The Naval Battle of Guadalcanal
By: Captain Walter Karig
and Commander Eric Purdon
From: The United States Navy in World War II
Compiled and edited by: S. E. Smith
. . . There was no respite for either side.
The Japanese intensified their efforts to cut the American supply line and step up the capacity of their own. With the former they achieved considerable success, but with the latter they were not so fortunate. Their only means of reinforcement was by the Tokyo Express, and twenty-four of our submarines made its periodic journeys through the Slot hazardous. During the first half of November the submarines sank at least six ships, and damaged seven more of assorted classes.
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| USS Atlanta (circa November, 1941) |
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| USS San Francisco date, location unknown |
On the 7th, Guadalcanal planes attacked an enemy light cruiser and ten destroyers. They scored one bomb and two torpedo hits on the cruiser, damaged two destroyers and shot down sixteen planes.
The Japanese continued to try to lighten the pressure on the defending forces. The darker the night the more certain the Marines could be that enemy units by squads and platoons were being sneaked ashore. In counter action, PT boats from Tulagi attacked repeatedly. On the night of November 6-7 they sank a destroyer. Two more were damaged on other nights.
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| USS Helena in 1940 |
Such reinforcements dribbling in to the beleaguered Japanese were far from adequate and the cost in transportation was profligate. The Japanese realized that they would have to make another major strike. Again they gathered and concentrated a fleet in the Rabaul-Buin area.
This time, the Japanese said in effect, we won’t be stopped. Nothing the Americans can bring together will be strong enough. And the roving, watchful reconnaissance planes, emblazoned with the star of the United States, counted sixty enemy ships in anchorages of Buin, Faisi and Tonolei.
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| USS Sterett DD-407 |
They included four battleships, six cruisers, two carriers, and thirty-three destroyers besides more than a score of transports and cargo ships.
Vice Admiral William F. Halsey Jr., Commander South Pacific Force and South Pacific Area, had no force like this. Only one carrier, the Enterprise, was near-by, and she was in Noumea being repaired. The Big E could not possibly be ready to fight again until the third week in November, the wounded ship’s bedside report had it. But news of impending battle hastened recovery.
The Allied forces on Guadalcanal had received some reinforcements from Efate on November 6. Now seven more United States transports were scheduled to sail from other ports with much-needed supplies and men. These would have to be protected and, probably, a major enemy offensive simultaneously would have to be beaten back. If we couldn’t accomplish that, the Solomons campaign would be finished––and with it our position in the entire South Pacific would be dangerously compromised.
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| Admiral R. K. Turner |
In all, about 6,000 men were to be put ashore from the seven transports. For their protection Admiral Richmond Kelly Turner had a force of only twenty combatant ships: three heavy cruisers, one light cruiser, two anti-aircraft light cruisers, and fourteen destroyers. These were based at Noumea, New Caledonia, and Espiritu Santo, New Hebrides.
Task force TARE’s Noumea section sailed first on the afternoon of Sunday, November 8. Espiritu Santo Section 2 followed next morning, with the first section leaving early Tuesday. All were to rendezvous on Wednesday morning, the 11th, southeast of San Cristobal.
By the afternoon of Monday, November 9, there was no longer any doubt that the Japanese had started a vast amphibious offensive. Reconnaissance and intelligence reports led Admiral Turner to estimate that the enemy planned to use two to four carriers, possibly two to four fast battleships, as well as cruisers and destroyers, to the northward of Guadalcanal. As protection for at least one division of troops in eight to twelve transports, the Admiral reasoned, two heavy cruisers, two to four light cruisers, twelve to sixteen destroyers, and several light minelayers would probably operate eastward from Buin. He anticipated that land-based planes would start bombing Guadalcanal on Tuesday, and that the airfield would probably be bombarded by surface craft Wednesday night. A continuous and concentrated carrier air attack on Henderson Field would probably take place on Thursday, with further naval bombardment and landings, perhaps after midnight, on Thursday night near Cape Esperance or Koli Point.
Although no carriers were directly involved, many of these hypotheses were accurate.
Since the enemy invasion force was expected in the Guadalcanal area by Friday, November 13, it was very important that our transports should have finished unloading by that time and be well out of danger. Therefore they would have to finish by Thursday. The combatant ships, no longer charged with the protection of the transports, would then be able to carry the fight to the Japanese.
