Attack on Pearl Harbor (22 page)

Of the fourteen sorties, two American fighters were lost. The survivors submitted claims for ten kills and four probables. The AAF awarded official credit for nine kills; a close analysis indicated that the actual score might have been as low as eight kills and as high as eleven. That represents a four-to-one (or 5.5 to one) kill ratio in favor of the American fighters.

Just as significantly, twelve of the fourteen American fighters, outnumbered in the air by 36 of the vaunted A6M Zeros, survived and returned to their bases.

In spite of an overwhelming aerial superiority in numbers and aircraft performance, the Japanese fighters did not sweep the skies of defending fighters. This was a disappointing performance by the Japanese fighters, and certainly a failure to achieve their primary mission.

The performance of the Japanese fighters will be further examined in
Chapter 9
.

The Second-Wave Dive-Bomber Attack

Before taking off, the dive-bomber aircrews were told there were no carriers in port. With their primary target absent, one aviator reported that they “were told to attack the same targets as the first wave,”
²⁵
meaning battleships. Another recorded they were to “finish off ships damaged in the first attack, preferably the battleships.”
²⁶

These oral instructions contradicted the prioritization plans, which directed the dive-bombers to attack cruisers before hitting battleships. It meant using GP bombs against battleships, in spite of the fact that the Japanese recognized that these bombs could be expected to do only superficial damage. Why the targeting instructions were changed at this last minute is unknown.

The dive-bombers’ strike leader, Lieutenant Commander Shimazaki Shigekazu, signaled the attack at 0854 as they approached Kaneohe Naval Air Station on their path to Pearl Harbor. They were greeted by a tremendous volume of AA fire, something never before seen in their combat experience over China, a stunning development. A massive column of smoke rose from Battleships Row and drifted over Ford Island, obscuring any chances for an up-wind attack against the battleships. An almost solid layer of clouds covered the harbor at 3,500 to 5,000 foot altitude, interposing between their usual pitch-over altitude of 10,000 feet. Shimazaki could not have been happy with the conditions.

Fuchida, orbiting the harbor, watched as the dive-bombers approached.
Nevada
had slipped her moorings and was underway heading south between Ford Island and the shipyard. He saw this as a great opportunity to sink a ship in the channel and bottle up the entire Pacific Fleet. He had instructed his aviators in the pre-strike briefings to be alert for such a chance. He said that he considered assuming command of the dive-bombers, but demurred when he saw the leader of the dive-bombers lining up against the
Nevada
.

A large oiler backed into the channel as
Nevada
passed. The
Neosho
was nearly as massive as a battleship, 25,000 tons at full load. It would have been easier for the dive-bombers to sink her in the channel rather than a heavily armored battleship. The oiler was mostly ignored.

Lieutenant Makino Saburo, leader of
Kaga’s
dive-bombers, headed for
Nevada
. Other bombers moved into position. As
Nevada
pulled abreast of 1010 Dock they attacked from two directions, into the wind from the southwest and crosswind from the southeast.
²⁷

The dive-bombers were handicapped by environmental conditions. When using their 55-degree dives initiated from 2,000 meters (6,561 feet) altitude, the planes had to start a half-mile from their target. However, huge pillars of smoke were rising from Ford Island, Battleship Row, and Hickam Field, and clouds had moved in creating a nearly solid cloud base from 2,000 to 3,500 feet, obscuring targets except for fleeting glances. It was hard to identify targets, and hard to establish a path to attack the targets.

About 14 dive-bombers attacked
Nevada
.

Many of the American ships had awnings mounted to shade their living compartments from the tropical sun. The awnings broke up the normal profiles on the ships’ identification cards with which the aviators had trained, making differentiating battleships from large auxiliaries difficult.

The attack dragged as the bombers sorted out targets. Bombers were metered into the airspace, as they customarily would attack in order of each
shotai
in each ship’s formation of bombers, with units waiting until the previous attackers had completed their dives.

American observers noted some strange behavior on the part of the dive-bombers. Sometimes they appeared to just dive through a hole in the smoke, and then set up to attack whatever they found below them. Some of the dive-bombers were observed on an attack path toward one target, only to divert in mid-dive to a different target. Some attacked in dives steeper than the customary 55 degrees, while others glide-bombed under the cloud cover at angles of 20 to 40 degrees, an attack technique outside their normal training and beyond the settings of their bomb telescopes. The customary tactical unit of a
shotai
, consisting of three bombers, was sometimes broken up, with perhaps a third of the planes attacking individually or in pairs. Some opted for easier targets away from the maelstrom over the harbor. There was no central command and little localized control, forcing individual decisions onto stressed
shotai
leaders and individual pilots.

