USS Wasp (CV-7) was a United States Navy aircraft carrier commissioned in 1940 and lost in action in 1942. She was the eighth ship named USS Wasp, and the sole ship of a class built to use up the remaining tonnage allowed to the U.S. for aircraft carriers under the treaties of the time. As a reduced-size version of the Yorktown-class aircraft carrier hull, Wasp was more vulnerable than other United States aircraft carriers available at the opening of hostilities. Wasp was initially employed in the Atlantic campaign, where Axis naval forces were perceived as less capable of inflicting decisive damage. After supporting the occupation of Iceland in 1941, Wasp joined the British Home Fleet in April 1942 and twice ferried British fighter aircraft to Malta.
The Naval Battle of Guadalcanal, sometimes referred to as the Third and Fourth Battles of Savo Island, the Battle of the Solomons, TheBattle of Friday the 13th, The Night of the Big Guns, or, in Japanese sources, the Third Battle of the Solomon Sea, took place from 12 to 15 November 1942 and was the decisive engagement in a series of naval battles between Allied and Imperial Japanese forces during the months-long Guadalcanal campaign in the Solomon Islands during World War II. The action consisted of combined air and sea engagements over four days, most near Guadalcanal and all related to a Japanese effort to reinforce land forces on the island. The only two U.S. Navy admirals to be killed in a surface engagement in the war were lost in this battle.
Frank Jack Fletcher was an admiral in the United States Navy during World War II. Fletcher commanded five different task forces through the war; he was the operational task force commander at the pivotal battles of the Coral Sea and Midway, which collectively resulted in the sinking of five Japanese aircraft carriers.
This is the order of battle for the Guadalcanal Campaign, called Operation Watchtower, the first major Allied offensive in the Pacific Theater of Operations in World War II. The campaign lasted from the initial American landings on 7 August 1942 until the final Japanese evacuation on 9 February 1943, a period of six months, far longer than was expected by Allied planners.
This is the order of battle for the Battle of Midway, a major engagement of the Pacific Theatre of World War II, fought 4–7 June 1942 by naval and air forces of Imperial Japan and the United States in the waters around Midway Atoll in the far northwestern Hawaiian Islands.
The Battle of the Coral Sea, a major engagement of the Pacific Theatre of World War II, was fought 4–8 May 1942 in the waters east of New Guinea and south of the Bismarck Islands between elements of the Imperial Japanese Navy and Allied naval and air forces from the United States (U.S.) and Australia.
The Battle of Cape Esperance, also known as the Second Battle of Savo Island and in Japanese sources as the Sea Battle of Savo Island (サボ島沖海戦), took place on 11–12 October 1942, in the Pacific campaign of World War II between the Imperial Japanese Navy and United States Navy. The naval battle was the second of four major surface engagements during the Guadalcanal campaign and took place at the entrance to the strait between Savo Island and Guadalcanal in the Solomon Islands. Cape Esperance (9°15′S159°42′E) is the northernmost point on Guadalcanal, and the battle took its name from this point.
Operation Ke was the largely successful withdrawal of Japanese forces from Guadalcanal, concluding the Guadalcanal Campaign of World War II. The operation took place between 14 January and 7 February 1943, and involved both Imperial Japanese Army (IJA) and Imperial Japanese Navy (IJN) forces under the overall direction of the Japanese Imperial General Headquarters (IGH). Commanders of the operation included Isoroku Yamamoto and Hitoshi Imamura.
USS Gwin (DD-433), a Gleaves-class destroyer, was the third ship of the United States Navy to be named for Lieutenant Commander William Gwin, an American Civil War officer who commanded river boats against Confederate forces in Alabama.
Kinugasa (衣笠) was the second vessel in the two-vessel Aoba class of heavy cruisers in the Imperial Japanese Navy. The ship was named after Mount Kinugasa, located in Yokosuka, Kanagawa, Japan.
This is the attack on Pearl Harbor's order of battle for both the Empire of Japan and the United States.
On 20 November 1943, simultaneous landings were made by United States Marine Corps forces on Tarawa and United States Army forces on Makin, two coral atolls located in the Gilbert Islands chain in the South-Central Pacific.
The Battle of Leyte Gulf, generally considered to be the largest naval combat in history, was fought 24–25 October 1944 in the waters of the Philippine Islands by elements of the Imperial Japanese Navy's Combined Fleet and the United States Navy's Pacific Fleet. Of the five separate engagements that made up the battle as a whole, the forces involved in the three principal ones are listed here.
The Battle of the Philippine Sea was fought 19–20 June 1944 in the waters west of the Mariana Islands by elements of the Imperial Japanese Navy's Combined Fleet and of the United States Navy's Pacific Fleet. The battle resulted from the Japanese reaction to the American invasion of the island of Saipan. Instead of attacking the troop transports off Saipan, Admiral Toyoda chose to engage the American carrier forces in what he intended to be the long-awaited “decisive battle” that would crush U.S. naval power.
For the April 1945 invasion of Okinawa, the Allies assembled the most powerful naval force in history. Since the few remaining capital ships of the Imperial Japanese Combined Fleet had been sunk or otherwise put out of action at the Battle of Leyte Gulf, the Allies were effectively unopposed in terms of major surface vessels; a single mission consisting of the superbattleship Yamato and a few escorts was undertaken, but the task force did not get within 200 nautical miles of the invasion area. The main Japanese naval opposition within the invasion area came from hundreds of Imperial Japanese Navy Shin'yō-class suicide motorboats and Maru-Ni Imperial Japanese Army attack boats.
The Battle of the Eastern Solomons was fought August 23–25, 1942 in the waters east and northeast of the Solomon Islands by forces of the Imperial Japanese Navy's Combined Fleet and the US Navy's Pacific Fleet. The battle resulted from a major effort by the Japanese to reinforce their troop strength on the island of Guadalcanal. The Japanese high command had realized this reinforcement was necessary following the annihilation of the Ichiki Detachment by the 1st Marines a few days earlier.
The Battle of the Santa Cruz Islands was fought 25–27 October 1942 in the waters northwest of the Santa Cruz Islands by forces of the Imperial Japanese Navy's (IJN) Combined Fleet and the United States Navy's (USN) Pacific Fleet. The battle resulted from a major Japanese offensive with the goal to drive the US forces from Guadalcanal.
On 17 October 1944, troops of the United States Sixth Army under the direct command of Lieutenant General Walter Krueger, invaded the Philippine island of Leyte. This operation was the beginning of General Douglas MacArthur's fulfillment of his promise in March 1942 to the Filipino people that he would liberate them from Japanese rule.
On 15 June 1944, United States Marine and Army forces landed on the southwest coast of the island of Saipan in the central Marianas chain. US forces declared Saipan secure on 9 July.
The Battle of Savo Island was part of Guadalcanal Campaign and was fought on 9 August 1942 in the waters around Savo Island by forces of the Imperial Japanese Navy (IJN) and Allies' Guadalcanal—Tulagi invasion force composed of ships from the United States Navy (USN) and Royal Australian Navy (RAN). The battle resulted in a major Allied defeat, losing four heavy cruisers. The Japanese lost no ships but failed to capitalize on the temporary strategic advantage gained from the battle, leaving the unprotected Allied transports unharmed.
US Navy combat ships:
Australian Navy combat ships:
