As Admiral Doorman returned from the Banka Strait on February 14, an MLD reconnaissance plane sighted seven transports escorted by three cruisers and seven destroyers assembled off Kendari. Three days later, another MLD plane reported that three transports escorted by two cruisers and two destroyers had left Kendari and were now some 50 miles south of Ambon. At this point, ABDA was unsure of their destination but believed that it was an invasion force bound for either Bali or Timor. But until the convoy’s true destination was ascertained, neither ABDA-FLOAT nor Admiral Doorman was willing to put to sea.
At 0910 on the 18th, four cruisers and two unidentified ships were sighted 140 miles south of Makassar. Air reconnaissance picked them up again at 1500 that afternoon 60 miles northeast of Bali. By now, they held a course for Bali, and the Allies began making plans to contest their pending invasion. However, Admiral Doorman was having difficulty concentrating his ships after the action in the Banka Strait and was unable to act in a timely fashion.
Although reported multiple times, the sightings were actually one convoy that had left Makassar on February 17 with two transports escorted by the 8th Destroyer Division. Aboard the transports was the 3rd Infantry Battalion (less one company) and supporting units from the 48th Infantry Division’s 1st Formosa Regiment. Trailing behind in distant cover were the light cruiser Nagara and the 23rd Destroyer Division. The covering force remained in the Banda Sea while the invasion convoy entered the Bandoeng Strait and landed its troops early on February 19.1
Despite heavy air attacks all throughout the 19th and a strong Allied naval counterattack on the night of February 19–20, the Japanese had control of Bali and its airfield by that morning. The local Balinese Defense Corp quickly deserted, leaving the few Dutch regulars on the island little option but to withdraw across the two-mile-wide Bali Strait to eastern Java. The invasion of Bali had originally not been in Japanese plans, but Kendari’s airfield was often closed by bad weather, preventing them from hitting Soerabaja on a regular basis. Thus, Bali was needed to maintain their aerial assault on Java’s defenses.
On the same day the Bali convoy left Makassar, the seaplane tender Mizuho sailed from Kendari with a lone submarine chaser as escort to reconnoiter the area around Timor and establish an air presence. Later that day, nine transports sailed from Ambon carrying the 228th Infantry Regiment and 3rd Yokosuka Special Air Landing Force, which had orders to seize the island with the goal of cutting air reinforcement from Australia to Java. Their close escort consisted of the cruiser Jintsu with the 15th and 16th Destroyer Divisions and Umikaze from the 24th Destroyer Division.
Japanese Air Superiority February 25, 1942. Legend: (1) Sphere of Japanese air superiority provided by JNAF units operating from Singapore. (2) Sphere of Japanese air superiority provided by IJN units operating from Kuching. (3) Sphere of Japanese air superiority provided by IJN units operating from Balikpapan and Bandjermasin. (4) Sphere of Japanese air superiority provided by JNAF units operating from Makassar. (5) Sphere of Japanese air superiority provided by IJN units operating from Kendari. (6) Sphere of Japanese air superiority provided by IJN units operating from Ambon.
On the 18th five more transports also departed Ambon for Timor. They had a close escort of the 1st/24th Destroyer Division, two minesweepers, three fast transports and three sub chasers. Rear Admiral Takagi’s 5th Cruiser Squadron and two destroyers screened the operation from the Timor Sea. The Japanese went ashore at Koepang and Dili on February 20 and effectively had the island under their control by the 24th. A combined Australian/Dutch guerrilla force held out in the interior until mid-1943 but had no impact on the pending invasion of Java.
The Japanese preceded their invasion of Timor with a heavy air raid on the northern Australian port of Darwin on February 19. The attack was carried out by Vice-Admiral Choichi Nagumo’s 1st Carrier Fleet, which consisted of the 1st Carrier Squadron (Akagi and Kaga) and the 2nd Carrier Squadron (Hiryu and Soryu). Although the 3rd Carrier Squadron (Shokaku and Zuikaku) had returned to Japan in late January, Nagumo’s force was still essentially the same one that had attacked Pearl Harbor on December 7.
The force had departed Palau on February 15 with orders to attack Darwin. The raid would serve two functions. The first was to support the invasion of Timor that was due to begin on the 20th. The second was to interdict the flow of supplies to Java from Darwin, which had by now developed into ABDA’s main supply base outside the East Indies.
Akagi and Kaga had just returned to Palau from Truk, while Hiryu and Soryu were fresh off supporting the invasion operation at Ambon. They were screened by the 1st/3rd Battleship Squadron, 8th Cruiser Squadron and light cruiser Abukuma with her 1st Destroyer Flotilla (with the destroyer Akigumo attached).
Nagumo put into Kendari on the 17th and made a high-speed run across the Banda Sea the following night. By dawn of the 19th, his strike force was in position in the Timor Sea to attack Darwin. The four carriers launched 188 planes—36 fighters, 71 dive-bombers and 81 level bombers—that formed the first wave of the attack. Fifty-four JAAF Ki-21 “Sally” bombers from Ambon and Kendari would form a second wave that would concentrate on the port’s facilities and airfield.
