Kimura Masatome (1891-1960)

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Japanese Navy. Via Morison (1951).

Kimura Masatome was born in Tottori prefecture and graduated from the Japanese Naval Academy in 1912. Though trained in mine warfare, he spent almost his entire career in destroyers. He was promoted to rear admiral early in the war and become one of the foremost Japanese sea commanders.

Kimura commanded 8 Transport Fleet, the convoy that was mauled by Kenney’s 5 Air Force at the Battle of the Bismarck Sea. Badly wounded, with his flagship sunk from under him, he returned to Rabaul with the survivors and was reassigned to Destroyer Squadron 1, 5 Fleet in the Kuriles. He carried out the brilliant evacuation of Kiska in July 1943.

Kimura's force was rushed towards Formosa after the Halsey raids on that island in late 1944. The Japanese aviators had grossly overestimated damage to the enemy, but Kimura and the other Japanese admirals dispatched to “mop up” managed to elude a trap.

Kimura participated in the battle of Leyte Gulf, providing escort to Kurita’s powerful surface force. In February 1944, Kimura was assigned the suicidal mission to bombard the American landings on Mindoro, and, in one of the most brilliant coups of the war, managed to penetrate the American defenses and bombard San Jose for twenty minutes, then get away, with the loss of a single destroyer. However, the bombardment did little to hinder the American operation, since the Japanese Army had decided not to put up a fight for the island.

Kimura held senior staff positions in the final months of the war and was promoted to vice admiral after the surrender.

Service record

References

Dupuy et al. (1992)

Fuller (1992)

Garfield (1965)

Materials of IJN (accesssed 2007-11-15)

Morison (1950, 1951)

Prados (1995)

The Pacific War Online Encyclopedia © 2007-2008, 2012 by Kent G. Budge. Index

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