It was a surface action group that could not have been challenged, even if Halsey’s entire cruiser escort had been present. Given that his carriers were still far to the north approaching the Ellice Islands, the Japanese would have absolute naval supremacy during the invasion.
Major-General Koichi Abe’s veteran 47th Regiment began its landings in the narrow coral fringed channel leading to the port, which was hotly defended in spite of the pounding delivered by those ships. 3rd Battalion landed first, storming onto the quays and docks, but was soon pinned down by withering machinegun fire from well sited positions in the buildings adjacent to the harbor. Fires were already beginning in the town where the initial bombardment had fallen most heavily. But it was not until 1st Battalion landed on the narrow coastal strip between the town and Vunda Point to the south that the deadlock at the harbor began to break up.
Japanese troops rushed into the warehouses, bayonets fixed, and killed anyone they found, whether or not they had a weapon or uniform on. They then infiltrated into the town as the Kiwis attempted to regroup, and were soon stopped again with the timely arrival of the 36th Battalion from 8th Brigade, which had been moving to the scene for the last hour. This force was strong enough to counterattack, and soon the Japanese found themselves being pushed back toward the wharf and warehouse sector.
Major-General Abe was finally ashore, and he wasted no time reorganizing a renewed attack, gathering all three of his battalions to make the push. It was going to be a shock attack, with the veteran Japanese infantry advancing with fixed bayonets into the very fluid house to house fighting that was now underway.
Meanwhile the 48th Cav Recon Regiment under Lieutenant Colonel Kuro Kitamura, was landing well to the south in Nandi Bay with his raiding force. He had fast troops with light vehicles, and even horses to give the infantry element additional mobility in the rugged inland country. Before they would land, the battleships Kirishima and Haruna were detached from the bombardment group and met up with the heavy cruisers Tone, Chokai and Kinagusa in Nandi Bay. Their fire was mainly concentrated at the port of Nandi itself, the adjacent airfield, and shore batteries that had been position to oppose a direct landing there.
The 6-inch shore batteries positioned in well-fortified sites along that coast began to return fire, and a small duel began when the two batteries protecting Nandi Bay returned fire on the Japanese warships. A heavy mist lay over the bay, obscuring the positions of the enemy ships, which could only be identified when they fired. Well to the south, Kitamura’s men were already ashore and pushing into lightly cultivated ground south of Nandi. The enemy transports had not been seen, and so the opening bombardment had served as a big distraction, focusing the Kiwis defensive response right there near the harbor.
Kitamura’s first objective would be the small dispersal airstrip at Momi, defended by 1st Company, 35th Battalion of the 8th New Zealand Brigade. These troops had only just arrived on the scene, having been posted much further south at another possible enemy landing point, Likuri Harbor. The battalion there had detached this company to scout up the coast along the rail line that had been built from Nawa on the south coast to Nandi. They arrived just as Kitamura’s raiders made their push for Momi Airfield, and a brisk meeting engagement ensued. Outnumbered three to one, the Kiwis held for as long as they could, but within an hour they had been relentlessly driven back from the airfield and forced to retreat into the jungle.
All these early landings were further supported by a daring raid by the elite Rikusentai paratroopers of the 1st and 3rd Yokosuka SNLF battalions. Flying out of Noumea, these veteran troops had already fought in Borneo, at Kupang in West Timor, where they suffered severe casualties, and in the ill-fated operations against Sumatra and Java. The survivors had been reinforced with fresh replacements from Japan, and flew by night all the way from Rabaul to Luganville on the French controlled island of Vanuatu in the New Hebrides. The Ki-57 Troop transport planes had just enough range to make the trip, and the French had agreed to refuel the planes that night, making them ready for the final leg of their journey by air to the Fiji Islands, another 700 air miles.
Along the way the transports had been escorted by fighters off the Zuiho, which was now arriving on the scene of the action after coming all the way from the Solomon Sea south of Port Moresby. The careful planning and coordination of this operation was something that was simply beyond the capabilities of the Allies at this time. Like a fighter that had been dropped in the first round, pummeled on the ropes and staggered in the early going, the Allies were still covering up on defense as Japan moved in for the battle they hoped would clinch the fight in a knockout.
While this was going on, the second regiment scheduled to make the Fiji assault landing was still at sea, navigating the treacherous gaps between long coral reefs that surrounded most of the island group. Major General Shizuo Sakaguchi was leading his regimental sized detachment to the far north of the island, intending to land near the small port of Tavua. Even as the paratroopers of the 1st Yokosuka SNLF landed about seven kilometers to the east of that harbor, his transports were threading their way into the narrow Manava Passage leading to the port. They would be supported by naval gunfire from the heavy cruiser Aoba and a fist full of destroyers that were already in a hot gun battle with a battery of Kiwi coastal artillery.
For the Allies, with many miles of coastline to watch and defend, it was a frustrating morning. They could not make any major redeployment of ground troops because the Japanese could land anywhere they pleased, so the entire US 132nd Infantry Regiment was simply ordered to hunker down on the ground it held along the southern coast of the island, mostly around Suva Bay.
This was a former National Guard Regiment, that had come a long way from Camp Forest in Tennessee, loaded aboard trains guarded by FBI agents in those early fearful days of the war, and then onto transports in Task Force 6814 bound for Australia. It was to become the first regiment of what would soon be called the “Pacifica Division” in this history, and it was going to get but a brief respite before its baptism by fire would begin.
The troops had already seen the white winged Japanese fighters overhead, some swooping down to strafe their position near Suva, and then the Vals came in, their bombs whistling down to strike the anchorage sector. It was their own mini version of Pearl Harbor, made by airmen off two carriers that had been in on that raid months earlier. Informed by Takami that the seas and skies were clear, the pilots off Akagi and Soryu were free to impose their reign of steel over the island. If Nimitz had not diverted Halsey, this action might have met a strong challenge from the planes off Enterprise and Hornet. But Nimitz was playing a different game now, carefully husbanding his remaining pieces on the board, and planning to mount a counterattack once the Japanese carriers had run out their lease on these waters.