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Re: HMS Implacable and its Seafire's, 1945
John,
The late David Brown had this to say on the rationale behind the attack on Truk:
"Implacable's Air Group was well-trained and keyed up for operations, but the staff of 1st ACS wanted the ship to carry out one "training strike" prior to Task Force deployment, to put the edge of recent combat on the ship's efficiency. The target selected was Truk, once the keystone of Japanese naval expansion and defence of the South Pacific, but now by-passed and reduced to starving impotence by the US Navy's strategic policy of neutralising the perimeter strongholds. The island within the atoll had been subjected to a series of devastating carrier strikes from mid-February 1944 and few reinforcements reached the air or naval garrisons on Truk after the Marianas and Palau island groups were captured in June and September 1944."
See:
The Seafire.
Brown,David.
London:Ian Allan,1973.
p.120.
Col.
Last edited by Col Bruggy; 12th December 2015 at 07:31.
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