Sunday morning 7 December 1941 is a date that is printed in the collective American mind.
It was the day the Japanese launched their devastating surprise attack on the American
Naval Base in Pearl Harbour on the Hawaiian island of Oahu. Not the Americans, nor any
of the Colonial Powers in the far East and Pacific were able to adequately respond to
the Japanese declaration of war and their subsequent sweeping conquest of the pacific.
There was another island, about 3200 kilometres west of Hawaii… it was held by a small American
force… and it too came under heavy attack that fateful day. For the next 2 weeks, it
would be under heavy siege by the Japanese, attempting to capture Wake Island.
-intro-
The Japanese Attack
Following the attack on Pearl Harbour, the Japanese embarked on a steamroll campaign
and managed to carve out a gigantic Pacific empire. Within 5 months they captured the
islands of Guam and Wake, the Philippines, French Indochina, Burma, Thailand, Malaya
and the Dutch East Indies, ¾ of New Guinea and Papua, the Bismarck Archipelago and a
substantial part of the Gilbert and Solomon islands. To the north, they threatened Alaska,
to the south, Australia, and to the West they were making plans to invade India.
This is the story of that tiny atoll 3200 kilometres west of Hawaii, consisting of 3
islets. It was held by 450 US marines and 75 Army signal corps and Navy personnel with
over 1500 civilians under their protection. The commander of Wake was Officer Winfield
Scott Cunningham. In the weeks leading up to the Pearl Harbour (and Wake atoll) attacks
the Americans were constructing an airfield on the atoll. Once completed, it would be
a floating aircraft carrier. The Japanese ruined that plan by their attack
several hours after the attack on Pearl Harbour. 36 Japanese Mitsubishi medium bomber planes
flew over, bombed and destroyed seven of the 12 Wildcat fighters stationed on Wake. 23
marine personnel on the atoll were killed. Several more raids followed the next day and
the American soldiers tried to repel the Japanese as well as they could. But it wasn’t until
11th December that real fighting broke out again.
Early that morning a strong Japanese naval force moved on Wake. Three Japanese light
cruisers, six destroyers, two patrol boats, two medium transports and two submarines were
ready to lay siege to the small atoll, which had been preparing for this attack they knew
was inevitable. At 3 AM Commander Cunningham was woken up by Major James P. Devereux. He
commanded the ground forces at Wake. The lookout had sighted ships on the horizon and their
identity was unknown. It wasn’t likely they were allied and a Japanese naval bombardment
seemed like their best guess. Any aid for the soldiers on Wake was too far away and
they were merely equipped with 6 old 152mm guns in three batteries - the problem was
that their fire control systems had been destroyed by the initial aerial attacks. All in all,
it didn’t look too good for the Americans. Cunningham decided they would have to ambush
the Japanese. It was ordered searchlights to be extinguished. All men were rallied,
ordered to take up positions. Cunningham told his men of the plan: have the Japanese come
as close as possible, without so much as alerting them. Then they would have to bombard them
with everything they had in their arsenal. It was certainly a big risk, but Cunningham
figured they did not have any other viable option.
The Ambush
Cunningham later reminisced: ‘It was a perfect tropical night. A half-moon was coming up
over the ocean and the air was cool and soft. The roar of the surf had a soothing, almost
hypnotic quality about it.’ On Wake atoll, that evening, the marines dug themselves in,
patiently waiting for the Japanese flotilla to move closer to the atoll and their order
to open fire. The four planes that had survived the initial bombing, purely by luck because
they were patrolling in the sky at that time might I add, stood ready at the airstrip now.
Two hours after the initial report to Cunningham the Japanese were only 8 kilometres removed
from Wake, slowly sailing towards the southern side. As the Japanese were taking their positions
to launch their bombardment, Cunningham patiently waited for just the right time. Another hour
later, at nearly dawn, Cunningham ordered his troops to open fire. The Japanese were
startled by the sudden barrage of fire launched from the island which seemed peacefully asleep.
The Japanese light cruiser Yubari was instantly hit three times - it was the flagship of the
task force’s commander, Admiral Sadamichi Kajioka. It didn’t sink and was able to
sail away, out of range of American fire. But still, not a very great start for the
Japanese. The Americans kept on firing - a succession of hits was scored both on the
transport ships, cruiser and two destroyers. Of the destroyers, the Hayate blew up and
sank after being hit. The Japanese flotilla now withdrew, hiding behind a smokescreen
from the hit ships. The retreating ships were pursued by the four remaining Wildcats, bombing
two light cruisers, setting fire to a transport ship and sinking the destroyer Kisaragi when
Captain Henry Elrod dropped a bomb directly on it. The pilots were rather positively surprised
about the fact that the Japanese did not have any aircover. The first Japanese assault was
over, and admittedly, the Americans did better than expected.
