Aleutian Campaign

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ALEUTIAN CAMPAIGN WORLD WAR 11:

HISTORICALSTUDY AND URREW PERSPE TIVE

A th esi s pres ente d to the Faculty of t he U.S. ArmyCamnand and General Staff Coll ege in partial

fulfillment of the requirements for thedegree

HASTER OF MILITARY OF ART AND SCIENCE

ROBER T L. JOHN SON JR. MAJ USAB.S.. McN ees e Sta te Universi ty. Lake Charles. Lou isia na. 977

Fort Leavenworth Kans as992

Approved for public release ; distribution is unlimited.


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MASTER OF MILITARY ART AND SCIENCE

THESIS APPROVAL PAGE

Name of candidate: Major Robert L. Johns on, Jr.

Title of thesis: Aleutians Campaign, World War 11: Historical Studyand Current Perspective.

Approv ed by:

The sls Conunlttee Chalrman

Mr. Charles W. T i m o n s . M.S.S.M.

Accepted this 5th day of June 1992 by:

4n?L , Director, Graduate DegreePhilip 3 Brookes, Ph.D. Pro gra ms

The opinlo ns and conclusions expressed herein are th ose of the studentauthor and do not necessarily represent the views of the U S ArmyC m a n d and S ta ff Col lege or any o ther governmenta l agency.

Refere nces to this study sho uld include the foregoing statement.)


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ABSTRACT

THE ALEUTIANS CAMPAIGN WORLD WAR 11: HISTORICAL STUDY AND CURRENT

PERSPECTIVE by MAJ Robert L. Johnson Jr.. USA2 6

pages.

This work is a detalled historlcal study of the Aleutians Campaignconducted by U.S. Armed Forces from June 1942 through 8 August 1943to gain control of the North Pacific and eject the Japanese from Attuand Kiska Islands. The campaign characterized by combined and jointoperations. involved an extended air battle a brutal fight for controlof the waters of the western Aleutians and two major combat amphibiousoperations.

The Aleutians Campaign of major significance at the time quicklybecame over-shadowed by later naval air and amphibious operationsconducted in the Pacific. Though studied extensively after August 1943

to apply lessons learned to other operations the Aleutlans Campaignattracted llttle attention by milltary scholars in the years afterWorld War 11. This study detai Is the conduct of the campaign andapplies tactical operational and strategic aspects to the currentU.S. Army model for campaign planning.

There is significant parallel with current U.S. doctrine for conductinga regional campaign especially in an austere theater with that usedto conduct the Aleutians Campaign n the North Pacific theater ofoperations.


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ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

am deeply appreciative of the assistance of a great number ofpeople who contributed to this effort. The time and advice freelygiven by the staff of the U.S. Army Combine d Arms Research Lib raryespecially Mrs. Betty Bohannon and Mr. Cra ig Mclean wer e invaluable.Also I am thankful for the suppo rt given by my fe llow offi ces of StaffGroup 15 especially Major David Lewis. Their moral support and advicekept me going s t rong and will never be forgotten.

My most s incere acknowledgement of outst andin g support must go tomy wife Lawanna and son Mark. The understanding and enthusiasm theyimparted to me su staine d th is effort at every step. Not only did sheassume most of t he family responsibilities during thi s year but shegave birth to our second son Nicholas in February 1992. There isl i t t le more one co uld ask of a spouse. Thank you s o much.


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TABLE OF CONTENTS

CHAPTERS PAGE

Introduction.. Al eu ti an Campaign. Ju ne 1942-August 1943 .............

Ch ap te r One.. Ja pa ne se Of fe ns iv e in th e Al eu ti an s ...................... 8

..............................wo--Stan d-Off in the Ale utia ns 48

Three.. Pre lude t o an Amp hibious Operat lon.. .................. 2

Four.. Assault on Attu and Kiska ............................. 126

Five.. The Al eu ti an s Campalgn: A Curren t Pe rs pe ct iv e ........ 70

Bibliography ........................................................ 197

FIGURES

Figure 1 Map of North Pacific ........................................

2 Chain of Command, Joint Chiefs to North Pacific . . . . . . . . . . . . .

3 Japanese Eas te rn Defensive Per ime t er ....................... 12

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .Map D epictin g Battle of Midway 16

5 Map of Alaska and Aleutians ............................... 37]L 1. . . . . . . .Organizat ion of U.S. North Pa ci fic For ce (TF Eigh t) 50

........Organization of Japanese Fifth Fleet. 20 May-9 June 68. . . . . . . . . . . .0rganization of Japanese Fifth Fleet. 9-13 June 69

....Organiz ation of Japane se Flf th Fleet. 13 June-15 August 7 0

1 Organizat ion of Task Force Fifty.one . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1 1

......................Organization of Task Force Sixteen 11 -113/. ..-

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .Attu Landing Plan . /. 17I ....\ . . . .

13 ispost ion of Enemy For ce s on Attu ....................... ilq..

1 Capture of Attu 29

1 Plan for Klska Landing .................................... 64


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INTRODU TION

On the 3rd of June 19 42 aircraft of Japan s Northern Naval F orce

atta cked the Un ite d States naval stat ion on Unal aska Island in the

Aleutians. Th is aerial attack on Dutch Harbor Naval Base and Fort

Mears.the companio n army base, an d the follow-up attack conducted the

next day, were the opening shot s of a battle for control of th e North

Paci fic and the Aleutian Islands that woul d continue until the early

fall of 19 43 (Refer to Figu re 1. Ha p of the North Paci fic. pag e 6 .

Action in the North Pacific and on the Aleutian Islands during

World War I1 were small ope rati ons in relation to the combat in Europe.

and it pales in comparison with the ma Jo r amphibiou s operations yet to

come in the Pacific. However. a very important conslderatlon made t he

struggle in the North Pacific unique. Th is wa s the potential for one

side or the other to achieve a huge strategic payoff in the Aleutians,

and thi s caused both Japa nese and American planners significant worry.

Th is stra tegi c potential wa s never realized for either side. By

the end of the Aleu tia ns Campalgn In August 1943. Americ an plan ners

Ju dg ed the weather and s ea condi ions of the North Pacl f lc too

inhospl table from which to launch a maJ or offensiv e through the

northern app roaches to the Japanese homeland. Though planning for such

an operat lon, an d f o r the basing-of s trat e .dc bombers, continued

throughout 1944 succ esse s in both the Southwest and Central Paci fic

made such an offensive unnecessary.

Japanese ope rati ons in the North Pacific, after the Japanese fo rces

on Attu were destroyed by U.S. combat tro ops in May 1943 and t hose on


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Klska evacuated the Island short ly thereafter, were l lmlted to defenslve

activ ity in an d aro und their own Kuril Islands. U.S. pla ns for us e of

the Aleut lans a s a base from which to launch a strategic offensive

against th e Japan ese homeland, though considered feasible by the Unite d

Sta tes until the end of the war, wer e never t o be a reallty.

Llk e the eventual fa1 lure of the A1 led concept plan to attack

Nazl Germany from the south throu gh Italy, the American plan to attack

Japan from the north by way of the Aleut ians never fully materialized.

In fact. a f ter the last Japanese wi thdrew f r m the Aleutlans In August

1943. U.S. for ces in th e regi on becam e an occupational force inv olved

in th e completi on of base an d facllity construction.

Although the actlve campaign in the Aleutlans lasted for fourteen

months. included over 325,000 U.S. personnel (245,745 troop s t o Alaska

and Northwest Servi ce Cornand), requl red the comnltment of a large

volume of sca rce resources, and created much interest (and alarm) in

the U.S. at the time, there are fe w secondary source s on the NorthPaciflc/Aleutlans Campaign. Additionally, most publlshed wor ks on the

Aleut lans and Alaska during World War I1 are of th e You wer e there

variety an d tak e a micro -view of a part lcular operation. These

pub1 ished ac cou nts contr lbute to our understanding in that they add

One notable exception s the work by Brian Garfield,and the Aleut m (Garden . .

City Ne w Yor k: Dou ble day Comp an y, Inc.. 1969). Garfield s wo rk isthe only complete published work on the Aleutlans Campaign. Writt enwith the full cooperation of the U.S. Air Force, uslng avai lab ledecla ssifi ed doc ument s and based on extensl ve lntervlews with U.S.partlclpants. Garfield s account remains the definitive published workon the Wor ld War I1 Aleut ians Campaign. Personnel fi gures from RobertW. C oakl ey and Rich ard M. Le ighton. Globs1 9 4 3 945 Unite d Sta tes Army in World War 11 The War Department(Wash ingto n. D.C: Cen ter of Mlllt ary Hls tor y, 1986). 834.


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interesting and informative substance to battles that are difficult for

one to gain an appreciat ion for by the rea din g of only official

documents. Though cited frequently n historical works , the Aleutian

Campalgn is usually afforded only a sid e note during analysis of the

Battle of Midway.

An examination of available unpublished literature reve als a wealth

of Information from U.S. and Japanese sources. The C m a n d e r in Chie f

of the North Paclfic. A h ir a l Chester W. Nlmltz, with headquarte rs at

Pearl Harbor, exercised carmand through a representative, Rear Admiral

Robert A. The oba ld, headqu artere d at Kodia k Naval Stati on, Alaska. The

Army cha in of c m a n d s tre tched f rom the Alaska Defense Command, Major

General Simon B. B uckner , Jr.. with he adq uar ter s at Ft. Richards on,

Alaska to the Wes te rn Defense C m a n d . L ieu tenant General John L.

DeWitt, with headquarte rs at the Presid io of San Francisco. Thi s

wide ly d i spersed c m a n d and contro l sys tem requi red that a

surprisingly detailed amount of operational ma tte rs be coordinated

between these headquarters by message traffic. Thi s *pa per trail

of operational decisions, synop sis of con feren ces and campaign plan

development actions, situation reports, and chronology of event s during

the campaign's sea, air, and land ope rat ion s provi de a wealth of

information and lnslghts (Refer to Figure 2 C ha in of C m a n d . Join t

Chiefs to North Pacif ic , page 7 .

On the Japanese side, most of original docum ents and orders

concerning their Aleutian op erati ons were lost due to the syste matic

destruction of records that occurred at the end of the war. However.

sufficient docume nts survived the war t o provide military historians th e


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opportunity to recreate operational details. Addltlonally, the U S

Army spon sored a series of monogr aphs written immediately after the war

by Japanese off lcers, most of whom w ere p artic ipants In the various

campaigns.

Thoug h many U.S. un it s and key personnel we re quickly tra nsferr ed

to other t heate rs of war at the end of the campaign in August 1943, the

contin uation of occupational for ces in the regio n ens ure d the

preparation of After Action Rep ort s (AAR), operat ions and intelligence

estimates, and adninistrative and logistical reports. Senior leaders

involved in the offensive phase of the campaign did not write about it

after the war. Th e leader most likely to have written about Alaska and

the Aleut ians wa s the original ma Jor comnander in the region,

Lieutenant General Simon B. Buckner, Jr. However, General Buckner did

not survive the war.=

Why dl d the Japanese arm ed for ces seize bases in the Aleutian

Islands? Why did it take the United State s fourteen month s to respo nd

In sufficient strength to force the Japanese out of the North Pacific

and reclaim the Aleutians? What were the strate gic and operational

considerat ions that lnf luenced the development of the campaign plan for

that theater of operations? Th e central question is are there lessons

to be de rived from the Aleut ian s Campaign that can b e u sed by today s

campai gn planners? Th is study will foc us on the U.S. and Japan ese

campaigns in the North Pacific, conducted from June 194 2 through August

LTG Buckner was kl led 8 June 1945 on Oklnawa wh l le c m a n d l n gth e U.S. Te nt h Army. It is likely that Buckner wou ld have writtenextensively of his experiences In Alaska a s comnander of the AlaskaDefense Conanand, and of the offensive operations in the Aleutians, hadhe not been kille d by Japanese artillery.


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1943 and assess the strateglc impact of the theater of operatloris on

the war in the Paclflc. Thls lnformatlon wlll be framed in terms of

the current U.S. Army Command and General Staff College methodology for

regional force piann1ng.l From thls, comparisons can be drawn wlth

current U.S. Army doctrine for campaign planning.

'Joint and Combined Environments.' U.S. Army Comnand and GeneralStaff College, Fort Leavenworth, Kansas, C500 1 August 1991 102-103.

5


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Fig. 1 Map of the North Paci fic depicting the Alaskan Peninsula theAleutian Archipela go, th e Kamchatka Peninsula. Kurll Islands, andH o kk a ld o n o rt h er n m os t m a J o r is la nd o f J a ~ n ) . Reprinted f ro m LouisMort on, St rat eqv a nd Corranand: T he Flr st T WO Year s, Uni ted Sta tes Armyin Worl d War 11. Th e War in the Pac lfl c Wash ingt on, D.C: Offl ce of theChief of Military History, 1962), 422.


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JOINT CHIEFS OF STAFF

KODIAK NAVAL STATION~ D M HEOBALD

PRESIDIO OF SAN FRANCISCOLTG DEWITT

FT RICHARDSONMG BUCKNER

Fig. 2 Chain of Comnand, Joint Chiefs to North Pacific Theater ofOperations.

Cmander, North Pacific Force also C m a n d e r , Task Force (navaltask force allocated to the North Pacific).

Yorrmander, Alaska Defense Command exercised command and controlover all U.S. Army forces in Alaska and the Aleutians (including EleventhAir Force). Inedlately prior to the Japanese attack on Dutch Harbor,Commander. North Pacific Force (Theobald) was given operational controlof Eleventh Air Force. The Eleventh Air Force Commander (BG William 0Butler) then had to report to both Theobald and Buckner.


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CHAPTER ONE

Japanese Offensive in the North Paci fi c

When you have undertaken the offenslve, It shou ld bemainta ined to the last extremity.

Napoleon, UL l tarv

n the early morning hou rs of 3 Jun e 1942 Rear Admiral KakuJi

Katuka, comnandlng the Japanese Second Mobile Force built around the

aircraft carrlers yyip and u aunched the Initial attack on

the U.S. Navy base at Dutch Harbo r in the Ale uti an Islands. Hi s

missi on w as to str ike Dutch Harbor to neutral lze the eastern most U.S.

base in the Aleut ians, then screen the operatl on of the fleet s main

body ( Japanese Fifth Fleet, comna nded by Vice Adniral Boshiro Hosogaya)

to se i ze the i sland s of Attu. Klska, and Adak.

Ultimately, Adniral Isoroku Yamamoto, comnander of the Japanese

Combined Fleet , decided that seizing Adak represented too great a

risk and del ete d it from the target list. Adak, which is 275 nautical

miles further east than Kiska, would undoubtedly be much harder to

defend and supply. Yamam oto made t his decision at the end of the

Battle of Midway, and lndlcations from Japanese army r ecords are that

the outcome of that engagement influenced Yamamo to to cancel the Adak

portion of the operation.

Pl an s did account for the possibility that the Aleutians operation

U.S. Arm y, Histo ry of Imper ial Gener al Hea dqu art ers , ArmySection, Japa nese Monograph Number 4 5 K h l ed St ates ArmyHeadquarters. USA Japan. Assistant Chief of Staff, 6-3. ForeignHis tor ies Division. 1945), 84-87. U.S. Army, Aleutian NavalOperation, March 1942-February 1943, Japane se Monograph No. 88' (UnitedSta tes Army. Headquarters. Army F orces Far East, Office of MilitaryHistory), 17 19.


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would have to be modified. There were flve different op tlons built

into the plan (North ern Naval For ce Operational Order Number 2 4 and

Yamamo to ultimately selecte d the one that did not include Adak (Plan

Number 5 . The Japanese F i fth F leet , c m a n d e d by Vlce Admira l Boshi ro

Hosogayo, accomplished this modif ied mlsslon on 7 and 8 June 1942.*

The Japanese attack on Dutch Harbor lnitlated a campaign for

control of the Northern Paci fic Ocean that continued through late

s u m e r of 1943. The air, sea, and land battl es of the campaign wer e

fought in some of the most difficult environmental condit ions of World

War 1 1 Th e personal depriv ations and isolation, coup led wi th the

feel lng among partic ipants of both sid es that they never received

sufficient materiel and equipment, made the Aleutian Campaign one of

the least documented and generally unpop ular theaters of World War 11

However, the importance of thi s campaign for control of th e water s and

islan ds of the North Pacif ic should not be understated simply because

it la cked glamour.

The apparent importance of the Aleuti ans to any combat operation

into eastern Sovlet Union or the northern half of the Paclflc Rim

quickly becomes obvi ous in even the most superficial strate gic study.

Attu, the wester n most island of the chain, s only 630 miles from the

Sovie t Union's Kam cha tka Penin sula. Fro m Attu, i t s only 650 nautical

U.S. Army, * Th e Aleutian Island s Campaign. Japan ese Studie s inWorld War 11. Japanese Monograph Number 46* (United Stat es Army,Headquarters, FEC (Far East Command), 16-17, 25. U.S. Army, JapaneseMonograph Number 4 S P Y86. U.S. Army, Jap ane se Monograph Number 8 8 ,33-34, 42.


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mi le s to the Jap ane se Kurll Islands.' Th i s dis tan ce is to the nearest

military target, the naval base at Paramu shi ro, an important Japanese

base in the Kurlls. The Kurils are key to the northern approache s into

the Japanese home islands. (Refer to Figure 1, Map of the North

Pacific. page 6 .

As a start ing point for an examination of th e Aleutian Campaig n, it

is important to understand the intent of Japanese strategic planners

for the North Pacific, and what event or operation triggered their move

into the area. Japane se intent in thi s regard is a complex question and

will be discussed later, but the trigger operation for their move into

the North Pacific, the Battle of Midway. is one of the most widely

studie d and publicized battles of the war. The Japanese main effort In

the Central Pacif ic during the Midway fight, commonly vlewed a s a

turnin g point for th e U.S. in the Pacif ic, ove rsh ado ws the Japanese'

successful s upp ort ing attac k in the North Pacific. T he feeli ng in

Admiral Cheste r W. Nlmitz' (Comna nder in Chief , Pacif ic Fleet)

headquarters was s u m e d up by the log entry of 3 June 1942: *Th e whole

course of the war in the Pacif ic may hin ge on the develop ments of the

next two or three day sS U4

'Merriam-Webstet's w t h New Collea ia te D i c t i ~ n a ~ Spr ingfie ld,Massa chuse tts: Merri am-We bster Inc.,1988). 1473.

First spel lin g of Kuril Islan ds is UKuril ," however "Kuril e"Is

alternate spelling. Except where quoting a work that uses thesecon d spelling, thi s work will use the first spelling. Many earlyworks of the post-World War I1 period use the alternate spelling, butmost mod ern U.S. pub lis hed atlas , maps, and encyclopedias use the f irstspelli ng exclusively.

4U.S. Navy, "AAdmiral Nlmitz Comnand Summarv/Runnins Estlmate andSummary* 3 ~ u n C l 9 4 2 Hea dquar ters . P a ci fi c ~ l e e t , e p a r t m e n t f t heNavy, 1945), Frame 570

These documents, a compendium of dispatches to, from and through


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Fig.

3

Deplctlon of Japanese eastern defensive

outer)

erimeter as

of 2 uly 1

Reprinted, wlth permission. fromThomas

Grless.

ed.,

~

t

~

~

of

he

orld War:

A

and the Pacific

Wayn

e*

Avery

Publ

ishing Group, I

1

Map 16.

2


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violating their neutrality. The Japanese had a very real concern that

the Sovie ts may agree to lease bases on the Kamchatka Peninsul a or in

Primorskaya (located north of Vladivostock) t o the Americans. From

these bases the U.S. would have been only 600-750 miles from ma Jo r

targe ts in the Japanese home island^.^ Amazingly, the Japanese were

studious1 ignor ing the Lend-Lease materiel pou rin g from U.S. west

coast ports lnto Vladlvostock--a route over which more than 50 of all

Lend-Lease materiel to the Soviet Unlon flowed.

The Aleutian operat ion, scheduled to s tar t one day prior t o the

Miciway attack , wa s actually a reco nnais sance in force desi gned to dra w

the attention of Achniral Chester W. Nimitz, Comnander in Chief U.S.

