According to him, only half of the boats had radar and earlier in the evening (it was a very black night), only the radar boats fired their torpedos at a string of Japanese destroyers intel had said were coming - missed them - and then the returned to base.
The remaining boats didn't have radar, which included PT-109 and PT-105 and they stayed at their posts waiting for the Japs to come back through.
According to him, JFK had put the crew on 50% watch, so half were sleeping and the Japanese suddenly returned and the IJN Amagiri was almost on top of them by the time they saw her. JFK allegedly ran the throttles to "full" but the mufflers were closed and the engines stalled during those critical seconds and they got cut in half.
According to Keresey, it was a kind of "new guy" mistake and he didn't blame him - but he did blame the radar boats for leaving the area and making all the remaining boats blind.
I take a dim view of those who seek to denigrate JFK's actions during WWII. Compare that to the draft dodging Bill Clinton, and you'll see how far America has fallen.
Last year I read a novel called “The Hooligans” by retired US Navy Captain PT Dueterman.
It was a piece of fiction but included a great deal of history of the Hooligan Navy who operated the PT Boats.
It seems these guys were the motorcycle gang of the navy. Strictly following the rules wasn’t their thing but they were rather effective at their craft.
In other words, McHale’s Navy was somewhat a documentary.
For some reason I always admired the PT boats. When I was in college, I was on a summer mission project with Campus Crusade for Christ in Wildwood, NJ. We also had summer jobs. Mine was working on the crew of a tour boat. The owner had a WWII mine sweeper tied to the dock. It was a project boat he never worked on. The sweeper was essentially a PT boat with a different purpose. It was an amazing looking craft.
Another tour boat was an actual repurposed PT boat. The owners late father owned it at one time.
Thank you for a great post AND for your service!!!
The skipper of one of the other three boats on patrol with 109 said - quote “ When I heard 109 was hit, I asked myself ‘ I could see at 1500 to 1800 yards, why couldn't other people?’ I never got an answer. It could have been they were doping off (meaning goofing off not drug taking !)” Another skipper of a nearby boat said later “ It's amazing. You could see it at great distance. We saw it was more or less headed right at 109. We radioed Kennedy to look at his starboard bow. There was a bow wake coming directly toward him. No response. Nothing.”
He had only 1 of his 3 engines in gear which was against regulations. The squadron commander - Thomas Glover Warfield said JFK wasn't a particularly good boat commander.
No other motor torpedo boat was ever rammed by a destroyer in WWII on either side. The speed differential between the two would make that impossible for an alert boat ! It did not happen in the European\Mediterranean\Baltic theaters either where the Germans, Italians, Russians & British operated comparable craft. Also not in WWI. (Note the ship type destroyer originally came from a pre-WWI designation for torpedo boat destroyer. A ship specifically designed to destroy torpedo boats by rapid gunfire. When submarines entered fleets they displaced motor torpedo boats for the most part. The destroyer took on a different role one of firing torpedoes in fleet actions and antisubmarine.)
He was heroic in regard to saving his men. However he never should have gotten them in that fix.
Not making any of this up ! It's from the book “A Question of Character”: A Life Of John F. Kennedy” by Thomas C. Reeves. The book is meticulously sourced. Reeves admits at first he expected to write a glowing biography like most academics and others had done. However in his research he found a different story. In the bibliography I can go right to the basic sources. For 109 details: Blair's “The Search for JFK” and Robert J Bulkley’s definitive account on PT Boats in the USN - “At Close Quarters: PT Boats in the United States Navy”.
JFK dodged a court martial because of his family connections. You or I would have had that court martial.
Read the book, read the sources ! I did ! Then decide !