REVIEWS & COMMENTARY

Book Reviews & Letters to the Editors by Tom Kimmel

 

Samuel Eliot Morison,

HISTORY OF UNITED STATES NAVAL OPERATIONS

IN WORLD WAR II, VOLUME THREE,

The Rising Sun in the Pacific 1931-April 1942,

Little Brown and Company, Boston, 1948;

Naval Institute Press, Reprint edition, April 15, 2010

Reviewed by Tom Kimmel

 

Samuel Eliot Morison’s treatment of Admiral Kimmel, the Commander of the Pacific Fleet at Pearl Harbor during the attack, in his 1948 The Rising Sun in the Pacific was, in his words, uncharitable, and based on insufficient facts.   His manly efforts to atone for his misgivings are commendable and important to history.  His current publisher, the Naval Institute Press, should ensure that readers are aware of Mr. Morison’s revised analysis, and the shortcomings that led to it.

 

Thirteen years after writing The Rising Sun in the Pacific, Morison manifested second thoughts about his unfavorable treatment of Kimmel, and General Short, the head of Army Hawaiian Command; and his favorable treatment of others, specifically, the heads of the Army, Army War Plans, and Army Intelligence, Generals Marshall, Gerow, and Miles, respectively; and the heads of the Navy, Navy War Plans, and Navy Intelligence, Admirals Stark, Turner, and Wilkinson, respectively.

 

The Saturday Evening Post published Morison’s article, “The Lessons of Pearl Harbor,” on October 27, 1961:

 

[Kimmel and Short] were no more to blame than officers in Washington—especially Admirals Stark and Turner, and Generals Marshall and Gerow. . . .The writer is greatly indebted to Mrs. Roberta Wohlstetter for permission to read her as yet unpublished study Warning and Decision at Pearl Harbor, and to Walter Lord’s Day of Infamy (1957) for many facts that he did not encounter when he made his study of Pearl Harbor for The Rising Sun in the Pacific (1948) [emphasis supplied].

 

Morison was even more contrite in his 1961 letter to Admiral Shafroth, the President of the U.S. Naval Academy Alumni Association (USNAAA):

 

I have come out of this study with a more charitable feeling toward Gen. Short and Adm. Kimmel than I felt before. It seems to me that they are, to put it briefly, no more blamable than a number of people in Washington—Turner and Gerow, Marshall, Miles, Wilkinson. If I were pushed to name one person as being more careless or stupid than all the rest it would be Kelly Turner; but he has not even received mention in the Congressional Committee Minority Report.

 

Mrs. Wohlstetter . . . is largely responsible for changing my views [and] ought to be thanked.

 

If you and your friends are getting up any sort of petition to have Admiral Kimmel's status restored or record changed, you can count on me to sign it. [Indeed, a USNAAA endorsed initiative by the Pearl Harbor Survivors Association in 1984 was elevated to law in 2000. The chief sponsor of the bill was, then Senator, Joe Biden. See http://www.pearlharbor911attacks.com for details.]

 

 

Our leader at the Battle of Midway, Admiral Raymond Spruance counseled Morison in a letter under date of November 29, 1961 (author’s file):

 

I have just read once more your Saturday Evening Post article on "The Lessons of Pearl Harbor." . . . . Certainly from the time I arrived in Pearl Harbor at mid-September 1941 until 7 December, I always felt that the Navy there was very much on the alert for a possible attack. This was especially true when we were operating at sea, but it also applied when the ships were in Pearl Harbor. . . .

 

I have always felt that Kimmel and Short were held responsible for Pearl Harbor in order that the American people might have no reason to lose confidence in their Government in Washington. This was probably justifiable under the circumstances at that time, but it does not justify forever damning these two fine officers.

 

In a letter, dated March 10, 1960 (author’s file), Admiral Dave H. Clark, senior Pacific Fleet material officer on Kimmel’s staff, commander of the Norfolk Naval Shipyard, and President of The American Society of Naval Engineers, critiqued for Morison’s edification several referenced pages of The Rising Sun in the Pacific in the following particulars among others:

 

1. Pages 78 and 79—Morison minimized the importance of the Japanese spy messages and ignored the fact that Kimmel made it a condition in accepting command that he be furnished full military and diplomatic intelligence, which, the record shows, he did not receive. 

 

2. Pages 133 and 134—Morison failed to explain that the reason training in the Pacific Fleet was continued at the expense of alertness was only because Kimmel lacked the intelligence available to Washington which would have indicated that the time had come to suspend training and to utilize the men and material available to the utmost in the period immediately ahead. The tragic mistake was Washington not furnishing Kimmel and Short with the intelligence directly related to Pearl Harbor.

