I have always wondered how the attack would have played out if the Americans
had correctly interpreted the reading from the Army radar site on the north
tip of Oahu.
The attacking Japanese planes were picked up at a range of 132 miles at 7
o'clock Sunday morning. The radar operators phoned the duty office, Lt.
Kermit Tyler and told him (paraphrase) that ".... a large formation of
planes is approaching from the north."
Tyler knew that eleven B-17s were due to arrive and assumed that the radar
operators were seeing the B-17s and told them "Well, don't worry about it."
The operators had interpreted the signal that they were seeing as
representing over fifty planes. They did not know about the B-17 flight. If
they had told Tyler that there were over fifty planes approaching instead of
saying a 'large number', Tyler might have sounded the alarm.

If he had sounded the alarm the Americans would have had about thirty
minutes to get ready for the attack. I don't know how long it would take
the sailors to get to their battle stations but I assume that 30 minutes
would give them enough time to get to their AA guns and get them loaded. At
least they would all be out of their bunks and all water tight doors and
hatches could have been closed. The AA defenses on the ships were nothing
like the late WWII batteries but there were dozens if not hundreds of 1.1"
quad mounts on ships in the harbor when one considers the number of
destroyers and auxiliaries present. The 1.1" had a lot of long term
reliability problems but put out a lot of firepower when they were working.
There were probably even more .50 caliber machine guns in addition to the
sixty or seventy 5'' dual purpose mounts. The Army also had substantial AA
batteries and the infantry and marines had .30 LMGs and BARs.
On the other hand, many soldiers and sailors might have been off base or
ashore.

Could the Army have gotten their P-40s and P-36s up in time? The P-40s were
more than a match for the Zeros (contrary to popular myth) and would have
been going after the Kates and Vals anyway. I don't know how many P-40s were
in Hawaii that morning of if there were any Navy or Marine fighters on Ford
Island or at Ewa air station.

I think the American carries were about 200 miles west of Pearl Harbor on
the morning of the attack. Could they have sent approximately 80 Wildcats
into the battle? They probably could not have gotten there by 7:55 but they
could have been there by the time the second wave arrived. The second wave
would probably have been canceled by the Japanese if surprise had not been
achieved.

Another twist I have wondered about is what would have happened it
anti-torpedo nets had been deployed at Pearl Harbor. I think more than half
the Kates in the first wave were armed with torpedoes. The Navy had not
completely discounted the possibility of torpedo attacks due to the
relatively shallow depth of the harbor. I also don't know how well the nets
would have worked but the possibility of neutralizing a large portion of
the first wave would surly have affected the battle.
Admiral Furlong, the day's Senior Officer Present Afloat ordered all ship to
sortie as soon as the attack began. If he had been given a 30 minute warning
would he have ordered the sortie if nets had been present? They probably
couldn't get steam up in 30 minutes anyway.

I looking forward to hearing the group's thoughts.

Thanks,

Dave Kennedy
Atlanta