Battle near Endau (1942)
Japanese destroyer Asagiri , whose torpedoes sank the British destroyer Thanet in the battle off Endau .
| date | 26./27. January 1942 |
|---|---|
| place | off Endau , northeast coast of Johor , Malay Peninsula |
| output | Japanese victory |
| consequences | Allied withdrawal. Largely undisturbed landing of Japanese troops near Endau and support of the Japanese advance against Singapore. |
| Parties to the conflict | |
|---|---|
| Commander | |
| Troop strength | |
| 1 light cruiser 6 destroyers 5 minesweepers 2 troop transports ~ 60 aircraft |
2 destroyers 76 aircraft |
| losses | |
|
2 troop transports damaged |
1 destroyer sunk |
The battle near Endau was an air and sea battle fought off the coast of Endau in 1942 during the Second World War in the context of the Japanese attack on the Malay Peninsula between a Japanese invasion fleet and two Allied destroyers and the air forces on both sides. in the north of the Malay state of Johor , and ended in a victory for the vastly superior Japanese invasion forces, in which a British destroyer was sunk. The battle at Endau was also the last Allied attempt to prevent Japanese landings on the Malay Peninsula by advancing their own naval forces.
prehistory
The planned landing of the Japanese at Endau took place in the context of the Japanese invasion of the Malay Peninsula from December 8, 1941 , the aim of which was the capture of Singapore . In order to accelerate the advance of the Japanese units approaching from the north (which had landed near Kota Bahru at the beginning of December 1941) in the direction of Singapore and to support them, flanking landings near Endau and a reinforcement of nearby Singora were planned for the end of January 1942 standing Japanese troops, which would have put the Commonwealth units north of Endau under pressure. To this end, the Japanese pulled together naval and transport forces for the planned landing operation in the (Japanese-controlled) Cam Ranh Bay in French Indochina , which had been occupied by the Japanese in the summer of 1941.
In addition to the light cruiser Sendai , six destroyers as well as several minesweepers and submarine hunters as immediate local security, eleven troop transports were used. Remote and air security of the operation should provide the aircraft carrier Ryūjō , the heavy cruisers Suzuya and Kumano , the light cruiser Yura and three other destroyers. In addition to around 30 to 40 aircraft on board the Ryūjō , there were also around 20 to 30 land-based aircraft that were to fly over the air raid protection landing head, operating from southern Thailand . On board the transporter fleet were the bulk of the Japanese 18th Infantry Division as well as parts of a construction battalion, whose task it was to prepare the Allied airfields near Kluang for flight operations again after the conquest by the Japanese. In total there were around 10,000 soldiers on board the transporters.
Course of the battle
On January 20, 1942, the Japanese ships left Cam Ranh Bay and headed for the Malay Peninsula . After reinforcements landed at Singora on January 24th, the warships of the local security continued to Endau with two transporters (and 2,000 soldiers on board), but on January 26, 1942, at 8:30 a.m., the unit was operated by two RAAF - Hudson scouts of the Allied aerial observation was recorded and reported. Since the convoy was already about ten nautical miles north of Endau at this point , the landing could not be disrupted at first. At 11.00 a.m. the first Japanese soldiers landed against little resistance at Endau and were about 80 kilometers north of Singapore .
Allied air raids on January 26, 1942
During the January 26, 1942 took off from Singapore and Palembang ( Sumatra including about 20 heavily outdated) from a total of 76 British and Australian aircraft, Vickers Vildebeest - torpedo planes , Hudson bomber and fighter aircraft of the types Brewster Buffalo and Hawker Hurricane to the Japanese Attack landing head at Endau. The attacks, carried out in several waves, dragged on throughout the day, with the two Japanese troop transporters Kansai Maru (8,614 GRT) and Canberra Maru (6,477 GRT) being damaged by gunfire and bombs. In addition, the Japanese landing beaches were attacked and shot at at low altitude. About 20 to 25 Japanese sailors and soldiers were killed. In return, however, the Allies suffered heavy losses due to the Japanese anti-fighter defense and the fire from the ship's flak .
The second wave of attacks alone, which reached Endau at around 5:20 p.m. and which consisted of 23 aircraft, lost eight aircraft with 22 flight personnel. A wave of six British Hudson bombers attacking in the evening hours , which had previously started in Palembang on Sumatra , lost two machines and did not score a single hit. On January 26, 1942, a total of 15 British and Australian aircraft were lost via Endau without the Japanese invasion troops being significantly disturbed. At least 28 Allied pilots, navigators and gunmen were killed and seven others were wounded. The Japanese lost seven aircraft, including four land-based Ki-27 fighters , and six pilots in repelling the attacks .
