Ships
- IJN Asanagi Captain for the second landing at Wake, 23 December 1941 · Relieved on 10 October 1942
- IJN Akebono Captain from 20 October 1942
Kouhei Hanami was a lieutenant commander in the Imperial Japanese Navy whose wartime commands were the destroyers Asanagi and Akebono. He took Asanagi into the opening weeks of the Pacific War and, the following autumn, shifted to Akebono.
On 23 December 1941 he was captain of Asanagi for the second landing at Wake. That assault followed the failed first attempt earlier in the month. Japanese forces went ashore and took the atoll, and Asanagi was among the destroyers supporting the operation. Hanami remained in command of the ship through the first year of the wider war.
He was relieved of Asanagi on 10 October 1942. Ten days later, on 20 October 1942, he became captain of Akebono. Both ships were destroyers of the same generation, and the move kept him in command of a fleet destroyer at a time when those ships were being used hard for escort, transport, and night actions in the Solomon Islands.
Among officers associated with the same ships and the same stretch of the war were Minoru Nakagawa, Ietaka Inuzuka, and Shiro Yoda. Their paths crossed the destroyer service in which Hanami spent these commands.
The record of his time afloat in this period is the succession of those two captaincies: Asanagi through the second Wake landing and until 10 October 1942, then Akebono from 20 October 1942. He is identified here as Lieutenant Commander Kouhei Hanami.