Japanese sink Soviet submarine L-16 off Washington, October 1942

In 1942, the Soviet Union decided to reinforce the Northern Fleet with submarines stationed in the Pacific as it was neutral in the war with Japan. Submarines L-15 and L-16 were dispatched from Vladivostok on September 24th with orders to transit the Panama Canal and link up with the Northern Fleet. Onboard L-16 was US Navy Chief Photographer's Mate Sergei Andreevich Mihailoff of Arcadia, California to act as an interpreter. After refueling at Dutch Harbour, the two submarines cruised down the coast when on October 11th, about 800 miles of the coast of Washington they crossed into the sights of the Japanese submarine I-25, which had just conducted the famous Lookout air raids. I-25, mistaking L-16 for an American submarine, fired a torpedo which sank L-16 with all hands.

This incident doesn't seem well documented despite it's significance and doesn't seem to have provoked any tensions between Japan and the USSR, who were not at war. Why is that so? Were the Soviets, considering their precarious situation on the Eastern Front, eager to avoid further escalation with the Japanese?

 

I recall reading about this, and that the Russians thought it was an internal explosion. It wasn't until after the war that we found out it was a Japanese I-boat that did it.

 

Well, no,

the Russians did not think it was an internal explosion(although I-25 fired her one remaining torpedo and two distinct explosions were reported). The signalman aboard L-15 reported seeing a periscope and L-15's gun crew were called to action and fired a few rounds. The signalman also thought the periscope resembled that of S-31(which the Russian submarines had berthed near when in Dutch Harbor). This led the Russian crew of L-15 to suspect it was an American submarine that did the deed.

The US Navy did indeed suspect that it was I-25(although they did not know the I-Boat's designation at the time) and this is laid out in the USN Memo regarding the sinking of L-16.

Note - I-25 was the submarine that torpedoed the CAMDEN and DOHENY.
A reproduction of the memo in full
Researcher@Large - The Death of Chief Photographer Sergei Mihailoff, USNR and the Soviet submarine L16


While the incident is relatively unknown, it is well documented. It's significance is minimal, a drop in the proverbial bucket of WW2. Not to mention that the Soviets did suffer their own losses to US submarines.
https://www.norpacwar.com/friendly-fire
http://lend-lease.airforce.ru/english/articles/paperno/index.htm

Why was no issue made? There was, simply, there was no proof that the Japanese did it - indeed the Americans were initially suspected. Further, what good would it have done? The Russian were relying heavily on the Pacific Route to deliver Lend-Lease from the Americans, and this required the good will of the Japanese to reach the final destination of Vladivostok. Had the Russians decided to make an issue of L-15, the Japanese could have easily have shut down the flow of Lend-Lease to Vladivostok, forcing the Russians to divert the flow of goods to other ports that were less well equipped to handle the large flow of supplies, backing up the whole works and restricting the flow of Lend-Lease. Declaring war on the Japanese would also force a diversion of effort from the Germans, which is something the Russians took great pains to avoid.

 

I stand corrected. Thanks.

 

For later purposes the soviets had their US POW`s in case to use.In case they.found it firty for them they haf their hostages.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/arch...-crisis/54578871-6dfc-4d97-8736-04b91398af44/

 

Detailed in this 1994 Rand report.
https://www.rand.org/content/dam/rand/pubs/monograph_reports/2006/MR351.2.pdf

 

In the RAND report there is it 716 to start wirh, of those released down to 220 stayed./were imprisoned yet.This was released by the Yeltsin report info in 1992 abous ww2 prisonbers.