October 25, 1944. On the evening of the 24th I had positioned my boat at the south end of the San Bernardino Strait hoping to intercept the Japanese fleet on its way to the battle off Samar island and hopefully bag my first Yamato class BB. As expected an enemy fleet appeared coming in fast from the west but this was bigger than I expected, had more than 6 BB's including two Yamato's, a Fuso and an Ise.
I lined up to get in front of the fleet and submerged waiting for the lead DD's to pass over me. Once the periscope came up I saw a Yamato coming up in front of me and a CA about to pass behind me. Fired all 6 mk18's at the yamato and 3 at the CA. Unfortunately the CA was too close and the torps failed to arm, but there were six nice explosions along the side of the Yamato and she started to slow down and list to one side. I went as deep as I could to rearm and tried to follow the fleet.
On other task forces I have encountered, if you cripple the capitol ship the others will circle around and you can sneak away, rearm and come back for more, but not this time. They left the Yamato alone and dead in the water and steamed on up the San Bernadino strait. Three more mk18's and the BB sank below the surface and I proceeded to follow the fleet.
I found a Kongo BB at the edge of the shallow water leading to the strait like it was hung up on something. My first salvo went wide to the right, seams the TDC though it was going 4kn when it was stationary. So I got closer, aimed behind her enough so the torps would hit home and dispatched my second BB of the day.
The rest of the task force was way ahead of me and now having only one rear torp left I headed home. I tried to report the contact but of course since a 'convoy' was not in view SH4 would not let me.
Now historically this task force was too big. Musashi was sunk earlier on the 24th so there should not have been two yamato's in admiral Kurita's center force that evening, and there should have been only four battle ships total. I suspect that had an actual sub had the success I did Kurita would have turned around and headed home. Having lost two more of his BB's and having his position discovered would have been too much for him to continue and the battle off Samar would not have happened.
Balao class sub using GFO mod.
|