Battle of Rennell Island

Part of the Guadalcanal Campaign of the Pacific Theater of World War II

USS Chicago low in the water on the morning of 30 January 1943, from torpedo damage inflicted the night before.

Date	29–30 January 1943
Location	Rennell Island, Solomon Islands, Pacific Ocean
Result	Japanese successfully forced US Navy withdrawal, protecting the Japanese evacuation of Guadalcanal.

Belligerents

United States

Japan

Commanders and leaders

William Halsey, Jr.
Robert C. Giffen

Isoroku Yamamoto
Jinichi Kusaka

Strength

1 aircraft carrier
2 escort carriers
6 cruisers
8 destroyers
14 fighters

43 bombers

Casualties and losses

1 cruiser sunk
1 destroyer damaged
85 killed

12 bombers destroyed
60–84 killed

The Battle of Rennell Island (Japanese: レンネル島沖海戦) took place on 29–30 January 1943. It was the last major naval engagement between the United States Navy and the Imperial Japanese Navy during the Guadalcanal campaign of World War II. It occurred in the South Pacific between Rennell Island and Guadalcanal in the southern Solomon Islands.

In the battle, Japanese naval land-based torpedo bombers, seeking to provide protection for the impending evacuation of Japanese forces from Guadalcanal, made several attacks over two days on US warships operating as a task force south of this island. In addition to approaching Guadalcanal with the objective of engaging any Japanese ships that might come into range, the U.S. task force was protecting an Allied transport ship convoy carrying replacement troops there.

As a result of the Japanese air attacks on the task force, one U.S. heavy cruiser was sunk, a destroyer was heavily damaged, and the rest of the U.S. task force was forced to retreat from the southern Solomons area. Partly because they turned back the U.S. task force in this battle, the Japanese successfully evacuated their remaining troops from Guadalcanal by 7 February 1943, leaving it in the hands of the Allies and ending the battle for the island.

On 7 August 1942, Allied forces (primarily U.S.) landed on Guadalcanal, Tulagi, and Florida Islands in the Solomon Islands. The landings on the islands were meant to deny their use by the Japanese as bases for threatening the supply routes between the U.S. and Australia, and to secure the islands as starting points for a campaign with the eventual goal of isolating the major Japanese base at Rabaul while also supporting the Allied New Guinea campaign. The landings initiated the six-month-long Guadalcanal campaign.

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