World War 2 In Review No. 1: Pearl Harbor

By Merriam Press

Merriam Press World War 2 In Review Number 1: Pearl Harbor

2023 eBook Edition

Number 1 includes the following articles covering many aspects of the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor:

(1) The Road to Pearl Harbor

(2) Anti-torpedo Baffles for Protection Against Torpedo Plane Attacks, Pearl Harbor, February 1941

(3) Bombs Over Pearl Harbor: A Family Affair

(4) Japan’s Pearl Harbor Spy: Takeo Yoshikawa

(5) Japanese Spy at Pearl Harbor

(6) Japanese Battle Orders for Pearl Harbor Attack

(7) United States Note to Japan, 26 November 1941

(8) Out of the Loop: Japan’s Envoys Unaware of Pearl Harbor Attack

(9) War Warnings: Deliberately Confused Messages

(10) USS Ward’s Attack on a Japanese Midget Submarine at Pearl Harbor

(11) The Mystery of Midget D: Crew of Sunken Japanese Submarine Never Found

(12) Hawaii Undersea Research Lab Report on Condition of Three Piece Japanese Midget Submarine

(13) The Attack on Pearl Harbor

(14) The Battle of Pearl Harbor: December 7, 1941 – “Day of Infamy”

(15) Chronology of the Pearl Harbor Attack

(16) Ships Present at Pearl Harbor, 0800, 7 December 1941

(17) The USS St. Louis at Pearl Harbor

(18) Pearl Harbor Heroes: George Welsh and Ken Taylor

(19) Pearl Harbor’s Hero with a Hangover

(20) Pearl Harbor: Up Close and Very Personal

(21) “0745—Rig for Church”: A Chaplain at Pearl Harbor

(22) A Marine’s View from Kaneohe NAS

(23) A Sailor’s View from Battleship Row

(24) A Sailor’s View from the U.S.S. Tangier

(25) A Sailor’s View from the U.S.S. Vestal

(26) A Sailor’s View from the U.S.S. Sumner

(27) A Sailor’s View from Ford Island NAS

(28) “We Were There”: Pearl Harbor Survivors

(29) Flying Into the Hell of Pearl Harbor

(30) Eyewitness Gives Vivid Description of Nippon Raid on Pearl Harbor

(31) Military and Civilian Deaths at Pearl Harbor

(32) USS Arizona Casualties and Survivors

(33) Churchill: “Roosevelt Did Know”

(34) Pearl Harbor: The Second Japanese Attack

(35) Mitsuo Fuchida

(36) USS Arizona Memorial

(37) Advancement of Rear Admiral Kimmel and Major General Short

(38) Did You Know…

(39) Pearl Harbor Bibliography

250 B&W and color photos and illustrations

• Language: English
• Publisher: Lulu.com
• Release date: Jun 15, 2017
• ISBN: 9781387041589

Book preview

The Road to Pearl Harbor

The attack on the military forces of the U.S. at Pearl Harbor, Hawaii, did not just happen nor was it a quick reaction to initiatives instituted by President Roosevelt. The Japanese believed that they were being pushed into a corner by Roosevelt and felt that they must act to protect the Empire. Gordon Prange in At Dawn We Slept describes pre-attack events in detail. The description of these events note the mistakes made on each side.

1937

July: The Japanese Army invaded north China from Manchuria, eight years of combat with the Chinese began.

December: The gunboat U.S.S. Panay, while on routine duty in Chinese waters, was attacked by Japanese aircraft. We do not know if the attack was intentional or an accident but Roosevelt looked for ways to punish Japan. Nothing became of this incident because the Japanese government apologized, paid for all damages, and promised to protect American nationals.

1938

October: With the continued German military rearmament program and European leadership capitulation at the Munich conference, President Roosevelt asked Congress for $500 million to increase America’s defense forces. This action was done because he believed that Germany was a threat to the U.S. The Japanese saw this build up as a direct threat to their Empire because the U.S. was the only country in the Pacific which could impede their expansion.

