Ships
- IJN Ushio Captain from 20 January 1943 · Relieved on 3 July 1943
- IJN Nowaki Captain from 3 July 1943
Commander Takeo Kanda commanded destroyers of the Imperial Japanese Navy in 1943. Before he was appointed to Ushio, he had served as personal aide to Prince Takamatsu Nobuhito, the Emperor's brother, who was then a captain in the Navy.
On 20 January 1943 Kanda became captain of Ushio, a Fubuki-class destroyer completed in 1931 and long associated with Destroyer Division 7. The ship was already a veteran of the war's first weeks, including the bombardment of Midway in December 1941. He remained her captain until 3 July 1943.
That day he moved to the Kagero-class destroyer Nowaki, and Masami Araki, who had held Nowaki through the preceding weeks, went to Ushio. Nowaki was at Yokosuka, closing out a long repair after heavy damage. The yard period also gave her search radar and more antiaircraft guns. The work ended on 25 July, and she left Yokosuka on 29 July.
Her first passage under Kanda carried her out to the Combined Fleet. On 31 July she sailed with the battleship Musashi, wearing the flag of Admiral Mineichi Koga, the heavy cruisers Myoko and Haguro, the carrier Unyo, the light cruiser Nagara, and the destroyers Akebono, Hatsukaze, and Shiratsuyu. The formation reached Truk on 5 August 1943. Nowaki belonged to Destroyer Division 4. In those same days Arashi and Hagikaze of that division were lost at the Battle of Vella Gulf, while Nowaki was on the passage to the fleet anchorage. Kanda kept her with the Combined Fleet at Truk through the rest of his command.
He left Nowaki on 25 December 1943, and Setsuji Moriya succeeded him. Moriya was still in command on 26 October 1944, when American cruisers and destroyers sank Nowaki south-southeast of Legaspi, Luzon, after she had taken men off the heavy cruiser Chikuma during the Battle off Samar. The men aboard were lost with the ship. Her first captain had been Mogotaro Koga, who had her from commissioning on 28 April 1941 until 10 April 1943. Kanda's months in her covered the last of the Yokosuka refit and her return to the fleet at Truk.