During World War II, the U.S. Navy relied on a powerful carrier fleet and won back the unfavorable situation caused by the sneak attack on Pearl Harbor through many decisive battles at sea with the Japanese carrier fleet, and finally won the victory in the Pacific Theater. The United States built a total of 151 aircraft carriers in World War II, of which 122 were escort aircraft carriers.
Anyone who knows the military knows that this is nothing more than an aircraft carrier converted from a merchant ship. Therefore, many people look down on escort aircraft carriers. She was given many nicknames, such as "Jeep Aircraft Carrier" or "Baby Flat Top Boat", and although they were clumsy, slow, and unarmored, they were all-rounders. In the Atlantic, Mediterranean, Pacific and Arctic, they are responsible for escorting fleets, hunting submarines, supporting amphibious landings, and transporting people and aircraft. They played a heroic and important role in the fascist war.
The concept of an escort aircraft carrier dates back to the 1930s. At the time, the United States, Britain, and Japan were studying the possibility of converting merchant ships into small aircraft carriers. And she herself is a continuation of what began during World War I.
As early as 1935, the U.S. Bureau of Naval Construction and Repair studied the possibility of converting 10 passenger ships to military use, and they developed a plan to take "quick action" when such ships were needed in a war emergency. By then, however, the Navy was already building a large fleet of powerful carriers, so proposals to build auxiliary carriers were quickly shelved.
As Secretary of the Navy Frank Knox told the U.S. Maritime Commission in the fall of 1940, the characteristics of the aircraft changed, imposing stricter requirements on aircraft carriers. The requirements are such that a converted merchant ship can no longer produce a satisfactory aircraft carrier.
Still, President Franklin D. Roosevelt supported the concept of auxiliary aircraft carriers, thanks to the influence of shipbuilder Henry J. Kaiser. His shipyard was ready for wartime production, and British Prime Minister Winston Churchill, who also saw the potential to assist aircraft carriers in quickly replenishing the Royal Navy's heavily damaged carrier power.
Franklin D. Roosevelt sent a memorandum to Admiral Stark, Chief of Naval Operations, proposing the experimental acquisition and modification of a merchant ship with a displacement of 6,000-8,000 tons. It will be equipped with a flight deck and equipped with about 10 helicopters (sic) or 10 low-speed aircraft.
In January 1941, Stark and his assistants worked on Roosevelt's advice, one of which was that the selected merchant ships should have a sister ship that could be converted and used by the British, who had been fighting in the war for a year and a half. On Jan. 7, the Maritime Commission informed the Naval Department that two 492-foot-long, 9,000-ton C-3 diesel-powered cargo ships, Mormacmail and Mormacland, could be converted into aircraft carriers. Stark estimated that the renovation project would take 18 months, but Roosevelt set a deadline of 3 months.
The two ships began refitting on March 6. The transformation of Momacmel was completed in less than three months. On 2 June, the Navy reactivated the ship, the first escort carrier of the war, and named it CVE-1. CVE is a classification of U.S. warships, i.e. escort aircraft carriers. Long Island was not used for combat, but shortly after the Battle of Midway, Long Island shipped aircraft to Pearl Harbor and in late August 1942 shipped 19 Grumman F-4F Wildcat fighters and 12 Douglas Dreadnought SBD dive bombers to Espirito Santo for use in Guadalcanal. For the remainder of the war, the Navy used her to train carrier pilots and transport troops.
On 17 November 1941, the modified mormacland was handed over to the Royal Navy as HMSArcher, the first of 39 U.S.-built escort carriers planned under the Lend-Lease Act, which subsequently entered service in the Battle of the Atlantic.
In the second half of 1941, four other merchant ships were converted into British escorts— the Avenger, the Deceitful, the Shocker, and the Assaulter—and were ready to enter service in the spring and summer of 1942. The U.S. Navy canceled the lease-transfer order for the Assaultor, which entered service on March 3, 1942, as a second escort carrier.
Ironically, the First Allied escort carrier came from the enemy. The 5,527-ton, 15-cartel German merchant ship, the Hanover, was captured in the West Indies in March 1940 by a British light cruiser and a Canadian destroyer. It was recommissioned in June 1941 and renamed HMSAudacity in July, with its superstructure removed and replaced with a 475-foot flight deck from start to finish.
Once commissioned, the Bold and its six Wildcat fighter jets (known as Martlets in the Royal Navy) proved so effective in protecting Mediterranean escorts that Nazi submarine commander Dönitz felt the need to take action against the ship, which continued to maintain an "air umbrella." On the evening of December 19, shortly after transporting survivors of the sunken HMS Ark Royal aircraft carrier, Bold was torpedoed by a German submarine. Seventy-five officers and men were killed, including captain D.W. McKendrick.