Pacific Fleet. The Aleutian operation wa s designed to fool the

Americans lnto thinking the Japanese were makin g a major move into the

North Pacific. If this effort succee ded, Nimltz would be obliged to

shift naval fo rces out of the North Pacific to meet the threat. Th is

would g ive Yamamoto t ime to a tt ack and s e i ze Midway I ~ l a n d . ~

Fortunately for the Americans, their code break ers had deciphered

eno ugh of Yamamoto's pla n to feel assure d that they knew the true

Japanese objective. Therefore. Nimitz was able to assume an acceptable

risk in the North Paci fic, relyin g on land based av iation in lieu of

carrier based aviation, and concentrate the majority of his combat

'Major-General J.F.C. Fuller, he S ec on d W d d ar 1 939-1945.H l s t w ( N e w Yor k: D ue ll , S lo an a n d Pe ar ce ,

1954). 208-209.

7T. Dodson Stamps, Vincent J. Esposito, eds..


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power against Yamamo to at Midway.n

Th is risk invo lved the comni tment of the U.S. aircraft carriers.

Nimitz, fairly certain of the Japanes e obJec tlv e in the North Pacific.

wa s not about to split up his few carrier task forces. However, not

wil l ing to leave the Aleut ians ccmpletely unopposed t o the Japanese

Incursion, Nimitz deployed a task force organized around cruisers,

destroyers, submarines, and land-based aviation.

While Yamamoto planned to use h is powerful bat t leships as the

defeat mechanism to destr oy the U.S. fleet durin g the Midway battl e,

Aciniral Nlmit z w a s re ly in g on hi s carri ers. Iro nic all y, Acbniral

Yamamo to had eight car riers for the operation, while Aciniral Nimitz h ad

only three. Yamamoto was relying on surprise to ensure the quick

reduc tion of the U.S. garri son on Midway. After sei zin g Midway , hi s

plan called for quickly moving Japanese aircraft onto the island which

would give him an overwhelming advantage wl th which to meet the

a nt ic ip at ed U.S. c o u n t e r a t t a ~ k . ~ ~

Adniral Nimitz, aware of significant po rtions of t his plan.

reinforced the Midway garri son and moved the Central Pacific fleet into

position to ambush the Japanese. Since the Japanese plan did not hinge

on their carriers, Yamamoto dispersed his carrier s throughout the

Imperial Fleet ( tw o of them wer e in Hosogayo s Northe rn Area For ce n

eRonald H. Spector,Zpepn (Ne w York: Vinta ge Books , 1989), 168.

-Louis Morton. United S tat es Armv in Wor ld War 11 Th e War in thev and C-d: Th e Fir st Tw o Y e a r3 (Wa shi ngton:

Department of the Army, 1962), 280-282.


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the Aleutians) while Nlmitz concentrated his three carrlers at

Midway. (Refer to Figure 4, Map Depicting Battle of Midway, page 16.

The U.S. Naval Tas k Force dispatch ed t o the North Pacifi c (Task

For ce Eight), comma nded by Rear Admlral Robert A. Theobal d, departed

Pearl Harbor on 21 Hay 1942 fully aware that th e Japanese fleet would

contai n at least two carriers. With all th ree of the U.S. carr iers

commlt ed to the Midway oper ation, Theobald's Tas k Force wou ld have only

combatants with which to face

U.S. Air Fo rc es in Ala ska under

cruisers and destroyers a s major

Hosogaya

Admiral Nimitz did place a1

control of Theobald. Th e Operations Plan (No. 29-42 of May 194 2 for

the defense of *Hawai lan and Alaskan B a s e s V n prepara tion for the

Japanese attack on Midway allocated forces to the North Pacif ic Task

Force (Task Force Eight) as follows:

Thi s force 1s being formed at the direction of theCm an de r- ln -C hi ef [s ic] , U.S. Fleet . t com pri ses all of the

force s which ca n reach Alaskan waters during the first week inJune. As Task Force EIGHT, this will eventually comprise: 2 CA, 3CL. 1 2 DD...and all Army airc raf t that can be ma de avai labl e.Being opposed to a force containln g carrie rs, it must de pend veryheavlly on land based air.

Although Admiral Nimit z knew that Yamamoto's main effort wa s at

' U.S. Na vy, WAd ml ra l N lm lt z C m a n d S u m n a r ~ , ~ essage trafficfrom CINCPA C (Nimitz ) to COMIN CH (King). 160 325 May 1942, fram e 471.CINCPAC's fourth carr ier, the a r a t o a a , was undergoing repairsfollow ing the Battle of the Coral Sea and would be available untilseveral d ays after the Battle of Midway was over.

LaU.S. Na vy, A h I r a 1 Nlml t z C m a n d S um na ry, st h a t e o f t heSituation, Attack on Hawaiian and Alaskan Bases, Part I-Mission, 11-5,11-6. CAM is the U.S. Navy des ign ati on for heavy cr uis er, 'CL is al ight cruiser, and * DD u is destroyer.


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F

4

The Battle of Midway.

3

une 1

Movement of maJor

aval

force

s.

Reprinted, with permission, from Thomas

Grless, e

f he Second World War: Asla and the Pacific

Wayne, N

Avery

Pub1

shlng Group. I

1

Map 15.

6


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Mi&ay, all other available reso urce s that coul d be assembled were

c m i t t e d to meet the Japanese threat in the North Pacif ic .

Slgnlflcantly. the Pacl flc Fleet's seven surviv ing batt lesh ips had

been withdrawn to the West Coast of the U.S. nbe cau se of entire lack of

air support and inadequacy of screenin g vessel^.... '^^ It s clear that

Adniral Nimitz was c m i t t i n g everything avai lable to the defense of

Midway Alaska, while maintaining what could be considered a

hemispheric strategic reserve.

Fortunate1 y, the U.S. C m a n d e r had benef t ted im easu rabl y from

the efforts of the Navy code breakers in Hawaii (Station Hypo) and

Aust rali a reg ardi ng Yamamoto's Midway-A leutian plan. By the last week

of May 1942. the U.S. had recovered almost 9 0 percent of this long and

complex m e s s a g e b n d was aware of the da te , p lace , and t ime of the

operation, a s well as the composition of the Japanese forces

involved.*1s

Vic e Admiral Hosogaya's air st rik es of 3 and 4 June on Dutch

Harbor and Ft. Mear s (the U.S. Army post located i nmediat ely adjacent

to Dutch Harbor) were successful. However, they inflicted relatively

mino r dama ge to the bases. Tu rni ng away from Dutch Harbor. Hosogaya's

carriers steamed toward the western Aleuti ans to support Phase I of

the Aleutian operation. the seiz ure of Kiska and Attu Islands. Early

on 7 Jun e 1942, the Japanese landed about 1,250 troops on Kiska and

about the same number on Attu early on 8 June. These garrisons were

141bid., nE st lm at e of the Situati on: Own [sic 1 Forces.' 1-1, 1 2.Frame 506-507.


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routinely reinforce d by the Japanese throughout the occupation

period.16

Except for a ten man crew of weather observers on Klska, led by

Navy Aerographer s Mat e Wil lia m C. Hous e, the re wer e no U.S. Forces

on either of the two islands. The Americans, wlth Task Force Elght

desperate1 sear chin g the North Pa clf lc and Berin g Sea for Hosogaya s

carrier, battleship, or assault task force s that comprised his FIfth

Fleet, began t o suspect the Japanese had landed in the Aleutians when

radi o transmi ssio ns from House s team on Kiska and an American ci vili an

amateur radio set on Attu cea sed transmitting on 7 June. However. it

wa s not until 10 June that the weat her Improved enough for an American

reconnaissanc e airplane t o discover Japanese warships in Klska Harbor.

Admiral Theobald (Task Force Eight) had fai led to make contact with the

Japanese fleet and, opera ting under radio silence, could not react to

the Dutch Harbor attack or interfere wlth the Japanese landings further

West .The Battle for Midway ended with Admiral Yam amot o retiring with

staggering losses and without achieving elther of hi s two obJecti ves in

the Central Paclflc. The supporting operation of securing a foothold

in the Aleu tian s wa s a tactical su cce ss but an operational failure.

This latter fai lure wa s due to Achniral Ni mi tz kn ow le dg e of Yamamoto s

intent and the true obJec tlve his operation. The attack n the North

ldU.S. Army. Japanese Mono grap h Numb er 45, 86-87 365. TheJapanese theater comnander struggled, just a s the U.S. comnanderdid, t o obtain suffficlent men and materlel for hi s Aleutian forces.

I7Brian Garfield, he ile W (Garden City, NY:Doub leda y Com pan y, Inc., l969), 23 82-8E


24/211

Pacific was designed as a feint to confus e the Americans and draw

significant forc es out of the Central Pacific. Of course , Nimltz

did not react in accor dance with Yamamoto's ass ump tio ns and, in th is

regard, the Aleutian operation w as also a failure.

However, the fact s that the Japanese ended up with significant

force s in the Aleutians. Th is afforded them a huge advantage in that

their northern appr oache s were sec ure and provided them with a success

to exploit for propaganda purposes at home. The matter of homeland

security had heated up in Japan ever since the 8 April 194 2 attac k on

the Japanese homeland by Lieutenant Colon el Doolittle's B-25 bombe rs.1e

Th e bombing of Tokyo, especially before the Japanese became

certa in of the base fro m which the B-25's wer e launched. had made the

~ a p a n e s e ore aware of the potential danger of enemy operations from

both China and Siberia. These concern s of the Japanese, of whlch the

U.S. planne rs were aware, taken with the estimate of an upcoming

offensive against t he Russl ans from Germany and the movement of

signi ficant alr for ces to Param ushir u, indicated to the U.S. that the

Japanese may be planning to at tack St . Lawrence Island and N m e In

order to cut comnunlcations from Alaska acr oss the Bering Sea. Thi s

move would be taken preliminary to an attack on Siberia.I9

One of the provi sions of the Japanese basic war plan formulated by

the Imperial General Headquarters wa s the 'seizure of strategic areas

lgT Dodso n Stamps. Vinc ent J. E sposl to, eds.,nf World War 11. Volume 11, 302-303.

*Grace Person Hayes, he Historv of the J o i n t w f S UWorld War 11. Th e War AqbLDst J a ~ u Annapolis, Maryland: NavalInsti tute Pre ss, 1982). 133.


