Britain's Pearl Harbor - Indian Ocean Raid 1942 Animated - YouTube

after the empire of japan completed its  defeat of the dutch east indies in march 1942  

the japanese navy devised a bold follow-up strike  gathering together the full power of its mighty  

force of aircraft carriers they set out into  the indian ocean determined to launch a pearl  

harbor-style attack that would destroy the british  eastern fleet once and for all this video is  

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in the spring of 1942 the raw navy was  reeling from heavy blows in the east  

malaya and singapore had fallen and the remaining  british ships in the east indies had been  

sunk at the battles of the java sea the task then  for admiral james somerville who arrived to become  

the commander-in-chief of the eastern fleet at  the end of march was a difficult one at this  

time a new eastern fleet was being hurriedly  assembled at ceylon modern-day sri lanka  

to provide some kind of force to protect  india from potential japanese invasion  

somerville's fleet was an impressive size on  paper he had three aircraft carriers formidable  

indomitable and hermes and five battleships  war spite rameli's revenge resolution  

and royal sovereign but this wasn't the full story  only warspite had been modernized and was capable  

of the speed and endurance needed for extended  operations the other battleships were really  

only suitable for convoy escort duty the carriers  too were flawed hermes was old and formidable and  

indomitable's aircrews were inexperienced the two  modern carriers also had armored decks reducing  

the number of aircraft that each could carry  somerville's total air group was only 39 fighters  

and 57 strike aircraft the imperial japanese navy  understood the potential weakness of the british  

in march 1942 they actually thought the eastern  fleet was even smaller at two battleships and  

two carriers but believed heavy reinforcements  were on the way including two further carriers  

and six more battleships this meant there was an  opportunity to destroy the british fleet before  

its reinforcements could arrive and assure  japanese naval control over the indian ocean  

it was an opportunity they were not about to  pass up at the start of april 1942 japan began a  

two-prong defensive into the indian ocean  codenamed operation c the first phase saw  

vice admiral zaburo azawa lead a task force  including the light carrier ryuho into the bay  

of bengal once there over a five-day period  they rampage through allied shipping lanes  

sinking more than 20 ships and around a hundred  thousand tons of shipping before returning to  

port as if to underline the overwhelming naval  strength japan now enjoyed azaw's force went  

completely unbothered by allied naval or air  forces as its side through britain's merchantmen  

this was because to the south admiral somerville's  fleet had more than enough problems of its own

a few days before the end of march the main  japanese force departed the east indies  

crossing into the indian ocean and progressing  up the coast of sumatra this was the core of  

japan's naval strength the fearsome kido bhutai  with five fleet aircraft carriers and four fast  

battleships under the command of admiral chucci  nagumo it was the same force as that which  

had attacked pearl harbor and devastated port  darwin in australia in the middle of february  

nagumo's fleet turned eastwards on april 3rd  intending to approach the ports of colombo  

and trincomalee and launch massive airstrikes  aiming to once again catch allied ships in port  

thankfully for the british the  japanese naval code had been broken  

and so admiral somerville was forewarned  about the planned japanese offensive  

british intelligence pointed to an attack  on colombo on april 1st and somerville's  

own assessment was that japan would only  have perhaps two carriers available for this  

operation he therefore devised a plan to take  his fleet to sea evade the japanese initially  

and then launch knight torpedo attacks on the  enemy making use of radar-equipped bombers

admiral somerville assembled his fleet south of  ceylon on march 31st and waited unfortunately or  

perhaps fortunately as we will see for two  days the japanese were nowhere to be seen  

by april 3rd the slow unmodernized battleships  in the british fleet were low on fuel and as  

far as somerville could make out there was no  imminent japanese attack coming he therefore  

set about returning to port the bulk of the fleet  would move to a new anchorage at adu atoll in the  

maldives with the heavy cruisers cornwall  and devonshire travelling back to colombo  

and the carrier hermes heading for trincomalee  

unbeknownst to somerville the japanese strike  force had merely been delayed leaving the east  

indies and was twice the size of the force the  british expected barely a few hours after the  

eastern fleet arrived at abdu atoll on april 4th  a catalina flying boat made contact with a large  

japanese fleet steaming north east towards ceylon  somerville immediately stepped up the refueling  

managing to get back to sea with his faster  ships grouped up as force a just after midnight

the british admiral still harbored ambitions  of pressing home an attack at night still  

unaware at this point of the true strength  of the enemy fleet the cruisers cornwall  

and devonshire were ordered to link up with  force a leaving colombo at 10 pm on april 4.  