Eight ships were sunk in the attack, and three were saved only through beaching; 10 others were damaged. On the ground the Japanese destroyed virtually every Allied plane at Darwin. The USAAF lost 11 P-40s from the 33rd Pursuit Squadron, one LB-30 and three USAAF Beechcraft biplanes, while the RAAF lost six Hudsons with another and a Wirraway damaged.
En route to Darwin, nine Zeros also shot down the PatWing 10 PBY 22-P-9, which made a crash landing in the ocean near Melville Island. When the Japanese arrived over the harbor, they found the PatWing 10 Catalinas P-4, P-8 and P-41 (the former MLD Y-41) lying quietly at anchor undergoing maintenance. Almost before their crews knew what had hit them, three Zeros from Hiryu set all of the PBYs ablaze. The tender Preston lay nearby and also came under attack but was able to clear the harbor despite being badly damaged by a dive-bomber.
Combined with the Darwin raid, the loss of Bali and Timor effectively closed the eastern half of the Netherlands East Indies to the MLD and PatWing 10. Although both units continued to periodically fly operations in the area, they were now extremely vulnerable to Japanese fighters that seemed to roam every corner of the area. At the same time, the Japanese now had a suitable air base just two miles off the eastern shore of Java, which allowed them to further intensify their air strikes on Morokrembangan, although very few Allied seaplanes were still operating from there.
On February 25 X-21 went missing while on a reconnaissance and minelaying mission over Bali and the Lombok Strait. Despite repeated radio calls throughout the day, it did not answer and never returned. Only after the war was it learned that a Zero of the Tainan Air Wing had scrambled from Bali’s Den Passar Airfield and shot down the X-boat with no survivors.2 X-21 was the fourth plane lost in two days, and the toll was to go still higher.
Losses for the MLD began to mount at an alarming rate. With the Japanese now on the doorstep of Java, the remaining Dorniers and Catalinas had few places left to hide, and barely a day passed without MLD planes seeing action of some kind. To make matters worse, their own AA guns also frequently fired on them. In an effort to remedy the problem, all Dutch planes painted over their traditional orange triangle national markings and replaced them with a red, white and blue square to avoid confusion with the red circle indicative of Japanese aircraft.
On February 24, P-42 (MLD Y-42) went missing on a reconnaissance patrol over Makassar. The plane initially arrived over the harbor just before dawn, where the crew reported three transports and a submarine before turning for home. However, 45 minutes later the PBY was ordered to turn around and bomb the transports, despite the fact that it would put the plane over its target in daylight.
Japanese fighters intercepted the seaplane long before it ever reached the harbor. Just after dawn, she signaled “Am Being Attacked Fighters.”4 But by dodging in and out of the clouds, P-42 was able to avoid them and make a bomb run in which her pilot claimed one hit and one near miss before diving back into the clouds to continue the northward swing of his patrol. Unfortunately though, this would very shortly lead to the PBY’s demise.
Approximately two hours later the Catalina was again intercepted by Japanese fighters; P-42’s radioman sent an urgent message in the clear: “Am Being Attacked by Aircraft. North Many Planes and Fleet.”5 The PBY had stumbled across the Japanese invasion convoy bound for Eastern Java and was now about to pay a steep price for doing so. Unable to evade the enemy this time, the PBY disappeared without a trace or another radio signal, leading Captain Wagner to post the above melancholy report in PatWing 10’s war diary.
By the last week of February, seaplane fighters from Sanyo Maru and Sanuki Maru were operating at will over both the South China and Java seas. Their operational area covered a huge swath of territory, stretching from the Anambas Islands to Soerabaja. As land bases become available in southern Sumatra and Borneo, they were reinforced by Japanese Army and Navy land fighters, which further restricted the ability of the Allied flying boats to effectively operate.
This fact was driven home yet again on the 24th when X-17 and X-18 of GVT.8 bombed a concentration of Japanese warships and transports assembled off Muntok Island. Despite bombing through heavy cloud cover and taking heavy flak, they claimed one hit on a transport. On the way out, three Zeros of the 22nd Air Flotilla—which had reached the island’s airfield the previous day—intercepted the Dorniers near North Wachten Island in the Thousand Islands chain.
X-17 went down in flames almost immediately with no survivors.6 The seaplane’s overturned hull was later photographed by Y-64. The fighters then hammered X-18 until it too broke into flames and made a forced-landing on the sea and sank. Although the entire crew survived, it was forced into the water without lifeboats. Fortunately, the Japanese left them alone, and they were able to swim ashore near the lighthouse on North Wachten Island. They were rescued by the auxiliary minesweeper Hr.Ms. Djombang and returned to the ME the following day.
The Japanese further reinforced their point with an aggressive air attack on Y-48 of GVT.18 later that day. The PBY was on convoy escort duty off the coast of Sumatra when attacked by Japanese aircraft and badly damaged. Although 1st Lieutenant KMR P.D.M.A. Biljard managed to bring his crippled aircraft back to Tandjoeng Priok, the plane was so badly damaged that it would never fly again.7
Following the loss of Banka and southern Sumatra, the Dutch were determined to limit Japanese naval traffic moving through the area. On the night of February 24–25, Lieutenant-Commander G.F. Rijnders received orders to take the Catalina Y-69 out on a minelaying mission to the Banka Strait. Carrying two unwieldy magnetic mines on improvised racks under each wing, the PBY proved extremely difficult to fly; the mission was not made any easier when the Y-boat ran into high winds and heavy rainstorms shortly after taking off from Tandjoeng Priok.
However, the flight crew very quickly forgot about the high winds because the mines it carried were prevented from arming only by a large ball of cotton that was intended to dissolve in seawater. As they plowed through the driving rain, the plane’s crew prayed that the cotton would not prematurely dissolve and detonate the mines.8 Fortunately, they did not, and Y-69 dropped all of its mines in the Banka Strait and returned home without incident. The Dutch later claimed that these mines damaged two Japanese ships, but this is unconfirmed.
Meanwhile, JAAF planes from southern Sumatra continued to attack targets throughout western Java. On the 25th, 26 “Oscar” and “Nate” fighters escorted 15 Ki-48 “Lily” bombers on a raid to Tandjoeng Priok. They caught Y-62 of GVT.2(NEW) on the water at the seaplane base and splintered it badly, although ground crews were able to quickly repair the damage. The Japanese claimed five other planes damaged that day, but none was from the MLD.
The Japanese continued to solidify their air supremacy over the Western Java Sea as they made plans for the invasion of Java. Y-63 of GVT.2(NEW) was the next MLD plane lost as the Japanese tightened their grip. It left Tandjoeng Priok at 2100 hours on the 26th for a night reconnaissance patrol over Banka Island and the Banka Strait. The orders were to search out an invasion force thought to be approaching Java.
By 2300 Y-63 was south of Banka, where it reported a large number of enemy warships and transports. Turning north, the PBY continued up the strait. At 0300 on the 27th, Y-63 was over Muntok harbor, where its radio operator reported flying over a large concentration of Japanese ships at an altitude of 1,000 feet at a range of two miles. This was the last contact, although two naval radio stations on Java tried to raise the plane for several hours afterwards.9 It would not be until after the war ended that the KM and MLD would learn of the plane’s fate from its pilot following his release from a Japanese prison camp.
By daybreak, Y-63 was over the southern entrance of the Banka Strait. The pilot, 1st Lieutenant W.P.A. Ditmar, had two choices—1) return to base without orders to avoid Japanese fighters or 2) stay in the area and undoubtedly meet the enemy. He chose the latter and decided to remain in the area until 0630. Seeing nothing, the plane remained on its patrol route until 0640, when the PBY turned south for Tandjoeng Priok.
Ditmar tried to avoid enemy fighters by flying under the clouds at 1,300 feet. However, a patrol of six “Nates” from the JAAF’s 12th Flying Battalion suddenly appeared out of the clouds in two tight formations of three planes each and bounced the PBY. Raking the seaplane, the fighters roared past. As they came around for a second pass, the radio operator gunner recovered and put a long burst into one of the “Nates,” which immediately trailed black smoke and dove into the sea. Both waist gunners and the plane’s NCO pilot claimed to have seen the plane crash.
At the same time, the starboard waist gunner hit a second fighter several times. It disappeared into a rain cloud and was not seen again. However, the four remaining “Nates” now attacked with a vengeance. Y-63 tried to hide in a nearby rain cloud, but it was too small and did not last long. The Japanese soon found the PBY, which was flying low to the water in a desperate bid to escape.
Attacking from behind, the fighters then proceeded to saw the flying boat out of the air. The copilot was hit in the head and fell onto the controls, sending the plane diving toward the water.10 Ditmar managed with difficulty to regain control, only to find the starboard aileron completely gone and the fuel tanks shredded, forcing a crash-landing on the water in Force 3 conditions without power. Touching down, the PBY bounced high into the air before slamming into the water.
Y-63 sank in about seven minutes, giving the crew barely enough time to pile into a badly holed rubber raft with the wounded pilot. Luckily, the Japanese were not in a vindictive mood and did not strafe the men in the water as they circled the sinking PBY. After 22 hours in the punctured dinghy (which the wounded pilot plugged with his fingers to keep it inflated), the crewmen landed on North Gebroeders Island, where the exhausted men slept on the beach.
The next morning a Japanese reconnaissance plane flew over but failed to see them. The men now attempted to find food and plug the raft, but both efforts failed. They then tried to shoot a large gorilla but missed. They finally resorted to eating snails. Meanwhile, others searching the island found an abandoned motorboat with some water aboard. Although the propeller was damaged, they got it into the water at high tide and sailed for Sumatra on the 1st.
That night, a heavy rainstorm blew in, soaking the exhausted men, who still had no food or water. With the current against them and only paddles from the rubber raft to move them along, the launch made little progress. They finally reached the coast of Sumatra on the 3rd, where they met two praus that towed them ashore. For 100 guilders they rented a prau to replace the launch that was close to sinking.
On March 3 they reached Ketapang on the southwest coast of Sumatra. Here, they rented another prau to take them down the coast to Soekoer for 50 guilders. From here they would cross the Soenda Strait to Java. The men received a warm welcome from the villagers and were able to rent a prau paddled by four Javanese for 50 guilders.
During a stop at a small island in the Soenda Strait, the Javanese paddlers tried to steal the prau. However, after a short scuffle with the MLD crewmen, the Indonesians disappeared into the jungle. The group then crossed the strait and landed at Anjer, Java, on March 6. There, to their dismay, a local official informed them that the Japanese had landed a week earlier and now controlled most of Java, including the entire western half.
