Ships
- IJN Nachi Captain from 20 August 1944 · In command when she was lost, 5 November 1944
Enpei Kanooka was born on 11 April 1901 in Fukushima Prefecture, the fourth son of the physician Kanji Kanooka. He passed through the old-system Ishikawa Middle School and entered the Imperial Naval Academy at Etajima. He graduated in July 1921 with the 49th class, fifth of 172 in the class order, and the Navy commissioned him an ensign in May 1922.
His first specialty was torpedoes. He finished the advanced course at the Torpedo School at the head of his class, served as a division officer in the heavy cruiser Kako, and then spent a tour in the United States attached to Yale University. Back at sea he was navigator of the destroyer Yugiri, torpedo officer of the destroyer Yunagi, and a division officer in the heavy cruiser Haguro. In July 1934 he completed the Naval War College A course with the 32nd class, again standing first.
Staff duty filled the years after that. He served with the Naval General Staff, commanded the gunboat Saga, joined the staff of the 2nd Base Force, and worked in the First Section of the Naval Affairs Bureau at the Navy Ministry. From that office he became naval aide to Prime Minister Hideki Tojo. The Tojo cabinet resigned in July 1944, and in August the Navy sent Kanooka back to sea.
On 20 August 1944, while the ship lay at Kure Naval Arsenal, he took command of the heavy cruiser Nachi as captain. He relieved Shiro Shibuya. Earlier in the Pacific War the same cruiser had been commanded by Takahiko Kiyota and then by Akira Sone. Nachi, second ship of the Myoko class, had spent much of the war as flagship of the Fifth Fleet in northern waters. At Kure she received additional 25-millimeter anti-aircraft guns in September and a Type 13 air-search radar in mid-October. On 14 October she sailed as flagship of Vice Admiral Kiyohide Shima, commanding the Second Striking Force, with the heavy cruiser Ashigara, the light cruiser Abukuma, and destroyers of the 1st Destroyer Squadron.
The first orders sent the force east of Taiwan, after Japanese air reports claimed heavy losses among the American fast carriers. Those claims failed, and the ships were turned south. Nachi called at Amami Oshima and entered Mako, in the Pescadores, on 20 October. From there Shima took her into the Battle of Leyte Gulf. In the early hours of 25 October the Second Striking Force entered Surigao Strait behind a column the American Seventh Fleet had already broken up. In the dark Nachi collided with the heavy cruiser Mogami and was damaged along the port side. She withdrew to Manila, arriving on 27 October for emergency repair. On 29 October a bomb in an air raid set off torpedoes on board and killed dozens of men. Yard work had her afloat again by 2 November, with sailing set for 6 November.
On the morning of 5 November Shima went ashore in Manila for a conference. Carrier aircraft of Task Force 38 then struck the bay. Nachi got under way and was caught off Corregidor by planes from Lexington and Ticonderoga. Bombs and torpedoes stopped her around 1250 hours, and the destroyer Akebono closed to assist. A further strike shortly before 1500 broke the cruiser into three parts. She sank near 14 degrees 31 minutes north, 120 degrees 44 minutes east, and Captain Kanooka went down with her. Of about 1,027 officers and men, 807 were killed and 220 survived. Officers of Shima’s staff died in the ship. From the Manila waterfront, Shima watched the flagship destroyed. The Navy struck Nachi from the list on 20 January 1945.
Kanooka was forty-three. The Navy promoted him after death to rear admiral. In Tokyo it was later said that Tojo, on hearing of the loss, gave the name Nachi to a dog kept at his house. The following spring, divers from the American salvage ship Chanticleer worked the wreck in Manila Bay and brought up radar equipment and documents from the hull.