 

3. Page 134—Morison criticized Kimmel for not making Admiral Bloch his deputy ashore for cooperating with the Army in defense of Oahu, but, of course, this is exactly what Bloch’s job was.

 

4. Pages 134 and 135—Morison again minimized the importance of intelligence denied to Kimmel.  Clark noted that, the important and tragic error was that for some unexplained reason much intelligence applying directly to the Pacific Fleet and to Hawaii was not furnished to Kimmel, Bloch, or Short. No one can evaluate intelligence relating to their Commands as effectively as the Commanders in the field. There are those who have concluded that this intelligence was denied them through cupidity. Since no direct evidence proving this was ever adduced, Clark said it was either cupidity, or stupidity. Certainly, it is disappointing that the Congressional Investigation failed to determine why intelligence available in Washington and of vital importance to the discharge of their responsibilities, was not furnished Kimmel, Bloch, and Short. This could have been done through the simple interrogation of General Marshall and Admiral Stark, and depending on their answers, others higher or lower in the scheme of things as may have been necessary.

 

5. Pages 141 and 142—Morison again minimized the importance of intelligence denied Kimmel by endorsing Admiral Wilkinson’s absurd testimony that Navy intelligence had “not the slightest” hint that Pearl Harbor was a Japanese target. Clark noted that, the President, the State Department, the War Department and the Navy Department had a vast amount of intelligence which strongly suggested that an attack on the Pacific Fleet at Pearl Harbor was imminent, and none of this was furnished Kimmel, Bloch, or Short.  Clark offered there was no doubt in his mind (and he believed any officer who ever served with Kimmel would express the same view) that had Kimmel been furnished the intelligence on December 2nd regarding the Japanese Consul at Honolulu being directed to furnish continually information regarding the ships in Pearl Harbor, and the further intelligence (available in Washington Saturday night, December 6) which pointed to 0730 Hawaiian Time December 7 as the hour of destiny, not only would training schedules in the Pacific Fleet have been interrupted, and the Fleet and the Army in Hawaii alerted, but air searches and all other measures would have been instituted to the extent possible with the forces available. In short, the Tragedy of Pearl Harbor would have been averted.

 

In addition to Admiral Clark’s comments, there were many more facts that Morison must have belatedly considered before his public mea culpa, such as:

 

1. Page 44—Morison should have been aware that his statement, “Admiral Richardson instituted a plane patrol to westward of Oahu that covered considerably more ocean than did the one subsequently set up by Admiral Kimmel,” was so misleading as stated as to be historically worthless. In the week preceding the attack, there was a daily scout by patrol planes on Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday, of a sector to the north and northwest of Oahu to a distance of four hundred miles, after which the planes required maintenance and upkeep. This distance covered was greater than that searched by Admiral Richardson at the time of the June 17, 1940 Alert—the only Alert received prior to the attack. (Report of the Joint Committee on the Investigation of the Pearl Harbor Attack Congress of the United States; Pearl Harbor Attack [hereafter PHA], U. S. Congress, Joint Congressional Committee [hereafter JCC] on the Investigation of the Pearl Harbor Attack, 79th Congress, 40 parts, Washington, D.C.: U.S. Government Printing Office, 1946, Part 32, page 451 [Hereafter 32PHA451])

 

2. Page 86—Morison should have known that his statement, “[Yamamoto] was cognizant of Admiral Kimmel’s habit of bringing the Fleet into Pearl Harbor every weekend,” was not true.  The Naval Court of Inquiry found that the fact all the battleships were in Pearl Harbor on December 7th was pure coincidence, and not the normal practice. (Naval Court of Inquiry [hereafter NCI] Finding of Fact II, 39PHA298)

 

3. Page 100—Morison should have known that his statement, “The main and 5-inch batteries were not manned at all; the plotting room, directors and ammunition supply were not manned; and, in the machine guns that were manned, the ready ammunition was in locked boxes and the Officer of the Deck had the keys,” was not true as determined by the Naval Court of Inquiry. (NCI Finding of Fact X, 39PHA302)

 

4. Page 128—Morison should have known that his unattributed statement, “on 20 August General Martin advised General Short that the most probable approach of a Japanese carrier force would be from the northwestward,” would, and did, cause much unwarranted mischief.  There was no most probable sector identified in writing before the attack—see CNO Trost’s letter to SECNAV Dalton, under date of  October 4, 1994, copy available at http://www.pearlharbor911attacks.com.

 

5. Pages 134 and 141—Morison takes Kimmel to task for moving ashore by twice implying he was more interested in “Sabbatical rest” than operations at sea. Morison fails to mention that Nimitz, King, and Hart did the same thing for the same reason— their staffs were too large to remain afloat.

