Sunken US WWII warship that went down with more than 200 servicemen found after 81 years (USS Edsall)

An American World War II warship sunk by Japanese forces in a fierce battle after the attack on Pearl Harbor has been discovered at the bottom of the Indian Ocean.

More than 200 American servicemen perished when the USS Edsall was brought down by Japanese forces on March 1, 1942. The Royal Australian Navy discovered the vessel last year some 200 miles east of Christmas Island, south of Java, but the announcement of the discovery was withheld to coincide with Veterans Day.

“Captain Joshua Nix and his crew fought valiantly, evading 1,400 shells from Japanese battleships and cruisers, before being attacked by 26 carrier-dive bombers, taking only one fatal hit,” Caroline Kennedy, US ambassador to Australia, said in a video statement alongside Vice Admiral Mark Hammond, head of the Royal Australian Navy.

“This is part of our continuing efforts to honor those who made the ultimate sacrifice. We will now be able to preserve this important memorial and hope that the families of the heroes who died there will know their loved ones rest in peace,” Kennedy said.

The ship’s deftness in avoiding so many shells from Japanese warships — which included pulling off some difficult maneuvers and deploying smokescreens — led to the vessel being nicknamed a “Dancing Mouse” by a Japanese combatant.

The discovery of the 314-foot destroyer came as a surprise to the Australian navy, which used “advanced robotic and autonomous systems normally used for hydrographic survey capabilities to locate the USS Edsall on the seabed” while conducting an unrelated, unspecified mission.

Hammond said the Edsall earned its place in both US and Australian naval history.

My dad was also harboring at Tjilatjap with the Edsall.

Here is some trivia.

L. Ron Hubbard claim
“L. Ron Hubbard claimed that he had served on Edsall during World War II and that, following her sinking, he swam to shore and remained in the jungle as the ship’s sole survivor. He claimed that this is where he was during the bombing of Pearl Harbor, although Edsall had been sunk in 1942, and the U.S. Navy has no record of his service on the ship. Navy records show that Hubbard was in training in New York when the war broke out. He was supposed to be posted to the Philippines, but his ship was diverted to Australia. There he angered the US naval attaché for assuming “unauthorized duties”; he was relieved from his assignment and returned to the United States.”

Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor and other US targets in the Pacific, December 7th 1941 (I think due to the Int’l Dateline, the attack occurred on the 8th?)

Doolittle’s Raid on Tokyo, April 18th 1942, had little practical effect but was a massive punch in the nose and profound humiliation, and caused it to dawn on the Japanese warlords that all their cities were located on the seacoasts. Meanwhile, Washington DC is also on the seacoast, but on the wrong coast. Most of the industry of the US was along or east of the Mississippi.

Battle of Midway, June 3rd 1942, obliterated the four big carriers; also lost were quite a few of Japan’s best pilots, who were uncontroversially the best in the world. Some ditched and were picked up, some had landed and managed to abandon the carriers before they went down.

The USMC landed on Guadalcanal August 7th 1942, overwhelming the Japanese troops and construction crews which thoughtfully built a nice airfield for US use. :^) After considerable effort on land and sea, the Japanese finally gave up on their campaign to retake the islands in February 1943.

I believe the number of divisions the Japanese had used to basically secure much of the island off SE Asia, plus French indo-china, was a mere eleven, amazing. With the attrition in their airpower, they lost air supremacy and their ability to expand or even hold what they’d taken.

Boeing worked hard to bring the B-29 long range heavy bomber into operational status, manufacturing over 3000 of them, mostly in Kansas, from 1944 to 1945. Meanwhile US naval forces and air power whittled down the Japanese air and naval forces, while ground forces conquered Saipan and other places to use as land bases to strike the Japanese home islands.

Iwo Jima was needed as an emergency landing spot for ailing B-29s returning from raids on Japan. The first use of the capability happened during the Battle of Iwo Jima, and used one of the three airfields the Japanese had built there. By that time over a hundred B-29s had been lost due to getting shot up or having other mechanical problems, and capture of Iwo was crucial.

B-29 raids on Japan consisted of up to 1000 aircraft at a time, kind of a lot really.

[/pedantic stuff]

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