He caught a quick glimpse of the pilot. It was obvious he had been trying to ram them, dying in flames . . . He felt an instant of pity for him, going out like a warrior
“We’re gonna get one!”
He looked up, tightened his grip. A shudder ran through Enterprise as the fourth bomb of the second wave struck square on the forward elevator, piercing the deck, blowing up below on the hangar deck. The elevator, dismounted from its hydraulic lifts, pitched up twenty feet, then slammed back down, tilted drunkenly
We’re out of action now, he thought. As if it mattered: he had no planes left to fight with, other than the few Wildcats still aloft and rapidly running out of fuel. They’d most likely have to ditch. The bridge loudspeaker crackled with their excited reports:
“I’m on him, got him . . . got him, you son of a bitch . . .”
“This is blue two, closing on torpedo bombers to the north . . . Come on, tighten it up!”
“Vince . . . He’s on your six . . . He’s on your six ... !”
The loudspeaker crackled off for a moment, carrier wave lost, and he could see a plane, sky blue belly, a Wildcat, breaking up, a second one diving straight down, Zero on its tail
He swung his binoculars aft, caught a glimpse of a Wildcat trying to intersect the torpedo bombers, Zeroes from above pouncing
“Another!”
Men around him ducked. He instinctively followed suit. He felt a damn hard slap. A geyser of water erupted directly abeam the bridge. He stood back up, water cascading down around him, wiped his face, raised binoculars, scanning to port. Nearly every gunner on the port side had lowered their barrels, was now pouring it into the wave of Jap torpedo bombers. It was hard to see with the smoke--six, maybe seven, one of them on fire, going in
They were pressing in faster, a lot faster than Devastators
Enterprise started to turn again heeling back over. He kept the torpedo bombers in focus, four at least still boring in, one after another releasing, but still coming straight in after dropping, not exposing their bellies, skimming low, so low that gunners could no longer depress their barrels to hit them. At the last instant they pulled up, skimming right over the deck of Enterprise. Damn, they were good, one pilot actually saluting the bridge as he roared past, but the tail gunner, with a far different attitude, had his 7.7-millimeter machine gun depressed, aiming at the bridge, firing. Several shots flashed off the steel siding
The torpedoes?
He could see two wakes, tracking in
The blows from the two torpedoes striking starboard amidships, spaced a hundred feet apart, were stunning. It felt as if the 27,000 tons of Enterprise had been physically lifted half out of the water by the explosion of half a ton of high explosive in each one. In those first few milliseconds of detonation, the expanding blast actually pushed hundreds of tons of water back and away from the hull, creating a near vacuum. The detonation at nineteen feet below the water line ignited an upward rush, a column of water over two hundred feet high, a geyser weighing a thousand or more tons, until finally gravity brought it back down in a crushing shower that could knock a man flat. Some of the explosion blew in the bulkhead, rupturing through a fuel tank filled with fuel oil, designed that way to actually serve as an outer shield of armor. The blast was so intense, though, that the Shockwave burst through the fuel oil, cracking open the main hull
Less than half a second after detonation, the outward push of the explosion was finally overcome by the weight of water, which now slammed back inward, filling the vacuum created. A tidal wall burst into the initial hole cut by the explosion itself, tearing aside steel plates as if they were sheets of paper, smashing in through the oil bunker and then into the bowels of the ship. Less than a second later the lives of forty men were snuffed out seven decks below Halsey, crushed by the thousands of tons of water that tore apart dividing bulkheads, watertight doors . . . thousands of tons of water in less than thirty seconds added its mass to that of the Enterprise, initiating a list that if unchecked could eventually cause the ship to roll over and turtle
Halsey stood silent, watching the flight deck relative to the horizon, saying nothing as with each passing minute the list increased. Enterprise seemed to be dying
Chapter Eight
The White House December 8, 1941 18:30 hrs EST
This home of the President was steeped in history, FDR thought, and never did he feel the weight of it press down as heavily as it did at this moment
As his Secret Service agent pushed the wheelchair toward the closed doors of the conference room in the basement of the White House, he allowed a moment of thought beyond the present crises
Is this how Lincoln felt when word came of First Bull Run, the bloodbath at Antietam, or the futile charges at Fredericksburg? He remembered how Lincoln was moved to tears when reading the casualty reports after yet another failed battle lamenting, My God, what do I tell the people?