According to the original plan, Admiral Scott’s cargo vessel from Espiritu Santo were due off Lunga Point, Guadalcanal, at 5:30 A.M. on Wednesday, November 11. The forces under Admirals Turner and Callaghan were to reach Indispensable Straight that night, after which the Noumea transports would pass through Lengo Channel and reach the unloading point Thursday morning. Admiral Callaghan was to precede the transport group with his three cruisers and six destroyers and arrive at the end of Sealark
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| Admiral Daniel Judson Callaghan |
Channel two hours before midnight. There he was to be joined by Admiral Scott’s fighting ships, except for three destroyers detached as anti-aircraft and anti submarine protection for the three Espiritu Santo transports. During the night he was to pass through Sealark Channel to Savo Sound and strike any enemy forces he might find, with attention to any possible transports in their rear. If none were found he was to return and cover the unloading during the day. As far as the landing itself was concerned, all the troops were to be put ashore first, carrying two days’ rations and ammunition. Those who were on the beach were to work continuously at unloading the boats. As Admiral Turner said, the safety of the position of the troops ashore on the island depended entirely on the rapidity with which the ships were emptied.
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| Rear Admiral Norman Scott c.1942 |
fifteen Zeros chose the transports as they peeled off from 10,000 feet.
Rocked by heavy anti-aircraft fire, and pounced upon by our Marine land-based fighters, the bombers dropped three bombs near the Zeilin, flooding near No. 1 hold. The Libra and Betelgeuse were slightly damaged by other near hits. Then the half of the bombers that had survived the anti-aircraft fire roared away with our fighters close on their tails, falling one by one as they tried to escape.
Unloading operations were promptly resumed. At 11:27 a flight of twenty-five medium and heavy level
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| USS Zeilin, Attack transport USS Libra and USS Betelgeuse are of similar design |
bombers, protected by five Zeros, caused another alert. These planes, however, occupied themselves with the ground installations on the island. Ten more bombers fell to the combined fury of ack-ack, and the Marine fighters lost one Grumman.
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| USS Lardner DD-487 |
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| USS Portland (CA-33), at Pearl Harbor, Hawaii, on 14 June 1942. |
Admiral Turner’s four transports anchored off Kukum Point at half past five Thursday morning and the Libra and Betelgeuse anchored two miles east of Lunga Point. Combatant vessels were formed in two protective semicircles about them.
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| USS Barton in Boston Harbor, Massachusetts on 29 May 1942 |
debarkation was not interrupted. What was one shore battery compared with the fifty bombers expected to arrive at any minute?
The alert didn’t come until afternoon, a good three-quarters of an hour warning enabling our ships to up anchors and get into previously
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| USS Shaw (DD-373), September 1938 |
designated formation to repel attack.
Just after two o’clock two dozen Mitsubishi type-1 torpedo bombers and eight Zeros roared in low over Florida Island. Over the beach they dipped down close to the water’s surface, skimming toward the transports at 200 miles an hour, in a long line abreast. It was a terrifying charge of aerial cavalry, but it ran headlong into point-blank fire of the screening ships so devastating that four or five enemy planes were immediately blasted from the air and as many others set ablaze. It was holocaust. In a desperate attempt to avoid destruction the formation split into two groups, one swerving across the bows of our ships and the other swinging around astern. So violent was the maneuver that their torpedoes were jerked haphazardly into the sea.
But the attempt to escape was fruitless. The land-based. Marine and Army fighters, five of the Zeros already bagged on the approach, now eliminated every remaining bomber but one. But the attack had drawn blood.
A Mitsubishi which dropped its torpedo on the starboard side of the McCawley was set afire by that ship’s guns. The pilot swerved his blazing plane in a suicide course for the San Francisco. Although he was practically parallel to her and disintegrating under her guns, he managed to strike Battle II and the after control structure with one wing, and sideswipe the ship like a scythe of flame before diving into the
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| USS McCawley circa 1941–42 |
water. Several fires broke out, all soon extinguished, but thirty lives had been mowed down and three after 20-mm. guns on the after superstructure demolished. Their crews were killed to a man as they steadfastly stood to their guns, firing until the plane hit them.
The transports anchored again at about 3:25, two hours’ unloading time lost.
