Talk:Battle of the Santa Cruz Islands

Sinking of Porter

I don't have access to a copy of Frank (1990) which was apparently cited for the (IMHO dubious because would require a long sequence of unlikely events) proposition that Porter was sunk by a torpedo inadvertently released from a US Avenger torpedo bomber after it ditched nearby. Apparently Frank asserts that Japanese records don't support that Japanese sub I-21 fired the fatal torpedo. Without reading Frank, it's hard for me to assess whether I-21 or some other Japanese sub might have fired the fatal torpedo, so for now I have changed the article to simply say a torpedo hit Porter without saying where it came from. Hammel (1987) contains substantial evidence that the torpedo which hit Porter was one of spread of three, including three separate eyewitness accounts of multiple torpedoes missing ahead and astern at the same time. A spread of three torpedoes could only have come from a submarine. I welcome input from anyone who has access to a copy of Frank. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Navyhistorybuff (talk • contribs) 07:29, 7 December 2013 (UTC)

Casualties

US casualties in the info box lists 1 carrier twice. So were 2 carriers sunk or just 1? - RoyBoy ⁸⁰⁰ 18:24, 24 July 2006 (UTC)

1 carrier sunk, 1 carrier heavily damaged. Cla68 20:11, 24 July 2006 (UTC)

Should we list the 2nd US carrier as heavily damaged? Enterprise was out of the game for a good while after the battle --RoyalBlueStuey (talk) 11:26, 7 March 2023 (UTC)

Removal of uncited passage in Aftermath section

I removed the following passage from the Aftermath section, not because it wasn't a valid point, which it was, but because it was uncited (except for the date in the first sentence):

“ The Japanese fleet had been sailing since October 11 , and had already engaged US ships, sinking Meredith and harassing convoys bound for Guadalcanal; since then it had been hovering to the Northeast of the island. Hadn´t US carriers been sent to attack the Japanese ships, the most likely result was that upon noticing the failure of the land offensive at Henderson Field, Japanese carriers would have retreated to their base at Truk. It must be noted that this is what happened in September, when Japanese carriers retreated upon knowing of their land defeat at the Battle of Edson's Ridge, even though they had not engaged US forces in the area, which were in a particularly weak state after the loss of Wasp and damage of Saratoga by submarines. Although the IJN suffered serious losses (see below), the loss of ships and aircraft of the US Navy can hardly justify this small strategic success. Had Japanese carriers been available for the Naval Battle of Guadalcanal, it is unlikely that they could have changed the outcome of the battle, since surface actions were at night and the convoy could not be protected constantly from air attacks. Hence, the Battle of the Santa Cruz Islands can be seen as an atrittion clash that didn´t change the essential keys of the Guadalcanal campaign, apart from further reducing the carrier strength of both sides. ”

Please cite a reference that supports the assertions in this paragraph, and then I'll help rewrite it into smoother English for inclusion in the article. Cla68 23:12, 29 October 2006 (UTC)

Time of the 1st Val impact

Hi! I'm now writing an article about USS Hornet on czech Wikipedia [1] and I've found a few discrepancies… (I'll pass over discrepancy between description in Hammel's Carrier Strike (or it's citations) on one side and Hubáček's Vítězství v Pacifiku and ENEMY ATTACKS ON THE HORNET GROUP on the other… And I'll fixate just about the first suicide Val attack)

The description of USS_Hornet_(CV-8)_during_battle_of_the_Santa_Cruz_Islands.jpg picture in this article says that it was at 9:13. But the time mentioned in the text is 9:14 with citation of Frank's Guadalcanal p. 386 and Hammel's Carrier Strike p. 262–267. Which variant is correct or what timestamp is exactly used in this cited books? (I don't have them so I can't check it personaly Y_Y).

Thanks for help and bye…--Sceadugenga (talk) 11:22, 8 April 2008 (UTC)

Frank, 385–386:

"... the second Val detachment burst through to lead the throng of nearly twenty dive-bombers into wailing dives at 0910.

