The U.S. Army and

In recognition of the new national security strategy’s focus on the Asia- Pacific Region, ARMY Magazine will include articles this year on the role of land forces in the Pacific theater in peace and war. Articles will highlight the history and current presence in the region. We start with . y v a N

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By COL Stanley L. Falk f the 43,000 officers and men in the U.S. Army’s Hawai - AUS retired ian Department on December 7, 1941, barely a handful Owere awake and at work in the predawn hours of that warm, sleepy Sunday morning. Among those on duty were a few members of the Signal Aircraft Warning Company, Hawaii, manning half a dozen new mobile SCR-270 radar sets at key locations on the island of Oahu. These air warning stations, while still in a training status, had been operating for three hours daily since Thanksgiving,

Above, the destroyer Shaw ex - when LTG Walter C. Short, the department commander, had issued plodes in the floating drydock, her bow blown off by a bomb. an alert order against the probable start of war with Japan.

50 ARMY I February 2013 December 7, 1941

LTG Short had acted in response to a series of warnings from the War Department that hostilities were “possible at any moment.” The wording of these warnings, however, had appeared to suggest sabotage and other subversive ac - tivities as posing the greatest danger to his command. The general’s alert order, therefore, emphasized the dangers of saboteurs and internal unrest rather than of any overt at - tack on Hawaii or its great Pearl Harbor naval base. Nevertheless, to guard against the possibility of a Japan - ese air attack—however improbable this appeared then— LTG Short directed the air warning stations to operate each day from 0400 to 0700, two hours before dawn and one hour after, the most likely time for a carrier strike. At about 0645 on December 7, the three stations on Oahu’s north shore began to pick up radar blips indicating a small number of aircraft approaching from the north. Since the U.S. Navy was known to be flying some sort of dawn patrol, the radar men ignored the blips and began to prepare to end their watch at 0700. In fact, however, these blips represented scout planes from the Japanese Pearl Har - bor Strike Force, then less than 300 miles away and prepar - ing to launch their attack. The Japanese task force, built around six heavy carriers with 360 aircraft, had left the Kuril Islands 12 days earlier and reached Hawaiian waters undetected. Its mission was to destroy the U.S. Pacific Fleet in the first hours of Japan’s war with the West. The fleet stationed at Pearl Harbor was a

powerful one and, as Japan’s naval planners well under - y m r A stood, a major threat to Japanese military ambitions. Defense . S .

of the American warships was, of course, a naval responsibil - U

Above, the engine nacelle of a destroyed Army air - craft was incorporated in a hasty antiaircraft revet - ment at Hickham Field. Below, a fuel dump burns at Hickham, with wrecked vehicles in the foreground. y m r A

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February 2013 I ARMY 51 Hawaiian Depart - ment artillerymen drill on an M1917A1 75 mm gun in a beach de - fense position dur - ing exercises in the summer of 1941. y m r A