By late afternoon it was calculated that the transports could be 90 per cent unloaded before nightfall. Then scouting aircraft sent in reports of three strong enemy forces steaming toward Guadalcanal, close enough to arrive during the night if they kept to their course. They were not accompanied by transports. Obviously their mission was to attack our transports and bombard our positions ashore.
Admiral Turner did some quick calculations. He decided to withdraw his transports to safer waters and to send Admiral Callaghan to meet the Japanese.
Leaving only one damaged destroyer, two low-fuel destroyers, and two minesweepers to cover the transports, he assigned to Admiral Callaghan five cruisers and eight destroyers, as a welcoming committee for at least two battleships, three cruisers eleven destroyers and two seaplane tenders, with more perhaps in the offing. Well, so had we something in the offing too. To the southwest, Admiral Kinkaid’s task force was steaming toward the area, and the invincible Enterprise, her wounds patched, was with him. They wouldn’t be near enough for action this night, but the following morning, Friday the 13th, would be in fly-off position at Guadalcanal.
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| Cushing off the Puget Sound Navy Yard during her pre-commissioning trials period in July 1936. |
There was no moon when the ships’ clocks showed it was Friday the 13th, November, 1942. Nor were there any stars, for the sky was overcast with ink-black clouds. In a single column, Admiral Callaghan’s thirteen ships entered Lengo Channel for a search of the Savo Island area. They were in Battle Disposition “Baker One”: the Cushing leading, followed in order by the destroyers Laffey, Sterett and O’Bannon, the cruisers Atlanta, San Francisco, Portland, Helena,
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| USS Laffey alongside another U.S. Navy ship, while at sea in the South Pacific on 4 September 1942 |
Juneau, and destroyers Aaron Ward, Barton, Monssen and Fletcher. Only five of these ships were equipped with search radar: Portland, Helena, Juneau, O’Bannon and Fletcher. Their antennas revolved, sending out probing beams of microwaves through the inky dark.
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| USS Sterett DD-407 |
The Helena’s clocks said 1:24 when blots appeared on her scopes. The report was flashed to Admiral Callaghan on the flagship San Francisco: Three groups of ships off the port bow, at distances ranging from thirteen to fifteen miles!
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| USS O'Bannon (DD-450) |
Course was changed to head directly for the enemy. The two fleets closed rapidly and the warning eye of radar showed that now the enemy was split into four groups––on either side of our ships. All told there were between eighteen and twenty Japanese ships. To the right were two light cruisers and several destroyers; to the left were two heavy cruisers and two or three destroyers to be met first, then a battleship, Hiyei, and three or four destroyers. To the north and somewhat to right was another battleship, Kirishima, and escorting destroyers.
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| Juneau underway during the Battle of the Santa Cruz Islands, 26 October 1942 |
At 1:45 Admiral Callaghan ordered the task force to stand by to open fire at a range of 3,000 yards. At this point, the cat’s eye of radar showed enemy ships on both sides of our column, but the opposing forces were invisible to each other. The seconds ticked by as the yardage decreased. Suddenly the Americans tense on deck saw the Japanese flash recognition signals––red over white over green, and then at once realizing their mistakes, they flared their searchlights, port and starboard, illuminating the United States force as if it were on holiday display. Then, down the track of light screamed the first
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| USS Aaron Ward approaching USS Wasp on 17 August 1942, during operations in the Solomon Islands area. |
enemy salvos.
The time was 1:48.
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| USS Barton in Boston Harbor, Massachusetts on 29 May 1942 |
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| USS Monssen DD-436 |
At a conservative estimate, the Japanese could throw three times as much steel per broadside as the Americans. They could also pound our ships from both sides and from ahead. The American fleet was in a box. But the Japs had not expected to fight a surface engagement. They had been ordered to bombard our positions on Guadalcanal, especially the airfields and supplies, to clear the way for another landing, and so their guns and ammunition hoists were loaded with bombardment ammunition. Despite the initial Japanese accuracy of fire, the amount of damage caused the American ships by the lighter shells was low.
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| USS Fletcher DD-445 |
Immediately as the enemy illuminated, what was believed to be a light cruiser two miles to starboard came under fire from the San Francisco and Sterett. Seven main battery salvos from the San Francisco, and the Japanese ship––a large destroyer––blew up in a gaudy display of firewords. The job was accomplished in one minute flat.
