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Pearl Harbor

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Caleb
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« Reply #15 on: August 05, 2007, 05:35:39 am »



Aerial attack plan battle map

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« Reply #16 on: August 05, 2007, 05:37:40 am »

Imperial Japanese navy's orders, directives and setup

The attack force Kido Butai


November 26, 1941, the day the Hull note was sent out, the carrier battle group Kido Butai with the 1st Air Fleet, which had 414 airplanes fitted with Type 91 torpedoes, armor-piercing bombs and general purpose bombs on board six aircraft carriers (1st, 2nd and 4th Carrier Divisions) with escorts (17th and 18th Destroyer Divisions, 1st Destroyer Squadron, 2nd Submarine Division, 3rd Battleship Division, 8th Cruiser Division, 7th Submarine Fleet, 1st and 2nd most powerful carrier force with the greatest air power in the history of naval Supply Train) overall commanded by Admiral Chuichi Nagumo left Hitokappu Wan in the Kuril Islands bound for Hawaii under strict radio silence. It was the warfare to date. The six aircraft carriers were Akagi (flag), Kaga, Sōryū, Hiryū, and the newest, Shōkaku and Zuikaku, with 135 Mitsubishi A6M Type 0 fighters (Allied codename "Zeke", commonly called "Zero"), 171 Nakajima B5N Type 97 torpedo bombers (Allied codename "Kate"), and 108 Aichi D3A Type 99 dive bombers (Allied codename "Val") embarked. Two fast battleships, two heavy cruisers, one light cruiser, nine destroyers, and three fleet submarines provided escort. In addition, the Advanced Expeditionary Force included 20 fleet submarines and five two-man Ko-hyoteki-class midget submarines, which were to gather intelligence and sink U.S. vessels attempting to flee Pearl Harbor during or soon after the attack. It also had eight oilers for fueling.
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Caleb
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« Reply #17 on: August 05, 2007, 05:38:56 am »



Commander of the Kido Butai for the attack, Admiral Chuichi Nagumo
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Caleb
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« Reply #18 on: August 05, 2007, 05:40:38 am »



Rising Sun Flag is the ensign of the Imperial Japanese Navy forces
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« Reply #19 on: December 07, 2007, 09:26:54 pm »

Attack on Pearl Harbor order of battle



Aircraft carrier Akagi
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« Reply #20 on: December 07, 2007, 09:28:15 pm »



Kaga
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« Reply #21 on: December 07, 2007, 09:29:13 pm »



Shokaku
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« Reply #22 on: December 07, 2007, 09:30:26 pm »



Zuikaku
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« Reply #23 on: December 07, 2007, 09:31:33 pm »



Soryu
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« Reply #24 on: December 07, 2007, 09:33:00 pm »



Hiryu
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« Reply #25 on: December 07, 2007, 09:34:44 pm »

On December 1, 1941, after the striking force was en route, Chief of Staff Nagano gave a verbal directive to commander of the Combined Fleet Admiral Isoroku Yamamoto, informing him:

Japan has decided to open hostilities against the United States, United Kingdom, and the Netherlands early in December...Should it appear certain that Japanese-American negotiations will reach an amicable settlement prior to the commencement of hostilities, it is understood that all elements of the Combined Fleet are to be assembled and returned to their bases in accordance with separate orders.[20]

[The Kido Butai will] proceed to the Hawaiian Area with utmost secrecy and, at the outbreak of the war, will launch a resolute surprise attack on and deal a fatal blow to the enemy fleet in the Hawaiian Area. The initial air attack is scheduled at 0330 hours, X Day.[20]


20. ^ a b c US Army. Japanese monograph #97. Pearl Harbor Operations: General Outline of Orders and Plans, 5 November to 2 December 1941. Washington, DC: US dept of the Army.
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« Reply #26 on: December 07, 2007, 09:35:59 pm »

Upon completion, the force was to return to Japan, re-equip, and re-deploy for "Second Phase Operations".

