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Rising Sun, Falling Skies : The Disastrous Java Sea Campaign of World War II by Jeffrey Cox (2014, Hardcover)
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About this product
Product Identifiers
PublisherBloomsbury Publishing
ISBN-101780967268
ISBN-139781780967264
eBay Product ID (ePID)150632410
Product Key Features
Original LanguageEnglish
Book TitleRising Sun, Falling Skies : the Disastrous Java Sea Campaign of World War II
Number of Pages504 Pages
LanguageEnglish
Publication Year2014
TopicMilitary / World War II, Military / United States, Americas (North, Central, South, West Indies)
IllustratorYes
GenreHistory
AuthorJeffrey Cox
FormatHardcover
Dimensions
Item Height1.6 in
Item Weight29.9 Oz
Item Length9.5 in
Item Width6.2 in
Additional Product Features
Intended AudienceTrade
Reviews"In the Pacific War's first months, elements of four navies, Dutch, British, American, and Australian, fought a delaying action against superior Japanese forces as heroic as it was hopeless. Cox brings an attorney's incisiveness, a historian's comprehension, and a storyteller's passion to this compelling account of the Java Sea campaign. Rising Sun, Falling Skies commemorates not a defense but a defiance: a forgotten epic of character and honor." Dennis Showalter "A seminal work about a long neglected part of World War II in the Pacific... richly detailed with accounts from the men on both sides of the conflict who fought desperate struggles in 1942 either as conquerors or defenders." -Mike Walling, author of Forgotten Sacrifice and Bloodstained Sea, "A seminal work about a long neglected part of World War II in the Pacific... richly detailed with accounts from the men on both sides of the conflict who fought desperate struggles in 1942 either as conquerors or defenders." -- Mike Walling, author of Forgotten Sacrifice and Bloodstained Sea "In the Pacific War's first months, elements of four navies, Dutch, British, American, and Australian, fought a delaying action against superior Japanese forces as heroic as it was hopeless. Cox brings an attorney's incisiveness, a historian's comprehension, and a storyteller's passion to this compelling account of the Java Sea campaign. Rising Sun, Falling Skies commemorates not a defense but a defiance: a forgotten epic of character and honor." -- Dennis Showalter "As Japanese forces were hitting Pearl Harbor, countrymen undertook to maul the Allies in the Java Sea. That 1941-1942 onslaught, which cost the Royal Navy the dreadnoughts Repulse and Prince of Wales, inflicted a string of defeats unjustifiably accorded short shrift in many histories. Here they receive an informed airing." -- World War II Magazine
Dewey Edition23
Dewey Decimal940.542598
Table Of ContentPrologueChapter 1. On the Day Before Chapter 2. Just a Little More Time Chapter 3. Breakdown Chapter 4. Finding Trouble Chapter 5. Shooting at Venus Chapter 6. Slapped Together Chapter 7. Luck - The Battle of Balikpapan Chapter 8. Bloody Shambles Chapter 9. Can't Catch a Break - The Battle of the Flores Sea Chapter 10. A Thousand Cuts Chapter 11. Too Clever by Half - The Battle of Badoeng StraitChapter 12. No Breath to Catch - Preliminaries to the Battle of the Java SeaChapter 13. Nerk Nerk Nerk - The Sinking of the Langley Chapter 14. One Shell - Day Action of the Battle of the Java SeaChapter 15. A Turn Too Far - The Second Part of the Battle of the Java SeaChapter 16. A Hopeless Plan - The Escape from JavaChapter 17. Dancing in the Dark - The Battle of Soenda StraitChapter 18. Nowhere to Run - The Second Battle of the Java Sea Chapter 19. To the Winds - Escape Attempts from Java Chapter 20. Aftermath - Not Quite Vanquished NotesBibliographyIndex
SynopsisA fresh look at the disastrous Java Sea Campaign of 1941-42 which heralded a wave of Japanese naval victories in the Pacific but which eventually sowed the seeds of their eventual change in fortunes. In the immediate aftermath of Pearl Harbor, the Japanese juggernaut quickly racked up victory after victory. Desperate to secure resource-rich regions in the Pacific and ensure their continued dominance of South East Asia, Japanese forces were determined in their efforts to conquer Malaya, Singapore and the oil-rich islands around Java Sea - Borneo, Sumatra and Java itself. In the face of this seemingly unstoppable tide stood a small Allied force - American, Australian, British and Dutch. Thrown together by circumstance; cut off from reinforcements or in many cases retreat; operating with old, obsolete equipment and dwindling supplies, there was little hope of victory. Indeed, the month-long Java Sea Campaign, as it subsequently became known, quickly evolved from a traditional test of arms into a test of character. In the face of a relentless enemy and outnumbered, outgunned and alone, they defiantly held on, attempting to buy weeks, days, even hours until a better line of defense - and offense - could be established. These were the men of the US Asiatic Feet, the British Far Eastern Fleet, the Royal Netherlands Navy's East Indies Squadron and the Royal Australian Navy. And their supporting units like Patrol Wing Ten, the Royal Netherlands Naval Air Service, the US Army Air Force's 17th Pursuit Squadron and submarines of all these fine nations. A campaign that has been too often either ignored by historians or criticised for poor command decisions, this is the story of the sailors and the airmen at the sharp end, and how they fought and endured the first months of the War in the Pacific., Following the attack on Pearl Harbor, the Japanese offensive in the Far East seemed unstoppable. Allied forces engaged in a futile attempt to halt their rapid advance, culminating in the massed fleet of American, British, Dutch, and Australian forces (ABDA) clashing with the Japanese at the battle of the Java Sea - the first major sea battle of World War II in the Pacific. But, in a campaign crippled by poor leadership and disastrous decisions, the Allied response was catastrophic, losing their largest warships and their tenuous toe-hold in the south Pacific within the first 72 hours of the battle. This defeat left ground troops cut off from reinforcement and supply, with obsolete equipment, no defense against endless Japanese air attacks, and with no chance of retreat. However, although command decisions were to condemn the Allies to defeat, the Allied goal was never an outright victory, simply a delaying action. Facing a relentless and thoroughly vicious enemy, the combined forces responded not by running or surrendering, but by defiantly holding on in a struggle that was as much a test of character, bravery, and determination as it was a test of arms, ultimately costing the Allies ten vessels and the lives of 2,100 brave sailors. In Rising Sun, Falling Skies, Jeffrey Cox examines the events and evidence surrounding the Java Sea Campaign, reconstructing battles that in hindsight were all but hopeless and revealing where fatal mistakes and missed opportunities condemned the Allied forces in an insightful and compelling study of the largely overlooked clash in the Java Sea.
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- 26 Dec, 2023
Worth the Time to Read It.
If one is interested in the beginning of the movement towards the end of the war, this book about the battle of Guadalcanal and the surrounding seas, this is a book to read. It details how the admirals of the transport fleet and carrier task forces left the Marines high and dry without most of their food and equipment and how the Cactus Air Force made do with dribbles of equipment and how they pieced together different planes to make one fly. It delves into how both Marine and Navy pilots learned to fight the Japanese pilots with better aircraft than we had. I didn't realize it, but I had read this previously, but it is worth reading a second time.Verified purchase: YesCondition: Pre-owned
