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The Asiatic-Pacific Raids campaign of February 16 to October 9, 1944, marked a revolutionary transformation in naval warfare, as the United States Navy launched an unprecedented series of carrier-based strikes across the Central Pacific that ultimately secured American victory and brought B-29 bombers within range of Japan's home islands.
In mid-January 1944, the US Navy unleashed a powerful new offensive weapon against the Empire of Japan, shifting the Pacific Theater from defensive battles in the South Pacific to an organized, aggressive plan of attack against Japanese perimeter defenses across the Central Pacific. Task Force 58, formed on January 6, 1944, departed Pearl Harbor with an enormous striking force under the watchful eyes of Undersecretary of the Navy James Forrestal and Fleet Admiral Chester Nimitz.
The campaign operated under a dual command system designed to maintain operational tempo while confusing enemy intelligence. When the force was part of Admiral Spruance's Fifth Fleet, the carrier task force was commanded by Mitscher and bore the designation Task Force (TF) 58. When led by Admiral Halsey as part of the Third Fleet, the carrier force was commanded by Vice Admiral John S. McCain Sr. and its designation was Task Force (TF) 38.
Key Commanders:
During the 1920s and '30s, Japan had developed Truk in secret as a powerful naval and air base. By the start of WWII in 1939, Truk had become the Imperial Japanese Navy's Fourth Fleet Base, and from 1942 to 1944 it was the Japanese Combined Fleet's main forward naval base in the Pacific. Under the command of Commander Fifth Fleet Vice Admiral Raymond A. Spruance, USN, the Fast Carrier Force (Task Force 58), commanded by Rear Admiral Marc A. Mitscher performed raids on February 17-18, 1944 at Truk Island.
The attack on Truk was also the first night aircraft carrier strike when aircraft departed after midnight on February 18. Besides the numerous merchant ships sunk, the Japanese Navy lost light cruisers Katori and Naka; destroyers Maikaze, Fumizuki, Oite, and Tachikaze; submarine chasers Ch-24, and Ch-29, along with submarine chaser Shonan Maru #15 and Motor Torpedo Boat #10.
"The raid on Truk was followed by air raids on the Marianas in late February 1944. The Japanese detected the approach of Task Force 58 but were unable to inflict significant damage on the force, highlighting the American ability to defeat Japanese land-based aircraft even when they had advance warning."
The Fast Carrier Task Force included multiple task groups with state-of-the-art vessels:
|
Task Group |
Composition |
Key Vessels |
|
TG 58.1 |
Fleet Carriers, Light Carriers |
Enterprise, Yorktown, Belleau Wood, Bataan |
|
TG 58.2 |
Fleet Carriers, Light Carriers |
Bunker Hill, Wasp, Monterey, Cabot |
|
TG 58.3 |
Fleet Carriers, Light Carriers |
Essex, Intrepid, Princeton, San Jacinto |
Desecrate I was a US carrierborne air attack on Japanese targets in the Palau islands group, and Yap and Woleai in the Caroline islands group, by Vice Admiral Marc A. Mitscher's Task Force 58 of Admiral Raymond A. Spruance's 5th Fleet, and undertaken in support of the 'Persecution' and 'Reckless' landings at Aitape and Hollandia respectively on the northern coast of New Guinea.
TF58 sank the destroyer Wakatake, repair ship Akashi, one submarine chaser, four auxiliary submarine chasers, one patrol boat, one netlayer, one cargo ship and aircraft ferry, five transports, seven oilers, two guard boats, one salvage vessel, one torpedo transport and repair ship, and five cargo ships at Palau, and sank nine small transports and damaged four other vessels at Angaur. Twenty-five US aircraft were lost, but 26 out of 44 air crews are rescued.
Planes from a three-carrier task force, Task Force 58, under the command of Rear Admiral A. E. Montgomery, hit Marcus Island with a predawn fighter sweep and strafed and bombed the island for two consecutive days. It consisted of three carriers, the CVs USS WASP and USS ESSEX, and the CVL USS JACINTO, and five cruisers, the CAs USS BOSTON, BALTIMORE, and CANBERRA, and the two CLs (AA) USS SAN DIEGO And RENO.
On 14 May, she and her sister carriers of TG 58.6, Essex (CV-9) and San Jacinto (CV-30), sortied for raids on Marcus and Wake Islands to give the new task group combat experience; to test a recently devised system of assigning, before takeoff, each pilot a specific target; and to neutralize those islands for the fo. Carrier planes struck Marcus on 19 and 20 May and Wake on 23 May. They encountered little opposition and accomplished their mission with very light losses due to anti-aircraft fire.
