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Attack on Sydney Harbour
Part of World War II, Pacific War
June 1, 1942. A Japanese Ko-hyoteki class midget submarine, believed to be Midget No. 14, is raised from Sydney Harbour. (Photograph by Ronald Noel Keam.)
Date May 31-June 8, 1942 Location Sydney Harbour, Sydney, Australia Result Japanese victory
Combatants
Australia, United States, United Kingdom, Netherlands.	Japan
Commanders
Gerard Muirhead-Gould	Hankyu Sasaki
Strength
Two heavy cruisers, one light cruiser, two armed merchant cruisers, three destroyers, two corvettes, one submarine, two anti-submarine vessels and six channel patrol boats.	five submarines, three midget submarines
Casualties
22 dead; one depot ship sunk; one fighter plane lost due to mechanical failure.	six dead; three midget submarines and two spotter planes lost.

In late May and early June, 1942, a group of five Imperial Japanese Navy submarines made a series of attacks on Sydney, Australia and the nearby port of Newcastle. These attacks are one of the best known examples of Axis naval activity in Australian waters during World War II. On the night of May 31-June 1, the submarines launched three Ko-hyoteki class midget submarines against Allied shipping in Sydney Harbour. A torpedo exploded under a small Royal Australian Navy (RAN) depot ship HMAS Kuttabul, killing 21 people. On June 8, two of the submarines shelled Sydney and Newcastle, with little effect.

The crews of the Japanese midget submarines which attacked Sydney and Diego Suarez, in Madagascar.

On May 18, the submarines I-22, I-24 and I-27 left the major naval base at Truk Lagoon, in the Japanese territory of the Caroline Islands. Each was carrying a midget submarine. They later made a rendezvous with two other submarines, I-21, I-29 56 kilometres (35 miles) off Sydney. The submarine group, known as the Eastern Advanced Detachment, was commanded by Captain Hankyu Sasaki. Its main mission was reconnaissance, although it was planned that any "major enemy warships" sighted would be attacked with the midgets.

The Imperial Japanese Navy had first used midget submarines during the attack on Pearl Harbor in December 1941. By May, it was planning to use them in simultaneous raids on Allied warships in two harbours: Sydney and Diego Suarez, Madagascar.[1] (See Battle of Madagascar for more details.) These attacks were to take place less than a week before the Japanese attempt to capture Midway Atoll, the turning point of the war in the Pacific.

The Allied Naval Officer in Charge, Sydney, was a British Rear Admiral, Gerard Muirhead-Gould. Naval vessels in port included: the U.S. Navy heavy cruiser Chicago, the USN destroyers Perkins and Dobbin, the RAN minelayer Bungaree and the Royal Indian Navy minesweeper HMIS Bombay, all in Man-of-War Anchorage; the RAN heavy cruiser Canberra in Farm Cove; the RAN auxiliary cruisers Kanimbla and Westralia, in Neutral Bay; the obsolescent light cruiser HMAS Adelaide, on the west side of Garden Island; the RAN corvettes Whyalla and Geelong, on the north-west corner of Garden Island, and; the Royal Netherlands Navy submarine K-IX and the converted suburban ferry Kuttabul, at the south-east corner of Garden Island.

Other defences included an electromagnetic indicator loop at Sydney Heads. At the inner entrance to the harbour there was a semi-completed antitorpedo net, between George's Head on Middle Head, and Green Point on Inner South Head. The centre part of the net, including boom gates, was complete but there were gaps at each end. The net had gates to allow vessels to enter and leave the harbour. The anti-submarine vessel HMAS Yandra on duty patrolling near the harbour entrance and a similar vessel, HMAS Bingera, was on stand-by at the Naval Anchorage in Woolloomooloo. The minesweepers HMAS Goonambee and HMAS Samuel Benbow were located in Watson's Bay. Six channel patrol boats armed with depth charges and four unarmed auxiliary patrol boats were also on duty in the vicinity of the boom gates.

HMAS Kuttabul following the Japanese attack

Three of the Japanese submarines carried spotter seaplanes. On May 23, the pilot of a Yokosuka E14Y1 from I–29 made a brief flight over the Sydney-Newcastle area, detecting a large number of ships in Sydney Harbour. However, the plane's wing was damaged shortly after landing near I-29.

