Though the attention of the Western Allies was fixed uneasily upon the territorial gains of the Japanese, that of the most influential Japanese strategists continued to concentrate upon the war at sea. It was to be the greatest naval war in history. The great prize of war would be the mastery of the Pacific Ocean, and this would go to whichever Navy proved to be the stronger. The Japanese war planners, in the months after Pearl Harbor, had kept a very flexible outlook. Some favoured a blow in the Indian Ocean, which would open the way to military operations in the region. There was even talk of a naval sweep of the Indian Ocean, which would end with the Japanese making contact at Suez with the victorious German armies. Others wanted an attack in the South Pacific which would isolate Australia; others a renewal of the attack on Hawaii which Pearl Harbor had begun.
Nearly all sections agreed that Japan must continue to be aggressive. Only by exploiting the impetus gained by Pearl Harbor could Japan even seem to prosper. The long-term odds against Japan were so desperate that the conversion of the war into a defensive one would have been half to admit defeat. The best course lay in a constant series of surprises, which would divert attention from the sombre reality of Japan’s true position.
During all this period, the Japanese Army showed little willingness to embark on joint plans with the Navy. At this time the situation and prospects of Germany were very uncertain: it was in the middle of its great adventure against Russia, which, if successful, would have altered the complexion of the war; the Japanese Army was therefore anxious to keep its hands free, so that it could be ready to strike whenever this might, by the unfolding of events, become desirable. Although, by its southward move, Japan had turned its back upon Russia, and was genuinely anxious to make its Non-Aggression Pact with Russia a reality, it could not ignore the fact that Russia was reeling. If it were to be defeated, or to be in obvious danger of defeat, a new situation would come into being, and Japan would be driven to interfere in Siberia. Its divided attention during these months probably accounts for the salvation of India, and perhaps of Australia, from invasion.
The centre of initiative in the months between Pearl Harbor and June 1942 was the brain of Admiral Yamamoto Isoroku. It is true that, as Commander-in-Chief of the Combined Fleet, he remained technically subordinate to the Naval General Staff. But he was regarded by everyone as the author of the victory at Pearl Harbor, and he used the prestige which this gave him to impose his concepts upon more conservative Japanese admirals. In Yamamoto, Japan had produced one of its undisputed geniuses of the war: a man whose ideas gave a new turn to naval strategy, and who had the capacity to translate the ideas into action.
As a next move, Japan sent a fleet of five aircraft carriers and four battleships, one light and two heavy cruisers and eleven destroyers, into the Pacific Ocean in the direction of Ceylon. It was a superbly well-balanced fleet, incomparably stronger and more efficient than any other then afloat. It was under the command of Admiral Nagumo Chūichi, who had had the operational command at Pearl Harbor. It was a task force very similar to that which had raided Pearl Harbor, and its objective was to bomb Colombo and a naval base at Trincomalee in the same manner, though of course it could not hope for the same element of surprise. It was seeking out the Eastern Fleet of the British Royal Navy, and would try to put it out of action in the Far East by dealing it the same crippling blow that had been inflicted on the American Pacific Fleet. In support of Nagumo, and to throw the enemy into confusion, a Second Expeditionary Fleet, called Malay Force, raided shipping and attacked shore installations along the east coast of India. This Fleet was split into three divisions covered by a screening force. Altogether this meant that Nagumo’s Striking Force effectively was augmented by the Ryujō (a light carrier carrying forty-eight aircraft), three heavy cruisers, two light cruisers and fifteen destroyers. The Japanese operations in the Indian Ocean were destined to be shortlived, but their formidable nature is self-evident from the size of the forces which the Japanese devoted to the accomplishment of their objectives.
This was a foreshortened version of the plan first prepared by Yamamoto’s Combined Fleet Staff. They had wanted the Army to contribute an expeditionary force of five divisions, far larger than the forces employed in Malaya or the Philippines, to occupy the entire island of Ceylon. This in turn was to be the precursor of a grand plan to link up with German forces advancing from the Caucasus through the Middle East. The Army, owing to its preoccupations with the magnetic north, refused to take part in the plan.
