The Whale Has Wings Vol 3 - Holding the Barrier
Read The Whale Has Wings Vol 3 - Holding the Barrier Online
Authors: David Row
by David Row
Copyright 2013 by David Row
This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events or locales is entirely coincidental
Other titles and further information on David Row’s books
(including the previous books in this series) can be found at
The earlier books can be purchased from Amazon at the various local stores
Vol1 -
The Whale Has Wings, Rebirth
Vol 2 -
The Whale Has Wings, From Taranto to Singapore
Edition, License Notes
This e-book is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This e-book may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to Amazon and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author
I would like to thank Kevin Reagh for providing the cover art.
And thanks to Adrian Cengia and
Clive Loebenstein-Peckham for their invaluable help in preparing the book for publication.
Table of Contents
Chapter 1 - The Invasion of Malaya
Chapter 2 - Meeting the Assault
Chapter 3 - First Battle of the South China Sea
Chapter 4 - First Battle of the South China Sea, the surface attack
Chapter 6 - Second Battle of Wake Island
Chapter 9 - The Dutch East Indies
Chapter 10 - The Bismark Archipelago
Chapter 11 - Pillar arrives at Singapore
Chapter 14 - The Japanese reach for Java
Chapter 15 - The Battle for Java
Chapter 18 - The Doolittle Raid and its consequences
Chapter 19 - Preparations for Midway
Appendix 2 - Aircraft Carriers
Maps
What has gone before...
This is the third book in the Whale Has Wings series. While I hope you have read the previous two, the books do stand alone. However if you have not you will probably be slightly confused as to how history arrived here, so this is a summary to set the scene for the next act.
In 1932, the British Royal Navy finally reached the end of its patience with the RAF's penurial control of the Fleet Air Arm. They demanded its return, and after a short political campaign managed this. They were then in a position to make the changes and implement the plans they had been working on for some years. This meant new carrier planes more suited for the job they had foreseen. With more planes available, they reverted to the large-capacity carrier designs that started with the Ark Royal.
Through the 1930s the Fleet Air Arm continued to build steadily in strength. Although funds were short before 1937, the force was more capable than in our history. By the start of the war in 1939, there were a handful of light carriers available as well as the slightly earlier completion of large fleet carriers. This enabled a heavy night attack on the German port of Wilhelmshaven on the night of the 31st December 1939, which caused considerable damage to the German Fleet.
While the greater air power available to the Royal Navy was advantageous in the Norway campaign, it was insufficient to force the German Army back, and although the fighting was somewhat more successful, the Allies were forces to withdraw after France was invaded.
There was nothing the Fleet Air Arm could do to help the land fighting in France. However the stronger air arm available, led to somewhat different results of operations against the French after the fall of France.
Seeing a chance to pick over the spoils of the defeated Allies, Italy entered the war and the Royal Navy dusted off their plans for an attack on the Italian fleet. This took place at Taranto, and this time the carrier force was the three carriers originally planned. The Italian fleet did not fare well.
The successful Taranto strike did have an unexpected side effect. Paralysed by the shock, the Italian Navy demanded a delay in the Italian attack on Greece. While this did proceed, it was some weeks later than in our history. This meant that the attack against the Italian Army had a little more time to develop before being halted. With this extra time, and with more help from the French, the British advanced further into Italian North Africa. With the front line troops further forward, they decided to reinforce Greece with fresh troops rather than the tired veterans. However, this put the British in a far better defensive position when the German Africa Korps and the Italians counterattacked, and after a short campaign, the Allies had full control of North Africa.
This success wasn't enough to help Greece, which fell to a joint German and Italian force. The presence of fighters from British carriers helped the withdrawal, and with these and more troops brought out of Greece, Crete was held. With the Allies in no position to effectively attack in 1941, Hitler went ahead with Operation Barbarossa, the attack on Russia, meant to break the Soviet Union by Christmas. The Allies could do little to help except to provide an increasing stream of arms and supplies to the beleaguered Russians. The occupation in North Africa had one beneficial effect for the British. Without the need to constantly resupply and add to the forces there, it was possible to start the long-planned reinforcement of Malaya and Burma slightly earlier, and send some better officers east. This was seen as desperately needed, as with the fall of France and the fighting in Europe the Japanese Empire was casting covetous eyes on the resources of Southeast Asia and the Dutch East Indies.
Before the British defensive build-up could be completed, the Japanese Navy struck a terrible blow to the Americans, sinking most of their Pacific Battle Fleet at Pearl Harbor. The British land forces moved to their defensive positions while the Far Eastern Fleet, thankfully reinforced due to less need in the Mediterranean, prepared to take action against the Japanese invasion force.
This story is what happens next.
Attack on Kota Bharu, Malaya.
