History
Established on 14 July 1942, the IJN 8th Fleet was a headquarters unit established to direct Japanese naval operations in the Solomon Islands and New Guinea. The warship forces assigned to the 8th Fleet were known as the Outer South Seas Force and Vice Admiral Gunichi Mikawa was assigned as the first commander.
The first warships assigned to the 8th included the heavy cruiser Chōkai, Cruiser Division 6 (CruDiv6) which included the heavy cruisers Aoba, Kinugasa, Kako, and Furutaka, light cruisers Tenryū and Yubari, and four destroyers. On July 26, Mikawa, on Chōkai led his force from Truk to Rabaul, New Britain where he established his headquarters. He detached CruDiv6 to Kavieng, New Ireland.
The IJN 8th Fleet under Mikawa engaged United States Navy forces in the Battle of Savo Island on August 8–9, 1942. In the battle, 8th Fleet commander in chief Admiral Gunichi Mikawa defeated a superior American force, sinking four of eight cruisers, but failed to follow through and destroy the lightly protected American transports that had just landed troops on the island, initiating the Guadalcanal Campaign.
The IJN 8th Fleet also played a major role in the Naval Battle of Guadalcanal from November 12–18, 1942, during which the Japanese won a tactical victory, but suffered a strategic defeat due to large losses of irreplaceable ships and an inability to enable the delivery of sufficient army troops to retake Guadalcanal from Allied forces. The 8th Fleet subsequently played a major role in Operation Ke, the successful withdrawal of army forces from Guadalcanal the first week of February, 1943 that conceded victory to the Allies in the hard fought campaign.
From December 20, 1942 until the end of the war, the IJN 8th Fleet came under the operational authority of the Southeast Area Fleet. Its headquarters staff was later isolated on Bougainville Island with remnants of Imperial Japanese Army forces at the end of the war.
Read more about this topic: 8th Fleet (Imperial Japanese Navy)
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