1939

February: Japan continues its conquest of China by occupying Hainan Island off the southern coast. This occupation improved Japan’s ability to interdict maritime trade routes.

Because the U.S. was the primary military threat in the Pacific, Japan had prepared war plans to deal with this problem, and the U.S. had similar war plans aimed at Japan. The Japanese plan was to conduct one large naval battle against the American Navy, destroying it, resulting in the inability of the U.S. to interfere with Japanese expansion throughout Asia. Admiral Isoroku Yamamoto assumed command of Japan’s Combined Fleet in August of 1939. Having lived in America for several years, he knew Americans, the type of people we were, and he knew that this war plan was impractical. He needed a new plan which would remove the threat of U.S. intervention from his flank.

1940

January: Sometime between January and March 1940 Yamamoto devised his plan to destroy the U.S. Navy in Hawaii and demoralize the American people. Prange asks the question Why did Yamamoto think that this attack would crush American morale since he knew them? but he does not answer his own question. No actions were implemented to put the plan in action.

July: Trade sanctions followed by a trade embargo were imposed resulting in increased ill-will and additional political problems with Japan. These trade actions were imposed because Roosevelt was attempting to stop Japanese expansion.

1941

January: Admiral Yamamoto begins communicating with other Japanese officers, asking them if an attack on Pearl Harbor would be possible. The final outcome of these discussions was the attack was possible but would be difficult.

Secrecy and surprise were the two elements which were most important to the success of this plan. With that said one wonders how secure was the flow of information around the Imperial Naval Staff, because on 27 January 1941, Joseph C. Gerow, the U.S. Ambassador to Japan, wired Washington that he had learned information that Japan, in the event of trouble with the U.S., was planning a surprise attack on Pearl Harbor.

No one in Washington believed the information. If someone had believed this information, the Pearl Harbor attack possibly could have been avoided. While many thought that war was possible, no one believed that the Japanese could surprise us.

Most senior American military experts believed that the Japanese would attack Manila in the Philippine Islands. Manila’s location threatened the sea lanes of communications as the Japanese military forces moved south. Another thought to location of attack was toward the north into Russia because of the war in Europe between Germany and the Soviet Union.

February: As the Japanese were conducting preliminary planing for the attack, Americans were preparing to defend American property. Admiral Husband E. Kimmel, Commander in Chief of the U.S. Pacific Fleet, and Lieutenant General Walter C. Short, Commanding General of the Hawaiian Department, prepared Hawaii for attack. Defense of the islands was an Army responsibility though the Navy did play a major role in preparing to repel an attack.

Admiral Kimmel planned on taking his fleet out of the harbor and confronting the enemy at sea.

With this in mind both officers communicated with their seniors in Washington attempting to obtain additional men and equipment to insure a proper defense of all military installations on Oahu. At this time, war production of the U.S. was still limited resulting with the dispersal of material around the world trying to fill everyone’s needs: Britain, Russia, the Philippines and Hawaii.

March: Nagao Kita, Honolulu’s new Consul General arrives on Oahu with Takeo Yoshikawa, a trained spy. As the military of both countries prepared for possible war, the planners needed information about the opponent.

The U.S. knew that Hawaii was full of Japanese intelligence officers but because of our constitutional rights very little could be done. Untrained agents like Kohichi Seki, the Honolulu consulate’s treasurer, traveled around the island noting all types of information about the movement of the fleet. When the attack occurred the Japanese had a very clear picture of Pearl Harbor and where individual ships were moored.

April: During the time period U.S. intelligence officers continued to monitor Japanese secret messages.

American scientists had developed a machine, code named Magic which gave U.S. intelligence officers the ability to read Japanese secret message traffic. Magic provided all types of high quality information but because of preconceived ideas in Washington some data was not followed up on and important pieces of the pre-attack puzzle were missed.