Still hoping to escape, the men left the wounded pilot with the official for medical attention and continued to Batavia. The remaining six crewmen split into two three-man groups and headed for Tjilatjap by separate routes. The first group was surrounded by Indonesians shortly after leaving Anjer and murdered. A short time later, the second group was robbed by local villagers and betrayed to the Japanese, who took them into custody.11 Sergeant-Pilot van Dijk was cared for in the hospital until being sent to Serang Prison. He would later be killed in 1944 when the transport he was aboard was torpedoed and sunk by an American submarine.
The Japanese were now closing in on Java as their air power engulfed the island. This made the need for fighter planes critical, so the USN agreed to dispatch the seaplane tender Langley to Java with 32 P-40E fighters. The last leg of Langley’s voyage to Tjilatjap was dangerous and open to Japanese air attack from the newly captured Den Passar airfield on Bali, a small yet strategically vital island just two miles off the eastern shore of Java. It was planned that Langley would reach Tjilatjap by noon on February 28. Based on this timetable, she would be in the most danger during the morning hours of February 27.
To provide her with A/S protection, the commander of GVT.5(NEW) was ordered to maintain air cover over the tender on the morning of February 26. Beginning at 1300 that afternoon, Y-65 and Y-71 alternately flew A/S patrols during the daylight hours. The first day went well with no Japanese planes or submarines sighted. However, trouble loomed the next day when a long-range reconnaissance plane from Bali spotted Langley and her escort, the American destroyers Whipple and Edsall, while they were still some 100 miles south of Tjilatjap. The ships had hoped to travel this last stretch under the cover of darkness, but a series of conflicting orders concerning the tender’s naval escort kept her at sea in a series of critical course reversals.
Initially, her orders called for Langley to be escorted into Tjilatjap by the two destroyers. However, when Y-65 and Y-71 appeared overhead, they signaled new orders that they and the Dutch minelayer Willem van der Zaan were to provide escort.12 But when Langley rendezvoused with the minelayer, her captain, Commander Robert P. McConnell, discovered that Willem van der Zaan could make only 10 knots due to a leaking boiler pipe. This was three knots less than Langley’s top speed, and McConnell was unwilling to remain with the limping minelayer.
If forced to stay with the minelayer, McConnell reasoned that Langley would lose the cover of darkness, which represented her only protection against air attack. With this in mind, he left Willem van der Zaan without orders and proceeded ahead with the intention of joining the destroyers. However, several hours later, he received orders confirming that the minelayer was indeed his escort and that Langley was to rejoin her immediately.
Orders changed again as Willem van der Zaan came into sight; Langley was now to join Whipple and Edsall. Hours behind schedule, this critical series of delays pushed her time of arrival back from the early morning of February 27 to 1700 hours. In the end, Japanese bombers caught all three American ships in broad daylight on the morning of February 27 while still 75 miles south of Tjilatjap.13 At 1150 Whipple signaled many aircraft approaching from the northeast, and all hands went to battle stations. These were 11th Air Fleet G3M “Nells” from Southern Celebes that had been dispatched on the strength of their reconnaissance plane’s report earlier that morning.
As the first wave of Japanese bombers appeared overhead, Y-65 and Y-71 were on the scene providing A/S support. Although alone and unescorted, the Catalinas continued to circle the tender and her escort for the first 35 minutes of the attack. As the bombers punished Langley, their wireless operators sent out a stream of updates as the pilots stood by to provide whatever help they could.
Despite the bombers having an escort of 15 Zeros, the Japanese initially left the PBYs alone as they focused on the tender. While three fighters flew cover, the remainder strafed Langley’s decks. As the seaplane tender’s condition worsened, the Dutch decided that it was time to return to Tjilatjap. But shortly after turning for home, Y-65 and Y-71 were intercepted by six Zeros at 1246 as their bombers left the tender and prepared for the long flight back to Celebes. Although Y-71 was lightly damaged, Y-65 suffered the brunt of the attack. In an unequal fight lasting 34 minutes, the fighters shot out Y-65’s starboard engine and blew away an aileron.
In return, one of the Dutch gunners shot down the Zero piloted by NAP 1st Class Toyo-o Sakai, which is confirmed by Japanese records.14 In his log, Langley’s captain reported a running air fight between a large flying boat and many fighters in the distance.15 There was a huge cloud of black smoke, and an object dove to the sea trailing a long streamer of smoke. Whether this was Sakai’s fighter or the damaged PBY running for home is unknown.
This action could also have been the Qantas Airlines Empire “C” flying boat “Corio,” which was also attacked by the fighter escort about this time. The unarmed seaplane was one of three Qantas seaplanes under contract to the USAAF making regular supply runs between Broome and Java. On the inbound trip, they brought in supplies to Java and took out evacuees on the flip side. Stumbling onto the plane, Zeros swarmed the flying boat and quickly dispatched it with no survivors.
Y-65 was luckier and staggered home to Tjilatjap. The Japanese claimed they shot it down, but it landed in the harbor at 1420 with extremely heavy damage. It never flew again and was eventually destroyed by GVT.5(NEW) personnel when they abandoned the seaplane base on March 3.