During the night of the 7th, the Japanese convoy heading for the Malay Peninsula had split up. Most of the ships headed west of northwest towards Siam, but a group of three large transports were heading south down the coast. This is noted with interest by the Singapore command; the SeaLance planes were keeping the Japanese under observation by radar, and due to the poor weather the planes themselves had been undetected by the Japanese. While there had been a number of technical issues, the ships didn't seem to realise they were being tracked, and no large course changes had been made which could have caused them to be lost. The splitting up of the fleet posed a problem; Park decided to keep tracking the southern force by radar (this was the only one that looked like it could directly attack Malaya), while a Hudson was sent out to try and keep the northern force under observation.
Unfortunately the poor weather - heavy cloud and intense rain - meant the Hudson could not find the northern group, and two Catalinas sent from Singapore had no better luck. One of the Catalinas failed to return. At the time, this was thought to be due to the bad weather but in fact this aircraft was the first Imperial casualty in the Pacific war, having been shot down by Japanese fighters escorting the convoy. The submarine patrol line had better luck. After dark, a signal was received that the northern group was indeed heading for Siam.
Because no invasion of the country or request for help from the Empire had been made by Siam, Operation Matador could not be put into action, as had been expected by both Park and Alexander. Instead, the troops and airfield at Koto Bharu were warned that an enemy landing 'may take place within the next 12-36 hours'. Non-essential personnel were evacuated from the forward air base and its satellite fields, and some of the reconnaissance planes flown south. The planes remaining were readied for immediate action. The forces in Malaya had already been put on alert when the convoys were spotted, and the state of readiness was increased. No hostile actions were to be permitted unless the Japanese actually attacked. While it was realised that this meant waiting and giving the invader the advantage, it was politically impossible to risk starting a war over what might, after all, just be a feint or an action not aimed at the Empire.
Just before midnight off Koto Bharu a heavy blanket of cloud set in, reaching almost 50 miles out to sea and coming down very low, giving the invasion transports excellent cover. The group consisted of three large transport ships, four destroyers and the cruiser HMIJS Chokai. Unfortunately, these clouds did nothing to hide them from the southernmost submarine in the British patrol line (HMS Urge), who had been waiting off the coast in case all or part of the convoy was indeed headed there. As the transports anchored, and started to lower their boats (some coming to grief in the heavy swell), her captain decided that this fell well within his remit to attack, and at 0130 he put three torpedoes into the biggest of the ships, the Ayatosan Maru, which immediately started to list heavily. In 10 minutes, she had rolled over and sunk with heavy loss of life. As expected, the escorting destroyers made an attack on where they thought the submarine was, but this was ineffective and she crept away to make her action report. The attack did not stop the Japanese troops unloading, indeed if anything the sight of the ship burning and listing gave them an extra incentive to get into the boats.
The sound of the torpedo explosions and the burning ship had been noticed by the Indian troops defending the beach. Already on alert, they fully manned their defences (the beach was covered by pillboxes, barbed wire and mines). At around 0230, heavy fire from the escorting Japanese warships landed on them. This was observed with satisfaction by HMS Urge, who used the concentration of the destroyers on the beach to put two torpedoes into the destroyer Isonami, which started to sink by the head immediately, bow broken off by one of the torpedoes. This time the counterattack was more accurate, and it took the submarine some hours to get clear, meaning she was unable to put in any more attacks that night.
While this had been happening, the airfield commander had been alerted and, on the assumption that this was a landing by the reported ships, an air strike was being assembled. His orders, while pointing out that no offensive action should be taken as long as the Japanese stayed outside territorial waters, left any response to his discretion if they moved inside them. The first planes to take off were a flight of nine torpedo-armed Beaufighters (based at the Gong Kedah satellite field), with two flare-carrying Hudsons to illuminate the targets. The airfield was very close to the coast, and it only took minutes before they reached the transports. Ironically, the burning ship which had for a time beautifully illuminated the area had sunk too quickly to be of use to them, and the Hudsons were forced to make a number of passes dropping flares. AA fire was heavy, and the second Hudson was hit and had to abort its run; it was close enough to be able to recover to the airfield despite its damage.
The Beaufighters went into their attack runs despite the limited illumination and the AA fire. One plane was hit and plunged into the sea, but the other eight dropped their torpedoes at the two anchored transports. Three torpedoes hit one of the ships (the other luckily being shielded by its compatriot) and it immediately began to sink, rolling over in only some 15 minutes.
While the air attacks were going in, the first of the Japanese landing craft were approaching the beach. The Indian troops defending it were well dug in behind barbed wire and pillboxes. Already on alert, the pyrotechnics out to sea had been watched by them with interest as they prepared, and while the limited bombardment by the Japanese had been unwelcome, it had done little to upset their preparations. The first thing they noticed was a couple of large craft (these were the lead Japanese assault craft) nosing in to shore. Considering it highly unlikely that this was a friendly tourist visit, they opened fire with machine guns and mortars, sinking one of the craft and leaving men swimming in the water. Despite this setback, and an increasing number of craft damaged (and in some cases sunk) by the defenders, the Japanese pressed on with their landing (perhaps encouraged by the fact that due to the attacks on the ships they had little hope of escape in any case), and a number of craft managed to unload their troops, although often in confused circumstances.
