October 1993
Vol. 2 Number1
Published by the World War Two Roundtable
Edited by Joe Grant and Jim Gerber
Welcome to the 1993 - 1994 season of the WW II Roundtable. I am sure that we are all looking forward to this season’s programs. As usual Don Patton has done a superb job of arranging speakers. We are also looking forward to our first WW II Roundtable symposium in November. The subject will be: Was the Atomic bomb necessary? Mr. Ron Reimann will present a talk on submarine tactics in the Pacific which put a strangle hold on Japan and Dr. Deutsch will follow with a discussion on the necessity of the atomic bomb in view of this strangle hold. The date is Saturday Nov. 20, 1993 at 1:00 P.M. at Historic Fort Snelling. There will be displays for you to enjoy starting at 12:00 noon. The cost will be $5.00. Please plan to attend.
In connection with our symposium, here is our first story:
Scientist Deplores Hiroshima
An atomic physicist was weeping in the office of President Truman. “I haven’t been able to sleep,” he said holding out his palms, “I feel there is blood on my hands.” “Here’s a hanky,” offered peppery Harry Truman. He then gave orders to Dean Acheson, his secretary of state: “Don’t let that cry-baby in here again. If you’ve done it, it’s done. Don’t look back. After all, he only built it. I’m the one who ordered it to be used.”
Truman’s meeting with Dr. Robert Oppenheimer was recalled by New York Times reporter David Halberstan. It was estimated that the President’s swift decision had saved many lives.
A Mystery Solved: The Japanese Dunkirk
The heroic military retreat at Dunkirk is now rivaled by its Japanese counterpart--their secret retreat from Sitka. The Japanese had seized and occupied Sitka, Alaska in 1942 for 14 months. Their mission: to jam Allied communications. To protect themselves from the constant American shelling they had dug a network of extensive tunnels. They were trapped by three rings of U.S. Navy destroyers, submarines and patrol bombers which kept fuel and food from reaching the island. For the Japanese it was escape or die. Their commander, a Captain Kasukabe, had been trapped and was wounded in the debris of his bombed-out barracks. He, nevertheless, helped to design an unorthodox surprise evacuation. Kasukabe, now 80, tells how he did it: “ I listened to the radio(he had spent his boyhood in Idaho) and heard the American ships say that they were going away to refuel and get more ammo. They did not talk in code. Our rescue fleet evaded American radar by sailing around the volcano and into the harbor. We loaded 5500 men in 55 minutes. We then sank our landing craft and threw our rifles into the water. We left. They never saw us.”
That was on July 28,1943. Consequently we bombed and shelled the deserted island for two and one-half weeks and then landed there on August 15. Our green troops suffered more than 300 dead from booby traps, accidents and so-called ‘friendly fire’. An American veteran says, “the real fiasco of Sitka was that there weren’t any Japanese there, no enemy fire and, in the heavy fog, with zero visibility, we fought each other. We saw the enemy in our own friends and sometimes even in rocks which looked to us like round Japanese heads.” He was with the 87th Mountain Infantry Regiment which led the reoccupation assault.
As for Captain Kasukabe, he returned to work as a translator for Mitsubishi in Nagoya. These events were described in an August reunion of former foes, now friends, in Sitka and reported in the Matanuska Valley Sun.
Jimmy Doolittle Dies
For four months after the attack on Pearl Harbor it looked as though the U.S. could not muster an effective counterattack. Our morale sagged badly. That is until the Doolittle raid in April of 1942. This heroic attack on Tokyo showed the enemy that we could reach him where he lived and helped to restore Allied morale. The general died in his sleep at the age of 96, at the home of his son in Pebble Beach, California on September 27th.
Nazis Flee Sinking Ship
Twenty U-boats left Germany in 1945. The Third Reich was collapsing and prominent Nazis were fleeing their country, carrying with them looted precious paintings and jewelry. On May 4,1945 a Royal Air Force bomber sank one, a sixteen-tonner between Sweden and Denmark. It now rests on the bottom of the sea, off Anholt Island, awaiting salvage.