early the next morning the  japanese carriers swung into action

commander fuchida mitsuo led 91  japanese bombers on the attack run  

escorted by 36 fighters at  8am colombo was hit hard

waves of japanese bombers appeared devastating the  port facilities with impunity the small numbers  

of allied fighters on ceylon tried to fight  back but they were outnumbered and outgunned  

the only positive for the british was  that little damage was done to shipping as  

most had already left port but this was about to  change at 11 30 the cornwall and dorset shear were  

spotted and shadowed by an enemy reconnaissance  plane the crew were fully aware of what the  

lone aircraft heralded and sure enough after two  hours 80 dive bombers appeared over the horizon  

led by lieutenant commander takashige agusa it  was a rapid and devastating onslaught within  

20 minutes both ships had gone to the bottom  surviving barely long enough to inform somerville  

of what was happening immediately on receipt of  signals from the cruisers somerville realized his  

assessment of the japanese strength had been wrong  it was much more powerful than he had thought  

in an instant his focus had to change from trying  to attack the enemy to just trying to keep his  

remaining ships afloat as the historian evan  maudsley puts it somerville had suddenly realized  

that he was not the hunter but the fox the  admiral's biggest fear now was that the japanese  

would attack ado atoll but mercifully for him  they had no idea of its existence admiral nagumo  

was in fact already steaming away from somerville  spending the next three days of repositioning his  

fleet for the upcoming attack on trincomalee this  began in the early morning of april 9th again with  

a large attack force devastating the port area  but failing to catch significant vessels in port  

hms hermes and her escorting destroyer vampire  had left the previous evening to avoid the attack  

it was not a planned departure so hermes was not  even carrying any aircraft when she was discovered  

at 9am and a wave of 80 dive bombers again led  by lieutenant commander ragusa approached hermes  

stood no chance and was hit again and again until  she sang all told more than 40 bombs found their  

target at 1102 vampire went the same way when  her magazine exploded having completed their  

operations admiral nagumo's fleet now steamed  away returning ultimately to japan to rest and  

refit ahead of future campaigns though admiral  somerville had lost the carrier and two cruisers  

he had actually been quite lucky had the japanese  arrived at salon when the entire eastern fleet was  

together at the start of april the resulting  battle would have likely been devastating  

particularly for the slow old battleships as it  was even before hermes was sunk somerville had  

decided to pull his ships out of the eastern  indian ocean entirely the slow force b ships  

would head for east africa the fast force a for  bombay the admiralty was not particularly happy  

about this but as far as somerville was concerned  it was retreat or see the eastern fleet destroyed  

further japanese attacks were to be expected and  perhaps even an invasion of india from the sea  

winston churchill would later call this the most  dangerous moment of the war he was faced with a  

seemingly unstoppable japanese advance that could  yet engulf india and the western indian ocean  

while all the while the european  war remained in the balance  

and the raw navy was being stretched to breaking  point across at least four major theaters  

in fact it was japan's first and last major  foray into the indian ocean before too long  

the operational commitments against the united  states in the pacific would be all-consuming  

and then the battle of midway would happen  with this in mind there's a strong argument  

that operation c was a strategic mistake that  japan's carriers would have been better served  

strengthening their position in the south pacific  while the us was still reeling from pearl harbor  

on the other hand the japanese did force a british  retreat from ceylon but in truth somerville's  

ragtag fleet was not that much of a threat to  the new japanese holdings in southeast asia  

anyway on the british side the indian ocean  raid as the battle would come to be known  

was yet another humiliating episode though they  had escaped without major damage the degradation  

of britain's naval power was exposed as so bad  as to require the surrender of large parts of  

the indian ocean as well as the east indies  the frustrating thing for somerville was that  

the situation could have been different  if only britain's priorities had been  

shortly after the raid he wrote it looks to me  as if the japs can walk in anytime they like we  

might lose india just for the sake of a handful  of aircraft and one or two decent ships the  

interesting point here is that what summerville  was after particularly in terms of planes was  

not a huge commitment of industrial capacity but  it ultimately wasn't available in part because the  

government was fully committed to the area bombing  campaign over germany as morden points out a month  

after a dozen british planes tried to defend  ceylon the raf would send 1 000 heavy and medium  

bombers against cologne broadly the fighting of  the second world war for britain was ultimately  

about prioritization and from the pre-war years  onwards the far east had taken a lower priority  

for supplies troops ships and aircraft the indian  ocean raid and the raw navy's humiliating retreat  

was the culmination of those decisions and of  the disastrous events of the previous few months  

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