Japanese consular traffic was also intercepted which provided additional intelligence. While the U.S. had all the data needed to arrive at a clear picture of Japanese intentions, the Navy had an internal struggle between the Office of Naval Intelligence and the War Plans Division about which department should be the primary collection office. When the War Plans Division was finally designated the first in line for data, all of the Navy’s intelligence collection was degraded.

To further complicate this problem the Army had its own intelligence office, G-2. At times the Army and the Navy did not talk to each other, again reducing the ability to divine Japan’s intentions. Finally, Washington did not communicate all the available information that was received to all commands, at times thinking that such a transmission would result in duplication. All in all, the U.S. knew that Japan was going to expand its war but the question remained, where? If U.S. intelligence people had communicated, preparations for the attack could have been improved.

May: Admiral Nomura informed his superiors that he had learned Americans were reading his message traffic. No one in Tokyo believed that their code could have been broken. The code was not changed.

If the Japanese had changed their code, the surprise of the attack would have occurred as it did but would we have been as poorly prepared or could the result have been even worse? This mistake would have impacted follow-on actions through 1942.

July: Throughout the summer Yamamoto trained his forces. His staff and the Naval General Staff finalized the planning of the attack: what route to travel on, how much fuel would be required for the trip, what U.S. ships would be in the harbor and where they would be moored.

The Japanese planners also had to coordinate their own requirement of additional military action around Indochina. Which action was more important and which would provide the greatest gain had to be worked out.

November: Tokyo sends Saburo Kurusu, an experienced diplomat to Washington as a special envoy to assist Ambassador Admiral Kichisaburo Nomura, who continued to seek a diplomatic solution.

Japan wanted the U.S. to agree to its southern expansion diplomatically but if they were unsuccessful, they would go to war.

On the 16th the first units, submarines involved in the attack, departed Japan.

On the 26th the main body, aircraft carriers and escorts, began the transit to Hawaii.

December 7th: At 0750, Hawaiian time, the first wave of Japanese aircraft began the attack. Along with the ships in Pearl Harbor, the air stations at Hickam, Wheeler, Ford Island, Kaneohe and Ewa Field were attacked.

For two hours and twenty minutes, Japanese aircraft bombed and shot up these military targets. When the second wave returned to their carriers, 2,403 people had been killed and 1,178 were wounded. Eighteen ships of different sizes had been sunk or damaged and seventy-seven aircraft of all types had been destroyed.

Only twenty-nine Japanese aircraft were shot down by American return fire, most during the attack of the second wave. This number of planes downed is significant but had the defenses of Hawaii been prepared the number would have been greater.

Before 7 December 1941, while war was actively being waged in Europe and the Far East, the United States, still a neutral, was expanding its manufacturing facilities to meet the demands for additional war materials, both for the growing U.S. forces and those of the Allies. On 7 December the Japanese struck Pearl Harbor in an attempt to so cripple U.S. naval power that future Japanese conquest and occupation in the Pacific would meet with little or no opposition. This attack dealt a serious blow to Navy and Army Air Forces units stationed in the Hawaiian Islands.

December 7, 1941 Oahu map showing the Japanese flights paths and ship arrangements around Ford Island.

Pearl Harbor December 7, 1941 with a few present-day facilities.

Hawai Kaisen tai suijō kansen senkazu, Shōwa 16-nen 12-gatsu 8-nichi = Estimated damage report against surface ships on the air attack of Pearl Harbor, December 8th, 1941 by Comander Mitsuo Fuchida. Title, legend and caption in Japanese and English handwritten by Fuchida. Post-battle damage assessment map of Pearl Harbor. Date inferred from Fuchida's autobiography; map was used for Fuchida's briefing of the Emperor on December 26, 1941. Graphic map, hand-drawn, of Pearl Harbor showing details of the attack; approximately 60 ships drawn with names and types, e.g. Arizona, Pennsylvania Type; red dots, red arrows, and red crosses show types of weapons with amount of munition used for attack (torpedo, 800 kg. bomb, and 250 kg. bomb); red lines indicate severity of damage (minor, moderate, serious damage and sunk); red arrows show direction and location of where torpedoes struck American ships; cross marks indicate bomb impacts; red smoke from ships drawn; English alphabet and Japanese iroha assigned to ships; black dotted line indicates course of Nevada Class ship. Confidential 軍極秘 (Gun gokuhi) handwritten in red at head of title.

