[c13Garrison]

The S-36 was on her second war patrol. Due to prolonged time on multiple stations and a fruitless side-trip to scout Cam-Rahn Bay, Java was being invaded before we could resupply, so Darwin was where we finally made port. We had only tallied a single small freighter, so I was inclined to take us back out since we still had operational orders. Looking at the map though it would be a lot of navigational rigamarole to get back on station up south of Okinawa, and then the return trip. Given we had a full load of fuel relatively far north, being docked in Darwin, it occurred to me that Truk wasn't much farther. I could count for sure on finding ships, maybe something significant, and then plot a straight course to Midway to re-provision. It would be a week longer perhaps, but I thought worth a go.

Plotting a course south of New Guinea and cutting up below Bouganville, we approached Truk from the South-East having had to dodge only a few air patrols on the entire sortie. I set a point 12nm south of the southern channel as my aim point.

Still about 20 miles from the closest "safe" surfaced position I had figured, lookouts spotted a small escort closing fast at long range. I watched it for about 30 seconds and concluded it had spotted us. Just like the S-30 & S-37, two members of my Subron now lost, first discovery when surfaced had been made by the enemy. If the ship had had any meaningful armament I'm sure shells raining down would have been my welcoming card to Truk.

I ordered a crash dive but immediately cut to 1/3 speed once we were awash to still the wake, but upped it to slow ahead once we passed the thermal layer. I had tested the boat off Manila on the first day of the war, so while the water was deep here I took her to 400'. Being discovered 30 miles south of a major base was Not my plan, and I had no idea what kind of trouble might be raising steam to come looking for me.

Given the long range of the sighting, by the time it reached our last location we were a few hundred yards on. I heard depth charging, but distantly, and gratefully saw by sonar plot that it started circling our last known position. Seeing we had seemingly dodged a bullet, I proceeded on course, giving myself 8 miles to run before coming up for a peek and maybe a breath of air.

After proceeding about 5 miles sonar indicated a merchant approaching, and 90 seconds of data allowed us to draw a plot that would take him right across our path, heading WNW to transect our NW course. Seeing as this was the first merchantman I'd had a hint of since the Luzon Straits more than 3 weeks prior, I was inclined to intercept given it was being so obliging. We came to periscope depth, and with speed close to zero raised the scope. It was a standard merchantman proceeding alone, and the escort 5 miles astern was no longer being detected. Confirming its track, I dropped the scope and ordered slow ahead to reach our shooting point. Torpedo run would be about 1500 yards. I took a peek at 4000 yards, then raised the scope again when it reached about 1800 yards.

It was sitting pretty in the scope, but I noticed a slight change in bearing and speed. It must have been making a turn to approach the Truk shipping channel as I couldn't fathom that it had spotted us. However, it was now opening the range and making for a dicey shot. With no time to lose since I couldn't exactly surface and scoot around her so close to Truk, I tried to mentally picture how a slow turn to starboard would affect her position at impact, picked 2 points on her forward hull as marks and fired. My goal was to hit her on the back half.

The first torpedo impacted after a 90 second run, painfully long when you know your target is changing its bearing and its rate of change of range. I raised scope to see the second impact right on her screws, while the first was a 2/3's the way down her hull. "Two hits Biggles, right in the works." Smugly I watched her continue to turn, looking for her to lose speed and come to a stop. ...and instead, she Raised speed, and smartly began a zig-zag to the North East. "...that son-of-a... Damn Biggles. Who-ever their chief engineer is he must've gone to Yale." Making 11 knots, I watched her move off, and then was reminded what an ass-stupid thing I'd been doing for the last 8 minutes.

Making 8 knots with the periscope up must've made a pretty mark on the water. Two Zeroes took off from Truk and immediately vectored towards us. "Down-scope, depth 300 ahead standard." I was less concerned about their attack than about the fact that I was in a very bad spot to be visited by my hosts.

Continuing back on my original course at 300', we were watching sonar for news of the merchantman we'd hit, when Sonar reported first one, then two warships closing at long range and high speed. I maintained speed until our plot showed them at 6000 yards, then went to 1/3 & silent running. The afternoon was a long creep then, but we slowly stretched the distance to the two hunters, now circling our last known position. We reached the original point I plotted for my Truk approach, but it felt too close, so I proceeded north 2 more miles, then came up to periscope depth. Nothing in sight, nothing on radar. With speed at zero I decided to surface. The batteries were down to 79%, and I wanted my freighter.

I stood bridge watch with the crew as dusk was settling, very anxious that either a late air patrol launch or falling shell would be the next thing announced, as we lay surfaced just 10 miles south of Truk's southern shipping channel. As we began our watch, Sonar somehow sifted from amongst the krill whispering that the freighter we had hit more than 2 hours before was breaking up. A small reward, yet I felt gratified, and after calling it in HQ was bemused that my assignment to hunt shipping off Luzon had finally been completed. The minutes dragged on, and I began to feel the lighting was poor enough that we might be safe and I could consider heading west, when I realized something. THREE escorts were presumably looking for me, 5 and 10 miles behind me. How many harbour patrols could Truk have? I might have a golden opportunity now.