He knew already that his speech delivered little more than six hours ago had served to galvanize a nation and put the world on notice. Where forty-eight hours ago there had still been voices of doubt, of dissent, even of fear, now Americans were a people united with a single goal
But to reach that goal? He had spoken of the enemy onslaught, but the new reports coming in all afternoon, each one darker than the next. . . Could the Japanese indeed push us so hard, then keep us off balance for so long that our national will, aroused at this moment, might waver?
Lincoln had faced that wavering during the dark winter of 1862 and the horrid debacles in the spring of 1864, when the North was bleeding out over two thousand casualties a day, and even then, as the national will faltered, he had held the course
I must do the same. We can be as brave and as determined as Lincoln and his generation. Our losses, appalling as they are, are small compared to the Soviets and British. During the summer and autumn, and even now, the Soviets were enduring a hundred thousand casualties a week. If we have to pay the same price to defeat this enemy, we will do so. He could conceive of no other answer except Yes, if need be, we will pay that price, we must pay that price. His friend Winston was indeed right: this was not just a war about imperialism, or economics, it was a back-to-the-wall stand of Western Christian civilization against the dark forces of totalitarianism. If we lose our will, if we turn aside now, the world will indeed be plunged into a thousand years of darkness
The increased military presence around the White House was highly noticeable. Though he thought the reaction was extreme, there were rumors of saboteurs targeting the White House or the Capitol, and as in 1861, troops were now positioned nearby to repel any threats. Even the door to the conference room ahead was guarded by two well-armed Secret Service agents, one of them opening it at his approach
As usual, he preferred to roll himself in rather than be pushed in and took over the wheels of his chair. Waiting for him, in what was already being called “the map room,” were the secretaries of War and Navy and their military counterparts, Admiral Stark and General Marshall. All stood as he came in, and he motioned for them to be seated as he slipped into place at the head of the table
He paused for a moment, putting a cigarette in its holder, lighting it up, and inhaling deeply
“Two things,” he began, without any preamble. “I want to know the situation now, as of this moment, and what your projections are for the next few days. Let me add, I have already spoken to Prime Minister Churchill once today. He is all full of enthusiasm, and I will talk with him again after this meeting. Our disaster seems to be his opportunity. I need to know the hard truth of the matter.”
He scanned the room, and Secretary of the Navy Frank Knox stirred, clearing his throat
FDR knew the real report would come from Admiral Stark, but a sense of protocol indicated the Secretary should speak first. Frank was by no means a heavyweight, though a good man and a solid manager. He was a Republican and had run against the Democrats in the 1936 election as Landon’s vice presidential candidate.
He had been brought into the cabinet in 1940 as an attempt to build bipartisan support for the impending war and had turned out to be, at least as an advocate to the Congress, the news media, and the American people, a good choice. Republican but an avowed anti-Nazi who was passionate about preparedness, he was, interestingly, a combat veteran, having fought alongside Cousin Teddy as a Rough Rider in Cuba, back in 1898
The President nodded for him to begin
“I’ll leave the operational details to Admiral Stark,” Knox said, “but, sir, it is grim, and getting worse by the minute. There is the distinct prospect that within a week there might not be a single major American warship afloat from the coast of China to Hawaii. Hawaii itself might very well be enduring an invasion. If not Oahu, the Japanese might venture to seize one of the smaller islands in the chain. We must assume that Wake and Midway islands will be attacked as well.”
