The Battle of Midway (Pivotal Moments in American History) (66 page)

10
. D. B. Duncan to King, Feb. 4, 1942, King Papers, NHHC, Series I, box 1. At the end of Duncan’s report, King scrawled the comment: “Excellent, K.”

11
. Duane Schultz,
The Doolittle Raid
(New York: St. Martin’s, 1988), 5–10.

12
. Ibid., 17.

13
. King to FDR, March 5, 1942, King Papers, Series I, box 1, NHHC. The document is also printed as Appendix V in Thomas B. Buell,
Master of Sea Power: A Biography of Fleet Admiral Ernest J. King
(Boston: Little, Brown and Company, 1980), 532.

14
. Buell,
Master of Sea Power
, 532; Lowell Thomas and Edward Jablonski,
Doolittle: A Biography
(Garden City, NY: Doubleday, 1976), 158.

15
. James H. “Jimmy” Doolittle, with Carroll V. Glines,
I Could Never Be So Lucky Again: An Autobiography
(New York: Bantam Books, 1991), 28–34; Thomas and Jablonski,
Doolittle: A Biography
, 13–45; Schultz,
The Doolittle Raid
, 25.

16
. Doolittle and Gaines,
I Could Never
, 98; Dik Alan Daso,
Doolittle: Aerospace Visionary
(Washington, DC: Brassey’s, 2003), 18–21; Schultz,
Doolittle Raid
, 31–32.

17
. James A. Doolittle oral history (Aug. 3, 1987), U.S. Naval Institute Oral History Collection, USNA, 12.

18
. Henry Miller (May 23, 1973), 1:30–32; and James A. Doolittle oral history (Aug. 3, 1987), 10, both in U.S. Naval Institute Oral History Collection, USNA.

19
. Henry Miller oral history (May 23, 1973), 33.

20
. Richard Cole interview (Aug. 8, 2000), NMPW, 27.

21
. James A. Doolittle oral history (Aug. 3, 1987), USNA, 20. This story is repeated in virtually every Doolittle biography, but Doolittle seems to have told it first to Carroll V. Glines, who included it in his book
Doolittle’s Tokyo Raiders
(Princeton, NJ: Van Nostrand, 1964), 53–54.

22
. Nimitz to Mrs. Nimitz, March 22, 1942, Nimitz Diary #1, NHHC; William F. Halsey, with J. Bryan III,
Admiral Halsey’s Story
(New York: Whittlesey House, 1947), 101.

23
. James A. Doolittle oral history (Aug.3, 1987), 15–16.

24
. Prange et al.,
Miracle at Midway
(New York: McGraw Hill, 1982), 111; James A. Doolittle oral history (Aug. 3, 1987), 22.

25
. James A. Doolittle oral history (Aug. 3, 1987), 31. The Japanese routinely kept all their planes on the hangar deck, bringing them up only for launching. That was one reason why they carried fewer planes on their carriers.

26
. Henry Miller oral history (May 23, 1973), 1:37; and James A. Doolittle oral history (Aug. 3, 1987), 27. Mitscher to Nimitz, April 28, 1942, Action Reports, reel 2.

27
. Clayton Fisher, “Officer and Enlisted Airmen,”
The Roundtable Forum
, April 24, 2010; Stephen Jurika oral history (March 17, 1976), 1:457; Henry Miller oral history (May 23, 1973), 1:43; James A. Doolittle oral history (Aug. 23, 1978), 15.

28
. Richard E. Cole interview (Aug. 8, 2000), 36, NMPW; Mitscher to Nimitz, April 28, 1942, Action Reports, reel 2.

29
. Richard Best interview (Aug. 11, 1995), NMPW, 23.

30
. Ibid.; Thomas and Jablonski,
Doolittle: A Biography
, 178–79; Doolittle and Gaines,
I Could Never
, 4.

31
. Halsey and Bryan,
Admiral Halsey’s Story
, 101.

32
. John B. Lundstrom,
The First Team: Pacific Naval Air Combat from Pearl Harbor to Midway
(Annapolis, MD: Naval Institute Press, 1984), 148; interview of Gilbert Martin and Paul McKay (Sept. 2000), NMPW, 181.

33
. Thomas and Jablonski,
Doolittle: A Biography
, 181.

34
. James A. Doolittle oral history (Aug. 3, 1987), 19, and Stephen Jurika oral history (March 17, 1976), 1:470–71.

35
. Doolittle to Arnold, June 5, 1942, available at
http://www.ibiblio.org/hyperwar
; Doolittle and Glines,
I Could Never
, 8; James H. Macia interview (July 21, 2000), NMPW.

36
. James A. Doolittle oral history (Aug. 3, 1987), 6.

37
. Ibid.; Doolittle and Glines,
I Could Never
, 8–9.

38
. Quentin Reynolds,
The Amazing Mr. Doolittle: A Biography of Lieutenant General James H. Doolittle
(New York: Appleton-Century-Crofts, 1953), 209–12; Doolittle and Glines,
I Could Never
, 10–11.

