Pearl Harbor: The Seeds and Fruits of Infamy - Ludwig von Mises ...

264 Pearl Harbor: The Seeds and Fruits of Infamy
all the shops” and arrange for them “to get repairs on guns, batteries,
or anything else.” He was also busy routing American merchant
ships in that area. And he frequently had to arrange special
passes for the many American visitors arriving at the airports with
dispatches, money, and sometimes pistols, which were not always
allowed into the country. 38
A report reached Singapore during the night of December
4 or 5 that a pilot of a British reconnaissance airplane, fl ying
from a certain point “northeast of Malaya on a regular patrol up
toward Siam . . . in the late afternoon . . . had encountered a large
[ Japanese] convoy of what looked to him like transports, several
old battleships, an aircraft carrier, and attendant destroyers.”
Th ey were already south and west of Indochina and were “headed
west and almost south of the south point of Siam. . . . [W]hen
he went closer in his plane to observe them . . . Japanese fi ghter
planes came up off the deck of the carrier and went straight at
him, making it perfectly evident that they would keep him from
approaching the convoy.” It was presumed that “after nightfall
they would [either] continue west to the Kra Peninsula, north of
Malaya, or shift northwest toward Bangkok, toward which many
threats had been made recently.” 39
Two big British ships, Repulse, a battle cruiser, and Prince
of Wales, a battleship that was undergoing repairs so as to be
ready for sea duty once more, had been sent out to Singapore.
Admiral Sir Tom Phillips, recently appointed commander-inchief
of the Eastern Fleet, had arrived there ahead of the ships
and had fl own on December 4 to Manila for a conference with
Admiral Hart. Th eir talks “ended abruptly” with the news of the
large Japanese convoy on its way from Camranh Bay towards the
Gulf of Siam. “As Philllips was leaving for Singapore . . . Hart
38 Joint Committee, Pearl Harbor Attack, part 10, p. 5081, Creighton testimony
before the Joint Committee.
39 Ibid., p. 5083–84.