Now, a searchlight is a two-way affair, and if our ships were lit up, the
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| Japanese Battleship Hiyei |
beams led back to their source. On the port side, the Atlanta, Juneau, Helena, Aaron Ward, Barton, Fletcher, Laffey and O’Bannon opened up on illuminating vessels, concentrating on two in line. The Atlanta and Juneau blasted a light cruiser, while the Helena, Barton and Fletcher attacked a heavy cruiser. Both enemy ships burst into flames and retired. Seeing her target out of action Fletcher shifted fire to the next ship in line which she reported as either “a Natori-or Tenryu-class cruiser.” She was joined by the Sterett, which fired thirteen salvos. Both Japanese ships were thought to have sunk almost immediately. In the same area “an enemy destroyer exploded” and two others were
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| Kirishima at Tsukumo Bay on 10 May 1937 |
seen to be on fire.
The Atlanta, an odd-numbered ship had been unable to open fire to starboard as ordered because our destroyers were in the way. While she was shooting at a cruiser to port, a division of Japanese destroyers crossed half a mile ahead of her. Concentrating her forward guns on the last in line, the Atlanta put twenty shells into her and she “erupted into flames and disappeared.” The after group of guns continued to fire at the cruiser until she, too, vanished.
The Atlanta herself was not unscathed. By now she had sustained thirteen 5-inch hits and some 3-inch from the light cruiser, mostly around the bridge, and twelve 5-inch hits from the destroyers, and she was fighting fires forward. Then, as the enemy ceased fire, the cruiser was struck by one or two torpedoes forward from a destroyer to port. All power was lost, except the auxiliary diesel, and the rudder was jammed left. The Atlanta began to circle back toward the south.
The San Francisco saw a “small cruiser or large destroyer farther ahead on the starboard bow,” and shifted her fire to the vessel which “was hit with two full main battery salvos and set afire throughout her length.” The range was 3,300 yards. At about the same time, as nearly as can be judged, “a heavy cruiser” came up in the dark on Atlanta’s port quarter and opened fire against her at a range of about 3,500 yards, bearing 240º relative. The Atlanta reported that nineteen hits were scores on her with 8-inch armor-piercing ammunition. Although many of the projectiles failed to explode, her hull was holed several times, and her damaged bridge was shattered. The shells were loaded with green dye, the San Francisco’s color. As the first shot struck, Captain Samuel P. Jenkins of the Atlanta rushed to the port side to get off torpedoes. When he returned to starboard, Admiral Scott and three officers of his staff had been killed, as well as a large number of others. The foremast collapsed, fires were blazing everywhere, and the Atlanta was dead in the water.
The remodernized Japanese battleship Hiyei was being engaged by the destroyers O’Bannon and Aaron Ward. The O’Bannon’s guns shot out the battleship’s searchlight and started several blazes. Then the San Francisco took Hiyei under fire and scored at the waterline with two salvos.
The engagement had now become a battle royal, in which the temptation was to shoot first and identify afterward. The sea was crosshatched with torpedo tracks and plumed with geysers of shell splashes. When the San Francisco shifted her fire to the Hiyei, that vessel did not shoot back. Instead, mistaking foe for friend, the battleship frantically blinker-signaled the code for “error.”
Admiral Callaghan had to get his ships in some semblance of order. Over the short-range voice radio, TBS, he broadcast: “Cease firing!” The order did not get through to the other vessels, but the San Francisco stopped firing at the Hiyei.
The enemy battleship, probably thinking her signal obeyed, bore down on the destroyer Laffey, which put on a burst of steam and managed to cross the enemy’s bows with a few feet to spare. As the destroyer slid by she swung out her tubes and fired two torpedoes, but the range was too short and the missiles bounced, unarmed. Simultaneously the destroyer blasted the battleship’s bridge with all guns she could get to bear, before a salvo from the Japanese smashed her own bridge as well as her No. 2 turret.
Meanwhile, at 1:52, the Portland’s second salvo to starboard ripped into one of the enemy destroyers making a torpedo attack on the American column, but it was a poor exchange because the Portland herself had a screw sheared off by a torpedo, and the cruiser Juneau and the destroyer Laffey were mortally wounded.