Defensive fire was intense. Of the 78 dive-bombers, 14 were shot down (18%) and another 14 so damaged they were written off on their return to the carriers.

While the 78 D3A Val dive bombers in the second wave gave their attentions to the ships in the harbor, 54 B5N Kate bombers loaded with 250kg GP bombs from the green aircraft carriers
Shokaku
and
Zuikaku
headed for Oahu’s airfields. Their primary targets were hangars and administrative areas. While it is impossible to separate out the damage that they inflicted from that of the previous wave’s dive bombers and strafing fighters, their attack was evidently effective. Only one salvo was a clear “miss,” a set of bombs that hit a baseball field near one of the air bases. This was a location that had been planned for an installation of underground fuel tanks, igniting a historical rumor that the Japanese had somehow obtained the Americans’ airbase building plans.

Of the 94 operational American fighters, only fourteen sorties got aloft, with two other aircraft shot down as they attempted to take off. Those fourteen sorties scored eight to eleven kills, some by interjecting themselves unnoticed into the holding patterns of Japanese aircraft waiting their turn to dive in on strafing runs against the airfields. None of the American fighters appeared over Pearl Harbor or contributed to the defense of the fleet, their primary mission.

The second wave attack began at 0854. The fleet’s defenders reckoned the attack was over around 0930.

Finally, over the harbor, the sky was clear of aircraft.

The attack left behind 2,403 people dead or dying and another 1,178 wounded. Of the dead, 1,177 were assigned to
Arizona
and 429 assigned to
Oklahoma
. Three battleships were sunk and two sinking. Two cruisers were torpedoed and three destroyers wrecked. The majority of the Army Air Force and Navy aircraft were either destroyed or damaged.

The Japanese left behind 29 aircraft with their crews, and five sunken midget submarines.

The Pre-Dawn Reconnaissance

Just prior to the day of the attack the Japanese had received accurate information that the fleet was in port and not off Maui, that no carriers were present, and there were no torpedo nets. This was important information, needed to allow the plan to be changed if necessary before the strike was launched. The submarine accomplished its mission without being detected.

Why, then, were additional floatplanes launched on the morning of the attack to repeat the reconnaissance? The chances that the fleet would move out of Pearl Harbor to Lahaina Roads on a Saturday night were miniscule—the Japanese had months of reports and knew the Americans’ operating patterns. Lahaina Roads had not been used as a fleet anchorage for almost a year due to its vulnerability to submarine attack.

The reconnaissance seaplanes might be spotted and identified. The most probable American reaction would be to launch additional fighters, in addition to the usual dawn patrol, to investigate. The air defenses might also be placed on alert, as the presence of a Japanese floatplane required the presence of warships. As it was, two radar stations on Oahu detected these aircraft at 0645.

Planning an aircraft reconnaissance of Lahaina was appropriate, in case the submarine did not accomplish its mission. However, after the submarine reported, this flight ought to have been cancelled. This is another example of the lack of flexibility demonstrated by Japanese decision makers, and another place where alert defenses could have changed the course of history.

A second floatplane was to overfly Pearl Harbor to report the number of ships and the weather conditions. Again, this was an unnecessary report. The first-wave strike would receive this information en route, about 40 minutes before the attack, with no real opportunity to act on it due to a lack of communications between leaders and the strike aircraft. At this point the information had no real tactical significance. It accurately reported that there were no carriers in the harbor, but the Japanese did not use the information, and the information did not prevent the mistaken attack on
Utah
. The weather report was not particularly useful, since the attacker would be able to see the weather for themselves in a few minutes, and the report was not needed for any decisions. Even then, a more accurate report was intercepted from a commercial Oahu radio broadcast. There simply wasn’t time (or communications paths or command and control) to react to any unique information the reconnaissance flight might discover.

Both of these sorties risked the success of the strike for very little return. Had the Army’s Air Information Center been active, a full alert could have been triggered. But the Japanese plan assumed that their scouts would not be detected, and that was the end of the matter.

Updating the Plan for the Updated Intelligence

Two different sources confirmed that the carriers were not in port. There were no changes made to the attack plan to reflect this intelligence—the planners clung to the hope that a carrier would arrive in time for the attack.

