Like many Japanese aircraft of the period, the G4M was lightly built to maximize range. The impact damage to the transport was minimal, although the bomber's engines managed to penetrate the hull and destroy the ship's fire mains. The ship was sunk by the fires started by the bomber's fuel, which lit the still loaded cargo of supplies for the Marines on fire.
What if Japan adopts Kamikaze tactics in 1942?
- Thread starter steel_captain
- Start date
I do see ENTERPRISE being lost at either Eastern Solomons or Santa Cruz if a dozen planes were tasked to do a deliberate suicide attack on her. The USN wouldn't have been prepared and our AA was still quite primitive to what it would be in a year's time. Of course that is with everything else OTL regarding the HORNET and WASP being lost as they were but it could have been a quicker death for the former if she faced an attack by pilots intent to fly right into her.
How are they supposed to sink a carrier without torpedoes, thereby introducing water?
Just like the USN destroyed four IJN carriers without needing torpedos in a obscure battle called Midway. You need not sink a carrier to kill it.
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Band in China
Banned
So the Americans will give the Japanese intel and willing sail into a trap based on good feels of a Decisive Battle? Doesn't sound like USN doctrine at the time.
I said at Eastern Solomons or at Santa Cruz. We were already there and at ES ENTERPRISE was rendered close to dead already. Some deliberate crashes into her by IJN planes could have been a coup de gras on her.
Oh, so they're going to catch the American carriers with their pants down and decks full of fueled and armed aircraft?
Oh, wait, they couldn't pull that off at either Santa Cruz or Eastern Solomons.
Plus, y'know, the Japanese carriers at Midway were considerably more fragile than the Yorktowns. (And the Shokakus, before you get on my case)
You can dial back on the sarcasm. As I pointed out earlier, it took three torpedoes, two suicide aircraft and five bombs to sink Hornet. She will not go down to bombs alone.
The adoption of suicide tactics was an act of desperation to try and stem the impending defeat of Japan
This was not yet the situation in 1942 - where the Japanese Military was pretty much winning everywhere until it wasn't
And into 1943 it was still pretty much holding its own.
It was only the Cartwheel operations that ground down the Japanese air strength and saw much of its Navy destroyed.
So I cannot see them adopting it in 1942.
So let's assume Midway has happened and the 3rd Fleet is reorganizing with the intention of employing carrier based kamikaze tactics in the 2nd half of 1942. I think the intended air wing might look something like this -
Shokaku, Zuikaku
54 x A6M2
54 x B5N1 (Kamikaze)
36 x B5N2 torpedo
36 x D3A1 (land based reserve)
Junyo, Hiyo
42 x A6M2
36 x D3A1
18 x B5N2
Zuiho, Ryujo
45 x A6M2
27 x B5N2
I would think that the first strike on the US fleet would be an escorted kamikaze attack to knock out the flight decks. The second wave would be the torpedo bombers to cripple the now defenseless carriers. The IJN surface forces would then go in to mop up while the IJN carriers attacked retreating US surface forces. The logical conclusion is that unless the IJN torpedo force misses its target, the US carriers would be in serious trouble in any carrier battle in 1942 against such an air wing backed by superior surface forces.
My thoughts in posing the question was if the IJN had adopted Kamikaze tactics in the second half of 1942 could it have resulted in a situation where the USN would no longer be able to support the Marines on Guadalcanal? We all know how pivotal the Campaign for Guadalcanal was and all the follow on issues that would have arisen had it fallen to the Japanese
I guess it also bears mentioning that IJN leadership in 1942 did expect a pilot to crash his plane into an enemy ship, the concept of suicidal sacrifice was already there. The only difference being that the leadership was saying that a pilot should do a suicide attack only after his plane was hit and could not be saved. It doesn't seem to be very far to go the extra distance to say to a pilot if you see the opportunity to do a deliberate attack you should take it even if your plane is fully intact? Not the same as what was ultimately coming in late 1944 but still close enough.
I'm also aware that for a kamikaze to truly take out a carrier does mean to hit it with planes either in the hanger or on deck however between bomb hits and deliberate attacks on a single carrier even without its planes on board could devastate the ship so badly as to render it out of the fight for a very long time to come in 1942 was the period we're losing a carrier even without it being sunk was in essence the same result.
I'm also aware that for a kamikaze to truly take out a carrier does mean to hit it with planes either in the hanger or on deck however between bomb hits and deliberate attacks on a single carrier even without its planes on board could devastate the ship so badly as to render it out of the fight for a very long time to come in 1942 was the period we're losing a carrier even without it being sunk was in essence the same result.
To the first point: it’s a much bigger difference than you’re making it out to be. See again my post about the IJN Air Admiral from earlier.
To the second: like Enterprise was at Santa Cruz? Like Yorktown was at Coral Sea? Bomb damage alone was demonstrably not enough to get the US to pull a carrier long-term, they’d patch her up and suffer the deficiencies as long as there was need.
The problem, of course, being that the Japanese don’t have 54 extra Kates and their crews available when they were reorganizing their air assets. So while the idea of reserving their torpedo bombers for a follow-up is sound the kamikaze attack will still leave a major hole in the air wing on their biggest and best carriers.
Plus their panicked response to Guadalcanal is their own worst enemy. Trying this at Eastern Solomons is going to put that hole in their air wings, made worse by their actual losses - 95 aircraft lost out of 177 embarked is significantly worse losses than 64, and that’s 31 more critical strike aircraft pilots. And at Eastern Solomons we know the Japanese did miss with their torpedo bombers, meaning most likely Enterprise just gets beaten up more and fundamentally the character of the campaign doesn’t change. And trying this at Eastern Solomons is likely to leave the Cranes desperately short of aircraft and their crews - even IOTL the losses at Eastern Solomons hadn’t been made entirely good by Santa Cruz.
There’s also the elephant in the room I’ve pointed out in past threads: more carrier losses earlier mean that the US wouldn’t risk the Santa Cruz action with just Hornet. Halsey was, until Hiyo broke down and Enterprise returned to the battlefield, quite content to dance around letting the Japanese burn fuel for nothing.
So @steel_captain there’s your answer: no, because if the Americans take more carrier losses early in the campaign they won’t risk another fleet battle, and they don’t need to risk a carrier battle to cover the island.
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The other problem is that the B5N was not a very good suicide attacker.
Mike Yeo's "Desperate Sunset" is probably the definitive work on kamikaze attacks and worth its weight in gold. In it he analyses which Japanese aircraft functioned best as kamikazes - the Ki-45, Ki-51, B6N and D4Y came up on top due to the fact that they either had decent speeds, armoured protection or a mix of both in addition to being capable of carrying a decent bomb load, thus enabling them to dodge interceptors and flak plus survive damage from both long enough to perform a significantly impactful crash dive.