|
Post by joeconnor53 on Jan 14, 2014 22:28:44 GMT 8
A few weeks ago, I watched a documentary on Wake Island on the History Channel. It was interesting, primarily because there were interviews with some of the survivors. However, the theme of the show was that Wake Island was surrendered prematurely. The theory was that the defenders were actually winning the fight. Because communications on the island had been destroyed, however, Devereaux and Cunningham believed that the battle was lost and further fighting would lead only to unnecessary loss of life. Does anyone have any insight on this issue? I re-read the chapter on Wake Island in But Not In Shame by John Toland and it appears that there may be something to this premature-surrender theory.
The saddest thing is the Navy's behavior in the Wake Island battle.
According to But Not In Shame, there was a naval carrier task force under Admiral Fletcher about 500 miles from Wake at the time of the fighting. Its mission was to relieve or reinforce Wake. However, Admiral Pye recalled the task force. This seems to have been a significant error because, as Toland writes, "If Fletcher had been allowed to continue west he would easily have caught Kajioka's invasion fleet laying off Wake. Unprotected by carrier aircraft these ships would have been sitting ducks for the Saratoga planes."
If the U.S. had beaten back this second invasion attempt and if the Saratoga planes had clobbered the invasion fleet, you have to wonder if this would have: (1) taken some of the pressure off the Philippines; and (2) emboldened the Navy to be more aggressive in the Pacific.
|
|
|
Post by okla on Jan 15, 2014 3:02:07 GMT 8
Hey Joe....I have long been under the assumption that the Surrender was a bit premature. It is well known that the Marines were kicking Butt on Wilkes Island, "had the situation in hand", as the saying goes, and were moving toward Wake itself. They would have struck the flank and rear of the Japanese force besieging the Marine CP. As the story goes, as I recall, this group from Wilkes came upon a White Flag bearing group (I can't remember if Cunningham/Devereaux were in this group or not) who ordered them to lay down their arms. This group of Wilkes Marines were dumbfounded according to narratives that I recall describing the situation. Smacking Kurita's invasion force around would have been a great boost to American morale and probably would have evened things up in the Central Pacific, but Nagumo and his formidable force were still unscathed and itching to take on what was left of the American Fleet. My, highly uneducated, guess is that we would still have eventually lost the PI. An attempt by the remaining Naval forces of the US, I think, would have taken a pretty severe pounding in an attempt to penetrate thru the Mandated Islands with the land based Japanese Air Forces stationed there. I would think that we had to husband what strength that we had left for the later battles in the South. This is not to defend our withdrawal from a Wake Island encounter. Striking Kurita's vulnerable force would have been a big boost to our side at that critical time in the Pacific, but changing the ultimate outcome in the PI, methinks, would still been too difficult, if not impossible. Just my illiterate take on this subject. As I am always saying, "ain't it fun to ponder those events and decisions of early 1942"
|
|
|
Post by xray on Jan 16, 2014 12:23:38 GMT 8
I think in retrospect it can be seen that the naval force was too timid, but with the stakes as high as they were, Wake was already written off as a total loss, as in fact the Philippines were as well, and that we weren't going to risk the carriers short of an invasion of Hawaii. What would be interesting would be the perspective of a man like Halsey, who as I recall replaced Admiral Ghormley for his timidness in the early stages of the Guadalcanal campaign. Surely he [Halsey] must have touched on this subject in his memoirs ?
|
|
|
Post by domack on Jan 16, 2014 16:49:41 GMT 8
When Devereaux with the Japanese surrender party was told he had to go to surrender Wilkes Island he was surprised. Because Devereaux/Cunningham had no communication Wilkes assumed the worst Cunningham decided to surrender. Yeah I know Cunningham made the call but Devereaux as far as I can tell was in a agreement. Although the defenders of Wake were going on offense may have defeated the landing force the brass had called back reinforcements. There was a carriers force "Rear Admiral Hiroaki Abe,carriers Hiryu and Soryu Commander, 8th Cruiser Division" a sizable force would have possibly caused a major carrier battle. Had this taken place who knows what affect this might on the campaign PI. Here's a bit on why Pye decided to withdraw his forces. "However, in the midst of his deliberations, shortly after 0736, Pye received a message from the CNO which noted that recent developments had emphasized that Wake was a "liability" and authorized Pye to "evacuate Wake with appropriate demolition." With Japanese forces on the island, though, Pye felt that capitulation was only a matter of time. "The real question at issue," Pye thought, "is, shall we take the chance of the loss of a carrier group to attempt to attack the enemy forces in the vicinity of Wake?" Radio intelligence from the previous day linked "CruDiv 8 ... CarDiv 2" and erroneously, "BatDiv 3" (consisting of two battleships) with the forces off of Wake. A pair of Kongo-class fast battleships, supported by carriers and heavy cruisers would easily have overmatched Fletcher's Task Force 14."