Lieutenant Roger W. O’Neill, a doctor aboard the Juneau, felt the jolt of the torpedo’s hit. “I can assure you it was terrific,” he said. “It had sufficient concussion to cause the deck to buckle. . . . From what I could gather, the torpedo hit somewhere between frames 42 and 45 and entered the forward fireroom on the port side. The hit was below the armor belt. . . . All hands, approximately seventeen, inside this forward fireroom were killed immediately. . . . The chief engineer was quoted as having said, in his opinion, the keel of the ship had been broken by that initial torpedo hit. Immediately following the hit, the ship seemed to rise and settle deeper and listed somewhat to the port side. All lighting forward of the after mess hall was lost. We had also lost all our engine room generators for power and we couldn’t fire our guns. . . . We immediately left the scene of action because we were injured to the extent that we could not fire and there was nothing left for us to do.”
At 1:54, with the battle only six minutes old, Admiral Callaghan again gave the order to cease fire, but few heard it because of damage to their TBS, and the melee continued. The Cushing firing six torpedoes at the Hiyei and was immediately blasted by destroyer and cruiser salvos that put all her guns, except her 20-mm., out of commission. One minute later the Barton stopped to avoid colliding with a friendly ship and was struck with one, and then two torpedoes. She broke in half and sank in ten seconds, the loss of life tragically increased when a destroyer astern, and herself under attack, tore through the Barton’s swimming survivors at high speed.
At 1:56––eight minutes of the battle gone––the O’Bannon closed to within half a mile of the burning battleship Hiyei, readied her torpedoes, and fired a spread of three at the colossus. There was a tremendous explosion on the enemy ship, and a sheet of fire completely covered her. Burning particles fell on the destroyer, which was swung north to avoid colliding. From her decks five burning ships could be counted astern, whether friend or enemy none could tell.
Now, the San Francisco again had the blazing but still firing Hiyei on her starboard bow, with the battleship heading parallel on the same course. On the flagship’s starboard quarter an enemy cruiser was groping for her range, and a Japanese destroyer cut across her bow, turned hard left and raked her port side, all guns blazing.
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| San Francisco (center) after being hit by a Japanese plane in the Naval Battle of Guadalcanal, 12 November 1942. |
The San Francisco’s predicament was called out to the fleet over voice radio, and the Portland responded, asking for directions. Admiral Callaghan, broadcasting the appeal to get “the big ones,” told the Portland to concentrate on the Hiyei, a shining mark. The American cruiser fired four main battery salvos at a range of two miles and made fourteen hits on the enemy battleship. The San Francisco also gave the Hiyei everything she had in one grand broadside just as the enemy cruiser found her range and the Hiyei’s third salvo smashed her bridge, killing Admiral Callaghan and mortally wounding Captain Young.
The San Francisco kept firing at the Hiyei as long as the main battery would bear, and the Japanese battleship threw two or three more salvos before the duel was broken off. The San Francisco had received fifteen major-caliber hits and uncounted lesser ones. Twenty-five separate fires were aggravating that damage. The officer of the deck, Lieutenant Commander Bruce McCandless, was conning the damaged ship, while Lieutenant Commander Herbert Schonland, who had succeeded to command, continued to fight the fires below.
After just fifteen minutes of battle, most of our ships were seriously shot up. Target for twenty direct hits, the destroyer Cushing was lying helpless. The Laffey and Barton had sunk; the Sterett had lost her foremast; the O’Bannon was slightly damaged. The cruiser Atlanta was burning, and the San Francisco and Portland were badly holed. The Helena had received minor injury. The Juneau had crawled from the scene of action, her back broken. Only the Aaron Ward, Monssen and Fletcher were untouched.
The Aaron Ward’s immunity was short-lived. In pursuit of a cruiser she received three 14-inch, two 8-inch, and five smaller hits, and was put out of action. Then the Sterett was caught in a cross fire while pumping torpedoes at the Hiyei and sustained several 5-inch hits on her bridge.
At twelve past two, twenty-four minutes after the opening gun, the Helena tried to reassemble the scattered American units. Most of the Japanese ships had turned in headlong retirement, firing haphazardly at each other as they withdrew. The Sterett, despite her serious damage, closed with a limping enemy destroyer and set her afire with two torpedoes and two 5-inch salvos, before the Jap was able to return a single shell. When the Japanese destroyer blazed up, the light from the explosion revealed the Sterett to other enemy stragglers who immediately took her under fire, and the courageous destroyer absorbed eleven more direct hits, setting ready-service powder afire. Now the destroyer had only two guns still serviceable; her remaining two torpedoes were jammed in their tubes. But the engines were all right and the Sterett managed to get away at flank speed, just as the near-by Monssen, one of the two ships left unscathed, was illuminated by star shells. Believing them to have come from a friendly vessel trying to make formation, the destroyer flashed recognition lights. Immediately searchlights lit her up and a salvo of medium-caliber shells hurtled down, putting her out of action. Steering was lost and her upper works became a mass of flames. Without guns, torpedoes or power, the ship was ordered abandoned. The commanding officer and several others were trapped on the bridge, but managed to jump into the water from the rail, all suffering serious injury.