. S . U ity, but LTG Short’s primary mission was also to protect the t a few minutes before seven on the morning of fleet. To do so, he had only limited means. On December 7, December 7, the mobile radar stations on Oahu 1941, the Hawaiian Department contained two under - prepared to shut down. At Opana, the northern - strength infantry divisions, four antiaircraft regi - Amost station on the island, PVT Joseph L. Lockard ments, four coast artillery regiments, a single company of and PVT George E. Elliott decided to keep their set in oper - light tanks, supporting troops and the Hawaiian Air Force. ation until the truck arrived to pick them up. At exactly The latter, LTG Short’s primary defense against air attack 0702, a large, luminous blip appeared on the set, larger than or invasion, included just over 230 aircraft, half of which either of them had ever seen before. They soon concluded it were obsolete. Furthermore, his aircraft warning system was a mass flight of aircraft about 130 miles away and mov - was far from complete, short on parts and trained person - ing rapidly south. It was, indeed, the 183 bombers, fighters nel, incapable of differentiating friendly from hostile planes and torpedo planes constituting the first wave of Japanese and without any mechanism for vectoring defending air - attackers. craft to intercept attackers. At approximately 0720, PVT Elliott called the Aircraft LTG Short had cordial relationships with the Pacific Warning Information Center at Fort Shafter, several miles Fleet commander, Adm. Husband E. Kimmel, and with east of Pearl Harbor, to report the radar sighting. Just about Rear Adm. Claude C. Bloch, commandant of the 14th everyone at the center had left except PVT Joseph P. Mc - Naval District, but there was no arrangement for close Donald, still on the switchboard, and LT Kermit Tyler of the Army-Navy coordination and mutual support. Completely 78th Pursuit Squadron. PVT McDonald was impressed by lacking was any effective means of developing joint plans, the report, but LT Tyler told him and the two men at Opana coordinating operations or even exchanging intelligence that the sighting was merely a group of Army B-17s ex - information. pected to arrive that morning from the mainland. Since assuming command in February, LTG Short had Privates Lockard and Elliott continued to track the on - concentrated on badly needed troop training, airfield de - coming planes until they were obscured on their screen by velopment, coastal defense improvement, and replacement the permanent echo of the surrounding mountains. Then, at of obsolete or inoperable planes and equipment, yet, on the 0739, when the Japanese aircraft were 20 miles from Oahu, eve of the Pearl Harbor attack, his defenses were inade - the two men shut down their set. A quarter of an hour later, quate to meet precisely the kind of assault the Japanese as they rode back to camp, the aerial onslaught began. were about to launch. The Japanese blow came in two great waves. The first, detected earlier by Privates Lockard and Elliott, struck at COL Stanley L Falk, AUS Ret., PhD., is a military historian about 0755 and attacked repeatedly, with few lulls or and author specializing in World War II in the Pacific. This ar - pauses, for almost an hour before withdrawing. Torpedo ticle is reprinted from the December 1991 ARMY. planes, dive bombers and high-level bombers smashed at

52 ARMY I February 2013 Japanese aerial photograph taken during the attack, showing ranks of burning and, as yet undamaged, Army aircraft at Wheeler Field in central Oahu. y v a N

. S . U the warships anchored in Pearl Harbor, while dive bombers lmost simultaneously with the raid on Hickham, and fighters pummeled Army and Navy airfields on Oahu. Japanese dive bombers struck the grounded air - The second wave, almost as large as the first but without craft of the 14th Pursuit Wing at Wheeler Field, in torpedo planes, arrived at about 0915 and followed a simi - Acentral Oahu. For 15 minutes, they wreaked havoc lar pattern of assault. By 1000 all Japanese aircraft were on among the closely parked planes. One bomb tore through a their way back to their carriers. dispensary in a former hangar, inflicting heavy casualties. Behind them lay the smoldering wreckage of the Pacific Another left a huge crater in the 34th Engineers area at Fleet: eight battleships sunk or crippled, more than half a nearby Schofield Barracks. Japanese fighters followed this dozen other warships heavily damaged and some 2,700 assault with repeated strafing attacks. naval casualties. Despite the ferocity of the onslaught, a number of Ameri - While the fleet had been the primary objective of the at - can fighters were able to take off from Wheeler. Four old P- tack, the Japanese had placed an even heavier emphasis on 36s of the 46th Pursuit Squadron even managed to shoot hitting the Oahu airfields. Nearly 60 percent of the strike down two Japanese planes, while losing one of their own. force had been targeted against the air bases in an effort to Other Japanese bombers and fighters devastated the smother any American aerial resistance. Navy and Marine Corps air bases on , in the At Hickham Field, on the side of Pearl Harbor center of Pearl Harbor, at Ewa, 10 miles to the west, and at and the headquarters of Maj. Gen. Frederick L. Martin’s Kaneohe, on the east coast, yet they almost missed two Hawaiian Air Force, some 50 bombers of the 18th Bombard - other smaller Army airfields. ment Wing were lined up in the open. Parked close to - Bellows Field, a few miles south of Kaneohe, was strafed gether for protection against possible sabotage, they made by a single fighter and then by a flight of nine more, appar - an easy target. The Japanese dive bombers and fighters ently only as a target of opportunity. The Japanese struck struck repeatedly at the massed planes and at hangars, bar - just as P-40s of the 44th Pursuit Squadron were trying to racks and other airfield installations. take off, destroying two of them as well as many still on the There was little opposition. Antiaircraft positions were ground and preventing any real opposition. unmanned, and soldiers racing to them or frantically try - Only one Japanese fighter managed to find and strafe ing to haul ammunition from supply depots were cut the small field at Haleiwa, on the north coast. Half a down by strafing Japanese fighters or torn apart by explo - dozen planes of the 47th Pursuit Squadron took off from sions. One of the first bombs destroyed a mess hall and that field and downed four Japanese aircraft. One P-36, killed three dozen men at breakfast. Still others died seek - however, fell victim to American machine-gun fire from ing shelter in the vulnerable hangars. No planes got off the Schofield Barracks, where the bulk of LTG Short’s troops ground, but soldiers fired some of the aircraft guns back at were stationed. The Schofield gunners also managed to their attackers. down a Japanese plane.

