Honolulu "Military Blog Day Tour" to see and imagine
▓ Zhang Changning
Hawaiian Islands IC photo
The U.S. state of Hawaii, a 132-island state of Hawaii, is located at the "crossroads" of the Pacific Ocean and is a hub for sea and air transportation between Asia, the Americas and Oceania. Not long ago, I flew to Hawaii, and as I hovered over it, Pearl Island, overlooking the southern bay of Oahu, was like a giant pocket, with only a dredged waterway connecting the vast Central Pacific Ocean.
Before the Boeing 747 plane landed at Honolulu International Airport, a subconscious thought made me cross to make an association: in October 1940, in this airspace and sea, the US military code-named "Ship Question" 21 offensive and defensive exercises rehearsed the real "Pearl Harbor Incident" a year later. In the early morning of December 7, 1941, hundreds of Japanese Zero fighters followed the "road map" of the "Blue Army" attack on Pearl Harbor in the exercise, quietly crossed the Waianay Ridge in the northwest of the port, blew up and sank 44 capital ships and other ships in the "Pocket Harbor", and almost completely destroyed the US Pacific Fleet.
Pearl Harbor in 1943. IC photo
In recent years, the "Pearl Harbor incident" has been questioned in the historical circles, and the rising tide has made Hawaii's "military blog day trip" more attractive. The Hawaii War Museum, which is dominated by graphics and audio-visual explanations, is not far from the entrance to the Parking Lot of Pearl Harbor Scenic Area, and tourists from all over the world must "punch in" here. Next, whether you are taking a boat to "go deep" into the cabin of the USS Arizona with its wrecks buried at the bottom of the sea, or climb the ladder to take a photo on the "landing deck" of the USS Missouri, you have to wait in a long line, but the video footage of naval warfare that keeps rolling out on the wall screen is very powerful, the torpedo launches, the warplanes are bombed, the guns are shelled, and the deafening acoustic effects make people feel as if they are in modern naval warfare.
World War II classic documentary "Attack on Pearl Harbor"
The Bolfen attack submarine, which sank 39 Japanese cargo ships and 4 Japanese warships during World War II, spent $10 in line to buy tickets that day before boarding the deck of the boat known as the "Avengers of Pearl Harbor" and visiting the "Museum of Missing Submarines in World War II" in the cabin. The most annoying thing about the "day trip" with the group is that all the tour guides have a problem: constantly greeting and changing venues. I was halfway through the visit to the "World War II Missing Submarine Gallery" on the hero boat that day, when the annoying tour guide blew the whistle and "picked up the duck" and went ashore to rush to the next attraction.
↑↓ Sneak attack scene and exact time
Soldiers washing the deck
These old photographs were remade by Vahiri at Naval Base Pearl Harbor on November 7, 2017.
Commander of the Japanese Army
Rushed to the "Pacific Air Pavilion" in Horununu, but temporarily closed because of its interior decoration. In the face of general dissatisfaction among tourists, the tour guide made an exception for the group to contact a "U.S. Army Museum" far from the city to visit, which is an army museum built on the difficult facilities of the coastal fort, but exhibits a large amount of naval history. It was through this visit that I was most deeply touched by the US Navy's "Ship Question" 21 exercise, which exposed the "weakness" of the US fleet in Pearl Harbor, which was precisely the "dead hole" found by Japanese Admiral Isoroku Yamamoto.
In January 1941, Rear Admiral Hesbend Edward Kimmel was promoted directly to the rank of general, making him Commander-in-Chief of the Pacific Fleet. Please note that at this point in time, it is less than 100 days away from the major hidden dangers of the weak air defense force exposed by the codename "Ship Question" 21 exercise. Kimmel took office and the first thing to firmly grasp was to "make up for the dead sheep", arrange radar nets for air defense, add and strengthen anti-submarine nets to the seabed, and later prove that the radar nets gave timely warnings of the Japanese aircraft sneak attacks, and the anti-submarine nets covered a number of pocket submarines invaded the sea area by the Japanese army.
Pearl Harbor Wahiri on November 7, 2017
Tourists have embarked on submarines to visit Vahiri photographed
In order to further improve the early warning capabilities of the whole of Hawaii in the Pacific Ocean, Kimmel has been constantly sending upward reports since his arrival, asking for more and better radar equipment and patrol aircraft, etc., and such reports have been repeatedly perfunctory as "reaching out for money in the coffin". The "Pearl Harbor Incident" that broke out at the end of 1941 not only caused extremely heavy losses to the US Pacific Fleet, but also lost its military deterrence and leading advantage in the Pacific region. After a series of hearings presided over by the Lord Chancellor, Kimmel and The Hawaiian Army Commander Short were both identified as "negligent in their duties that led to the success of the Japanese raid", and the two were demoted and discharged early.
According to public information from the U.S. Army Museum, just one day before the "Pearl Harbor incident" on December 7, 1941, the U.S. Department of the Navy deduced from intercepted and deciphered a series of telegrams sent by the Japanese government to the ambassador to Japan that the next day was the time when Japan launched an offensive. When US President Roosevelt read the "13th paragraph" of the "continuous telegram", he also had a premonition that "war is about to break out." A month earlier, in November 1941, a letter deciphered by U.S. intelligence agencies, code-named "Magic," had clearly foreshadowed a Japanese raid on Pearl Harbor. At about the same point in time, a British and German double-agent, carrying a copy of the Japanese intelligence that had attacked Pearl Harbor, sneaked into the United States and gave it to FBl. However, although the above-mentioned US side learned of important information in a timely manner, it has not informed the Hawaiian military.
World War II veterans sign up for memoirs on the spot Photographed by Vahiri
Photo by veteran Vahiri
American history expert Charles Beard and the famous writer John Tolan believe that President Roosevelt and his senior staff carried out a "bitter plan" to eliminate the strong isolation in the country and let pearl harbor be attacked in order to make the United States into war. I once agreed with this "conspiracy theory". However, the public information I saw at the Hawaii War Museum on that occasion showed that on the occasion of the 70th anniversary of pearl harbor in 2011, the Roosevelt Presidential Archive released the incident in all the archives for half a year before and after the incident, and there was no evidence that he had prior information as the commander-in-chief of the three services of the United States.
In Honolulu, Hawaii, military museums, war memorials, etc. can be described as blossoming everywhere, most of them are free to the public, although they do not charge tickets but accept donations, especially those who can be exhibited about the war do not refuse, the more the merrier. In addition, for tourists to express their views and raise questions in words on the library's message book, they will be conveyed to the relevant experts by the librarians, that is, the times, and once there is a conclusion, they will fulfill the obligation to inform at the first time. Hawaii is the "capital of the world's military museums", and these museums here are like exchange centers for war history and a platform for the interaction of military ideas.
Zhang Changning close-up
Zhang Changning, born in Nanjing in 1954, has a bachelor's degree in Chinese from Nanjing University, and has been engaged in news gathering and editing business in Nanjing Daily and Xinhua Media Group for 30 years. The travelogues included in this series are all articles that the author has published in many newspapers and periodicals in recent years.