Reports of the actions and the attack on the ships had already been reported to Command in Singapore even before the submarine had managed to elude her attackers and make her report. It was obvious that if the Japanese were already attacking Malaya then it was too late to implement Matador. Indeed, any chance of actually using that plan had always been considered unlikely by Alexander and Park, and so the order was given for the alternative plan, Operation Krohcol, to proceed. Alexander had always felt that this was the plan that would actually be implemented, and had prepared the forces required accordingly. At Singapore, the fleet was ordered to sail before dawn; while no immediate night attack had been made (as had been feared), a daytime attack was considered a possibility, and in any case it was obvious that it might be possible to intercept some of the Japanese invasion force or their cover. What was unknown at the moment was how heavy any covering force was (due mainly to the bad weather, it had still not been spotted), and also what level of air support the invasion would have. Somerville had no intention of recklessly risking his ships for little gain, although he was happy to employ them in a calculated risk if the benefits warranted it. At the moment the only naval vessels reported was the small group accompanying the Koto Bharu invasion force, and he expected to be able to handle that with his submarines and RAF support unless the weather closed in dramatically. It seemed highly unlikely that this was the only IJN force in the area, and he wanted his force available to attack any larger force that presented itself.
An RAF Beaufighter squadron (torpedoes) and a Cormorant dive bomber squadron were put on alert for a dawn strike at the Koto Bharu invasion force and its escort. They would take off in a few hours. It was also intended to strike at the rest of the invasion fleet, which it was presumed was now attacking Siam; a reconnaissance was planned for dawn, followed by a torpedo strike once the ships had been located. Somerville's second line of submarines was currently oriented east-west to block off the lower part of the peninsula from an attack force. At the moment this would stay in place, however the northernmost two boats of the north-south line were ordered to be ready to attack the main part of the troop convoy once it had been located.
Meanwhile the aircraft at Koto Bharu were still taking very aggressive action against the landing force. There were eight Hudsons available, and these took off loaded with bombs to attack the remaining troop transport, which was also under fire from shore batteries. The Japanese AA fire was both heavy and accurate, one Hudson being shot down and three badly damaged, but they managed to hit the remaining transport ship with at least a dozen small bombs. It may also have been hit by the shore batteries, but in the confusion, this was impossible to determine. The ship was left on fire and slowly withdrawing from the landing zone, leaving her offloaded troops to take care of themselves.
The landing itself was a bloody affair. The landing craft themselves had been engaged by the defender's heavy weapons, causing a number of the boats to be sunk. The Japanese then had to make their way through the minefields and barbed wire, all the time under machine gun fire. Despite all this, many of them got as far as the Indian unit's trenches, where the battle came down to hand to hand fighting, the Japanese desperate to get ashore. The situation was only resolved in favour of the defence by the intervention of two Matilda tanks - due to the outlying but important geographical position of the airfield, it had been provided with a detachment of four tanks for its defence. Invulnerable to anything the Japanese could do, these acted as mobile machine gun positions to roll up the Japanese, and in the case of those men who did not retreat, rolling over them. By 0700, the landing had been defeated, although it took almost another day to mop up the final elements, the Japanese infantry preferring to die fighting rather than to surrender.
While the situation on the beaches near Koto Bharu had been contained by the early morning, the situation seen by the commanders at Singapore was far less comforting. During the night the action at Pearl Harbor had been reported, and had not gone down well. The naval contingent in particular was torn between sympathy for the American losses and amazement that they could have let themselves get caught in this way. The troops marked for Operation Khrocol, already alerted, were ordered to advance as soon as Singapore had confirmation that Siam had been attacked.
The Japanese also made a much larger impression on the staff when at 0320 a number of unknown aircraft were spotted by radar heading for Singapore. These were 17 G3M Nells (a total of 65 had been sent out, but this group was the only one to find the island given the bad weather). While the air defences of Singapore had been put on alert, only three night fighters were currently ready - these were sent up at 0345 to intercept the planes. The radar control was still unpractised at vectoring fighters into a close enough range that they could use their own radar to intercept the bombers, and as a result only four of them were shot down. The fighter pilots were surprised at how readily the Japanese bombers burst into flames compared to the bombers the Luftwaffe had been using over Britain. Also due to inexperience, and despite the drills, the civil defence and AA of Singapore did not perform well. While sirens were sounded at 0350, the response was poor, and for some reason the city was still not blacked out when the bombers arrived. The AA was ineffective, and no bombers were shot down. For their part, although some 50 people were killed, the bombers spread their attack between the naval base, the city, and two of the airfields, instead of concentrating on one target. As a result of this, no serious damage was done.
A reconnaissance flight had been sent off north just before dawn, to report on what it could find at the most likely landing places. It was anticipated that these would be close enough to French Indo China for the Japanese to have arranged some sort of fighter cover, so a Whirlwind was used rather than a Hudson. While it was hoped to get photographs, the plane was ordered to radio immediately if it found Siam being attacked, as that would allow Alexander to order his forces into the country. As soon as the ships had been detected, a strike would be sent off from Singapore, hopefully not only catching some of the ships but some of the troops as well.