I understand all that I was just wondering if it wouldn’t have been beyond the capability of the Jap attackers to keep all the planes from taking off if those carriers had been in port. I’m not trying to argue the point, just wondering if our ability to defend against the surprise attack would have been different if we had had those carriers with their planes available to respond.
Everyone always assumes that it was bad for the Japs that they missed the carriers. I’m just wondering if it would have also been bad for them if the carriers had been there to fight back against the attack.
I’m not saying... just wondering.
” just wondering if our ability to defend against the surprise attack would have been different if we had had those carriers with their planes available to respond.”
Sadly enough, I don’t think it would have helped. Pearl was 100% unprepared for war or attack even though there was a large amount of intelligence to suggest that such an attack was highly likely. It is still not clear whether that intelligence was withheld from Pearl or the Pearl commanders simply ignored it. Either way the Pearl commanders were relieved of duty.
And the Japs attacked on a Sunday when most men were on leave and at a base in which everyone apparently believed they were on an extended Hawaii holiday given their inability to fight back and given the extent of damage. Both the ships and the planes on the fields were all lined up in neat rows ready to be taken out in mass, rather than scattered about in protective positions. There was even advance radar detection of the incoming Jap planes from several minutes out, but there was confusion about whether the planes MIGHT be a squad of our airplanes out on some UNKNOWN exercise and no one could sort it out until the Jap planes started dropping bombs.