Sunday, December 7th, 1941...

We all know what happened, the suprise attack on pearl harbor that brought the USA into WW2. over 3,000 sailors died while Japan lost only 29 aircraft. Despite images and beliefs, the day of infamy severely damaged, but did not eliminate the US fleet, in additon the Aircraft Carriers and Submarines were not hit.

"We have awakened a sleeping giant and we have instilled within him a great and terrible resolve" - Isoroku Yamamoto.

Yes, and I would like to take this opportunity to thank the Empire of Japan for dragging the United States into WW2….for without this unprovoked attack, the Americans were quite prepared to just sit back and watch the whole of Western Europe, Scandinavia, the Mediterranean, and Western Russia, fall under the evil dominion of the Nazis.

(“That’s bit harsh Kryten!”. Yes, it is a little bit. After all, president Roosevelt, one of the best presidents that America has ever had, was bending over backwards trying to get America into the war. And who knows, maybe even without the attack on Pearl Harbour he might have succeeded....but it would have taken several years, making the war last several years longer, by which time the Nazis would have jet aircraft, long ranged missiles, super tanks, super submarines, and possibly even atomic bombs, making their defeat far from inevitable)

I'm still amazed today that the Japanese were able to accomplish such a surprise attack.
The movie Pearl Harbour had some good scenes in it when the Japanese attacked.
If the Japanese were able to turn back time and have a second go (like saving a civ game) I wonder what they would have done differently?

The most enduring World War II conspiracy theory contends that President Roosevelt and sundry other national political and military leaders "knew" that the Japanese were about to attack Pearl Harbor and, indeed, even provoked the attack. There are numerous variations on the theme. For example, one suggests that Winston Churchill "knew" but refused to tell, so that the U.S. would come to Britain's rescue against Germany. These theories all all based on "evidence," often "new" evidence which has "just come to light." Unfortunately, when all this "new" evidence is examined (which always turns out to be information of little value or relevance long available to the public, if it cared to inquire), the most charitable thing that can be said is "not proven."

Some of the theories about the attack rank with Elvis sightings. There's one contention that the attack was actually carried out by British aircraft based on one of the outlying islands of the Hawaii group!

In fact, the disaster at Pearl Harbor was the result of a lot of audacity, planning and luck on the part of the Japanese and numerous blunders by many American political and military leaders, with no particular person being criminally responsible. As historian Gordon Prange said, "There's enough blame for everyone."

Sarevok, the reason why the carriers weren't hit was because they weren't there :D

As for the mistakes.... I tend to think someone had an inkling something was up, I did see a documentary on British TV which claimed the British knew through Ultra that there was an attack planned, just not the day or location. You would assume that if they passed this information to the US the people in Pearl and other locations might get mighty suspicous of marauding midget submarines and early B17 flights, but anyway, given the nature of Ultra it's hard to say whether they knew and if so what they could do without blowing the cover.

Another rumour I heard was that the Japanese had actually declared war prior to the attack, sending a document the previous day outlining a number of issues they had with the US government, but not declaring war. The declaration came within a short time of the attack, but no-one was available to decode and translate the document in time and it was not felt important as the Japanese routinely sent such complaint documents. Not sure how accurate that one is though.

One things for sure, had the carriers all been home in Pearl and sunk, the US would have been up a certain creek without a paddle.

the u.s.had broken some japanese codes ( not all ) and knew " something " was up but not who,what, where and why.

on a side note-my mom was born this day in 1941--one of TWO disasters that day:lol:

Only momentarily, whilst newer carriers and battleships were constructed; there were others very much into the building process. It would have changed tactics, but not the overall strategic outcome. Even the battlewagons that were attacked were repaired and back into service before too long, save for the Arizona and the Utah.

Originally posted by Simon Darkshade
Only momentarily, whilst newer carriers and battleships were constructed; there were others very much into the building process. It would have changed tactics, but not the overall strategic outcome. Even the battlewagons that were attacked were repaired and back into service before too long, save for the Arizona and the Utah.

From what I've read this would have taken until mid 1942, that's a long time for the Japanese to dominate the Pacific, time in which they could hurt the US. One suggestion was to take this time to occupy Pearl and the islands around it, which if possible would have severely harmed US interests. Any problems caused during that period might have forced a change in emphasis to the Pacific rather than europe. Either way one or both theatres would have been drawn out longer.