Anti-torpedo Baffles for

Protection Against Torpedo Plane Attacks,

Pearl Harbor, February 1941

Consideration has been given to the installation of A/T baffles within Pearl Harbor for protection against torpedo plane attacks. It is considered that the relatively shallow depth of water limits the need for anti-torpedo nets in Pearl Harbor. In addition the congestion and the necessity for maneuvering room limit the practicability of the present type of baffles.

Certain limitations and considerations are advised to be borne in mind in planning the installation of anti-torpedo baffles within harbors, among which the following may be considered:

A minimum depth of water of seventy-five feet may be assumed necessary to successfully drop torpedoes from planes. One hundred and fifty feet of water is desired. The maximum height planes at present experimentally drop torpedoes is 250 feet. Launching speeds are between 120 and 150 knots. Desirable height for dropping is sixty feet or less. About two hundred yards of torpedo run is necessary before the exploding device is armed, but this may be altered.

There should be ample maneuvering room available for vessels approaching and leaving berths.

Ships should be able to get away on short notice.

Room must be available inside the baffles for tugs, fuel oil barges and harbor craft to maneuver alongside individual ships.

Baffles should be clear of cable areas, ferry routes, and channels used by shipping.

Baffles should be sufficient distance from anchored vessels to insure the vessels' safety in case a torpedo explodes on striking a baffle.

High land in the vicinity of an anchorage makes a successful airplane attack from the land side most difficult.

Vulnerable areas in the baffles should be so placed as to compel attacking planes to come within effective range of anti-aircraft batteries before they can range their torpedoes.

Availability of shore and ship anti-aircraft protection, balloon barrages, and aircraft protection.

Availability of naturally well protected anchorages within a harbor from torpedo plane attack for a number of large ships. Where a large force such as a fleet is based, the installation of satisfactory baffles will be difficult because of the congestion.

As a matter of interest the successful attacks at Taranto were made at very low launching heights at reported ranges by the individual aviators of 400 to 1300 yards from the battleships, but the depths of water in which the torpedoes were launched were between 14 and 15 fathoms. The attacks were made in the face of intensive and apparently erratic anti-aircraft fire. The eastern shore line of the anchorage and moorings were protected by numerous balloon barrages, but there was no trawler borne balloon barrage to the west. The torpedoes were apparently dropped inside of the nets, probably A/T nets.

It is considered that certain large bays and harbors, where a fleet or large force of heavy ships may be anchored and exposed with a large body of water on an entire flank, should have that flank protected by a series of baffles if the water is deep enough for launching torpedoes. The main fleet anchorage at Scapa Flow, for instance, has an A/T net extending slightly to the north of a line between Calf of Flotta and Cava Island protecting the main fleet anchorage. The depth of water where this net is laid is approximately 17 fathoms. On the other hand constricted harbors, in which practically all available space is taken up by anchorages, and which is relatively deep probably must depend upon other defense measures. It might be possible and practicable to provide in some places, which are not protected by relatively shallow water, anti-torpedo baffles practically surrounding a limited number of berths or large ships, such as battleships or carriers. An extreme example of this is furnished at the present time by the French at Dakar, where double nets surround the Richelieu; she is placed similarly as in a dry dock, and evidently would have to open a section of the net to be hauled clear. The depth of water at Dakar, however, is very shallow.

The present A/T nets are very expensive extremely heavy, their heavy anchors and moorings take up about 200 yards space perpendicular to the line of the net, take a long time to lay, and are designed to stand up under heavy weather conditions. There is apparently a great need for the development of a light efficient torpedo net which could be laid temporarily and quickly within protected harbors and which can be readily removed. It is hoped that some such net can be developed in the near future.