 

Morison wrote of the attack that, “One can search military history in vain for an operation more fatal to the aggressor.”  Likewise, one can search The Rising Sun in the Pacific in vain for any mention of an investigation more favorable to the accused, Admiral Kimmel, than the Pearl Harbor Naval Court of Inquiry (NCI).  The NCI effectively exonerated Admiral Kimmel, and was the only tribunal that accorded Admiral Kimmel the opportunity to defend himself, yet Morison makes no mention of it.  Such an omission by a competent historian is unconscionable, and demands redress. Even he thought so.  Perhaps the Naval Institute Press should make its readers aware of Morison’s errors, if not for Kimmel’s legacy, Morison’s.

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Percy & Bettina Greaves, Pearl Harbor:  The Seeds and Fruits of Infamy

 Reviewed by Tom Kimmel

 

Percy and Bettina Greaves [Pearl Harbor:  The Seeds and Fruits of Infamy, Mises Institute, Auburn, Alabama, 2010, 937 pages] never mention, but more than justify Vice President Joe Biden’s pre-election comment that, “[The Rear Admiral Kimmel and Major General Short matter] is the most tragic injustice in American military history.”  And they do so without ever using the word, conspiracy.  Just the facts—mainly those uttered under oath by the principals involved, many who are thus injured by the testimony that they intended to use to injure others:  Army Chief of Staff George Marshall and Chief of Naval Operations Harold Stark most notably.  The fact that the Department of Defense remains almost willfully obtuse to these facts continues to disappoint; indeed, amaze.

 

In 2000, the Congress, led by then Senator Joe Biden, passed a law recommending that the President posthumously advance Kimmel and Short to their highest held temporary ranks in World War II in accordance with the Officer Personnel Act of 1947 from which they alone have been punitively excluded.  Percy Greaves deceased in 1984, the same year that the Pearl Harbor Survivors Association (PHSA) initiated the preceding action. Clearly, PHSA would have referenced this book in its decades long struggle had it been available to them. Before the sun finally sets on PHSA the matter should be revisited using this book as exhibit A+: a well-deserved A+.

 

The Seeds:  A chronological trace of the conflicting forces from 1894 that led the Japanese to attack Pearl Harbor in 1941.   The chronology depicts a well-informed President secretly making, but not declaring war; or an innocently-surprised President honorably standing on principle.  The reader is prompted to decide.

The Seeds alone is worth the price of the book, but the payoff is The Fruits.

The Fruits:  Another chronology, but this time by a Pearl-Harbor story principal, Percy Greaves, who served as the minority counsel for the Joint Congressional Committee (JCC) investigating the attack.  This makes the book perhaps the last first-hand account of the Pearl-Harbor story we will ever get, which by itself automatically makes the book unique, and important.

Greaves is at his best describing what he knows best, his work for JCC member Senator Homer Ferguson.  Greaves suggested the lead that led to the highlight of the entire JCC proceeding—the testimony of Navy Commander Lester R. Schultz, who on December 6th delivered the 13th part of the 14-part Japanese response to the American Note of November 26, 1941, prompting the President to famously say, “This means war.”  This in turn prompted investigators to wonder if the President could possibly read this secret communication from the enemy, declare that, “this means war,” and not immediately reach out for the heads of his army and navy.  Thus begins the sycophantic stories of Marshall’s mendacity and Stark’s shame presented in their own disgraceful words chronologically.

Greaves presents news to this life-long student of the attack.  Commander Joe Rochefort, the cyptographic hero of the June 4-7, 1942, Battle of Midway, inexplicably was also a casualty of the post-Pearl Harbor attack personnel changes and ordered in October 1942 to command a floating drydock in San Francisco.  Enroute he serendipitously met Kimmel in New York and gave Kimmel his first hint that crucial information about Japanese intentions had been available in Washington prior to the attack, which had not been relayed to him in Pearl Harbor.  This then may well have been the genesis of Kimmel’s long march toward vindication, and helped explain why the Office of Naval Intelligence (ONI) in Washington, D.C., which Kimmel was forced to rely on prior to the Pearl Harbor attack, was ignored by Kimmel’s successor, Admiral Nimitz, after the attack. Indeed, ONI was not even aware of the Battle of Midway until it was over.  Rochefort’s belated vindication came posthumously in 1985 when awarded the Distinguished Service Medal.