Finally, Order number 9, issued on 1 December 1941 by Nagano, instructed Yamamoto to crush hostile naval and air forces in Asia, the Pacific and Hawaii, promptly seize the main U.S., British, and Dutch bases in East Asia and "capture and secure the key areas of the southern regions".[20]

On the home leg, the force was ordered to be alert for tracking and counterattacked by the Americans, and to return to the friendly base in the Marshall Islands, rather than the Home Islands.[21]

U.S. civil and military intelligence had, amongst them, good information suggesting additional Japanese aggression throughout the summer and fall before the attack. At the time, none specifically indicated an attack against Pearl Harbor, nor has any doing so been identified since. Public press reports during summer and fall, including Hawaiian newspapers, contained extensive reports on the growing tension in the Pacific. Late in November, all Pacific commands, including both the Navy and Army in Hawaii, were separately and explicitly warned[22] war with Japan was expected in the very near future, and it was preferred that Japan make the first hostile act as they were apparently preparing to do.[23] It was felt that war would most probably start with attacks in the Far East: the Philippines,[24] Indochina, Thailand, or the Russian Far East. The warnings were not specific to any area, noting only war with Japan was expected in the immediate short term and all commands should act accordingly. Had any of these warnings produced an active alert status in Hawaii, the attack might have been resisted more effectively, and perhaps resulted in less death and damage. On the other hand, recall of men on shore leave to the ships in harbor might have led to still more being casualties from bombs and torpedoes, or trapped in capsized ships by shut watertight doors (as the attack alert status would have required),[25] or killed (in their obsolescent and obsolete aircraft) by more experienced Japanese aviators. When the attack actually arrived, Pearl Harbor was effectively unprepared: anti-aircraft weapons not manned, most ammunition locked down, anti-submarine measures not implemented (e.g., no torpedo nets in the harbor), combat air patrol not flying, available scouting aircraft not in the air at first light, Air Corps aircraft parked wingtip to wingtip to reduce sabotage risks (not ready to fly at a moment's warning), and so on.

By 1941, U.S. signals intelligence, through the Army's Signal Intelligence Service and the Office of Naval Intelligence's OP-20-G, had intercepted and decrypted considerable Japanese diplomatic and naval cipher traffic, though nothing actually carrying significant information about Japanese military plans in 1940-41. Decryption and distribution of this intelligence, including such decrypts as were available, was capricious and sporadic, some of which can be accounted for by lack of resources and manpower. At best, the information available to decision makers in Washington was fragmentary, contradictory, or poorly distributed, and was almost entirely raw, without supporting analysis. It was thus, incompletely understood. Nothing in it pointed directly to an attack at Pearl Harbor, and a lack of awareness of Imperial Navy capabilities led to a widespread underlying belief Pearl Harbor was not a possible attack target. Only one message from the Hawaiian Japanese consulate (sent on 6 December), in a low level consular cipher, included mention of an attack at Pearl; it was not decrypted until 8 December.[26]

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« Reply #27 on: December 07, 2007, 09:37:24 pm »



Fleet Admiral Osami Nagano
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« Reply #28 on: December 07, 2007, 09:38:54 pm »

In 1924, General William L. Mitchell produced a 324-page report warning that future wars (including with Japan) would include a new role for aircraft against existing ships and facilities. He even discussed the possibility of an air attack on Pearl Harbor, but his warnings were ignored. Navy Secretary Knox had also appreciated the possibility of an attack at Pearl in a written analysis shortly after taking office. American commanders had been warned that tests had demonstrated shallow-water aerial torpedo attacks were possible, but no one in charge in Hawaii fully appreciated this. And a war game surprise attack against Pearl Harbor in 1932 had been judged a success and to have caused considerable damage.

