Battle 360: The US Strikes at the Battle of Guadalcanal (S1, E3) | Full Episode | History

after six grueling months of war uss enterprise  had proven her steel at the battle of midway   the japanese navy has taken  a beating but the big e   is about to face her greatest challenge  yet invasion at a place called guadalcanal uss enterprise a fighting city of steel she is the most revered and  decorated ship of world war ii on this 360 degree battlefield  where threats loom on the seas   in the skies and in the ocean depths the  enterprise's enemies could be anywhere and everywhere there's nowhere to run when the battles all around  you battle 360 uss enterprise jaws of the enemy august 7 1942 6 13 a.m off a remote pacific island the stillness of the waters is  shattered by massive artillery blasts   the cruiser uss quincy has opened  fire with her eight-inch guns the island is about to become famous its name guadalcanal other cruisers and destroyers quickly join  in drowning japanese shore positions in a   tsunami of lead steel it was exhilarating  to see all the big shells going to show up   and to hear the shales exploding dive bombers from enterprise unleash  thousand pound bombs on the island their success is marked by the massive fireballs  from exploding shore installations and fuel dumps   which can be seen miles away by the  men aboard the ships of the task force minutes later landing craft head for  the beaches and u.s marines storm ashore   it is the marines first experience  of invasion in the pacific war i know from personal experience  exactly what they're feeling right now   by going right into the jaws enemy  there's a lot of anxiety they're feeling   a lot of confusion but overall  they're focusing on their task at hand for the first time in world war ii the  american military is on the full offensive everything else up to that  point was strictly defensive   even the battle of midway but the  solomons was the first offensive action as the invaders hit the beach  the men aboard enterprise   wait offshore unaware of the  day's strategic significance pedro sandoval has only been  on the big e a few weeks   but the confidence of veteran sailors has already  rubbed off on this teenager from laredo texas who is headed for danger and you know  you're headed for danger there's nothing   you can do about it just relax and do  the best you can that's what we did but to the architects of the war this  invasion is the key to the future the solomon islands lie in the center  of shipping lanes in the pacific   just 1200 miles off the coast of australia whoever  controls the sullivans controls the war and the   japanese navy has made the island of guadalcanal  the center square in the chessboard of the pacific   the japanese were obviously extremely  disheartened by their defeated midway   but they did not believe that that meant  that they had lost the war overnight throughout the summer of 1942 the japanese have  invaded the solomon islands and are building an   airfield on guadalcanal if they succeed  they'll be within easy striking distance   of the vital sea lanes of the south pacific  and that's only the beginning from this base   that they're building on guadalcanal they will  be able to launch multi-engine medium bombers   this will be done as a precursor  to the invasion of australia   an air base on guadalcanal could potentially  mean the loss of australia to the japanese enterprise must put a stop to this plan target   guadalcanal objective seize the island  and its airfield from the japanese   strategy send a combined fleet of cruisers  battleships and carriers to bombard guadalcanal   and deliver one division of marines to assault  the island then begin the long march toward tokyo for the first time in world war ii a new  weapon joins enterprise's protective arsenal   the battleship uss north carolina is an  offensive and defensive powerhouse   combining anti-aircraft defense with  massive shore bombardment capabilities   she has nine 16-inch guns and 25-inch 38s backed  up with a score of automatic anti-aircraft guns   with a cruising speed of nearly 30 knots  she's perfect protection for the big e fire control man harold smith and his shipmates  aboard north carolina are looking for action well   we were very eager i mean we're a cocky ship we  were a good ship we were well trained the whole   crew was pretty cocky we couldn't wait to get  going the fleet makes its way to the solomons at dawn august 7th 1942 the savage battle begins enterprise launches its air  groups and bombards guadalcanal they first disable the enemy airstrip surface ships bombard the shore   then the marines hit the beach and the  long battle for guadalcanal was underway as marine riflemen put boots on the ground   fifteen thousand feet above the  skies roar with dozens of warplanes   eighteen enterprise dive bombers pummeled the  island with a barrage of thousand-pound bombs   as wild-capped fighter planes straight the  enemy positions manned only by work crews and   a handful of soldiers the japanese base is not  prepared for an invasion there is no resistance   it came as a real surprise to them that all of  a sudden one of their outposts had been attacked   initially they badly underestimated the size  of forces that we had present on the island but the walk in the park soon ends  at 12 30 the japanese strike back enemy fighters appear over the  southern tip of guadalcanal they are led by saburo sakai the  red baron of the japanese air corps   with over 50 kills to his credit he's gunning to  add some of the big ease warplanes to his grim   tally one of the first men to meet the enemy  head on is wildcat pilot vincent dupois a 1939   annapolis graduate who has been aboard enterprise  as a member of fighting squadron 6 since mid-june the enterprise was known to be the crack  ship of the u.s navy so i was really quite   blown up