He stood for a moment, arms folded, looking over at the map of the Pacific Ocean on the north wall of the room. Numerous pins of red and some of blue were affixed to it. He then turned his attention to Admiral Stark, who sat patiently, and motioned for him to start
Stark stood up, clearing his throat. He held a sheaf of telex printouts in his hand
“Sir, these are the latest reports from our naval monitoring station at Mare Island and the Army station at the Presidio in San Francisco. They’ve been able to monitor some radio transmissions and have wired them here.”
“Are the cable connections to Hawaii back on line yet?” the President asked
“No, sir. There must have been a direct hit where the cables came ashore; either that”--he paused--”or they were sabotaged.”
“Sabotaged?”
“Sir, that was our primary concern all along, and I think it should still be one. Tens of thousands living on Oahu are of direct Japanese descent. They even had their own Japanese-language newspaper on Oahu, which would print reports of the latest victories of their ‘gallant army’ in China. I think, sir, if you checked with Mr. Hoover, you would see that the FBI has dossiers on scores, perhaps hundreds who traveled back to Japan this year, some to volunteer for their army, others undoubtedly to get orders, and then came back to Oahu and even to California. It will require action on your part.”
The President nodded, taking that in, not reacting though. The subject, now that war was declared, was a delicate one. In the last war there had been excesses against those of German descent that proved to be a national embarrassment by the time calmer heads had prevailed. Besides, it was not the top priority this evening
“But at this moment, now, what is happening to our Navy?” he asked
“These are the latest reports monitored in San Francisco,” Stark said, holding up the flimsy sheets of paper, and he scanned through them
“Kaneohe, Bellows, Pearl, and Hickam were bombarded for several hours by at least two Japanese battleships. The bombardment has exacerbated the damage already inflicted by the air strikes of yesterday
“A battle was fought off the coast by the cruiser Minneapolis and a small flotilla of destroyers led by Admiral Draemel. It appears as if our losses were severe. Minneapolis is definitely gone, nearly all the destroyers as well, but we did cripple one Japanese battleship, either Hiei or Kirishima.
“An air strike, launched by Admiral Halsey at dawn, reinforced by several B-17s from the island that survived the attacks of yesterday, did further damage. The report, picked up from a ham radio operator claiming he was broadcasting reports handed to him by naval personnel, states that the Jap battleship is foundering thirty miles southwest of Oahu.”
“Excellent,” FDR muttered, but my God, the price in return. A flotilla of destroyers and another cruiser lost? And yet, taking out a Japanese battleship would be greeted as something of a victory
“Our carriers?” he asked
Stark hesitated
“No word at all from the Lexington. It is still operational somewhere between Midway and Hawaii. There was the intention for it to move to the southeast and Enterprise under Halsey to the northwest for a link-up. But both ships are now maintaining nearly complete radio silence, so there is no information there
“Enterprise has only broken radio silence once today, for what we think is a rendezvous signal to a small group made up of the cruiser Indianapolis and its escorting destroyers. We’ve also monitored several Japanese reports, transmitted in the clear. They are claiming to have sunk Enterprise along with a second carrier in the same action, and our queries broadcast out of San Francisco have not been yet been answered.”
“Merciful God,” the President whispered. He lowered his head for a moment, then looked back up at Stark. “Do you think it’s true?”
“Sir, regarding the Enterprise and its group under the command of Admiral Halsey: They only had sixty planes on board when this started. They definitely did strike at the battleship. And we monitored plane-to-plane communications that a Japanese carrier was damaged, perhaps destroyed in a second strike, though our losses were severe. Few if any of our aircraft survived, and they are coming into Oahu, not back to their ship, which would indicate the loss of Enterprise. As to their claims of a second carrier being sunk, I think it doubtful. There was not enough time for Enterprise and Lexington to effect a rendezvous.“
“Why go after a battleship if it was already damaged?” Secretary of War Stimson asked. “Couldn’t your surface ships have finished it off?”
