Wake Island: Construction workers to the front!

Markus

Banned
Part 2 of "they fight with what they have". Part 1 is here.


WI, August 22nd:
Major L. Hohn and 170 Marines of Defence Battalion 1 arrive on Wake. They find 1,200 civilian construction workers building all sorts of facilities for the planned air/seaplane base. The critical defence installations like gun positions, command posts and the airfield have to be build by the Marines themselves. Who also are supposed to refuel the B-17 stopping on the way to the PI – by hand because no powered pumps are available. A process that would demand many man hours from the already overworked Marines.

The first B-17 crew landing after Aug. 22nd is given a hand powered pump and told to “fill her up yourself. We have more important things to do!” Maj. Hohn also issues and urgent request for either a powered pump or some airmen to do the refuelling. Miraculously his request is granted, the next Pan Am clipper brings two dozen (unarmed) Airmen to Wake.


October 18th:
Major Devereux takes command. His first action is a request to have the construction workers help with building of Wake´s defences. The Major emphasises the Marine´s manpowershortage and states Wake can´t be ready in time if the Marines have to do all the work alone. Dan Teters the boss of the workers attaches his own letter, assuring his bosses and Adm. Kimmel Maj. Devereux´s request doesn´t really amount to much work and if granted would barely slow down base construction. An understatement, but a small one. The worker outnumber the Marines by a factor of three and they have heavy equipment. They can do in a day what takes the Marines ten days and won´t even break a sweat. The request is granted.


Events until Dec.8th:


Dan Teters immediately dispatches a sizable number of workers to work with the Marines.. By the time 200 more Marines arrive on Nov. 2nd, bringing strength up to 15 officers and 373 men meaning the battalion has roughly a third of it´s TOE-strength much progess ahs already been made. Gun emplacements, command posts, ammo dumps are completed in record time, underbrush is cleared to have free fields of fire, all positions are carefully camouflaged, eventually even dummy positions are being build.
Special attention si given to the airfield. The runway is paved and widened so two planes can take off at the same time and more than a dozen shelters are made. Underbrush is put on their canvas “roofs” and sides making them nearly indistinguishable from the landscape. The taxiways leading to the shelters are giving it away, so in a safe distance poorly concealed dummy shelters with dummy planes are made. The last stretch of road to the real shelters is covered with some foliage to obscure it. Furthermore a number of dummy planes is put in the old, cramped parking area near the runway.


November 28th:

Commander Cunningham, eight USN officers and 58 sailors and 51 Marines of VMF-211 arrive with USS Wright. Ground crews are delighted seeing everything is ready at the airfield, so is the new island commander.


Dec. 4th:

VMF-211´s twelve F4F-3 fighters arrive from USS Enterprise


Dec. 8th:

06:50 hrs: Wake receives message PH is under attack. Call to arms is sounded. A CAP is launched.

11:50hrs: Lt. Lewis spots 36 Betty bombers in 10,000 feet and right on top of him. Seconds later the first 3inch guns and cal. 50 machine guns open fire, but 100lb fragmentation bombs and 20mm shells are already raining down … on the dummy planes in the parking area. After that two 12 planes formations attack the camps the third strafes the airfield one more time. The AA shoots one Betty down and damages two more, the CAP can´t make contact, planes can´t the launched from the shrapnel littered runway.

Damage assessment: The airfield is ablaze, but it´s the fuel drums deliberately put in the parking area that are burning. VMF-211 personnel and equipment has escaped with minor losses thanks to the elaborate system of trenches and shelters.

Dec 9th:

05:45 hrs: The CAP is launched

10:40hrs: All Wildcats take off. Based on the time of sunrise and distance an air raid is expected any time after 11:00 hrs.

11:40 hrs: two CAP fighters spot 25 Bettys, alert Wake and attack. The Bettys withdraw before the entire CAP can make contact, but the Wildcats got five and three more fell victim the AA which got accurate altitude data from the Wildcats. Again damage on Wake is marginal. The Marines notice the Bettys approached form the same direction and at the same altitude as on Dec.8th.


Dec10th:

10:30 hrs: 20 Bettys and eight four-engine Kawanishi H6K flying boats are approach just like expected and run into the entire CAP. The attackers never make it to Wake! The slow Kawanishis are wiped out with the first pass, follow up attacks down all but four Bettys.


Dec. 11th:

All quiet on the western front so to speak. After Dec.10th debacle Admiral Inouye has cancelled the invasion planned for this day. As long as the Americans have air superiority an invasion will not be attempted. He return to base, requests carrier support and decides to use all of his 950 infantrymen in the next attempt.