On 1 April 1942 the British Admiral, Sir James Somerville, was alerted to the presence of Nagumo’s fleet, and concentrated his available force to meet him. Somerville had a fairly large fleet, five battleships, five light and two heavy cruisers, three aircraft-carriers and fourteen destroyers; but only one of his lumbering battleships, H M S Warspite, was modernized. All five of his capital ships were fatigued, having begun their active service in the midst of the First World War, a quarter century before. Somerville’s two fleet carriers, H M S Indomitable and H M S Formidable, were of the latest British designs and carried thirty-five to forty aircraft. His only other carrier, tiny HMS Hermes, the British first ship ever designed and built as an aircraft carrier, normally carried a complement of only nine obsolete swordfish torpedo-bomber/reconnaissance aircraft but could squeeze in half a dozen extra aircraft at a cost of seriously reduced ship efficiency. All these vessels were thoroughly outclassed by the fighting ships of Nagumo’s Carrier Strike Force, which deployed more than 360 aircraft. On the other hand, Somerville had the enormous advantage that he held the Japanese naval cipher; and the Japanese did not suspect this. No major shift took place in the Japanese disposition but he was aware of it as soon as it happened. The eyes which this gave him were probably decisive in the action which followed.
On 4 April the Japanese made what was intended to be a major air strike at Colombo. They found the British alert to the attack; no warship was in harbour; the British air forces were already in the air, and gave the Japanese a fair fight. The Japanese, denied the advantage of surprise, broke off the attack to bomb, and sink, two British heavy cruisers, which had approached dangerously near to the Japanese aircraft-carriers from which the bombing planes had come.
Somerville had in the meanwhile discovered that Nagumo’s force was larger than he had at first supposed. He recognized that he was hopelessly outclassed; his old and very slow battleships were no match for the enemy. He was therefore forced to take evasive action by day, and attempt to engage the Japanese at night, although in fact no naval engagement took place. On 9 April Nagumo made an air strike at Trincomalee, the British naval base, but again failed to take it by surprise. The anti-aircraft and fighter defences were formidable: nevertheless the Japanese bombers did more harm than they had done at Colombo. They ended the raid by locating and sinking the little Hermes.
With that, the Japanese raid into the Indian Ocean came to an end. Their total loss had been five bombers and six fighters. They had sunk an aircraft-carrier and two heavy cruisers, with naval auxiliaries and 112,312 tons of merchant shipping, and they had destroyed thirty-nine British aircraft. This coincided with Japanese submarine raids off the west coast of India which sent five more ships of 32,404 tons to the bottom. The combined effect of these operations was that military and merchant shipping traffic on both sides of the Indian sub-continent was thoroughly disrupted. In conjunction with the Japanese casualties at Pearl Harbor, their losses were absurdly low from this initial combat with the American and the British navies. In ships traded, Somerville came off decidedly the worse. But he had saved the bulk of his fleet from the destruction that might have overtaken it from the Japanese aircraft-carriers, and for this he had to thank Allied decipherers of the Japanese naval codes.
By this time, the British had convinced themselves that a Japanese attack upon Madagascar was imminent. This was a familiar theme: as early as November 1940 the Joint Intelligence Committee had received information indicating that the Vichy Government of France had yielded to German pressure and were prepared to accept Japanese occupation of the entire island. Following on the recent example of French Indo-China, it seemed exceptionally unlikely that the Vichy colonial administration on the island would refuse to permit the Japanese to establish at least submarine berths and depot facilities there. The establishment of Japanese air bases on the island was a distinct possibility, and there were even fears that Japanese cruisers might find shelter in the harbours of the island. Thus, even prior to the mutilation of Admiral Sir James Somerville’s Eastern Fleet by Admiral Nagumo’s five carriers, there seemed to be a considerable risk that if the Japanese were not forestalled, Britain’s imperial lifeline round the Cape to India, Australia and New Zealand might be severed; South Africa, together with the coastline of the whole of British East Africa, might be exposed to an effective blockade and the flow of Persian oil to the West might suffer serious disruption.
