9 March 1942
Hawaii
The enemy ground forces made a major push and got nowhere, apparently too disorganized from their landings. Casualties were 1661 to 32, and critically, our fortifications held.
Makassar Strait
S-36 tried to attack a major troop convoy but ended up having to settle for sinking an escorting Kaibokan.
Java Sea
One of my transports and a minelayer evacuating Surabaya were intercepted by an enemy surface detachment and sunk.
An enemy destroyer hit a mine near their beachhead at Tjepoe. HMS Trusty and a US sub have been hard at work there. USS Pike was detected here and depth charged for moderate damage.
Air raids targeted Surabaya and ships at sea near there. Losses were 6 Zeroes, 3 Nells vs 1 P-39 and a Hurricane. Fleet damage was bad as they worked over the survivors from yesterday:
CL Enterprise, Bomb hits 4, heavy fires, heavy damage
DD Walke
CL Tromp, Bomb hits 4, and is sunk
CL Capetown, Bomb hits 5, on fire, heavy damage
CL Durban, Bomb hits 3, heavy fires, heavy damage
DD Vampire
CL Sumatra, Bomb hits 8, Torpedo hits 1, heavy fires, heavy damage
CL Mauritius, Bomb hits 9, heavy fires, heavy damage
DD Nizam
DD Van Ghent, Bomb hits 1, on fire, heavy damage
CL Boise, Bomb hits 8, Torpedo hits 2, and is sunk
DD Barker, Bomb hits 2, heavy fires, heavy damage
DD Edsall
We also attempted a raid on Tjepoe that did not go well, 4 Dutch medium bombers went down with nothing to show for it.
Eastern Australlia
The Lexington CVBG was spotted by a sub outside of Sydney. We depth charged the sub and caused minor damage before it got away, but now he knows exactly where the Lex is.
New Hebrides
The timing of the spotting of the Lex was especially bad, because I also revealed the location of Enterprise's group so its USMC Wildcats could harass ships landing at Uputa (sinking 2 landing barges and damaging a PB). The SBDs would have gone if there was anything bigger there. But now he knows where they all are.
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