By Jack McKillop
U.S. ARMY COMMANDERS, PERSONNEL AND AIRCRAFT
On 7 December 1941, the Japanese caught the Hawaiian Air Force completely by surprise. Although diplomatic relations with Japan were at a standstill, and many people felt war was just around the corner, Hawaii maintained a business-as-usual attitude. Conversely, the Japanese understood the importance of the American Fleet stationed at Pearl Harbor and devised a plan to destroy it. To reach the fleet they would need to destroy the Hawaiian Air Force. To destroy this force they would need surprise and luck. Japan would achieve the surprise, and fate would give them the luck they required. The U.S. Army's Hawaiian Department had the forces, leadership, and equipment to stop the attack or at least make it very expensive. But fate, in a series of decisions, events, and personalities, would step in to prevent them from ever being used. The Japanese use of air power on 7 December 1941 resulted in a decisive, if short -lived, one sided victory--indeed from their perspective as decisive as any air battle that would be fought over the next four years.
THE COMMANDERS
To understand what happened to the Hawaiian Air Force on that fateful morning, we must try to understand the leadership that brought it to that day. At the time of the attack, the U.S. Army's Hawaiian Department, under Lieutenant General Walter C. Short, commanded all Army personnel in the Territory of Hawaii. Major General Frederick L. Martin reported to General Short, both as commander of the Hawaiian Air Force, activated on 1 November 1940 at Fort Shafter, Oahu, located 4.9 miles (7.9 kilometres) east southeast of Ford Island in Pearl Harbor, and as the Hawaiian Department Air Officer. In addition, General Martin had direct access on aviation matters to Major General Henry H. "Hap" Arnold, Chief of the Army Air Forces in Washington, D.C. The Hawaiian Air Force consisted of the 18th Bombardment Wing and the Hawaiian Air Depot at Hickam Field, Oahu, located 2.0 miles (3.2 kilometres) south of Ford Island in Pearl Harbor, the 14th Pursuit Wing at Wheeler Field, Oahu, located 9.4 miles (15.1 kilometres) located north northwest of Ford Island in Pearl Harbor, and a gunnery training facility at Bellows Field, located on the east coast of Oahu 15.5 miles (24.9 kilometres) east of Ford Island in Pearl Harbor. In addition, several smaller installations were scattered throughout the island chain. For the Navy, Admiral Husband E. Kimmel was Commander in Chief, and Rear Admiral P. N. L. Bellinger was Commander, Naval Base defence Air Force. General Martin, through the Hawaiian Air Force, was in command of Army Air Forces personnel and functions associated with aviation, while General Short commanded nonaviation personnel and functions through the Hawaiian Department. Thus, although Martin controlled the airfields, he lacked control over the antiaircraft units assigned to defend them. General Martin would control the island's Air defence Center after it became operational, but General Short controlled the radar units that supplied the center with information.
As the Hawaiian Department Commander, General Short was responsible for insuring that General Martin and the Hawaiian Air Force had the capability to accomplish their primary job, defending the Hawaiian Islands and the Navy's Pacific Fleet facilities from air attack. Training was the key to this task, and General Short was well suited for the role. Training assignments made up most of his career. At the time of the attack, he was 61 and had worked his way up through the officer ranks by solid, dependable work. During World War I, he helped organize the First Corps automatic weapons school in France in 1917, and after the war he served as the assistant chief of staff in charge of the Third Army's training program in Germany. He attended both the School of the Line and the Army War College at Fort Leavenworth, Leavenworth, Kansas, and later spent two years as a staff officer there. In addition to several other command assignments he worked four years in Washington DC, at the Bureau of Insular Affairs. General Short was an infantryman through and through.
With a philosophy that reflected his experience, General Short demanded training in the basic infantry duties and skills for Hawaiian Air Force personnel not involved in flying. To accomplish this, the Hawaiian Department published a standing operating procedure in July 1941 that set up a six-to-eight week schedule in basic infantry training. When General George C. Marshall, Chief of Staff of the U.S. Army, questioned training Army Air Forces personnel as infantrymen, General Short countered that an enemy would not attack the Hawaiian Islands until after it had destroyed American air power and with the aircraft destroyed, large numbers of Hawaiian Air Force personnel would be available for infantry duty. Furthermore, General Short felt that the Hawaiian Air Force was overstaffed and more than half, or 3,885 out of 7,229 personnel, could be used as infantry after the invasion started. (This was the Hawaiian Air Force strength as of 14 October 1941; by 7 December 1941 personnel had increased to 7,460.) He stated that the training was necessary to give these people something to do during exercises. General Short did not believe in using the regular infantry to protect Hawaiian Air Force personnel who had nothing to do but sit around.
