Chapter 655: The Sound of Singing
Akado’s inspection of the King Tiger tank production workshop was just one of many major events in those days. The event that truly captured the world’s attention was the decisive battle for the island of Kauai in the Pacific between the United States and Japan.
Two American carrier fleets, one formed around the Ranger and the other around the Hornet, had headed south, cutting into the shipping lanes between the Japanese mainland and Darwin, Australia. This had caused a brief panic among the Japanese Army forces nearby.
As a result, the Japanese Combined Fleet was forced to abandon its plan to immediately return to Kauai and instead sailed south with great momentum to hunt down this American fleet. In the end, the counter-attack from the Combined Fleet that the Japanese soldiers on Kauai had been hoping for had still not arrived by the end of October. The two Japanese divisions on the island had been reduced to the strength of a single division.
What was even more despairing was that this Japanese force had expended all the ammunition for its heavy weapons. They lacked basic supplies of food and ammunition, and even the rounds for their grenade dischargers were almost gone. Their combat effectiveness could be said to be completely lost. The only thing sustaining them was the hope of the Combined Fleet’s counter-attack and the ethereal blessing of the Emperor.
The commander of the 131st Division, Lieutenant General Fukuda, had been killed in a desperate counter-attack not long ago. When this division commander, whose eyes were green with hunger, made his final charge, he even had to be supported by two slightly stronger Japanese soldiers. Many Japanese soldiers were so hungry they couldn’t even lift their weapons, let alone find the strength to shout slogans to bolster their courage. Some even hoped to be killed by the American army sooner, to end these nightmarish, difficult days.
While the Japanese Army on Kauai was worrying about a mouthful of grain, a single artillery shell, or even a single pill, the Americans were eating canned beef and dropping one large-caliber howitzer shell after another onto Kauai to greet these despicable Japanese from the west.
Moreover, the U.S. Navy was not resting at this time. A dozen of the newest destroyers had already entered service with the U.S. Navy and were unhesitatingly thrown by Nimitz into the anti-submarine blockade of Kauai. The arrival of these warships immediately plunged the Japanese submarine transport efforts into despair. After all, these destroyers were built based on the experience gained from being ravaged by the Germans. Their anti-submarine capabilities were unprecedentedly strong. While they might have still struggled slightly against German submarines, dealing with the inexperienced Japanese submarines was a piece of cake.
In the process of supporting the Japanese army’s operations on Kauai, the Japanese Navy had already had 6 large, ocean-going submarines sunk. While this loss might not sound terrifying, when you consider that these sunken submarines went to the bottom of the sea along with the supplies they were carrying, for every submarine sunk, the Japanese soldiers on Kauai lost that much supplies. Thinking of it this way, one can understand the heavy price the Japanese army had paid.
“Those idiots at Imperial General Headquarters are practically accomplices of the Americans!” Nagumo Chuichi complained sullenly to Marshal Yamamoto Isoroku beside him. He knew that Yamamoto had intended to head east first, capture the Hawaiian Islands in one go, and then head south to encircle and annihilate the American carrier squadrons. But Yamamoto’s suggestion had been idiotically rejected by the high command. These masters far away in the Japanese homeland wanted the Combined Fleet to ensure the safety of the shipping routes to Australia, so the entire fleet had to go south.
The result was that the two divisions on Kauai could only rely on their unwavering will to fight a decisive battle with the Americans, while the Japanese Navy’s Combined Fleet had to play hide-and-seek with an American raiding party in the vast ocean.
One couldn’t blame Nagumo Chuichi for losing his composure. While Yamamoto was inspecting his flagship, the Akagi, a telegram arrived from the Navy Ministry. The telegram stated that a 7th submarine had lost contact in the waters near Kauai. The Japanese Empire’s supply line to the Japanese army on the island had been completely severed by the U.S. Navy.
Yamamoto Isoroku’s mood was now extremely gloomy. After returning to the Japanese mainland to rest for a few days, his heart had grown heavier with each passing day. While the United States was already producing dozens of destroyers and cruisers with its vast industrial system, in the shipyards of the Japanese homeland, the Japanese Navy was still slowly building the world’s two most powerful battleships.
Although some of the old die-hards of the big-gun, big-ship faction in the Japanese Navy Ministry claimed that these two warships were absolutely the most powerful battleships in the world, Yamamoto still felt that relying on these two warships, which could not enter service in the short term, to win a war was an unlikely, one-sided fantasy.
Of course, like all senior generals in the Japanese Navy, he was not heartbroken over a few submarines. He was mainly worried about the impact on the entire Pacific war situation if the Japanese army on Kauai was annihilated by the Americans.
