This Week in History recalls memorable and decisive events and personalities of the past.
18th April 1943 – In Operation Vengeance, Admiral Isoroku Yamamoto is killed when his aircraft is shot down by US fighters over Bougainville Island
Admiral Yamamoto, a few hours before his death, saluting Japanese naval pilots at Rabaul
On 7 December 1941, the United States was shocked by a sudden and unexpected attack on its main Pacific naval base in Hawaii at Pearl Harbour.
Despite some intercepted communications and warning signs, the Americans were caught completely by surprise.
In 90 minutes, the Japanese 1st Air Fleet had destroyed four American battleships, damaged four more, sunk two more ships, and damaged another nine. Almost 200 aircraft were destroyed and another 150 damaged. Nearly 2,500 American soldiers and civilians were killed.
Photograph taken from a Japanese plane during the torpedo attack on ships moored on both sides of Ford Island shortly after the beginning of the Pearl Harbor attack. A torpedo has just hit USS West Virginia on the far side of Ford Island (centre). Other battleships moored nearby are, from left, Nevada, Arizona, Tennessee (inboard of West Virginia), Oklahoma (torpedoed and listing) alongside Maryland, and California. On the near side of Ford Island, to the left, are light cruisers Detroit and Raleigh, target and training ship Utah and seaplane tender Tangier. Raleigh and Utah have been torpedoed, and Utah is listing sharply to port.
Leading the attack was Japan’s Admiral Isoroku Yamamoto, commander in chief of the combined fleet and author of Japanese strategy for a war with the US.
Isoroku Yamamoto
Yamamoto, born in 1884, was the son of a former middle-ranking Samurai. He attended the Imperial Japanese Naval academy in 1904, and was considered 11th best in his class. He left the academy in 1904 to serve aboard the cruiser Nisshin during the Russo-Japanese War (1904-1905). He was wounded, losing his index and middle fingers on his left hand, during the most famous engagement of the war, the Battle of Tsushima in 1905, in which the Russian fleet was annihilated by the Japanese.
In 1914, he returned to the Academy, becoming a lieutenant commander in 1916 and being promoted to commander in 1919.
Yamamoto, left, and lifelong friend Teikichi Hori, as young officers of the Japanese Navy
He then went to the US, where he studied at Harvard University from 1919 to 1921, and then was posted as a naval attaché in Washington, D.C. where he became fluent in English. He toured the US in the 1920s.
Yamamoto as a naval attaché to the US in 1926, with Secretary of the Navy Curtis D. Wilbur, Captain Kiyoshi Hasegawa, and Admiral Edward Walter Eberle
Yamamoto was promoted to captain in 1923. He was granted his first command in 1928 on the cruiser Isuzu and later was posted to the aircraft carrier Akagai.
Captain Yamamoto in January 1928
Yamamoto became an influential member of the Japanese naval establishment, which had a fierce rivalry with the Japanese army. As Japan slipped fully under military rule in the 1920s and ‘30s, the army and navy came to dominate Japanese foreign policy decision-making and were often at odds with each other, pursuing radically different strategies.
As part of the naval establishment, Yamamoto opposed the aggressive movements of the Japanese army in the 1930s, including the invasion of Manchuria in 1931, the full-scale invasion of China in 1937 and the alliance with Germany and Italy in 1940.
Japanese troops of the 2nd Division entering Tsitsihar, Manchuria
For this he was regularly threatened with death by radical officers in the Japanese army.
His posting to the position of commander-in-chief of the combined fleet was only done so as to make it harder for assassins to kill him.
Despite his strong opponents in the army and government, Yamamoto was popular in the fleet and was promoted to admiral in 1940. He was opposed to Japan declaring war on the US, and the European powers. His experience of America led him to understand the potential strength of the US and how difficult it would be for Japan to win a war against it, particularly while engaged in a massive war in China.
Nevertheless, the Japanese government decided to go to war with the US and placed Yamamoto in charge of naval strategy.
Yamamoto on board the battleship Nagato in 1940
Yamamoto was an innovator in naval aviation, and he understood the power of the aircraft carrier. Until his command, Japanese strategy for a war with America had been a war of attrition followed by a defensive decisive battle in which the Japanese would attempt to destroy the American fleet. Yamamoto feared the production capacity of the US and believed that, by using aircraft carriers coupled with the element of surprise, the Japanese could land a decisive knockout blow on the Americans and that this would be the only chance of winning the war.
In January 1941, Yamamoto drew up the plans for an attack on the American fleet at Pearl Harbour. On 5 November 1941, the date of the attack was set for a month hence, Sunday 7 December.
Sailors rescue a seaman from the 31,800 ton USS West Virginia. Beyond is the USS Tennessee
After the stunning success of Pearl Harbour, the Japanese, with great speed, swept through South-East Asia and secured the vital rubber and oil resources of Indonesia. By mid-1942, the Japanese navy had established dominance of the western Pacific.
Tokyo hoped at this point that the incredible success of Japanese forces would prompt the Americans, British and Dutch governments to negotiate. However, no such negotiation was forthcoming. This effectively collapsed the entire Japanese strategy for its war against the Western powers, as they knew they would struggle to win a drawn-out war with the Americans and the big colonial empires. Seeking a new strategy, the Japanese sought to fortify their holdings and considered invasions of India, Australia and the US itself, none of which came to pass, as the army was too bogged down in China.
Yamamoto drew up a plan to attack the Americans at Midway Island and draw the American aircraft carriers into a battle which, he hoped, would see them destroyed, buying Japan more leverage in negotiations.
Unknown to Yamamoto, the Americans had broken the Japanese naval codes, and so learned of the plan in advance, allowing them to prepare to strike the Japanese instead.
SBD Dauntless dive bombers from Scouting Squadron 8 aboard USS Hornet approach the burning heavy cruiser Mikuma
In the following Battle of Midway on 4 June 1942, the Americans smashed the Japanese carrier fleet, sinking four of Yamamoto’s carriers after catching them by surprise.
The battle was a decisive check on Japanese momentum, and Japan’s industry was never able to fully restore the force it had had before Midway.
Yamamoto would win a number of naval battles against the Americans at Guadalcanal, but ultimately the Japanese were defeated in the Guadalcanal campaign and forced back.
In April of 1943, American intelligence intercepted plans for Yamamoto to tour some of the island garrisons in the Solomon Islands, and so the Americans launched Operation Vengeance.
On 18 April, the plane which Yamamoto was flying in was attacked by the 339th Fighter Squadron of the 347th Fighter Group, and was shot down. His body would be recovered on 19 April in the jungles of the island of Bougainville.
The wreck of the Mitsubishi bomber which was shot down over Bougainville on 18 April, 1943, killing Yamamoto
His death was a major blow to Japanese morale and he would be accorded a full state funeral on 5 June 1943.
Yamamoto’s state funeral
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