To All,
I hope you all had a great and happy Thanksgiving with your families.
Regards,
Skip
This day in Naval History
Nov. 27
1941—Chief of Naval Operations Adm. Harold R. Stark sends "war warning" to Commander in Chief, Pacific Fleet, Adm. Husband E. Kimmell, and Commander in Chief, Atlantic Fleet, Adm. Ernest J. King.
BUT,,,,,,,,,On Nov. 26, 1941, under the greatest secrecy, the Japanese armada—commanded by Vice Adm. Chuichi Nagumo—left Japan to attack the U.S. Navy at Pearl Harbor. The armada included all six of Japan's first-line aircraft carriers—Akagi, Kaga, Soryu, Hiryu, Shokaku, and Zuikaku. With more than 420 embarked planes, the ships were by far the most powerful carrier task force ever assembled. In addition to the carriers, the Pearl Harbor striking force included fast battleships, cruisers, and destroyers, with tankers to fuel the ships during the passage across the Pacific. An advance expeditionary force of large submarines, five of them carrying midget submarines, was sent to scout around Hawaii. Their mission was to dispatch the midgets into Pearl Harbor to attack ships there and torpedo American warships that might escape to sea.
The first 4 carriers were sunk at the Battle of Midway 7 months later
1942—By orders of French Vice Adm. Jean de Borde, the French fleet is scuttled in Toulon, France to prevent the ships being used by the Germans.
1943—USS Callaghan (DD 792) is commissioned. Named in honor of Medal of Honor recipient Rear Adm. Daniel J. Callaghan, who was killed during the Naval Battle of Guadalcanal November 1942, she serves in the Pacific until she is sunk by a Japanese kamikaze July 28, 1945.
1943—USS Bowfin (SS 287) sinks the Vichy French cargo ship Van Vollenhoven off the coast of French Indochina while USS Seahorse (SS 304) sinks the Japanese fleet tanker San Ramon Maru in the East China Sea.
1944—Japanese kamikazes sink the submarine chaser SC 744 and damage USS Colorado (BB 45), USS St. Louis (CL 49) and USS Montpelier (CL 57). All the light cruisers are repaired and return to combat duty for the remainder of World War II.
Thanks to CHINFO
No CHINFO FOR TODAY
Today in History
November 27 | ||
43 BC | Octavian, Antony and Lepidus form the triumvirate of Rome. | |
511 | Clovis, king of the Franks, dies and his kingdom is divided between his four sons. | |
1095 | In Clermont, France, Pope Urbana II makes an appeal for warriors to relieve Jerusalem. He is responding to false rumors of atrocities in the Holy Land. | |
1382 | The French nobility, led by Olivier de Clisson, crush the Flemish rebels at Flanders. | |
1812 | One of the two bridges being used by Napoleon Bonaparte's army across the Beresina River in Russia collapses during a Russian artillery barrage. | |
1826 | Jebediah Smith's expedition reaches San Diego, becoming the first Americans to cross the southwestern part of the continent. | |
1862 | George Armstrong Custer meets his future bride, Elizabeth Bacon, at a Thanksgiving party. | |
1868 | Lieutenant Colonel George A. Custer's 7th Cavalry kills Chief Black Kettle and about 100 Cheyenne (mostly women and children) on the Washita River. | |
1887 | U.S. Deputy Marshall Frank Dalton, brother of the three famous outlaws, is killed in the line of duty near Fort Smith, Ark. | |
1904 | The German colonial army defeats Hottentots at Warm bad in southwest Africa. | |
1909 | U.S. troops land in Blue fields, Nicaragua, to protect American interests there. | |
1919 | Bulgaria signs peace treaty with Allies at Unequally, France, fixing war reparations and recognizing Yugoslavian independence. | |
1922 | Allied delegates bar the Soviets from the Near East peace conference. | |
1936 | Great Britain's Anthony Eden warns Hitler that Britain will fight to protect Belgium. | |
1942 | The French fleet in Toulon is scuttled to keep it from Germany. | |
1950 | East of the Choosing River, Chinese forces annihilate an American task force. | |
1954 | Alger Hiss, convicted of being a Soviet spy, is freed after 44 months in prison. | |
1959 | Demonstrators march in Tokyo to protest a defense treaty with the United States. | |
1967 | Lyndon Johnson appoints Robert McNamara to presidency of the World Bank. | |
1967 | Charles DeGaulle vetoes Great Britain's entry into the Common Market again. | |
1970 | Syria joins the pact linking Libya, Egypt and Sudan. | |
1973 | US Senate votes to confirm Gerald Ford as President of the United States, following President Richard Nixon's resignation; the House will confirm Ford on Dec. 6. | |
1978 | San Francisco mayor George Moscone and Harvey Milk, the city's first openly gay supervisor, assassinated by former city supervisor Dan White. | |
1978 | Kurdistan Workers' Party (Parti Karkerani Kurdistan, or PKK) founded; militant group that fought an armed struggle for an independent Kurdistan. | |
1984 | Britain and Spain sign the Brussels Agreement to enter discussions over the status of Gibraltar. | |
1999 | Helen Clark becomes first elected female Prime Minister of New Zealand. | |
2001 | Hubble Space Telescope discovers a hydrogen atmosphere on planet Osiris, the first atmosphere detected on an extrasolar planet. | |
2004 | Pope John Paul II returns relics of Saint John Chrysostom to the Eastern Orthodox Church. | |
2005 | First partial human face transplant completed Amiens, France. | |
2006 | Canadian House of Commons approves a motion, tabled by Prime Minister Stephen Harper, recognizing the Quebecois as a nation within Canada. | |
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This Day in U S Military History for 27 November
1826 – Jedediah Smith's expedition reached San Diego, becoming the first Americans to cross the south-western part of the continent. He crossed the Mohave Desert and the San Bernadino Mountains from Utah. In 1826 at the Cache Valley summer rendezvous, in what is now northern Utah, but at that time a part of Mexico, General William H. Ashley sold out his interests in the fur trade to Jedediah Smith, David Jackson, and William Sublette. Following the purchase, Smith and seventeen fellow trappers began the famous South West Expedition, which proved to be instumental in combating the pretensions of Mexico, Great Britain, France, and even Russia, to a vast domain, which would become (in large part) the western United States. Those eighteen men became the first Anglo-Americans to traverse the harsh Mojave Desert, before reaching California in November 1826. They had also been the first of their race to cross the high Sierra Nevada range of the Rockies and the Great Basin, the latter encompassing most of Nevada, along with parts of Utah, California, Oregon, and Idaho. In the process the expedition disproved the existence of a river, which it had been thought could be found, with an unobstructed flow from the Rocky Mountains to the Pacific Ocean near San Francisco.
1909 – U.S. troops land in Bluefields, Nicaragua, to protect American interests there. In October, 1909, there was an anti-Zelaya rebellion in Bluefields, a foreign and Conservative stronghold. The rebels supported the local governor, Juan Estrada. The rebellion "at least" had the sympathy of the US mining company and probably its connivance. When the Zelaya forces caught and executed two US citizens (professional dynamiters who worked for the company) for being in the rebellion, Taft broke relations with Zelaya and sent Marines to Bluefields. Zelaya was forced out and, in August, 1910, Estrada became the provisional president.
Medal of Honor Citations for Actions Taken This Day
GOETTEL, PHILIP
Rank and organization: Private, Company B, 149th New York Infantry. Place and date: At Ringgold, Ga., 27 November 1863. Entered service at: Syracuse, N.Y. Birth: Syracuse, N.Y. Date of issue: 28 June 1865. Citation: Capture of flag and battery guidon.
PACKARD, LORON F.
Rank and organization: Private, Company E, 5th New York Cavalry. Place and date: At Raccoon Ford, Va., 27 November 1863. Entered service at. Cuba, N.Y. Birth. Cattaraugus County, N.Y. Date of issue. 20 August 1894. Citation. After his command had retreated, this soldier, voluntarily and alone, returned to the assistance of a comrade and rescued him from the hands of 3 armed Confederates.
SCHEIBNER, MARTIN E.
Rank and organization: Private, Company G, 90th Pennsylvania Infantry. Place and date: At Mine Run, Va., 27 November 1863. Entered service at: Berks County, Pa. Born: 13 October 1840, Russia. Date of issue: 23 June 1896. Citation: Voluntarily extinguished the burning fuse of a shell which had been thrown into the lines of the regiment by the enemy.
THOMSON, CLIFFORD
Rank and organization: First Lieutenant, Company A, 1st New York Cavalry. Place and date: At Chancellorsville, Va., 2 May 1863. Entered service at: New York, N.Y. Birth:——. Date of issue: 27 November 1896. Citation: Volunteered to ascertain the character of approaching troops; rode up so closely as to distinguish the features of the enemy, and as he wheeled to return they opened fire with musketry, the Union troops returning same. Under a terrific fire from both sides Lieutenant Thomson rode back unhurt to the Federal lines, averting a disaster to the Army by his heroic act.
GARCIA, MARCARIO
Rank and organization: Staff Sergeant, U.S. Army, Company B, 22d Infantry, 4th Infantry Division. Place and date: Near Grosshau, Germany, 27 November 1944. Entered service at: Sugarland, Tex. Born: 20 January 1920, Villa de Castano, Mexico. G.O. No.: 74, 1 September 1945. Citation: While an acting squad leader of Company B, 22d Infantry, on 27 November 1944, near Grosshau, Germany, he single-handedly assaulted 2 enemy machinegun emplacements. Attacking prepared positions on a wooded hill, which could be approached only through meager cover, his company was pinned down by intense machinegun fire and subjected to a concentrated artillery and mortar barrage. Although painfully wounded, he refused to be evacuated and on his own initiative crawled forward alone until he reached a position near an enemy emplacement. Hurling grenades, he boldly assaulted the position, destroyed the gun, and with his rifle killed 3 of the enemy who attempted to escape. When he rejoined his company, a second machinegun opened fire and again the intrepid soldier went forward, utterly disregarding his own safety. He stormed the position and destroyed the gun, killed 3 more Germans, and captured 4 prisoners. He fought on with his unit until the objective was taken and only then did he permit himself to be removed for medical care. S/Sgt. (then private) Garcia's conspicuous heroism, his inspiring, courageous conduct, and his complete disregard for his personal safety wiped out 2 enemy emplacements and enabled his company to advance and secure its objective.
*DESIDERIO, REGINALD B.
Rank and organization: Captain, U.S. Army, commanding officer, Company E, 27th Infantry Regiment, 25th Infantry Division. Place and date: Near Ipsok, Korea, 27 November 1950. Entered service at: Gilroy, Calif. Born: 12 September 1918, Clairton, Pa. G.O. No.: 58, 2 August 1951. Citation: Capt. Desiderio distinguished himself by conspicuous gallantry and intrepidity at the repeated risk of his life above and beyond the call of duty. His company was given the mission of defending the command post of a task force against an enemy breakthrough. After personal reconnaissance during darkness and under intense enemy fire, he placed his men in defensive positions to repel an attack. Early in the action he was wounded, but refused evacuation and despite enemy fire continued to move among his men checking their positions and making sure that each element was prepared to receive the next attack. Again wounded, he continued to direct his men. By his inspiring leadership he encouraged them to hold their position. In the subsequent fighting when the fanatical enemy succeeded in penetrating the position, he personally charged them with carbine, rifle, and grenades, inflicting many casualties until he himself was mortally wounded. His men, spurred on by his intrepid example, repelled this final attack. Capt. Desiderio's heroic leadership, courageous and loyal devotion to duty, and his complete disregard for personal safety reflect the highest honor on him and are in keeping with the esteemed traditions of the U.S. Army.
*FAITH, DON C., JR.
Rank and organization: Lieutenant Colonel, U.S. Army, commanding officer, 1st Battalion, 32d Infantry Regiment, 7th Infantry Division. Place and date: Vicinity Hagaru-ri, Northern Korea, 27 November to 1 December 1950. Entered service at: Washington, Ind. Born: 26 August 1918, Washington, Ind. G.O. No.: 59, 2 August 1951. Citation: Lt. Col. Faith, commanding 1st Battalion, distinguished himself conspicuously by gallantry and intrepidity in action above and beyond the call of duty in the area of the Chosin Reservoir. When the enemy launched a fanatical attack against his battalion, Lt. Col. Faith unhesitatingly exposed himself to heavy enemy fire as he moved about directing the action. When the enemy penetrated the positions, Lt. Col. Faith personally led counterattacks to restore the position. During an attack by his battalion to effect a junction with another U.S. unit, Lt. Col. Faith reconnoitered the route for, and personally directed, the first elements of his command across the ice-covered reservoir and then directed the movement of his vehicles which were loaded with wounded until all of his command had passed through the enemy fire. Having completed this he crossed the reservoir himself. Assuming command of the force his unit had joined he was given the mission of attacking to join friendly elements to the south. Lt. Col. Faith, although physically exhausted in the bitter cold, organized and launched an attack which was soon stopped by enemy fire. He ran forward under enemy small-arms and automatic weapons fire, got his men on their feet and personally led the fire attack as it blasted its way through the enemy ring. As they came to a hairpin curve, enemy fire from a roadblock again pinned the column down. Lt. Col. Faith organized a group of men and directed their attack on the enemy positions on the right flank. He then placed himself at the head of another group of men and in the face of direct enemy fire led an attack on the enemy roadblock, firing his pistol and throwing grenades. When he had reached a position approximately 30 yards from the roadblock he was mortally wounded, but continued to direct the attack until the roadblock was overrun. Throughout the 5 days of action Lt. Col. Faith gave no thought to his safety and did not spare himself. His presence each time in the position of greatest danger was an inspiration to his men. Also, the damage he personally inflicted firing from his position at the head of his men was of material assistance on several occasions. Lt. Col. Faith's outstanding gallantry and noble self-sacrifice above and beyond the call of duty reflect the highest honor on him and are in keeping with the highest traditions of the U.S. Army. (This award supersedes the prior award of the Silver Star (First Oak Leaf Cluster) as announced in G.O. No. 32, Headquarters X Corps, dated 23 February 1951, for gallantry in action on 27 November 1950.)
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AMERICAN AEROSPACE EVENTS for November 27, 2020 FIRSTS, LASTS, AND SIGNIFICANT ACCOMPLISHMENTS. THANKS TO HAROLD "PHIL" MYERS CHIEF HISTORIAN AIR FORCE INTELLIGENCE, SURVEILLANCE, AND RECONNAISSANCE AGENCY
27 November
1912: The Signal Corps accepted its first flying boat (No. 15), a Curtiss Model F with a 75-HP, Curtiss "O" engine from the Curtiss factory. As a bonus, the Corps received its first pair of water wings. (20)
1929: Through 29 November, in their effort to establish a flying endurance record, Bobbi Trout and Elinor Smith became the first women pilots to fly an aircraft and be refueled in the air. Engine trouble on the refueling aircraft brought an early end to the mission. (18)
1933: The Army accepted Martin's first production-model B-10 bomber. It was the first all-metal monoplane bomber with an internal bomb bay, retractable gear, rotating gun turret, and enclosed cockpit. It flew faster than pursuit aircraft of the day. (21)
1954: A Pan American Airways Super-Stratocruiser set a speed record for commercial planes when it flew from New York to Paris in 9 hours 42 minutes, averaging 371 MPH. (24)
1957: SECDEF Neil H. McElroy decided to place the Air Force's Thor and the Army's Jupiter into production for operational deployment by December 1958. (6) Using McDonnell RF-101 Voodoos, four pilots set various FAI records. Capt Robert M. Sweet flew his jet at 721.85 MPH to set a round-trip transcontinental record of 6 hours 46 minutes 36 seconds from Los Angeles to New York. Returning to New York, he also set an east-west record of 677.73 MPH in 3 hours 36 minutes 32.4 seconds. Capt Robert J. Kilpatrick and Lt Gustave B. Klatt both broke Sweet's West-East record by flying to New York at 765.7 MPH and 781.7 MPH. Klatt also claimed the time record of 3 hours 7 minutes 43.6 seconds. These officers broke records set by Capt Ray W. Schrecengost, Jr., who set speed marks from Los Angeles to New York at 749.95 MPH, New York to Los Angeles at 607.8 MPH, and for the roundtrip at 721.85 MPH. (9)
1962: Davis-Monthan AFB received the first Titan II ICBM. (6)
1963: NASA launched the first liquid-hydrogen-powered vehicle, the Atlas-Centaur, from Cape Canaveral into a 300- to 900-mile orbit. The empty Centaur stage, at 10,200 pounds, became the heaviest object put into orbit by a US rocket to date.
1964: SECDEF McNamara approved Project Long Life to launch three modified Minuteman I (Model B) missiles in a realistic operational environment on short-range flights from Ellsworth AFB. Each missile had sufficient fuel in the first stage for a seven-second flight, and all other stages were inert. Two of the three shots were failures. (6)
1972: The US Geological Survey completed a map of Mars--the first detailed map of another planet--from 1,500 of 7,000 photos taken by Mariner IX. It was launched on 30 May 1971.
2001: An AFFTC aircrew from Edwards AFB flew a Boeing C-17A to 13 official FAI world payload and altitude records during three sorties, giving the plane 33 world records in various categories. The C-17 carried various payloads, as much as 88,200 pounds to altitudes above 43,800 feet to set 11 records. Other records included maximum altitude in horizontal flight without a payload and greatest payload to a height of 2,000 meters. (3)
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A bit on Ted Williams from the archives. Compare this Marine to the professional players of today. They are not in the same league with him.
Thanks to Shadow
Gents…
As a kid who played a lot of baseball… Ted Williams was my idol. He was also my dad's favorite ball player. Growing up as a Navy Brat, I thought it was cool that he had been a Marine, serving both in WW II and Korea. I also heard stories and rumors that he may not have served as honorable as one would hope. Turned out, that's all they were… Rumors.
I finally had the chance to get the straight scoop on Williams from John Verdi who was a squadron and tent mate with Williams when he was in VMF-311 in Korea. John absolutely refuted any inference that Williams did not carry his load… actually quite the contrary. It was John and the others in the tent who forced the grounding of Williams because of his pneumonia. Williams refused to go to the Flight Surgeon because he knew the snipers would be out to get him and claim he was a malingerer. Instead he continued to fly long after he should have been grounded.
On the famous gear up landing… John was a witness to it and opined that anyone other than Williams probably couldn't have pulled it off… He made a perfect gear up landing at over 200 knots… no drop tanks to soften the landing.
Couple of anecdotes… John said Ted was a "World Class Bitcher"… Complained about everything… The weather, the food, The Corps, the Commies and the cold. But NOT ONCE… did he ever try to snivel out of a hop or mission, no matter how dangerous or how crappy the weather was. John said he and his squadron mates were absolutely supportive of Williams and pointed out his recall to Active Duty was nothing more than a PR stunt and political move. He pointed out that Williams was not even in the Active Reserves and had never even flown any military airplane since WW II… much less a jet, when called back on Active Duty. There were thousands of Active Reserves far more qualified. In conclusion, he said Ted was a stand up guy! They stayed in contact with each other until Ted died.
Shadow
Thanks to CVAT for this....Hal
Even if your not a baseball fan this an interesting story. Probably many Boston Red Sox and Williams fans aren't aware of this part of his history.
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When asked to name the greatest team he was ever on,
Ted Williams said, "The US Marines".
Ted Williams was John Glenn's wingman flying F-9Fs in Korea.
I didn't know this about Ted Williams.............
Ted Williams was John Glenn's wingman on F-9Fs in Korea.
The Boston Red Sox slugger, who wore No. 9 as a major leaguer, would now be assigned to an F-9 Panther jet as a pilot. Ted flew a total of 39 combat missions in Korea. He was selected by his commander John Glenn (later the astronaut, senator, and 'septuagenonaut') to fly as Glenn's wingman.
While flying an air strike on a troop encampment near Kyomipo, Williams' F-9 was hit by hostile ground fire. Ted commented later: "The funny thing was I didn't feel anything. I knew I was hit when the stick started shaking like mad in my hands. Then everything went out, my radio, my landing gear, everything. The red warning lights were on all over the plane." The F-9 Panther had a centrifugal flow engine and normally caught fire when hit. The tail would literally blow off most stricken aircraft. The standard orders were to eject from any Panther with a fire in the rear of the plane. Ted's aircraft was indeed on fire, and was trailing smoke and flames. Glenn and the other pilots on the mission were yelling over their radios for Williams to get out. However, with his radio out, Williams could not hear their warnings and he could not see the condition of the rear of his aircraft. Glenn and another Panther flown by Larry Hawkins came up alongside Williams and lead him to the nearest friendly airfield. Fighting to hold the plane together, Ted brought his Panther in at more than 200-MPH for a crash landing on the Marsden-matted strip. With no landing gear, dive brakes, or functioning flaps, the flaming Panther jet skidded down the runway for more than 3000 feet. Williams got out of the aircraft only moments before it was totally engulfed in flames. Ted Williams survived his tour of duty in Korea and returned to major league baseball.
Pssst: Ted missed out flying combat missions during WW II, because his flying and gunnery skills were so good that he was kept as an instructor for much of the War. During advanced training at Pensacola, Florida Ted would accurately shoot the sleeve targets to shreds while shooting out of wing-overs, zooms, and barrel rolls. He broke the all time record for 'hits' at the school. Following Pensacola, Ted was sent to Jacksonville for advanced gunnery training. This is the payoff test for potential combat pilots. Ted set all the records for reflexes, coordination, and visual reaction time. As a result of his stunning success he was made an instructor at Bronson field to put Marine aviation cadets through their final paces. By 1945 Ted got his wish and was finally transferred to a combat wing, but weeks later the War was over. He was discharged from the military in December of 1945. Seven years later, in December of 1952, Ted was recalled to active duty as a Marine Corps fighter pilot.
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A bit of history
The Somers Mutiny.
On Dec. 1, 1842, 175 years ago, Midshipman Philip Spencer, Boatswain's Mate Samuel Cromwell, and Seaman Elisha Small of the U.S. Navy brig Somers were executed for mutiny. The ship, commanded by Cmdr. Alexander Slidell MacKenzie, was on the passage to the West Indies when the officers noticed a steady worsening of morale. On Nov. 26, MacKenzie arrested Spencer, the son of Secretary of War Spencer, for inciting mutiny. The next day, Cromwell and Small were also put in irons. An investigation by the officers of the ship over the next few days indicated that these men were plotting to take over the ship, throw the officers and loyal members of the crew to the sharks, and then to use Somers for piracy. On Dec. 1, the officers reported that they had "come to a cool, decided, and unanimous opinion" that the prisoners were "guilty of a full and determined intention to commit a mutiny," and they recommended that the three be put to death. All three were promptly hanged. To learn more, check out the new Somers page under Notable Ships at NHHC's website.
An After-Thanksgiving Attack in "Suicide Alley," Part I.
If asked what ship sustained the most casualties during World War II, most if not all would name the battleship Arizona that was lost during the attack on Pearl Harbor on Dec. 7, 1941. But what about the ship that sustained the second-greatest loss of American lives? On Oct. 12, 1943, several thousand American service members departed from Hampton Roads for the Atlantic aboard five American transport ships. Then on Nov. 24, more than 2,000 of them reembarked at Oran, Algeria, aboard HMT Rohna to join convoy KMF-26. While onboard Rohna, the service members learned that their destination would be the China-Burma-India theater of operations. Many of the men were on their first deployment from the United States and were unaware that they would be passing through a section of the Mediterranean known as "Suicide Alley." To learn more about the story of Rohna, read the post by Justin Hall at the Hampton Roads Naval Museum's blog.
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To All,
I 2017 Admiral Cox published the first of 55 H-Grams. They have been an outstanding addition to our Naval History. Here is the first one again.
Thanks to Admiral Cox
From: Director of Naval History
To: Senior Navy Leadership,
"Understand the lessons of History so as not to relearn them" is one of four subtasks in the "Achieve High Velocity Learning at Every Level" LOE of the Design for Maintaining Maritime Superiority. My intent for this monthly e-mail is to assist in the accomplishment of this CNO-directed subtask by providing a tailored product to flag-level Navy leadership, keyed to the anniversary of significant historic U.S. Navy events, that you can use in talks to your Sailors, speeches or even testimony, or that might come up in press inquiry. The next two/three years will mark the 100th anniversary of U.S. entry into World War I, the 75th anniversary of World War II, and the 50th anniversary of key events of Vietnam, and these momentous events will be the focus of most of my notes. However the next few years will also mark the 50th anniversary of some controversial events, e.g, the Israeli attack on the USS Liberty (AGTR-5), the loss of the USS Scorpion (SSN-589), the fires on USS Forestall (CV-59) and USS Enterprise (CVN-65). In all cases, my intent will be to provide you with the most accurate up-to-date historical analysis and the relevance to current events. My focus will skew toward valor in combat and moral courage, both to ensure that we do not forget the great sacrifices made by those who served before us, and to provide you with useful examples to share with your Sailors. However, I will also frequently touch on the Navy's history of being on the cutting edge of technology, even during the lean times. These notes will also be my personal assessment, aided by the great historians we have at Naval History and Heritage Command, but they will not always dovetail with the "conventional wisdom," the first example of which will be my note that follows on Pearl Harbor. This first note will be significantly longer than normal due to the seminal importance of Pearl Harbor. Very respectfully, Sam
World War II 75th Anniversary
Pearl Harbor
"At Dawn We Slept" was the title of one of the most influential books about the disastrous Japanese surprise attack on Pearl Harbor on the morning of 7 Dec 1941, "a date which will live in infamy" as President Franklin Roosevelt called it in his declaration of war speech. However, I respectfully disagree with the premise of the title, as it gives the impression that the U.S. Navy was laying around the beach drinking Mai Tai's and was totally unprepared for the outbreak of war. The reality is somewhat different. To the extent that anyone in the Navy in Hawaii was asleep the morning of 7 December, it was a sleep of exhaustion from months of intensive exercises and preparations for a war that everyone in a position of senior leadership knew was imminent, particularly the commander-in-chief of the U.S. Pacific Fleet, Admiral Husband Kimmel. The story of Pearl Harbor as it is now usually told in popular culture, that the U.S. was not expecting to be attacked, has led to a sense of complacency today; the sense that we could never be so stupid or unaware as we were back then. The reality is that the story of Pearl Harbor actually represents the razor thin line between defeat and victory against a highly capable adversary. It is a story of incredibly intense effort to get ready by some very smart people, with decisions that were made with great deliberation and purpose, some of which proved incorrect, but were not due to complacency. It is a story of an incredible effort to be ready, that was heartbreakingly close to success, but that still failed. And it should also be noted that virtually every carrier strike in WWII, U.S., Japanese and British, achieved tactical surprise, as did the multiple exercise carrier strikes conducted on Pearl Harbor in the inter-war years. (see attachment H-001-1 for more info related to U.S. Navy preparations for war.)
Readiness. The ship whose duty it was to be on alert that morning, was on alert, and performed her duty in an extraordinarily effective and efficient manner. The USS Ward (DD-139) sank a Japanese midget submarine (launched from mother submarine I-20) attempting to gain access to the harbor a little over an hour before the air raid commenced (but an hour after the Japanese strike had already launched.) In doing so, the USS Ward fired the first shot of the battle, the first U.S. shot of WWII in the Pacific, and with her second shot achieved the first kill. Well before the attack, in response to extensive intelligence pointing toward an outbreak of hostility in the Far East and a build-up of Japanese submarines in the Marshall Islands, Admiral Kimmel had on his own initiative, and without consulting Washington, issued orders that any submarine operating in the restricted area in the approaches to the harbor, and not under positive surface escort, was to be sunk without need to refer to higher authority. Kimmel also directed that any submarine prosecution tactical communications be conducted in the clear, to ensure the widest situational awareness amongst the forces at Pearl Harbor. The duty patrol ship, the USS Ward, was manned almost entirely by enlisted reservists from the Minnesota Naval Reserve, who had been activated on 21 Jan 41 and deployed on 23 Jan 41, to bring the Ward, inactive since WWI, into operational status. The ship's CO, LT William Outerbridge (USNA '27), had been in command less than two days, but nevertheless acted immediately and decisively to attack the submarine as soon as it was spotted by the supply ship USS Antares (AG-10) attempting to trail her into the harbor at 0645, coordinating with a PBY Catalina flying boat as he did. Closing the sub at 20 knots, Ward opened fire with 4" gun #1 (bow) at 100yds and just missed over the sub's conning tower. Gun #3 (amidships, starboard) fired at 50yds and scored a direct hit at the base of the conning tower, which proved fatal, and was a feat of gunnery greeted with some degree of skepticism until the sub was found in 2002. As Ward passed between the submarine and the Antares, she rolled four depth charges over the stern, which detonated 100' under the sub, which was observed to roll over and sink. The PBY dropped depth charges on the datum as well. At 0653, Outerbridge passed the first of several clear voice and coded messages, with his second message in the clear stating what he hoped was unambiguous, "we have attacked, fired upon, and dropped depth charges upon submarine operating in the defensive sea area." While previous false reports had been numerous, firing on a target was something new. The watch officer ashore reacted with alacrity, and the duty destroyer USS Monaghan was quickly notified to get underway and assist. However, a linear, sequential notification process was slowed by "busy signals" and multiple requests to have the Ward re-confirm the report before passing it up the chain. Nevertheless Kimmel was notified at 0735, cancelled his regular golf game with General Short (unlike in the movie Pearl Harbor), and was on his way into the headquarters in reaction to the report when the air attack commenced at 0755. (see attachment H-001-2 for more on the USS Ward)
Valor. Although Pearl Harbor was a devastating tactical defeat resulting in 2,403 U.S. military and 68 U.S. civilian deaths, the vast majority of U.S. Sailors responded immediately and in many cases with extraordinary acts of bravery, many of which were unrecorded due to the deaths of so many witnesses. Even so, Navy personnel were awarded 15 Medals of Honor, 51 Navy Crosses, and (somewhat anomalously) four Navy-Marine Corps Medals; the most medals for bravery under fire for a one-day action is U.S. naval history. Medal of Honor recipients included; Rear Admiral Isaac Kidd and Captain Franklin Van Valkenburgh, killed at their post on the bridge of USS Arizona (BB-39) when she exploded; Captain Mervyn Bennion, skipper of the battleship USS West Virginia (BB-48), who attempted to continue to fight his ship even after being mortally wounded by shrapnel; Commander Cassin Young, skipper of the repair ship USS Vestal (AR-4) moored alongside the Arizona, blown clear off the bridge of his ship into the water, nevertheless climbed back on board and got his sinking ship underway and beached it so it would not be an obstruction. Other Medals of Honor included Chief Boatswain Edwin Hill of the USS Nevada (BB-36), the only battleship to get underway during the attack, jumped into the water, swam to the mooring pier, cast off the lines, swam back to the Nevada and got on board, and was leading actions on the forecastle in preparation to beach the ship, which had attracted numerous Japanese dive bombers, when he was killed by strafing and bomb explosions. Among the Navy Crosses was Ensign Joe Taussig, Jr. (son of Commander, and later VADM, Joe Taussig of WWI "we are ready now" fame) who continued to direct the Nevada's anti-air defenses even with a leg amputating wound. Another Navy Cross was awarded to Messman Third Class Doris Miller, for aiding the dying Captain Bennion on West Virginia under fire, before manning a .50 cal machine gun, on which he had not been trained, and assisting in the downing of more than one Japanese aircraft. Miller was the first African American Sailor to receive the Navy Cross, and of note, Miller's actual battle station, one of the 5" gun mounts, was destroyed by one of the first torpedoes to hit West Virginia, which is why he ended up on the bridge. (see attachment H-001-3 for more of valor at Pearl Harbor)
"Neutrality" Patrol
For those in the Atlantic, although 7 December is marked as the entry of the U.S. into WWII, the fact is that the U.S. Navy was already in an undeclared shooting war with Nazi Germany at sea well before that. President Roosevelt and other senior U.S. and political leadership were convinced that England could not be allowed to fall. U.S. Navy leaders were particularly concerned about the possibility that the Royal Navy could fall into Nazi hands (as did most of the French Navy, before the British unilaterally sank most of it) which would dramatically increase the naval threat to the United States. As a result the U.S. pressed the envelope on "neutrality" and in many cases technically exceeded it, and multiple such "violations" were cited in Germany's declaration of war against the U.S. after Pearl Harbor. In agreement with the British, U.S. Navy assets were escorting trans-Atlantic convoys across "our side" of the Atlantic as far as Iceland before handing them off to British escorts, frustrating German U-boats, who were under orders not to attack U.S. warships, although identification could be challenging (especially after we "loaned" the British 50 WWI-vintage four-piper destroyers.) On 10 April 1941, USS Niblack (DD-424) dropped depth charges on a German U-boat without result, but arguably the first U.S. "shot" of WWII. On 4 Sep 41, USS Greer (DD145) was prosecuting U-652 and providing information to a British patrol bomber, which dropped depth charges on the submarine. U-652 retaliated by firing a torpedo at Greer, which missed, and Greer responded with an unsuccessful depth charge attack. At the time, U.S. Navy ROE allowed passing tactical data to the British, but otherwise limited U.S. forces to self-defense. The Greer incident resulted in new ROE approved by President Roosevelt, which became known as the "shoot-on-sight" order allowing U.S. ships to attack any U-boat detected. On 17 October, USS Kearney (DD-432) responded to a wolf-pack attack that had overpowered the Canadian escorts of a convoy and conducted several depth charge attacks on German U-boats before being hit and damaged by a torpedo fired by U-568, killing 11 U.S. Sailors and wounding 22 more. As the conflict continued to escalate, during daylight on 31 October, USS Reuben James (DD-245) positioned herself between an ammunition ship and a German wolf-pack, and was hit by a torpedo from U-552 intended for a merchant ship (so said the Germans). The torpedo detonated the forward magazine, blowing the bow off the ship, and causing the Reuben James to sink within 5 min. Only 44 enlisted Sailors and no officers survived of her crew of 136 enlisted and seven officers. At the time of the attack on Pearl Harbor, the U.S. political and military leadership viewed the Atlantic Theater as paramount, and numerous naval assets, including aircraft carriers and battleships were diverted from the Pacific Fleet. In particular, the priority basing of long-range patrol aircraft to the Atlantic was a critical factor in the acute shortage of such aircraft (and trained crews and parts) at Pearl Harbor which contributed significantly to the Japanese surprise.
H-001-1 17 Nov 16 S.J. Cox
Pearl Harbor, 7 December 1941
The following is not intended to be a comprehensive account of Pearl Harbor, nor to whitewash the numerous errors of judgment and failures of process that occurred across all levels of the U.S. chain-of-command from the President to the tactical level. Over time, the lessons of history tend to get distilled to a "bumper sticker" level, when the reality is far more complex and nuanced…and many times the conventional wisdom bumper sticker is just plain wrong. There is no question that the United States and the Navy were not prepared for war, despite the fact that Navy leaders well-understood that U.S. diplomacy and economic embargos were pushing the Japanese toward initiating hostilities. Navy leaders kept arguing for our diplomats to back off in order to buy more time. The commanders at Pearl Harbor were anticipating war far more than they were ever given credit for. Hopefully this will stimulate you and your Sailors to want to know more.
Things You Might Not Have Heard About Pearl Harbor:
Vice Admiral Nagumo's post-attack report stated that after the first five minutes U.S. AAA fire became so intense that it effectively negated the effect of surprise. The fact that more Japanese planes weren't shot down (9 on the first wave, 20 on the second wave) had more to do with the ineffectiveness of the weapons being used (.50 cal with too-short range, insufficient numbers of jam-prone 1.1" quad AAA guns, 5" guns that couldn't elevate enough to counter dive bombers, large numbers of dud rounds) than due to surprise. Japanese sources reported astonishment at the volume of fire put up by U.S. ships at Pearl Harbor, and the increasing intensity and accuracy was a major factor in Nagumo's decision not to send a "third wave." The U.S. shipboard 5" guns, which became active mostly on the second wave, fired over 3,100 rounds, which actually accounted for the majority of U.S. civilian deaths (all the damage in Honolulu was from U.S. AAA returning to earth.) The deficiencies in AAA were well known to Navy leaders in Washington, demonstrated in exercises at sea, but uncorrected until late 1942 with the introduction of Bofors 40mm, Oerlikon 20mm, and 5" with proximity fuses. Due to the pre-war budget-driven paucity of "live-fire" training, the large number of defective rounds to came as an unpleasant surprise to the defenders at Pearl Harbor. The Japanese torpedo planes that attacked Battleship Row (all in the first wave) also rolled in five minutes before planned, and even so, seven of the last nine were shot down; had they been on schedule, their losses to U.S. AAA would have been even greater.
The known AAA deficiency of the U.S. ships (based on exercise experience) was a principle factor in why the battleships were in port rather than at sea ("Sunday" had little to do with it.) The two U.S. carriers (USS Lexington (CV-2) and Enterprise (CV-6)) in the mid-Pacific were away on higher-priority national tasking to deliver U.S. Marine aircraft (stripped from Pearl Harbor defenses) to Midway and Wake Island to support the transit of B-17 bombers to the Philippines in a hastily conceived change of national strategy to use bombers to deter Japanese attack against the Philippines. The original orders called for the carriers to carry and launch U.S. Army Air Force fighters (also stripped from Pearl Harbor) but Admiral Kimmel succeeded in convincing Washington that was a dumb idea. Without carrier air cover, the battleships at sea were considered to be highly vulnerable to both air and submarine attack, and the lack of carrier air cover was the principle reason Kimmel brought the fleet in, and in the event the ships were sunk, they wouldn't be lost in deep water with most of their crews. In Pearl Harbor, the responsibility of air defense was with the Army (Navy was responsible for long range reconnaissance.) The Army's capability to defend Pearl Harbor against air attack was a known serious deficiency, one that the Army commander in Hawaii, General Short, had lobbied hard to correct but had been overridden by Washington due to higher priority elsewhere. Despite knowing this, Kimmel reasoned that having the ships in port with some air cover was better than being at sea with no air cover (which disabuses the notion that "battleship admirals" just didn't get it.)
Because of the known deficiency in Army air defense (minimal AAA and many obsolete aircraft) Kimmel directed the ships in port maintain a higher status in AAA readiness then they would normally have been at. Although the stories of ammunition being "locked up" (which was true for ships in repair status) have become common lore, a quarter of the fleet's .50 cal AA were manned and ready, and reacted almost immediately. The 5" guns came on line quickly, but too late to counter the torpedo bombers which led the first wave (which were most vulnerable to fire from the 5" guns) and largely ineffective against the dive and high-level bombers. For every story of naval personnel being dumfounded that they were are under attack, there are more where naval personnel instantly grasped what was happening; the signal for air attack was being hoisted as the first bomb was falling on Ford Island, and most ships began responding with the capability they had almost immediately (although the gun crews were actually well-trained and drilled, the .50 cal were just not particularly effective). The ships were more fully manned than they normally would have been; 70% of the officers and almost all enlisted were aboard ships in operational status. (Thanksgiving leave and liberty had been cancelled; Kimmel's staff had been at work late Saturday – the fleet was not in "holiday routine." Of note, after Admiral Nimitz assumed command, he carefully reviewed Admiral Kimmel's inport air defense plan and chose not to change any of it, reasoning that it was as well-thought out as could be given the system limitations.
Admiral Kimmel, and his predecessor, Admiral Richardson, were well aware that Pearl Harbor was potentially vulnerable to air attack (contrary to popular lore). In at least four major fleet battle problems in the 1920's and 1930's (and numerous smaller exercises,) U.S. carriers had "attacked" Pearl Harbor and achieved surprise every time. Admiral Richardson was fired by President Roosevelt for vociferously arguing that putting the Pacific Fleet in Pearl Harbor was a provocation and a vulnerability rather than a deterrent to the Japanese, and also lacked the support/supply infrastructure of the Pacific Fleet's then home ports of San Pedro and Long Beach. The Pacific Fleet had deployed to Hawaii as part of an exercise in 1940 and had been ordered by President Roosevelt to stay (Imagine three carriers going out on RIMPAC and being directed to stay in Hawaii indefinitely, with no families or preparation and insufficient support infrastructure.) When Kimmel assumed command, he lobbied continuously and vigorously for more long-range reconnaissance, more air defense capability, and even barrage balloons and torpedo nets. Almost none of what Kimmel requested was forthcoming, due to the higher priority of the Atlantic, or because the U.S. Navy didn't have the capability yet.
The critical thing that Admiral Kimmel did not know (and no American knew) was that only at the 11th hour in late October had the Japanese figured out, through extensive trial and error, a torpedo fin configuration that would enable torpedoes to be launched from aircraft in water as shallow as Pearl Harbor. Kimmel anticipated a bomb threat, that barring a lucky hit like the one on the Arizona, could damage a battleship, but wasn't considered near as lethal as a torpedo. Kimmel also was not anticipating an attack of the scale of Pearl Harbor; the first time the Japanese ever launched a six-carrier strike was 7 Dec 1941, even they hadn't practiced it. Kimmel, along with everyone else in the U.S. Navy at the time, "mirror imaged" Japanese capability in believing their carriers would operate as ours, in single carrier task groups. Many others woefully under-estimated Japanese capability, e.g. since our torpedoes couldn't be dropped in such shallow water, how could the Japanese with their "inferior" technology possibly do it?
Also contrary to lore, Kimmel and most other senior Navy leaders were very cognizant of the threat posed by carrier aviation. As early as 1916, the Navy General Board (the group of senior Navy Admirals that advised the Secretary of the Navy – eventually supplanted by the OPNAV staff) stated that whoever controlled the air at sea had a decisive advantage. During exercises in the 1930's however, the carriers were always "sunk," because they were highly vulnerable to the opposing carrier. The carriers were essentially viewed as a prizefighter with a knockout punch and a glass jaw, hence the continued focus on what the Navy viewed as a "balanced" fleet. Even the Japanese still viewed their battleships as the decisive force, even after the attack. Admiral Nagumo had a long list of reasons for not launching a third wave, but the primary one was that he did not know where the American carriers were and he assumed (erroneously) that we knew where he was, which made him acutely vulnerable to surprise attack by the American carriers.
The location of the Japanese carriers, particularly the big fleet carriers, was the highest priority for U.S. Naval Intelligence in the Pacific in the year leading up to Pearl Harbor, and the intelligence organization had gone to 24/7/365 manning (normal now, but unheard of then) months before the attack in response to rising tensions. In the weeks before the attack, U.S. naval intelligence knew that we had lost track of the carriers, a fact of great concern, but something that had happened several times before for up to three weeks in the preceding year. Although Japanese OPSEC was not perfect, they did not make themselves an easy target to track, ever. Kimmel was so concerned about that lack of locating data on the carriers, that he personally visited the basement location of Station HYPO (under the command of Commander Joe Rochefort, who worked for OP-20G (in Naval Communications) in Washington, not for Kimmel) which was also unheard of, to understand exactly which codes were being read, and how the traffic analysis process worked. At the morning staff meeting on 2 Dec 41, Kimmel said to his Fleet Intelligence Officer, LCDR Eddie Layton words to the effect, "do you mean to tell me the Japanese carriers could be rounding Diamond Head now and we wouldn't know it?" Layton responded with, "Yes, but I would have hoped they would have been spotted by now."
Two weeks prior the attack on Pearl Harbor, in response to rising tensions and even before the 27 November "War Warning" message, Admiral Kimmel directed the Pacific Fleet in Exercise 191. The exercise plan called for the USS Lexington (acting as "Black" Force) to proceed two hundred miles north of Oahu and launch a strike against "White Base" (Pearl Harbor) to test air defense reaction, and also to be on the lookout in case the Japanese might be in the area. The exercise was cut short by directive from Washington to avoid any actions that might be interpreted by the Japanese as provocative, as Washington belatedly came to the conclusion that "buying time" was necessary. Sources are in dispute as to whether Kimmel considered the north to be the primary threat sector, but this exercise (and the fact that previous exercise "surprise strikes" originated from the north, due to the far less dense shipping traffic) suggests that he did. As it turned out, the Japanese carrier force launched their strike from the same position as the Lexington did.
The U.S. had broken the primary Japanese diplomatic code ("Purple") and some lesser diplomatic codes. The U.S. was in the process of breaking the Japanese General Naval Operating Code (then referred to as the "5 Num" code, and later retroactively as the JN-25 series.) Sources conflict as to how much of the naval code the U.S. was reading before Pearl Harbor, but at best it wasn't much. The real point is that neither Kimmel nor Layton had access to Purple (also known as "Magic") intelligence, other diplomatic intercepts, or any JN-25 intelligence that might have existed. Some of the "conspiracy" books about Pearl Harbor postulate some sort of sinister intent on the part of Roosevelt, but the reality appears to be pure bureaucratic buffoonery. Kimmel and Layton sensed that there was intelligence they were not getting (and Gen MacArthur and ADM Hart in the Philippines were,) especially after they got a couple Purple-derived messages by accident in July, and kept requesting to receive such intelligence. The CNO, Admiral Stark (and others of the very few who were cleared) assumed that Kimmel was getting Purple traffic, or was told erroneously that he was, and no one followed up to be sure. The Purple traffic was so tightly compartmented that no one actually had the big picture; the few senior leaders with access each sifted through hundreds of raw decoded intercepts, with no overall assessment.
Within the Purple traffic, and the lesser diplomatic codes which were being decrypted very-time late, were plenty of indications that would have alerted Kimmel and Layton that Pearl Harbor was a target. They did not receive any of it. Prior to the attack on Pearl Harbor, there was a mountain of intelligence indicating that hostilities were imminent in the Far East between Japan and Britain and probably the United States. In no message from Washington that Kimmel received, including the 27 November "War Warning," was Pearl Harbor ever explicitly mentioned as a possible target. The fact that Washington was also directing that fighters be stripped from Hawaii, over Kimmel's and Short's protests, strongly suggested to Kimmel that Washington was not concerned about an attack on Pearl Harbor.
After the attack, the traditional American search for someone to blame (besides the Japanese) commenced in earnest. Secretary of the Navy Frank Knox arrived soon after the attack to investigate. The Army relieved General Short first, and in the spirit of "jointness" the Navy followed suit with Kimmel on 17 Dec 1941. Kimmel expected to be relieved and revert to his "permanent rank" of two-star RADM. (It was fairly common for 3 and 4 stars to accept follow on positions at 2 star rank. (RADM Claude Bloch, the Commander of the 14th Naval District (Hawaii) at the time of the attack, and who worked for both Kimmel and CNO Stark, had previously been the four-star Commander-in-Chief of the U.S. Fleet in 1938-40.)) Kimmel expected to be offered a follow-on job where he could contribute to the war, but that never happened and he eventually reluctantly resigned. The Roberts Commission in 1942, which was the first of numerous investigations, was conducted with none of the rules of evidence or rights of the accused (e.g., right to review evidence against them, etc.) of a court martial, yet concluded that Kimmel and Short were guilty of "dereliction of duty," resulting in a feeding frenzy by the press, public, and politicians. With no opportunity to appeal, Kimmel was accused of failure to conduct adequate long-range reconnaissance, despite the fact that because of acute shortages of aircraft, trained crews and especially spare parts, Kimmel could only sustain a fraction of the coverage required – and the weather would have almost certainly prevented discovery of the Japanese anyway, even if Kimmel had been prescient enough to launch his few aircraft to the north on that particular morning. Kimmel repeatedly requested a court-martial in order to defend himself, but was denied. The primary reason was that a trial would have risked exposing the code-breaking effort that was considered (and really was) of paramount importance in winning the war. Another unstated reason is that a trial would have risked the reputations of many senior military and government officials in Washington, who were far more culpable of the failures that led to surprise at Pearl Harbor than Kimmel was.
If by this point you think that Admiral Kimmel was treated unfairly, you are in the company of Admirals Zumwalt, Stockdale, Crowe, Hayward, Turner, Holloway, McKee, Lawrence, and 28 other 3-4 stars who signed a petition in 1991 to posthumously promote Rear Admiral Kimmel to Admiral. So far it hasn't happened.
I am not going to attempt to address the numerous conspiracy theories about Pearl Harbor (it is very much a cottage industry) other than to say that the vast majority are based on little-to-no actual evidence, usually taken out of context, and much speculation. What can be said is that U.S. political and military leaders knew full well that the economic sanctions were backing the Japanese into a corner that would almost certainly result in an outbreak of war, and that the outbreak was imminent. No one expected an attack on as devastating scale as that at Pearl Harbor. Everyone grossly under-estimated Japanese capability and resolve, assuming that when the expected war came, we would easily clean their clock.
It should also be noted that the Japanese made numerous errors of judgment as well, and but for some lucky breaks for the Japanese, the battle could have gone very differently. The many Japanese mistakes included the Air Strike Commander, Fuchida, botching the signal to the strike force as to whether surprise had been achieved or not, and which plan (surprise or no surprise) to execute, which significantly effected timing and targets. Most importantly, the Japanese apparently had no plan to take out the repair facilities, submarine base, and fuel storage facilities (all of which would play a critical role in their defeat) because most Japanese leaders believed the war would be too short for those to have an impact, and smoke from burning oil storage would just foul the range anyway. The Japanese, too, grossly underestimated their enemy.
Very respectfully,
Sam
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