We stayed up for less than an hour. When the batteries showed 85% I took us down to 120', and plotted a course into the shipping channels. I had 10 torpedoes, I ought to find something worthwhile laying in there. I asked the Chief for 3 1/2 knots, that would make for a 5 hour entry that would get us back out to deep waters roughly at dawn, 11 hours from now. Nobody on the boat could remember when dawn came for some reason, but I guessed 6.

The next 5 hours were erie. Slow ahead, just listening, knowing that only 120' would be like shooting a penny in a puddle if we were detected. Not a single contact came up during the whole road in, not even the hounds far to the south. Calling all stop I ordered periscope depth. We'd reached the edge of the first harbourage, time to take a look... and it was like Christmas. 8 ships lying at anchor in a 7500 yard area. If I'd had twice as many fish I could have a gambler's chance at sinking them all, ...but, I thought there might be something bigger here, and I didn't want to tip my hand for a freighter if I didn't have to. We proceeded deeper.

The next anchorage held another 6 or 7 merchants, and a single subchaser also at rest. Once again, I made the call to pass them by. It would mean going more than half-way in to continue, so I realized I'd probably be exiting to the north by going on, but I wanted to find something worth all this effort. As it stood, I'd had no hint I was even in danger, so going on didn't seem any more daunting than turning around and going back.

Finally approaching Truk proper, it was after 4am when I raised scope again. Another anchorage, more merchants, but there, finally, my hard earned prize; ...a 6,000 ton light cruiser. I looked around, there had to be something bigger... Going back down we pressed on another 6000 yards, then popping the scope to look around again. More merchants up to the north, one to the far west, but not a single other warship. Somewhat frustrated, given the hour I resigned myself to bagging just what was off Truk port here. It would be daylight by the time I got to deep water, and I definitely didn't want planes spotting me in shallow water. I started maneuvering to set up my first shot, closing to a point 1500 yds from the cruiser and 2000 from a freighter at a different bearing. It would be a significant offset to shoot both on a common bearing, so I was deciding which way to slew the boat first.

"Con Sonar! New Contact Warship bearing 005 Long range closing fast!" ...I would have said '****, Biggles', but at this point it was hardly necessary. We all just had.

Without changing bearing I ordered "Shoot 1!" on the freighter, turned the scope about 70* starboard and ordered "Shoot 2 3 4!" on the light cruiser, then with not a single revolution of the propellers took us to the bottom. 133' down, we prayed while listening for the explosions of our torpedoes. ...which didn't come. I went to the plotting table, trying to figure out how I could miss stationary targets at under 2000 yards. Because of the offset, their 150 yard or-so straight run from the tubes before turning must have made for a significantly different solution than I'd allowed for. The fish probably missed by less than a boat length. Disappointed, we sat on the bottom waiting to pay our bill.

The waiter, however, never brought the check. The escort only pinged once at about 2500 yards, then slowed, and leisurely went Right over us, turning east -and not searching. We listened for 20 minutes, until it passed detection. "...Well. We'll have to thank the guy that picked up our tab. Secure from silent running Biggles, lets let them re-load." After another 25 minutes we came to periscope depth again. I switched to the Attack scope, because it was growing so light out that the night scope gave an imperfect view. I didn't know how far away the escort was, but I reasoned that it wouldn't be easy to get back to my location given the landmass that was likely between us. I set my bearing dead on the light cruiser and fired 2. They both hit, the second causing a large explosion aft. However after 90 seconds the ship showed no sign of even settling, so given I didn't want to hang around Truk in broad daylight I went ahead and fired a third. The fish was just clearing the tube when the cruiser's masts noticeably dipped towards me. It had rolled about 30* by the time the 3rd fish hit, so it probably hit decking for all I know. There was a 2nd large explosion, this one had to be the after magazines, and it rolled on its back settling by the stern.

I turned towards the other freighter, plotting our exit course as I did so. Firing #4, the torpedo hit, but because I didn't want to wait for another reload I just hoped that it would cause enough flooding to do it in. If it ever did sink though we didn't pick it up. Half-way out the north channel I risked periscope depth just to see what I might have missed, but only found one medium freighter which I put the last two fish in. We then made our agonizing way out the north channel, finally making deep waters, and continued on to put some distance between us and the harbour. 10 miles out I came up to take a peek, and with nothing detected we surfaced.

15 1/2 hours we'd been under, but we'd made it. Although there wasn't a huge warship prize to be found, it was good to know that "showing" ourselves 15 miles offshore might be a useful tactic to use in the future, and to discover that we could successfully hide on the bottom. Grateful for the lowering overcast skies, we set our course for Midway. "Secure from battle-stations Biggles. Let's break out the apple cobbler, I think we all deserve a treat." It was June 6, and looked to be a quiet voyage back. We were all relieved.

...

1_TriggerMaru_Overhaul_2-5
1_TMO_25_small_patch
RSRDC_TMO_V502
Fixed Zero Bomb Load RSRDC
LST_TMO_v2
RSRDC_V5xx_Patch1
Improved Stock Environment_v3_TMO&RFB
Submarine Hull Numbers
TDW_Ship_Plane_Fire_Damage_v1_3_SH4
Easier AI for TMO 2.5 by Orpheus