over the prospect of being a  member of fighting six aboard enterprise depois and his pack of wildcats are  flying protection over the island battleground suddenly 12 miles ahead depois spots   a formation of twin-engine  bombers and fighter planes as i approached i could see  fighters that appeared to be   diving on the large group of bombers headed  north and i mistook these small aircraft for   fighters from fighting five from the saratoga that  i figured were out there working the bombers over   it turned out i was wrong these were not friendly  fighters these were the escorting japanese heroes defoi ignores the fighters  heads with incoming bombers   the flyers of fighting six go on the attack ripping up japanese bombers with savage  bursts of 50 caliber machine gun fire   dubois fires on a bedding and watches it  spin toward the sea and smoking flames only then does he realize he's in trouble i heard  this ticking sound and then i realized that i   was being fired at and bullets were entering  the cockpit and hitting my instrument panel   from only 200 feet behind de pois saburo  sakai peppers the american plane with hot lead the fighting ace closes in for the kill takes a bullet in his shoulder  but he's still able to make a   tight s turd and disappear into a  billowing cumulus cloud losing sakai the japanese ace zeroes in on his next victim radio man gunner edward anderson is heading  back to the ship in his sbd dauntless when he   sees sakai's plane approaching in the distance  he came up underneath the plane i was in and   fired and shattered the radio transmitter in my  cockpit which is right practically between my legs sakai comes in from behind for the kill  it's a mistake he will quickly regret   sakai mistakenly believes he's attacking  a wildcat which has no rear seat gunner   rather than a dive bomber which very much does machine gun fire tears sakai's canopy apart he came practically straight back of us and then  he made a big wing over and we could see smoke   trailing from his ship and he just faded into the  horizon going back smoking all the way and we all   thought he was going to crash although one bullet  had blasted sakai in the face and blinded him in   one eye he somehow manages to pull his zero  out of a deadly dive and make it back to base i think it's just a testament to the training  skill and really the fitness levels of   pilots but to be able to pilot that aircraft  500 miles when you're hanging on to a   thin thread of life and bleeding profusely  in the face it's a it's pretty impressive   zakai will be out of action for five months by the time knight falls over guadalcanal the   americans have managed to  destroy 36 enemy aircraft by the next morning the marines have captured  the japanese airfield and renamed it henderson   field after major lofton henderson a  marine dive bomber pilot killed at midway   the american ground commander general vandegrift   very wisely decides to establish a perimeter  all the way around the airfield and defended   in depth perceiving almost once that henderson  field really is the key to this entire affair the initial invasion of  guadalcanal is a resounding success   if the rest of the fight for the island  is this simple it will be a short war the confident navy brass sends enterprise  and her sister carrier wasp out to sea   and away from the action leaving only a token  fleet to support the mopping up operations but the victory celebration is premature and the  decision to send enterprise to see is fateful if you underestimate your enemy you yourself will  not be as combat effective and as prepared because   if you go in there with an attitude that they're  not that good you're gonna end up with your kicked as the americans celebrate  their successful landing   two japanese surface task  forces steam toward the island   the u.s navy is about to be reminded  that the night belongs to the japanese   their night optics are much better than  ours they have very highly trained lookouts   who are capable of detecting an  enemy warship in long distances   some cases even farther away than american  warships equipped with radar were able to detect august 8 1942 one day after the successful  invasion the enemy ships steam down the new   georgia sound headed directly for the  american fleet anchored off guadalcanal   near the volcanic peak called savo island the heavy cruiser uss vincennes is one of  the ships supporting the guadalcanal invasion ships like vincennes are the vital  heavy frigates of the pacific fleet   born in the four river plant in quincy  massachusetts 588-foot vincennes is a   veteran of the doolittle raid and the battle  of midway she's one of seven new orleans class   heavy cruisers with an armament of eight and five  inch cannons backed up by 50 caliber machine guns in the dead of night the japanese task force  slinks in closer slipping around the allied   net of destroyers and cruisers enterprise  carrier is not anywhere near savo island   or the waters off guadalcanal when this happens  and it's probably beneficial if she isn't the men aboard uss vincennes  awake to gunfire and explosions   flares and star shells erupt on the southern  horizon vincennes scrambles to general quarters   as a massive battle explodes all around seconds  later blinding light floods the entire ship   searchlight beings have just  discovered the american frigate   they're dead across hairs of the imperial fleet  a lethal enemy broadside brackets the concents   her crew opens fire with their main battery  turrets to try and shoot out the searchlight   but it's too late an onslaught of japanese  shells pale down on the cruiser and two long   lance torpedoes tear into a number one fire room  within minutes vincennes is dead in the water it's not the only one japanese torpedoes  and shells land a deadly one-two punch   on heavy cruisers chicago and kambera