... At 0912 a bomb punctured the flight deck ... A few moments later, two more bombs with crisscrossing trajectories pierced the flight deck ... About 0914 a Val dove vertically into the ship ..." (emphasis added)

The article's image captions say "A damaged Japanese Val dive bomber (upper left) purposely dives towards Hornet at 09:13... ...and seconds later crashes into the carrier."

Even if the times are exact, the plane could have been diving at 0913 and not crashed until 0914. But it sounds like the sailors were pretty busy, and may not have been perfectly meticulous in their recording of events.

I'm a little uncomfortable with the characterization of the attack: "The Val's pilot, in an apparently spontaneous, kamikaze-style attack, then purposely crashed his aircraft into Hornet’s stack,"

It seems to me the essence of a kamikaze is that it's planned as a suicide, not spontaneous. A damaged dive bomber is going to crash somewhere, so it's not that surprising that the pilot would try to do the most good with the last moment of his life.

—WWoods (talk) 16:12, 8 April 2008 (UTC)

The sources mentioned the similarity between this pilot's decision in this case to crash his aircraft into the ship instead of trying to recover and escape with later, willful, kamikaze attacks, which is why I described it that way. But, I don't have any problem with taking that description off of the page. I think it's also ok to change the image caption so that it won't look like there is a contradiction in the times, which I will do right now. Cla68 (talk) 23:03, 8 April 2008 (UTC)

Thanks ^_^ --Sceadugenga (talk) 07:18, 9 April 2008 (UTC)

Allied and Axis (including some Japanese pilots) were known to deliberate crash into enemy vessels if their planes were shot up with no hope of flying home and were not considered suicides or Kamikaze. The Japanese Kamikaze pilots took off with the intention of crashing into enemy ships, a big difference. Historically Kamikaze became a policy in Oct 1944 at the time of the battle of Leyte Gulf. Naaman Brown (talk) 23:03, 2 August 2009 (UTC)

Just about everybody flying a military attack aircraft would consider using himself and the craft as a weapon if there was suddenly no hope of getting back alive and the opportunity for hurting the enemy presented itself. Let's say your cockpit is aflame, your coveralls are burning and there is an enemy ship underneath you... This is not at all kamikaze. Whatever wording we use, it should make clear that the Val pilot chose his fate in the moment. Binksternet (talk) 00:54, 3 August 2009 (UTC)

Photo of the Wildcat fighter

Dear Sir, it’s the first time I write concerning a Wikipedia article, so please forgive me if I’m not following the proper way to contact the author about just a little thing.

The photo of the Wildcat fighter

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:SantaCruzEHornetWildcat.jpg

closely resambles a stiil from the film taken by Photographer's Mate 2nd Class Marion Riley, on 24 August 1942 during the Battle of the Eastern Solomons while on Enterprise. You used another famous still from the same film is in the page of this battle

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:USS_enterprise-bomb_hit-Bat_eastern_Solomons.jpg

with the link to the complete film on Youtube:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kFXcnUtMT4A&NR=1

For instance at 1:31 you can see a Wildcat in the same position and with crew members lying on the deck in security position as in the Photo of Santa Cruz Batlle article. But actually in Youtube film I can fin no match for the exact one. St58 (talk) 14:38, 26 August 2009 (UTC)Please, check it out. If I'm true, this photo is acytually a still that refers to Enterprise between the first and the second hit in Eastern Solomons batlle. Otherwise, but it seems very less probable to me, in Youtube film there is an incoherent section, referring to Hornet, not to Enterprise.

If I'm wrong, please delete this post or otherwise tell me how to eliminate it.

Regards (and go on with your excellent job !).

st58 stefano.asperti@fastwebnet.it

(南太平洋海戦?),

"Japanese sources as the Battle of the South Pacific (南太平洋海戦?)"

Why is something cited from Japanese sources followed by Chinese text? I don't think the parenthetical is necessary anyway.

