Intel Insights: U.S. Slumbered Prior to Pearl Harbor

Seventy years ago today America began a transformation that would take it from being an inward-looking and isolationist backwater to becoming one of the greatest powers the world has ever known. The country the Japanese attacked on December 7, 1941 was not the same country that would defeat them a scant three years and nine months later.

The transformation of the U.S. is all the more remarkable when you consider how ill-prepared the country really was to conduct World War II, even though that war sure seems all but inevitable in hindsight. Prior to World War II we could only count 190,000 soldiers and 464 tanks in the U.S. Army. At the time, neither the soldiers nor the tanks seemed ready for war. The soldiers’ training was generally inferior and their weapons did not compare favorably to those of other nations. In 1939, our forces were basically equal to those of Romania.

Our intelligence organizations were also in their infancy, although President Roosevelt did have the foresight to establish the “Coordinator of Information”, run by Colonel William “Wild Bill” Donovan. This organization would become the Office of Strategic Services, or OSS, the forerunner of today’s CIA.

Both the Army and Navy intelligence organizations were starting to grow as well. A key part of their efforts was a nascent signals intelligence and code-breaking capability, which would later prove to be decisively important to the war effort.

But on December 7, 1941 these organizations were drowning in a backlog of work. President Roosevelt knew from intercepted Japanese diplomatic communications that war was coming. What he didn’t know was when or where the Japanese would strike.

The Japanese practiced extraordinary operational security. Their fleet sailed from Japan to a Central Pacific staging area north of Hawaii in nearly complete radio silence. This contributed immeasurably to the surprise the Japanese were able to achieve at Pearl Harbor.

The early morning attack in Hawaii began at 7:55 a.m. local time, when Japanese naval aircraft began their assault. In Washington, people began hearing news of the attack at 2:25 P.M. EST. The Redskins were hosting the Eagles at Griffith Stadium that afternoon. In that era before cellphones, the PA system had to be used to direct senior military officers to report for duty. The late journalist David Brinkley recounted the scene in his delightful book “Washington Goes to War.” Brinkley also described how the wife of a newspaper reporter, who had heard the news bulletins at home, sent a telegram to her husband, who was seated at the 25-yard line, telling him that we were at war with Japan and to go to his office immediately.

The attack awakened us from a slumber that we should have never been in. Our lack of preparedness manifested itself in ways both large and small. Prior to the Pearl Harbor attack, military personnel were not required to wear their uniforms to work. That changed the following day and many servicemen were seen in outdated and ill-fitting uniform combinations.

More importantly, though, it quickly became apparent that existing government structures were insufficient to sustain the war effort. That was certainly true of the Army’s and Navy’s intelligence organizations. Both had their headquarters in Washington and the surrounding area was also home to significant operational activities that, once developed, would help to shorten the war. Locally, units stationed at Vint Hill Farms and Fort Hunt developed amazing amounts of intelligence from intercepted communications and interrogations, contributing greatly to our understanding of the enemy.

Sadly, our understanding of this pivotal chapter in our history will soon lack the immediacy of first-hand eyewitness accounts. The 70th anniversary of Japan’s attack on Pearl Harbor also marks the end of the Pearl Harbor Survivors Association, which will disband after this year’s commemoration. Only 125 of its members are expected to attend Pearl Harbor observances in Hawaii this year. Since its membership has an average age of over 90, fewer can make the arduous trip to the place where our long national journey began. That in itself is a milestone worth noting. As our World War II veterans pass from the scene, all of us should not only remember Pearl Harbor but resolve that, as a nation, we are never surprised like that again.

Cedric Leighton lives in Lorton and is the Founder and President of Cedric Leighton Associates, a Washington area strategic risk and management consultancy.