By the spring of 1942, the U.S. escort carriers Long Island and Assault were operational, and another 13 were being refit. These include Sangamon (CVE-26), Savangni (CVE-27), Sinango (CVE-28) and Santi River (CVE-29), which was converted from a new 7192-ton 19-section tanker.
In the summer of 1942, the Navy ordered 74 additional escort carriers, of which the first 24 were C-3s, led by the USS William (CVE-31). She was retained and other ships were transferred to the Royal Navy when they were completed in 1943 and 1944. The other 50 Casablanca-class escort carriers were built at the Kaiser shipyard.
The burly, balding "Hurry Up" Henry Kaiser was a self-made industrial tycoon who built the Grand Boulder, Bonneville and Grand Coulee Dams before becoming America's leading shipbuilder. He persuaded President Roosevelt that escorting an aircraft carrier was a response to the threat of submarines, and peddled to him a 498-foot-long, 6,730-ton mass-produced aircraft carrier design from Gibbs & Cox. The U.S. Navy department was not satisfied with the design, but President Roosevelt approved a plan to build a "small aircraft carrier," which would be administered by the U.S. Maritime Commission.
Kaiser's shipyard also helped produce a large number of Liberty cargo ships, using female welders, prefabricated parts and Henry Ford's assembly line technology. The CVE was ordered on June 18, 1942, and the first one would be delivered in February of the following year, but the main ship Casablanca (CVE-55) did not enter service until July 8, 1943, and the Caesar Shipyard was behind schedule. The 50th "Caesar Aircraft Carrier" was completed on July 8, 1944, a year after the first, but it was still an amazing shipbuilding feat.
As with the C-3 modification, Caesar's aircraft carriers each had two lifts and a catapult that could accommodate 30 combat aircraft, or transport up to 90 aircraft to complement large fleet carriers. Later Borg-class and Sangamon-class escort carriers proved invaluable in the Atlantic and Pacific campaigns, and these escort carriers were larger, better equipped, more stable than the Long Island class, and equipped with starboard islands.
Meanwhile, from the Mediterranean to the Arctic, Allied escort carriers were quickly put into battle. The HMS Avenger was the first escort carrier to transport vital supplies to the Soviet Union. In September 1942, while escorting PQ-18 through fog, snow, and ice, her 12 Hurricane Hawker fighters and 3 Swordfish torpedo bombers thwarted the U-boat's attack and destroyed some of the aircraft. Seventeen of the 39 merchant ships were sunk, but the German Navy and Air Force Supreme Command complained that the Avenger prevented more losses.
On November 8, 1942, seven British and American escort carriers fought jointly in OperationTorch, a massive Allied amphibious landing in North Africa. When 70,000 U.S. and British troops landed in Algeria and Morocco, the Royal Navy's Anglo-American carrier groups "Mighty," "Victorious," "Furious" and "Argus," as well as the U.S. Navy's HMS Ranger (CV-4), stood behind them with the support of the CVE carrier force. Sinango transported 78 U.S. Air Force P-40 Warhawk fighter jets to the occupied airfield, followed by 500 survivors from a sunken British destroyer.
Wildcats, Avengers and The Fearless from Santi destroy Marrakech's airport. The Decepticon, Shocker, and Avenger fighters from the British CVE provided close support to the assault forces, and the Shooter transported 35 U.S. Air Force P-40 fighter jets to Port Lyotei.
In the brutal and long Battle of the Atlantic, British and American escort carriers and fast destroyers formed new submarine hunting formations, making the most important contribution to this war. The CVE was deployed in the spring of 1943 and quickly succeeded — with the help of new tactics, land-based long-range bombers, improved radars, and guided torpedoes. They shut down the "black pit" in the middle of the ocean where German submarines randomly attacked the Allied escort fleet.
In May of the same year, 41 U-boats were sunk, and in the first five months of the year, a total of 114 submarines were sunk, which turned the tide of the battle. Admiral Dönitzney privately admitted that he had lost the Battle of the Atlantic and began deploying his remaining ships to safer waters. In the months that followed, 62 Allied convoys crossed the Atlantic without losing a single ship. Meanwhile, british, American, and Canadian navies used subsequent convoys to lure and destroy more U-boats.
