Six Oilers: The Epic History of Founding the Supply Line Between America and Australia in 1942
Professor Sal Mercogliano will be our guest speaker for April. He is currently researching the history of early World War Two fuel distribution across the Pacific to Australia to support the allied navies, in particular the fast carriers.
The Japanese strike across the Pacific in 1941, from Pearl Harbor, to Hong Kong, to Singapore, highlighted the fight and need for resources, in particular oil. The Allied fleets found their traditional bases attacked, neutralized and threatened and had to establish new supply lines and methods to maintain them. At the same time, naval units had to sail longer distances and strike in areas far beyond their normal steaming range. In early 1942, the US Navy utilized six converted commercial tankers, a half dozen older oilers, and a fleet of commercial tankers to connect Hawaii, America and Australia and establish a base from which attacks against Japanese possessions and pivot toward the offensive. That trans-Pacific sea lane provides lessons for any future peer-to-peer conflict in the Pacific.
Salvatore Mercogliano is the Chair of the Department of History, Criminal Justice and Political Science at Campbell University in Buies Creek, North Carolina, US. He is a former merchant mariner and his area of research is the role of the merchant mariner in national defense. He hosts the What’s Going on With Shipping channel on YouTube, and can be found on Twitter as @mercoglianos.
