Missing Pieces: - Royal Australian Navy

164 Missing Pieces
Chongjin, and the defence of the South Korean base on the island of Yang Do, northeast
of Songjin. 517 Before her arrival, an unsuccessful attempt had been made from the
mainland to capture the latter. As CTG,Warramunga had one US destroyer-minesweeper
and several ROK Navy minesweepers under her command, and her main duties were to
interdict coastal transport, bombard targets in Songjin and Chongjin and offer support
to the Yang Do Koreans. 518 There was an ROK Navy patrol boat base at Yang Do, but it
is not clear that these units were also part of TG 95.22.
The issues confronting the Warramunga command team, apart from the weather, which
was extremely cold and snowy, were the disruption of enemy rail traffic, the location
and destruction of enemy coastal batteries and the effective surveillance of the four
kilometre-wide channel between Yang Do and the mainland. 519 Mines were a potential
problem in the Yang Do channel, and there were numerous shore batteries protecting
her two target ports. A large number of railway tunnels in which Communist trains
could shelter from naval interdiction were strung along the coastline.
The intelligence Warramunga had to support her operations was varied and of differing
quality. First, her command team had been briefed by FO2ICFES intelligence staff at
Sasebo before sailing, giving them the benefit of nearly a year’s experience gained by
the UN on this length of coastline. This provided the locations of worthwhile targets,
enemy gun positions and vulnerable communications links. 520 Thus, on 1 March
Warramunga was able to demolish a vulnerable railway bridge that had been repaired
by ‘cribbing’ supports out of sleepers. Second, chart inaccuracy was not an issue, and
the conventional wisdom was that no mines could be expected in waters deeper than
180 metres. This advice, naturally, applied to moored and influence (ground) mines.
Drifting mines were another issue, as Soviet designs did not deactivate when their
mooring cables parted. 521 Third, the command team would have expected no surface
opposition, with the possible exception of armed junks. Air attack was also unlikely,
with the carriers of TF 77 and their combat air patrols only 60nm to the east. By 1952,
with armistice talks underway at Panmunjom, the possibility of submarine attack could
only be regarded as remote.
Warramunga was aware of the US carriers to seaward and of the UN units in her
vicinity. 522 Because of the constant changing of units assigned to the Northern Patrol,
the command team would not have been familiar with the calibre or capabilities of these
ships. There were also communications difficulties, apparently caused by the Australian
ship’s lack of the US codebooks used within the Task Element (TE) of the task force.
Nevertheless, a way was found around this problem and the TE went about its duties with
apparent success. Warramunga and the destroyer USS Doyle bombarded Chongjin on
2 and 3 March, the first attack involved Warramunga in an artillery duel with a North
Korean battery of five guns at ranges between three and five nm. This was a spirited
encounter, with the destroyer withdrawing stern first to present the smallest (and most
dangerous) target to the Korean guns. 523 The Yang Do channel was kept swept of mines,