The British also had to consider the views of their Allies. The South African Prime Minister, General Jan Christian Smuts, never one to mince his words with Winston Churchill, made no secret of his desire to see something done quickly: he regarded Madagascar as ‘the key to the safety of the Indian Ocean’. The Americans were inclined to agree: they encouraged the British to take the matter in hand. General Charles de Gaulle, likewise, fancied his own chances at capturing the whole island for the Free French, provided that the British gave him the necessary air and naval cooperation. Neither the British nor the South Africans were willing to risk another joint venture with de Gaulle’s forces after the débâcle at Dakar.
Churchill and his advisers mulled over these ideas for several months. Ultimately, the Prime Minister brushed aside doubts expressed by the Chief of the Imperial General Staff and the objections of his Director of Military Operations to ‘Bonus’, a plan to invade Madagascar. ‘We are not setting out to subjugate Madagascar but rather to establish ourselves in key positions to deny it to a far-flung Japanese attack,’ he reminded the Chiefs of Staff. The War Cabinet, as usual, gave the Prime Minister what he wanted. Smuts and Roosevelt were informed; de Gaulle was not.
The forces required for the operation, renamed ‘Ironclad’, interspersed themselves in the stream of reinforcements bound for India and Ceylon. They assembled in Cape Town at the end of April and then moved on to Durban a few days later before setting sail for the short voyage to Madagascar. The attack on 5 May was spearheaded by Force 121, a commando and three brigades of Royal Marines led by Major-General R. C. Sturges, RM, supported by air and naval gun protection afforded by a considerable task force comprising two British aircraft-carriers, the venerable dreadnought H M S Ramillies, two cruisers, eleven destroyers and thirty other vessels. It was the first large-scale amphibious operation conducted by British forces since Churchill’s Dardanelles campaign of the First World War. Nevertheless, Madagascar is an island larger than metropolitan France and more than twice the size of the United Kingdom. The plan was predicated upon a hope that the French colonial governor would offer no more than token resistance. The French garrison was believed to number only 6,000 troops, mostly African, and a few ragtail aircraft. The two initial objectives therefore were confined to storming of the outstanding natural harbour at Diego Suarez on the northern tip of the island and seizure of an airfield five miles to the south. Against all odds, the French stoutly resisted, however, and Churchill finally ordered the overall commander of the task force, Vice-Admiral Sir Neville Syret, to break off the attack in order to give the French Governor-General of Madagascar, Armand Annet, time to reconsider his predicament.
Meanwhile, at the end of April, five fleet submarines of the Japanese Fourth Submarine Flotilla had proceeded from Penang across the Indian Ocean towards East Africa on the first of two special missions by such forces intended to distract Allied commanders from the forthcoming Midway and Aleutians campaign. Refuelled by two supply vessels which sailed with them, the little hunting pack soon reached its target zone. Floatplanes catapulted from the decks of the 2,400-ton headquarters submarine 1-10 and at least one scouting submarine searched in vain for enemy warships in the ports of East Africa from as early as the first week of May. They only narrowly missed finding the British task force at Durban by four days. The Japanese then headed north towards the commotion at Diego Suarez. During a reconnaissance flight over the British invasion force after nightfall on 29 May, one of the Japanese floatplanes was spotted by the British, who opened fire without result. The British forces were alerted but to no avail. On the next night, at a distance of about ten miles from the harbour entrance, two midget submarines of the same class as those launched prior to the Pearl Harbor attack were released from their mother ships, the 1-16 and 1-20 attack submarines. Penetrating the British defensive screen, they entered the harbour, sank a tanker and badly damaged H M S Ramillies. Only luck and efficient damage control saved the battleship from total loss.
It was an effective reminder of that vulnerability which the British had every reason to fear in eastern waters, and it scuppered any remaining hopes that the desultory armistice negotiations then underway with Annet would lead to any early solution. As these negotiations dragged on without result, British patience waned. The Chiefs of Staff in London, concerned at recent reverses in the Middle East and worried at the possibility of a Japanese invasion of India, ruled out any resumption of the offensive on Madagascar until the broader strategic picture looked more favourable. As the summer drew to a close, a fresh East African brigade and a brigade of South African troops arrived in September to assist one of the brigades that had taken part in the initial landings and between them they mopped up what remained of the Vichy forces on the island. Two months later, the French governor finally surrendered in November after it had become abundantly clear that his position was untenable.