The following day, at 3.45am, I-21 launched its own E14Y1. The pilot, Warrant Officer Susumu Ito, made several reconnaissance circuits over Sydney Harbour. P-39 fighters from the United States Army Air Forces's 41st Pursuit Squadron, based at Bankstown Airport, were sent up to investigate, but by that time Ito had spotted Chicago, believing it to be a battleship and had returned to I-21. Ito's plane capsized soon after landing and was then scuttled.

The following afternoon, the Japanese force approached to within 11 kilometres of Sydney Heads, and at about 4.30pm the three midget submarines were launched. Midget No. 14 was detected by harbour defences at about 8.00pm, but was not precisely located until it became entangled in the net. The channel patrol boat HMAS Lolita, a converted yacht, dropped three depth charges that failed to explode, due to a lack of water depth. Before a similar vessel, HMAS Yarroma, was able to launch its own depth charges, No. 14's self-demolition explosives were ignited, destroying the vessel and killing the two crew members, Lieutenant Kenshi Chuma and Petty Officer Takeshi Ohmori.

At 9.48pm, Midget "A" (also known as Midget No. 24, or M-24) entered the harbour and headed west towards the Sydney Harbour Bridge. It was also detected and a general alarm was sounded at 10.27pm.

Midget No. 21 entered the harbour after Midget "A". At 10.52pm, the crew of the unarmed auxiliary patrol boat Lauriana spotted Midget No. 21's conning tower above the surface and signalled HMAS Yandra. Just after 10.54pm, Yandra attempted to ram the sub, near Taylor's Bay, and at 11.07pm Yandra dropped six depth charges. These caused serious damage to Midget No. 21 and the crew of Lieutenant Keiu Matsuo and Petty Officer Masao Tsuzuku committed suicide with their handguns to avoid capture.

By this time the waters of the inner harbour were well-illuminated by searchlights and Midget "A" was spotted by Allied personnel about 200 metres from Garden Island, and was fired on by Chicago and Geelong. Some 5-inch shells from Chicago accidentally hit a small fortified island, Fort Denison, and fragments landed in the harbourside suburbs of Cremorne and Mosman.[2] At about 11.26pm the submarine's crew, Sub-Lieutenant Katsuhisa Ban and Petty Officer Namori Ashibe, returned fire with two torpedoes. One torpedo ran ashore on Garden Island without exploding. The other passed under K-IX and struck the harbour bed beneath Kuttabul where it exploded, sinking the ship and killing 19 RAN personnel and two British seamen. As a result of the explosion K-IX was severely damaged by an impact from Kuttabul.

The Midget "A" then disappeared for 64 years. In November 2006, it was discovered by a group of amateur divers a few kilometres off Sydney's northern beaches, suggesting that the crew did not escape. (See the Aftermath section of this article for further details.)

A house in Sydney's eastern suburbs damaged by a Japanese shell

Over the next week, the Allied navies and air forces searched, without luck, for the mother submarines.

On June 8, just after midnight, I-24 surfaced about 10 km (6 mi) off the Sydney suburb of Maroubra. For a four minute period, the submarine's deck gun was fired at the Sydney Harbour Bridge. Every shot landed well short of its target, with at least 10 shells hitting the residential suburbs of Rose Bay, Woollahra and Bellevue Hill. All but one of the shells failed to explode and there were no fatalities or serious injuries. Several houses were destroyed or badly damaged. Lt George Cantello of the 41st PS took off from Bankstown, but suffered mechanical failure soon afterwards, crashed and was killed. I-24 submerged and left the scene before it could be located by defence forces.