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and islands essential to the establishment of a perimeter for the

defense of the southern resource are a and the Japanese homeland. ao

Thi s perimeter, t r iangular in shape, began with its east arm stretchi ng

from the Kuril Islan ds in the north, through Wake, to the Marshal Is.

Th e southern base of the triangle wa s to be a line connecting the

Marshal Is, the Bismarck Archipelago. Java, and Sumatra. The wester n

arm was to extend from Malaya and southern Burma, thr ough Indochina.

and then along the China coast.2' (Refe r to Figure 3. Japanese Eastern

Defensive Perimeter, page 12.

Whether out of a desire to avoid antagonizing the Russian s or in

recognition of the difficulty n establ ishing an d sustaining bases

further out into the North Pacific, the Japanese initially had no plans

to establ ish a defensi ve stro nghol d beyond their own Kuril Islands.

Neithe r Yamamoto's sta ff' pla nne rs nor those at the Imperial General

Headqu arter s had planned on maintaini ng a garrison in the Aleuti ans

later than the fall of 1942. Howev er, the suc ces s of the Aleutian

operation prov ed to be useful for homeland propaganda.

The Japanese people did not learn of the defeat at Midway until

after th e war , and stringent securlty measu res were taken to keep even

Japan ese Navy personnel from learning the magnit ude of the losses. The

surviv ors of sun ken warshi ps were literally isolated to prevent word of

the disaster from spreading. Beyond the Navy high comnand, the truth

20R. Ernest Dupuy and Trevor N. Dupuy, U i t a r v Heri taae ofmerica (N ew York: McGraw-Hill, 1956; reprint. Fairfax. Virginia: H ero

Books, 1984 . 569-570.

a tL o u i s Mor ton , Vapan's Dec isi on for War.' in -ed. Kent Ro ber ts Greenfield (Washington: Center of Military History.Unite d Stat es Army, 1987), 110.


26/211

of the debacle extended only to Imperlal General Headqu arter s Army

Sectlon Chiefs at bureau level or hlgher.22

n any event , the decislon was made t o exploit the success in the

Aleuti ans and suppres s lnformatlon regarding the defeat at Midway. A

secondary reason for maintaining a presence in the North Pacifi c wa s

one of homeland security Many on t he Japanese staff f eared a repeat

of the Doolittle Raid, never fully acceptlng the estimate that la nd

based * Army bombe rs had been launched from an aircraft carrier. Hotly

debated throughout the Japanese staff, senior Japanese leaders soon

became aware of the detai ls of the Doolittle Raid. Th ls information wa s

obtained from those U.S. survivors of the mission that were captu red,

and later executed, in Japanese occupled

Another reason the Imperial General Staff agreed to a plan to

develop the sltuatlon beyond the orlglnal prov lslons of the

Mldway-Aleutians ope ration was the famlliarlty of the Japanese wlth

the water s of the North P aci fic an d t heir view of the region's

resources. The Japanese had historically maintained and deployed a

sizable North Paclf lc f ishing f leet and continued operat ing thls f leet

throughout the months fol lowing the start of World War 11. Th is fishing

actlvlty r eache d its peak each June. Its Imp ort anc e to Japan's food

supply wa s not lost on the plann ers at Head quarte rs, U.S. Fleet.24

22U.S. Army , *Ja pa ne se Monogr aph No.45,' 87

2T h ad d eu s V. Tuleja, Climax at Midwav (New York: W.W. Norton 8Company, Inc., 1960), 36.

Navy, Messa ge from Comnander-ln-Chlef, U.S. Fleet toComnander-in-Chief. Pac ifi c Fleet, serial 002 10 March 1942. AcfniralNimit z Comma nd Sununary, Frame 539.


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By the end of April 1942 CINCP AC had developed a plan to send a

light cruiser CUSS Nashville to the North Pacif ic f ishing grounds off

Siberl a (east of the Kamchatka peninsula). Thi s plan called for the

m o conduct unrestricted ope ration s against the fishi ng fleet

to sink as many of the fishing vessels as possible. Thoug h the

m h v i l l e depar ted in la te May to execute the miss ion , sh e was d iver ted

on 7 May to Jo in Task Fo rc e Eight. =

In hi s history of the war in the Pacific. Walte r B. Clausen ar gue s

that the main reason * for the Japanese selzlng bas es in the Aleuti ans

wa s to protect their fishing groun ds in the North Pacific. Clausen

further maintained that any slgnlficant loss or disruption of the

Japanese fishing fleet could seriously affect their war effort.26

Clausen s work, wr itten even before t he end of the war, di d not t ake

into account many classif ied operational developments. Given acc ess to

th is information, Clausen would most probably redefine the main

r e a s o n q o r the Aleu t ian operat ion as a suppor t ing opera t ion of the

Battl e of Midway. Howev er, he did identify a reason that in all

probabi ity did weigh in a s a factor that contributed to the Japan ese

decision t o capit alize on their initial suc ces s in the Aleutians.

The Japanes e entrenchment in the Aleutians caused great concern

amo ng the U.S. ccimnands. F r m Admiral Nimitz Hea dqu art ers in Pea rl,

t hr ou gh th e Wes te rn D e fe ns e C m a n dn

San Franclsco, to the War

Department , sen ior c m a n d e r s and s ta ff o ff icers considered poss ible

a31bld., Fra me 53 9, 825.

2LWalter B. Clausen, Blood for the Ehoeror. A Narrative Historv ofthe Human Sid e of the War in the Paci fi c (N ew YorK: D. Appleton-CenturyCompany, Incorporated, 1943), 323-324.


28/211

U.S. respo nse to the situa tion in the North Pacific. The Joint Chiefs

of Staff felt that the Japanese effort may be part of a plan t o attack

into Siberia. 0t.her plann ers at the War Dep artme nt wer e, at the same

time, xploring the feaslbillty of an eventual U.S. Invasion of Japan

via Nome, Siberia, and Kam~hatka. ~

In a memorandum to the service chief s (Admiral Harold R. Stark

and General George C. Marshall entitle d United Na tio ns Action in Case

of War be tw ee n [ sic1 R us si a an d J a ~ a n , ~ arch 1942. President Franklin

D. Roosevel t encouraged the chle fs to consider a1 possible act ions to

be take n by the U.S. in the event of Russi an invol vemen t In th e war

with Japan. The President proposed that th is scenar io be studi ed from

all angles, such a s pening up the Aleutian Islands route to

Kamchatka and

Thl s plan requlred Russian cooperation but, despite Japanese

concer ns to the contrary. the Russia ns were studiously avoidi ng any

conflict on their eastern front. Conti nued denial of the use of

Russian terri tory forc ed U.S. plann ers to swi tch their attentio n to the

Aleutians a s a base from which to eventually attack the Japanese

On 5 May 1942, the War Department stated the rea son s for making the

defense of the Aleuti ans an objective. Manifested in Naval Order 18,

7Stetson Conn, Rose C. Engelman. and Byron Fairchild. U r d i n a theUnited State s and I ts O u t ~ o s t g Washington: Office of the Chief ofMil ltary Histor y, 1964), 263-2 64.

9 l e m o . President to Stark and Marshal l. V n i t e d Natlons Action inCase of War between (sic) Russi a and Japan, 4 Mar 42, enclos ure to JC S16 6 Mar 42. CC S 381 (3-5-42) (1). excerp ts quoted in Grace PersonHayes, The ~ i s t o r v f the Joint chiefs of- s taff in World War I I T heYar Aahia st 3a~a.n (Annapolis. Maryland : Naval Instit ute Press. 1982 . 131.


29/211

the Joint Chi efs of Staff published the following: 1 ) Dutch Harbor is

the key to the Bering Sea, and 2) ussian Lend-Lease route must be

preserved (Unimak Pass outs ide Dutch Harbor c m a n d e d approach to the

Berin g Sea). ' Enemy in con trol of th e easte rn Al eu ti an s could al so

interdict the air lanes used by the U.S. Lend-Lea se aircr aft movin g

through Fairbanks and Nome (Alaska) for Russia.

Ther e wa s no way that the Joint Chie fs of Staff or Admiral Nimitz

could ignore the situation in the North Pacific. The Aleutians, as

stat ed previously, app ear to be a natural r oute for invasion of Japan

from the United St ates or, a s many feared, a route for Japan to use to

invade North America. Each fearing the other would use the Aleutians

to th is end, both c ountries began to shift res ources to the theater.*O

The Americans, uncertain of the strength and exact dispos itions of

the Japanese forces in the Aleutian s after the initial discovery on 10

June that the Japanese had established themselves on Klska Island,

decided that a direct attack on the enemy-held islands

wa s mpractical.**' Accordin gly. the Amer lcan s prudent ly deci ded to

establish a seri es of bases from the Alaskan mainland out t o posi tion s

in the Aleutians within str ikin g dlstance of the Japanese in the

western Aleutians. In these bases, sufficient war materiel could be

stoc kpil ed that woul d eventually e nabl e the U.S. to mount an offens ive

operation that would be reasonably certai n of success.

'U.S. Navy , ex cer pts fr om #Nav al Or de r 18 C m a n d e r in C hie f,U.S. Fleet .* l is ted in *A&iral Nimltz C m a n d S u n a n a r ~ , ~ May 1942.

OHayes, U t o r v of the Joint Chi& of Staff in World War IT 272.

a'Ibid.. 272-273.


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Th e Aleutians, west of the Umnak airfield, wa s totally void of any

existing infrastructure. Both s ide s would have to develop austere

support bases on islands that offered nothing a s a starti ng point.

Fortunately for the U.S., the frantlc effor ts n 1941 by the Alask a

Defense C m a n d (with the by now MaJor Genera l Buckner s t i ll

c m a n d i n g ) had created a s izable infrastructure in Alaska and in the

eastern Aleutians from which t o carry out thi s strategy. Growing

recognition of the strategic value of Alaska and the Aleutlans had

continued since 939 with the approval of the Protective Mobilization

Pla n, 1939. Th e plan for defen se of the west coast of the U.S. an d its

hemispheric interests centered on Japan (referred to as ORANG E in the

family of war plans that pre-dated the Rainbow series) a s the

aggressor.

