We interrupt this broadcast to bring you this important bulletin from the United Press / Washington the White House announces Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor stay tuned to WOR for further development. 1941, Japan's situation. America and other nations have imposed an oil embargo on Japan which means Japan cannot continue their conquests.
No problem, Japan will just get the oil it needs from the Dutch Indies. Their underfunded and under gun fleet will pose no threat to the Imperial Japanese Navy. And if their ally Great Britain joins a conflict well Japan will fight them too.
Both nations are too occupied with the European war anyways. So through their new conquests Japan's demand for resources shall be met. However, geography has cursed them, look at what lays beside their vital supply lines.
the Philippines, a u. s. territory Although America is not officially allies with the British and the Dutch they are on friendly terms.
Japan cannot afford the risk of the u. s. entering the war while they are in the midst of their campaign.
Their proximity to Japan supply lines puts into jeopardy everything they are about to fight for. Basically, the Americans will be holding a dagger to Japan's throat the entire time they conduct their campaign ready to commence hostilities at a moment's notice. Thus, they come to the conclusion that they must take out the Americans as well.
This calls not only for an invasion of the Philippines but also a preemptive strike on the powerful American fleet at Pearl Harbor. And so with that history was set Japan sent its powerful Kido booty to strike Pearl Harbor on the morning of December 7th. Now, the goal of the raid was as follows: one, sink a battleship.
This was for propaganda purposes. Japan reasoned that if America saw their beloved battleships, symbols of their naval power destroyed, their will to wage war against Japan would be shattered as well. 2.
, immobilized the fleet for six months. The Japanese estimated that they needed six months to do all their conquests, then they would be on the defensive and await the American counter-attacks and wear them down culminating in a decisive naval clash. So note, the Japanese knew they could not win a long-term war with America so Japanese strategy revolved on them waging a short-term war.
This was why attacking the fuel tanks or naval facilities at Pearl Harbor was not even considered in the planning phase it was irrelevant to the six-month goal. At Pearl Harbor were some 80 ships. There were eight battleships, seven of them in battleship role and one in drydock.
Eight cruisers were at Pearl Harbor four of which were accessible to torpedoes. And dozens of destroyers and auxiliaries were docked elsewhere. unfortunately for the Japanese, the three American carriers were all at sea and not port that fateful day.
The attack on Pearl Harbor will be carried out by six fleet carriers and it's strike force of 350 planes. Their crews had endured ten months of training for this attack. In addition five midget submarines would be tasked with penetrating the harbor and attacking in conjunction with the main air strike.
The attack would be composed of two waves. During the first wave lieutenant Fujita commanded a strike against the ships in the harbor. The key to the first wave was the 50 level bombers and 40 torpedo bombers also known as KATES.
Their torpedoes had been modified with wooden fins so that he could be effective in the shallow waters of Pearl Harbor. Their priority targets were the battleships and carriers at Port. The first wave of a hundred and eighty-three aircraft was launched at 6:00 a.
m. . The strike force approached Oahu and soon the formation separated into groups to attack their assigned airfields and targets.
The sky was completely clear of American fighters, the Japanese had achieved complete surprise. The dive-bombers beat the torpedo bombers to Pearl Harbor, the first bombs hitting the southern tip of Ford Island minutes before even the first torpedo had been launched. Planes from hiryu and soryu approached at 7:55.
They were disappointed to discover that their targets, the carriers, were not in port that day. Lieutenant Nagai leader of Soryu's Air Group realized there were no potential targets so he and his wingman pulled off. However, the remaining six attacked.
They probably mistook the Old decommissioned battleship the USS Utah as a capital ship and they fired upon her. Two torpedoes slammed into her before 8 a. m.
. The rest missed. One miss so badly that the USS Raleigh was hit the Utah capsized at 8:12.
The Raleigh almost suffered a similar fate but prompt damage control prevented her from capsizing. Nagai went around Ford Island and launched against what he believed was a battleship. In reality it was just the cruiser the USS helena.
she was double berth with an old mine layer the Oglala. Its silhouette probably gave the impression of a battleship. His torpedo actually went under Oglala's heel and exploded into Helenus Hull damaging both ships.
Nagai's wingman recognized that it was just a cruiser and decided to attack Battleship Row instead. The 8 hiryu planes didn't fare any better. lieutenant Hirata and his wingman saw that there were no viable targets so they headed for battleship row.
However, the remaining six aircraft who were lagging behind got to see Nagai's attack on Helena and followed suit. Four launch torpedoes but they all missed terribly. The last pair aborted their run at the last minute and headed for battleships.
So now we have four hiryu and one soryu plane maneuvering for Battleship Row cutting right across the path of the other 24 torpedo bombers who were just coming in. In this photograph you can see the opening stages of the attack. Both the Utah and Raleigh have been hit and Utah is listing to port.
