Plans and Preparations
In December 1943 Admiral Halsey's planes were bombing Rabaul, his ships were patrolling the Solomon Sea, and his ground troops in Bougainville were either fighting the enemy or consolidating positions in anticipation of a fight.
But this was not enough to satisfy him. When he learned that Nimitz' plans, as they stood in December, would not permit the invasion of Mantis and Kavieng for several months' he decided to seize an air base site within fighter range of Kavieng in the meantime (Unless otherwise indicated this section is based on Craven and Cate, The Pacific: Guadalcanal to Saipan, P- 355; Gillespie, The Pacific, pp. 168-95; Halsey and Bryan, Admiral Halsey's Story, p. 188; Morison, Breaking the Bismarcks Barrier, pp. 412-19; Rentz, Bougainville and the Northern Solotnons, PP. 114-17; Building the Navy's Bases in World War II, II, 274-76; Halsey, Narrative Account of the South Pacific Campaign; Southeast Area Naval Operations, III, Japanese Monogr NO. 50 (OCMH), 60-62.)
At a conference in Port Moresby on 20 December attended by MacArthur, Kinkaid, Carney, Chamberlin, and others, the South Pacific representatives proposed that the Southwest Pacific attack Manus directly while South Pacific forces captured the Green Islands, some 37 miles northwest of Buka, and established there an airfield and PT boat base.
Situated 117 miles east of Rabaul and 220 miles southeast of Kavieng, this circular coral atoll was not strongly held. The Japanese used it only as a barge staging base between Rabaul and Buka. Allied seizure of the atoll Would put South Pacific fighter planes within range of Kavieng, extend the range of PT boat patrols as far as New Ireland, and cut the Japanese seaborne supply route to Buka.
MacArthur, deciding for the time being against a move to Mantis in advance of the projected invasion of Hansa Bay, approved simultaneous attacks against Mantis and Kavieng and told the South Pacific to go ahead with the plan to attack the Green Islands about 1 February. (Memo, SJC [Chamberlin] for Jnl, 21 Dec 43, sub: Conf at GHQ, 20 Dec 43, in GHQ SWPA G-3 Jnl, 21 Dec 43.)
The island group consists of four flat, thickly wooded coral atolls which encircle a lagoon. The.group is about nine miles long from north to south, five miles from east to west. Horseshoe-shaped Nissan, the main island, provided good landing beaches on its west shore inside the lagoon, but it was not known whether the passage between Barahun and Nissan would accommodate landing craft. Therefore Halsey sent four PT boats from Cape Torokma to examine the passage on the night of 10-11 January. They found seventeen feet of water there, or enough to float an LST. (A fully loaded LST draws 14 feet 1 1/4 inches of water astern, 9 feet 9 1/4 inches when loaded for landing operations.)
Admiral Halsey, who returned to Noum6a on 3 February, placed control of the operation and responsibility for the co-ordination of amphibious planning in Admiral Wilkinson's hands on 5 February. (Rad, Comdr Third Fit to CINCSWPA, CINCPAC, and all TF's SOPAC, 5 Feb 44, in GHQ SWPA G-3 Jnl, 7 Feb 44.)
This action confirmed warning orders which had been issued in early January.
Only destroyer-transports aiid landing craft were assigned to the attack force. Command of the landing force was given to General Barrowclough of the 3d New Zealand Division. Barrowclough's division (less the 8th Brigade Group), the 976th Antiaircraft Artillery Gun Battalion of the U.S. Army, a PT base unit, on of the U.S. Army, a PT base unit, communications units, a boat pool, and a large naval base unit including an entire construction regiment, constituted the landing force. Halsey ordered the Solomons air command and Ainsworth's and Merrill's cruiser task forces to support and cover the invasion, and arranged with MacArthur for Kenney's air forces to deliver the attacks on Kavieng during the first fifteen days of February. (Rad, Comdr Third Flt to CINCSWPA, 22 Jan 44, in GHQ SWPA G-3 Jul, 23 Jan 44; Rad, MacArthur to Comdrs AAF, ANF, ALAMO, et al., 27 Jan 44, in GHQ SWPA G-3 Jul, 27 Jan 44. Rear Adm. John F. Shafroth, Halsey's deputy commander, issued the warning orders on 3 January. Ltr, COMSOPAC to COMAIRSOPAC, COMGENSOPAC, et al., 3 Jan 44, sub: Warning Orders, in GHQ SWPA G-3 Jnl, 6 Jan 44.)