Bettina Greaves demonstrates enormous discipline by offering almost nothing that was learned after her husband deceased in 1984.  This adds much to the credibility of the work, which, of course, is attributed to him.  Nonetheless, Mrs. Greaves must have been sorely tempted to include a host of relevant information made public since 1984—a couple of examples should suffice for the point:

1. President Reagan's Director of Central Intelligence William Casey wrote in 1988 that, “The British had sent word that a Japanese fleet was steaming east toward Hawaii.”
(William Casey, The Secret War Against Hitler, 1988, p.7);


2. MI6’s Joint Intelligence Committee (JIC) Chairman Victor Cavendish-Bentinck reportedly said that, “We knew that [the Japanese Fleet] had changed course [by Friday, December 5, 1941]. I remember presiding over a JIC meeting and being told that a Japanese Fleet was sailing in the direction of Hawaii, asking ‘Have we informed our transatlantic brethren?’ and receiving an affirmative reply.” (Richard Aldrich, Intelligence and the War Against Japan, Cambridge Press, 2000, p.87);

3. Sir Julian Ridsdale, member of the JIC, "Recalled a JIC meeting at which radio silence adopted by the Japanese fleet was discussed and its possible destinations reviewed. Pearl Harbor was one of the targets thought most likely and as a result a warning telegram was despatched to Washington. [He later] met with Cavendish-Bentinck and confirmed that a warning telegram had been despatched." (Richard Aldrich, Intelligence and the War Against Japan, Cambridge Press, 2000, p.87);

4. Army Pearl Harbor Board (APHB) Member USA General Henry Russell’s APHB reminiscences. (Henry Russell, Pearl Harbor Story, 2001 {written 1946});

5. Admiral Arthur McCollum’s October 7, 1940 “Action Proposal” to D/ONI revealed in 1999 by Robert Stinnett, Day of Deceit.; and

6. VENONA declassification in 1995 by NSA confirming that Harry Dexter White and Launchlin Currie were Soviet spies.

Percy Greaves once wrote that there was no need to go beyond the known facts in telling the Pearl Harbor story.  He was correct, and this book is testament to a noble effort to get the facts straight as he knew them.

 

Tom Kimmel is a former naval officer, a retired FBI agent, and a grandson of Admiral Kimmel. For more information his website is: http://www.pearlharbor911attacks.com.

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Fred Borch & Daniel Martinez, Kimmel, Short, and Pearl Harbor, The Final Report Revealed,

Reviewed by Tom Kimmel

Kimmel, Short, and Pearl Harbor, The Final Report Revealed, by Army attorney Fred Borch, and Park Ranger Daniel Martinez, purports to be revealing and final. It is neither, because it suffers the same shortcoming as the Dorn Report itself, which it annotates. While some of the historian promoters on the book’s dustcover, Messrs Goldstein, Love, Stillwell, and Polmar do have military experience—none of the authors has any operational military experience, nor do they defer to flag officers who held high command at sea, that do. In an apparent effort to offer some balance of opinion, a counterpoint paper by former COMSIXTHFLT (Commander Sixth Fleet), and D/CINCPAC (Deputy Commander in Chief Pacific) Vice Admiral David Richardson is added as an appendix, but it is ignored.

The issue is this: Should Rear Admiral Kimmel and Major General Short, the commanders at Pearl Harbor during the attack, continue to be punitively excluded by the Navy and by the Army as the only flag and general officers, otherwise qualified, not to receive the benefit of the Officer Personnel Act of 1947--advancement to their highest temporary ranks held in World War II of admiral, and lieutenant general, respectively? The authors and dustcover promoters, except Mr. Stillwell (page 105), say yes. Giants of World War II, Nimitz, Halsey, Spruance, Kinkaid, and Burke say no. Admiral Richardson drives the point home in his counterpoint appendix. In fact, in writing, the United States Congress, the Pearl Harbor Survivors Association, the Naval Academy Alumni Association, the Admiral Nimitz Foundation, the Veterans of Foreign Wars, six former Chiefs of Naval Operations, two former Chairmen of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, one former Director of Central Intelligence, thirty-three four-star admirals (seven already mentioned), and the official historian of naval operations in World War II say no.

To the authors' credit the false allegation that Admiral Kimmel's "most grievous failure," was that he knew of and ignored advice regarding the direction and extent to which he should have ordered long-range air reconnaissance prior to the attack on Pearl Harbor is not made, as it was so recklessly made by the book's Foreword writer in 1981 in At Dawn We Slept, page 733, and again in 1986 in Pearl Harbor, The Verdict of History, page 441, in a chapter even titled, His [Admiral Kimmel's] Most Grievous Failure (see "Reopen the Kimmel Case," by Michael Gannon, Naval Institute of Proceedings, December 1994). Less credit is due the authors for styling At Dawn We Slept as, "acknowledged by professional historians as the best single-volume history of Pearl Harbor." How can that be while still containing this most grievous error, which has never been acknowledged, let alone corrected, by its authors? Perhaps the most-dangerous-sector myth that Admiral Nimitz tried so hard to kill in 1942 is finally dead--notwithstanding an effort to resurrect it by another contributing dustcover historian, Mr. Polmar, in his latest book.