But Nagumo Chuichi was thinking of much more than Yamamoto. Firstly, he himself was an aviation fleet commander and had never been well-liked by the mainstream Japanese naval generals among the high command. From the day they were born, his carrier aircraft had been regarded as an anomaly by the naval high command, which firmly believed in the doctrine of big ships and big guns. Therefore, the loss of the submarines made him feel a sense of “the fox grieving for the dead rabbit.”
“Nagumo-kun, we are Japanese soldiers. It is the duty of a soldier of the Great Japanese Empire to obey orders. Since the superiors at Imperial General Headquarters have ordered us to head south and annihilate the American fleet, we only need to do it. After all, if we can sink the American raiding fleet, it will also be helpful in supporting Kauai,” Yamamoto said. He was very grateful that the high command had not held the Combined Fleet responsible for the retreat in the Battle of Hawaii, so he now decided to repay them.
So this time, Yamamoto Isoroku, with Admiral Kurita’s battleship squadron as the vanguard and the carrier fleet as the core, had gathered most of the Combined Fleet’s forces and was heading south to seek a strategic showdown with the American fleet. He intended to inflict a third heavy blow on the American fleet to create an opportunity for a negotiated peace with the United States.
“But, Marshal Yamamoto, only the battleship Nagato is equipped with the secret weapon, the Type 1 Radar. It won’t be an easy task to find the American fleet in such a vast sea area, will it?” As the commander of the aviation fleet, Nagumo Chuichi naturally had his own concerns. He frowned and voiced his doubts.
“There is nothing to be done. Speaking of which, the Type 1 Radar broke down again before I came here. Your reconnaissance planes are our only long-range reconnaissance means now. I came here to get firsthand intelligence,” Yamamoto said with his hands behind his back. He then walked to the row of glass windows on the bridge that faced the distance, looked north, and sighed with frustration. “The Japanese soldiers on Kauai… I hope you can really hold on a little longer. For the future of the Great Japanese Empire, just hold on a little longer!”
North of the Combined Fleet, on the island of Kauai, Lieutenant General Oshima was receiving an encrypted telegram from Imperial General Headquarters with a trembling hand. None of the news on it was good for him. The previous few telegrams had either told him that he must hold on alone or that a submarine had been sunk and the cargo would be delayed. He now really wanted to smash that radio set so that he wouldn’t be so well-informed.
“To support your continued defense of Kauai, the 7th submarine from the homeland has been sunk by the U.S. military. The cargo can only be delivered at a later date. We hope you can continue to hold out on Kauai and await the arrival of the Combined Fleet,” General Oshima read, a bitter smile on his face. He tossed the telegram onto the document-strewn desk.
This was an underground shelter he was using on the island, a temporarily reinforced and converted civilian basement. The lighting inside was extremely dim, but it was still sturdy and durable. The day before yesterday, the last can of captured American food had been eaten by Oshima. For the past few days, he had only had pitiful dough balls to stave off hunger. The hunger had made him look terrible; his whole person was as gaunt as a vengeful ghost.
“Bakayaro! Those damn navy bastards! Sending a telegram talking about how many submarines have been sunk. Who knows if it’s true? They’re playing us for fools! They’re using the Americans’ hands to kill the army’s generals!” The Japanese officer who had replaced Fukuda as chief of staff picked up the telegram from the desk, glanced at it, and began to curse.
They were now at the end of their rope. It seemed the Americans had no intention of letting a single Japanese soldier on Kauai escape. Their plan was very simple: to use hunger to torture to death the entire Japanese army that had invaded Hawaii.
On the other side of the wall, there was a small cabinet that had been moved in for storage. On it sat a radio, which was broadcasting a 24-hour loop of inspirational songs from the Japanese mainland. Most of them were sung by children, encouraging the soldiers at the front to fight bravely and be invincible in Australia. The children’s voices sounded very inspiring, but the content of the lyrics had nothing to do with their own situation here.
The more the chief of staff listened, the angrier he got. He went over, turned off the power switch, and continued to complain, “Australia, Australia! They only remember Australia. Are we not soldiers of the Great Japanese Empire? Does anyone still remember us? Does anyone still remember us on Kauai? Did Lieutenant General Fukuda… die in vain?”
“Baka! Shut up! Are you an idiot? Watch your words!” Lieutenant General Oshima frowned and shouted at his subordinate. “We are all His Majesty the Emperor’s most loyal soldiers! Even if it is only for His Majesty the Emperor, only for all the Japanese in our homeland, we must defend this place to the last man!”
He gritted his teeth and said fiercely, “Send a telegram to the homeland! Send it in the clear! Say that Lieutenant General Oshima is determined to share the fate of Kauai! He would rather die in battle here than retreat a single step! His Majesty the Emperor… Banzai!”
Published: 2025-09-15T05:56:12.000+00:00
Last Edited: 2026-02-09T18:38:17.000+00:00
URL: https://www.patreon.com/caleredhair/posts/mtr-c655-sound-138920572
Advance chapters at Nightjar Reads · nightjarreads.com