Ships
- IJN Hamakaze Captain from 30 June 1941
- IJN Teruzuki Captain from 31 August 1942
Commander Tsuneo Orita, a graduate of the 49th class of the Imperial Japanese Naval Academy, spent the Pacific War in command of new destroyers. He commissioned Hamakaze in 1941 and Teruzuki in 1942, and he was still her captain when American patrol boats sank Teruzuki off Guadalcanal.
He joined Hamakaze before she was finished. From 28 November 1940 he was her fitting-out officer at the Uraga Dock Company. The ship completed on 30 June 1941, and that day he became her first captain. Hamakaze was a Kagero-class fleet destroyer, the thirteenth of the type and the second ship to carry the name. She entered Destroyer Division 17 with Urakaze, Isokaze, and Tanikaze.
The division screened the carriers of the First Air Fleet. Under Orita, Hamakaze was with that force for the attack on Pearl Harbor in December 1941 and for the carrier raids that followed, including the operation in the Indian Ocean in the spring of 1942. At Midway in June 1942 she picked up survivors from the carrier Soryu after dive bombers left that ship burning. On 20 July 1942 he turned Hamakaze over to Hiroshi Uwai. Command of Hamakaze later passed to Kazue Maekawa.
The Navy sent him straight to Nagasaki. On 20 July 1942 he became fitting-out officer of Teruzuki at the Mitsubishi yard. She was the second Akizuki-class destroyer, launched the previous November and armed with eight 100-millimeter dual-purpose guns for work with the carriers. Teruzuki completed on 31 August 1942, was registered at the Sasebo Naval District, and received Orita as captain the same day. He took her to Sasebo, then on to Yokosuka, arriving on 8 September. The last yard work ended on 30 September. On 7 October she joined Destroyer Division 61, beside Akizuki, in Destroyer Squadron 10 of the Third Fleet, and on 10 October she sailed from Yokosuka for Truk and the Solomons.
Her first battle came on 26 October 1942, off the Santa Cruz Islands, when she screened Vice Admiral Chuichi Nagumo's carriers. A near miss killed several of her men. She stayed with the damaged carrier Zuiho and entered Truk with her on 29 October, where Orita put the destroyer alongside a repair ship. On the night of 12–13 November, off Guadalcanal, Teruzuki fought American destroyers at close range and kept her searchlight dark. One of her torpedoes tore the stern off the destroyer Laffey. Other Japanese ships were firing into the same melee, and Laffey was lost under that combined gunfire and torpedo attack. Teruzuki came through the night nearly intact.
By early December she wore the flag of Rear Admiral Raizo Tanaka on the night supply runs to Guadalcanal. Orita commanded the ship, and Tanaka directed the operation from her bridge. In the early hours of 12 December 1942, off Cape Esperance, she was moving slowly when the American patrol boats PT-37 and PT-40 attacked. Torpedo hits aft killed nine men, started fires, and left her without power. The blast threw Tanaka to the deck. Orita judged the destroyer beyond saving and ordered the sea cocks opened so the hull would flood. The destroyer Arashi came up to the bow and took off a large part of the crew. Orita and the men still aboard got away in the boats and landed at Kamimbo, where Japanese troops were holding on. Submarines later carried that party off the island. Teruzuki sank that morning. On 15 January 1943 the Navy relieved Orita of command and ordered him to stand by at the Yokosuka Naval District. The ship was struck from the register later that month.