Mid 1942 for the Essex class to enter service maybe, but the USN had other carriers besides those operating out of Pearl Harbour.
The worst case scenario is that the war would be longer, but not change US victory.

Something close to half did operate from that base though (3 out of the 7 main fleet carriers in existence in 1941), had they all been sunk it's hard to work out how the US could have stopped such actions in the immdediate future. Of the remainder 3 were all based out of Norfolk Virginia and one in Bermuda and would have taken time to reach the area also, though obviously not as long as mid 1942, this could have affected any Japanese operations against Pearl or other locations.

And I never intended to state it would have stopped US victory, as I stated in my second post, the consequence of such an action would be to draw out the war much longer in both theatres with any added consequence this may have.

A Japanese operation against Pearl Harbour or Hawaii with the aim of taking it would have needed a lot more planning, resources and troops than a sneak air attack; as such, it would have to be planned before the actual raid on the chance that the carriers were removed from the equation. Difficult in all considerations.

It would have put America more on the defensive/backfoot, and may have made it necessary to borrow some carriers from the Royal Navy in the interim. We are certainly in agreement that it would have very possibly extended the war; the extent of this lengthening is something that we'll differ on, but alls fair in love, war and naval gunfire.

Originally posted by pawpaw
on a side note-my mom was born this day in 1941--one of TWO disasters that day:lol:

Had she not have been born, you wouldnt have either. :lol: and then you wouldnt be here to help me defeat the backstabbing Isabella:eek:

Interesting thought on the RN carriers, perhaps though their quality would be a thought against this, most RN carriers had somewhat less capacity than their US allies with the exception of the newer ones, and to my knowledge the planes in such carriers were inferior to their opponents also. They did have greater survivability IIRC though as they had armoured decks, hence their superiority when facing kamikazee attacks, but they didn't happen until later.

Agreed on the operation thing though, but I imagine had by sheer bad luck said 3 carriers been sunk at Pearl, knocking out the main US base in the Pacific could have been a major priority had it ever been possible. On the time period, from what I have read estimations based solely on the loss of the 3 carriers vary between 6 months and 1 year, but it doesn't say what affect this would have on the European war if any.

They did not have the capacity of US fleet carriers, and US planes would have been used, as was later done by the RN. The armoured decks did prevent immediate damage, but I recall that they did hide longer term damage/stress in some cases.

If 3 carriers had been knocked out, then the focus of the 4 remaining, and all other naval units, would have been to defend, and hold Hawaii. There would have been no carrier raiding campaigns, probably no Doolittle Raid, and a more conservative approach to strategy before resources allowed them to go on the offensive. There would not have been a significant drain on European operations, IMO, as the US naval role in the Atlantic was secondary in those early stages of the war. Perhaps bombers would have been diverted to defensive groups on the West Coast, along the pre war plans for using patrol bombers, and not been deployed to England in as great numbers.

Originally posted by Simon Darkshade
Even the battlewagons that were attacked were repaired and back into service before too long, save for the Arizona and the Utah.
While the Arizona was sunk at Pearl Harbor, the other battleship sunk there was the Oklahoma (BB 37), not the Utah. USS Utah (AG 16) had been built in 1909 as a battleship (BB 31). In 1931, as a consequence of the Washington Naval Treaty, she was disarmed and converted into a mobile target ship. She was sunk at Pearl Harbor, but hadn't been a battleship for 10 years when she went down.

Wasn't a warning sent to the Philipines that Japanese attacks were expected there not at Pearl?

Originally posted by Constantine
Wasn't a warning sent to the Philipines that Japanese attacks were expected there not at Pearl?

through broken codes the u.s. knew the japanese fleet was at sea, but not where it was going-singapore?, dutch east indies? or what its intentions were.

Originally posted by privatehudson

One things for sure, had the carriers all been home in Pearl and sunk, the US would have been up a certain creek without a paddle.

Dunno, I reckon the Americans could have evened up the balance a bit with their submarine fleet.