To make up the balance: the Japanese lost two destroyers (the first Japanese ships that
were sunk by Americans during the war) and nearly 500 men; the Marines of Wake lost just
one. Unfortunately, 2 of their remaining 4 Wildcats crashed, though both pilots survived.
Now Admiral Kajioka withdrew all the way to the Kwajalein Atoll in the Marshall Islands.
The Japanese were going to conjure up a new plan in order to bring the Americans of Wake
to their knees. On Wake, at the same time, they were celebrating their unexpected and
outstanding victory. Cunningham reminisced: ‘It was like a fraternity picnic; war-whoops
of joy split the air; warm beer was sprayed on late arrivals without regard to rank….’.
The Japanese Return
Those celebrations would not even last a day. The next morning, at 9:00 am a roar in the
distance alerted the American crew on Wake. 17 Japanese Mitsubishi bombers appeared on
the horizon. They dropped their bombs as the Americans tried to fend them off with anti-aircraft
guns as well as they could. Two Mitsubishis were shot down, both by Lieutenant Davidson.
15 flew away again. The casualties of that air raid were 26 officers and men of the fighter
squadron and around 40 of the 1500 civilians that were contracted to build the airfield.
Cunningham sent a list of equipment the men needed to withstand another Japanese assault
while the attacks by the Japanese continued via air raids.
Now, about 2 weeks before the final battle commenced, a relief attempt and US taskforce
to reinforce the atoll was set up. The Saratoga, a carrier with 72 fighters and dive-bombers
was sent together with a seaplane tender. Admiral William Pye received information that
the Japanese were approaching Wake: he ordered the ship to return to Pearl Harbour. It was
the 22nd of December, one day before the Japanese were to launch their largest and last assault
on Wake. The men were to face a much larger Japanese force, all on their own.
On 2 AM on December 23 this larger Japanese flotilla arrived. Once again, Admiral Sadamichi
Kajioka commanded the fleet. Six heavy cruisers and two of the aircraft carriers that attacked
Pearl Harbour, Soryu and Hiryu, were part of it. Around 2000 Japanese Marines received
orders to besiege and overtake Wake. According to Cunningham, this second attack was launched
‘in an atmosphere of desperate confusion from which only one clear factor emerged:
the overwhelming numerical superiority of the invaders’.
As the Japanese stormed the beaches and the Americans were subjected to an artillery barrage,
some of the civilian construction workers grabbed weapons and fought alongside the Marines.
The fighting over the three islets was a battle to the death: the beaches were littered with
the bodies of over 100 Japanese Marines, the first wave that set foot on land.
At daybreak, the Japanese dive-bombers carpet-bombed the American positions. There was no air support
anymore: the last Wildcat went missing in action the day before. The pilots that survived
now took up their guns and fought the Japanese from their foxholes as well. That morning,
suffering heavy casualties, those marines that had survived did all they could to repel
the Japanese. The Japanese Marines had slowly but surely managed to invade the beaches and
as the fight progressed they even moved up towards the improvised hospital on one of
the small islets. There were over 1000 civilians on the island and Cunningham had to make the
difficult decision: he did not want to risk absolute carnage and an all-out massacre.
The Japanese, after all, were already known for their brutality and war crimes.
Cunningham finally decided: he would order his men to surrender - they had to destroy
their weapons and a white sheet was to be hoisted from the base on the largest islet.
The fighting had lasted an entire night, and now that 122 men had died, of whom the majority
civilians, the men of Wake surrendered. It should be noted that Cunningham wasn’t too
wrong when he was worried about the Japanese brutality. Over 1100 American US civilians
that worked on the landing base on Wake were interned as POWs. 180 died in captivity.
That wasn’t everything though, and there is a landmark left on Wake island as a silent
witness to the horrors that were committed on the island. It is this rock you’re seeing
right now. After the capture of Wake the Japanese took hold of the island and set up a base
there. When in 1943 the tide of war was turning and the Japanese were expecting the US to
retake the island, Rear Admiral Shigematsu Sakaibara ordered the execution of 98 American
civilians on the island… Those civilian workers that initially built the airstrip
- some of those men had not been sent to Japanese concentration camps but were forced to perform
labour on the island. As the men were being executed, one of them escaped and managed
to carve “98 US PW 5-10-43” on the rock you’re seeing. He was eventually recaptured
and it is said he was beheaded personally by Sakaibara. As for the commander of Wake,
Winfield Cunningham was released in August 1945 - he had been a POW for over 4 years.
He was promoted to captain and subsequently continued to serve in the US Navy.
And that is the story of one of the many brave fights the Americans put up in the Pacific
theatre. Are there more events or people from this period and region you would like to know
more about? Let me know your thoughts in a comment! Thank you for watching this video.
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