About two hours later, I-21 surfaced about 9 km (5.5 mi) north east of Newcastle. At about 2.17 am, its deck gun fired the first of eight illuminating star shells and 26 live rounds towards the Newcastle shipyards, at Carrington. From about 2.26, the coastal artillery at Fort Scratchley returned fire. I-21 continued firing for about another 10 minutes. There were no casualties and little damage was caused. I-21 submerged and left the scene

The burial service for the Australian sailors killed during the raid on Sydney

Relatives of four of the Japanese sailors killed in the midget submarines which raided Sydney Harbor greet Kamakura Maru as she arrives at Yokohama with the ashes of the four submariners in October, 1942

The raid was the first and only time that Sydney has ever been attacked by enemy military forces. Although the raid lacked the psychological impact of the air raids on Darwin several weeks earlier, and it failed to sink any major warships, it nevertheless represented a symbolic victory for Japan, soon after its setback at the Battle of the Coral Sea.

Like the bodies from the Kuttabul, the bodies of four of the Japanese submariners were recovered. The Japanese seamen were cremated with full military honours and their ashes were returned to their families in Japan by way of a neutral country.

Two of the Japanese midget submarines were raised and used to construct a composite midget submarine. This submarine toured Australia during the war and is now on display at the Australian War Memorial.

Chicago and Canberra were both lost in battle within a year

I-21 and I-22 both disappeared at sea within a year of the Sydney attack. I-24 was sunk by Allied forces off Alaska in 1943. I-27 was sunk in the Indian Ocean in 1944. I-29 became one of only a few Japanese submarines to reach Nazi-occupied Europe, but was sunk off the Philippines on its return trip in 1944.

In November 2005, it was claimed in a television documentary, which was shown internationally on The History Channel, that the wreckage of Midget "A" was buried under sand on the seabed, near the mouth of Broken Bay. However, New South Wales government minister Frank Sartor later announced that sonar scans at the location had found no trace of the submarine, and that it was most likely nothing more than an unusual sand formation. [3]

On November 23, 2006, a Japanese midget submarine was discovered by divers near Long Reef, about 5.5 km north of the harbour entrance, in 20 m of water. Pictures of the submarine were published in a women's magazine, which pre-empted a story on the popular TV current affairs program 60 Minutes.[4] On November 27, Australia's Minister for Defence, Brendan Nelson, announced that steps were being taken to formally protect the site of the submarine.[5] Commander Shane Moore,[6] head of the RAN heritage collection and Dr Robert Nichols of the Australian War Memorial,[7] confirmed that a World War II-era Japanese midget submarine had been found and that both of its torpedoes had been fired. Dr Nichols stated that there appears to be little doubt that the vessel is Midget "A" (also known as "M24").

• G. Hermon Gill, 1968, "Japanese Midget Submarine Attack on Sydney Harbour 30-31st May 1942" (Australian War Memorial; from the book Royal Australian Navy, 1942-1945, pp 64-72).

• "Fact Sheet 192 Japanese midget submarine attacks on Sydney, 1942" (National Archives of Australia)

• Peter Dunn, 2005, "Sydney, NSW Shelled by a Japanese Submarine on 8 June 1942" (ozatwar.com)

• Peter Dunn, 2005, "Newcastle, NSW Shelled by a Japanese Submarine on 8 June 1942" (ozatwar.com)

• Bob Hackett & Sander Kingsepp, 2002, "HIJMS Submarine I-29: Tabular Record of Movement" (combinedfleet.com)

• Tanaka Hiromi, 1997, "The Japanese Navy's operations against Australia in the Second World War, with a commentary on Japanese sources" (Australian War Memorial)

• Lt Cdr Mick Gallagher, 2002, "Australia honours gallantry of Kuttabul" (Navy News)

• Damien Lay, 2005, He's Coming South (The History Channel)

• Jeannine Baker, 2004, "Midget Subs" (Rewind, ABC-TV)

• Kennedy, David (2003). The Midget Submarine Attack against Sydney: May 1942. Mysteries/Untold Sagas of the Imperial Japanese Navy. CombinedFleet.com. Retrieved on 2006-11-06.
• Steven L Carruthers (1982), Australia Under Siege: Japanese Submarine Raiders, 1942. Solus Books. ISBN 0-9593614-0-5
• Wurth, Bob (2007). Fallen submariners honored in Australia: Navies pay respects to pair who perished after attacking Sydney Harbor. The Japan Times Online. The Japan Times, print edition February 24, 2007, p. 3. Retrieved on 2007-02-25.