39
. The propaganda is quoted in Glines,
Doolittle’s Tokyo Raiders
, 337; Watanabe’s statement is from an interview by Gordon Prange (Sept. 25, 1964), Prange Papers, UMD, box 17.

Chapter 7

1
. Two excellent general summaries of the code-breaking wars in early 1942 are Ronald Lewin,
The American Magic: Codes, Ciphers and the Defeat of Japan
(New York: Farrar Straus Giroux, 1982), and John Prados,
Combined Fleet Decoded: The Secret History of American Intelligence and the Japanese Navy in World War II
(New York: Random House, 1995), Also essential are the memoirs of W. J. Holmes,
Double-Edged Secrets: U.S. Naval Intelligence Operations in the Pacific during World War II
(Annapolis, MD: Naval Institute Press, 1979), and Edwin T. Layton, with Roger Pineau and John Costello,
And I Was There: Pearl Harbor and Midway—Breaking the Secrets
(New York: Morrow, 1985). I am indebted to William Price and Rear Admiral Donald “Mac” Showers, USN (Ret.) for their help with this chapter.

2
. Prados,
Combined Fleet Decoded
, 210–14; Layton,
And I Was There
, 29; Holmes,
Double-Edged Secrets
, 13; David Kahn,
The Reader of Gentlemen’s Mail: Herbert O. Yardley and the Birth of American Codebreaking
(New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2004).

3
. Layton,
And I Was There
, 32.

4
. Holmes,
Double-Edged Secrets
, 3; Layton,
And I Was There
, 33; Ronald W. Russell,
No Right to Win: A Continuing Dialogue with Veterans of the Battle of Midway
(New York: iUniverse, 2006), 38; Joseph J. Rochefort oral history (Aug. 14, 1969), U.S. Naval Institute Oral History Collection, USNA, 5.

5
. Rochefort oral history (Aug. 14, 1969), 6.

6
. John Winton,
Ultra in the Pacific: How Breaking Japanese Codes and Ciphers Affected Naval Operations against Japan 1941–45
(London: Cooper, 1993), 6.

7
. Rochefort oral history (Aug. 14, 1969), 104.

8
. Ibid., 99.

9
. Edward Layton oral history (May 30, 1970), U.S. Naval Institute Oral History Collection, USNA, 137; Frederick D. Parker,
A Priceless Advantage: U.S. Navy Communications Intelligence and the Battles of Coral Sea, Midway, and the Aleutians
(Ft. Meade, MD: Center for Cryptologic History, National Security Agency, 1993), 16.

10
. Holmes,
Double-Edged Secrets
, 16; William Price, “Why There Was a Battle of Midway,” lecture presented at the U.S. Navy Memorial, Washington, DC, June 4, 2009.

11
. Lewin,
American Magic
, 55. The example of how “east” might be encrypted is borrowed from Russell,
No Right to Win
, 28–30.

12
. Rochefort oral history (Aug. 14, 1969), 131; the decrypted message (050202) is from the Layton Papers, NWC, box 26, folder 4. See also Jonathan B. Parshall and Anthony P. Tully,
Shattered Sword: The Untold Story of the Battle of Midway
(Washington, DC: Potomac Books, 2005), 60.

13
. Holmes,
Double-Edged Secrets
, 54

14
. Interview of Rear Admiral Donald “Mac” Showers by the author (May 4, 2010); Rochefort oral history (Aug. 14, 1969), 110–17, 126. Some of those who worked with Rochefort in the “dungeon” were subsequently angered by the popular portrayal of him as weirdly eccentric, though Rochefort himself later remarked, “If you desire to be a real cryptanalyst, being a little nuts helps.” Rochefort oral history (Aug. 14, 1969), 13.

15
. Rochefort oral history (Aug. 14, 1969), 34; Layton oral history (May 31, 1970), 124–25.

16
. Parker,
Priceless Advantage
, 16–17; Layton,
And I Was There
, 259.

17
. Layton oral history (May 30, 1970), 167.

18
. King to Nimitz, May 4, 1942, Nimitz Papers, NHHC, box 1:431; Layton oral history (May 30, 1971), 14–15.

19
. Layton oral history (May 30, 1970), 79.

20
. Parker,
Priceless Advantage
, 19, 22. MacArthur in particular was skeptical of the conclusions offered by the cryptanalysts and preferred to rely on “hard” intelligence gleaned by scout planes and submarines.

21
. Ibid., 108; Rochefort oral history (Aug. 14, 1969), 26; Rochefort oral history (Sept. 21, 1969), 145.

22
. Holmes,
Double-Edged Secrets
, 65; Parker,
Priceless Advantage
, 18, 20; John B. Lundstrom,
Black Shoe Carrier Admiral: Frank Jack Fletcher at Coral Sea, Midway, and Guadalcanal
(Annapolis, MD: Naval Institute Press, 2006), 120–22.