As South Pacific headquarters estimated that Rabaul and Kavieng would be virtually neutralized by mid-February, D Day was set for the 15th. General Barrowclough, who had been island commander at Vella Lavella, moved his headquarters to Guadalcanal in January to be near Wilkinson during the planning. They decided to send a large reconnaissance party to Green in order to determine the strength of the enemy garrison and to examine possible airfield sites, beaches, and naval base sites, and the lagoon tides. The party was to spend twenty-four hours ashore.
Three hundred and twenty-two soldiers of the 30th New Zealand Battalion and twenty-seven American and eleven New Zealand hydrographic, air, small boat, communications, and intelligence specialists boarded three APD's on 29 January. The destroyer-transports hove to west of Barahun about midnight and launched landing craft. Two of the torpedo boats that had checked the passage led the landing craft through to the beach. Once ashore the reconnaissance party waited for daylight while the APD's hauled clear. Guarded by the New Zealand soldiers, the specialists set to work and gathered their data.
They found a good airfield site, and estimated that the enemy garrison numbered about a hundred. The twelve hundred native inhabitants proved so friendly and cooperative that preliminary naval bombardment to support the main landing was omitted. The specialists were not molested, but the enemy fired on one landing craft that went to the south part of the island where there was an abandoned Roman Catholic mission and killed three New Zealanders and one American. When Rabaul heard of the landing Kusaka sent six bomb-carrying fighters to Green. They attacked the landing boats but did no damage.
The APD's reclaimed the New Zealanders and Americans on 31 January and returned safely to Guadalcanal. On the way back two of the escorting destroyers sank a Japanese submarine near Buka Passage.
The Japanese Green Islands garrison reported it had suffered heavy losses, asked for reinforcements, and fled northwest in three landing craft to the Feni Islands. Kusaka put 123 men aboard a submarine on 1 February and sent them to Nissan. The submarine hove to off the northeast coast about midnight in a sea so rough that after 77 men had gone ashore, the submarine commander called off the operation and returned to Rabaul with 46 men still on board. The return of the original garrison to Nissan on 5 February brought total enemy strength to 102.
The Landings
In the meantime the South Pacific's APD's returned from service in the Cape Gloucester operation. Shortly before 12 February the APD's, LST's, LCI's LCT's, LCM's, and patrol boats and coastal transports of the amphibious force took aboard the 5,806-man New Zealand-American landing force at Tulagi, Guadalcanal, the Russells, New Georgia, and Vella Lavella .. ( Eleven destroyers escorted; two aircraft rescue boats and two tugs were also in the amphibious force. There were 4,242 New Zealanders and 1,564 Americans in the landing force.)
The ships timing their departures so as to meet Bougainville on 14 February, sailed from their various ports on the 12th and 15th.
A Japanese reconnaissance plane spotted them west of Bougainville on 14 February, reported their presence to Rabaul, and kept contact. Admiral Kusaka sent thirty-two planes against the ships throughout the moonlit night of 14-15 February. They did no damage to Wilkinson's ships but managed to hit the cruiser Saint Louis in Admiral Ainsworth's task force, which was operating south of Saint George's Channel. Twelve Japanese planes were lost.
The APD's arrived in the transport area west of Barahun shortly after 0600 on 15 February and promptly dispatched LCVP's toward the passage. Thirty-two fighters of the Solomons air command were on station overhead. But Kusaka did not yield easily. He sent out seventeen bombers and about fifteen of these attacked the landing craft. They scored no hits. At the same time Kenney's airmen, with four A-20 and seven B-25 squadrons, delivered a strong blow against Kavieng which kept that base from attacking the invaders at Green.
Within two hours all men of the New Zealand combat units went ashore on Nissan. During the day all ships and boats were completely unloaded and with the exception of the LCT's, all left for the south once they were emptied. The LCT's remained as part of the naval advanced base.
Between 15 and 20 February the New Zealand infantrymen hunted down and killed the Japanese garrison. Ten New Zealanders and 3 Americans were killed; 21 New Zealanders and 3 Americans were wounded.
By 17 March 16,448 men and 43,088 tons of supplies had been sent to the Green Islands. The 22d Naval Construction Regiment had begun work at once. Within two days of the landings a PT boat base opened. This extended the range of torpedo boat patrols to New Ireland and along the entire northeast coast of Bougainville. By 4 March a 5,000-foot fighter field was ready; in late March a 6,000-foot bomber field was opened. Kavieng now lay within range of fighters and light bombers as well as heavy bombers from Bougainville. But, stripped of its naval planes when Admiral Koga ordered their withdrawal in February, it had already ceased to menace the Allies.
More Expanding Into the Bismarck Archipelago
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