Recommendations and comments of the Commander-in-Chief are especially desired.

(s) H. R. Stark.

H. R. STARK.

Copy to

CinC Atlantic Fleet.

CinC Asiatic Fleet.

CONFIDENTIAL

February 17, 1941

From: The Chief of Naval Operations

To: The Commandant, First Naval District

The Commandant, Third Naval District

The Commandant, Fourth Naval District

The Commandant, Fifth Naval District

The Commandant, Sixth Naval District

The Commandant, Seventh Naval District

The Commandant, Eighth Naval District

The Commandant, Tenth Naval District

The Commandant, Eleventh Naval District

The Commandant, Twelfth Naval District

The Commandant, Thirteenth Naval District

The Commandant, Fourteenth Naval District

The Commandant, Fifteenth Naval District

The Commandant, Sixteenth Naval District

The Commandant, Naval Station, Guantanamo

Subject:     Anti-torpedo baffles for protection against torpedo plane attacks.

In previous correspondence the Commandants and Local Joint Planning Committees have been requested, where considered necessary, to submit recommendations concerning the employment of nets and booms in their defenses. In nearly allcases the recommendations received were limited to harbor entrances. One of the reasons for this was that the Department, after previously making studies of many harbors, submitted certain proposals for consideration by the Districts, but did not specifically propose any protection against torpedo plane attacks.

The Commandants and Local Joint Planning Committees are requested, if they have not already done so, to consider the employment of and to make recommendations concerning anti-torpedo baffles especially for the protection of large and valuable units of the fleet in their respective harbors, and especially at the major fleet bases.     

In considering the use of A/T baffles, the following limitations, among others, may be borne in mind:

A minimum depth of water of seventy-five feet may be assumed necessary to successfully drop torpedos from planes. About two hundred yards of torpedo run is necessary before the exploding device is armed, but this may be altered.

There should be ample maneuvering room for vessels approaching and leaving berths.

Ships should be able to get away on short notice.

Room must be available inside the baffles for tugs, fuel oil barges and harbor craft to maneuver alongside individual ships.

Baffles should be clear of cable areas, ferry routes, and channels used by shipping.

Baffles should be sufficient distance from anchoraged vessels to insure the vessels safety in case a torpedo explodes on striking a baffle.

High land in the vicinity of an anchorage makes a successful airplane attack from the land side most difficult.

Vulnerable areas in the baffles should be so placed as to compel attacking planes to come within effective range of anti-aircraft batteries before they can range their torpedos.

Availability of shore and ship anti-aircraft protection balloon barrages, and aircraft protection.

Availability of naturaly well protected anchorage within a harbor from torpedo plane attack for a number of large ships. Where a large force such as a fleet is based, the installation of satisfactory baffles will be difficult because of congestion.

R.E. INGERSOLL

Acting

- - - - - - - - - - - - - -

Copy To: 

Cinc,Pacific

Cinc,Atlantic

Cinc,Asiatic

C.O.Nav.Net Depot, Tiburon

C.O.Nav.Net Depot, Newport

BuOrd

OP-12

Bombs Over Pearl Harbor: A Family Affair

by Patricia Lee Holt

Millions of Americans still recall a date which will live in infamy. At approximately 7:55 a.m., 7 December 1941, the Japanese began an attack on Pearl Harbor.

That Day of Infamy, as President Roosevelt called it, is especially memorable because it was on a Sunday, a time of families to be together. It is ironic that a little-known family of spies helped make the sneak attack possible.

The Bernhard Kuhn family were likable people, had many friends on the island, and aroused absolutely no suspicion among them. They, like all successful spies, had a genius for becoming inconspicuous, having established a perfect cover.

Kuhn, a middle-aged man, his matronly wife, pretty teenage daughter and six-year-old son, projected the image of an average Honolulu family. But the fact remains that the entire Kuhn family spied for the Japanese and succeeded in pulling off one of the greatest intelligence feats in history.