astoria and quincy are hit  at the same time as vincennes the allied navy never saw it coming   the japanese navy had a very well thought out set  of night fighting tactics that they used meaning   that even in conditions of surprise and confusion  which are endemic to night fighting in general   they were often able to react appropriately and  more quickly than their american counterparts   probably even more successful than the japanese  element of surprise was the psychological effect   on the american navy there was a sense   that we had technological superiority  better equipment we had a better navy and yet the japanese used one of their  best tactics shattering that concept   in just 32 minutes the enemy sinks four heavy  cruisers and badly damages a cruiser and a destroyer what remains of the american  fleet escapes out to sea   so many sunken ships are left behind that  the sea lane is nicknamed iron bottom sound over a thousand us sailors are killed  in the night battle of sabo island   it's a steep price to pay for underestimating  the enemy the americans have been successful in   putting ground forces on guadalcanal but  because of the battle of savo island the   americans ended up having to pull their supply  ships out of those waters very expeditiously from the shores of guadalcanal  marines had seen the battle   and thought it was the japanese  fleet that was taking a pounding when they wake up the next morning  it's a slightly different situation   in the next few hours there's not really  going to be an american task force   at guadalcanal they leave the ones that  haven't been sunk pull out transports   they offload some of their equipment  and supplies and then they pull out abandoned and alone the grunts on the  ground are left to defend guadalcanal   with little more than light artillery  and world war one era springfield rifles so almost from the get-go the americans are in a  precarious position in terms of their logistics   and that would define the fighting  for the americans throughout   the next two or three months  trying to build up enough   material to keep that base in operation  and you know finally secure the island the invasion is an unqualified success  one day and a complete disaster the next   with the american fleet sunk off savo  the marines only hope of holding on is   protection from carriers like enterprise and the  enemy knows it from their bases in rabbal and   truck the japanese send a massive carrier task  force and troop transports to guadalcanal their   plan destroy enterprise and the other american  carriers and wipe out the marines on the island august 20th 1942 three japanese carriers  steamed toward the solomons two of them shokaku   and zuikaku are the largest carriers in the  japanese navy veterans of pearl harbor the third   a lighter carrier named ryujo escorts japanese  troop transports heading for guadalcanal 1200 miles away the navy brass are seemingly  unaware of their precarious position   there's no sign of japanese reinforcements  so the carrier wasp is sent south to refuel one third of the task force  disappears over the horizon   leaving enterprise and her sister carrier saratoga  alone to face the oncoming japanese menace for the sailors of enterprise  it's business as usual   merle twible is a 26 year old from kansas  stationed at enterprises machine shop   situated below decks it is repair central  for every piece of equipment aboard ship all the elevators and the ammunition hoists  everything hydraulic we were responsible for that twybles a tinkerer among his achievements he's  modified the standard issue breathing apparatus   used by the ship's fire rescue  crews doubling its capacity   one man's small contribution to the  war effort on this floating fortress all around the ship the men of  enterprise are getting nervous   it's been too long since the last action alfred ace mccullum and his twin brother alphys   have a sense of foreboding we  knew he was going to battle   and he uh i guess pre-nation she said today i  die i said so do i just like that joking you know we know the job carriers were in the  area we had some surface battles at night   we'd heard about and we just wait for it to  happen and of course it happened on august 24th   that was the day we got our baptism of fire  august 24 1942 as day breaks enterprise scout   patrols take off in search of the japanese task  force on board ship the normal routine continues   nothing much was happening so i went down to  the supply office to play a continuation of   a checker tournament with my friend paul miller  he's a pretty good guy he was a store from omaha   nebraska and his widowed mother was at home  there and earnestly praying for him i'm sure 9 35 a.m enterprise scouts have  found nothing but an american pby   spots a tempting target it is the light carrier  ryujo protected only by the heavy cruiser tone   the pby radios back and enterprise  bombers prepare for action around 11 o'clock the general quarters alarm rang   we put the checkerboard back said we'll finish  the game later and paul went down about four or   five decks below the water line and i went up  to where the captain's bridge was at 12 39 p.m 23 dive bombers take off to hit ryujo   we knew that the japs were there our  patrol planes the pbys that spotted them   and our planes were sent out to find them ed anderson is aboard a dauntless as  it first makes as we got the end of our   segment of the search we did see two heavy  cruisers and a whole bunch of destroyers so my pilot got some altitude and  we made a run on one of the cruisers   and dropped his bomb alongside the rear end of the   ship they were shooting at us and we were shooting  at them but we got through i don't know how the bombers of enterprise  work over the japanese carrier soon turning her into a floating  wreck the victory is short-lived   100 miles