On 7/21/2015 3:10 PM, Richard Aiken wrote:
> Never mind that the actual wartime missions mostly involved motoring
> quietly to a spot where previous experience showed Japanese supply
> boats were liable to be encountered, waiting with lights off and
> motors idling for these heavily-laden slow-moving targets to put in an
> appearance, drifting quietly into torpedo range THEN launching and
> immediately hitting the gas, leaving at flank speed under heavy smoke
> while earnestly praying that no searchlights found them . . .
>

Not exactly.  Many missions were patrol missions around disputed islands
and hunting Japanese landing craft and lighters which were then shot
up...or, landing shore parties to collect intelligence and then backing
off for a couple hours before moving in to recover the shore parties.
My father had a lot of stories about his years commanding a PT boat in
the South Pacific and one thing he impressed on me was that each time
they went out it was rarely boring or a "sit and drift" mission.
Torpedoes became so rarely used that they removed two of the four for
better performance and replaced them with more machine guns.

--
Kurt Feltenberger
xxxxxx@thepaw.org/xxxxxx@yahoo.com
“Before today, I was scared to live, after today, I'm scared I'm not
living enough." - Me