Remembering the Battle of the Bismarck Sea....75 Years Later

For those of us who are fascinated by the intriguing twists and turns of history, there is a tendency to see almost every episode from the past as pivotal or as a turning point. While the largely forgotten Battle of the Bismarck Sea may not qualify as a genuine turning point in the grand scheme of World War II, it, nevertheless, represents a decisive juncture in the unfolding of the war in the Pacific. With the German name Bismarck, it sounds as if it were likely naval action that occurred in the waters of northern Europe near the coast of Germany. Actually, the Bismarck Sea is located in the southwest Pacific near New Guinea, named for the German leader Otto Von Bismarck during the days of European colonization there. Interestingly, although a sea battle, the U.S. Navy had only a relatively minor role. It was primarily fought, on the American side, by the Army Air Forces (USAAF), with land based bombers. Many readers may not realize that the United States Air Force did not come into existence as a separate and distinct branch of our armed forces until 1947, two years after the end of World War II. Before then, it was a part of the Army.

During early March of 1943, exactly 75 years ago this month, there was still a long, bloody road ahead until Germany and Japan would be finally defeated in 1945. But, the tide of the great conflict had ever so slowly, almost imperceptibly, shifted. It was what Winston Churchill had referred to as “the end of the beginning.” The Russians had finally turned on their German invaders. American and British forces were close to pushing the Germans and Italians out of North Africa, capturing over a quarter of a million enemy soldiers in the process. Hitler’s stubborn foolishness in trying to hold on in this part of the world would cost him over 250,000 front line troops, prisoners for the duration of the war. German U-boats were gradually losing their advantage in the epic Battle of the Atlantic, a titanic struggle to deny the passage of essential supplies from American factories and farms to the battlefields of Europe.

In the Pacific, the Japanese had conceded defeat to the Americans in the historic six month battle for Guadalcanal. Although somehow managing to evacuate the starving remnants of their army there, they had lost scores to battle, tropical disease, and starvation before finally throwing in the towel. Defeat on Guadalcanal had humiliated the proud Imperial Japanese Army and had galvanized them in their resolve to yield no more ground to the upstart Americans. They had determined to draw a line in the sand, some 900 miles to the north, in the wild and rugged jungles and mountains of New Guinea. WWII historian Henry Hitch Adams has described this area as having “some of the nastiest terrain in the world.” In those jungles and along those mountain passes the Americans and Australians were already pushing hard against occupying Japanese forces.

To stop the American-Australian advance in New Guinea, the Japanese needed more troops and supplies. From Rabaul, a powerful enemy base in northern New Guinea, almost 7000 soldiers, along with precious war fighting supplies, were dispatched to turn back and destroy the growing Yankee-Aussie coalition. They sailed on the last day of February, 1943, packed aboard eight troop transport ships and eight screening destroyers. Bad weather gave reason for hope that American aircraft would not be able to spot the large enemy convoy through a thick and stormy cloud cover. The Japanese cause in New Guinea rested heavily upon their safe arrival, almost 400 miles to the south, at the port of Lae.

Once again, the American ability to intercept and decode Japanese messages paid huge dividends. Alerted to the enemy’s intentions to reinforce their army, U.S. reconnaissance aircraft began searching for the convoy. On March 1, through a hole in the clouds, an American B-24 spotted the slowmoving, ocean-going supply train, and immediately reported its position in the Bismarck Sea. The weather then began to clear, a providential blessing for the Allies, but a cause of grave concern for the Japanese. For the next two days, beginning on March 2, American and Australian bombers, flying from airstrips in southern New Guinea, places like Port Moresby and Milne Bay, pummeled the Japanese vessels. Higher altitude B-17 bombers did some damage. However, the convoy would still likely have made it to Lae, with manageable losses, had it not been for the daring of some specially equipped aircraft employing a new tactic.

Certain B-25 medium bombers and A-20 light bombers participating in the attack had been modified with multiple .50 caliber machine guns in their noses. This enabled them to also function somewhat like smaller attack aircraft. Interestingly, the B-25 was the same vaunted aircraft used in the morale-

Week of March 25

Lunch & Learn for Social Workers and Discharge Planners at 12 noon on Tuesday, March 27 at Morning Pointe, located at 660 Jolly Road NW in Calhoun. Join us for an educational luncheon as Elder Law Attorney David McGuffey speaks about issues affecting the senior population. This talk is eligible for CEU credit.

Gordon County Extension Lunch & Learn - Composting and Mulching with Gordon County Extension Agent Greg Bowman on Wednesday, March 28, 12 noon - 1:15 p.m. at the Gordon County Agricultural Service Center on 53 Spur in Calhoun. Do you know that landscape refuse can account for up to 20 percent of the waste being placed in landfills? Composting and mulching is an alternative by recycling these natural materials and putting them to good use on a property. For more information, call Gordon Extension at 706629-8685 or email Greg Bowman at gbowman@ uga.edu.

