"Conspiratorial What-If - Pearl Harbor" Topic

I don't recall seeing this "what-if" ever discussed.

It deserves its own thread, I suspect.

What if the US carrier group(s) from Pearl Harbor arrive back at the islands just as the Japanese attack is occurring, or just afterwards?

Also, never read any definitive info on when they were sortied, why (presumably for practice; conspiratorial rumors are to save them from the attack the President knew in advance was coming), and to where, so would love to know more info about that.

IIRC they were delivering aircraft to one of the US island bases. Arriving back at Pearl while the Japanese had aircraft in the air would have been 'very bad' to say the least – the Japanese had the capacity to launch at least one more full strength wave but their commander got cold feet as he didn't know where the US carriers were.

Yes, at least some of them were being used to ferry aircraft out to other islands. Any conspiracy theory otherwise is just that, the carriers had been doing these aircraft transfers for awhile by the time of the Pearl Harbor attack.

If the carriers had arrived, it depends upon when exactly.

Doctrine at the time was to launch the air groups to land
at the shore bases while the ships were porting.

If the air groups had arrived in the midst of the Japanese
attack, well, hmmmm….do recall that USS Enterprise's
SBD's did arrive after the attack and some suffered
damage from US AA fire.

Compelling information on the failures of Adm. Stark and naval intelligence.

Only an idiot would think that the President was "in on it".

What if the US carrier group(s) from Pearl Harbor arrive back at the islands just as the Japanese attack is occurring, or just afterwards?

USS Enterprise was arriving at Pearl on Sunday, December 7. She was close enough that 18 of her bombers flew right in to the attack, and were variously shot up by the AA fire and the Japanese.

She (and her task force of cruisers and destroyers) were scheduled to arrive in Pearl on Saturday, the 6th. But a storm caused a delay in their approach. Vice Admiral Halsey, commander of the Enterprise task force, was later quoted as saying only God had prevented his ships from being in Pearl on that fateful day.

Also, never read any definitive info on when they were sortied, why (presumably for practice; conspiratorial rumors are to save them from the attack the President knew in advance was coming), and to where, so would love to know more info about that.

OK. Let's see if we can fill in the blanks in a "definitive" way.

First a bit of doctrinal failure in any of the conspiracy theories I've seen.

Naval doctrine at that time was that the battleships were the main strength of the navy. Carriers were adjuncts to the battle fleet. Their roles were scouting and harassing the enemy, initially to allow the battle fleet to bring the enemy to decisive combat, and then to exploit a battlefleet victory by picking off stragglers, or cover a battlefleet withdrawal by continued scouting and harassing of pursuing enemies.

To understand the depths of this doctrine one needs look no further than the classification of carriers in the USN vernacular. CV (the standard prefix for a carrier) places the aircraft carrier as a type of cruiser. CL = Light Cruiser, CA = Heavy (Armored) Cruiser, CV = Aviation Cruiser.

The British carriers in the hunt for the Bismark provide a textbook example of how naval leaders at that time expected to use carriers. Scout and find the enemy, harass them and hamper their maneuver, so that they can be brought to decisive combat by battleships. After the Bismark had sunk Hood, the HMS Victorious and Ark Royal scouted and harassed the Bismark while the RN detached battleships Ramilles and Rodney from convoy escort duties and sortied King George V, all to join Prince of Wales, in order to sink the Bismark.

If there was indeed a conspiracy, why were the battleships, the key weapons of the navy, left in port to take a pasting, while the carriers, an adjunct scouting / harassing force, were out sailing about on that "conspiratorial" day?

Theory and doctrine aside, here are the details for all three carriers assigned to the Pacific Fleet. I hope this is "definitive" enough.

On 7 December 1941, USS Saratoga (assigned to the Pacific Fleet) was just entering San Diego after an interim dry docking at Bremerton, Washington. This process had begun several weeks prior to December of 1941.

With Saratoga detached off to dry dock on the West Coast, there were two remaining Pacific Fleet carriers based at Pearl Harbor: Enterprise and Lexington.

