171 - Axis Armies Facing Starvation - WW2 - December 4, 1942

What if it goes wrong?

Huh?

BOOM?

Yeah, that would suck.

So where are they doing it, way out in the boonies?

What?

Chicago?!

But… but… but… what if..?

I got nothing.

December 4, 1942

This week something happens that, well, that really will eventually change how the whole

world thinks about things.

For real.

This week sees the first ever man-made controlled nuclear chain reaction.

We have entered the nuclear age.

I’m Indy Neidell; this is World War Two.

Last week the huge Soviet counteroffensive continued, surrounding hundreds of thousand

of men near Stalingrad.

They also launched other offensives farther north.

The Allied advance into Tunisia was slowed, however, and the French scuttled their fleet

at Toulon to prevent it falling into German hands.

Here’s what follows.

On the 30th comes Naval Battle of Tassafaronga.

Since the Japanese can’t afford to lose any more transports, and since their submarines

only have limited transport capacity, Raizo Tanaka’s destroyers are towing drums laden

with all sorts of supplies into Ironbottom Sound.

“Sailors cleaned heavy drums and filled them with 330 pounds of rice and barley.

They loaded between 200 and 240 drums, joined in clusters by ropes, on the weather deck

of each destroyer.

Once off Guadalcanal, the clusters of drums would be shoved overboard close to the landing

points and pulled ashore by a central line.

This method would require only 20 destroyer runs per month to feed 20,000 men and drastically

reduce the exposure period of each destroyer by minimizing the amount of time spent off

Guadalcanal.”

Tanaka has 8 destroyers, but American Carleton Wright has 4 heavy cruisers and one light

one, and 6 destroyers.

Wright’s task force leaves Espiritu Santo at midnight the 29th and heads for Guadalcanal.

The two sides meet the night of the 30th.

Tanaka’s men are topside readying the drums for their swim when their enemy appears, so