Originally posted by YNCS

While the Arizona was sunk at Pearl Harbor, the other battleship sunk there was the Oklahoma (BB 37), not the Utah. USS Utah (AG 16) had been built in 1909 as a battleship (BB 31). In 1931, as a consequence of the Washington Naval Treaty, she was disarmed and converted into a mobile target ship. She was sunk at Pearl Harbor, but hadn't been a battleship for 10 years when she went down.

Yep, saw that one shortly after I typed it, but didn't get around to changing it due to getting sidetracked by Operation Crossroads, of all things. :ack: The Japanese did expend a few attacks on her, thinking otherwise.

As an interesting side note, the timbers placed on her deck as part of her role, to cushion the impact of practice bombs used in her target stint, did hamper some escape attempts of her crew because of shifting as she listed and eventually rolled.

In regards to the sub fleet, they needed to change their torpedos over first, as the newer ones weren't working all that well off the Phillipines, as I recall.

Originally posted by Simon Darkshade


In regards to the sub fleet, they needed to change their torpedos over first, as the newer ones weren't working all that well off the Phillipines, as I recall.

yes, the torpedeo firing pin was too brittle, when it struck the target it did not set the charge off--it broke!!!

:lol: Might have been a problem sinking a Japanese carrier with one of them :D

Originally posted by privatehudson
:lol: Might have been a problem sinking a Japanese carrier with one of them :D

i think they recalled all the subs back to pearl till they fixed the problem

Did that take long? :)

Originally posted by Constantine
Wasn't a warning sent to the Philipines that Japanese attacks were expected there not at Pearl?
On November 27, 1941, the Chief of Naval Operations, Admiral King, sent the following message to CINCPAC (Commander in Chief Pacific, in Pearl Harbor) and CINCAF (Commander in Chief Asian Fleet, in Manila, Philippines):

From CNO
To CINCAF, CINCPAC
Info CINCLANT, SPENAVO

This dispatch to be considered a war warning. Negotiations with Japan looking toward stabilization of conditions in the Pacific have ceased and an aggressive move by Japan is expected within the next few days. The number and equipment of Japanese troops and the organization of naval task forces indicates an amphibious expedition against either the Philippines, Thai[land] or Kra Peninsula or possibly Borneo. Execute an appropriate defensive deployment preparatory to carrying out the tasked assigned in WPL46. Inform district and army authorities. A similar warning is being sent by War Department. SPENAVO inform British. CONUS districts, Guam, Samoa directed to take appropriate measures against sabotage.

NOTES: CINCLANT is Commander in Chief Atlantic. SPENAVO was the Special European Naval Office, USN liaison with the Royal Navy. CONUS is Continential United States. WPL46 was the War PLan for an attack by Japan.

So 10 days before the attack, Washington was convinced that a war with Japan was going to happen. The appropriate commanders in the Pacific were informed. However, the crystal ball wasn't good enough to show an attack at Pearl Harbor.

Source: Gordon W. Prange et al. [i]The Verdict of History: Pearl Harbor. New York: Penguin Books, 1991. Pp 651-652.

Edited to give source.

IIRC they replaced the torpedo firing pins, with pins machined from damaged aircraft propellors. Hard, lightweight, etc. The torpedo steering mechanisms were simplified, so that the depth of the run was fairly constant. The elaborate depth guage system had the depth running up and down more than 50 feet. The rudders were problematic as well. the Tang sank herself because the rudder on the torpedo stuck hard to port,, causing the torpedo to swim a circle, which happened to have its mother in it.

Torpedoes got a lot of Navy men very upset.

I personally tend to give credence to the story that the high command expected an attack, or at least suspected the possibility enough to sail the carriers for no appearant reason. Remember this is the same command staff that sniffed out Midway 6 months later. If it was playing a longshot that sent the carriers out, I would not want to sit in at the table. USNaval luck was very good in retrospect.

J

Though that could be checked through knowledge of the location and intent of the 3 carriers I imagine, ie if they went into dry dock in San Diego some 2 months before the attack or similar it's less likely they suspected, but if they simply sailed out of Pearl a week or so before on some routine mission that wasn't absolutely needed....

Edit: After a little browsing:

Lexington left Pearl on the 5th December to augment the Midway Island defences

Saratoga had just entering San Diego after a period in dry dock in Washington state

Enterprise was on it's return journey to Pearl and some of it's planes were caught in the attack when they flew to the ground bases prior to it.