The story began with Kuhn’s young daughter, Susie Ruth. At 17 years of age, back in Berlin, Ruth became the mistress of a powerful Nazi, Propaganda Minister Joseph Goebbels. But the club-footed Goebbels, despite his repulsive appearance had his pick of many beautiful women in pre-war Berlin. He soon tired of his young mistress, but faced a problem in ridding himself of her. Ruth was the daughter of Dr. Bernhard Julius Otto Kuhn, who had great influence in the Nazi Party in 1935. Doctor Kuhn cultivated a close relationship with Heinrich Himmler, head of the Gestapo, and later became a minor official of the dreaded secret police. Goebbels knew it wouldn’t be easy to get rid of a girl with such connections. But he finally hit on a plan. The Nazis had close ties with Japan at the time, and had been requested to supply an Occidental spy to work at Pearl Harbor, as it was almost impossible for an Oriental to work unnoticed in an American community. It would be a kind of lease-a-spy arrangement, with the Japanese paying a great deal of money and picking up all the expenses. When Goebbels heard about the request, he quickly recommended Ruth Kuhn and her family.

Doctor Kuhn accepted Goebbels’ proposition, and on 15 August 1935, the Kuhns arrived in Honolulu. The family included Dr. Kuhn, am amicable, educated man of 41, his wife Friedel, alluring Susie Ruth and her half-brother, six-year-old Hans Joachim. Kuhn bought a house in Pearl City and a cottage very close to the ocean in Kalama—overlooking Pearl Harbor. For his cover, he claimed to be a retired doctor with a big inheritance, to others he was a student of Hawaiian history, to still others he posed as an inventor. None of his friends who visited his house filled with fine paintings and sculpture ever suspected his true identity, not even when Mrs. Kuhn traveled to Japan twice and returned the second time with $16,000 that she deposited in an expanding bank account. If there were any questions, Dr. Kuhn would simply explain that he had made successful investments abroad.

In the meantime, the Kuhns were collecting and transmitting secret military information on a remarkable scale. By 1939 they had been instructed to obtain all intelligence possible about U.S. ships in the Pacific—primarily those in Hawaii. The Japanese were training to implement Adm. Isoroku Yamamoto’s daring plan to cripple America at Pearl Harbor.

Early in November 1941, C-in-C of the Combined Fleet, Adm. Yamamoto, began his plan to destroy Pearl Harbor, an operation to which six regular aircraft carriers, two battleships, three cruisers and eleven destroyers were allocated. Yamamoto set Monday, 8 December (Japanese time) as the approximate day of the Pearl Harbor attack.

In preparation for the attack, the Kuhn family worked diligently to supply information that would be of extreme importance to the Japanese. Everyone in the family supplied valuable information. The beguiling Ruth obtained information in several ways. At first she dated military personnel. She excelled in tennis, dancing and swimming. This outgoing, charming girl found it an easy task to extract information from her dates about their ships, bases or assignments. After becoming engaged to a young Navy officer, her task was made even more simple. But the beauty parlor she opened in Pearl Harbor turned into her most important source of valuable information. Ruth made it a policy to give the best and least expensive service on the island for the wives of high-ranking military personnel. These wives’ wagging tongues lived up to Ruth’s greatest expectations. They talked so much, she would later say, that it was a relief when they left the place.

So much information seeped into the beauty parlor that Ruth’s mother had to come in on certain days to help eavesdrop on the conversations.

Frau Kuhn, who resembled everybody’s favorite grandmother, worked busily at her own method of spying. She bought and often used 18-power binoculars to spy on ships in the harbor and military installations below. Sometimes Friedel and the doctor sailed around Pearl Harbor itself, mentally taking notes of everything they saw, while smiling at the crews aboard the big ships.