The authors, page12, inaccurately list the date and the attendees at the April 27, 1995 Thurmond Hearing, page 12. I, and others are left out, but see Admiral Richardson's appendix, page 124, for an accurate list and date (unfortunately, this appendix is not indexed). These errors are not of much moment until the authors state that, "Unfortunately for the Navy, [the General Counsel of the Navy] Steve Honigman had been too strident and combative in the meeting. Thurmond was now more convinced than ever that the Navy could not be fair." Actually Honigman was worse than strident. As the chief gatherer of facts for the attending Secretary of the Navy and the Deputy Secretary of Defense he was wrong on a key fact as he read what he styled "the official position of the Navy today" to Chairman Thurmond and all assembled. With great certainty he argued against Kimmel stating that Kimmel had been allowed to call and to cross-examine witnesses before the Joint Congressional Committee, which is flat wrong as I pointed out to Mr. Honigman in turn. The fact of the matter is that only one of the ten tribunals that investigated the attack accorded Admiral Kimmel the opportunity to call and to cross-examine witnesses, the Naval Court of Inquiry. Neither the Dorn Report, nor the authors mentioned this fact, let alone gave it any weight. What did the Naval Court of Inquiry find? You will not find out in the Dorn Report, or from the authors' annotations.

  1. They found that there was not a scintilla of evidence to support a charge of dereliction of duty against Admiral Kimmel;
  2. They found that Admiral Kimmel committed no errors of judgment;
  3. They approved of all of Admiral Kimmel's force dispositions on the basis of information that he was given;
  4. The President of the Court, Admiral Murfin, opined that they thought Admiral Kimmel had done everything possible under the circumstances; and finally
  5. They severely criticized Admiral Kimmel's only uniformed boss in the Navy, Chief of Naval Operations Admiral Stark, for not keeping Kimmel properly informed.

The authors state, page 43, that "the [Naval] Court. . . concluded that the evidence was insufficient to warrant court-martial of Admiral Kimmel. . . . However, the evidence strongly suggested 'errors of judgment'." I challenge the authors, the dustcover historians, or anyone else to cite an example of where the Naval Court of Inquiry suggested any error of judgment by Admiral Kimmel.

The authors mention, page 4, that in 1988 then Chief of Naval Operations Admiral Trost declined to support Rear Admiral Kimmel's advancement to four-star rank stating that "there is a vast difference between a degree of fault which does not warrant a punitive action and a level of performance which would warrant bestowal of a privilege," page 38. The authors fail to mention that Admiral Trost's 1988 opinion was prompted by flawed research from his Director of Naval History who relied on Mr. Goldstein's previously described most grievous error. Nor do the authors mention that, six years later the Kimmel Family finally gained access to the Director of Naval History's flawed memorandum, and Professor Michael Gannon pointed the errors out to Chief of Naval Operations Admiral Trost, who then honorably wrote to Secretary of the Navy John H. Dalton on October 4, 1994, withdrawing his memorandum to Secretary Webb, dated January 19, 1988, and asked that the case of Admiral Kimmel be reopened. "I believe such action is owed to the Admiral," he wrote, "to his sons, and to the Navy. No mistake should be allowed to stand in this sensitive matter, and I personally disavow my unwitting support of one (see "Reopen the Kimmel Case," page 56)." Today Admiral Trost supports Rear Admiral Kimmel's advancement as does former Navy Secretary James Webb. 

The authors state, page 83, that, "it is important to remember that no adverse action of any kind was ever taken against Kimmel or Short." But see the authors' bracketed addition to General Brooks' description on General Short's relief in time of war, page 9, "General Brooks viewed this relief as 'sufficient [adverse] action against him.'" The Dorn Report cover letter, with the authors' apparent approval, page 118, stated that, "The official treatment of Admiral Kimmel and General Short was substantially temperate." General Frank of the Army Pearl Harbor Board (APHB) said that, "General Short had received a soldier's greatest punishment, relief from his command, and retirement in time of war (Pearl Harbor Story, by General Henry Russell {also of the APHB}, page 160)." Recall that similar and less public adverse action against the commanding officer of the USS Indianapolis resulted in his 1968 suicide.