Langley was abandoned early on the afternoon of February 27 with Whipple and Edsall taking off her survivors. But although a total loss, the tender refused to sink despite being helped along by nine four-inch rounds and two torpedoes from Whipple. By now, the destroyers were badly overloaded with survivors and in no condition to withstand another air attack, which was expected at any time. As a result, they departed the scene at 1446, leaving Langley’s shattered hulk low in the water and heavily ablaze; she eventually sank unobserved later that day.
With the loss of Bali, Timor and southern Sumatra, Java’s fate was sealed, and all that remained was the agony of a Japanese invasion to put the Allied defense of the East Indies out of its lingering misery. To carry out the invasion of Java and effectively bring the campaign to a close, the Japanese drew up a complex, multi-pronged approach that called for simultaneous landings at four separate locations, including three on Western Java and a fourth on its eastern end. The troops involved in these operations would then converge toward the island’s center and force a Dutch surrender.
The invasion of western Java was assigned to the 2nd Infantry Division, which would land at Merak and Bantam Bay, and the 230th Infantry Regiment, which would land farther east near Eretenwetan. These units departed from Camrahn Bay aboard 56 transports on February 18 with a convoy escort consisting of the 3rd Destroyer Flotilla, 5th Destroyer Flotilla and 1st Base Force. The four heavy cruisers of the 7th Cruiser Squadron provided close escort, while the 16th Cruiser Squadron and two destroyers provided distant cover for the convoy. Ryujo provided air cover and A/S support for all elements of the Western Invasion Force.
Reconnaissance aircraft sighted Rear-Admiral Kurita’s 7th Cruiser Squadron near Anambas Island on February 23. It reported one Atago-class heavy cruiser, two Mogami-class heavy cruisers and one Natori-class light cruiser with a number of transports and oilers. Kurita had withdrawn to this location on the 21st after Vice-Admiral Takahashi, the invasion convoy commander, requested and received permission to delay the Java operation for two days “ . . . because of the fact that there were three large cruisers, five medium cruisers and eight destroyers of the English Fleet in the Java Sea.”16
The IJA High Command concurred with his request, and the convoy turned north at a position 120 miles southeast of Anambas for approximately 24 hours. Although there was no naval engagement or substantial change in the strength of the Allied fleet, Takahashi turned south again on the 23rd.
The invasion of eastern Java was assigned to the 48th Infantry Division and 56th Regimental Group, which would land at Kragan, a small village approximately 100 miles west of Soerabaja. Once ashore, one of its objectives was to capture Soerabaja, the ME and Morokrembangan. The 48th Division left Jolo on February 19 aboard 41 transports and was almost immediately spotted by a PatWing 10 PBY, which reported 80 to 100 ships. Nonetheless, the convoy put into Balikpapan on or about the 21st and collected the 56th Regiment (minus a garrison detachment). From there, it moved south on February 23 escorted by the 4th Destroyer Flotilla.
The following day, the 2nd Destroyer Flotilla and 5th Cruiser Squadron joined the convoy in the Makassar Strait after steaming at high speed from Timor, where they had covered that operation. A PatWing 10 Catalina sighted this force near Bali on February 24 and took AA fire, but Admiral Doorman was in no position to interdict their movements. Although the flotilla’s destroyers joined the convoy’s screen, the heavy cruisers assumed a distant covering position some 100 miles behind; they would join the convoy only in the event of trouble from an Allied naval force. At the same time, the omnipresent Mizuho, Sanyo Maru and Sanuki Maru provided air cover and A/S support for the eastern convoy.
As their invasion convoys moved toward Java, the Japanese also took care to ensure that the island could and would not be reinforced or evacuated by sea. Following the Darwin raid, Vice-Admiral Nagumo had taken his carrier force back to Staring Bay to refuel and refit. From there, he again put out to sea on February 25 with orders to enter the Indian Ocean through the Ombai Strait (between Alor and Timor Islands). His force would take up cruising positions approximately 200 miles south of Tjilatjap with orders to sink or capture any warships or merchant vessels trying to slip into or out of Java’s southern ports.
Nagumo’s force included his four heavy fleet carriers (Akagi, Kaga, Soryu and Hiryu), six supply ships, the 1st/3rd Battleship Squadron, 8th Cruiser Squadron and light cruiser Abukuma with her 1st Destroyer Flotilla. Admiral Nobutake Kondo provided the carrier force with a distant cover using his 2nd/3rd Battleship Squadron and 4th Cruiser Squadron with a screen of three destroyers.
By February 26 the Dutch and their allies fully expected an invasion of Java at any time. The day before, Japanese destroyers had landed a small combat team on Bawean Island, just 85 miles north of Soerabaja. The Netherlands Meteorological Service was the first to learn of the landing when it almost immediately lost contact with a weather forecasting team it had stationed on the island.17 After securing the island, the Japanese proceeded to set up a radio and weather observation post of their own to help coordinate the upcoming invasion of Java.
About the same time, Dutch codebreakers informed the Dutch High Command to expect an invasion any day. In response to these indicators, the planes of GVT.17—flying from Morokrembangan—were in the air continuously throughout the 26th. One plane searched the Java Sea west of Bawean, while a second flew east of Bawean to the southern entrance of the Makassar Strait.
