Seventy Years Ago: Battle Of The Santa Cruz Islands

"Halsey's arrival in Noumea sent American morale skyrocketing throughout the region, as did his assurances to General Alexander A. Vandegrift, the Marine commander on Guadalcanal, that the Navy would give the Marines all possible support within its means. Halsey kept his word...."

"On October 23, as the Marines and Americal soldiers repelled a second violent Japanese assault, the Big E and her task force rendezvoused with Hornet east of Espiritu Santo, forming Task Force 61, under Rear Admiral Thomas Kinkaid. Halsey, anticipating a Japanese move into the waters northeast of Guadalcanal, ordered Kinkaid to sweep north of the Santa Cruz islands - a small, malaria-infested chain 700 miles north of New Caledonia - to engage the Japanese fleet...."

"Dawn on October 25, then, found the Combined Fleet and Task Force 61 steaming aggressively towards each other, closing range at close to 30 miles every hour. Confrontation was inevitable...."

"Anticipating the Combined Fleet would make a move towards Guadalcanal, Halsey ordered Kinkaid's Task Force 61 - consisting of Enterprise's TF 16 and Hornet's TF 17 - on an aggressive sweep northwest of the Santa Cruz Islands, hoping to outflank the Japanese fleet as it steamed southwards from Truk."

Admiral Kinkaid's two carriers and 169 aircraft were up against Admiral Nagumo's four aircraft carriers and 212 aircraft. Each force found the other the morning of October 26, 1942. By 0900 they had launched strikes.

Details of the ensuing battle are posted on the web site of the Enterprise CV-6 Association at http://www.cv6.org/1942/santacruz/santacruz.htm. The story reads like a novel. The web site's story continues here and here and here.

By the time the battle ended, USS Enterprise was damaged and USS Hornet, the Doolittle raider, was sunk. As of October 26, the US Navy had no operating aircraft carriers in the Pacific.

Even so, a numerically inferior force had kept Japan from achieving their goals.

"The Consequences

"Though tactically Santa Cruz was a draw, strategically it was a narrow victory for the Americans. Nagumo's carriers and Kondo's battleships had been turned away from Guadalcanal, giving the Marines and soldiers there some much needed relief. Perhaps more importantly, the destruction of the best Japanese naval aircrews, begun in earnest at Midway, culminated at Santa Cruz. Though plane losses were high on both sides - 74 American and 92 Japanese - the loss of airmen pointed to a Japanese catastrophe. Nearly 70 Japanese aircrews - including a number of squadron leaders - never returned to their carriers at Santa Cruz, while all but 33 American airmen did.

"The first hint of the damage done to Japan's naval airpower was seen the day of the battle, in the feeble afternoon strikes at Hornet. A more telling sign came on November 11, when Enterprise - after quick patching by Sea Bees and the repair ship Vulcan - sortied from Noumea, a full air group on her flight deck, ready to fight.

"The only Japanese carriers in the area - Hiyo and Junyo, both slow converted ocean liners - were well north of Guadalcanal, carefully staying clear of the American planes there. Without planes and the crews to fly them, the enemy's fleet carriers were impotent. Although Enterprise and her task force faced significant threat from ground-based air forces and submarines, the simple fact was this: 15 days after Santa Cruz, an American carrier stood off the Solomons, battered but ready for action, and not a single enemy carrier came forth to challenge her."