Those two carriers were sortied because the Navy Department had issued a War Warning on 25 November 1941, which put the Pacific Fleet on a heightened state of alert. As a part of the moves to enhance the USN's defensive posture in the central Pacific, two task forces were assembled, one around each carrier, with orders to ferry Marine aviation squadrons to outlying airfields at Midway and Wake. After delivering the Marine planes, the task forces had orders to spend a several days patrolling and training, and then to return to Pearl.

USS Enterprise departed Pearl Harbor on 28 November on a mission to deliver 12 Grumman F4F-3 Wildcats of Marine Fighting Squadron Two Eleven (VMF-211) to Wake Island. The Enterprise, with the accompanying three heavy cruisers and nine destroyers, comprised Task Force 8 (TF 8).

The Marine fighters were launched on 2 December when the Enterprise was 75 miles (120 km) north of Wake Island. She then turned east and headed back to Pearl Harbor where she was due to arrive on 6 December. Due to a storm, Vice Admiral William Halsey, commander of TF 8 in Enterprise, ordered reduced speed thus delaying the carrier's arrival at Pearl Harbor until 7 December.

On 7 December 1941, the Enterprise Air Group consisted of:

Bombing Squadron Six (VB-6) with 17 Douglas SBD-2 Dauntless
Fighting Squadron Six (VF-6) with 16 Grumman F4F-3A Wildcats
Scouting Squadron Six (VS-6) with 10 Douglas SBD-2 and 8 SBD-3 Dauntless
Torpedo Squadron Six (VT-6) with 18 Douglas TBD-1 Devastators and 2 North American SNJ-3s

At 0618 hours on 7 December, Enterprise launched SBDs of VB-6 and VS-6 to search a sector 045 to 134 degrees for a distance of 150 miles (240 km) and to then proceed to NAS Pearl Harbor on Ford Island. A total of 18 aircraft arrived over Pearl Harbor during the Japanese attack. One was shot down by U.S. antiaircraft fire, four by the Japanese and one crash-landed. The remainder landed at either NAS Ewa or NAS Pearl Harbor.

USS Lexington departed Pearl Harbor for Midway Island on 5 December with 18 Vought SB2U-3 Vindicators of Marine Scouting Bombing Squadron Two Thirty One (VMSB-231) aboard. Along with the heavy cruisers USS Chicago (CA-29), USS Portland (CA-33) and USS Astoria (CA-34) and five destroyers, the Lexington formed Task Force 12.

The plan was to approach within 400 miles (640 km) of Midway and fly the Marine squadron off to land on the island; Lexington would then be free to continue training/scouting. They expected to reach their flying-off position (400 miles from Midway) by mid-morning of 7 December.

On 7 December 1941, the Lexington Air Group was composed of:

Bombing Squadron Two (VB-2) with 15 Douglas SBD-2 Dauntless
Fighting Squadron Two (VF-2) with 16 Brewster F2A-3 Buffalos
Scouting Squadron Two (VS-2) with 1 Douglas SBD-2 and 14 SBD-3 Dauntless
Torpedo Squadron Two (VT-2) with 12 Douglas TBD-1 Devastators

Upon learning of the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, the Lexington instead launched search planes to hunt for the Japanese fleet, and at midmorning headed south to rendezvous with USS Indianapolis (CA-35) and USS Enterprise (CV-6) task forces to conduct a search SOUTHWEST of Oahu until returning to Pearl Harbor on 13 December.

There's no mystery in where the ships were, or why they were there, or when they left, or what their orders were, or why they had received those orders. While conspiracy theories can be intriguing, you really have to be a "post-truth era" enthusiast* if you want an explanation of USN behavior other than the reasonable and doctrinal response of the fleet to a period of heightened tensions.

-Mark
(aka: Mk 1)

*ie: Ignore the vast number of verifiable facts, and amplify any little tidbit, whether taken out of context, deliberately misstated, or even wholly made up, that could be woven into a story to confirm pre-conceived notions.

Naval doctrine at that time was that the battleships were the main strength of the navy. Carriers were adjuncts to the battle fleet.