behind ryujo and her escorts the  giant japanese carrier shokaku and zuikaku   are ready to pounce ryujo is bait for a  trap and enterprise has sailed right into it   shokaku and zuikaku are sister ships both carriers  helped launch the pearl harbor attacks and both   are destined to meet enterprise again and again  on the field of battle over 800 feet long with   crews of at least 1600 men these twin sisters can  launch more than 160 aircraft against enterprise waves of bombers launch within  striking distance of the big e 4 pm enterprise saratoga and their escorts sail  in close circles expecting only a minor scrap   american radar isn't picking up  any aircraft but it should be 88 miles away a massive air assault closes in there was a horrible breakdown in terms of the  radar functionality on board both of the american   carriers normally we had been getting detection  ranges of up around 75 to 85 miles and in this   case didn't detect the incoming japanese aircraft  until they were almost on top of the americans my good friend charlie mason and i  were on the flight deck we watched   the ship's radar point in a certain direction  and stopped revolving just hunt back and forth so we know that they've seen us and they're on the  way every gun on enterprise is trained on the sky   every man at his battle  station in the skies overhead 54 wildcat fighters patrol around the  carriers like a protective swarm of hornets the enemy is out there somewhere and gaining fast 4 19 p.m the wildcats encounter  the first japanese planes   two formations of bombers  escorted by zeros the fight is on for 20 minutes the skies are  filled with machine gun fire   as the air forces grapple  with an aerial death match american fighter pilots down an  astounding 29 japanese planes   meanwhile the rest of the enterprise air  groups scramble to get into the skies   seventeen thousand feet in the air enterprise  pilot vincent d'aqua spots low incoming zero   he had an advantage of probably three or  four thousand feet when i first saw him   when i got to within about a thousand or 1500  feet he pushed over and went by me like a bat out   of hell i didn't get a shot as he went by dupois  pushes into a dive and chases the enemy airplane   suddenly the air is blanketed with exploding  flag and tracers from his own ships i look down and here was this battleship below me  and of course they were doing their best to knock   him down and probably me they were shooting  at him and i was getting the benefit of it amazingly the enemy flyer dodges the rapid  gunfire from north carolina and makes his escape as the last american planes lift off  from the deck of enterprise and head to   the enemy carriers the gunners aboard  ship wait for their first clear shot   it's only a matter of time before the  japanese planes get clear of the fighters   and make their plunge on the big one of the  ship's key defenses the 20 millimeter battery   the oerlikon 20 millimeter is a 70 caliber  air-cooled anti-aircraft machine gun the weapon   has an effective range of 1000 yards and can spit  out a stream of fire at 450 rounds per minute manning the portside 20 millimeter gallery are  marines joe shinka and frank graves platoon   sergeant joe schinker was a character aboard  ship always giving us young sergeants a bad time   joe always chomping a cigar when he could get them  but on the 24th of august joe spotted dive bombers   shinka spots sunlight gleaming off the wings of an  enemy val he doesn't wait for orders he opens fire the rest of the ship's guns blaze just as  30 dive bombers plunge out of the skies on the flight deck roy blood  and his friend charlie mason   stared in disbelief we watched this  first black bomber coming straight down   and when we saw this little black object drop  away from the plane we knew it was a bomb   i said charlie let's get the hell out  of here and boom that's when it started first bomb is a near miss enterprise erupts  with gunfire as every battery spews lead directly behind enterprise wait's 45 000  ton battleship north carolina ready to   blast the enemy to hell we knew it was a  fairly good strike enterprise was their   target they were paying more attention  to the enterprise than the rest of us battleship north carolina  explodes with anti-aircraft fire   the earth-shattering eruption  takes the entire fleet by surprise   and the enterprise asked us if we were on fire  because we were firing so many guns at the planes back on enterprise her five-inch gun crews  hammer out a barrage at the incoming planes enterprise's first defensive weapon her eight  five-inch 38 caliber dual purpose guns are the   best in world war ii with a team of the  big east gunners behind them they can lob   15 5-inch explosive shells per minute  at a maximum range of 18 200 yards but firepower comes at a cost there is  almost no protection for the gunners   who stand out in the open a steel helmet is all  that stands between them and a gruesome death the ship is shaken and roaring with noise  vibration that's when the fear comes it's not   the fear so much of dying it's the fear that god  awful noise must mean something is coming at us   as unrelenting gunfire rattles the  enterprise the ship takes evasive action   bobbing and weaving like a  prize fighter on the choppy seas   basically there's no place to go the dive  bombers are aiming right for the middle   of that flight deck keep a steady stream of  fire within minutes downing 15 enemy planes despite several close calls enterprise remains  unscathed but the japanese dive bombers are   moving too fast for effective anti-aircraft  fire we had anti-aircraft guns galore including   those of the battleship north carolina who was  sailing right alongside us they did the best   they could but somehow or another one or two or  three or four of those planes slipped through for the first time lucky  