At this moment the torpedo runs against the battleships have begun. you can even spot two planes finishing their bomb runs. Due to the geography of Pearl Harbor the torpedo bombers really just had one avenue of approach.
If they had gone over the naval buildings the turbulence would have thrown off their accuracy and limited their launch window. Therefore, the overwhelming majority of the Kate bombers flew single-file down the southeast lock. The result was that instead of the attack being spread out it will be disproportionately concentrated on the southern tip of Battleship Row, much to Oklahoma's and West Virginia's despair.
Twelve Akagi planes approach single-file a thousand feet apart starting at 7:57. All of akagi's twelve planes launched against these two battleships. Except one which skillfully maneuvered and struck to California.
The four hiryu planes from before joined shortly afterwards and launched against Oklahoma and West Virginia. Contrary to belief the Japanese were not attacking with impunity. The defenders had taken advantage of the precious - warning afforded by the Ford Island bomb blasts so that when the first torpedo planes of Akagi approached many anti-aircraft Gunners were already prepared.
These vulnerable slow-moving kates had to make their torpedo runs under fire. Three miles behind akagi's strike was kaga's Air Group. By now the anti-aircraft fire was becoming more effective and again Oklahoma and West Virginia took the brunt of the attack.
In the middle of their launch that single soldier plane from earlier swept in and got a hit on the California. however one of kaga's plane veered to the right because of this but was able to hit the Nevada at 8:03. kaga's Air Group was the only one to suffer losses.
five of the last seven attacking kate's were shot down. In this historic photograph the torpedo attack is perfectly captured. You can see the torpedo hits on the Oklahoma, West Virginia, and the California.
All of them are gushing out oil. In the background you can see Hickam field burning and the Helena can be seen leaning against the Oglala. And a Japanese plane can also be spotted.
However, the attack wasn't executed as smoothly as hoped. An attack that should have taken less than 90 seconds stretched out over 11 minutes from first run to last. Some had to abort and redo their runs due to mutual interference and the heavy anti-aircraft fire threw out the pilots aim and caused them to over concentrate on just two battleships.
21 torpedoes were launched at Oklahoma and West Virginia, over half of the available torpedoes. Oklahoma had 12 torpedoes launched at her. 5 hit her and she capsized in 15 minutes.
West Virginia was hit by sevens torpedoes but prompt counterflooding prevented her from capsizing and she settled to the bottom. California should not have sunk from two torpedoes but her hatches were open for inspection that morning which contributed to her sinking. And she was abandoned due to fires and when she was reboarded it was too late.
Of the 36 torpedoes launched only 19 achieved hits that's a 48% hit rate. 10,000 feet above came Fuchida and his high level bombers. Their mission was to take out the inboard battleships inaccessible to torpedoes.
they came in groups of 5. They released their salvos and scored an impressive 20 percent hit rate. Unfortunately, for the Japanese out of the 10 bomb hits about six were low ordered detonations or malfunctions.
That is an outrageous 60% dud rate! the Japanese aviators were greatly let down by the weaponry. The damage could have been deadlier.
However, the distribution was effective. California was missed but to ineffective hits on Maryland were scored, both West Virginia and the Tennessee were hit twice, and there were two additional collateral damage hits on the repair ship Vestal Moored outboard of the Arizona. Vestal suffered severe flooding and had to be beached afterwards.
But all of these hits were overshadowed by the two hits on the USS Arizona. The first struck her aft on the quarterdeck and another landed near her number two turret. It caused a magazine explosion which exploded with a great force and a tremendous fireball was seen.
She split in half and sunk in the harbor taken more than a thousand sailors with her, heavy fires burned for days. The explosion was actually caught on tape (film) by doctor hakensen who was on the hospital ship Solace. Nevada was the only battleship not suffering heavy damage and capable of getting underway.
She did so at 8:40 with the intention of heading out of the channel. Now one of the mini subs actually did make it into the harbor, the other four were unsuccessful. At 8:36 the sea tender the USS Curtis spotted a sub.
The submarine fired at Curtiss but missed. In return the submarine was hit by a 5-inch shell. The destroyer monoghan which happened to be getting underway at this moment saw the sub and approached with the intent to ram her.
the sub turned and fired its last torpedo which missed the destroyer. at 8:40 the sub was rammed and depth charge. She sunk with both crew members killed.
A hundred and sixty seven planes formed the attack of the second wave of which 78 were dive bombers allocated to go against warships. Much was expected from these skilled pilots, however their performance was disappointing. First, take a moment to see what they were up against by now the anti-aircraft defenses were up and ready to greet the dive bombers.
Couple this with the fact that there was a 70 to 90% low overcast their accuracy was destined to be off. But most importantly these pilots were guilty of poor target selection. This was the priority list:.
. . These dive bombers with their general purpose bombs were well suited for attacking the 8 cruisers left in Pearl Harbor but during the attack about roughly thirty attack battleships only seventeen whimper cruisers sixteen attack destroyers and twelve attacked auxiliaries.
