Twelve Zeros of the 4th Ku. were escorting eight bombers in a raid on Horn Island on March 14 when they encountered seven Curtiss P-40E Warhawks of the 7th Squadron, 49th Pursuit Group, U.S. Army Air Forces (USAAF), led by Captain Robert L. Morissey. In the fight that ensued, three pilots of the 4th Ku., including Nishizawa, claimed six P-40s, along with two probables, while their opponents claimed five Zeros. In actuality, the Japanese lost two fighters and their pilots (Lt. j.g. Nobuhiro Iwasaki and PO1C Genkichi Oishi), while the Americans lost one P-40 whose pilot, 2nd Lt. Clarence Sandford, bailed out over Bremer Island.

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The Japanese did not encourage the tallying of individual scores, being more inclined toward honoring a team effort by units. As with the French and Italians, Japanese victories were officially counted for the air group, not for individuals. Generally, attempts to verify personal claims by Japanese airmen can only be conducted from postwar examinations of their letters and diaries, or those of their comrades.

Nishizawa’s next claim was a Supermarine Spitfire over Port Moresby on March 24. He was also one of five Japanese pilots who participated in shooting down three alleged Spitfires claimed over the same location on March 28. It may safely be said, however, that the Japanese had misidentified their opponents, since there were no Spitfires in Australia at that time.

Meanwhile, on March 8, Japanese forces had landed in northeastern New Guinea and captured Lae and Salamaua. Then, on April 1, the JNAF underwent a reorganization, during which the 4th Ku. became exclusively a bombing unit, and its fighter chutai–including Nishizawa–was incorporated into the Tainan Ku., under the command of Captain Masahisa Saito. The unit operated from the jungle airstrip at Lae, where the living conditions were miserable. “The worst airfield I had ever seen, not excluding Rabaul or even the advanced fields in China,” said Tainan Ku. member PO1C Saburo Sakai. But his wingman, PO3C Toshiaki Honda, gleefully described Lae as “the best hunting grounds on the earth.” Honda was referring to Port Moresby, an Allied hornet’s nest lying just 180 miles away. There, RAAF P-40s were being bolstered by the Bell P-39 Airacobras of the 8th Pursuit Group, USAAF.

A flight of Tainan Ku. Zeros, led by Lt. j.g. Junichi Sasai, patrolled the Coral Sea and was making its return pass over Port Moresby on April 11 when the Japanese sighted a quartet of Airacobras. Sakai, covered by his two wingmen, PO3C Honda and Seaman 1st Class Keisaku Yonekawa, dove on the two rearmost P-39s and promptly shot down both.

“I brought the Zero out of its skid and swung up in a tight turn,” Sakai wrote, “prepared to come out directly behind the two head fighters. The battle was already over! Both P-39s were plunging crazily toward the earth, trailing bright flames and thick smoke….I recognized one of the Zeros still pulling out of its diving pass, Hiroyoshi Nishizawa, a rookie pilot at the controls. The second Zero, which had made a kill with a single firing pass, piloted by Toshio Ota, hauled around in a steep pullout to rejoin the formation.”

From that time on, Nishizawa and the 22-year-old PO1C Ota stood out among the veteran airmen of the Tainan Ku., later ranking alongside Sakai as the leading aces of the group. “Often we flew together,” wrote Sakai, “and were known to the other pilots as the ‘cleanup trio.’” Ota shared Nishizawa’s mastery of the Zero’s controls, but his personality could not have been more different; he was outgoing, jocular and amiable. Sakai thought Ota would have been “more at home, I am sure, in a nightclub than in the forsaken loneliness of Lae.”

For the next several weeks, the Tainan Ku. had its share of successes, but opportunities seemed to elude Nishizawa. On April 23, he, Sakai and Ota shot up Kairuku airfield north of Port Moresby, and on April 29, Nishizawa was one of six Zero pilots who celebrated Emperor Hirohito’s birthday by strafing Port Moresby Field itself. On neither occasion, however, did the Japanese encounter aerial opposition. Then, on May 1, eight Zeros were heading for Port Moresby when they encountered 13 P-39s and P-40s flying along slowly at 18,000 feet. Nishizawa, as usual, spotted them first and swung around in a wide turn to attack the enemy planes from the left and rear. His seven comrades were not far behind, and they took the Americans completely by surprise, shooting down eight before the survivors dove away.

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