Dec12th to 19th:

Japanese activity is limited to night raids and shelling by subs. It´s a minor nuisance to Wakes defenders who are busy improving their positions and tapping into “new” manpower reserves. The 30 odd airmen are airmen of the US Army Air Force and thus have received infantry training at some time. They are given the few spare small arms the Marines have and a sector to defend. The construction workers are under military command now, but Cunningham and Devereux issued their orders as requests. Only when this does not yield the expected results they turn to Dan Teters and have him give actual orders to his men. A process that is hardly ever put in use. The number of volunteers usually exceeds the demand. By Dec. 19th all loaders and ammo handlers are either sailors or worker … errr. I´m mean militiamen who volunteered for “90 day or the duration of the battle”. Rules of warfare need to be observed.
This frees a lot of Marines manpower allowing more AA-gun to be made operational quickly.(In OTL just six out of 12 3inch-AA guns could be manned.)


Dec 20th:

10:00 hrs: CAP fighters spot 50 single engine bombers. In accordance with the new strategy agree upon for such a case they carefully stay away. The remaining wildcats –now in blast proof shelters- are kept on the ground. AA-fire is deliberately reduced.


Dec 21st:

08:50 hrs: second attack by 50 carrier based planes. Again Wildcats avoid contact; AA-fire is reduced again.
12:00 hrs: 11 land based bombers attack. They face no CAP and little AA-fire


Dec.22nd:

09:00 hrs: Third and last air strike by 40 CV-based planes.


Damage assessment on Wake for the last three days: The first phase of Plan “Possum” is a success. The dummy positions have suffered badly, damage to the AA-batteries is limited, the fighters and the seacoast guns are undamaged.


Dec23rd:

Fourth Feet – 3 CL, 6 DD, 2 APD, 2 transports and 2 subs approach Wake under the cover of darkness.

03:00hrs: They are spotted, the garrison is on full alert.
05:00hrs: the CL open fire. The Japanese infantrymen board their landing craft
06:00hrs: CL Yubari and two APD approach Battery A(two 5inch guns).
06:30hrs: At 3,000 yards the APDs overtake Yubari and head for the beach. Two CL, three DD and the transports close in on Battery L on Wilkes Island. Now that the Japanese have shown their hand the second phase of plan “Possum” begins: The Marines no longer play possum, but fight back. The artillery opens fire Both APDs are quickly ripped apart by consecutive 5inch hits after which Battery A shifts it´s fire to Yubari. Battery L in the meantime has scored some hits on the transports before the DDs shield them with smoke. But it does them little good, because the Wildcats are launched. They go straight for Kongo and Konryu Maru scoring multiple hits with 100lb fragmentation bombs turned jury-rigged HE bombs and set both ships on fire. After that they strafe the helpless infantry in their landing craft. With their flagship drifting and burning after more than a dozen 5inch hit and two DDs suddenly vanishing in balls of fire the Japanese are not retreating, they are fleeing. But not fast enough, one transport is sinking before the ships are out of range, but by no means have they reached safety. As soon as they stop shelling of Wake the Wildcats land rearm and come back with a vengeance. The reaming transport is the No1 targets. Only after it is bombed and strafed until it´s dead in the water do the Wildcats attack the fleeing warships and sink one more DD.

Damage assessment: Due to the short range the Japanese scored some hits this time, but as a whole the shore batteries are intact. The IJN however has suffered an unmitigated debacle: 1 of 3 CL is sunk, three of six DD and worst of all; all APD and transports with the entire infantry Fourth Fleet had at it´s disposal.


What might the next days bring? The CVs might return, but so what? Unlike infantry they can´t invade and infantry is what the Japanese don´t have for some time. The CVs sure as hell won´t stay until reserves can be found. Wake was supposed to be a strictly local operation by Fourth Fleet, the CVS are needed in SEA. So Adm. Fletcher will pick up his cap, turn TF-11 around one more time and dropp of the following equipment:
  • Three complete sets of fire-control instruments and data-transmission systems for 3-inch antiaircraft batteries, plus additional electrical data-transmission cables, and ordnance tools and spares.
  • Replacements--plus needed spare items--for all 5-inch seacoast fire-control and ordnance gear previously damaged.
  • More than 3 million rounds of belted .50 and .30 caliber machine-gun ammunition, plus ample rifle and pistol ammunition and grenades. Barbed wire, antipersonnel mines, and additional engineer tools were also included.
  • Nine thousand rounds of 5-inch shell and 12,000 rounds of 3-inch shell. The latter, equipped with new type 30-second mechanical time fuzes, would give the Wake antiaircraft batteries a higher ceiling and far more dependable ballistic performance than the World War I 21-second powder-train antiaircraft fuzes with which they were supplied.
  • Most important in this critical cargo, however, was radar--something unfamiliar even as a word to many Marines of those days. One early warning set, an SCR-270, and a primitive fire-control radar, the SCR-268, were stowed aft on the flight-deck of the Tangier.
  • Battery F, Fourth Defense Battalion, FMF (3-inch antiaircraft)
  • Battery B, Fourth Defense Battalion, FMF (5-inch seacoast)
  • Provisional ground and antiaircraft machine-gun detachment from Batteries H and I, Fourth Defense Battalion, FMF
  • Provisional headquarters and service detachment from H & S Battery, Fourth Defense Battalion, FMF
  • Detachment of VMF-221(14 F2A-3)
 
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