Hope is not strategy. This intolerance to dynamic circumstances was an early manifestation of the inflexibility that would dog Japanese planners throughout the war. Matsumura’s 16 torpedo bombers remained assigned to the carrier anchorages in spite of the knowledge that the carriers were absent, a stunning decision (or lack of one). Either the carriers were so important in Genda and Fuchida’s minds that they could not bear to re-allocate the aircraft, or alternately, after working on their plan for so many months they were psychologically wedded to it in all its details. Both, perhaps. Certainly the second factor was there, considering that when earlier they needed to provide a contingency plan for the case where surprise was not achieved, their response was to only make minimal changes to their established plan. This reflects a fundamental lack of flexibility in Japanese staff processes.

The meeting between Genda, Fuchida, and Murata, where they considered what to do if surprise was not achieved, was a very curious meeting. It only involved the three of them, the chief planner, the strike commander, and the commander of the torpedo bombers. Absent were the commander of the fighters and the commander of the dive-bombers, the commanders of the OCA strikes and, most significantly, any flag officers. One would think that such a momentous decision would need to be coordinated with all elements of the attack, and would warrant flag interest and review.

The torpedo bombers who were to attack the carrier anchorages were, if the carriers were missing, to seek out other targets. The attack routes available to Murata’s formations included routes against nests of destroyers and tenders, targets low on the priority list. Were these actually intended to be considered as targets, considering that only “crippling power” was allocated against the battleships? How could Murata’s aviators be expected to allocate their attacks down a priority list without information on the damage inflicted to higher priority targets by other torpedo bombers that they might not see?

The failure to react when circumstances were different from those assumed in the plan meant that 16 carrier attack planes were buzzing about Pearl Harbor looking for targets, an air traffic control horror story.

Fuchida’s Fumble with the Flares

The process of communicating using flares was not well thought out. Fuchida fired two flares, which was interpreted both as signaling the “surprise” and “no surprise” contingency plans by different elements of the force. The attack went into the attack with the same level of organization as the Kentucky Derby after the horses are turned loose. Everyone was racing for their target, the dive-bombers under the assumption that the defenders had been alerted, and the torpedo bombers realizing that surprise had been achieved and wanting to get their attack in before the defenders woke up. According to one of the observers on a torpedo-carrying Kate, “Due to miscommunication between our pilots the attack sequence was utter confusion. All of our aircraft were trying to attack at the same time.”
¹

The planners failed to provide a clear and reliable means of communicating which attack plan was to be used. They also failed to provide a plan that could be executed in an organized manner should the enemy defenses be alert. “Surprise,” and then “no surprise” was signaled, resulting in disarray. The communications problem could have been easily solved, either by designating different colored flares for each plan, or by specifying an interval between two flares as the signal, or by having the flares fired only to signal a change in plan away from a default plan.

Radio was not used, either as a primary or backup means of signaling. It is not known why the Japanese would signal the initiation of the attack (“
To, to, to
,” for “charge”) and not use that same means to signal which plan was to be employed. Tactically, apparently no attempt was made to use the radio by the leaders of the torpedo bombers to prevent the attack on
Utah
, or to sort out and allocate targets. Although as we have seen, the IJN’s radio equipment at the time was flawed, the Japanese had not yet come to terms with radio’s command and coordination potential.

Fuchida’s attitude towards his error with the flares is remarkable. Rather than taking responsibility for the error, he disingenuously attempted to convince a historian that his blunder was of no import. This claim was accepted for 65 years, but more thorough analysis indicates that Fuchida’s blunder was significant. It cost lives and wasted weapons.

The mistimed wake-up call to Pearl Harbor came as bombs detonated on Ford Island a short distance from Battleship Row. A more effective reveille cannot be imagined. In exchange, the Japanese destroyed an aircraft and a hangar, targets that were not time-critical and could have no impact on the early part of the battle. If surprise had indeed been lost, the first bombs ought to have been targeted as SEAD to support the torpedo bombers’ attack—but the Japanese did not think in those terms.

Most of the ships in Pearl Harbor were in Condition Three, an alert status that required 25% of the anti-aircraft battery to be manned, with ammunition adjacent to the guns but locked in ready service lockers. These explosions triggered a frantic search for the keys, which in most cases were held by the senior duty officer, the duty gunnery officer, or the duty gunners mate. Many impatient gun crews smashed the locks off. The minutes required to get the “ready” guns firing were provided through Fuchida’s error.