During the months of the Pacific War, when long island sent two Marine squadrons to Guadalcanal, almost all of the escort carriers sent there were sent to tedious supply missions and had to wait for action. Their bored crew complained as they transported personnel and equipment for the fast carrier group. Only there was a brief battle in Nassau in the Aleutian Islands. But the era of CVE is coming, and CVE has proved indispensable when the powerful task force of the U.S. Navy crosses the Central Pacific to launch a huge island-hopping offensive against Japan.
When Rear Admiral Julian C. Smith's Second Division and Rear Admiral Ralph C. Smith's 27th Infantry Division attacked Makin Island, Betio Island, and Tarawa Atoll in the Gilbert Islands from November 20 to 23 November 1943, eight Caesar-built escort carriers fought alongside Vice Admiral Raymond A. Spruce's U.S. Fifth Fleet. The Coral Sea (CVE-57), Corregado (CVE-58) and Liscom Bay (CVE-56) belong to the Makin Island Attack Group, while Sangamon, Savangni, Sinango, Nassau and Barnes (CVE-20) belong to the Tarawa Island Attack Group. With their Avengers, Wildcats, Intrepids, and Grumman F-6F Hellcats strafing and bombing cover for the landing forces, the CVE added nearly 200 more aircraft to the 700 aircraft provided by the offensive force's original 11 fast carriers. After fierce fighting and heavy marine losses, the three atolls were captured on 23 November.
Rear Admiral Henry M. Murinix's three escort carriers of Task Force 52.3 fought valiantly in the first operation, and the exhausted crew was proud for good reason after a complex and massive three-day, hectic three-night operation. The Japanese were completely defeated ashore, but their naval forces were closer than the Americans realized, and tragedy struck early on November 24.
A newly arrived Japanese submarine, I-175, was tracking the CVE, and on the night of November 23-24, flares dropped by Mitsubishi G4M Betty bombers gave her a clear view of Captain Owen D. Wiltz's Liscomb Bay while she was cruising near Butari Tarry Island. At 5:10 a.m. on Nov. 24, the I-175 submarine slipped out of the gap left by the two escort destroyers and fired a large number of torpedoes. One of them hit the Liscomb Bay, where, perhaps the worst, was in the ordnance storage area between its front and rear engine chambers.
Other crews on the CVE watched in horror as two violent explosions shook the carrier, bright orange flames rising to 1,000 feet high. Debris from the ship and plane was thrown into the air, and the debris rained down on the ship 5,000 yards away. The tail of the Liscomb Bay caught fire, and half of the ship nearly disintegrated. More explosions shook her, and she sank in the stern 23 minutes after being hit. She was the first of six U.S. escort carriers to be sunk in the war.
Among the 644 officers and men who sank along with LeithcomBeam Bay were Captain Willsy, Rear Admiral Murinix, and Doris Miller, a black cook who was awarded the Navy's Cross on December 7, 1941, aboard the battleship USS West Virginia (B-48) at Pearl Harbor, which was a huge loss for the Navy.
During Operation Flintlock, which took place from January 31 to February 5, 1944, eight escort carriers were in the most intense state of combat. The Fifth Amphibious Forces of Marines and Rear Admiral Holland M. Smith invaded Kwajalein Atoll and Roy-Namur Atoll in the Marshall Islands.
They are Chenango, Coral Sea, Correcido, Nassau, Sangamon and Savannah, as well as the brand new Manila Bay (CVE-61) and Natoma Bay (CVE-62). The 200 fighter jets and torpedo planes sent by the CVE provided air cover for the landing ships and provided close support to the assault forces. The assault forces captured Kwajalein Atoll after 6 days of intense fighting.
The fleet and escort carrier group maintained its forward momentum when it invaded Eniwitok at the end of February, located at Truk Atoll, 360 miles northwest of Kwajalein Atoll, known as Japan's "Pacific Gibraltar". The U.S. offensive continued, and the Jeep aircraft provided valuable support in several attacks on Japanese-controlled islands, such as in the Admiratti Islands, Hollandia, Saipan, Tinian, Guam, New Guinea and Ogasawara.
Between 1944 and 1945, when the Japanese were forced back to their islands, larger and more advanced frigates began to join the Pacific Task Force, proving indispensable in naval operations in Samar, Surigao Strait, Cape Engano, the South China Sea and Leyte Gulf, and incursions into Palaus, the Philippines, Iwo Jima, and Okinawa. Despite their excellent service, several were sunk by bombs, artillery fire or submarine torpedoes. In late October 1944, desperate Japanese launched a frenzied kamikaze attack on Leyte Bay and Samar, with sharp increases in losses.