173.26.53.210 (talk) 07:21, 9 February 2012 (UTC)Colin

I removed the parenthetical. Kablammo (talk) 19:51, 25 September 2017 (UTC)

Japanese uses Chinese characters. Brutannica (talk) 02:02, 29 October 2017 (UTC)

Just for funsies Google translate 南太平洋海戦 Japanese detected Minamitaiheiyō kaisen South Pacific Ocean War --Naaman Brown (talk) 19:02, 24 May 2019 (UTC)

Recent edits

Transcribed from Kablammo's talk page:

Hi Kablammo, I saw you recently made an edit to the Santa Cruz page. I recently corrected a few things that I believe you may have inadvertently overwritten in your edit. The first is the quote from Nagumo, cited from Tameichi Hara's Japanese Destroyer Captain. The book does not say this was said in a report to Combined Fleet Headquarters, but privately to Hara when Hara visited him after he was reassigned to Sasebo. The quote from the book is:

"Just between us, Hara, this battle was a tactical win, but a shattering strategic loss for Japan. As you know, I made a special study of America's war potential during my stay in the States. Considering the great superiority of :our enemy's industrial capacity, we must win every battle overwhelmingly. This last one, unfortunately, was not an overwhelming victory."

The other inaccuracy is the statement that: "Although the Battle of Santa Cruz was a tactical victory for the Japanese in terms of ships sunk, it came at a high cost for their naval forces, which had no active aircraft carriers left to challenge Enterprise or Henderson Field for the remainder of the Guadalcanal campaign." This is incorrect as Junyo continued to participate in the campaign and planes from Junyo provided air cover for ships against air attacks from both Henderson and Enterprise during the pivotal Naval Battle of Guadalcanal. I had previously removed the last part of this sentence in order to make the statement factual.

I would like to remake these corrections to the article if there is no objection.

Regards, Boris0192 (talk) 05:18, 14 September 2017 (UTC)

Hello Boris 0192. I took on the task of reworking the last section in response to a request to help prepare it for the main page. I worked in a a sandbox and you made changes in the meantime. I tried to incorporate your edits but apparently I was not entirely successful.

Feel free to edit the article. I cannot edit it much for the next ten days but will check in with you when I return. Kablammo (talk) 17:08, 15 September 2017 (UTC)

Boris0192, please look at my recent changes. Feel free to edit them, and to make or suggest any other changes to the article. Regards, Kablammo (talk) 20:11, 25 September 2017 (UTC)

Comments by Dr John Prados accurate?

So the Dr is claiming that the U.S. won solely due to industrial output, so obviously he's not aware of the many technological advantages, such as fire retardant, and proximity fuse anti-aircraft rounds, among other things. And U.S. planning and training was practical, as opposed to some race and class based decision making, which led to the line of trained pilots to fill the superior aircraft it could produce. I'm pointing these things out, because there seems to be this false narrative of “Fascist superiority", when their war effort was more of a poorly, barely planned gamble that ended in disaster for Europe and Asia. Mrhaysy2k (talk) 21:42, 12 February 2019 (UTC)

My Dr. Prados quote ended with the sentence "In Prados' view, the real story of the aftermath is that the Imperial Navy failed to exploit their hard-won victory." What follows that was added later. Dr. Prados certainly wasn't advocating "Fascist superiority" -- far from it. He praises the industrious and far-sighted preparations that the US Navy made after the battle. 99.141.222.170 (talk) 08:08, 4 March 2019 (UTC)

URFA 2020

For WP:URFA/2020, could someone cite the last sentence of this section? SandyGeorgia (Talk) 19:40, 23 November 2020 (UTC)

Couldn't find a source, deleted it. For the record, as far as I am concerned, the state of this FA is satisfactory, and while improvements could definitely be made, it definitely shouldn't go to FAR in its current condition. Peacemaker67 (click to talk to me) 09:40, 27 November 2020 (UTC)

Terry King was on the U.S.S. Craven October 27, 1942 at 1:35 a.m. when I was born in Oakland,CA. The ship telecommunications told Terry they got the message his daughter, Sandy was born at that time. Me.

Terry King was my stepfather. He was on the U.S.S. Craven the night I was born and he and the crew wer battling but had a happy note about the baby being born to Terry King. Me. I just had my birthday October 27, born in 1942. 2600:8801:3100:A40:3463:FD6A:2D3B:6C0D (talk) 18:08, 30 October 2022 (UTC)