Originally posted by YNCS
The most enduring World War II conspiracy theory contends that President Roosevelt and sundry other national political and military leaders "knew" that the Japanese were about to attack Pearl Harbor and, indeed, even provoked the attack. There are numerous variations on the theme. For example, one suggests that Winston Churchill "knew" but refused to tell, so that the U.S. would come to Britain's rescue against Germany. These theories all all based on "evidence," often "new" evidence which has "just come to light." Unfortunately, when all this "new" evidence is examined (which always turns out to be information of little value or relevance long available to the public, if it cared to inquire), the most charitable thing that can be said is "not proven."

Some of the theories about the attack rank with Elvis sightings. There's one contention that the attack was actually carried out by British aircraft based on one of the outlying islands of the Hawaii group!

In fact, the disaster at Pearl Harbor was the result of a lot of audacity, planning and luck on the part of the Japanese and numerous blunders by many American political and military leaders, with no particular person being criminally responsible. As historian Gordon Prange said, "There's enough blame for everyone."

I have heard this too. The government knowing about this attack before hand. Some evidence shows lots of ships and aircraft on pointless missions. Anyway Japan felt the reprasle of that attack pretty badly. :nuke:

Originally posted by pawpaw

i think they recalled all the subs back to pearl till they fixed the problem

Nope - the Navy refused to admit that there was any problem with the torpedos until early 1943. When the problem was finally admitted to, the sub skippers were told to stop using the (incredibly) defective magnetic detonators and stick to the (still flawed) contact detectors, using modifed tactics to avoid the worst of the torpedos known problems. From memory, the US subs didn't have properly working torpedos until late 1943 (or early 1944?) and this explains the subs relatively poor performance until that time.

At no stage were patrols canceled due to torpedo problems.

I personally tend to give credence to the story that the high command expected an attack, or at least suspected the possibility enough to sail the carriers for no appearant reason. Remember this is the same command staff that sniffed out Midway 6 months later.

They didn't 'sniff out' the attack on Midway - they knew it was coming thanks to the superhuman efforts of their codebreakers (more then one of whom suffered a breakdown as a result of the strain prior to Midway). Furthermore, much of the staff commanding the Pacific Fleet at the time of Pearl Harbour were long gone by the time of Midway.

Anyway, if they did think an attack was coming, sending two lightly escorted carriers off on individual missions towards the direction any Japanese attack would come from hardly attests to the brilliance of the US Pacific Fleet's staff - as it was, they were probably lucky that the Japanese didn't find and sink at least one of the carriers.

The Allies did fully expect a Japanese attack somewhere in the Pacific, most likely in the East Indies and Philipines, and considerable reinforcements were flowing into those areas in late 1941. Combinded with the allies later sucesses with codebreakring this historical fact seems to have been the basis for the belief that the Allies knew exactly what the Japanese were planning, thereby providing Roosevelt and/or Churchill with the means by which they could enact a Machiavelian plot win the American public's support for the war via the sacrafice of the 'unimportant' battleships of the US Pacific Fleet at Pearl Harbour. As is often the case with conspiricy theories, occums razor cuts this to shreds.

Speaking of RN carrier, I found out that USN actually did borrow A carrier from RN in WW 2 for operation in pacific ocean. It was HMS Victorious if I have not mistaken

http://www.fleetairarmarchive.net/Ships/Victorious.html for more information

sounds interesting...

The US knew that theyw ere going to be attacked during December 1941. They had, in 1931, created a simulation battle plan that they thought the Japanese would use. They even tested the plan, and won easily. The only thing that happened different was that the Japanese attacked 2 and 1/2 hours later.

Originally posted by pomsa
The US knew that theyw ere going to be attacked during December 1941. They had, in 1931, created a simulation battle plan that they thought the Japanese would use. They even tested the plan, and won easily. The only thing that happened different was that the Japanese attacked 2 and 1/2 hours later.

So- it should really be called a "day of tardiness" rather than a "day of infamy"?

I guess. Although, Roosevelt couldn't say that and have the Republicans support him, could he?

Originally posted by pomsa
I guess. Although, Roosevelt couldn't say that and have the Republicans support him, could he?