February 2013 I ARMY 53 The parade ground and bar - racks at Hickham Field, with oil fires burning fiercely in the harbor area. y m r A

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hile the attacking Japanese were swarming be when they saw the attacking planes. It’s doubtful, how - about their targets or regrouping for fresh as - ever, that any of this had much effect. saults, a dozen Army B-17s appeared in the Meanwhile, like practically everyone else on the island, Wskies. These were the bombers from the main - LTG Short had needed a few moments to accept the fact land for which LT Tyler had mistaken the first wave of that an attack was actually under way. Indeed, the standard Japanese planes. Stripped of guns and ammunition in order reaction of most people to the initial reports and first sights to carry more fuel for the long flight and without any warn - and sounds of the Japanese assault was that the whole ing of what awaited them, the B-17s came under fire from thing was some sort of bad joke or practice alert or perhaps both Japanese fighters and American antiaircraft gunners. an American military exercise. Almost miraculously, eight B-17s were able to get down From his headquarters at Fort Shafter, the Hawaiian De - at Hickham, while three landed with some difficulty on the partment commander could not see Pearl Harbor, but the shorter runways at Haleiwa and Bellows. The last of the big sound of the explosions and the rising smoke suggested to planes outmaneuvered the attacking fighters to put down him that the Navy was running a surprise “battle practice.” on a golf course far to the north. Three of the B-17s were Within 10 minutes of the first bomb, however, he had an ac - heavily shot up, however, and a fourth was destroyed on curate report and immediately put the department on its the ground. highest alert footing, prepared to resist an invasion. Army antiaircraft fire proved generally ineffective LTG Short’s battle command post was a hardened under - against the Japanese. While naval gunners were able to ground position in the Aliamanu Crater, three miles west of throw up a fairly heavy barrage at the second wave of at - Fort Shafter. Since spring, department engineers and civil - tackers, most Army antiaircraft fire was restricted to .50-cal - ian contractors had been laboring to develop well-protected iber machine guns and smaller arms. Few of the Hawaiian underground tunnels and fuel and ammunition storage ar - Department’s mobile three-inch batteries were in proper eas in the crater. While these improvements were in position, and ammunition was not readily on hand. progress, however, signal corps crews had taken out the So when batteries of the 53rd Coast Artillery Brigade command post’s switchboard and distribution cables to (AA) at Forts Weaver and Kamehameha, at the entrance to protect them from blasting and other construction activity. Pearl Harbor, opened fire at Japanese planes sweeping in On the morning of December 7, only the hasty arrival and on the fleet, most of the weapons used were of small cal - fast work of an alert signal corps team reestablished the iber. A single fixed three-inch battery at each fort and an - command post communication system before LTG Short other at Sand Island in Honolulu Harbor were the only arrived. heavier Army weapons to get into action. Elsewhere, at A similar event took place at Schofield Barracks, where Schofield Barracks and Camp Molekai, on Oahu’s south - the telephones and switchboards for the 98th Coast Ar - west coast, antiaircraft gunners fired machine guns. tillery Regiment (AA) had been locked in the supply depot There was, indeed, a great deal of small-arms fire of all to prevent theft or sabotage. It took nearly half an hour for sorts being thrown up at the Japanese. Soldiers, sailors and the regimental communications section to set up a switch - marines grabbed whatever weapon was available to them board and connecting lines from the command post to gun and blasted away in anger and frustration. At Schofield, positions at Schofield Barracks and Wheeler Field. 25th Division infantrymen set up machine guns on roof- Fortunately, such incidents were not widespread; further - tops, but many individuals fired Browning automatic rifles, more, the Japanese attack had not gone after communica - M1s and even sidearms from wherever they happened to tions centers or signal installations, so Hawaii experienced

