Piercing the Fog - Air Force Historical Studies Office

Piercing the Fog
considerable delay caused by the loss of equipment in an air crash, the Navy
opened an intercept and direction-finding station on Guadalcanal?’ Both the
intercept station’and coast watchers supplemented radar to warn of approaching
enemy formations.
Air defense of the southern Solomons was crucial to preventing the
Japanese from retaking Guadalcanal, and it depended to a great extent on the
adept use of radar to identify approaching threats, supplemented by operational
intelligence from coast watchers hiding all along the Solomons chain. These
men observed and counted Japanese bomber and fighter flights going south,
then radioed operations officers on Guadalcanal. Interceptors, primarily Navy
and Marine, rose to make a single pass at the bombers before diving to safety.
After an attack, as the Japanese pilots flew home, the coast watchers again
counted formations and aircraft, radioing Guadalcanal with information that
helped confirm or deny the pilots’ and AA gunners’ reports of enemy aircraft
shot down?’
Recording of the patterns of Japanese flights by the intelligence officers on
Guadalcanal had significant operational implications. Because of the distance
from Rabaul, Japanese strikes usually arrived over the island’s Henderson Field
between 1 1 AM and 1 PM. This knowledge, coupled to coast-watcher reports and
radar confirmation, gave the air commanders time to alert the pilots and crews
for the coming fights.50
Pilots’ observations and reconnaissance data were always important in
governing the ways in which Air Commander Solomons (COMAIRSOLS)
officers directed the use of U.S. Army air power in the Solomons. On December
5, 1942, two AAF P-39 pilots sighted the partially camouflaged construction
at a new Japanese airfield at Munda, New Georgia, confirming coast-watcher
reports of activity there. That confirmation brought heavy and continuing
bombardment and strafing of the field. Soon after the Japanese began to use
Munda, they found their position untenable. By the end of the year, Munda only
serviced aircraft; none could be stationed there and survive the air attacks.51
One of the most adept and controversial interservice uses of intelligence
resulted in the ambush and death of the Japanese Combined Fleet’s
Commander-in-Chief, Admiral Yamamoto. On April 14,1943, American radio
intercept operators picked up a Japanese message that, when decoded, revealed
Yamamoto’s plans for a visit to his forces in the northern Solomons; also
included was his travel itinerary. In Honolulu, Admiral Nimitz weighed the
risks and possibilities of air interception with his intelligence chief, Cmdr.
Edwin T. Layton. Seeing a golden opportunity to dispose of his enemy
counterpart, to kill the man who planned the attack on Pearl Harbor, and deal
the Japanese Navy’s morale a heavy blow, Nimitz ordered commanders in the
Solomons to ambush Yamamoto if they thought they could make the long flight.
The only fighter aircraft capable of such an extended overwater run were the
AAF’s P-38s at Guadalcanal. Immediately, planning began. At dawn on April
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