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The Japanese Attack on Pearl Harbor
By Dr Khalid Siddiqui
Ohio

Much of the information on the Japanese preparations leading up to the surprise attack on Pearl Harbor had been classified. However, recently many of the FBI files on this subject have been declassified. Unfortunately, the Japanese Naval Intelligence archives had been burnt in 1945. But, fortunately, many documents regarding Japanese Naval Intelligence, and the memoirs of many senior naval officers have survived. Most of these have been declassified.

The major contribution of a British naval officer in updating the Japanese Navy to pull off this surprise attack has now been revealed. Also, the ego of the British and US intelligence services, and their desire not to share the information, were partly blamed for ignoring all the ominous signs of this attack. Most of the information in this article was obtained from the book, ‘Beverly Hills Spy’ by Ronald Drabkin. The book was released only this year (2024).

Pearl Harbor: Part 1

* The biggest naval battle of WWI (1914-1918) was fought between the British and German fleets in the North Sea about 60 miles off the western coast of Jutland, Denmark. It was the first battle in which an aircraft took off from an aircraft carrier. The heroics of the British Navy pilot Frederick Rutland at the Battle of Jutland (May 31 – June 1, 1916) earned him two medals – Distinguished Service Cross (DSC); and Albert Medal, First Class, in gold. He met King George V twice in the same month to receive the two medals from him. He became famous as Rutland of Jutland. He was found to possess an excellent technical aptitude in understanding the mechanics of an airplane. After the war he headed a committee with full authority over aircraft carrier and sea plane design. Later, he was transferred to the Royal Air Force (RAF) and promoted to the rank of squadron leader.

* By 1922, Rutland’s marriage with Dorothy was on the rocks. They had two small children, Fred and Barbara. He started having an affair with a fellow officer’s wife, whose name was also Dorothy. Although he was well-known for his technical expertise, he was not a combat pilot and had never shot down any German plane. He was over thirty years old and came from a lower socio-economic background. Based on these non-technical reasons he was not considered for promotion. His ego was badly hurt by this indignity. He decided to grab any opportunity to make money and become a member of high-class society.

* During WWI, Japan was an ally of Britain. The Japanese Navy felt that the Royal Navy was much superior compared to its own navy. In September 1921 a group of thirty British naval aviation experts was sent to Japan. They stayed there for eighteen months and taught the Japanese latest British tactics in torpedo bombing, flight control, carrier landings and take off. The Japanese’s ability to learn and improvise quickly alarmed the British, and they terminated the formal alliance. By then, Japan had already built its first aircraft carrier, Hotshot.

* By late 1922, The Japanese navy was making progress but still far too many of their pilots were crashing and dying while trying to land on the aircraft carrier. Their planes were all designed by the British. They needed help in aircraft takeoff and landing, and carrier design –areas in which Rutland was the best. Just then, Rutland happened to walk into the office of the Imperial Japanese Navy in Westminster, London, and offered his services. He was hired immediately on a very high salary by the Japanese. Since he could not work for the Japanese Navy directly, he was employed, on paper, by a private Japanese company called Mitsubishi. He then retired from the RAF. The RAF and MI5 (British Military Intelligence – Section 5) had been intercepting Japanese radio traffic and found out about Rutland’s recruitment by them.

* Rutland arrived in Yokohama, Japan in December 1923. Mitsubishi rented a house for him in Kamakura, across the hill from the main Japanese naval base in Yokosuka. He started coaching the Japanese on how to update the designs of the aircraft carrier Hosho and the two new carriers under construction, Akagi and Kaga. Rutland would go to the Mitsubishi office in Tokyo only two or three times a week. Later, he moved to Yokohama and built an extremely impressive house in the best location of the city. He had a lavish lifestyle. MI5 was, apparently, tracking him but never learned about his work with the Japanese Navy. Its director, Col Sir Vernon Kell, however, was convinced that someone other than Mitsubishi was also paying Rutland.

* The Japanese naval officers came to his home infrequently and always in civilian clothes. The British never learned about his work with the Japanese Navy. As Rutland was the world’s leading expert on landing gear for planes, he was introduced to Shrio Kayaba who had a workshop in eastern Tokyo where he made landing gears for the Japanese Navy planes. They had considerable technical issues with the landing gear. Rutland visited Kayaba’s workshop and later invested in his company to bring it up to date. Their company received many more orders for the landing gears.

* Ellis Zacharias was a young US Naval officer and Japanese language student stationed at the Yokohama Port since 1920. The US and Japanese navies considered each other as potential enemies ever since Japan defeated the Russian Navy in 1905, but the idea of actual war between the two countries was considered absurd. However, Zacharias was convinced, based on Japanese expansionism, that war was bound to take place sooner or later. Their last two wars against Russia and China had both started with Japan executing a surprise attack. The warnings by Zacharias and the others about an attack by Japan were mostly ignored by the US authorities. However, William Rudolph Hearst did highlight the Japanese threat in his newspaper.

* In 1928, Ellis Zacharias, now a US Navy Commander, was stationed as a superior officer at the US Navy Department at Washington, DC. One day Japanese Navy Captain Yamamoto, who was also staying in Washington DC those days, invited him to his apartment for drinks and a poker game. Aircraft carriers, the combination of sea power and airpower, were the obsession with Yamamoto. In his opinion, the future wars would be decided by the carriers and their planes. In between the games, he asked Zacharias many probing questions on these subjects. Zacharias got alarmed. Later, he mentioned the Japanese threat to his superior who laughed that possibility off. Zacharias then met with FBI director, J. Edgar Hoover, to discuss this issue. Hoover told him that he was more concerned about the Communists, gang warfare in Chicago, and bank robbery than a Japanese threat. He then called his assistant and asked him to physically escort Zacharias out of his office.

* Director of the Japanese naval intelligence, Rear Admiral Shigetaro Shimada, felt that a war against the USA was imminent because of many insults that the US had heaped on Japan lately. The US (and Australia) had blocked the League of Nations’ proposal that all the races were equal. The US had blocked immigration from Japan in a racially motivated policy in the 1920s. The US had called the invasion of Manchuria by Japan illegal at the League of Nations in 1931. However, the most important reason was not mentioned in the book. Japan imported all its oil from the USA. Japan was sure that as soon as it embarked on its policy of expansionism, the USA would cut the supply of oil. The Japanese would then have to get oil from the Japanese-occupied Dutch East Indies (Indonesia). And to secure a smooth flow of oil they would have to knock out the American and British navies.

(To be continued)