The authors report, pages 36 and 37, that, "There is little in the record to indicate why those decisions [not to advance Kimmel and Short] were reached. . . .Presumably decisions not to advance Admiral Kimmel and General Short were based on review of their performance at Pearl Harbor." The authors point out that General Gerow was a member of a board that reviewed such matters. Whether or not General Gerow had a hand in reviewing advancement for Short is not revealed. Recall that the famous November 27th War Warning Message, which did not do the job either in the Philippines, or in Hawaii for whatever reason, was drafted by General Gerow, and should have given him sufficient reason to recuse himself from any advancement review consideration of Short.

The authors take exception to the Dorn Report in only one instance, page 66. The Dorn Report said that, "Admiral Kimmel and General Short did not get tactical warning." (Indeed, the Dorn Report goes so far as to argue that Admiral Kimmel was not entitled to tactical information from Washington, only strategic information, and that Admiral Kimmel committed error by relying on Washington for tactical information.) The authors say, "The Dorn Report is incorrect on this point," because Admiral Kimmel received tactical warning when the USS Ward attacked a submarine at about 6:40 a.m. The authors fail to mention that the only reason the Ward attacked the submarine was because Kimmel countermanded CNO Stark's standing order not to attack submarine contacts around Hawaii--see Admiral Kimmel's Story, pages 74-77 for details (an excellent copy can be found at this link: http://www.rooseveltmyth.com/KimmelStory/ ). Should Admiral Kimmel be criticized, or praised for firing the first shot?

The Dorn Report mentioned that Admiral Kimmel had received a report on December 2, 1941 that the Japanese aircraft carriers could not be located. The authors infer much from this, page 54, but, like the Dorn Report, do not mention that that situation was normal. As the Memorandum for the Roberts Commission from Lieutenant Commander E. T. Layton, Fleet Intelligence Officer Pacific Fleet, dated January 5, 1942, 17PHA2486, clearly stated, the failure to identify Japanese carrier traffic, on and after December first when the call signs changed, was not an unusual condition. During the six months preceding Pearl Harbor, there existed a total of one hundred and thirty-four days--in twelve separate periods, each ranging from nine to twenty-two days--when the location of the Japanese carriers from radio traffic analysis was uncertain. That was 74% of the time.

The vast majority of damage at Pearl Harbor was inflicted by air-dropped torpedoes in shallow water. The prevailing wisdom of the day was that ships in Pearl Harbor were immune from such shallow-water attack by air. The Dorn Report took Kimmel to task for not requesting torpedo nets, but neither the Dorn Report nor the authors made mention of Admiral King's endorsement to the Naval Court of Inquiry, that "the decision not to install torpedo baffles appears to have been made by the Navy Department [in Washington, DC]." Furthermore no mention was made in the Dorn Report, or by the authors, that the Navy Department had a secret report in its files, dated July 15, 1941 from its London Naval attaché that the British had developed the capability to successfully air drop torpedoes in water as shallow as 24 feet. Obviously, this report would have radically changed Kimmel's estimate of the prevailing wisdom, but it was not furnished to Kimmel, or to any of the ten investigations, and was not declassified until 1998.

The authors discuss Henry Clausen's book, Pearl Harbor, Final Judgement, in considerable detail without mentioning that General Marshall's champion--not his critic--Clausen said, "Marshall. . . had caused perjured testimony to be presented to the [Army Pearl Harbor] Board. Marshall had ordered his subordinates to lie to the Army Board, and they had complied (35PHA101, and Pearl Harbor, Final Judgement, pages 193, 201). General Miles, head of Army intelligence, signed an affidavit admitting that he had lied to the APHB, and that Marshall had ordered it (35PHA102). General Gerow, the head of Army war plans also lied to the APHB. Marshall let stand testimony to the Roberts Commission by Admiral Ping Wilkinson, Director of the Office of Naval Intelligence, that, "Care was taken [in Washington] to see that these two officers [Admiral Hart in the Philippines, and Admiral Kimmel in Hawaii] were kept fully advised as to developments. [Admiral Hart and Admiral Kimmel] had available to them the same [MAGIC] information [as we did] here [in Washington]. Admiral Stark, Admiral Turner, General Gerow, and General Miles also acquiesced to Admiral Wilkinson's false testimony. The silence of the authors, the dustcover historians, and the Dorn Report to admitted official perjury disappoints. Admiral Wilkinson killed himself in 1946 by accident or design.

Mr. Polmar recently told an audience at the Naval History Center in Washington, DC that, "[Admiral Kimmel and General Short] were harassed. . .and that was wrong. They were treated poorly, no question of that. And for that I think the Navy, the Army, Congress, the Country owes them an apology."