|
|
|
Post by joeconnor53 on Jan 17, 2014 6:00:38 GMT 8
Here's a pretty thorough excerpt from an American Heritage magazine article on the recall of the naval task force www.americanheritage.com/content/defense-wakeConsidering the losses suffered at Pearl Harbor, Kimmel’s plan was astonishingly bold. Conceived as early as December 9, it called for the deployment of all three fast carrier forces then available. Task Force 11 with Adm. Wilson Brown aboard the Lexington would make a diversionary raid on Jaluit in the Marshall Islands while Adm. William Halsey took the Enterprise and Task Force 8 west of Johnston Island with the double mission of covering the approach to Hawaii and lending support to the main attack. The job of leading the strike force heading straight for Wake was given to Adm. Frank Jack Fletcher. Fletcher’s command was a pickup fleet that had never sailed as a unit before; it included nine destroyers, three heavy cruisers—Astoria, Minneapolis, and San Francisco—and the venerable carrier Saratoga, holder of several speed records between California and Hawaii, and which was then steaming toward Pearl Harbor from San Diego at twenty-one knots. Fletcher’s ships held everything Wake needed: two hundred Marines aboard the San Francisco and a fresh squadron of fighter planes on the Saratoga. Even if Fletcher’s ships were too late to effect the relief of Wake, they were heading for a hell of a fight. Kimmel’s plan involved considerable risk, but it was a good one. With speed, a little luck, and a Nelson on the bridge, it might have succeeded. It had none of these.
Skipper of the San Francisco, Fletcher was a solid officer. He had been graduated high in his class at Annapolis and seen service as a destroyer commander in World War I. He held the Medal of Honor from Veracruz. But Fletcher had no experience as a carrier force commander and had been given the assignment because he was the senior flag officer in the group. Adm. Aubrey Fitch, commander of the Saratoga and the most knowledgeable carrier admiral in the Navy, was relegated to a secondary role when Fletcher came aboard.
The expedition was plagued by misfortune and delay from the outset. The Lexington could not be fueled because of bad weather and did not get under way until the fourteenth; the Saratoga did not leave until the sixteenth. Worse, the Saratoga, which should have been dashing for Wake at top speed, was slowed to a crawl by the decrepit oiler Neches, which could put out only twelve knots. On the seventeenth, the Lexington, steaming toward Jaluit, held an antiaircraft gun drill and discovered that none of the ammunition aboard its cruisers worked. By then the relief expedition had lost its guiding spirit. Admiral Kimmel had been relieved of his command on the sixteenth and hustled into retirement until he could be court-martialed after the war for his part in the disaster at Pearl Harbor. Adm. Chester Nimitz was named to replace him, but Nimitz was still in Washington and could not take command for two weeks. In the interim the job would be held by Adm. William Pye, temporarily on the beach since his battleship California had been sunk on December 7. The rights and wrongs of Kimmel’s court-martial are not within the scope of this article, but it should be noted that on December 15,1941, Admiral Kimmel’s principal thought was to seek out the Japanese and engage them wherever they could be found. His replacement’s chief aim was to preserve the fleet and not turn a large butcher’s bill over to the new commander in chief.
Pye was a careful officer. Nimitz, the kindest and most gently spoken of great war admirals, once described him as a “great brain but no guts.” In an operation where other men saw opportunity, Pye was the sort of man who naturally saw difficulties. In looking over the operational plans of the departed Kimmel, Pye saw difficulties aplenty. In a single gambler’s toss Kimmel, who had lost much of the Pacific Fleet in one afternoon, was sending the rest of it piecemeal into waters that the Navy did not control to engage an enemy whose position and strength he did not know. No, Pye didn’t like the plan at all. Prudently he ordered Admiral Brown’s Lexington to turn north away from the Marshalls to give Fletcher closer support. More cold water was thrown on the plan from Washington on December 20 when the chief of naval operations, Adm. Harold Stark, confided to Pye that Wake was considered more of a liability than an asset and left the relief of Wake up to Pye’s “discretion,” a universally understood shorthand in the military meaning the commander would be held responsible for any failure. In his heart Pye wanted to call off the project then and there. It was only when several staff officers begged him with tears in their eyes to keep the fleet on course that he agreed. The Sea Hawk spirit that had animated the project gave way to a sense of foreboding and concern. Still, the Navy was steaming for Wake. If the Marines there could hold for another four days, they might yet be saved...After conferring with Devereux at five, Cunningham sent a message to Pearl Harbor. “ENEMY ON ISLAND.” Cunningham’s mind went back to a phrase in an Anatole France novel, The Revolt of the Angels, which he had read many years before: “for three days...the issue was in doubt.” And he added, “ISSUE IN DOUBT.”There was not much doubt in Pye’s mind any longer. He had never liked the plan in the first place, and Cunningham’s message indicated it was too late to relieve Wake anyway. But should he let the Saratoga force sail on and engage whatever enemy could be found? Pye didn’t like that idea much either. A captain sailing into a sea battle ought to have some idea what he was getting into, but as one staff officer commented, “we had no more idea than a billy goat” what was going on at Wake. Pye radioed Fletcher, telling him to break off and return to port.Joe Connor
|
|
|
Post by okla on Jan 17, 2014 9:00:54 GMT 8
Hey Joe...Thanks for posting. This is good stuff. With Truman's well described "hindsight is 20-20" analogy, one can see Admiral Pye's no win situation. Extracting the Marines from Wake, etc would have been very tricky, reinforcing the island, for any length of time, not too likely nor an inviting prospect for those involved. I suppose the withdrawal, though highly distasteful to those involved, was probably the correct decision, but it would have been great if we could have had our one "time at bat" and hassled Kurita's invasion force while it was without air cover. The fact that our Cruisers were carrying ammunition that didn't work, absolutely, blows my mind. This situation is inexcusable, if not nearly criminal. Can anyone imagine a modern Naval force going into action with ammo that is unusable??? Absolutely mind boggling. Thanks again for posting this critique from American Heritage. It adds a clearer view to the Greek tragedy/Chinese Fire Drill atmosphere that our side experienced in those wild, crazy weeks that followed Pearl Harbor. Striking examples of a Nation that was not really ready for War. Cheers.