At last, though, the Helena instructed all the ships to form on her and head eastward. The only means of communication left to the San Francisco was a flashlight, and by it she signaled the news of Admiral Callaghan’s death. The Cushing was sinking, and her crew abandoning ship. The Fletcher formed up, and shepherded the Helena and San Francisco out of Sealark Channel, meeting up with the damaged Juneau in Indispensable Strait. The O’Bannon and Sterett retired through Lengo Channel and joined the four others in a limping procession toward Espiritu Santo, none knowing that the Juneau would never get there.
Daybreak found the battle area still smoking. The Portland was circling, her steering out of control. Dead men, and some still living, dotted a sea foul with oil and wreckage.
Two miles to the south lay the Atlanta, her fires out. The Cushing and the Monssen were burning to the northwest and north, and presently the latter blew up and sank. The Aaron Ward was dead in the water seven and a half miles to the north. Northwest of Savo Island the battered Hiyei was slowly steaming, circling, her steering also shot away; a destroyer was standing by the stricken giant. Six and a half miles from the Portland, south of Savo, lay a Japanese destroyer with two small boats alongside.
The crippled ships glowered at each other. Then suddenly, angrily, the cruiser Portland pumped six 6-gun salvos at the Jap destroyer. The last one exploded the after magazine and the destroyer sank. According to Admiral Nimitz, this destruction of an enemy vessel while steering was still out of control was “one of the highlights of the action.”
Half an hour later the Japanese battleship, like a dying rattlesnake striking in final fury, hurled eight 2-gun salvos at the Aaron Ward, which was about to be taken under tow by Lieutenant James L. Foley’s tug Bobolink from Tulagi. Then the Japanese firing stopped, for out of the sky was descending a formidable antagonist––planes from Guadalcanal to give her the coup de grace.
At ten o’clock the Atlanta and Portland were still helpless off the enemy-held shore. The Bobolink returned from taking the Aaron Ward to Tulagi, and took the worse-hurt Atlanta to Lunga Point, a fruitless labor because salvage operations proved to be of no avail, and a demolition party led by Captain Jenkins himself sank the cruiser that night.
In the afternoon the sturdy, homely, tireless Bobolink came back for the Portland. Towing was slow and difficult and it took until the following morning, almost exactly twenty-four hours after the battle, to berth the Portland in Tulagi.
During all that salvage and sporadic shooting during the daylight following the engagement, survivors were being picked up by small craft and taken to Guadalcanal.
So ended the first phase of what Naval history will record as the Battle of Guadalcanal.
In thirty-four minutes of slam-bang furious action a vastly inferior American force had, at great cost, stopped Japan’s South Pacific fleet and turned it back in staggering retreat. That fleet’s mission had been to blast a hole in the Americans’ grip on the Solomons through which would be poured the army of veteran troops even then bearing down on Guadalcanal.
The battle cost us five ships––the new anti-aircraft light cruiser Atlanta and the new destroyers Barton, Laffey, and Monssen, the older but modern Cushing. The heavy cruisers San Francisco and Portland were severely damaged, the light cruiser Juneau more so, her sister ship Atlanta less. Three destroyers had been hurt in varying degrees of severity––Aaron Ward, Sterett and O’Bannon. Only the Fletcher came through relatively unmarked by the most savage fleet action of modern times.
The Japanese, fully aware of the presence of the American cruisers and destroyers in Guadalcanal waters, admittedly did not believe that the light force would challenge Nippon’s superiority in ships and fire power. The enemy once more suffered much less material damage than did the victors––one battleship and two destroyers sunk, two cruisers and three destroyers damaged. But he had lost the field again. The object of the Japanese fleet was to flatten the American positions on Guadalcanal. The mission of the handful of American ships was to prevent that accomplishment, no matter the cost, and––they succeeded . . .
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