[ARC5] FW: How the U.S. Cracked Japan's 'Purple Encryption Machine' at the Dawn of World War II

[Joe Connor]

Here's what happened:
With respect to the bombers, as soon as word of Pearl Harbor reached the Philippines, Brereton (air commander) sought MacArthur's permission to launch a bombing raid on Japanese bases on Taiwan. Through his chief of staff (Sutherland), MacArthur denied permission, saying he wanted the Japanese to make the first overt move. (What the hell was Pearl Harbor, Brereton asked). Later that morning, MacArthur finally gave permission for a photo reconnaissance mission to Formosa. The B-17s were on the ground at Clark Field getting gassed up for that mission when the Japanese hit at around noon. Exhaustive research has been done, but no one can figure out what the hell MacArthur was thinking when he refused to immediately authorize attacks on Taiwan.
The fighters were not MacArthur's fault. It was a middle-management screw-up. Also, the air-warning system sucked, the Air Corps lacked sufficient revetments, dispersal fields etc., and everyone still had a peacetime mentality.
An excellent book on this is "December 8, 1941: MacArthur's Pearl Harbor" by Bill Bartsch. (It's December 8 because the Philippines were on the other side of the international dateline).
Ironically, Nagumo refused to authorize a second strike on Pearl Harbor because he feared exactly what would happen at Midway: the American carriers would find him and the U.S. planes would hit his carriers while his planes were being refueled and rearmed for the second attack.
Joe Connor  

    On Thursday, December 8, 2016 11:09 AM, Glen Zook <gzook at yahoo.com> wrote:
 
 

 The "story" that I heard, about the fact that there were a significant number of aircraft, on the ground in the Philippines, was that they were airborne shortly after the information that Pearl Harbor had been attacked.  However, those aircraft had run out of fuel and were on the ground being refueled when the attack finally came.    

Very similar to what happened to the Japanese at the Battle of Midway.
 Glen, K9STH 
Website: http://k9sth.net

      From: Dennis DuValll via ARC5 <arc5 at mailman.qth.net>
 To: Joe Connor <joeconnor53 at yahoo.com> 
Cc: "ARC5 at mailman.QTH.net" <ARC5 at mailman.QTH.net>; D C _Mac_ Macdonald <k2gkk at hotmail.com>
 Sent: Thursday, December 8, 2016 12:10 AM
 Subject: Re: [ARC5] FW: How the U.S. Cracked Japan's 'Purple Encryption Machine' at the Dawn of World War II
  
The MacArthur family had strong political connections going WAY back…..

   

 
   
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