|
|
|
Post by domack on Jan 17, 2014 11:44:22 GMT 8
I've always wondered why they didn't fly in reinforcements and fly out the civilians. At the time of the attack there was 370 or so marines and a thousand plus civilians workers there. They could have commandeered Pan Am clipper air ships and used PBYs for the task. Wake was used for refueling Army B-17 headed for PI from Hawaii and as a Pam Am Clipper seaplane base. So air reinforcement/extraction wasn't out of the question.
|
|
|
Post by joeconnor53 on Jan 17, 2014 21:40:52 GMT 8
Okla, yeah, that is mind-blowing about the ammo. On the other hand, how long were our submarines operating with non-functioning torpedoes? How many hand grenades on Bataan were duds? How many mortar rounds were defective? It really is mind-blowing. What even blows my mind more is the lack of radar on Wake and the presence of only one primitive radar unit on Luzon. We had tons of observers at the Battle of Britain and our military should have know full well how crucial radar was as an early warning system against air attack. Domack, I suspect the problem with evacuation was the availability of suitable planes. Did they even have many functioning B-17s in the Pacific at that time? Recall the problems that MacArthur had a few months later getting several flight-worthy B-17s to evacuate him and his entourage from Del Monte. In any event, B-17s were probably too small for the job. I was in one a few summers ago and the interior was far smaller than I expected. I could stand in the middle of the fuselage in the bomb bay area and simultaneously touch each side wall. I doubt a B-17 could carry many passengers. As for transport planes, did they have any in the Pacific? In the PI, the only way the military was able to extract significant numbers of people was via submarine, not plane. (Of course, there was no place to land a B-17 or large transport plane on Bataan or Corregidor). By the way, the American Heritage website is a terrific resource. Here is a list of articles from American Heritage about Bataan: www.americanheritage.com/search/node/bataanJoe Connor
|
|
|
Post by domack on Jan 23, 2014 7:41:27 GMT 8
Okla, yeah, that is mind-blowing about the ammo. On the other hand, how long were our submarines operating with non-functioning torpedoes? How many hand grenades on Bataan were duds? How many mortar rounds were defective? It really is mind-blowing. What even blows my mind more is the lack of radar on Wake and the presence of only one primitive radar unit on Luzon. We had tons of observers at the Battle of Britain and our military should have know full well how crucial radar was as an early warning system against air attack. Domack, I suspect the problem with evacuation was the availability of suitable planes. Did they even have many functioning B-17s in the Pacific at that time? Recall the problems that MacArthur had a few months later getting several flight-worthy B-17s to evacuate him and his entourage from Del Monte. In any event, B-17s were probably too small for the job. I was in one a few summers ago and the interior was far smaller than I expected. I could stand in the middle of the fuselage in the bomb bay area and simultaneously touch each side wall. I doubt a B-17 could carry many passengers. As for transport planes, did they have any in the Pacific? In the PI, the only way the military was able to extract significant numbers of people was via submarine, not plane. (Of course, there was no place to land a B-17 or large transport plane on Bataan or Corregidor). By the way, the American Heritage website is a terrific resource. Here is a list of articles from American Heritage about Bataan: www.americanheritage.com/search/node/bataanJoe Connor The B17s were engaged or destroyed. And the PPY's were doing picket duty I believe. It's the Pan am flying boats that had come to mind. A PPY and a Pan am Clipper flying boat did land and leave Wake during the battle. The Pan am Clipper was shot up at WAKE before it returned to Hawaii. It's just a wild what if and not very realistic. The Clipper is a sweet looking air ship. Thanks Joe for the link.
|
|