In 1991 former CNO Arleigh Burke wrote to then Secretary of Defense Richard Cheney at Mr. Cheney’s urging and said that:

  • “It is my judgment that you should approve this posthumous promotion [of Rear Admiral Kimmel to admiral] and recommend it to the President…
  • “not because of the importance to…the Kimmel family but because of the importance to the Navy as an institution.”

Admiral Kimmel dedicated the remainder of his long life to bringing the facts about Pearl Harbor to the American public. He was remarkably successful, but clearly much still needs to be done.

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Kimmel Case Dubbed 'Totally Political'

By Fred L. Schultz

Naval History, February 2004

Michael Gannon presented “new evidence” in support of the Pearl Harbor commanders recently at the National Press Club, but political expedience may be the factor that tips the scale.

The Kimmel family and its supporters refuse to surrender. On 6 November 2003, the only living son and three grandsons of Husband Kimmel staged a press conference at the National Press Club in Washington, DC. The event sustained their efforts to persuade the President of the United States to issue a proclamation, posthumously nominating Kimmel and Walter Short, respectively the U.S. Navy and U.S. Army commanders during the 7 December 1941 Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, for retirement at their highest wartime ranks—Admiral and Lieutenant General—under the Officer Personnel Act of 1947.

According to Admiral Kimmel's son, Edward R. "Ned" Kimmel, supporters of this effort "are at war with the Department of Defense." After what he refers to as being "stonewalled at every turn" by the bureaucracy in the Pentagon (and in the White House, including a snubbing from Chief of Staff Andrew Card), he said, "I am now seeking assistance from the Press."

As part of the Armed Forces Spending Authorization Act of 2001, both houses of Congress voted unanimously in September 2000 to exonerate Admiral Kimmel and General Short and to ask the President for the elusive restoration of rank. But congressional action apparently is not enough. When asked exactly what the family and its advocates are seeking, grandson Manning M. Kimmel IV replied, "It's real simple. We need one sentence from the Commander-in-Chief."

Grandson Thomas K. Kimmel Jr. drew a parallel between the numerous Pearl Harbor investigations and the Kean Commission's current investigation of the 11 September 2001 terrorist attacks on the United States. "You might call the comparison tenuous," he said. "Actually, the parallel is frightening. . . . [B]y declining to determine true accountability for the disaster at Pearl Harbor, an entire parade of administrations may have laid the groundwork for the success of the 9/11 attack… And now, those same dynamics, which block accountability for the 9/11 disaster, may unwittingly lay the foundation for the next attack." In fact, Admiral Kimmel's son Ned volunteered to testify before the Kean Commission after reading about Chairman Thomas H. Kean's wish for more success than the "much criticized panels created after the bombing of Pearl Harbor."

The featured speaker was Dr. Michael Gannon, Distinguished Service Professor Emeritus of History from the University of Florida and a respected World War II historian, who presented "new evidence" that Kimmel and Short supporters claim bolsters their case. One of the key pieces of information, according to Gannon, comes from recently discovered documents indicating official Navy knowledge that the Japanese had developed successful shallow-water torpedoes, a fact never passed on to the Pearl Harbor commanders.

The second key element in what the Kimmel family calls the vindication "smoking gun" points to Chief of Naval Operations Admiral Ernest King's charge of dereliction of duty in 1944, based on Admiral Kimmel's choice of sectors in which long-range aerial reconnaissance would be conducted. Some sectors had been identified as "more dangerous," according to Admiral King, and Admiral Kimmel chose the wrong ones. But Gannon says that "recent research" (the basis of which he acknowledged using for a December 1994 article in the U.S. Naval Institute's Proceedings) indicates no such "more dangerous" list. Furthermore, Admiral Kimmel did not have sufficient numbers of patrol aircraft (49 PBY Catalinas) to conduct full-range surveillance over any one sector for more than four or five days. "Thus," said Gannon, "if following the so-called 'war warning' of 27 November Kimmel had thrown all his patrol aircraft into a single-sector search, the entire force would be down for repair or overhaul by 2 December, leaving the balance of days prior to 7 December unattended."

Had the shallow-water torpedo information not been withheld from Admiral Kimmel at Pearl Harbor, said Gannon, "alarm bells would have sounded insistently in Kimmel's staff offices. But the knowledge was deep-sixed until found by a researcher 60 years later. Where now is the dereliction?"

According to the Kimmel family and retired Naval Reserve Captain Vincent J. Colan, the matter remains mired in the Department of Defense, apparently in the office of Under Secretary for Personnel and Readiness, David S. C. Chu. The department allegedly has drafted two memoranda: a "Do" recommendation, with evidence to support the restoration of rank, and a "Don't" recommendation, with arguments against such an action. Efforts by Captain Colan to obtain copies of their contents have thus far proved futile.