enterprise runs out of luck   4 44 p.m a val die bomber scores  a direct hit on enterprise the 550 pound ball plows in five then explodes with a numbing force that  rattles the ship and wreaks havoc in her bowels   the first bomb hit right back at the fan tail and  went down to the keel of the ship where my friend   paul miller was located and his crew of 22 damage  control repair people was wiped out immediately pedro sandoval and his damage control  crew weighed in enterprises sick bay   where the explosion catches  them completely by surprise and we got hit by the bombs and  that ship felt like a model t   going in the rough road i told the guys let's get  out of here because the sickbay was full and small   sandoval leads his comrades to safety then makes  his way to his battle station on the hanger deck   i got up in the hangar deck i went to my shop and   right beside me is a kid there  laying down calling for his mother he might have been 18 years old he wanted water i went to give him water in the  garment signal he says you know him the back of   his head's gone james barnhill is two levels  above the flight deck when the bomb hits his   younger brother also serving aboard enterprise  is directing anti-aircraft fire from sky control   i glanced back up at sky control where i could  ordinarily see him and i didn't see him anywhere   and it looked like sky control was crumpled  way over to the side and i started crying fortunately barnhill is mistaken  sky control has been strafed   but it still stands with no casualties barnhill's mistake is just a case of combat nerves obama hit just below us and blew all  those guys parts on up there with us and   yeah i guess i was in shock the sound  of explosions seemed to go on forever this is the first direct hit the big e has  ever suffered reeling in shock groping blindly   about in the clouds of thick smoke surviving  sailors desperately fight to save the ship the big e is hit and listed just as another  squad of dive bombers begin their assault august 24th 1942 near the island of  guadalcanal uss enterprise is assaulted   by combined aerial attacks at 4 44 p.m a dive  bomber makes a direct hit on the big e's deck we took terrible catchphrase  down there with the repair crews   they would be locked into their particular area   and with all the hatches locked down and  everything and they just sit there and wait the devastation is just beginning   30 seconds later a val scores another  direct hit 15 feet from the first one the explosion detonates the powder  bags in the five-inch gun tubs   and a massive ball of fire plumes over the ship   there were two five inch gun crews there  both crews were just wiped out instantly and there were shoes that had been on the  feet of those people that had been blown   out of those positions there  by the concussion of that blast 38 men are instantly burned alive   they were at their duty loading  ammunition into the five-inch guns some of the people were frozen in  that position as they found them   some getting ready to hand shells to someone else the gun captain in his little cradle  pointing the gun it was a very eerie sight among the dead is ace mccullum's twin brother  who had predicted his own death that morning   when they hit baker then i knew he went ten men are so horribly burned that they are never  identified there was a guy sitting on the gun now   without any clothes on burned right off and he was  cooked and burned open his body had burst open in   riverlets like a cooked hot dog and just his web  belt was still around his waist head was gone   there's just clumps of body laying on the gun my platform   for months after that you couldn't eat because  the smell of the flesh was in there all the time as enterprise trails smoke and flame her damage  control crews leap into action through the now   listing carrier to control the fires during all of  this every gun on deck continues to spew out flack one thousand yards away uss north carolina blasts planes out of the sky  with a deadly barrage we have ten five-inch guns   going off at the same time we were firing so fast  that they bring the paint off the barrels i can't   remember how many rounds we fired but it was a  lot 400 500 rounds we fired in that seven minutes but two minutes after the second bomb hits   another enemy dives i've been standing out on  the port wing of the bridge and i saw this plane   coming down from out of nowhere and it dropped  what looked like a pea and pretty soon it became   a baseball and then it was a grapefruit and by  the time it got to be a watermelon i said time   for me to head inside and i got behind the armor  plating of the pilot house and about that time a third bomb 500 pounds of enemy hell nails  enterprise just forward of the number two elevator   the blast punches a 10-foot hole in the flight  deck and knocks out the elevator platform it went down into the hangar that space and  exploded in pieces but the voice damage was   back aft that set the ship on fire  broke down the steering mechanism up on the bridge captain arthur davis orders a  full left rudder but the helmsman cannot get the   rudder to answer the bomb has hit the steering  mechanism enterprise is careening out of control now the entire task force must  turn in circles around enterprise   to keep from ramming into her we were going  round and round in circles the flight deck was   at quite an angle and we were losing airplanes  over the side would just fall off the side to lose the helm in the middle of  a battle that's the worst thing   that the captain of a ship could ever live to see enterprise turns in hopeless circles  and nearly collides with a destroyer we couldn't stare out of the way of other ships  we were panicked we had fires were damaged below   decks we were circling in a very tight circle  and blowing the emergency whistle to keep the   other ships out