Central Makassar Strait 0015, January 3, 1943
HMS Ashanti radioed in another sighting report. A column of heavy cruisers were coming up hard at thirty two knots and they were only a few thousand yards from merging with the two battle cruisers.
The plots aboard six battleships and a dozen cruisers were quickly updated. The two Kongos were now only 19,000 yards from the battle line and 12,000 yards from the outer edge of the screen. They were traveling in line across and had slowed to eighteen knots as they waited for reinforcements. By now, the cruisers and destroyers closest to the Japanese scouts were in lethal range as soon as the battle cruisers could lash out at anything that they could see.
Radar aboard the six battleships was holding the two battleships tight. The Royal Navy battlewagons had been assigned to the eastern battle cruiser while the Americans had the western ship allocated to their guns. Every thirty seconds the solution had been updated. And now the final update was used. Six battleships each fired a single turret salvo. As soon as the incredibly powerful guns fired their massive shells, secondary batteries threw up star shells to assist the targeting systems. The cruisers and destroyers had been waiting for the stars of the production to take center stage before they drew attention to themselves. American heavy cruisers were picking out targets twenty five thousand yards away while all of the other cruisers except for USS Nashville and USS Columbia were adding an avalanche of steel and high explosives. The two American light cruisers were focusing on the insignificant destroyers. No one paid attention to the actions of the American or British destroyers. They were only ordered to hold onto their torpedoes for mass attacks. None of the first salvos connected.
Aboard the two Japanese battle cruisers, lookouts were stunned. The entire southern horizon had erupted. Dozens of point sources were now visible. Shouts to increase speed and to present broadsides were quickly followed. No targets were quite locked down until the second incredible salvo from the Allied battle line arrived. Shells went short, shells went long, shells went ahead, shells went astern. There may have been a straddle but it would not matter.
USS Billings was the target of Kongo. Eight three quarter ton shells landed in a tight pattern four hundred yards short. The cruiser’s captain swore and ordered a hard turn to chase the splashes. Hiei had started to fire at HMS Anson.
An American battleship scored the first hit; a sixteen inch shell pushed through Kongo’s belt armor with embarrassing ease before it detonated against the barbette armor. The wound was not fatal but it was the start of the constant slashes and slices. The two battle cruisers had offered their broadside for enough time to fire five salvos and for the allies to send seven full salvos northward. Half a dozen battleship shells and an uncountable number of destroyer and cruiser strikes landed before the two battle cruisers turned north to run at twenty seven knots.
Kongo had some success. A single fourteen inch shell had slammed into Billings, wrecking her A turret. By now, Kongo's aft turrets were the only working guns Massachusetts had sent a trio of heavy shells into the the forward third of the ship. The forward magazine was already being flooded as fires were coming ever closer to the dangerous stores of powder. Hiei was swerving and attempting to dodge the thirty heavy shells that arced towards her every thirty five to forty seconds. Her armor had deflected a few hits but it would not matter as a dozen shells had burrowed deep into her citadel anyways.