Even little Hans Joachim worked as a spy, probably the only bonafide child spy in history. Hans worked as an active agent before he turned 11. Dressed as a little sailor, Dr. Kuhn would take him aboard the warships in port. Officers often invited the friendly little sailor aboard, taking him on tours of their ships and answering all the questions this bright little fellow asked about the vessels and their operations. Doctor Kuhn had trained the ten-year-old to observe, ask key questions and remember anything unusual. Little Hans was questioned as soon as he and his father arrived back home. The information was recorded, like all information the family gathered, by Frau Kuhn in written form. In the beginning this intelligence was secretly delivered to the Japanese consul general, who forwarded it to Tokyo via couriers with diplomatic immunity. Toward the end, more elaborate precautions were taken. Takeo Yoshikawa, the Japanese master spy, came to Honolulu to work with the Kuhns.

Using binoculars, Yoshikawa watched while Dr. Kuhn flashed him coded messages from the attic of the Kalama cottage. As amazing as it seems, this ancient system of lantern signals went undetected until the end.

The Japanese knew virtually everything there was to know about Pearl Harbor, thanks to the efforts of the Kuhns and Yoshikawa over the years.

On 7 December 1941, Pearl Harbor was attacked by the Japanese. The base at that time was accommodating seventy U.S. fighting ships, twenty-four auxiliaries, and some three hundred planes. All eight battleships present were hit (five of them being sunk and another heavily damaged), two destroyers were sunk and nine other ships sunk or crippled; 140 aircraft were destroyed and eighty more damaged, and 2,330 servicemen were killed and 1,145 wounded, apart from a hundred civilian casualties. But the Pacific Fleet’s three carriers, then at sea, escaped as did shore installations and oil storage facilities.

Most people immediately think of bombs dropping when the words Pearl Harbor are mentioned. The slogan Remember Pearl Harbor is as famous as Remember the Alamo. Yet the story of the spy family who helped the Japanese plan the attack on Pearl Harbor is largely unknown. The contributions from the Kuhns cannot be too strongly emphasized. For example, only five days before the attack, they had transmitted to the Japanese an account describing every American ship in Hawaiian waters.

The Kuhn’s operations continued until after the Pearl Harbor attack. They were busy observing the repercussion of their endeavors through binoculars and flashing this information to Yoshikawa. Military intelligence finally noticed the blinking lights emanating from the cottage and traced them to their source. The Kuhns were arrested while still enthusiastically at work.

Doctor Kuhn was tried and ordered shot as a spy. But when he volunteered valuable information about his Japanese and Nazi contacts, his sentence was commuted to fifty years at hard labor. He was released after serving four years of his sentence. Yoshikawa eventually returned to Japan in exchange for an American diplomat and became a prominent businessman in Tokyo. Frau Kuhn was given a light sentence and later returned to Germany. Ruth returned to Germany also after serving a few years in prison.

Should you ever get into a discussion about that Day of Infamy, remember the Kuhns—the family that gave you Pearl Harbor.

Sources

Encyclopedia Britannica: Knowledge in Depth, Volume 19. Chicago, 1974, page 989.

Wallenchinsky, David, and Irving Wallace. The People’s Almanac. Doubleday, Garden City, N.Y., 1975, pages 651, 653.

World Book Encyclopedia, Volume 21. Field Enterprises Educational Corp., Chicago, 1976, page 392.

Japan’s Pearl Harbor Spy: Takeo Yoshikawa

by Ron Laytner

Published 10 December 1978

Takeo Yoshikawa is the spy who can never come in from the cold. His espionage was so successful that it ruined his life forever. Yoshikawa helped the Japanese in their surprise attack on Pearl Harbor.

World military circles have considered Yoshikawa one of the most successful spies in history. Yet, he has received no awards, no honors, not even a pension from the Japanese government. He has no job today. He lives as a down-and-out and drinks to forget.

I have been wiped clean from Japanese history, he said at his home on the island of Shikoku, south of Tokyo. "Five years ago when I applied for a pension, they said, ‘We never heard of you.’