Desire Under the Palms
“It happened in 1945 on the ship on which I served as radioman,” reports a Navy man. “Our fleet was anchored off of Okinawa. We were doing ‘picket duty’ circling the island on the look-out for suicidal Kamikaze frogmen eager to die in the act of blowing us and themselves out of the water.”
A bad storm was approaching and as the visibility shrank, our flag ship ordered us to limit our sector and concentrate on Katina-Ko, a group of tiny islands sheltered by the Okinawa hills.
“This was ‘nervous news’. The crew was edgy enough without it: Casualties from midnight raids by Kamikaze flyers, no mail, no leave, no recreation, no sex, frustration. We took cover and moored in a narrow inlet, close to islands on both sides, port and starboard. We were close enough to see the beaches plainly and, could it be? Women! All eyes were on them. Some were digging shells for food, tossing them into baskets slung over their shoulders, others were taking a break from their work, their brown bodies leaping gleefully over the white crests of the pounding surf. Clad only in grass skirts, all ages, some mature, some nubile, leaping above the breakers, their bodies bouncing provocatively.”
“Tantalized, Seaman Heron, could stand it no longer. He decided to risk everything. Wearing only his dungarees he dove overboard. We gave him the ‘good luck’ salute as he swam away. A Bos’n’s Mate Conway broke out his binoculars for a closer view. We took turns to watch and fantasize. The sailor with the binocs suddenly grunted, ‘Whoops! Oh, no!’ ‘What’s wrong?’ He passed the glasses around and we all saw the bad news. A wooden sign nailed to a tree lettered in Tagalog and English said, LEPER COLONY. KEEP AWAY.’”
Code Security
After the war it was learned that the U.S. shot down Japanese Admiral Yamamoto’s plane with the help of Ultra intelligence. The British charged that the U.S. compromised the security of the code-breaking, but the U.S. denied the charges and defended its position. Previously secret wartime messages released to the U.S. National Archives in 1981 substantiate the British position. American fighter pilots talked over the air so much about the Yamamoto incident that the Japanese suspected their codes were being read and immediately changed them. It took four months for the U.S. to crack the new code.
What to do.
When Adolf Hitler was told that France and Britain had declared war on Germany as a result of the invasion of Poland, the Fuehrer slumped in his chair and was silent for a few moments. Then, looking up at the generals around him, he asked, “Well... what do we do now?”
October 14, 1943
A force of 291 Flying Fortresses from the Eighth Air Force is sent to attack the German ball-bearing works at Schweinfurt. They do considerable damage to the target but lose 60 planes with a further 140 damaged. Most of the losses occur during the 400-mile round trip unescorted from Aachen. The Eighth Air Force has lost a further 88 aircraft in the last week. These losses are intolerable and the USAAF abandons long-range, unescorted daylight attacks for the time being. They are not equipped to attack by night. The theories of the American airmen have been disproved on two accounts. Bombers cannot fight their way to a target without prohibitive casualties and even carefully selected targets like Schweinfurt offer no great gains. Production in Germany is quickly switched to other areas, extra supplies are brought in from Sweden and in any case an investigation ordered by Albert Speer shows that stocks of ball-bearings will last for several months.
October 1943, Battle of the Atlantic
From early in the month the Allies are able to use bases in the Azores and thus cover areas of the Atlantic which their land-based aircraft have been unable to patrol previously. The efforts of the newly equipped U-boats continue, especially against the convoys ONS-18 and ON-202 but have little success. The U-boat fleet is still large at 175 operational boats and 237 in training but a further 26 are lost during the month. In September and October nine merchant ships have been lost in the North Atlantic and 25 U-boats have been sunk while attempting to attack.
Book Store Opens
Paul Kisselburg has opened a military bookstore in downtown Stillwater. The store is open Saturdays 10:30 to 4:30 and by appointment. The address is:
Kisselburg Military Books
105 Union Alley
Stillwater, Mn. 55082
612-439-7013 or 439 1884
Tapes Available
For those who may have missed a program or a presentation of the WW II Roundtable, tapes are available and may be rented for $3.00 by calling Don Patton at 835-7600.