Between 1904 and 1939, U.S. war pla ns had been based on the

assum ption of the U.S. facin g only one other opponent nation. Each

country or situation was given a code-color, for instance Japan wa s

ORANGE, Great Britain was RED. M exico was GREEN, and Germany wa s BLACK

In these plans. Under Plan ORANGE, the Army would have to hold Manila

In the Philippin es until the Pacifi c Fleet arrived. Then the fleet

would be able to sortie against the Japan ese Fleet. Th is plan, revised

in 19 38, assumed there would be no other nation combatants, and the

decisive action would take place in the water s off the Asiatic coast.a2

Th is plan was obviously limited and somewhat simplistic in light

a2Loul s Morton, Germany First: Th e Basic Concept of All ledStrategy in Wor ld War 11, in m d e c i s i ~ 1 ~ 9 , d. Kent RobertsGreenfleld (Washington: United St ate s Army, 1987 . 13-15, 19-20:S pe ct er , b a l e d 55


31/211

of the history of coalition wa rfare that ha s dominated European

warfare. More and more, planne rs on the Joint P lanni ng Cornnittee began

to look at other possibilities. Foremost wa s the possibility of

coord inate d action by Germany in the Atlan tic an d Japan in the

Throughout 1938, U.S. planners studie d the proble ms posed by such

a scenario. Finally. in Jun e 1939 t h e Join t P lanning Cam i t t e e

submit ted tenative plans to the Joint Boar d for the development of a

new seri es of war plans to meet the canbined threat of Germany. Italy.

and Japan. The new name for thi s family of plans wa s RAINBOW. new

name was chosen to sho w distinct movement away from the old color

Plans and a c c m o d a t e the upda ted assumpt ions brought about by the

ongoin g aggressive activi ties of the European Axis partners. *

The Joint Pl an s Cornnittee quickly cam e up with five RAINBO W plans.

all designed to defend the United State s and the Western Hemisphere

from Axis aggression.

RAINBOW1 assumed the U.S. to be at war without major al lie sfacing a violation of the Monroe Doctrine that required firstpriori ty, rele gating U.S. Pac ifi c intere sts to a strategic defenseinitially.

RAINB OW assum ed the U.S. to be allie d with Great Brita in,

'9lorton, Germany First : The Basic Concept of All ied S t r a t e g ~ , ~in Command D e c i s i m , 13-14. 20.

Th e Joint Board, cr eated in 19 03 an d reorga nized in 1919consis ted of the Army Chief of Staf f, the Chief of NavalOperations, their deputies, and the chief of the War Pl an sDivision from both services. Th e Board reported to both of theServic e Secretaries, and took up mat ter s that were joint innature. The responsibility for the detailed development of jointwar p lans res ted wi th the e ight man Jo int P lanning C m l t t e e .The se eight off icers worked for and r eporte d to the Joint Board.


32/211

and Franc e req uir ing minim um partic ipati on by t he U.S. in theAtlantic. Th is would a llow the U.S. to undertake imnediate majoroffen ses against the Japanese in the Pacific.

RAINB OW 3, like Ralnbo w 1 assumed the United S tat es to be atwar without major allies, but made the assumption that sufficientcombat power would be available ensure hemispheric defense andallow for the immediate undertaking of offensive operations intothe western Pacific.RAINBOW 4 , similar to the Rainbow 1 plan, assu med the U.S. wou ldhave no major allies. The focu s on this plan wa s for the defenseof the weste rn hemis phere , but in a mor e aggressi ve manner.The Army would have to deploy forces to the southern part of SouthAmerlca an d in eastern Atlantic are as as part of Jo int operatlons.Th is plan would obviously require a strateg ic defense in thePaclflc due to lack of forces.

RAINBOW5 assumed the United Sta tes would be al l ied with GreatBritain and France. Th e U.S. would conduct actions to ensure

defense of th e western hem isphere but with early projection ofU.S. for ces to the easter n Atlantic, an d to either or both theAfrican a nd European Continents. A strategic defense was to bemaintained in the Pacif ic until suc ces s against the Axis permittedt ransfer of major forces to the P ac i f i ~ . ~

Planning continued on the Rainbow seri es through 1939 and 1940.

By 1940, wlth the fall of Fran ce and Great Britain , it became apparent

that Rainbow 2 and 3 with their early fo cus on the western Pacific,

had lost their applicability. There fore, by mid-1940, Rain bow 4 w a s

judged t o be the most feasible of the Rainb ow famil y and i t received

the prepo ndera nce of the planners' attention. The trigger for

implementation of Rainbow 4 wa s to be the end of both French and

British resistance in Euro~e. '~

By win ter 1940, wlth t he bleak sit uatlo n In weste rn Euro pe,

Ackniral Harold R. Stark, Chief of Naval Operations, briefed the

Presi dent on a new basic U.S. policy dev eloped by Brig adier General

George V. Strong. Strong, a s the Chief of the Joint Plann ing


33/211

Committe e, an d hi s staff of plan ners had reali zed that the U.S. must

develop a purely defensi ve policy in the Pacific and should cease aid

to the Alli es in favor of mob iliz ing U.S. fo rce s for hemisph eric

defense.a7

Except for halting the shipment of lend-lease materiel to the

fight ing All ies , this r e c m e n d a t l o n became the pol icy of the U.S. and

t wa s ra n this position that American and British planners met 9

January 1941 through 9 March. Thi s meeting, carmonly referred to a s

ABC-1 (Am eri can Bri tish Confer ence 1). res ult ed in a join t posi tion

cal lin g for defeat of Germany ear ly, wlth the U.S. effort being in the

Atlantic and European area. Action against Japan would be constrai ned

to that o f a s t ra teg ic defense wl th a cor responding c m i t m e n t of

r e s o ~ r c e s . ~ ~

The Ralnbow Plan tha t most c losely a c c m o d a t e d the ABC-1 pos i tion

was RAINBOW5. Actually, the strategic principles of the ABC-1 matche d

those of Rainbow 5 almost exactly. On 14 May 1940 the Joint Board

approved both RAINBOW 5 and ABC-1, which it had tentatively approved on

28 May (Navy) and 2 June (Army)

The President withheld approval of both the ABC-1 principles.

because t he British government had not approved them, and RAINBOW 5

because the plan wa s partially based on the ABC-1. However, the Service

Chie fs and Secretary of War Henry L. Stlmson agreed that detailedoperational planning by the serv ices could be undertaken since the

Ibid., 29-30.

agIbid., 44.

aPIbld., 46.


34/211

President had not disapproved Rainbow 5, but had merely decided t o

table the plan while waiti ng for the British government to voice

approval of the ABC-1 direct ives40

t was under RAINBOW 5 that defensive mea sur es for Alaska began to

pick up steam, incre asing from a susta inment level necessary for a

single outpost to that of m aJ or expendl tures for airfields, naval

bases, and support facilities. RAINBOW 5 cal led for a s t rategic

triangle, formed by llnes connecting points in Alaska. Hawail, and

Panam a, to ensur e the defense of the U.S. mainland. Defens e of other

American interests in the Pacific, such a s in the Southwest Paci fic,

wer e not include d in the Rainb ow 5 Plan.

Th e specific plan for defense of Alaska and the North Pacific wa s

codified in the Joint Pacifi c Coastal Frontier Defense Plan, RAINBOW

NO. 5 (Reinforcements for Alaska, 16 October 1941 update). In

accordance with t his Joi nt plan the serv ice s (including Army Air Corps)

had the following major missions:

m Alaskan Defe nse C m a n d )1 ) Supported by the Alaskan Sec tor (Navy), defend the

Alask an Sector. ..against att ack s by sea, land, and air.2) Defend United S tat es military and Naval bases in

Alaska. including Unalaska, against external att acks and sabotage.(3) Support the Alaskan Sec tor (Navy) in protecting the

sea lines of commun icatio ns rovide for local protection oinclude Navy Bases (Sitka, Kodiak and Dutch Harbor).41

m Alask an Secto r (Navy), Thirt eenth Naval District:1 )

Patrol the coastal zone of the Alaskan Sec tor scontrol and protect shippi ng therein.2) Destroy Axis sea comnunications.3) Support the Army in repel ing land, sea , and air

U.S. Army, 'Joint Pa ci fi c Fro nti er Def ens e Plan. RAINB OW No. 5,Pacific Coastal Frontier: Department of War, 1941 Par t XI , Annex No. 3.


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Air Eleventh Air Force (Alaska))1 ) Defense of Army and Naval bases and other vial

installations against land, air and se a attack.2 ) Denial of use by enem y of air, land, and sea bas es

in Alaska and the Ale~tians:~

In 1939. Cong ress had approved only $4,000,000 for construction of

military fac ilities in Alaska. This, an insufficient sum even for the

day considerin g the expensive nature of any operation in Alaska, was

earmarke d for construction of a cold weather aviation test facility at

Fairbanks. Adding to this wa s the fact that the only Army post

anywhere in Alaska garrisoned only a battalion size force. Th is post.

Chilkoot Barracks wa s located in Southeas tern Alaska near the CanadianBorder. Though afforded 'Military District stat us under the Western

Defense Connnand and a very profe ssional organiza tion, the unit ha d no

relevant mission and was functioning only as an uoutpostQo nfined to

the local area of operation^ ^^

In July 1940 the Army sent over 750 troops of the 4th Infantry

Regiment to Anchorag e, Alaska. By 16 October 1941 the number of U.S.

Army personnel had increased to 19,887. Of these, 7,431 were infantry

(4th Infantry Regiment , 37th Infant ry Regimen t (les s the band), 153rd

**U.S. Ar my , 'Protective Mobili zat ion Plan. 1939.' (H Q, Nin th

Corp s Area. Office of the Cumnandi ng General. P resi dio of SanFra nc isc o, April 1, 1939). U.S. Army, 'Official His to ry of the Ala skanDepartment . (U.S. Army. Headquar ters, West ern Defen se Cumnand,Pr esi di o at San Francisco, 1945), 276

The Ninth Corps Area wa s divided into seven Mili taryDistric ts, together the seve n enco mpa ssed the west ern U.S. Th eCarmandin g Officer. Chilkoot Barracks, AK was empowered to perform,for Alaska, the duties assigned to District Ccirunanders.