After setting up a program to ensure all personnel would be trained to defend the island against a possible invasion, General Short began an intensive effort to protect the facilities against possible sabotage from the large Japanese population living on Oahu. To this end he created three alert levels aimed at providing the most appropriate defence response based on the forms of attack he believed the island would receive. Significantly, the first level, Alert One--and the one the department would be in on 7 December--was sabotage alert. During Alert One, ammunition not needed for immediate training would be boxed and stored in central locations difficult for an enemy to reach and destroy. Thus, when the attack began, most antiaircraft ammunition was boxed and stored far away from the actual gun locations. At Wheeler Field, maintenance personnel not only removed the machine gun ammunition from the aircraft, they removed it from the belts so it could be boxed and stored in one location. Coincidentally, the Japanese hit this central location (a hangar) during the attack and destroyed most of the ammunition stored there. Aircraft, during Alert One, would be centrally located as close together as possible (wingtip to wingtip) for ease in guarding them. Hawaiian Air Force personnel would be used to guard not only aircraft and storage facilities on flying fields, but also warehouses and critical facilities throughout the island.
After being notified about an impending air attack against Hawaii, the Hawaiian Department would go to Alert Two. At this level, measures used in Alert One would remain in effect; in addition, personnel would activate the Air Warning Center, arm fighter aircraft and place them on alert, launch long-range reconnaissance, and arm and deploy antiaircraft units. From this intermediate level, the entire Hawaiian Department would go to Alert Three when invasion seemed imminent. At level three, the command. functions would move to underground facilities and available personnel would deploy to prepared beach defenses. General Short immediately decreed Alert Three after the 7 December attack began.
Major General Frederick L. Martin, Commanding General, Hawaiian Air Force, and leader of the air arm of the Hawaiian Department, arrived in Hawaii on 2 November 1940. He was an experienced pilot with over 2,000 hours flying time. His training included the Air Tactical School at Langley Field, Hampton, Virginia, Command and General Staff School at Fort Leavenworth, Kansas, and the Army War College. He had held several command positions including, as a brigadier general, command of the 3d Bombardment Wing at Barksdale Field, Shreveport, Louisiana. The Hawaiian Air Force received an experienced and well-qualified commander.
General Martin's first problem upon arrival concerned the strained relationship between the Navy and the Army in Hawaii. What had started as friendly rivalry had developed into an almost hostile environment. Aircraft from both branches buzzed and practiced low-level simulated strafing runs on each other's facilities. Only in the most essential matters did the Army and Navy cooperate, and then very reluctantly. General Short and Admiral Kimmel did have some close contact. They played golf together every other weekend, and they directed their staff members to work more closely with their counterparts. But real cooperation did not exist. General Arnold gave General Martin direct orders before leaving Washington for Hawaii to resolve this problem and increase inter-service cooperation. To his credit, by 7 December, relationships between the two services had started to improve. Unfortunately, in his role as peacemaker General Martin had a tendency to place cooperation between the Army and the Navy and cooperation within the Army over Hawaiian Air Force needs. As a result, when General Short started his infantry training program, instead of insisting that Hawaiian Air Force personnel could not do both jobs, General Martin sent one protest letter and then chose to support Short and promote harmony. Again, when Short became obsessed with possible sabotage and demanded parking the aircraft close together, Martin agreed that the sabotage danger was real and went along with him, even arguing against his own commanders who wanted to disperse the aircraft.
A second problem confronting Martin was poor health. The general had a severe, chronic ulcer condition, which required surgery and would hospitalize him immediately after the attack. The need to comply with General Arnold's directive to be a peacekeeper added to his poor health. Due to the ulcer, General Martin did not drink and kept his attendance at official functions to a minimum, which tended to give the average airman an impression that the commander was a bit straight-laced and did not appreciate his men.
So in the end, the Hawaiian Air Force had one general who was infantry oriented and obsessed with the possibility of sabotage and another in poor health and trying to keep everyone working together. Events were to prove this was not the best combination of commanders.
THE PERSONNEL
By 7 December 1941, the air arm of the Hawaiian Department had been built up to a total strength of 754 officers and 6,706 enlisted men. Personnel were concentrated on the island of Oahu and assigned to bomber units at Hickam Field, pursuit (fighter) units at Wheeler Field, the 86th Observation Squadron at Bellows Field, or to one of the air base groups, maintenance companies, service detachments, and other support units comprising the remainder of the Hawaiian Air Force. In addition to the three major flying installations on Oahu, there was a small training field at Haleiwa on the north shore of the island and emergency or auxiliary fields on other islands of the Hawaiian group, including Kauai, Lanai, Hawaii, Maui, and Molokai.
Personnel of the Hawaiian Air Force came from varied backgrounds. Many were Depression-era youngsters who had never ventured beyond their hometowns or states. Those fortunate enough to go on to college after graduation from high school often joined the Reserve Officers Training Corps (ROTC) program to ease their financial situation, then fulfilled their military commitment as commissioned officers. Some were selected for flight training and won their wings as army aviators. Thousands of other young men, however, faced unemployment or worked at jobs paying meager wages and had no funds to finance college educations. Enticed by posters, radio announcements, word-of-mouth, and newspaper advertisements extolling the advantages of Army life ("experience, advancement, travel, and a lifetime pension") , they dropped in at recruiting stations in great numbers to enlist. Some of those who volunteered for duty in Hawaii were not quite sure where it was located. John M. Neuhauser, of Flanagan, Illinois, for example, learned from his friend, Ned Oliver, that the US Army Air Forces recruiter was signing up men to be sent to Hawaii for training as aircraft mechanics. "Where's Hawaii?" he asked. "It's an island in the Pacific Ocean, I think," Ned said.
