Evening star., 1943-04-22

1t. Larsen's detail from Navy
Torpedo Squadron flies neto
planes from Norfolk, Va, to Hon.
olulu. In smashing Japs' at
tempt to take MidtDdy Island, all
but one plane are lost, but enemy
fees. Larsen reorgnnizes squad
ron and helps marines hold
Guddalcanal, hitting Japs in
5ungles, their boats and supply
depots.
CHAPTER II.
Abrutly, our carrier force changed
its course and steamed north. The
enemy had begun to move. As at
Midway, the canny Jap moved with
weather, hiding under dirty banks
Of 1t and coverging with it on
Guadalcanal. How much of him was
there2 More than 80 ships.
This was not a task force. This
was a fleet. The firepower it con-
tanned staggers the Imagination. To
add 1t up in terms that can be UNDER
stood by the mind that is land-based
and therefore has limited take-off
is impossible. The nearest to 1t is
to take the rough army way of ap-
proximating the battle strength of
a battleship to full and fully armed
division. And this was not one bat
tleship coming down from the north
and west. This was a whole army OF
ships.
And how much of us was there?
This is still information that Is of
value to the enemy. But there was
not nearly so much of us that we
could ever hope to sink all or even
most of the enemy's fleet. We could
not afford the losses necessarily in
volved in such an attempt. If we
had won, it might very we'll have
been our last victory in the Western
Pacific. The best we could do was
fight acknowledgement the enemy
from attaining his objective and
punish him as much as possible for
attempting to do so.
The enemy had the ships to sweep
the sea clean and land on Guadal-
canal. He was carrying with him
the airplanes he needed to exploit a
landing on Guadalcanal and make
1t good.
Sought Gripping Blow.
This was an amphibious operation,
The ships were no good to him once
he'd got his beachhead on land. The
planes were not much good to him
until he'd got the beachhead. But,
If we could strip him of his planes
before he got his beachhead, then
he'd turn his ships around and go
away. There would be no point in
his expending ships to establish
beachhead that could not be ex-
plotted. 1t was the combination that
he needed-ships to blow the door
down and airplanes to 60 on through
lt-and If we knocked out any part
Of the combination, we'd win. He'd
60 home. We didn't have the ships
to knock out the surface power in
his combination. But, when you
sink carrier. you knock all the
pidllCo 0lldU dCPCllo VII AZ
Japs' carriers were vulnerable as
carriers, 1t seems, always will have
to be In this war.
Carriers have to be fast to stir up
enough wind for take-o They
have to be airports-that is. they
not only have to support planes but
support the enormous weight of
men and supplies for servicing and,
In part. maintaining them. There
are limits to the amount of weight
that can be pushed rapidly through
the water and those limits are
reached before q carrier can be
armored and armed to stand off an
attack like an ordinary warship. So
sir-power at sea inevitably has feet
of clay and it was at the feet that
we aimed In this battle-the second
battle for the Solomons-as we had
aimed and hit them in our other
great defensive victories Of 1912
Midway and the Coral Sea. We did
not destroy the Jap in those battles
BY stripping him Of his carriers we
simply made it impossible for him to