of our way keep from colliding  with them and we circled for quite some time   uss enterprise is a flame and out of the fight their mission accomplished the last of the  japanese bombers break off their attack   and disappear into the clouds desperately the crews below decks struggle to  fight the fires and get control of the ship we got to order some main control to go back and  try to find out what happened in the steering gear flames and smoke fill the passages but chief  machinist mate william smith has a secret   weapon the homemade breathing device created  by machinist merle twivel i gave it to him and   he said i'm going down the steering  gear and he took off and went those fires were raging down and  around the engine room quarters and   the temperature gauges registered up to 180  degrees and those gauges had gone as high as   they could go i've been told that at 145 degrees  the sweat will all disappear from your body   you start having chills and the linings of  your lungs will become charred and seared 40 minutes elapse as smith and the repair  teams fight their way to the steering room sure it was hot down there and there was smoke but  he saw that hydraulic big valve was in the neutral   position smith pushes the valve into gear and the  rudder is now under control it is twible's rescue   breathing apparatus or rba that literally saves  the enterprise if he hadn't had this rba with this   stuff on it he wouldn't have been able to get down  there as quick as he did these guys survived i   will never know i think they're the true heroes of  that day there because they got the ship righted   they got the rudder straightened out they got the  gears greased and they got the ship back on course when the uss enterprise leaves the field of battle  at eastern solomon's she's hurt she's hurt bad the ship's deck is torn and smoldering the number  two and three airplane elevators are disabled   jagged gashes gigantic holes riddle the hull and  seawater is still flooding into the ship's bowels and with a malfunctioning radar the men of  enterprise don't realize that a second wave   of aerial assaults has been launched  from the gigantic japanese carriers   in a twist of fate the big  e's damage actually saves her   the bombers are unable to find enterprise  because she is no longer on course later the   radar picked up a large flight of japanese planes  the southwest of us where we would have been had   we maintained that course so we think that going  in a circle for an hour to save us from being hit the next day the wounded giant  steams into friendly waters and the enterprise's deck becomes the scene of  an emotional farewell to the ship's fallen men that was a very solemn affair i can still remember  that bugle with this mournful rendition of taps we had two or three boys in caskets  flags raped we'd line up in the tension   and say a few words the chaplain and slide them  over the side that was in respect for the dead those that we were had to recover  we put them in a mattress cover with   a 53 pound projectile and eased them  over the stern while this was going on terrible job i had bad dreams  about it for years sorry about that except for the fact that the young  captain randall moved us to the   20 millimeters my group of people would have been   some would have been putting us in a mattress  cover and putting us over the fan tail also you were not a 19 year old  boy no more he was a man made you in a hurry you grew  up fast you grew up fast 77 men are dead 91 are wounded and  the enterprise is no longer invincible for the first time this ship is hit by bombs  and it's instantly realized how vulnerable a   carrier is under air attack and how vulnerable  men are serving a carrier in an air attack the battle has devastated enterprise   but it is a victory for america the big e  has held off another assault on guadalcanal as the great battered carrier sails to the  american base at numea new caledonia for repairs   japan looks at the scorecard and sees disaster enterprise has been hit but she hit back hard enterprise  bombers have sunk the carrier ryujo 70 planes and their crews are victims  of enterprise's deadly firepower   the giant japanese carrier shokaku and zuikaku   are in full retreat the big e has stopped japan's  thrust toward australia dead in its tracks the japanese plan was to reinforce the garrison on  the island of guadalcanal and because an american   aircraft carrier task force sailed out met them  engaged them and fought them in a spirited battle they didn't make it through guadalcanal remains in american hands   the battle of the eastern solomons is  a tactical and strategic u.s victory for harold smith and his buddies on battleship  north carolina their violent initiation on   august 24th 1942 will never be forgotten we went  back to pearl and went down to the tattoo shops   we put them on our left wrist  though faded by time and age   the date still remains on the  sailor's skin an eternal reminder and we were going to make a place  that would have a reunion every year   on august 24th make that as our initiation i can relate to why those sailors went got  their tattoos of course i can it was a big   day in their life and i'm sure every day he  looks at that he thanks god that he's alive enterprise has endured her hellish  baptism of fire but at a price she returns to pearl harbor for repairs  and the enemy will seize this opportunity   the japanese navy intends another assault on the  blood-soaked island called guadalcanal hundreds   of japanese ships will begin steaming down through  the island chain bringing massive reinforcements when enterprise returns to battle she will  find herself facing an imperial fleet that   outnumbers the americans by two to one  and aircraft carriers are the number one target bloodied but unbeaten enterprise is  about to steam toward another fight you