On 25 October, at Gambir Bay (CVE-73) near Samar, as Rear Admiral Clifton M. A.F. Sprague was shot while part of the Seventh Fleet Task Force was fighting. The ship suffered more blows than its damage control team could withstand, lost power, and had about 850 crew members on board before the ship capsized and sank. Two other aircraft carriers, Kitquin Bay (CVE-71) and Kalining Bay (CVE-68), were destroyed but still floating on the water. More of Sprague's aircraft carriers, including Van Shaw Bay (CVE-70), Santi and Savangni suffered damage and crew losses while struggling to avoid kamikaze attacks.
On October 26, the Japanese attack intensified when a Kamikaze Zero aircraft crashed into the San Rae (CVE-63) in Leyte Gulf, detonating bombs and torpedoes on its hangar deck. A series of explosions nearly shattered her, and she sank along with about 100 crew members. The San Roh was the first U.S. warship to be sunk by kamikazes.
The Americans defeated the Japanese fleet at the Battle of Leyte Gulf, but the kamikazes continued to pay a heavy price in the campaign to liberate the Philippines. In November 1944 alone, they crashed and destroyed 7 aircraft carriers, destroying 2 battleships, 2 cruisers, 2 transport ships, and 7 destroyers. When Luzon was invaded in early January 1945, Vice Admiral Jesse Oldendorff and Rear Admiral Durkin led a task force into Lingayan Bay, where escort carriers were once again targeted. Using the Chiquient Bay (CVE-71) and The Bay of Garda Hill (CVE-76) was hit and damaged, the O'Mali Bay (CVE-79) was fatally damaged and had to be destroyed by a destroyer's torpedo. The total number of casualties on the carrier was 93 dead and missing, and 65 wounded.
On February 19, 1945, when the U.S. 4th and 5th Marine Divisions invaded the 8-square-mile volcanic island of Iwo Jima, Rear Admiral Durkin provided close support from 12 escort carriers Aboard the Wildcat, Hellcat, Avenger, and Intrepid. A few days later, the kamikazes began attacking the CVE. On the night of 21-22 February, a Japanese twin-engine Betty bomber flew toward the CVE-94. Her sister ship Bismarck Sea (CVE-95) opened fire and shot down the plane. A few seconds later, another plane flew low toward the Bismarck Sea and crashed sideways at the foot of its stern elevator.
When the fire broke out, a second bomber swooped vertically onto the hapless carrier. The hangar deck full of planes soon turned into a sea of fire. As the flames approached torpedoes and bombs, the captain issued an order to abandon the ship. The Bismarck Sea, one of the last Casablanca-class aircraft carriers at Caesars Shipyard to participate in World War II, burned and exploded until it rolled over and sank, carrying 218 of its 943 crew. Meanwhile, Cape Lunga was destroyed by four more aircraft, but it survived.
Then there was Operation Iceberg, codenamed for an offensive assault on okinawa in the Ryukyu Islands, which was designed to strengthen the blockade against Japan, strengthen raids on its cities, and provide a staging base for an amphibious assault on Kyushu, the southernmost tip of the Japanese mainland. At the end of March, after the island of Okinawa was bombed by Task Force 54 of 52 warships by Rear Admiral Morton L. Deyo, a large fleet of Admiral Spruance's Fifth Fleet entered the last major operation of the Pacific War. It included Admiral Mark Mitchell's Task Force 58 and Admiral Richmond Kelly Turner's Task Force 51, as well as Task Force 57 of the newly formed British Pacific Fleet, providing air cover support between Okinawa and Taiwan Island. 29 CVEs led by Major General Du jin participated in the operation.
In the early morning of Sunday, April 1, 1945, commando units of the U.S. Tenth Army and the 1st, 2nd, and 4th Marine Divisions led by Lieutenant General Bucknell landed on the west coast of Okinawa. Initial resistance was sporadic, but tenacious defenders had dug trenches in the hills, caves, and pillboxes, forcing the Americans to fight for almost every yard. During the campaign, which lasted until 21 June, Allied support ships were subjected to multiple attacks by Japanese torpedo bombers and kamikazes. In the most expensive naval operation in history, 34 U.S. warships were sunk, 368 damaged, and more than 4,900 sailors were killed.
Dukin's CVE carrier-based aircraft unit flew about 18,133 sorties in Okinawa, dropping 2,000 tons of bombs and 30,000 rockets, destroying many ground targets and 280 enemy aircraft.
Although the potential of escort carriers was questioned, they proved successful and played an important role in the Atlantic and Pacific during World War II. The United States has 122 escort aircraft carriers, including 50 in the Casablanca class and 45 in the Borg class. (Power talks about the world / Zhang Mi)