The attack began at 8:54. The USS Nevada was caught in its escape during the second wave. the prospect of sinking the ship in the channel and thus blocking access to Pearl Harbor was a very very improbable outcome however the pilots couldn't resist the opportunity so they attack from two directions.
14 to 18 vals dropped against Nevada. Nevada was hit five times by nine o'clock and at 9:10 she had to Beach herself. this was the shining moment of the second wave but it deserves to be criticized.
Did they contribute to sinking a battleship? yeah, but it was by the rarest of luck. Nevada succumbed not to Japanese bombs but to poor material condition critical design flaws and a massively significant damage control mistake.
And again it still doesn't make any wiser, the battleship should have been avoided. The attempt to sink Nevada in the channel was a waste of ordnance that could have been better employed against targets more vulnerable to their effects. One two three dive bombers went for California scoring one hit.
The USS Pennsylvania, the fleet's flagship the only battleship in dock was also poorly selected. Nine bombers went after her. She suffered only a single hit at 9:06.
The real victims though were the two destroyers ahead of her which received collateral damage. Two hit the Casson and one hit the Downes heavily damaging both. So there could be a culture explanation to why the Japanese pilots went for battleships.
These young twenty-year-old pilots were going into the most significant battle in Japan's history. No one wanted to go back home and report that they attacked a simple cruiser or a destroyer. No way!
They wanted to go for battleships, sticking true to their samurai spirit. But overall the second wave attack was just scattered throughout Pearl Harbor with many attacks missing their targets. A puzzling target selection was the destroyer USS Shaw which was targeted by as many as fifteen bombers.
Three bombs hit her, one of which unleashed a tremendous fireball. The reason to her being targeted was probably because she was in a floating dry dock and resembled a capital ship. On the west side the Curtiss, a sea tender was inexplicably targeted.
A damaged Val committed a suicide dive and crashed into her and minutes later she was hit by a bomb. And lastly, the only hit on a top priority target was on the Raleigh. As many as five dive bombers went for her still listing from that torpedo hit.
She was hit once at 9:08. Also, we can add a near miss on the Honolulu which caused minor damage. So only one hit and one damage near miss were achieved on the dive bombers highest priority targets.
Against a fifty-five percent accuracy rate achieved during their training the pilots got only 15 hits. That's a rather disappointing nineteen percent hit rate. It was a poor performance of the second wave it contributed nothing substantial to the fleet in Pearl Harbor.
Also, as in the case of the armor-piercing bombs the general purpose bombs were deficient. But the second wave had the opportunity to be more damaging. Take for example the Phoenix here, a modern Cruiser which was completely ignored by the second wave not to mention the first wave of torpedo bombers.
She was a suitable target but even more telling was the fact that the Naval Yard was basically ignored. Four modern 10-ton cruisers were tied up here, all of them packed so closely together. One could hardly have missed anything of value had the attack been concentrated here.
On top of this these ships were in a very vulnerable position, flammable materials were scattered throughout, hatches were open, fire main systems might have been isolated, a bomb hit here would have caused a tremendous fire and been particularly devastating and there was no smoke around this area at all. the Japanese missed a chance to deliver a more effective blow. Only about ten dive bombers attacked this area and as previously mentioned only a damage near miss caused any damage whatsoever.
By 9:30 the attack was over. The attack left behind two thousand three hundred and thirty five people dead and another 1178 wounded. Civilian casualties totaled 103 including 68 dead.
Five battleships have been sunk but only two were permanent losses: the Arizona and the Oklahoma. The rest were repaired and served before the war's end, the other three battleships at Pearl Harbor suffered light damage. however, this attack didn't really cripple the Pacific Fleet.
Soon the Japanese would realize that it wasn't these old obsolete battleships that posed the real danger to them it was the carriers that they had missed. They would soon feel their vengeance half a year later. To the list we can add a target ship and a mine layer and the repair ship vestal which was beached.
There was heavy to moderate damage to three destroyers two light cruisers and a sea tender and there was light damage to a light cruiser. The Japanese also achieve great success on their strikes on the airfield spread out on Oahu. Over a hundred and sixty planes were destroyed.
They destroyed two to three times the number of aircraft that they had expected. The Japanese lost only 29 planes. Nine in the first wave, twenty in the second wave.
A testament to the Americans quick air defense. Also none of Japan's five major submarines made it back. Was the mission accomplished?
Well yes, all four battleships hit by torpedoes were out of the war for six months or more and they had sunk one other battleship by bombs alone. And with that the Kido Butai sail back home unscathed. World war II had just started for America and the sneak attack left behind a temporary shock nation but a nation that afterwards would be resolved to finish the war with nothing less than a total victory on their side.
The Japanese had awoken a sleeping giant.