At 1300 that afternoon ABDA-FLOAT received a garbled message from a then unidentified MLD plane reporting the presence of 30 transports northeast of Bawean Island. They were moving south at 10 knots with a heading of 245°, putting them on a course for East Java. The plane also sent a second signal just after 1500 reporting the sighting of two cruisers and two destroyers halfway between the Paternoster Islands and Sibbalds Bank 20 minutes earlier.18
Although the MLD plane had given a clear position and heading, Helfrich assumed that it had been shot down when nothing more was heard from the flying boat. Because of this, he was greatly concerned about the possible presence of an aircraft carrier providing cover for the convoy. If true, it would be extremely dangerous to send out the Allied fleet to stop the invasion fleet without air cover.
However, the exact opposite was true. Not only was there no carrier present, but in reality, the Japanese invasion convoy bound for East Java had little or no air cover for much of the voyage. Although fighters from Balikpapan had been ordered to provide a CAP for the convoy, weather over the Makassar Strait proved inclement, and their efforts to maintain constant air cover proved spotty at best. So bad was the weather that three Zeros from the Tainan Air Wing were lost, although their pilots were eventually able to return to their unit.
This lack of air cover was driven home at 0800 on the 26th when Y-67 dropped out of the clouds and attacked the destroyer Amatsukaze with a single bomb that missed by some 500 yards. Evading return fire from the destroyer, the PBY then disappeared back into the murky sky and was not seen again. Although previously attached to GVT.5 at Tjilatjap, Y-67 was now operating from Morokrembangan following repairs to the damage suffered in its collision with Y-65. While there, its pilot was ordered to fly a reconnaissance patrol over the Java Sea, where he sighted the Japanese fleet and sent the garbled report.
Y-67 continued on to the north, where it signaled the presence of 27 transports, three cruisers and six destroyers northeast of the Arends Islands at 4° 50' South, 114° 20' East.19 Soon afterwards, the PBY reported being attacked near the Arends Islands by two cruiser floatplanes. As a result of damage suffered in this action, Y-67 was forced to return to Morokrembangan, where it landed late that afternoon. Lieutenant-Commander A. Höfelt then commandeered the PBY and ordered it flown to the auxiliary base at Toeloeng Agoeng as the base was no longer considered safe.
Shortly after Y-67’s attack, three USAAF A-24 dive bombers, escorted by eight American P-40s and five ML Buffalos, appeared overhead. They had left Ngoro Airfield on eastern Java at 1600 for a strike mission against the convoy. Once again there was no air cover present, allowing the Allied planes to take their time. Attacking in the face of heavy AA fire, they claimed one direct hit on a transport, but the Japanese later stated that it was nothing more than a near miss.
Meanwhile, Japanese fighter cover continued to break down all throughout the day, and it was only the poor aim of Allied bombardiers that saved the convoy from substantial damage. The final air attack of the day came at 1700, when two B-17s from Java dropped six 500-pound bombs on the destroyer Hatsukaze without results. Another flight of B-17s then attacked the destroyer Yukikaze the following morning, but it too failed to score any hits.
Despite the presence of a Japanese convoy off Bawean, REC-GROUP could put few aircraft into the air to monitor its movements. The heavy air strikes over the previous three weeks had decimated Dutch and American air strength in East Java so that only a handful of long-range reconnaissance aircraft remained at Morokrembangan. The rest had been evacuated to Australia or dispersed to isolated secondary bases. As a result, PatWing 10 had only three operational PBYs on the base.20
At the same time, GVT.17 had only two airworthy aircraft available for service. According to Dutch sources, the American planes did not have working radios, which precluded their being sent on a reconnaissance patrol over the Japanese convoy.21 The Dutch planes were being held back for night-reconnaissance work to avoid fighter cover. With no American or Dutch naval reconnaissance aircraft immediately available, a USAAF B-17 was sent out over the Java Sea with a Dutch observer aboard.22
At 2230 on the night of February 26, the naval radio station at the ME received a signal from KNIL HQ in Bandoeng relaying a phone call received from its 3rd Division, which was deployed some 400 miles away in West Java. At 1830, the divisional staff had received a signal from an American B-17 reporting a Japanese invasion convoy northeast of Bawean at 5° 30' South, 113° East. Although four hours old, this report gave Admiral Doorman a relatively recent fix on the location of the Japanese convoy.
But although everyone knew the Japanese meant to invade Java, no one could say exactly where they intended to land with any certainty. As a result, Doorman was forced to continue searching blindly in the dark for the invasion convoy.23 Leaving the ME on the afternoon of the 26th, he swept east along the north coast of Java and Madoera in the belief the Japanese might be planning an invasion of East Java to occupy the naval base. He then turned west early on the morning of the 27th and swept along the coast toward Rembang and the Bay of Toeban.
Early on the morning of the 27th, Y-45 of GVT.18 took off from Tandjoeng Priok for a reconnaissance flight over the Java Sea. Flying just under the clouds at about 1,000 feet, the pilot sighted a Japanese fighter patrol near Semerang that he managed to evade. As the Catalina crossed over Toeban at 1100, a force of about 20 ships was sighted. Coming closer, the crew identified De Ruyter, Java and a number of ABDA cruisers and destroyers of the CSF.