Nevertheless, because it was believed Pearl Harbor had natural defenses against torpedo attack (e.g., the shallow water), the Navy did not deploy torpedo nets or baffles, which were judged to inconvenience ordinary operations. And as a result of limited numbers of long-range aircraft (including Army Air Corps bombers), reconnaissance patrols were not being made as often or as far out as required for adequate coverage against possible surprise attack; they improved considerably, with far fewer remaining planes, after the attack. The Navy had 33 PBYs in the islands, but only three on patrol at the time of the attack.[27] Hawaii was low on the priority list for the B-17s finally becoming available for the Pacific, largely because General MacArthur in the Philippines was successfully demanding as many as could be made available to the Pacific (where they were intended as a deterrent). The British, who had contracted for them, even agreed to accept fewer to facilitate this buildup. At the time of the attack, Army and Navy were both on training status rather than operational alert.

There was also confusion about the Army's readiness status as General Short had changed local alert level designations without clearly informing Washington. Most of the Army's mobile anti-aircraft guns were secured, with ammunition locked down in armories. To avoid upsetting property owners, and in keeping with Washington's admonition not to alarm civil populations (e.g., in the late November war warning messages from the Navy and War Departments), guns were not dispersed around Pearl Harbor (i.e., on private property). Additionally, aircraft were parked on airfields to lessen the risk of sabotage, not in anticipation of air attack, in keeping with Short's interpretation of the war warnings.

Chester Nimitz said later, "It was God's mercy that our fleet was in Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941.". Nimitz believed if Kimmel had discovered the Japanese approach, he would have sortied to meet them. With the American carriers absent and Kimmel's battleships at a severe disadvantage to the Japanese carriers, the likely result would have been the sinking of the American battleships at sea in deep water, where they would have been lost forever with tremendous casualties (as many as twenty thousand dead), instead of in Pearl Harbor, where the crews could easily be rescued, and six battleships ultimately raised.[28]

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« Reply #29 on: December 07, 2007, 09:40:48 pm »



Lieutenant General Walter C. Short, commanding general of the Army post at Pearl Harbor.

Part of the Japanese plan for the attack included breaking off negotiations with the United States 30 minutes before the attack began. Diplomats from the Japanese Embassy in Washington, including the Japanese Ambassador, Admiral Kichisaburo Nomura, and special representative Saburo Kurusu, had been conducting extended talks with the State Department regarding the U.S. reactions to the Japanese move into Việt Nam in the summer (see above).

In the days before the attack, a long 14-part message was sent to the Embassy from the Foreign Office in Tokyo (encrypted with the Type 97 cryptographic machine, in a cipher named PURPLE by U.S. cryptanalysts), with instructions to deliver it to Secretary of State Cordell Hull at 1 p.m. Washington time. The last part arrived late Saturday night (Washington time) but due to decryption and typing delays, and to Tokyo's failure to stress the crucial necessity of the timing, her Embassy personnel did not deliver the message breaking off negotiations to Secretary Hull until several hours after the attack.

The United States had decrypted the 14th part well before the Japanese Embassy managed to, and long before the Embassy managed a fair typed copy. The final part, with its instruction for the time of delivery, prompted General George Marshall, Army Chief of Staff, to send that morning's warning message to Hawaii.[29] There were delays because General Marshall couldn't be found (he was out for a morning horseback ride), trouble with the Army's long distance communication system, a decision not to use the Navy's parallel facilities despite an offer to permit it, and various troubles during its travels over commercial cable facilities (somehow its "urgent" marking was misplaced, adding additional hours to its travel time). It was actually delivered to General Walter Short, by a young Japanese-American cycle messenger, several hours after the attack had ended.

Japanese records, admitted into evidence during Congressional hearings on the attack after the War, establish that the Japanese government had not even written a declaration of war until hearing news of the successful attack. The two-line declaration of war was finally delivered to U.S. Ambassador Grew in Tokyo about 10 hours after the attack was over. He was allowed to transmit it to the United States where it was received late Monday afternoon (Washington time).

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