Officers and enlisted personnel, as well as family members, sailed to Hawaii on US Army transports like the USAT Republic, USAT Grant, USAT St. Mihiel, USAT Leonard Wood, USAT Chateau Thierry, USAT Hunter Liggett, and USAT Etolin. Those who embarked from San Francisco spent about a week on the high seas. Russell J. Tener recalled "six days of hectic ocean travel, consisting of seasickness, boredom, card playing and some KP (kitchen police)."
Others like John W. Wilson, who had enlisted in Philadelphia, spent 21 days on the Army transport that carried them from New York via the Panama Canal. When the ships rounded Diamond Head and docked at Honolulu harbor near the Aloha Tower, the new arrivals received a typical Hawaiian welcome. The Royal Hawaiian Band serenaded them as they walked down the gangplank, pretty Hawaiian girls greeted them with fragrant flower leis, and dozens of native boys jumped into the water and dove for coins tossed by the soldiers. The newest members of the Hawaiian Air Force then proceeded to one of the three major airfields on the island.
THE AIRCRAFT
Both Generals Short and Martin bombarded Washington with requests for newer and more aircraft. The Air Force's inability to provide the long-range reconnaissance necessary to protect the Hawaiian Islands from a sneak attack especially worried General Martin. In early 1941, he and his Navy counterpart, Rear Admiral Bellinger, wrote the now famous Martin-Bellinger report, which not only detailed how a possible attack could occur, but also outlined what steps would be necessary to prevent its success. The report stated that the primary defence against a sneak attack would be long-range reconnaissance. To be effective, reconnaissance would have to be conducted in a 360- degree arc around the island and extend out at least 1,000 miles (1,609 kilometres). Both officers realized that with the equipment available this could not be carried out for long, so they did not recommend its implementation until war was imminent.
The Hawaiian Air Force had 33 Douglas B-18 Bolo and 12 Boeing B-17D Flying Fortress aircraft assigned, but the B-18s were old and their range was so short, 850 miles (1,368 kilometres) they would be of little value for patrol duty. As a result the U.S. Navy, which had over 60 long-range Consolidated PBY Catalina flying boats, accepted the responsibility for long-range reconnaissance in the Hawaii area, while the Hawaiian Air Force providing short-range [20 miles (32.2 kilometres) out] coverage. On paper this sounded like a workable arrangement. Unfortunately Admiral Kimmel had decided that he needed the flying boats to provide long-range coverage in the areas where he planned to operate the fleet during war. If used to patrol the Hawaiian area, he reasoned, they would deteriorate and not be available when the actual war began. In addition, there were insufficient replacement crews to keep all the aircraft manned. Admiral Kimmel then took a calculated risk, based on the belief that the nearest Japanese possessions capable of supporting a full- scale attack on Hawaii were located south of the islands, and began using a minimum number of flying boats for anti-submarine patrol in that direction. So, the morning of the attack, which came from the north, the flying boats were patrolling the opposite area. The belief that an attack could only come from the south was so strong that after the attack began, the first Air Force reconnaissance aircraft to get airborne also patrolled the southern area trying to locate the enemy carriers.
A proviso in the Martin-Bellinger report called for the Navy to go to the Air Force for assistance if the Navy was unable to provide the reconnaissance coverage necessary. The Navy never exercised this option, since it believed that an attack on Hawaii could not occur without some warning. Besides, with only 12 B-17Ds, Martin could lend only limited assistance.
The fighter aircraft status on Oahu was somewhat better than the bomber picture. The command had 87 Curtiss P-40B and 12 Curtiss P-40C aircraft, with 55 in commission on 7 December. In addition, there were 39 Curtiss P-36A Hawk aircraft with 20 in commission. Although Washington considered the P-36 outmoded compared to European aircraft, and even the P-40 was not considered the most modern plane, they were the best the United States had at the time. Washington had received information about the Japanese fighter, the Mitsubishi A6M2, Navy Type 0 Carrier Fighter Model 21 more commonly known as the Zero, and its superb flying qualities from General Claire Chennault, Commander of the American Volunteer Group (the Flying
Tigers) in China, but senior military officials discounted this information and never sent it to the field. New fighter pilots had been arriving on the island in increasing numbers, and General Arnold had promised Martin additional aircraft as they became available. The consensus in Washington held that the fighter force defending Oahu, if somewhat small, was at least adequate for use against anything the Japanese might have. The major limiting factor for the fighters stationed in Hawaii was their short combat range, and they needed a strong ground control system to maximize their combat efficiency.