Pacific ships

IJN · Lieutenant Commander

Iwabuchi, Goro

All captains
GI

Ships

Goro Iwabuchi was an officer of the Imperial Japanese Navy who served as a lieutenant commander in the Pacific War. In the autumn of 1943 he received two destroyer commands in quick succession, and he was captain of each ship on the day she was lost.

On 15 October 1943, then a lieutenant, he became captain of Mochizuki. She was a Mutsuki-class destroyer, completed at Uraga on 31 October 1927 as Destroyer No. 33 and renamed on 1 August 1928. The name means full moon. Before he joined her, the ship had screened operations in the war in China, taken part in the Wake Island landings of December 1941, and carried troops through the Solomon Islands. Ryokichi Sugama commanded her from December 1938 until October 1940, and Saburo Terauchi took her on 15 October 1940.

Iwabuchi was in command of Mochizuki when she was lost on 24 October 1943, nine days after he assumed command. She was landing troops at Jacquinot Bay, on the south coast of New Britain, when American aircraft bombed her. She sank about ninety miles south-southwest of Rabaul, and about ten of her crew were killed. Iwabuchi and the other survivors were taken off by the destroyer Uzuki. Mochizuki was removed from the Navy List on 5 January 1944.

After the sinking he was posted to a naval landing force. On 5 November 1943, now a lieutenant commander, he was appointed captain of Yunagi in place of a commanding officer who had fallen ill. Yunagi was a Kamikaze-class destroyer whose name means evening calm. She had been completed at Sasebo on 24 May 1925 as Destroyer No. 17 and renamed on 1 August 1928. He joined her at Rabaul on a day when American carrier aircraft were striking the harbor, and the ship was still committed to the short transport runs out of that base. Masao Yamashita had commanded her from September 1940 to April 1942, Seiichi Okada from April 1942 to May 1943, and Masanori Kashima from May 1943 until 20 October 1943.

He remained captain of Yunagi into the convoy work of 1944. On 10 August 1944 she left Moji escorting convoy HI-71 toward Manila by way of Mako, and she was sent into Takao with the damaged transport Eiyo Maru. On 21 August she sailed from Takao with another convoy bound for Manila. On 25 August, about twenty miles north-northeast of Cape Bojeador on the north coast of Luzon, the American submarine Picuda torpedoed her. Yunagi sank near 18°46′N, 120°46′E, with 32 men killed and 19 wounded. Iwabuchi was among the survivors rescued by escort vessel No. 35. His appointment as captain ran until 1 September 1944, and the ship was struck from the Navy List on 6 October 1944.