Nocturnal advance of Allied destroyers: 26./27. February 1942
After it became known that the previously recognized on the landing fleet air strikes had no great effect to achieve, and not delay the landing in this regard had been able, by January 26 were 1942 in the afternoon Singapore from the two destroyers Thanet ( Royal Navy ) and vampires ( Royal Australian Navy ) marched to attack the Japanese off Endau. Both ships were obsolete, World War I veterans , and had only four inch guns . Both commanders, Commander William TA Moran and Commander Bernard S. Davies, were well aware of this fact and the fact that the Japanese cover forces were vastly superior. As a result, it was planned to surprisingly get to the two Japanese transporters in the night hours in a quick advance and to sink them with torpedo shots. Then both destroyers should sail south again at high speed. Long artillery fights with the Japanese security should be avoided at all costs.
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The mission, carried out at high risk, went differently than planned. At 2.37 a.m., just under eight nautical miles from Endau, both destroyers suddenly encountered the Japanese minesweeper W-1 , which was functioning as an outpost ship, in the dark . Although initially mistakenly addressed as destroyer by the Allied side and unsuccessfully attacked by the vampire with two torpedoes at a distance of about 600 m, the minesweeper managed to escape undamaged and alert the other Japanese security ships, which nullified the element of surprise hoped for by the Allied side . After the emergency call from W1 , the Japanese cover forces ran towards the two Allied destroyers.
At 3.18 a.m. , just under a nautical mile from Endau, the vampires encountered the Japanese destroyer Shirayuki and attacked it with two torpedoes, which however again missed the target. Four torpedoes fired by the Thanet also failed. After the first exchange of fire, the main Japanese armed forces , including the light cruiser Sendai and the destroyers Asagiri , Hatsuyuki , Fubuki and Yūgiri , intervened in the beginning battle from 3:25 a.m. from the north . In view of the overwhelming power, the two Allied destroyers then fled south at full speed.
In the nocturnal pursuit, which was carried out at high speed, initially neither side succeeded in getting hits. The Thanet was not hit by two 14 cm shells from the Sendai and some 12.7 cm shells from the destroyer Shirayuki in the engine room at about 3:50 a.m. The ship then quickly lost speed and was overtaken by the Japanese units. At 4.12 a.m., two Type 93 torpedoes fired by the destroyer Asagiri hit the old British ship, whereupon the ship capsized and sank within three minutes. Since the Japanese Association for the defaulted Thanet concentrated that could Vampire at high speed in darkness escape and reached the morning of January 27, 1942, at 10:00 am, again Singapore . The unsuccessful advance of the two destroyers was also the last Allied attempt to disrupt the Japanese landing at Endau.
Consequences and losses
The successful landing at Endau and the deployment of troops at Singora helped to facilitate the Japanese advance on Singapore, but had no strategic effect on the campaign on the Malay Peninsula, as the capture of Singapore by the Japanese would have been extremely likely even without the landing . The extent to which the conquest of the city was accelerated by the landings is difficult to prove, but if so, it should have been at most a time window of a few days.
The Japanese suffered very few losses on the landing themselves. Although the two transport ships were damaged and seven fighter protection aircraft were lost, the number of those killed is likely to be a maximum of 30 soldiers, pilots and seamen. Most of the victims resulted from the attacks of the planes operating from Singapore on the landing beaches.
On the Allied side, however, a destroyer and at least 15 aircraft were lost, including 13 from Singapore and two from Palembang . The number of those killed is at least 79. These included 28 members of the flying personnel and (presumably) 51 crew members of the Thanet , including the seamen who later perished in Japanese captivity. Of the 116 crew members of the Thanet , 20 were killed during the battle, but at least 31 were rescued from the water by the destroyer Shirayuki that night . There is no precise information about the fate of these 31 men. However, it is considered certain that they were handed over to Japanese land troops near Endau on January 28, 1942 and that they later died in captivity in an unknown location, possibly they were also victims of reprisals in January 1942. According to unconfirmed reports, however, one should Sailors survived captivity (?). 65 crew members of the Thanet remained in their lifeboats at sea, were fished the next day by the British patrol ship Giang Bee and landed in Singapore. The number of seafarers who perished in captivity is included in the adjacent information block in the number of dead and missing.
literature
- Dull, Paul S .: A battle history of the Imperial Japanese Navy, 1941–1945 . Naval Institute Press, Annapolis 2007.
- Gill, Hermon G .: Australia in the War of 1939-1945: Series Two Navy: Volume I: The Royal Australian Navy, 1939-1942 . Chapter 15 (ADBA / ANZAC). Australian War Memorial. Canberra 1957.
- Whitley, Mike J .: Destroyers in World War II. Technology, classes, types . Motorbuchverlag, Stuttgart 1991.
Web links
- The cruiser Sendai near Nihon Kaigun (English).
- The Thanet at Naval History.
- The Thanet at the National Ex-Services Association.
- The Battle of Endau (Naval Historical Society of Australia) (English).
Footnotes
- ↑ http://www.combinedfleet.com/W-1_t.htm
- ↑ http://www.navyhistory.org.au/action-off-endau/
- ↑ http://www.combinedfleet.com/sendai_t.htm
- ↑ http://www.naval-history.net/xGM-Chrono-10DD-07T-Thanet.htm
- ↑ Archive link ( Memento of the original from May 1, 2012 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.
- ↑ Archived copy ( Memento of the original from April 30, 2012 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.