Which is perhaps the main point. President Roosevelt had been Assistant Secretary of the Navy and was well steeped in that doctrine.

HAD HE BEEN IN ON A CONSPIRACY to get the US at war, he hardly would have left the "most important" ships in the Navy out to get destroyed while mere auxiliaries survived. Nobody could have predicted at the time that the RIGHT ships to win the war survived because they were of secondary importance.

Throughout history, incompetence explains far more than conspiracy. But Roosevelt is a target of conspiracy theorists because the theorists dislike his politics. Or maybe, they are just incompetent moonbats.

Finally, if Roosevelt was really maneuvering to get us into the war, wouldn't it have made more sense to manufacture an incident against Germany? Some would say that the convoy system was engineered to do just that.
Here's a leftist take on that.
YouTube link

Basically, Pearl Harbor was "inconvenient" for the anti-Fascist left. (Not that there was anything wrong with being an anti-Fascist leftist! )
Hitler put the American war back on track a few days later by declaring war on us.

Wait-wait-wait!

But where does "The Final Countdown" fit into this?

Kudos, Mk1, but damn! Did this just happen to be your thesis or dissertation? Incredible detail!

V/R,
Jack

I would have loved to see Kirk and his Karrier paste the Japanese fleet in 'The Final Countdown.'

Kudos, Mk1, but damn! Did this just happen to be your thesis or dissertation? Incredible detail!

Well actually I do not consider naval issues, nor the Pacific Theater as a whole, to be my strong suit when it comes to WW2 history.

But I do like doing good research, and I very much appreciate others who do good research, and I have learned, on this forum, not to rely too much on the conclusions I have reached from my own readings without providing some of the details that have led me to those conclusions.

And … in this case mea culpa for not giving credit to some sources. I posted much the same information in another thread, and cut and pasted much of it over to this thread, but neglected to add sources.

So here are some sources with background info on the US Carriers on 7 December 1941:

navsource.org/Naval/usf.htm

link

And here is a single source that gives you the disposition of every USN carrier in service or in the slips on 7 December 1941, including all the air groups. A really well researched and well presented source:

link

Hope that helps.

-Mark
(aka: Mk 1)

While Roosevelt Derangement Syndrome and the common paranoid style of American politics account for much of the Pearl Harbor conspiracy theorizing, racism had a lot to do with it as well. It was inconceivable that inferior, unintelligent buck-toothed, near-sighted little yellow men could possible inflict such a devastating defeat on the United States by themselves! Obviously, there had to be a conspiracy, a betrayal of the United States to deliver it into the hands of its enemies!

Obviously, there had to be a conspiracy, a betrayal of the United States to deliver it into the hands of its enemies!

If it serves you of any consolation, that kind of magical thought is common across nations and states. Somehow it is easier to believe that you have been betrayed, that to think that your current problems are a consequence of your opponent's ability, or of your own erroneous analysis.

Experts? We don't need no stinkin' experts! They just cloud an OBVIOUS CONSPIRACY with 'FACTS'.

Just Jack
You get used to it after a while. Someone once asked a question about Japanese Tanks, Mark gave an answer which could only be described as encyclopedic then apologised for the fact that "it was an area he didn't know much about."! ;)

Mark
On a visit to Hawaii some yeas ago my Mother and sister talked to a Veteran who had been on the Enterprise. He mentioned that the delay had caused a great deal of grumbling below decks because it meant they would miss Saturday night in town.

Fatman

The usual counter to post like Mark I is to state that both Roosevelt and Churchill were evil geniuses. They both had been heavily involved in the navy and understood better than anyone else that aircraft were the future and proved it by sinking the Italian fleet in port. The battleships were simply sacrificed as they knew they would be useless in the future anyway.

And then there is the theory that it wasn't the Japanese who bombed, but converted American planes and the reason why the carriers were not at Pearl that day is that they were bombing their own fleet, the pilots were told to fly on to another carrier waiting (there was none and the fuel gages were rigged so they would all crash into the ocean). All regular crew were kept below decks and then were ordered to remain silent. Most of the crews would end up killed in the war anyway and the survivors were told that they had a choice, either help sell the story that it was the Japanese who attacked, or disclose the lie and destroy everything that was achieved in victory and let the commies win.