The average time to get the ship’s anti-aircraft batteries into operation was five minutes for the battleships, four minutes for the cruisers, and seven minutes for the destroyers.
²
The first bomb landed about two minutes before the first torpedo detonated against
Utah
, which in turn was several minutes before the attack developed against Battleship Row. The bomb explosions preceded the torpedo attack against Battleship Row by about four to five minutes, compared to the four to seven minutes needed to get AA batteries in operation.

The first torpedo planes to attack Battleship Row took fire, led by Murata and Lieutenant (junior grade) Goto Jinichi. Goto reported, “In spite of the surprise attack early on a Sunday morning Murata and I saw machine-gun bullets coming onto us before we launched our torpedoes!… We were under a curtain of machine-gun fire.”
³

The premature warning allowed American machine gunners on
Bagley
critical seconds to get their weapons in operation.
Bagley
reported that she was able to engage the third torpedo bomber in the stream of attackers.

Fuchida’s blunder cost lives and aircraft.

A British study of low-level aircraft bombing attacks against merchant ships in the Mediterranean found that when ships fired back during an aircraft attack, 10% of the ships were sunk, while 25% were sunk when they did not. The AA only shot down 4% of the attacking aircraft, but reduced the rate of ships being sunk by two thirds. At Pearl Harbor, the defensive fire caused torpedoes to be launched outside the release envelope, disrupted their aim, and contributed to poor target selection as the torpedo bomber crews hurried to drop against the easiest available target. Of the 40 torpedoes brought to the battle, 35 were dropped, 19 hit a ship and perhaps 4 ran but missed their targets. Probably a total of 12 torpedoes (34% of those dropped) were delivered out-of-envelope or had technical failures and ended up stuck in the bottom mud of the harbor. Two of the 12 were dropped against
Utah
, three against
Helena
, and seven against Battleship Row.

The poor approach tactics handicapped the attackers. Most of those that attacked Battleship Row flew directly past the Navy Yard, one at a time, allowing the gunners on
Bagley
and other ships to practice, learn, adjust, and hit.

Fuchida’s fumble with the flares contributed to the loss of five torpedo bombers and precious torpedoes that were shot down or jettisoned before launch, and probably also contributed to the improper delivery of 12 others.

Assessment: Torpedo Attack

One of the ideas pounded home during the aviators’ briefings was that heavy damage on one battleship would be better than slight damage on many battleships. This was one of Genda’s initial planning principles. Yamamoto, too, wanted battleships crippled or sunk. How many torpedo hits are required to sink a battleship?

The US Naval War College assessed that the Treaty classes present at Pearl Harbor could take six to seven Japanese aerial torpedo hits before sinking. If the hits were scored within a fifteen minute period they could only take four to five, as the ships’ counterflooding capability would be overwhelmed and the ship would capsize.
⁴
A postwar study conducted by the US Navy’s Operations Evaluation Group derived similar numbers.
⁵

American battleships sacrificed speed in favor of sturdy construction, heavy armor and better torpedo protection. The damage-resistance capability of their hulls was demonstrated when the
Colorado
-class hull of the battleship
Washington
(BB-47) had to be expended under the terms of the Washington Naval Treaty, and so was used for damage-resistance tests.
⁶
Two 400-pound torpedo warheads and three 1,000-pound bombs were detonated against the torpedo defense system. The hull remained afloat for three days, even without a crew to perform damage control.

The best condition to resist damage is where the ship is at sea, with General Quarters set, fuel levels and tank closures in combat condition, the firemain split and pressurized,
⁷
dewatering systems manned and ready, and with the ship buttoned up with all watertight doors secured. This was known as “Material Condition Zed,” or, more familiarly, Zed.

Zed was not maintained in harbor. Maintenance, repairs, and resupply had to be performed, watertight doors were open for access and ventilation, and at times tanks and voids and other unmanned compartments were opened for corrosion inspections or maintenance. Open doors, hatches and access ports allowed progressive flooding, where water can spread far beyond the immediate vicinity of the hit.

The effects of reduced watertight integrity on ships in port were demonstrated earlier in the European war. The Japanese were aware of them via information from their Axis partners.
⁸
On 14 October 1939, the British battleship
Royal Oak
was sunk by three German submarine torpedoes in Scapa Flow. At Taranto on 12 November 1940, the Italian battleships
Conte di Cavour
and
Caio Duilio
were each hit by one aerial torpedo and sunk, and
Littorio
(a modern ship completed in 1940) was intentionally grounded after three aerial torpedo hits. In November of 1941 the British battleship
Barham
was sunk by three German submarine torpedoes when she was underway, though not at Action Stations.