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Infantr y Reglmen t, 201st Infantry Regimen t, a nd one battal Ion from the

297th Infantry) and 122 were armor troops (Company B, 194th Tank

Battalion). The remainder of the tro ops were Signal. Fle ld Artill ery,

C oa st A rt il le ry. E n gi ne er s, a nd He ad qu ar te rs a nd Se rv ic e T r o o ~ s . ~ ~

Also, the Army established the Alaska Defense Force, sub ordinat e to

the Wester n Defense Comnand (WDC), at Anchorage. Lieutenant General

(LTG) John L. DeWltt , comnanding the Western Defense C m a n d from San

Francisco, ordered Colonel Simon Bolivar Buckner. Jr. to c m a n d the

Alaska Defense Force . Colonel Buckner assumed c m a n d on 22 July

1940. L

Those at temptin g to prepare Alaskan defense s faced monumental and

seeming ly impossible tasks. The territory wa s void of any significant

Infrastructure and wa s linked to the U S only by s ea lines of

communication. There were no military airfields n Alaska, no dep ots or

signif icant military posts. Th e Navy had no base at all in the

Aleutians, and only a few small bases in southeastern Alaska. Adding

to th is dismal situa tion, that part of the civilian infrastructure that

could be utiliz ed for military application was small.

As late as 1934 Alaska had only five airfields more than 2,000

feet long and all five were civilian controlled sites. Th is despite a

very vocal and persuasive lobbying effort by General Wi I iam Billy

Mitchel I Assistant Chief of the Air Service, and Anthony J. Dimond.

*=U.S. Army, Joint Paciflc Coastal Frontier Defense Plan RAINBOWNo. 5 , 1941 (Revised 6 October 1941), Part XI Annex No. 3: AlaskanGarrison (as of October 16,1941 .


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Congressional Delegate from Alaska:

The se two enthu siasti c sup por ter s of Alaska s strat egic and

economic importance finally succe eded to a degree in 1935 when

Congressman John F. Dockweler of California introduced legislation to

establish a military air base in Alaska. The War Department appointed a

board of offi cers to select a sit e in the vicinity of Fairbanks, and

the board submitte d its report in September 1936. However. when the

Air Corp s Included a request for funding to purchase the land for the

site the Bureau of Budget struck down the request.40

In 1938 the Air Cor ps became Interested in establlshing a cold

weather experiment station, initially considered for construction in

Michigan. new site selection board wa s established in mid-1939 to

consider s i tes for defensive air bases and the cold weather t raining

station. The board visited sit es in Anchorage, Nome, and the

previously considered site in Fairbanks. As a result of thi s visit

the board reconanended estab llshin g an ai r base adjacent to Anchorage

(what would become Eimendorf Air Force Base) and t he cold weather

station at Fairbanks. Finally, these recomm endat ions were funded after

a c ons ider abl e amoun t of argument ive deba t e in W a ~ h i n g t o n . ~ ~

In this set t ing, in the s u m e r of 1940 Colonel Buckner set about to

establish a credible defense using all re source s available, and some

that weren t. Buckne r, con vin ced early on that wa r with Japan wa s

47Jerold E. Brown, m e aalesU.S. Armv Alrflelds. 1

v910-1941 (Westport. Connecticut: Greenwood

Press, 1990), 118


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immlnent, shifted reso urces within Alaska a s he sa w fit to prepare

defenses.'O In hindsight, we can see t was fortunate for Buckner that

war did come and it is for tun ate for the U.S. effor t in the North

Pacific that Colonel Buckner executed hi s mandat e s o aggressively.

Thoug h the plan for the defen se of Aiaska was a Joint' plan.

ini ti a lly there was no theate r c m a n d e r in the Nor th Pac if ic.

Buckner's Aiask a Defense Force, redes ignate d Alask a Defens e Comna nd on

4 February 1941, wa s subordinate to the Western Defense Command (WDC),

an al i army cm an d. The U.S. Navy in Alaska, c m a n d e d by Captain

Ralph C. P ar ke ~, '~ wa s directly subordinate to the 13th Naval District,

Seattle, Washington, which was part of t he Pacifi c Northwest Sea

Frontier, also headquartered at Seattle.ss

Integration of servic e efforts wa s to be by a spirit of

cooperation. With no joint cormander to ensure integration and unity

of effort, establish objectives, and promote cooperation, one would

expect problem s between the army and navy (the Eleventh Air Force

(Alaska) was subordinate to Buckner).

It wa s not until the Presidential Direc tive of 30 March 194 2 that

the geographic responsibilities of the Pacif ic were established.

This directive appointed General Dougl as MacArthur Comnander in Chief

of the Southwest Pa cif ic Area and Admiral Nirnitz. Comna nder in Chi ef ,

=OGar f ield. W 59-61.

slU.S. Army, Official History of the Alaskan Departm ent, 267 272.

saGarfield, The Thousand-Mile War. 17.

'U.S. Army, uJ oi nt Pa ci fi c Coa sta l Fron ti er Def ens e Pl an , RAI NBO WNo. 5 (Reinforcernets for Alaska), 1941 (R evi sed 16 October 1941).


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Pacifi c Ocean Areas. Nlmltz' area of responsibility wa s sub-dlvided

into the Central and North Paci fic, both under Nimitz' direct control.

and t he South Pacific, under a naval officer subordinate t o Nlmitz

(Vice Admiral Robert L. Ghormley). The boundary between Central and

North Pacif ic wa s 42 de gr ee s north.34

Buckner first established an Army base at Anchorage (Ft.

Rlchardson, actlvated 27 Jun e 1940 and located next to the air base

site selecte d by the 1939 Air Cor ps Airfield Selection Pan el) and

an Army alrfleld at F airban ks (Ladd Alrfleld. located in a large bend

I n the Chena River three mil es east of downtown Fairb anks and activated

1 July 1940).ss

Ladd Army Alrfleld, was constructed around a 9285 foot concrete

runway with a sec ond shorter parallel runway of asphalt and concrete.

Th is construction, still solid after fifty year s of use, wa s somewhat

of an en gineer ing marvel given the undesirable p ropert ies of permafrost

for a construction foundation. Eventually, the airfield and its

support f acilit ies prove d crucial to the successful Russian Lend-Lease

Progr am of providing aircraft t o the Soviets. These aircraft were

3 4 D ~ p ~ ynd Dupuy, l i itarv Heritaae of w 85.

='Fort Ri ch ard so n was na me d fo r Wi lds P Richardson, BrigadierGeneral, U.S. Army. Elmendorf Army Airfield w a s named for Capta in Hugh

M. Elmendorf, an army air cor ps aviator who was killed in a plane crashat Wright Airfield in 1933. Ladd Field , renamed Fort Wainwright afterGeneral Jonath an Mayhew Wainw right when the U.S. Army took over thebase I n 1961, was named for MaJor Arther K Ladd, army air corpsaviator killed in an air crash in South Carolina in 1935. Th isinformation from author's not es dur ing vis its to these loca tionsSeptember 1984-August 1988 Informatlon on activation date s ofins tal lat ion s co nf ir me d in U.S. Army, 'Order of Battle of USA Grou ndForce s in World War II-Pacific Theater of Operations, United Sta tesArmy, 1959, 278


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ferried from the U.S. to Ladd Airfield where Russian pilo ts accepted

them and flew through Nome into Siberia, then on to the Russo-German

front.

While busily working to construct a defensive Infrastructure for

Alaska, Buckner pressed the Navy to expand into the Aleutlans. He

conducted a personal sea-borne reconnalssance throughout the length of

the Aleutians. noting those suitabile for use as military bases.

This incursion by Buckner Into the domain of the Navy created

signi ficant conste rnatio n, not with t he Naval Com nander in Alaska,

Captaln Ralph C. Par ker , but with the Navy Department in Washington.

The posl t ive s id e of thi s episode was that the Navy then acceler ated

planning to expan d their presence in Alaska and establishment of bases

throughout the North Pacific, principally Kodiak (also referred to

during these early d ays a s Chiniak), Sitka , and Dutch Harbor.s*

Buckner s first construc tion west of Anchorage wa s at Cold Bay,

which is on the Alaska Peninsula, followed shortly thereafter by the

construction of an air base on Umnak Island. Th is air base was designed

to provide air defense for the Navy base at Dutch Harbor.

It was in establ lshlng these two air bas es, C old Bay on the Alaska

Penin sula and Umnak in the eastern Aleutian Islands, that Buckner really

stuck his neck out by h is shifti ng of resour ces from one project to

another. Landl ng constr uctlo n wor ker s at Col d Bay In the fall of 1941

under a deception plan that was designed to convin ce observer s that a

fish processing station wa s being built , Buckner began buildlng the


41/211

western most military airfield in Ala~ka.~'

Even before t his work wa s completed, he began organizing another

construction operation, again under the cover name of a fictional

fish packing company, to make h is move into the Aleutians ( landing

troop s on Umnak Island on 17 January 1942 and start ing airf ield

construction on 12 March). Fortunately for Buckner, on 26 November

1941 authorization ha d been granted an d funding provided for these tw o

air bases.se (S ee Fig ure 5 Map of Alaska and Aleutians, Pag e 37).

Buckner kne w that to project power into the Aleutians, he had to

establish bases; bases to stockpile materiel and bases to build up

combat power. These tw o air bases would later contri bute much t o the

succe ss of combat opera tions throughout th e Aleutians, and would

vindicate Buckner from the issues raised by those that questioned t he

intensity of hi s pre-war construct ion efforts. By Decem ber 94

Buckner, recently promoted t o Brigadier General, had substantially

increased the infrastructure of mainland Alaska (a road between

Anchorage and Fairbanks, improvised railway between the ice-free port

of Whittier and the railhea d south of Anchorage at Portage, about

thir teen military airf ields and forward operating bases completed, the

s71bld., 59. U.S. Army. Ar my Air Forc e Stu dy #34, Army AirFor ces in the War Against Japan. 1941-1942.* Uni ted Sta tes Army,

Headquarters, Army Air Forces, 122-123.During the war the airfield on Umnak (located about 775mi le s from Anchorage) wa s called Umnak AAF, later renamed CapeAir Force Base after First Lieutenant John Cape. Cape shot downone Japan ese dive bomber du ring the attack on Dutch Harbor, butwa s kil led when h is P-40 w as shot down by a Japanese Zero duringthe same fl a t . The companion instal lat ion on Umnak for groundand anti-aircraft troop s wa s called Fort Glenn.