Basileus66,

So true.

WW1 was lost to Jewish/Leftist traitors; not logistics, French/British/Belgian armies, British navy, late war American reinforcements (morale, the symbology of the event,) or any more realistic factors – just ask Adolph, he was there…

And in the AWI the presence of forces from Spain 🇪🇸 and France 🇫🇷 and Netherlands 🇳🇱 fighting worldwide had nothing to do with Britain 🇬🇧 making peace, just bayonetless farmers playing Indians.

So many examples…

The Roosevelt conspiracy is even more ridiculous because there was no need for the fleet to be sunk to get us into the war. If the harbor and airfields had been empty and the Japanese had been forced to just bomb the fixed facilities that still would have been enough to inflame American anger and get us into the fight.

Very true, most Americans only knew that the port was attacked and damage done. Hardly anyone knew that practically the whole fleet was out of commission.

Ragbones – Me too! I wonder what it the Karrier actually could have accomplished; I don't think one CVN is enough to win the war singlehandedly, and what about a lucky Japanese sub getting in a lucky spread of torpedoes? A swarm of Japanese dive- and torpedo bombers that manages to damage the nuclear reactor beyond what the crew was capable of repairing?

Mk1 – I meant my comments only in the most flattering way possible, thankful and incredulous that someone would take so much time to research and post on a toy soldier website.

Fatman – Yeah man, I've seen him in action before on TMP, but still.

Patrick – I really like the 'we did it ourselves' theory! Perhaps the Texas from Tora-Tora-Tora! were actually aircraft from the original strike that manages not to crash into the see, but were landed at a secret base on a Hawaiian volcano and stored in a cave until Hollywood needed them!

V/R,
Jack

That one CVN was going to wipe out the entire Pearl Harbor strike force and take out the entire Japanese naval air arm in one go. Japan was done for after that no matter if the Nimitz was sunk by a submarine before her planes even got back.

It is pretty clear their is no conspiracy, nor was their enough competence to prevent the attack.

US Intel had warnings that Japan was preparing to initiate hostilities.
US Intel believed that Japan would declare war first (and they intended to but not with enough time for the US to react).
US Intel believed the attack would go south into the Philippines and other areas, not to Pearl.
US Intel thought the fleet was safe in Pearl Harbor because they did not know Japan developed a torpedo that would work in those shallow water.
US Intel decided to provide vague warnings to the commanders in the Pacific to avoid revealing that we had cracked Japanese codes.
US commanders in the Pacific, failed to recognize these vague warnings were serious and required a war footing and security.

So it was a string of errors, not a conspiracy that set up Pearl Harbor for its day of Infamy.

The Roosevelt conspiracy is even more ridiculous because there was no need for the fleet to be sunk to get us into the war. If the harbor and airfields had been empty … that still would have been enough to inflame American anger and get us into the fight.

Very true, most Americans only knew that the port was attacked and damage done. Hardly anyone knew that practically the whole fleet was out of commission.

Indeed. The Congress, and the American public, had no idea that the Pacific Fleet's battle line had been crushed when we declared war on 8 December, nor even months after.

One look at any of the contemporary newspaper stories about the Pearl Harbor attack, many of which are easily available through library records, will confirm that the primary information at that time was only that the Japanese had launched a dastardly sneak attack and killed a bunch of our boys.

Another adder to how ridiculous the conspiracy theorists are, is that Roosevelt DIDN'T WANT war with Japan. He was working very hard to get us ready for, and involved in, the war against Germany! The Roosevelt administration was extremely clear on the "Europe First" priority. Japan was a major distraction, and his administration spent 1940 and 1941 trying to settle the Japanese down so that all proper focus could be placed on the conflict in Europe, which Roosevelt considered a genuine threat to the US.

