The Army Air Forces in World War II, Vol. 1 (archived PDF)

T H E B A T T L E L I N E I N T H E P A C I F I C
condition, apparently still ignorant of the existence of the Umnak
strip. Thus far, the Jap had enjoyed considerable success. One float
plane was gone, another crashed near its cruiser, and one of the
Ryujo’s fighters had made a forced landing on Akutan Island, but on
the credit side damage had been inflicted on Fort Mears. The task
force had steamed to a point only roo miles from Dutch Harbor; now
after recovering its planes on the afternoon of the 3d, it retired to
await better weather for its scheduled air attack upon Atka and
Adak.13’
The morning of 4 June was rainy, with a low overcast limiting visi-
bility. Search operations were difficult, but so were carrier operations
and Admiral Kakuda spent the early part of the day in awaiting a
break in the weather before launching a fresh attack. Finally, planes
for the second day’s assault were sent off in weather so poor that only
the best pilots on the two carriers were permitted to participate. Only
one wave was launched, consisting of a total of fifteen fighters and
eleven bombers from both carriers and six torpedo planes from the
R y ~ j o . ’ ~ ~At 1800, ten of the fighters swept over the naval air station
at Dutch Harbor in a strafing attack, followed by eleven dive bombers
whose bombs inflicted considerable damage upon fuel installations and
upon the Northwestern, a station ship then in use as barracks. At I 8 2 I ,
three more bombers attacked, but without achieving success; and at
1 8 2 5 , five more were overhead, killing four naval personnel as their
bombs struck an AA emp1a~ement.l~’This time the enemy did not
fare so well in his retirement. The Junyo’s striking group, which had
not learned of the Umnak strip, had selected as its rally point the west
end of Unalaska Island, and there four dive bombers and four fighters
were met by eight P-40’s of the I I th Squadron’s forward echelon. The
action occurred directly over Umnak, and the enemy’s lack of advance
information on that island’s installations cost him no less than 50 per
cent of this force. T w o enemy dive bombers and two fighters went
down, destroyed by Lieutenants Chancellor, Dale, White, and J.J.
Cape. Unfortunately Cape, for whom Cape Army Air Field was
named, fell before a Zeke, while one other P-40 crashed on the island,
but its pilot, Lt. Winfield E. McIntyre, walked unaided into camp.133
One more Junyo bomber failed to reach home apparently because of
failure of its radio receiver, which had been knocked out in the action
at Umnak, but the Ryujo recovered all her planes.
While Japanese planes headed for Dutch Harbor, PBY’s, B- I 7’s) and
467