Operation Ke

Operation Ke was the largely successful withdrawal of Japanese forces from Guadalcanal. It took place between 14 January and 7 February 1943, and involved both Imperial Japanese Army and Imperial Japanese Navy forces. The Japanese decided to withdraw for several reasons. All attempts by the IJA to recapture Henderson Field, the airfield in use by Allied aircraft, had been repulsed with heavy losses. Japanese ground forces on the island had been reduced from 36,000 to 11,000 through starvation, disease, and battle casualties.

About Operation Ke in brief

Operation Ke was the largely successful withdrawal of Japanese forces from Guadalcanal. The operation took place between 14 January and 7 February 1943, and involved both Imperial Japanese Army and Imperial Japanese Navy forces. The Japanese decided to withdraw for several reasons. All attempts by the IJA to recapture Henderson Field, the airfield in use by Allied aircraft, had been repulsed with heavy losses. Japanese ground forces on the island had been reduced from 36,000 to 11,000 through starvation, disease, and battle casualties. The decision to withdraw was endorsed by Emperor Hirohito on 31 December 1942. On 9 February, Allied forces realized that the Japanese were gone and declared Guadal canal secure, ending the six-month campaign for control of the island. The landings on the islands were meant to deny their use by the Japanese as bases for threatening the supply routes between the US and Australia, and to secure the islands as starting points for a campaign with the eventual goal of capturing or neutralizing the major Japanese base at Rabaul while also supporting the Allied New Guinea campaign. During the air campaign, a US cruiser was sunk in the Battle of Rennell Island. Two days later, Japanese aircraft sank a US destroyer near Guadal Canal. At a cost of one destroyer sunk and three damaged, the Japanese evacuated 10,652 men from Guadelcanal on the nights of 1, 4, and 7February by destroyers. Because of the threat by CAF aircraft, the Imperial Japan Navy was unable to use large, slow transport ships to deliver troops and supplies to the island, and instead, warships based in Rabaul and the Shortland Islands were used.

These high speed warship runs occurred throughout the campaign and were later called the ‘Tokyo Express’ by Allied forces and ‘Rat Transportation’ by theJapanese. After the failure of an attempt to retake Henderson Field in this manner, the IJN tried to deliver its heavy equipment three times to retake the island but was defeated each time. In mid-November Allied forces attacked the Japanese at Buna-Gona in New Guinea, and under the overall command of Japanese Combined Fleet Admiral Isoroku Yamamoto, the Combined Fleet began preparing for abandoning the southern Solomons. The Allies later renamed it ‘Cactus Air Force’ after the Allied code name for GuadalCanal. In response to the landings, the Japan Imperial General Headquarters assigned the Imperial JapaneseArmy’s 17th Army, a corps-sized command headquartered atrabaul under the command of Lieutenant General Harukichi Hyakutake, the task of retaking GuadalCANal. After a third failed attempt to deliver heavy equipment during the battle of 12–15 November, the next planned attempt was cancelled and the Japanese planned to return to the Solomon Islands in January 1944. The next day the US 1st Marine Division landed on Tulagi and nearby islands as well as the Japanese airfield under construction at Lunga Point.

Related posts:

Battle for Henderson Field Naval Battle of Guadalcanal Matanikau Offensive Koli Point action