Hitler's declaration of war against the US was in fact a fortuitous surprise. Without it, it would have been very difficult for Roosevelt to get the country involved in the war against Germany when the American public was all riled up with bloodlust for revenge against the Japanese.

US Intel had warnings that Japan was preparing to initiate hostilities.
US Intel believed that Japan would declare war first (and they intended to but not with enough time for the US to react).
US Intel believed the attack would go south into the Philippines and other areas, not to Pearl.

All true, except perhaps for the label "US Intel". There was NO US intelligence agency at that time. One of the significant findings of the Pearl Harbor investigation (the "Roberts Commission") was that US Naval Intelligence and US Army Intelligence were not sharing information in any meaningful way, not with each other, nor with the State Department or the White House. The concept of a central intelligence agency was an entirely new idea that only came out as a result of the intelligence failures leading up to Pearl Harbor.

US Intel thought the fleet was safe in Pearl Harbor because they did not know Japan developed a torpedo that would work in those shallow water.

US Naval Intelligence thought the fleet was safe in Pearl Harbor for many reasons. The assumption that air-dropped torpedoes were a low risk in Pearl was one, but not a compelling issue in and of itself. It was still common to rig torpedo nets in port. But indeed Pearl was so shallow (most of the battleships had only a few feet of water beneath their hulls) that rigging the nets was typically not done.

The greater assumption was that air dropped torpedoes were not a big threat because … well, who was going to fly a torpedo bomber into Pearl Harbor? The whole place was surrounded with US Army Air Force fields! There were hundreds of Army planes stationed on Oahu. The fact that the two commands did not share much information didn't seem to alarm anyone in the navy … the army was in charge of defending the airspace, and they seemed to be immanently well equipped to do so.

US Intel decided to provide vague warnings to the commanders in the Pacific to avoid revealing that we had cracked Japanese codes.
US commanders in the Pacific, failed to recognize these vague warnings were serious and required a war footing and security.

A War Warning was issued on 25 November. That warning meant that commanders were responsible to ensure that their commands were prepared for war to come at any time.

Here is the text of the warning sent to Adm. Kimmel at Pearl Harbor:

Consider this dispatch a war warning. The negotiations with Japan in an effort to stabilize conditions in the Pacific have ended. Japan is expected to make aggressive move within the next few days. An amphibious expedition against either the Philippines, Thai, or Kra Peninsula or possibly Borneo is indicated by the number and equipment of Japanese troops and the organization of their naval task forces. You will execute a defensive deployment in preparation for carrying out the tasks assigned in WPL-46 only. Guam, Samoa and Continental Districts have been directed to take appropriate measures against sabotage. A similar warning is being sent by the War Department. Inform naval district and Army authorities. British to be informed by Spenavo.

Here is the text of the warning sent to Gen. Short in Hawaii:

Negotiations with Japanese appear to be terminated to all practical purposes with only the barest possibilities that the Japanese Government might come back and offer to continue. Japanese future action unpredictable but hostile action possible at any moment. If hostilities cannot, repeat can not, be avoided the U. S. desires that Japan commit the first overt act. This policy should not, repeat not, be construed as restricting you to a course of action at might jeopardize your defense. Prior to Japanese hostile action you are directed to undertake such reconnaissance and other measures as you deem necessary but these measures should be carried out so as not, repeat not, to alarm the civil population or disclose intent. Report measures taken. Should hostilities occur, you will carry out task signed in Rainbow Five as far as they pertain to Japan. Limit dissemination of this highly secret information to minimum essential officers.

As can be seen, there are differences in the "appreciation" of the events provided to these two commanders. The Navy seemed much clearer that war was expected, the Army seemed to think that diplomatic discussions could well continue. Kimmel (Navy) was told that Short (Army) would be getting pretty much the same message. Short (Army) was told not to share what he got.

The warnings were not necessarily vague. Anyone with experience trying anticipating the future will quickly learn to shy away from too many specifics. But it is clear that the two commanders did not receive a unified message, and it is also clear that the likelyhood or even the potential of a large scale attack on Pearl Harbor was not appreciated at all.