The Mariana and Palau Islands campaign, also known as Campaign Plan Granite II, was an offensive launched by the United States against Imperial Japanese forces in the Pacific between June and November 1944 during the Pacific War. The campaign consisted of Operation Forager, which captured the Mariana Islands, and Operation Stalemate, which captured Palau.
Fast Carrier Task Force 58 included 15 fleet aircraft carriers carrying nearly 1,000 combat aircraft, and the invasion force, the V Amphibious Corps, comprised three combat divisions (the 2nd and 4th Marine Divisions and the 27th Infantry Division), reaching over 70,000 Marines, soldiers, and sailors.
The Battle of the Philippine Sea or 'Great Marianas Turkey Shoot (19-20 June 1944) was the first major naval battle in the Pacific since 1942 and was a crushing American victory that permanently destroyed Japanese naval aviation, leaving their carriers as hollow shells for the rest of the war.
Key Battles and Locations:
The Essex class aircraft carriers where the major assets that won the war in the Pacific as part of Task Force 58/38, completety obliterating the Imperial Japanese Navy in all engagements post-1943 after the first entered service. In all, 17 ships entered service.
|
Aircraft Type |
Role |
Key Specifications |
|
F6F-3/5 Hellcat |
Fighter |
Primary carrier fighter, 405 mph top speed |
|
SB2C Helldiver |
Dive Bomber |
Replaced SBD Dauntless, 295 mph, 2,000 lb bomb load |
|
TBF/TBM Avenger |
Torpedo Bomber |
275 mph, carried Mark 13 torpedoes or bombs |
The Fast Carrier Task Force incorporated the new fast battleships and heavy cruisers:
The Japanese defense relied on land-based aircraft and remaining fleet units:
Lieutenant General Hideyoshi Obata's 31st Army on Truk was made responsible for the Japanese army elements in the Mariana islands, and this headquarters later moved to the Palau islands group. While the 4th Fleet had overall responsibility for the area, it had also been decided that once any island was attacked, the senior army officer on that island would assume command of all available forces.
The extended time at sea of Task Force 58 throughout this period was possible due to the Navy's logistical capabilities. Mobile logistic ships provided repair and maintenance services to the task force while underway replenishment provided fuel and aviation gas. Two separate squadrons of tankers ensured a steady supply of fuel and gas.
The island of Majuro in the Marshalls provided the advance base from which Task Force 58 operated during the Central Pacific campaign. Operating out of this advance base, instead of the established fleet base at Pearl Harbor, was possible due to the dramatic expansion of expeditionary logistical capabilities such as mobile logistic supply ships and underway replenishment using oilers.
The fall of the Marianas meant that the Americans were now in a position from where they could cut the Japanese Empire in half - forces ranging west could hit the Philippines and threaten the sea routes to the southern resource area, while B-29 bombers based on the captured islands could strike Japan's home islands directly.
The global context of the defeat was not lost on the Japanese command or the Japanese public, but now there were more immediate vulnerabilities to consider. On 15 June, the same day as Saipan's D-day, American forces accomplished the first long-range bombing raid on Japan from bases in China. With Saipan's airfields soon to be operational (as well as those of Tinian and Guam, which the Americans would surely get in due course) and with Japanese air power having been all but eliminated in the Battle of the Philippine Sea, there was no protecting the home islands from aerial bombardment.
"The fall of Saipan caused a great crisis in Japan. The ease with which the Americans had penetrated the inner line of island defences, and the great naval defeat at the Philippine Sea, led Prime Minister Tojo to resign along with his entire war cabinet."
As soon as the United States captured Guam, Saipan, and Tinian, naval construction battalions began expanding the existing Japanese airfields in order to accommodate hundreds of the massive B-29 aircraft on their way to the Central Pacific Theater. Guam became the headquarters for the XXI Bomber Command and was the location of three airfields: Depot Field, North Field, and Northwest Field.
Naval vessels sunk during campaign:
Mawdsley concludes that the Central Pacific campaign was the start of an era in which the U.S. Navy exercised global command of the sea, an era that has lasted to the present. The Asiatic-Pacific Raids campaign demonstrated the decisive power of coordinated carrier aviation and established the template for modern naval operations.
The campaign proved several revolutionary concepts:
The Asiatic-Pacific Raids campaign of February 16 to October 9, 1944, represented the culmination of American naval aviation development and the decisive moment when the United States achieved irreversible superiority in the Pacific War. Through innovative tactics, overwhelming material superiority, and exceptional leadership, Task Force 58/38 operations during this period not only secured victory in the Pacific but established American naval dominance that would endure for decades to come.
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Additional Reading:
