FDR - Jean Edward Smith [340]
* Because Japan’s original war plan anticipated meeting the American fleet near the home islands, the Japanese Navy had neglected to design ships with a long cruising radius. The destroyers escorting the Pearl Harbor task force, for example, had to be refueled daily. Gordon W. Prange, At Dawn We Slept 322–323 (New York: Penguin, 1982).
* Naval historians are fond of pointing out that while Nagumo’s appointment rested on seniority, Kimmel was a “merit” appointee, selected to command the Pacific Fleet over the heads of six more senior admirals. U.S. Congress, Report of the Joint Committee on the Investigation of the Pearl Harbor Attack 75, note 4.
* In the two weeks prior to December 7, 1941, the nine military and naval commanders in the Pacific area received repeated warnings of pending hostile action by Japan. Seven of the commanders, including Admiral Hart and General MacArthur in the Philippines, General John L. DeWitt on the West Coast, and General Frank M. Andrews in Panama, put their commands on a war footing. Hawaii was the only exception. Neither Admiral Kimmel nor General Short took Washington’s war warnings seriously. Mark S. Watson, Chief of Staff: Prewar Plans and Preparations 505–512 (Washington, D.C.: U.S. Government Printing Office, 1950).
* The judgment of the Joint Congressional Committee on the Investigation of the Pearl Harbor Attack is scathing with respect to Admiral Kimmel and General Short. After months of hearings and detailed field investigations, the committee concluded:
The commanders in Hawaii were clearly and unmistakably warned of war with Japan. They were given orders and possessed information that the entire Pacific area was fraught with danger. They failed to carry out these orders and to discharge their basic and ultimate responsibilities. They failed to defend the fortress they commanded—their citadel was taken by surprise. Aside from any responsibilities that may appear to rest in Washington, the ultimate and direct responsibility for failure to engage the Japanese on the morning of December 7 with every weapon at their disposal rests essentially and properly with the Army and Navy commands in Hawaii whose duty it was to meet the enemy against which they had been warned.
Report, Pearl Harbor Attack 238.
TWENTY-FOUR
COMMANDER IN CHIEF
When the news first came that Japan had attacked us, my first feeling was of relief that the indecision was over and that a crisis had come in a way which would unite all our people.
—HENRY L. STIMSON, DECEMBER 7, 1941
THE ROOSEVELT ADMINISTRATION, like most of America, seriously underestimated Japan’s military capacity. Cartoon caricaturizations of the Japanese as little yellow men with buckteeth and horn-rimmed glasses who were no good at piloting airplanes because of their slanty eyes led to woeful miscalculations up and down the line. Japanese stereotypes of the United States were equally off base, particularly at high levels of government and in the Army. Not only did the Japanese leadership fail to recognize the enormous industrial potential and spiritual strength of the country, they grossly misinterpreted the nature of American society. Because women played no public role in Japan, decision makers had no way of measuring their impact on national policy. As Admiral Shigeyoshi Inoue observed, many Japanese leaders had “a childish notion” that because women had a powerful say in America “it wouldn’t be long before they started objecting to the war and demanding a settlement.”1
Pearl Harbor united Americans as nothing else could. If the Japanese had attacked Singapore, Borneo, or even the Philippines, the nation would have been divided over how