Week of April 1

FIRST THURSDAY BOOK CLUB will meet on Thursday, April 5, at Shoney’s on Red Bud Road at 7 p.m. We will discuss I’LL NEVER GET OUT OF THIS WORLD ALIVE by Steve Earle. “Earle brings to his prose the same authenticity, poetic spirit, and cinematic energy he projects in his music. I’ll Never Get Out of This World Alive is like a dream you can’t shake, offering beauty and remorse, redemption in spades.” —Patti Smith. ALL ARE WELCOME! Arrive a little earlier to enjoy dinner! For more information contact Roberta Charbonneau at 678-773-5655.

SISTERS Team for American Cancer Relay for Life will sponsor a Bake Sale and Pinto Bean Dinner on Saturday, April 7 from 4-7 p.m. at Resaca City Hall Building with special guests Highway 411 for entertainment.

Week of April 8

Gordon County Extension Lunch & Learn - Drop Them Pruners Until You Know What You Are Doing with Keith Mickler of Floyd County Extension on Tuesday, April 10, 12 noon - 1:15 p.m. at the Gordon County Agricultural Service Center on 53 Spur in Calhoun. A lively look at pruning mistakes and how not to let yourself fall into the pruning pit of misery. For more information, call Gordon Extension at 706-6298685 or email Greg Bowman at gbowman@ uga.edu. boosting Doolittle Raid on Tokyo almost a year earlier. Normally, both the B-25 and the A-20 would drop their bombs, in typical bomber fashion, down onto their targets from above. Now, with this new weapon configuration in their arsenal, these two aircraft would approach their targets at just above the water level, strafing with their machine guns to suppress anti-aircraft fire and “skip” bombing their targets. Bombs were released in such a way as to skip across the water and strike a ship in its side. It is exactly the same principle employed by a youngster skipping rocks along the water’s surface at a lake or pond.

Needless to say, such aerial acrobatics in larger, somewhat less maneuverable bombers were not for the faint of heart. Approaching the target ship, the bomb would be dropped just before the aircraft seemed likely to strike the masthead of the ship. Pulling up sharply and experiencing some significant G-forces, the goal was then to get as far away from the ship as possible before the bomb that had just been dropped exploded. Bombs utilized in skip bombing were specially retrofitted with 5 second delay fuses, giving the aircraft just enough time to get safely clear of the bomb blast. Gutsy skip bombing attacks by American and Australian pilots in the Battle of the Bismarck Sea were nothing short of devastating to the Japanese.

Finally, just after midnight on the morning of March 4, the U.S. Navy arrived on the scene to do its part. A group of eight PT boats, all similar to the one later commanded by future President John F. Kennedy, swarmed in among the surviving Japanese ships. In the darkness, they terrorized the enemy with gunfire and torpedoes. When the sun came up, only two crippled Japanese destroyers remained afloat. They were soon sent to the bottom by bombers later in the day.

The final tally for the Japanese was ghastly and staggering. In the midst of the melee, four Japanese destroyers, three of them damaged but still seaworthy, had gathered survivors out of the water and from the decks of sinking ships. Somehow they had managed to flee back to Rabaul. All of the other vessels, eight troop transports and four destroyers, were now on the bottom of the Bismarck Sea. Almost 3000 enemy soldiers and sailors were dead. Additionally, the Japanese had lost some 20 fighter aircraft, maybe more, attempting to protect their precious convoy.

This critical attempt to reinforce the Japanese army in New Guinea had been an abject failure. The enemy would never again be able to bring in additional men and supplies in the numbers necessary to hold off the Americans and Australians. The Battle of the Bismarck Sea had been a decisive and total Allied victory, paving the way for success in New Guinea, which in turn opened the door, geographically speaking, for the liberation of the Philippines. Skip bombing, first utilized by multiple aircraft in the Bismarck Sea, would remain a devastating bombing tactic throughout the war.

As is so often the case, behind the victory in the Bismarck Sea there was a man, a key individual. He was not physically present in the fighting on those days, but definitely vital to the ultimate outcome. That man, a larger than life figure who is mostly forgotten today, was Paul “Pappy” Gunn. His story reads like a war novel from the pen of a highly imaginative author. But, it’s all true; and we will learn more about his remarkable exploits in the next installment of the World War II Diary. Stay tuned.

In the meantime, let us never forget the brave pilots and crew members who flew across the wave tops in the Bismarck Sea, writing yet another chapter in the colossal saga of World War II. Thirteen of them paid the ultimate price. Remember them all, and their sacrificial service in the preservation of our freedom....75 years ago.

“If we forget what we did, we won’t know who we are....” Ronald Reagan