54 ARMY I February 2013 no crippling communications breakdown. Only one major heavier losses, were unable to get off the ground. cable, at Hickham Field, was put out of action by a bomb, Not until 1100, an hour after the last Japanese aircraft had but quick patching had all important circuits back on line in left the scene, was the 804th Aviation Engineer Battalion short order. able to clear the Hickham runways and free MG Martin’s Another bomb, dropped by one of the last departing at - remaining bombers to take off in search of the Japanese car - tackers, severed a phone line at the Waianae radar station riers. Engineer work continued during the day at Hickham on the west coast. This installation, like all of the other air and Wheeler, repairing broken water mains and damaged warning stations, had been fully manned and back in oper - utilities, and lengthening the runway at Bellows to enable it ation since about 0830. Now, with his telephone useless, the to handle B-17s. By early afternoon, fighters and other air - Waianae station commander somehow managed to find a craft as well as Navy search planes were aloft, but none had radio powerful enough to restore contact with the informa - any luck finding the enemy. tion center at Fort Shafter. The Opana air warning station tracked some of the Japanese heading north toward their carriers, but there y 0845 on December 7, the battle command post at were also tracks seemingly leading in other directions. In Aliamanu was in full operation, with ample com - the confusion, agitation and welter of mixed reports and munications wherever needed. LTG Short’s initial rumors, no solid information seems to have reached any - Balert order had already reached his major ground one capable of putting it to good use. Both Army and Navy commands—the 24th and 25th Infantry Divisions and the air searches looked to the southwest, and none came any - Hawaiian Coast Artillery Command—and movement to where near a Japanese carrier. assigned areas was under way. By now, the Pearl Harbor Strike Force had retrieved all of An infantry battalion of the 24th Division left Schofield its returning planes. Only 29 Japanese aircraft had been lost Barracks before 0900. Other elements of the division were during the mission plus a score more destroyed on landing drawing ammunition and supplies and loading up. The when rough seas tilted their flight decks. It was a cheap whole division (less one regiment stationed on the other is - price for the smashing victory. lands) was in planned defensive positions by late after - The exultant Japanese flyers pleaded to go back to Pearl noon, with almost all weapons in place and ready to fire. Harbor to destroy the docks, machine shops, oil tank farm The 25th Division moved equally rapidly. Its commander, and other installations left practically untouched in the MG Maxwell Murray, had had the forethought to issue am - morning’s attack. The strike force commander, however, munition to his infantry units several days earlier. With war concerned about the danger still posed to his carriers, was in the air, he wanted no delays to slow a suddenly ordered unwilling to risk another attack. deployment. On December 7, this early action paid off. He estimated that 50 American land-based bombers re - The Coast Artillery Command had passed the alert to subordinate units almost as soon as it received it. Many of its antiaircraft units, however, were so close to the points of Japanese at - tack that they really needed no warn - ing. Some of their weapons were in ac - tion within 20 minutes after the first bomb hit Pearl Harbor. Army air units under direct attack also required no special alert. Their ability to respond, however, was se - verely limited by the intensity and ef - fectiveness of the sudden assault. Their heavy losses—inflicted primar - ily by the first wave of attackers—to - taled about 70 aircraft destroyed and an equal number badly damaged. Re - pair shops and administrative offices were devastated, and wreckage cov - ered the airfields.