Channel: HISTORY

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Rating: 4.8299627 out of 5

Keywords: history, history channel, history shows, history channel shows, battle 360, history battle 360, battle 360 show, battle 360 full episodes, battle 360 clips, full episodes, battles, war, season 1, Battle 360 season 1 episode 3, Battle 360 s01 e3, Battle 360 s1 e3, Battle 360 se1 e3, watch Battle 360 full episodes, Battle 360 se01 e3, watch Battle 360 season 1, Episode 3, Jaws of the Enemy, Japanese Strike with a Vengeance, USS Enterprise, American Navy, Solomon Islands

Id: 9dDIxK_VydA

Length: 54min 34sec (3274 seconds)

Published: Thu Feb 25 2021

Reddit Comments

[u/showermilk]

oh hell ya ima watch this. damn i miss the days of history channel docs with the overly exciting orchestral music and terrible but extremely detailed cgi battle diagrams -- looking at you greatest raids or whatever it was called. also the one where it breaks the battle down by opposing generals and shows why they made the decisions they did. damn i used to love that show.

[u/Commander_rEAper]

NOOOOO not available in my country :(

[u/pickusername69]

I've watched it before :)

[u/RoboFreund00]

Thx for this, I love me a good documentary

[u/Mr_Pink_Gold]

Aliens?

[u/GhostArmy1]

Locked in germany...

[u/SomeOzDude]

Watch the 10 episodes. There is also another series called Patton 360 which is about.. well, you can guess.