When I told them of my espionage assignment of the long years working to become an expert on the American Navy and of my dangerous mission in Honolulu, they were without sympathy. They told me Japan never spied on anyone.

Pearl Harbor was a military feat so daring, so brilliant, so audaciously planned and so successfully carried out that it is worth a special volume in the annals of warfare. Here is Yoshikawa’s account.

"I was born in a very different world. It was in 1914 in the days of the great Japanese Empire when the Yamato race walked tall across Asia. It was something special then to be born a boy in Japan.

It was a time when the empire was on the march, he said. "But the world is not the same today. To die these days for one’s country is a waste of time.

Today, war is bad, war is wrong. But in my day it was good. It was right. I was a true hero of Japan. But look what it has brought me in my old age. Look at me today.

When Yoshikawa was a boy, the Japanese Empire indeed was on the march. In those times the death of a young man in battle was, in Japanese thinking, like the fall of a cherry blossom—which drops to its death at the height of its beauty.

The future spy enrolled at the Imperial Japanese Naval Academy at Eta Jima as a 1929 cadet. Four years later he graduated at the top of his class.

He served outstandingly aboard the battleship Asama and later trained on submarines and as a pilot.

A serious stomach ailment forced him to retire after two years. It was a bitter blow and he thought of killing himself. But a high-ranking officer offered him a job in Japanese Naval Intelligence.

Yoshikawa set out to become an expert on the U.S. Navy. For four years he worked on the America desk studying Jane’s Fighting Ships and Aircraft and thousands of U.S. books, newspapers and magazines.

In 1940 Yoshikawa prepared for an espionage assignment abroad by passing the Foreign Ministry English examinations. Soon he was a junior diplomat. It would be his cover.

In 1941, Yoshikawa received a diplomatic passport and went to Honolulu as a vice consul using the cover name of Tadashi Morimura.

He found out later that Admiral Isoroku Yamamoto had prepared a detailed Pearl Harbor attack plan in early 1941 and that the plan was presented to the Naval General Staff in August 1941.

I was a spy in the field without that secret inside information, he said, "but I assumed my job was to help prepare for an attack on Pearl Harbor and I worked night and day getting necessary information.

"The Americans were very foolish. As a diplomat, I could move about the islands. No one bothered me. I often rented small planes at the John Rodgers Airport in Honolulu and flew around U.S. installations making observations. I never took notes or drew maps. I kept everything in my head.

"As a long-distance swimmer I completely covered the harbor installations. Sometimes I stayed underwater for a long time breathing through a hollow reed.

And my favorite viewing place, recalled Yoshikawa, was a lovely Japanese teahouse overlooking the harbor. I knew what ships were in, how heavily they were loaded, who their officers were and what supplies were on board. The trusting young officers who visited the teahouse told the girls there everything. And anything they didn’t reveal I found out by giving rides to hitch-hiking American sailors and pumping them for information.

The work was dangerous. Once a U.S. Navy sailor on guard duty saw me crouched down near an electrified fence. He fired his rifle but missed me.

The big day grew closer. Yoshikawa handed a secret Japanese courier 97 answers to intelligence questions asked by Admiral Yamamoto concerning ships, planes and personnel at Pearl Harbor during the fall of 1941. The admiral learned, for example, that most ships were at anchor in Pearl Harbor on Sunday—so he planned the attack for that day.

On 6 December, Yoshikawa sent out his final message: No barrage balloons sighted. Battleships are without crinolines. No indications of air or sea alert wired to nearby islands. Enterprise and Lexington have sailed from Pearl Harbor.

In Tokyo, Foreign Ministry officials passed the information on to Admiral Yamamoto, and the attack planner radioed his fleet, moving in for the kill: Vessels moored in harbor—nine battleships, three class-B cruisers, three seaplane tenders, 17 destroyers. All aircraft carriers and heavy cruisers have departed harbor … no indication of any change in U.S. fleet or anything unusual.

In the darkness 400 miles north of