“I like that XO. Good call, assuming our guest plays along.”
“He doesn’t have to, sir,” Fukada smiled. “We just tell him he’s been summoned to Rabaul and we have orders to get him there ASAP to coordinate future planning with Combined Fleet HQ.”
The Captain nodded. It could work. “Outstanding. Let’s make it so. Mister Ikida, verify those fuel numbers with Chief Oshiro.” He looked over the room, proud to have this group with him now, good officers, each and every one.
“Mister Kimura, we haven’t heard your wisdom on any of this. Anything to add?”
The Marine Sergeant, shrugged. “At the moment I haven’t quite swallowed this whole fish yet, sir. I do know one thing. We’ve arrived, somewhere. And to prove it, we’re here!” Yankee Catcher Yogi Berra could not have put it any better. He smiled
Part VIII
All or Nothing
“If you do not enter the tiger’s cave, you will not catch its cub.”
Chapter 22
Yamamoto did not quite know what to make of the request when he first received it through channels. General Imamura, presumed lost in that terrible disaster off Batavia, had been found and rescued at sea by a destroyer. That was good news, for the entire operation on Java had ground to a halt in the chaos that erupted from that volcano.
We make our plans, he thought. We prepare so carefully, assigning men to ships, building our task groups, and timing everything to achieve the desired outcome. Yet nature has humbled us all. The initial reports on the losses most likely sustained by the 2nd Division are quite alarming. I had counted on using that unit in the Solomons after Java was secured, but that will clearly not happen. And now it seems that the entire area near Batavia will be useless from an operational standpoint for months. The harbor is wrecked, the roads impassible, the airfields covered with ash that still hangs heavily over the entire span of Western Java.
This will make the capture of Surabaya more important than ever, so I suppose the General wishes to coordinate with the navy to determine how we can now move to reinforce troops already landed in that sector. My understanding is that the 5th Division has been taken from Singapore for that purpose, so it will need transport and the assignment of a covering force. General Nishimura at least salvaged one pearl from this clam. His renewed attack on Singapore finally delivered that city and its excellent port, yet it too is under heavy ashfall for the time being, and the city itself is choking with refugees. I’m afraid things will get very ugly there, and Singapore will be of no use to the navy either, and for quite some time.
That ash cloud extends for a wide area, and well out into the Indian Ocean. It was astounding to think I could have heard that eruption even here at Rabaul, over 5000 kilometers from the Sunda Straits. At least we can be thankful that operations in the Solomons will not be affected. After Nagumo successfully covered Operation R, I sent him west with Carrier Division 5 to support the Java Operation, but I will need him back here soon. So perhaps it is best that I meet with General Imamura, and determine what the situation is in the Java Sea. Yet he would be some time coming here, and I am scheduled to move on to Davao. So I will have him meet with me there, a good midpoint between Rabaul and the Java Sea where he was found.
He took a quiet sip of tea, thinking. There was still trouble in the north to consider. Yes, that was as unexpected as this sudden eruption in the south. When we received that ultimatum from the Siberians, no one took it seriously. After all, what could they do? Now it appears that the Siberians have been at war with us since the day of that attack on Pearl Harbor. That they could have sunk Hiryu as Nagumo returned home was most disturbing—not to mention the damage we sustained to both Kaga and Akagi. Thankfully, that was not serious, and both ships were scheduled for refit at this time in any case.
Naval Rockets…
We have heard reports from the Germans on these for some time, but never really paid them any coin. Now it appears we were remiss in that as well. Naval Intelligence Group now believes that the ship that has caused such havoc in the Atlantic for the Germans has moved into the Pacific. If that is so, they could only have come by the Northern Route, and before the ice set in. That must be the ship that is now operating with the Siberians. They used it to cover their operation against Kamchatka—another lapse of both intelligence and planning that I must now account for to the Emperor.
The Army is fuming that they were not supported, but look what happened to Mutsu and Chikuma when they tried to intervene against the enemy landing operation on Kamchatka. Those were good sturdy ships, but now both are wrecked to a point where we will not have them back again for over a year! Perhaps we should proceed with the plans to convert Mutsu into an aircraft carrier, or a hybrid. That might be easier than trying to restore an old battleship that was already obsolete when it sailed north to that encounter.
I will have Kurita meet us at Davao as well, and we will then discuss operations in both the north and south at the same time. We may be taking on more than we realize with the opening of all out hostilities on the northern front. Things should be relatively quiet, but when the ice abates, and it allows us to operate in the Sea of Okhotsk, there will have to be a reckoning with the Siberians. They used the northern port of Magadan as their primary base, and that must be taken, or smashed.
Then there is the loss of Joyaku Kazantochi, the land of volcanoes on Kamchatka. Let us hope none of the fiery mountains that live there, and on our Kurile outposts, ever have a mind to rage as this one did here. Now that the Siberians have been bold enough to take Kazantochi, we will certainly have to plan a counterattack. Our real power was in the northern Kuriles, at Karamushiro and Shumushu, but the port and base we lost to the north was very useful, and we cannot allow the enemy to control it. Beyond that, they have seized all the airfields we were building there, an insult the Army will have to account for, though they will most likely find a way to blame the Navy.
Plans are already in the making. Tojo has recalled Yamashita, and they are assembling a new Army in the Amur region with divisions pulled from Manchuria and Mongolia. Yet soon I will hear that the navy must provide sealift there as well, because there are simply no roads leading to the next likely place of contention, Northern Karafuto, the place the Siberians call Sakhalin.
So… we finally get the one nightmare we had thought to avoid, a war on both our Pacific and Siberian fronts at the same time. It will require swift action, before the Americans can organize for offensive operations. We must deal with this Siberian threat, and complete the conquest of the barrier islands and the Solomons before I face the United States again at sea. Until both those sectors are well secured, I cannot contemplate any further offensive operations aimed at the Americans. The only question is this: what are they now contemplating? We have already seen a slow buildup underway at Fiji and Samoa, which was not unexpected. This makes the early occupation of the Solomons even more essential than Java from my perspective, and I will have to express that opinion to General Imamura. He will be expecting to focus all our energy to salvage the Java operation now, but there is really no threat from Australia, and we have time in our favor. I will need troops from his Army, so I must be very accommodating to any request he may make of the Navy. He already owes us a life, thanks to that destroyer plucking him out of the sea. Strange that the name of that ship was never reported to me.