42/211


43/211

large posts at Anchorage and Fair banks and the establishment of

c m u n i c a t i o n and navigat ion sys tems) .sP

With his construction projects completed or underway in the

Aleutians, Buckner's eff ort t o pr epare for war had greatly enhanced the

region's defens e capability. Buckn er ha d over 24,000 sol die rs and

a ir men under h i s c m a n d at t he ou tb reak of t he war on 7 December

1941 O

While he wa s busily constructing airfi elds throughout Alaska.

General Buckner wa s als o fighting to get an air force. It is somewhat

dlsconcertlng to realize that while the imnense--and expensive--effort

to construct airfie lds wa s in full swi ng there wa s no air force waiti ng

in the wings to occupy them. H w e v e r , thi s wa s exactly the situation

prior to fall of 1940.

Not hin g if not an optim ist, Buckner's ef fo rt s to get milit ary

aircr aft to Alaska eventually paid off, albeit initially very modestly.

On 12 August 1940 an obsolete B-10 bomber landed at Merrill Field on

the outskir ts of An~ ho rag e. ~ ' On board was the advance element of the

'*U.S. Army. Joint Pa ci fi c Coast al Fro nti er Def ens e Plan. RAI NBO WNo. 5 1941 (Revis ed 1 6 Octobe r 1941). Appen dix 5 t o Annex 5 (Air),Suppo rtins Plan-11th SIC) Air Force (Alaska).

The use of the term airfield here shoul d not give the readerthe impression that these bases had all the support faciliti esfou nd at air fo rce bas es in the U.S. an d at oth er mor edeveloped locations overseas. Th e terms used by the Air Force in

94in refer ring to their bas es we re 'Air Base, 'OperatingAirdrome,' an d 'Staging Field.' Fa ci li ti es we re best at the for mer

-OU.S. Arm y,* Ord er of Battle of USA Grou nd Fo rc es In Wor ld War145.

-'This airport is still acti ve and, today located in the heart ofAnchorage, is one of the busiest air por ts in the wor ld for generalav ia tion. C m e r c l a l a i r l ines today use the large AnchorageInternational Airport, not in existence in 1940.

8


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U.S. Eleventh Air Force, Major Everett Sanfo rd Davis and two enlisted

Major Davi s may not have realized it, but h e wa s facing a

herculean task in getting the Eleventh Air Force flying in Alaska.L1

There was n o system of navigatlon aids, of course limited number of

landing fields, and the arctic temper ature s did t hings to mechanical

components that a flier and aircraft mechanic from the continental U.S.

could not Imagine, much less remedy.

However, Major Davis, emula ting General Buckner s enthus iasm and

determination, had within weeks of hi s arrival in Alaska, surve yed six

air field locations and activated the Cold Weather Aviation Laboratory

at Fairbanks. Major Davis compil ed a textbook of data and Information

on flight operat ions in Alaska that wa s used throughout the war years

and eased the way for the pllots and mechan ics that would be op erati ng

against the Japan ese by Jun e 1942.*4

However well Buckner and Davis worked to construct a irfiel ds and

support facll ti es after August 1940, they still had only two combat

squadrons in Alaska on 7 December 1941. The fact that there wer e not

mor e wa s not due to lack of trying on Buckner s part. Thoug h he ha d

cont inua l ly asked for a irc ra ft through the Weste rn Defense C m a n d (LTG

DeWitt heartily endors ed Buckner s reques ts) the attitud e of the Army

63Major Everett S Davis was killed in an air crash east ofNaknek, Alas ka in November 1942. At the tim e of hi s death , Davis.previously promoted to Colonel, was the Chief of Staff, Eleventh AirForce. Th e Army Air field on Adak in the Aleutians was named Davis AirForce Base in 942 after Colonel Davis.

64Garfield, Thousa nd ile Wx 0.


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Air Corps n Washington was that if the situation required it, aircraft

could be rushe d to Alaska from the United States. Buckner wa s well

aware that t his wa s unrealistic, if not out and out impossible, and he

was a ga in pr ov ed co rr ec t in t he h ec ti c m on th s t o come. s

In 1936, General Henry ti Arnold, then assistant chief of the Air

Corps, sent Captain Edward Whitehead to survey a route from Seattl e to

Alaska. Whitehead surveyed f lve sl tes, al west of the Canad ian

Rockies, that would allow aircraft t o deploy to Juneau without e nterin g

Canadian airspace. Thoug h the air co rp s personnel involved in the

mission did everything they could to obtain approval and funding for

the projec t, i nclud ing Whitehead s emp has is on the comnercial be nef its

o f t he rou te . congres sional approval was not f o r t h ~ o m i n g . ~ ~

As a cons equenc e, in January 94 when the first two squadr ons

(on e squ adr on of B-26 s an d on e of P-40 s) dep art ed th e Air Cor ps depot

at Sacram ento for Alaska, they had t o use a route through Canad a that

went east of the Canadian Rockies. At t hi s time, there wer e only five

stagin g bases on this route, and none of them were complete. For the

fighters, some of the flight legs terminated at th e very end of their

fuel endurance, some of the stage fi elds had n o navigation beacons, and.

being January, the arctic cold increased the severity of every problem.

As a result, only seve nteen of the twenty-five P-40 s mad e i t to Ladd

Field in Fairbanks, and it took six weeks. The medium bomber s made out

somewhat better, ta king only four wee ks and l osing five of thirtee n

CsIbid.. 66 67.

*CBrown, Where Eaqles Land, 118-119.

4 0


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deploying aircraft . i7 Although the air corps got significantly better

at ferryl ng aircraft to Alaska, t is c m o n p l a c e e ve n to da y t o s ee th e

skele tons of crashed World War I1 aircraft throughout the state.

especially aroun d Fairbanks.

As la te as March 1942 the Air Corps was still s t ruggl ing to move

squad rons to Alaska. The troop list for the Eleventh Air Force on 1

March 1942 included, besides the Headquarters located at Elmendorf

Field: Three Medium Bombarcbnent Squadrons (73rd and 77th at Elmendorf,

36th at Naval Air Sta tio n, K~diak)'~, thr ee Int erc ept or Pur sui t

Squad rons (18th ( less one flight), and the 11th at Elmendorf, and one

flight of the 18th at Annette Isla nd Landi ng Field), and a larg e numb er

of air corp s service uni ts at these bases plus Ladd Field. Yakutat

Field, Otter Point. Nome, Northw ay, Cold Bay, and Naknek.cP

The Army Ferryin g Command, established in May 1941 at Long Beach,

Cal lfornia, instituted a system of flying Lend-Lease alrcraft through

Alaska that wa s ultimately a huge success. Aircraft bound for Russia

departed East Base Airfield outside Great Falls, Montana and flew a

&'Garfield, n e h o w d M il e 68.The commander of the P-40 squadron (11th Pursuit Squadron)

wa s Lieutenant John S. Chennau lt from Waterproof, Louisiana, sonof General C la ire Lee Chennau l t , c m a n d e r o f the Amer icanVolunteer Group that wa s fighting the Japanese in China.

A s A m y elements at Kodiak. the ai r corps uni ts , a i r defense,servi ce troops, etc. , were consolidated at on e area near the naval air

station, calle d Fort Greely. Thi s should not be confused with thepresent day Fort Greely located at Delta Juncti on, Alaska (De ltaJunction is about 9 0 mil es east of Fairbanks).

&-U.S. Army, *Jo int Pacif ic Frontier Defense Plan, Suppor tingPlan-11th (sic) Air Force (Alaska), Appe ndix No. 5 to Annex No. 5-Air,Tab le A, 1-2. U.S. Army, Army Air For ces In the War Against Japa n1941-1942, (Washington: Headquarter s. Army Air Forces. August 1945),2. 111 112.


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route established by the 7th Ferrying Grou p of the Air Transport

Comnand. After being winteriz ed at East Base, aircraft were flown

along the Northwest Staging Route airfields of Ednonton, Grand Prairie,

Fort St. John, Fort Nelson, Watson Lake, and then into Ladd Field.

During the twenty-one months t he 7th Ferrying Group operated this

route, almost 8,000 (7,983) aircraft passed through East Base bound of

Fa irb an ks for t ransfer to the R ~ s s i a n s . ~ ~

Without the dedicate d effort of U.S. sold iers , sail ors, and airmen

in the North Pacif lc protecti ng the Lend-Lease rout e fr om Fairbanks to

Nome, then acro ss the Bering Sea into Siberia the Japanese could have

easily disrupt ed or shut down t his strategi cally vital operation.

The United S tate s Navy In Alaska wa s in no better sha pe than the

Army. In fact, during the mont hs when General Buckner was feverishly

building an army in Alaska, the Navy wa s taking a far more caut ious

approach in allocating resour ces to the North Pacific.

The Thirteenth Naval District (Alaska Sector) had only sufficient

naval strength for harbor control an d patrolling. Its mission was

defe ndin g *...the coastal zo ne of the Alas kan Secto r; control an d

protect ship ping therein. = The Navy rece ived authoriz ation to begin

improving its sit es at Kodlak, Sitk a, and Dutch Harbor in July 1940.

These sltes, and other s in the Aleutians and in Southeastern

Alaska, wer e the subject of studies, panels, and survey parties

70Stan Cohen, he Foraotten War. A Pictorial Historv of World War.I1 in PLJ and Northwestern am (Missoula. Montana: PictorialHistories Publishing Company, 1981), 44-45.

U.S. Army, YJo int Pac ifi c Coastal Frontier Defense Plan , Rain bow#5, Annex No. 4, pp 7 8.


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througho ut the 1930 s. Thes e effo rts wer e about as fruitful as those

taken by the Army and Air C orps duri ng the same period.

The Navy had establ ished a wire less statio n at Dutch Harbor on

Unalaska Island in the Aleutian s in 1 912 to transmit weather reports.