Of interest, these warnings were issued at about the same time that the Japanese strike force sailed (within some number of hours). That does not represent some form of intelligence coup, but rather that it became clear to both sides that the diplomatic efforts had come to a close, and the military efforts were next in line.

-Mark
(aka: Mk 1)

I heard sometime back that the Dutch picked up radio traffic from the Japanese Fleet on their way to Pearl Harbor.

They sent their information on to the British but for whatever reason the British never forwarded the information on to the Americans.

So does anyone know of this?

Didn't Short receive the information that the Japanese embassies in the west were destroying their code books and cypher machines? If you do that, your embassies don't function as embassies anymore. That only makes sense if you're going to be at war.

How could the Dutch pick up radio traffic when the fleet was in a radio blackout. Also wasn't the nearest Dutch colony West of the Philippines.

It's possible that I did hear it wrong but a Dutch Submarine the K-XVII discovered the Japanese Fleet on Dec 6th 1941,and the information was sent to the British but they didn't send it along to the US.

Sorry, but the Dutch sub story has been repeatedly debunked. Just more mythical fodder for the conspiracy wackos…

Why would the Dutch send the information to the British but not the Americans?

If Roosevelt is not the crazy mastermind, it's Churchill. I heard theories that Churchill had agents in Berlin and Tokyo to push a war agenda.

He wanted America in the war to crush both Japan and Germany because he feared they would soon overtake Britain. Remember he was an evil mastermind, he didn't want Hitler to make a peace offer, Churchill wanted to destroy the poor innocent soul by forcing him into a war he couldn't win …

The Royal Navy allegedly tracked and shadowed the Japanese fleet and was ready to sink any ship that could warn the Americans.

Churchill had Roosevelt murdered because he was getting a bit too cozy with Stalin etc …

To answer the original question…

'What if the carriers had been in/near port at the time of the attack?'

- USN Carrier fleet is OOC along with the surface fleet.

- 2nd wave (maybe 3rd) hits Hawaii… more damage to PH and the fuel reserves are gone.

- Net result: USN is effectively out of the Pacific war in the West Pacific for at least another 18 months to 2 years.

- No Doolittle raid.

- Japan consolidates West Pacific holdings.

Turning Point… does Japan decide to conquer Hawaii? A lot depends on this. If they think the US will eventually move to retake the West Pacific, they really have no choice but to try. At the very least, they would try to institute some kind of blockade to prevent the US from rebuilding the military facilities there.

- Roosevelt still focuses on Europe first, but a lot of the second rate ships that would have gone to England or used for convoy escorts are now needed in the Pacific as a guard for the West Coast of the US.

- England does not fall, but D-Day is probably pushed back to 1945 or later.

- In what could be the largest Naval battle in history, the USN tries to break the blockade / retake Hawaii some time in 1943.

Depending on the results of this battle, the Pacific War either drags on until 1947 or later (potentially going nuclear in the process).

-or-

Some kind of armistice is signed, with the US keeping possession of (a demilitarized) Hawaii. A new cold war / arms race sets in as the war ends in Europe, Japan consolidates its holdings in Asia, and the US recruits its allies for Round 2 in the Pacific.

The cold war goes hot the instant Japan starts to move to take Australia.

In no way or fashion could the Japanese take Hawaii. They lacked any kind of amphib lift and operating that far outside of their main area was well beyond their logistics. Plus, if Hawaii becomes the key point, you can bet it would be fortified to the gills. As for interdicting the West Coast/Hawaii route and enforcing a blockade: the Japanese had neither the doctrine (this would have to be a sub war) nor the equipment.

If the US had lost the 2 carriers at Pearl, then the US might have been pushed into a defensive posture. But then come '43, when the flood of new ships its full stride, the Japanese would be pushed back through the Central Pacific all the way to Tokyo. Just like it happened historically. Would it have lengthened the war? Maybe by 6 months (if that). Would it have impacted the ETO? Minimally. Remember, the US fought a full fledged two front war. And had the resources to do it (and then some).