All but a remnant of the marines employed in the initial assault had re-embarked and sailed for India as soon as Diego Suarez itself was secured. Most of the naval support ships also quickly resumed their normal work. However the campaign as a whole was far more protracted than the British had anticipated. While the casualties sustained in the fighting had been light, malaria had cut a swath through the British troops during their cat and mouse game with the French after the initial struggle. Plans to reinforce frontline troops in India utilizing the forces engaged in this part of the Madagascan operation suffered setbacks and, according to the British official history of the war against Japan, this in turn was to have a considerable effect upon Wavell’s plans in the following months. This, like much of the Madagascan operation, remains a somewhat contentious point.
Ironically, the Japanese never had any intention of using Diego Suarez for themselves. Even Hitler recognized that the Vichy authorities would not have agreed to such a suggestion. The Japanese Navy regarded the Indian Ocean as a comparative backwater. They had missed a few opportunities yet they could look with satisfaction upon the whole Madagascan campaign as a fine short-term success.
Their next blow was another feint by submarines, this time delivered against Sydney Harbour in New South Wales. It was more or less intended as a carbon copy of the East African raid. Twenty-four hours after the attack on the British at Diego Suarez, a submarine-borne scout plane reconnoitred the harbour and escaped detection. On the following night four other submarines launched their midget submarines. The raiders sank one vessel of no military significance and failed to hit a nearby American heavy cruiser anchored in the harbour. The attack produced fright and pandemonium locally but had no greater result. Allied cryptanalysts had begun to unmask the true objectives of Yamamoto’s main forces. Although it is tempting to compare the tip-and-run tactics of the Doolittle raiders and those of the Japanese submariners, their consequences were altogether dissimilar.
In May 1942 the United States became aware of the fact that the Japanese were concentrating massive land, sea and air forces in the Japanese Mandated Islands in preparation for another major offensive. At this point it was not clear where the Japanese intended to strike. For a time Admiral Nimitz, as Commander-in-Chief of the Pacific Fleet (CINCPAC), was advised by his cryptanalysts and radio traffic analysts that the next move of the enemy might well be to enlarge the Coral Sea operation into the maelstrom of a final main fleet action fought between the two sides. As early as 6 May, however, CINCPAC correctly revised this estimate and observed that the Japanese might move into the Central and North Pacific areas. The Navy Department’s own cryptographic team in Washington, DC, Op20G, worked on similar material but still believed that the Japanese were intent on moving south. General MacArthur’s people supplied him with information which supported his demands for 1,000 more aircraft, 100,000 fresh troops and two carriers of his own to add to his existing strength in the South-West Pacific: he anticipated that the Japanese intended to complete their conquest of New Guinea and then catapult themselves on to the Australian mainland. Meanwhile the United States Army’s Air Intelligence experts were advising the head of the Army Air Corps, General Henry Arnold, that the Japanese were preparing to mount an assault on the American West Coast. The Chief of Staff of the United States Army, however, withstood pleas for any massive reinforcement of the American position in the Pacific. The ‘Europe First’ strategy agreed with the British was in safe hands.
Whether that was the wisest course will always be a subject for debate. Franklin Roosevelt himself had his doubts. Public opinion, although unaware that any formal decision had been reached, was deeply divided over the issue. The American public’s thirst for a campaign of revenge against the architects of the Pearl Harbor attack was unslakable. There was also the thought so bitterly expressed by President Mañuel Quezon of the Philippine Commonwealth as his life ebbed away during his unequal struggle with tuberculosis: ‘I cannot stand this constant reference to England, to Europe… How typically American to writhe in anguish at the fate of a distant cousin while a daughter is being raped in the back room!’ Nevertheless, the political centre of gravity in the United States remained on the East Coast, where concern about the extension of Nazi influence from across the European continent to the United Kingdom outweighed all countervailing considerations. Moreover, the Third Reich was incomparably stronger than the Japanese Empire. Most Americans regarded themselves as merely temporary foster parents of the Philippines but as the sons and daughters of European cultures that Hitler and Mussolini seemed determined to brutalize or obliterate. Europe came first.