Kiska in the western Aleut ians wa s set aside a s a naval reserve in

1904, and constructio n on a base wa s started in 1 916 but the site wa s

soon abandoned. In 1938, a Navy board headed by Adniral Arthur Hepbur n

proposed construction of fifteen naval bases and air statlons

throughout the continental United Sta tes plus air sta tlon s at Kodiak

and Sltka. On 2 5 Aprll 1939, funding wa s appropria ted for building

bases at Sl tka and K ~ d i a k . ~ ~

Kodlak, with constructlon well underway but far from complete at

the start of the war, play ed a key role in the Ale utia ns Campaign. An

island just south of the base of the Alaska Peni nsul a and about 125

nautical miles southwest of the Kenai Peninsula. Kodlak has a natural

harb or ( Ol d Woman s Bay ) an d Is strategically located to provide

command and control of the North Pacific Fleet. t Is here that

Admiral Theobald, a s commander of Task Forc e Eight would make his

headquarters in late May 1942

Until Task For ce Eight sai led into the North Pac ific, the only

naval force present was that of the Thirteent h Naval District (A laska

Sec tor ) cm a n d e d , a s no ted above, by Capta in Ralph C. Parker.

Comnandi ng the Alaska Sector since October 1940, Parker had only the

USS Charleston until the Navy leased private boa ts (cal led Yard Patrol,

thus the designat ion Y Y B V with which to fulf il his mission of harbor

7aCohen . B e orqot ten War, 154 .

4


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and coastal defense. n the fall of 1941 the District Ccinmander in

Seatt le had begun ccnmnitting patrol aircraft to Alaska. Opera ting out

of Sltka. Kodiak, and Dutch Harbor the PBY-5 squ adr ons of Patrol Wing 4

(espec ially VP-42) wou ld play a key role in Theobald's defens e of the

Aleutians. Th is illustrious servi ce would continue throughout the

campa gn a

The Japanese fleet certainly had no compunction to oper ting in the

inhospitable and harsh North Pacific, even as far east as the

Aleutlans. They had alw ays viewed it as an are a possessing invaluable

natural re source s with great strat egic potential.

There is little doubt that even wlth the Soviet s totally

preoccupied with Nazi Germany in the west the Japanese felt thr eatened

on the northern end of its defensive perimeter. There were no

indicators from which they coul d draw the conclusion that the Sovie ts

were plann ing t o invite U.S. forces into Siberi a or Kamchatka, yet they

conti nued to fear such an inevetibllity. So much s o that the Japan ese

never seriously attempted to interdict the flow of Lend-Lease suppl ies

mov ing alon g the 'Pacific Ro ut eY fran the U.S. west coa st, throu gh the

Japan ese Kuril s, to the port of Vladavostok. Th e Axis' failur e to

insist on an interdiction effort of this longest of the five surface

7aIbid.. 154-155. U.S. Navy, UAdnir al Nlmitz C m a n d Sumnary.message traffic from Commander. Northwest Se a Frontier to CINCPAC,Frame 523.

Th e American Consol idated PBY-5 patrol flying boat wa suse d extensively throughout the Pacific for maritimereconnaissance. Particularly effective in the North Pacif icbecause of its slo w flying spe ed and extended range. i t would bepressed into servlc e as a bomber dur ing the aerlal phase of theoperation to oust the Japanese from Kiska and Attu.


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Lend-Lease Ro ut es (the Alaska-Siberian Air Ferry Route was an all air

effort) would have great impact on the Soviet offense s during the last

two years of the war. Over 47 (9.24 million tons) of the total

Lend-Lease materiel that went to Soviet Russi a 19.6 mlllion tons) was

transported over the Pacifl c R~ute. ~

Certain1 Y w th the manpower and seapower requirements demanded

by thelr effort in the Southwest Pacif lc, th e Japane se simply did not

have the resou rces to establish bases in the North Paci fic (beyond

their own Kuri Island s, garris oned by their Northe rn Area Force). Why

then did the Japanese attack the U.S. Naval Base at Dutch Harbor and

occupy the Aleutians?

The shock of the 18 April 1942 Doolittle Raid was very real. The

Japanese military had sworn no enemy would be able to strike the

homeland. a nd they were deeply em barras sed and angered by that aerial

attack , however superficial the actual damage. Specul ation wa s rampant

throughout th e Imperlal General Staff about fut ure threa ts to the

homeland. Prevent ing this insult from reoccur ring was certainly a

priority and any opportunity to expand their eastern defensive

perimeter would be a s tron g argument for action. The Tokyo Raid served

as the final st raw for Achiral Yamamot o to lnslst on executing the

Midway operat ion, and oppo si ti on to t h i s plan qu ickly folded.

When the planners on the Combined Fleet staff developed the

'V.S. Army, International Aid Statis tics, Wor ld War 11,Sumnary of War Department Lend Lease Activities, eadquarters, ArmyServic e Forc es, War Department. 31 December 1945, 46. 47-54.

7sU.S. Arm y, Japanese Monogra ph No. 88, Ale uti an NavalOpe rat ion .I 6-8.


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complex Mldway plan, they want ed to ensure that the maln effort of the

Combined Fleet (seizing Midway Island) would be completed before the

U.S. Paci fic Fleet coul d interfere. T o gain this assurance, they

planned an operation in the North Paci fic against t he U.S. Aleutian s,

phased to be con ducted one day before the assault on Mldway. Par t one

of this operation to be a carrier strike against Dutch Harbor Naval

Base, an d part two to be the occupation of certal n islands in the

Aleutians. Tacticall y, the Aleutian operation wa s an unqualified

success. At the operatio nal level, it w a s a terr ible failure.76

I f the Ame ric ans reac ted in acco rdan ce with the plan s assu mpti ons,

Acbniral Nimitz wou ld rus h a number of h is fe w rema inin g carr iers north

to meet the threat in the Aleutians. Thi s would give Yamamoto, with

the maln body of the Combined Fleet, a free hand wlth which to reduce

the U.S. garrison on Mldway. Once Midway wa s taken and hi s own land

based naval aircraft operating from the atoll, Yamamoto would be ready

to ambu sh an d destroy the U.S. fleet when they counter attacked . Of

course, the Americans were aware of the plan in significant detail ,

thanks to intercepted radio transmissions and the Japanese were the

ones ambushed. The Midway operation was a disaster for the Japanese

Navy.

Given the opportunity to disguise a major failure with a minor

succ ess, the cha nce t o extend at least a segme nt of the homeland sdefensiv e perimete r, and the Japanese natural Inclination and

will ingn ess t o operate in the North Pacific , it is understandable why

the Japanese elected t o remain in the Aleutians beyond the period


52/211

provided for in the Midway plan. The original plan only allowed for

occupation of the Aleutians until the winter following the operation.

How well they could capitalize on their gains in the Aleutians and

use those gains to support the achievement of their strategy throughout

the Pacific remained to be seen.

77U SArmy, Japanese Monograph No.

45 8 4 - 8 5 s .Army,*Japanese Monograph No. 88, 12

Among many on the Imperial General Staff, especially in theNavy Section, the operation in the Aleutians was viewed withgreater import than Yamamoto attached to it. An exampleof this view can be demonstrated in the followingexcerpt from Japanese Monograph No. 45: '...there were to be twooperational areas-Aleutians and Midway-but these two areaswere to be closely coordinated. he occupation of thestrategic islands was an important objective I b


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CHAPTERTWO

There must be one man n c m a n d of a n e n ti re t h ea te r- -a ir ,ground, and ships. We connot manage by cooperation.

General Georg e C. Marshall , Geor ge C. Marshall. Ordeal an db ~ e . 939-1942

In spite of a rather innnense effort by Nimitz to thwart, or at

least disrupt, the Japanese thrust into the North Pac ific , the Japanese

had managed t o camplete their operation almost flawlessly. Nimitz had

dispatch ed Rear Achiral Robert A. Theobald a s Comnander. North Pacif ic

Force in late May to present the best def ense possible for the

Aleutians. Operating as Task Force Eight and armed with the information

on Japanese obJ ect lve s for the Midway and Aleutians operation. Theobald

wa s not successful in preventing the Jap anese from occupying islands in

the western Aleutians.'

Task Force Eight did not form at Pearl Harbor, but in fact was

drawn from are as throughout the Pacific. Th e various naval units then

rendezvo used south of Kodiak. Theobald departed Pearl Harbor on 22 May

1942 aboard the destroyer and arrived Kodiak on 27 May. He then

hoisted his f lag aboard the l ight c ru ise r bs hv i l lg , which had a l so

arrived on the 27th from a mission northwest of Midway.z

'Thaddeus V. Tuleja, l im a x (New York: W. W. NortonCo mp an y, Inc.. 1960). 60 .

ZU.S. Navy, 'The Battle of Midway Incl udin g the Aleutia n Pha se,June 3 to June 14 1942. Strategi cal and Tactica l Analysis. U.S .Navy, Naval War College, 1948 . 64.

The blashville had been ordered to an area about 400 milesnorthwes t of Midway to partici pate in a CINC PAC decepti on plan. The


54/211

By 2 June, all elements of Task Force 8 had arrived in the North

Pacific and was organized into four surface and subsurface groups

(refer to Figure 6, Organization of Task Force Eight, page 50). Themain group, TG 8.6 was composed of three llght cruisers, Elashville. Sf

m nd jjonolul~. two heavy cruisers, Jn di an a~ ol ig nd Louisville,four destroyers, Gridlev, McCall, Gilmer, and Humphrevs. TG 8.4 wa s

composed of the nine aged destroyers, W. W Brooks. r , WE

Talbot, and Waters, attached to Theobald from the

Thirteenth Naval District (Alaska) of the Northwestern Sea Frontier.

TG 8.2 was composed of one gunboat, Q L a r l e s t ~ , ne minesweeper,

W ive Coast Guard cutters, and fourteen patrol vessels. The

last task group, TG 8.5, wa s composed of seven submarines (SS 18, 23.

24, 27, 28, 34, and 35).

Air strength of the task force total led ninety-four Army fighters,

seven heavy bombers, forty-two medium bombers, twenty-three Navy patrol

aircraft (Catallna PBY's), and three scout a i r ~ r a f t . ~ he War

Department had been frantically attempting to introduce additional

aircraft to Alaska, however logistical requirements had greatly slowed

h s h v i e broadcast radio signals designed to deceive the Japaneseabout movements of the Pacif ic F

Aleutian Campaign

Documents

Aleutian Campaign