I always forget the big picture.

Besides, I'm not even sure he knew. Most of the military leaders who authored the plan and ran the exercises were rabidly pro-air power, and a good many of them were court-martialed for disobeying orders that in effect relegated the Air Force to a second-class citizen compared to the Signal Corps

Not only were the torpedoes not exploding, they often ran deeper than normal, and the problem continued till september 30 1943. Premature firings were also not unheard of.

About Pearl Habour it's interesting to see how different appears to have been treated by Western press the surprise attack of Port Arthur by Japanese Empire in 1904, that is similar in spirit to Pearl Habour. In my humble opinion, both are days of infamy...

that is the traditional Japanese way: attack without a declaration of war.

Originally posted by Sarevok
that is the traditional Japanese way: attack without a declaration of war.

Always the best way to attack though.

I agree.

Originally posted by Sarevok
that is the traditional Japanese way: attack without a declaration of war.
Actually, they declared war prior to Pearl Harbor, the Japanese just delivered it to Hull after Pearl Harbor was attacked because they didn't decode the message fast enough.

Originally posted by pomsa
The US knew that theyw ere going to be attacked during December 1941.


No, they didn't.


They had, in 1931, created a simulation battle plan that they thought the Japanese would use. They even tested the plan, and won easily. The only thing that happened different was that the Japanese attacked 2 and 1/2 hours later.


Billy Mitchell was the man who predicted Pearl Harbor and the attack on the Philippines. It was chillingly close to what actually happened.

Traditional naval thinkers never believed that Pearl Harbor could be attacked from the air. They were worried about submarines and sabotage.

Talking about naval predictions, when I was reading a book on Naval Wargaming by Donald Featherstone which described the 1920s and 1930s wargames by a guy called Fletcher Pratt. Pratt used to play in a large scale in ballrooms and used a kind of "guess the range and that's where you're shells hit" principle. Anyway, using his rules (which are quite good I might add, but not for the faint-hearted) he fought out an action like the battle of the river plate, only the Graff Spee was sunk in action, not limped into harbour. Most back then denounced his rules as being unrealistic as they figured no 3 cruisers could ever sink or even engage a pocket battleship....

The attack was attrocious from a moral viewpoint. But the strategy behind it was emense. Able to pull such a surprise attack on the newest and fastest growing world power.

Pearl Harbor- A stategic attack against a military target, though sneaky, very effective.

Bombing of Hiroshima and Nagisaki- Horrible, the use of nuclear weapons against civilian targets is just barbaric.

Of course there are consperiouses and rumors that the US knew about the attack, and was waiting for someone to attack to join the war. They did have a lot of boats on pointless reconsance missions. Not sure wheter I buy into it or not, but something to consider none the less.

Originally posted by CIVPhilzilla
Bombing of Hiroshima and Nagisaki- Horrible, the use of nuclear weapons against civilian targets is just barbaric.

The Japanese were real sweethearts in China. :rolleyes:

thats right, 30 milion deaths and only around 5M (not sure on their military losses) were soldiers.

Originally posted by joespaniel


The Japanese were real sweethearts in China. :rolleyes:

Did I ever say they were. We considered ourselves more civilizied yet we killed 30 + million people the vast majority being civilians.

I didn't say we were more civilized, just better at building long range bombers.

:D

Originally posted by CIVPhilzilla

Did I ever say they were. We considered ourselves more civilizied yet we killed 30 + million people the vast majority being civilians.

Strange, I didn't think the Japanese acknowledged their war guilt, or even knew about it. My brothers living over there at the moment and he says hes taken a new view point of ww2. A much more Japanese friendly one.

It is entirely reasonable to encourage the Japanese to reflect more openly on their role in the war and to do more to educate their society about it. However, it is not reasonable to expect them to simply adopt in total the western perspective on the war.

I think the 'Western Perspective' is that bombing civilians is not OK anymore, as evidenced by the change in military practice.

The Japanese perspective is to ignore what really happened. They don't teach schoolchildren about what the Japanese army did in China.

I know they don't Joe, and clearly they should. For one thing it is as much in their interest as in that of anyone else. (Just as an aside, it might be of interest to note that the Hiroshima A-bomb museum is active in trying to encourage that change).