Army fighter pilots, nevertheless, y m r A

managed to fly 25 sorties between . S .

0830 and 0930, knocking down several U Japanese planes. Navy and Marine An infantry machine-gun team sets up its .30-caliber M1917A1 Browning Corps aircraft, which suffered even water-cooled weapon during Hawaiian Department exercises in 1940.

February 2013 I ARMY 55 mained intact and capable of finding him. He also knew long been a source of concern for the Army as well as for that the Pacific Fleet’s three aircraft carriers had not been in many other Hawaiian residents. Nearly 500 of these indi - Pearl Harbor and were somewhere at sea, presumably viduals were taken into custody over the next few days, but looking for him. He ordered an immediate withdrawal at there was never any credible information that the remain - top speed to safer waters. der of the group posed a danger. Shortly thereafter, a map retrieved from a downed Japan - Approximately 1,300 Japanese-Americans were already ese plane near Fort Kamehameha indicated that the carriers serving in the 298th and 299th Infantry Regiments, two might be northwest of Oahu. Army aircraft headed in that Hawaiian National Guard units called into federal service. direction, but the Pearl Harbor Strike Force had left the area. The 299th Infantry was not on Oahu, but new draftees in the 299th Infantry at Schofield Barracks were temporarily dis - ack in Hawaii, LTG Short had begun evacuating armed and separated from other recruits until suspicions civilian dependents from the most hard-hit Army about their loyalty died down. installations. At 1000, Governor Joseph B. Poin- In the spring, after sufficient replacements arrived in Bdexter declared a state of emergency, and at 1515 Hawaii, the Japanese-American soldiers were finally the Hawaiian Department commander, with the approval shipped to the mainland. With other nisei, they became the of the governor and President Roosevelt, proclaimed mar - 100th Infantry Battalion and ultimately a part of the all- tial law throughout the territory. nisei 442nd Regimental Combat Team. Both units earned Under this authority, the Army suspended the writ of high marks for valor, bravery and combat effectiveness in habeas corpus, substituted military provost courts for Europe. Hawaiian civil courts, and instituted censorship of radio, Rumors, suspicions and false reports about the Japan - the press and civilian communications leaving Hawaii. It ese-Americans were not the only wild tales circulating also ordered a blackout and curfew, banned private cars throughout Hawaii on December 7. Japanese paratroopers from the highways, shut bars and halted liquor sales, or glider troops were supposedly landing in dozens of closed schools, temporarily halted food sales pending an places. Invasion fleets, submarines or mysterious sampans inventory, began gasoline rationing and converted four were close offshore. Japanese agents had poisoned the wa - civilian facilities into provisional military hospitals. ter or were signaling to enemy bombers or landing parties. LTG Short’s intelligence staff began a hasty roundup of Japanese troops had set up roadblocks using an armored “enemy agents and suspicious characters.” The fact that a vehicle disguised as a milk truck. Japanese aircraft, includ - large minority of Hawaii’s population was Japanese or of ing four-engine bombers, were still overhead, some with Japanese descent—approximately 160,000 people at least German pilots. three-quarters of whom were Americans by birth—had Given the rash of false or exaggerated stories that spread rapidly, it was no wonder that the night of December 7 was filled with unauthorized weapons firing. Army ground patrols sometimes shot at each other, and a great deal of ordnance was needlessly expended into the air at supposed enemy planes. One ex - ploding antiaircraft shell set off more rumors that Japanese bombers were again at work. Everybody was jittery. At 0428 on December 8, the Coast Artillery Com - mand alerted subordinate units to be ready for a dawn landing attack. Ten minutes later it reported 30 Japanese planes approaching Oahu and, in an - other half hour, that antiaircraft batter - ies at Wheeler Field were firing at dive bombers. At 0525, antiaircraft units at Schofield sent word they were shoot -