"It's totally political," said former Chief of Naval Operations retired Admiral James Holloway. "We have to find a way that the President could make this judgment and politically benefit from it." As of press time, neither the Department of Defense nor the White House has made a further move on what has become known as "The Kimmel Case."

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Wall Street Journal

Friday, April 2, 2004

Pearl Harbor Inquiries: A Hard-Won Exoneration

Your March 22 editorial "Sins of Commission," arguing that the Kean Commission should delay issuing its report until after the presidential election, gave the mistaken impression that there was only one Pearl Harbor inquiry instead of 10, and that the "Pearl Harbor inquiry waited until after World War II to publish its findings."

This is simply not true for the famous Roberts Commission Report. That commission convened 11 days after the Pearl Harbor attack, deliberated for 36 days, and published its entire report 47 days after the attack. The Roberts Commission found that the Pearl Harbor commanders, Adm. Husband Kimmel and Gen. Walter Short, were "solely responsible for the success of the Japanese attack," and "derelict in their duty." It further found, beyond its charter, that President Roosevelt, Secretary of State Hull, Secretary of War Stimson, Secretary of the Navy Knox, Chief of Staff of the Army Marshall, and Chief of Naval Operations Stark, all in Washington, did a good job.

In 1973, former Commander-in-Chief, Pacific Fleet, Adm. J.O. Richardson, Kimmel's predecessor, said "that the Report of the Roberts Commission was the most unfair, unjust, and deceptively dishonest document ever printed by the Government Printing Office." Adm. Richardson was only able to say that because in February 1944 Capt. Laurance Safford blew the whistle to Adm. Kimmel about America's success decrypting Japanese codes prior to the Pearl Harbor attack. The decrypted codes gave indications of the place of the Pearl Harbor attack, the time of the Pearl Harbor attack, the reason for the Pearl Harbor attack, and the deceit plan to cover the Pearl Harbor attack. Kimmel and Short received none of this information even though it was available in Washington, Manila and London. After learning about this, Adm. Kimmel initiated the next eight Pearl Harbor inquiries, and not surprisingly, the only one that accorded him the opportunity to defend himself -- the Naval Court of Inquiry -- exonerated him.

Congress passed a law in 2000 recommending that this administration advance Kimmel and Short on the retired list. To date, the administration has not done so, and refuses to release requested information explaining why.

Tom Kimmel
Cocoa Beach, Fla.

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New York Times

April 20, 2004

Pearl Harbor Readiness

To the Editor:

In "How Good Intelligence Falls on Deaf Ears" (Op-Ed, March 27), David Kahn contends that the Pearl Harbor commanders, my grandfather Adm. Husband E. Kimmel and Gen. Walter C. Short, had no excuse not to be ready for the attack even if they did not have all the intelligence needed to alert them to it.

The Naval Court of Inquiry, which approved of all of Admiral Kimmel's force dispositions, found that he committed no errors of judgment and that he had done everything possible under the circumstances. In fact, Fleet Adm. Chester W. Nimitz, who succeeded Admiral Kimmel, reissued the same readiness directive that Admiral Kimmel had in place on Dec. 7, 1941.

Further, as the Army Board reported, if field commanders cannot be given information that bears upon their actions, then the War Department must give specific directions to those commanders. The Pearl Harbor commanders got neither form of assistance, even though Washington, the Philippines and Britain had information that gave indications of the time, place, reason and deceit plan to cover the attack.

Mr. Kahn worries about good intelligence falling on deaf ears, but uses an example of good intelligence not falling on the right ears.

TOM KIMMEL
Cocoa Beach, Fla., April 17, 2004
Copyright 2004 The New York Times Company

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Commentary

 

350 Japanese Planes Attacked Pearl Harbor in Two Waves

The 1st attack wave from the Kito Butai (Japanese Strike Force) involved 183 plans:

43 Zeke Fighters+40 Kate Torpeodo Bombers+51 Val Dive Bombers+49 Kate High Level Bombers=183 total attack planes

The 2nd attack wave from the Kito Butai (Japanese Strike Force) involved 167 plans:

35 Zeke Fighters+54 Kate High Level Bombers+78 Val Dive Bombers=167 total attack planes

Former Chief of Naval Operations & Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff & Pearl Harbor Attack survivor & Navy pilot Admiral Thomas Moorer: "If Nelson and Napoleon had been at Pearl Harbor, the results would have been no different." (Letter Vice Admiral David Richardson to the author, author's file.)