Article No.18
Tracking the Grummans
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Author: Mr. Teruo Miyoshi
On the day, lying clouds were gloomily filling the sky and no winds in the morning. The streamer beside the runway kept pendulous.
My instinct told me that there should be an enemy attack on such a day when the people tended to be careless. I went to the weather forcast room. Checking the weather chart, I asked a staff how the atmospheric pressure positions would be. He advised that the wind would blow stronger as the low pressure on the north would come down to the south gradually. The isobars would crowd out.
Received a table of random numbers of the day at the cipher office, I went into the communication room.
A communication soldier was struggling on the radio "It's hard to catch. A lot of noise today".
"No way but give up like a today when the radio state is no good but, sorry to say, it is your mission to catch them even under the hard state. Do you know why the state is so bad?" I asked.
"No, I don't know."
"Radio, especially the shortwave reflects between the ionosphere and the earth surface many times to spread far but the stratocumulus(piling clouds) like today is floating at about 6,000feet high and reflect some extent of radio generating the phase which cause the noise." I explained and added
"I'm guessing a reconnaissance order today. Please catch my signals firmly then."
"Yes, I do my best."
For the security, I listened to JJY(*JJY is the call sign of a low frequency time signal radio station - by 'wiki research') to adjust my watch. I also checked a transportable long-wave receiver to bring aboard the plane. These preparations were to turn out to be useful afterwards on the day. Something was going on in the officer's room. My partner Sergeant-major came out the room and said "Be prepared for scramble."
I wished to say "I'm already prepared " but held the words.
He repeated the order [Enemy task force vessels are estimated at ---miles offshore the Boso Peninsula. Confirm their location]. In those days, we had frequent air-raids by the carrier-based aircrafts. 1,000lb (450kg)x2 bombs were loadable to a plane of Grumman plus as many as six 0.50cal(12.7mm) machine-guns were equipped with it to power. I didn't think it should be allowed to shoot the people who were trying to escape on the ground even in the wartime.
Above all, targeting and shooting the non-combatants was the evidence of malice aforethought and the murder itself.
(*Aboves are author's personal comments from a Japanese point of view as of 1945)
This time Two reconnaissance aircrafts had taken off, flying up into the sky through the thick dark clouds and headed for the south. What we could observe were the clouds after the clouds. Sea surface was little visible.
Our partner aircraft(*Dinah) had taken a dive to lower altitude under the clouds but my Sergeant-major was maintaining the 15,000 feet above the clouds. I couldn't often understand what Sergeant-majour was thinking. However, thinking the situation well, there were not necessarily no gaps among the clouds - stratocumulus. Sea surface would be visible through any gaps.
Yes, it was visible.
I had found the enemy fleet through a tiny gap. Two aircraft-cariers and a few escort vessels.
When I was sending telegrams to the base, our partner aircraft which was flying lower had been captured by the fleet radar and getting a fierce attack by the anti-aircraft cannons. U.S. war-vessels were equipped with the multi-loadable anti-aircraft cannons, so called 'pom-pom-gun' and enormous numbers of Japanese war-aircrafts were lost. Not a few suicide attack aircrafts(*Kamikaze) were also shot down before they reached to the target vessels.
By the aid of clouds, our plane had had no attack. My Sergeant-major was so cool and circling above the clouds as if nothing happned.
"Thinking the distance to the mainland and flight range of Grumman, Grummans will take off soon. Keep an eye on them." Sergeant-major said. Tiny-look enemy aircrafts were observed taking off their mother carriers one after another.
Circling and making up a formation unit of about ten aircrafts, totally thirty aircrafts in echelon formation were starting to head north toward our mainland.
Lest they should be found by the Japanese radars, they flew at extremely low altitude.
On the other hand, our plane flew so higher to follow and watch them that they was not aware of us at all.
I sent report by the telegram to the base.
On the occasion of such a good chance to intercept, our communication soldier of the base replied "Radio sensitivity is bad". He requested me repeating the telegram again and again, and again. The communication soldier of the day was quite a poor receiver.
Approaching to the Nojimazaki lighthouse which was located at the south end of the Boso Peninsula, strange to me, the enemy planes had begun to fly tandem with equal intervals. They would be avoiding the capture by our radar sites but I wondered if they were knowing our plane observing them from 15,000 feet high.
By the way, our IJA interceptors were not coming up yet.
What were they doing when we had been tracking the attackers for a long way, roling instead of the radars?
The line of formation had turned slightly eastward a few miles short of the Nojimazaki lighthouse and, after passing Takatsukayama(Takatsuka mountain) begun flying along the mountain ridges at ultra-low-altitude (approx. 150 feets) as if snaking on the ridge.
The five Grummans of the leading group were very good at snaking the ridge even at such a incredibly low altitude but the rest groups of the formation were flying up and down unstably. For the tailing group, it would be the first time to join the actual mission today. They looked as if baby ducks walking desperately after their parents.
"We'll join their back" said Sergeant-major and had doven.
We had our own position 300yards behind the last Grumman but the pilot was too busy about controlling his aircraft to check the following aircraft behind him.
Our interceptors were not arriving yet anyway.
I sent telegram again to the base. The base reconfirmed everything was OK with the headquarters.
I tapped out the code with the straight key in live(no encryption) style to the base "I'll tell you our flight course in the broadcasing style from now. Catch it well with no mistake." and then, scowling at the landform and the map, I transmitted a crossing point as a landmark. Full concentration to catch the point was requested under the speed of 270knot/h.
I also tried detection of the radio communication of the formation commander. Through the long-wave radio receiver which I had brought in earlier, I succeeded catching and listening their communication clearly but regretly all in Englsih. I was not so good at English then. However, the last word I caught was "Attack a target".
A line of tandem formation had separated into two forward/backward lines as if cut off. The forward lowered the altitude further to almost the sea level and headed for Yokohama crossing the Tokyo Bay. The backward aimed at somewhere in the central part of Tokyo. I could listen "Concentration time GMT ----."
I had known their concentration time but junction. It would be offshore Boso(*east of Tokyo) or Izu Peninsula(*west of Yokohama). Above Kisarazu area(*there was an IJA airfield) nearby Tokyo, a dozen of our interceptors were flying toward us at last and - our mission was OVER.
I thought that U.S.military was also training 'baby' pilots through the actual missions.
Our winning results of shot-down on the day was seven by intercept, eight by ambush at the south of Tokyo Bay for the concentration time. (*Our lost? not mentioned)
Perhaps veterans survived and new-comers shot down.
Later, our team was awarded and given a testimonial for the contribution but I was not so happy.
If the interception had been much faster, the situation wouldn't be so worse for the both sides.
We could have prevented our ground from the damage by the air-raid and a lot of lives would have been saved.
The other accompanying reconnaissance aircraft which had been shot by the U.S. warships had got an aileron damage but returned to the base safely earlier than us.
/End of Article No.18