damn well want the first one.” Tuve insisted on speed in every aspect of the development process, but still achieved a 97% quality control rate on the overall system. Everything needed, the radio transmitter, antenna, tubes, battery detonation switches and safety measures, all had to fit into a tube no more than 1.5 inches wide and 8 inches long, and with a shelf life for storage in the shells of up to three years or more.

It would later be learned that the Germans had employed at least 50 small project groups to try and solve the same problem, but believed it would not be achieved in time to matter in the war. Tuve proved them all wrong. His small initial team would soon burgeon into massive production centers producing 40,000 rounds per day. Over 22 million would be produced in the war before it ended.

Naturally, the Navy was very interested in the idea of a much more accurate AA gun to protect its ships. The gun that would fire them was the QF 5-inch dual purpose gun mounted on ships from destroyer class up to battleships and carriers. The technology increased AA accuracy by an order of magnitude, one day achieving 90% kill rates on V-1 Buzz Bombs with only ten rounds fired. It was going to be so significant, that it would spell the doom of Japanese naval and land based air power as an effective strike weapon of war. The Japanese would eventually learn the trick themselves, but too late in the war to really matter.

They did not know it at the time, but the fruits of Tuve’s project, the effort of over 80,000 men and women, had already produced proximity fuse rounds for the U.S. Navy to make surface ships much harder targets for naval strike craft. The first ships to be fully equipped with the new rounds were already at sea, and had already fired them at the planes and pilots of Hara’s Carrier Division 5.

During that battle, Halsey had ordered Fletcher’s battleship squadron to make a run at the Japanese positions around Nandi, particularly the airfield they had captured there. Two ships in that squadron had the new special proximity fused AA shells for their 5-inch guns, the USS South Dakota, and the light AA cruiser Atlanta. They would now report back that the new rounds were a tremendous success. South Dakota had taken down four enemy planes for the expense of only 42 of the new rounds. Without them they might have had to fire close to 500.

The new proximity fused shells had arrived six months earlier than they did in the unaltered history, when the cruiser Helena was the first to receive them in November of 1942. The use of the shell itself, and even its existence, was still to be considered a closely guarded secret. They could only be fired in situations where the military believed it would be impossible for the enemy to ever recover a dud or misfired shell to learn its secret. This was why all those 5-inch guns now carried two types of rounds, one for use against other naval targets or in shore bombardment, and the proximity fused rounds for use against enemy aircraft.

In case the shells were ever found, or captured by the enemy, the US was already working on a special jammer that could be installed on its own bombers. It was designed to sweep the signal band used by the radio transmitter in the shells, and inhibit their ability to bounce a clear signal off the target. It worked, and that fact also contributed to the secrecy that surrounded the new shells. They could be easily jammed, and so their best defense was to prevent the enemy from ever knowing they existed.