Roosevelt turned to face him. Interestingly, he was, like Knox, a Republican as well as a friend of his cousin Teddy, having served in his administration and been Secretary of War once before, under Taft. A bit ironic, Roosevelt thought yet again, that both of the top civilian military leaders were Republicans, the party that had leaned most toward isolationism
But this evening, Republican or Democrat didn’t matter. Their mission was to build an American front, regardless of parties. The old ideal that politics stopped at the border in times of crisis had to hold true, otherwise they would not win. Marshall had already voiced a fear of that to him, in the months before their entry into this conflict, the adage that “no Democracy can withstand a seven years’ war.” Politics as usual would finally take hold, sapping public support. It was a sobering concept, given that some analysis, what with the Nazi triumphs of this year, and the stunning onslaught of the Japanese, indicated it might take until 1950 to finally bring the Axis powers to their knees
“I can’t speak for Admiral Halsey,” Stark replied, interrupting the President’s thoughts, “but I suspect he launched toward their battleship in the hope of finding their carriers nearby, got pulled into a fight, and his pilots had to drop their ordnance on the closest available target
“We do know for certain, from a broadcast picked up from an Army B-17 that had been shadowing the Japanese fleet, that a second strike, launched by Halsey, hit and perhaps sank a Japanese carrier, but only a handful of our planes survived and apparently have returned to Pearl Harbor rather than to the Enterprise.”
FDR nodded and said, “Shrewd move. Their scout planes could not follow our strike wave back.”
“But the question still is out there. Is Enterprise gone? Returning to Pearl Harbor rather than their ship is an indicator of that reality,” Stimson said
“Or a shrewd move by Halsey to throw the Japanese off,” Stark retorted, “and make them think the carrier has indeed been sunk when in reality it is merely damaged, perhaps unable to recover aircraft but still out there.”
“Don’t you think it is reckless that Admiral Halsey ventured one half-armed carrier against at least four or more of theirs?”
“To go in harm’s way,” FDR said softly with a smile, stepping figuratively between the two. “Remember I’m a former Navy man myself. That has always been the doctrine. From what I know of Halsey’s reputation, he could not do otherwise and let them slip away unharmed.”
Stark did not reply, and Roosevelt wondered if there was some subtext between Stark and Halsey
�
�I think we have to assume Enterprise is out of the fight. Either crippled or sunk. If it is still afloat and seriously damaged, and now without planes, Halsey will not resume radio contact until he is certain he is well clear of their carriers.”
“So that means only one other carrier left to face three, maybe four or even more of theirs,” Stimson replied. “And then suppose this is the forerunner of an invasion of Oahu? It means the Navy cannot provide any air support.”
The President extended a hand in a calming gesture
“Admiral Halsey had to strike when he could, with what he had. I will not fault him for that. In this situation I want our commanders to be taking risks. And besides, Henry, look at the map. If the report on the Japanese fleet location is accurate, they are smack between Task Forces Eight and Twelve. The chances of effecting a rendezvous are slim.”
“Nevertheless, he initiated an attack with a weakened and divided force.”
No one spoke for a moment as the President snuffed out a cigarette and then lit another one
“Gentlemen, I think it appropriate to set a precedent here at the start. I will never, repeat never, fault a commander for being aggressive. Timidity, especially at this moment in our nation’s history, will indeed be the path to certain destruction. Do we understand each other?”
No one replied; there was simply a nodding of heads, and he could see the visible relief on Knox’s face. He had suspected that Stimson was going to try and deflect some blame for the debacle of December 7 onto the Navy, by castigating Halsey’s daring counter-strikes of this morning
“The tradition of our Navy, in perhaps its finest hour, was during the War of 1812, when but a few frigates raised absolute Cain with the British Navy, much to their chagrin. The odds did not matter. That tradition must stand, and I expect to hear, as soon as possible, a clear report of the gallant action of Admiral Draemel and his men. The entire nation must hear of it and every sailor in uniform look to it as an example of the audacity that will eventually win this war for us.”
Pearl Harbour and Days of Infamy Page 52