y ing at other planes, which they later m r

A said were American. Just at dawn, fi -

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U nally, the 53rd Coast Artillery Brigade Army airmen examine the wreckage of a Japanese naval Type 0 reported that the Marines or Navy fighter (Mitsubishi A6M2), one of only 29 attacking aircraft lost, which were firing on Army aircraft. crashed into the ordnance machine shop building at Hickham Field. This sort of wild and imaginative

56 ARMY I February 2013 Shattered hangars at Hickham Field in the aftermath of the attack. y m r A

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activity went on for several more hours before it slowly unteers who waited hours for busy doctors and technicians came to a halt. Orders went out to cease all promiscuous to attend them. firing and to stop shooting at planes unless the planes fired Similar lifesaving work went on at Schofield Station Hos - first. Slowly the Hawaiian Department began to get a grip pital, handling wounded from Wheeler Field and other on itself. nearby areas. The swift and thorough treatment of casual - One of the first things to be done was to take care of casu - ties at these and other medical facilities and the effective - alties. The Japanese attack had killed and wounded almost ness of newly developed sulfa drugs kept fatalities to an 3,600 American service personnel. The bulk of these were impressively low level. Navy and Marine losses. Army casualties were nearly 700, divided almost equally between killed and wounded. Civil - he end of the day found U.S. Army forces in Hawaii ian casualties totaled about 100, of which about two-thirds wounded, shaken and confused. LTG Short, never - died. Most of the civilian casualties were caused by Navy theless, was already taking steps to rebuild his bat - five-inch antiaircraft shells that exploded on the ground af - Ttered command and prepare the department for ei - ter failing to detonate in the air. ther another Japanese blow or to serve as a springboard for Caring for the wounded was a major challenge. The an American offensive. Hawaiian Department surgeon had been working to build Little more than a week later, however, amidst a wave of up his staff, facilities and supplies for two years, but De - recriminations, second-guessing and casting of blame, both cember 7 still found the department below authorized the general and Adm. Kimmel were relieved of their com - medical levels. The main hospital, Tripler General on the mands. Essentially, they were accused of major errors in Pearl Harbor side of Honolulu, Schofield Station Hospital, judgment and of failure to coordinate measures to ensure and smaller facilities at Hickham and elsewhere would all the mutual security of their forces. have to rely on civilian assistance to meet their needs. Neither was afforded the opportunity of a court-martial The heaviest Army casualties came at Hickham Field, in which to defend himself, and the circumstances and fair - quickly overwhelming doctors and nurses at the station ness of their reliefs are still matters of controversy. Did hospital there. They could do little more than administer Washington provide adequate warning and sufficient infor - morphine and give other forms of first aid to the wounded mation to the Hawaiian commanders? Did they, in turn, act before sending them on to Tripler. properly in light of information they actually possessed? Most of these men had been in the shattered Hickham Did they display the necessary superior judgment that the mess hall. They began reaching Tripler barely 10 minutes situation demanded and that would be required in exercis - after the bombs first hit, and several hundred wounded ing future command? were soon crowding the hospital, many on litters on corri - The majority of historians and other informed observers dor and hall floors. have concluded that the reliefs were justified. Others dis - Military and civilian surgical teams alternated between pute this. Whatever the ultimate verdict of history, how - operating rooms and the wards, working frantically to re - ever, no one can deny that LTG Short and his naval coun - pair shattered bodies and prevent post-operative infection. terpart were the final victims of the Japanese attack on A radio appeal for blood donors brought hundreds of vol - Pearl Harbor. (

58 ARMY I February 2013