IJN.

This is coolbert:

Here are a series of traditional surface naval battles, fought primarily sans aviation, between the Imperial Japanese Navy [IJN] and the various allied navies, in the months immediately following 7 December 1941, that seemed to vindicate the belief that Japanese Navy, pre-Pearl Harbor, was the most combat ready, the most professional, the most able military service in the world!

Surface naval combat actions, major warships engaging major warships in the "traditional" manner, naval gunfire and massive barrages of torpedoes fired by SURFACE VESSELS.

1. Battle of the Java Sea. [1942]

2. Battle of Sunda Strait. [1942]

3. Second Battle of the Java Sea. [1942]

4. Battle of Savo Island. [1942]

5. Battle of Cape Esperance. [1942]

6. First Naval Battle of Guadalcanal. [1942]

7. Second Naval Battle of Guadalcanal. [1942]

8. Battle of the Komandorski Islands. [1943]

The Japanese Navy, very well trained and prepared for naval warfare of the traditional type. These naval encounters of 1942 and 1943 not in the style of Pearl Harbor, Repulse and Prince of Wales, Coral Sea, Midway, etc.

Naval warfare during which the Japanese maximized their advantages, all the while minimizing their weaknesses.

The Japanese having trained for and preferring surface naval NIGHT COMBAT!

In particular, the Japanese making extensive use of the Long Lance torpedo as a war-winning secret weapon, the existence and potentiality of the Long Lance NOT even being appreciated by allied naval war planners!

It can be justifiably argued that ONLY in the case of Cape Esperance and surely in the case of Second Guadalcanal did the allied navies get the best of the Japanese, and in both cases, ONLY barely so and with some luck.

Those instance of allied naval defeat, such as Java Sea, Savo Island, being humiliating in the extreme, unexpected and catastrophic, unanticipated!

More than anything else, it was a matter of numbers and a dogged persistence that FINALLY allowed the allied navies to gain the upper hand over the Japanese during that period 1942-1943?

In all instances, it is NOT that the allied navies were so bad, the allied ships, the allied sailors, the allied commanders were so bad, but that the Japanese were so GOOD? More than likely so!

coolbert.