Passing over the Allied force, Y-45 provided the daily recognition code and continued north. Its orders were to search for enemy submarines operating in the area around Bawean. Although the crew sighted no submarines, the PBY soon made multiple contacts with what was obviously the main Japanese invasion force. Y-45 sent out a flurry of contact reports, all of which were received by KM HQ and relayed to Admiral Doorman’s flagship.
At 1340, Y-45’s wireless operator reported 20 transports escorted by an unknown number of destroyers approximately 65 miles north-northwest of Bawean Island at 4° 40' South, 112° 15' East; they held a course heading of 180°.24 At 1345 he reported a Japanese cruiser approximately 135 miles northwest of Bawean with a course of 220°.25 Five minutes later he reported 25 transports escorted by two cruisers and six destroyers 20 miles west of Bawean.26 The warships were moving south at high speed while the transports retired to the north.
As these position reports came through, Doorman was returning to Soerabaja to refuel. After the high-speed sweep along the coast of Java the previous night, many of his ships, particularly the destroyers, were running low on fuel.27 However, upon receipt of Y-45’s report at approximately 1430, Doorman signaled the CSF by spotlight: “Follow Me. The Enemy Is 90 Miles Away.”28 He immediately turned his squadron in the middle of the Westwater Channel minefield and set a course to intercept.
Meanwhile, Y-45 remained over the convoy, playing a cat-and-mouse game with several floatplanes launched by the cruiser escort. It might have also encountered a number of Tainan Air Wing Zeros flying cover from Balikpapan. One of the Japanese pilots claimed an Allied reconnaissance plane shot down on the afternoon of February 27, but no Allied seaplanes went missing.29
After one and a half hours of dodging in and out of the clouds, the MLD plane turned to the west and continued its patrol. At 1600, Y-45’s radio operator picked up a signal from De Ruyter—“Cruisers in Action.” The Battle of the Java Sea had begun. Although the seaplane did not land at Tandjoeng Priok until 1700, it picked up no more radio reports from De Ruyter or any other Allied ships of the CSF.
On the night of February 27–28, the ABDA fleet engaged the convoy escort near Bawean. In the first major surface battle of the Pacific War, the CSF lost heavily in both men and ships as the last naval barrier to the invasion of Java dissipated. De Ruyter, Java, the Dutch destroyer Kortenaer and the British destroyers Electra and Jupiter were all lost. In return, the Japanese suffered heavy damage to one destroyer and light or moderate damage to several other warships. No transports were lost or damaged, and the landings were delayed by only 24 hours.
As the battle raged, MLD planes continued to fly reconnaissance patrols over the Java Sea. One of these patrols again found the invasion convoy approximately 80 miles north of Bawean. Only lightly escorted by a few destroyers, it had turned away from Java while the escort engaged Doorman’s fleet. Meanwhile, to the west, other MLD reconnaissance planes reported that the western invasion convoy sighted earlier had also turned back near the Thousand Islands. With the destruction of the CSF, it again turned toward western Java.
The last sighting of the eastern invasion force came on the night of the 27th. At 1850 one of the last operational PatWing 10 PBYs on Java left the auxiliary base at Toeloeng Agoeng (near Kediri) for a reconnaissance flight over the convoy that had been reported off Bawean. P-5 flew over the CSF at 1955 during a lull in the action and eventually found the enemy convoy northwest of Bawean at 2222. Ensign Duncan Campbell later told how it took him a full eight minutes to fly over the enormous convoy from tip to tail.30 After signaling the convoy’s position, he remained overhead for the next 70 minutes shadowing its slow, ponderous movement toward Java.
As P-5 turned for home, the crew sighted a series of sharp flashes in the distance, followed shortly afterwards by several heavy explosions. It then reported seeing two ships leaving the area at high speed. The crew could not have known that it had just witnessed the fiery end of the Battle of the Java Sea, which culminated in crippling torpedo strikes on Java at 2332 and De Ruyter at 2334.31 The ships retiring were Houston and Perth, the last remaining ships of the CSF.
Although sightings from all reconnaissance flights throughout the day were reported to KM HQ and in turn were routed to Admiral Doorman, there are lingering questions as to whether and when he actually received them. Reasons for this lapse in communications are varied. As detailed earlier, the MLD suffered a severe shortage of shore-based communications personnel, and the volume of daily activities put upon them quickly overwhelmed its facilities.
However, the KM war room at Soerabaja remained fully staffed and equipped throughout the East Indies campaign, and that should have precluded any delays in relaying information to the CSF while at sea. And although the confusion of a multinational command initially created a logjam of information early in the campaign, this cannot be blamed entirely for a Dutch communications infrastructure that apparently was not up to the tasks thrust upon it in the Allies’ greatest hour of need.
Still, it is known that De Ruyter was in regular contact with Soerabaja throughout the Battle of the Java Sea. On several occasions Doorman requested information on the location and status of the main Japanese convoy. But while reconnaissance reports were available, it appears that virtually all of them arrived hours too late to be of much use to Doorman. An example was the position report of P-5, which reached the ME some 20 minutes after Doorman’s flagship had been torpedoed and put out of action.
