Unsuccessful Attack

TUE 28 DEC 1943
Pacific
Amphibious Training Base, Kamaole, Maui, T.H., is established.

Submarine Muskallunge (SS-262) unsuccessfully attacks Japanese convoy at 08°50'N, 147°20'E.

Navy PV-1 attacks Japanese net tender Katsura Maru off Kwajalein.

USAAF B-25s and P-40s sink Japanese merchant cargo vessels Heizan Maru, Unyo Maru and Koka Maru in Yangtze River, 30°40'N, 117°30'E.

Indian Ocean
U.S. freighter Robert F. Hoke en route from Abadan, Iran, to Mombasa, Kenya, is torpedoed by Japanese submarine I-26 at 20°05'N, 59°58'E, and abandoned by all but the 27-man Armed Guard, who remain at their guns and fire upon the I-boat's periscope to keep the enemy down. I-26 abandons any further attacks and retires while Robert F. Hoke remains afloat. The crew reboards the ship but is not able to get the ship underway and she is abandoned a second time. An RAF crash boat rescues all hands (41 merchant sailors and the Armed Guard) and the abandoned freighter is later towed to Aden by British rescue tug HMS Masterful. Robert F. Hoke is later towed to Suez but never returns to active service and is written off as a total loss.

Indian Navy minesweeper RINS Rajputana rescues the survivors of U.S. freighter Jose Navarro, torpedoed and sunk by German submarine U-178 the day before, and transports them to Cochin.

Atlantic
PB4Y (VB 105) on patrol over Bay of Biscay sights five German destroyers and six torpedo boats returning from attempt to rendezvous with blockade runner Alsterfurer, sunk the day before by an RAF No. 311 (Czech) Squadron Liberator. Of 15 PB4Ys dispatched as a strike force, six (five from VB 105 and one from VB 103) contact the enemy force and attack it. Contact reports by Navy planes, meanwhile, draw British light cruisers HMS Glasgow and HMS Enterprise to the scene, resulting in the sinking of German destroyers Z 27 and torpedo boats T 25 and T 26, the survivors of which are rescued by the British ships, an Irish steamer, and four Spanish destroyers.