Reasons for these delays vary. The first is that MLD HQ at Morokrembangan, which received the reconnaissance reports over the KM’s aircraft frequency, was slow in relaying them to KM HQ. In this case, confusion could have delayed delivery of these reports to the CSF in the Java Sea. However, given the extremely close prewar training between the MLD and KM, this explanation cannot realistically be accepted, especially when one considers the fact that prewar MLD reconnaissance reports reached the surface fleet in just 10 minutes.
It is also possible that the concussion from De Ruyter’s own main guns could have knocked her highly sensitive wireless set off-line. In the early days of the war, this was not unusual for ships of all navies. Concussion also broke the flagship’s searchlights, leaving her unable to communicate with the other ships in the CSF, except by small, handheld lamp.
However, faulty communications cannot be blamed entirely, as there seem to have been regular ship-to-shore communications throughout the battle. At 1857, the Dutch submarine K-XV picked up the following wireless signal from Doorman to KM HQ on Java: “Enemy Retreating to the West. Contact Broken. Where Is the Convoy?”32 But shortly after this message was sent, TBS communications between De Ruyter and the remaining American and Commonwealth ships—which were poor to begin with—failed completely. It is unknown whether the Dutch ships were still able to communicate with De Ruyter.
If they could communicate with the flagship by voice, then KM HQ certainly could too. But if De Ruyter’s wireless was off-line, Doorman would not have received the latest position reports sent from Java. It is also believed that he did not receive position reports of a new Dutch minefield laid the previous night.33 As a result, he spent the night of February 27–28 blindly searching for the convoy before losing De Ruyter and Java in a cataclysmic finale to the Battle of the Java Sea.
At 2300 hours on the night of February 28, Y-67 was ordered to fly a night reconnaissance mission over the Java Sea to locate the invasion convoy that Admiral Doorman had failed to stop. Y-67 found the convoy southwest of Bawean as it moved south at high speed just after midnight on March 1. It was a beautiful moonlit night without a cloud in the sky, allowing Lieutenant-Commander G.F. Rijnders to easily count 39 transports of all types in two huge columns. To avoid AA fire, he approached away from the moon and was able to remain undetected over the convoy for 30 minutes. His radio operator then notified REC-GROUP at Bandoeng, and Y-67 returned home. Shortly before dawn, this convoy landed troops of the 48th Division and 56th Regiment at Kragan on Java’s northern shore.
Later that day the Dorniers of GVT.6 flew a series of final missions over the now deceptively serene Java Sea. Despite combing the area around Bawean for survivors of De Ruyter, Java and Kortenaer, all they found was the Dutch hospital ship Op ten Noort being escorted to Bandjermasin by the Japanese destroyer Amatsukaze. One Dornier had been ordered out of the ME before dawn to search for survivors but was captured near Bawean. After three hours of searching the area around the hospital ship and dodging enemy ships, the plane returned to base.
With that flight, the MLD’s role in the defense of the East Indies ended. All that was left to do now was to execute prearranged plans the KM had for evacuating Java. However, the month of March was to have its share of disasters, although the MLD had turned its attention to evacuation and was no longer undertaking offensive actions.
In an ironic twist of fate, planes ordered by the MLD before the war continued to arrive as the Dutch began to evacuate. On the 28th, the Dutch freighter Kota Baroe put into Tjilatjap with six crated Douglas DB-7 light bombers. As the MLD, KM and Allied forces withdrew from the port, a group of 70 naval mechanics struggled to assemble the planes on the wharf while there was still time.
Two of the bombers were assembled at Tjilatjap, while the remaining four were supposed to have been sent still in their crates by train to the ML airfield at Tasikmalaja for assembly. However, it appears that they were never sent and the Japanese captured the planes still on the dock. On the morning of March 5, as the evacuation of Tjilatjap continued, Lieutenant H.V.B. Burgerhout, commanding officer of GVT.5, was ordered to fly one of the newly assembled DB-7s to Tasikmalaja. Despite the simple fact that he had never flown a land plane of this size and type, Lieutenant Burgerhout was the only pilot available.
Taking off from the dock, Burgerhout reached the airfield without difficulty. There, the base commander almost immediately ordered it destroyed, as Japanese troops were about to overrun the field. Crews attempted to disable the other four DB-7s by punching holes in their wings with crowbars and ripping off the carburetors. What happened to the final bomber at Tjilatjap is unknown, although the Japanese captured at least one bomber intact, or enough parts to assemble a complete bomber.
Evacuation operations were also under way at Tandjoeng Priok as a steady stream of naval crews, airmen and ground personnel slipped out of the port before the Japanese took over. As the last MLD planes and personnel departed Tandjoeng Priok on the 28th, a British flight crew and ground personnel worked frantically to repair and fly out 205 Squadron’s FV-U/Y-53. The PBY had damaged a float while landing at Tandjoeng Priok on February 18 and was still unserviceable.
However, the port commander would not allow any extra time for repairs, so the men worked feverishly to repair the PBY before KNIL engineers blew up the plane and its hangar to prevent their capture. But when the PBY was hoisted into the fuel-covered water for an engine test, it immediately developed a serious leak during fueling. Before the leak could be repaired, the port commander received orders to begin demolition of the naval air station, slips and all remaining shipping in Tandjoeng Priok. This included FV-U/Y-53, which forced the British personnel to evacuate Java by an alternate route. Japanese troops moved into Batavia and Tandjoeng Priok within hours of Dutch forces pulling out of the city.