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

1944: A Year of Investigations 435
Hart: Was any of the foregoing information, under dates of
November and December, 1941, disseminated by the main
Washington unit direct to the corresponding unit in Fourteenth
Naval District [Hawaii]?
Saff ord: No, sir. Th at was not permitted by a written order then
in force; but there was one exception. On the 3rd of December,
I prepared OpNav Secret Dispatch 031855. . . . In sending
this information, I was overstepping the bounds as established
by approved war plans and joint agreement between Naval
Communications and Naval Intelligence.
Th is information was sent to Manila for action and it was
routed to Pearl Harbor for information. 46 It reported the Japanese
government’s orders to its emissaries throughout the world to
destroy their codes and code machines. 47 Hawaii could not possibly
have gained this information through their own eff orts. Th e
dissemination of such intelligence was the duty, responsibility,
and privilege of the Offi ce of Naval Intelligence, not of Saff ord’s
Communications Intelligence Unit. 48
Th is was Saff ord’s fi rst testimony before a Pearl Harbor
investigation; he had not been asked to testify before the Roberts
Commission. His revelations were startling. No one appearing
before Roberts had hinted at the availability of such intelligence as
Saff ord described. And of the Washington witnesses questioned
by Hart, only Turner and Ingersoll had said anything that might
have been interpreted as referring to the Japanese intercepts.
Saff ord appeared to know what he was talking about, but he
was unable to produce copies of any of the Japanese messages to
support his testimony. Almost three years had passed since he
had actually seen any of the intercepts he was describing. How
46Ibid., p. 392.
47Ibid., part 14, p. 1408, Saff ord’s Top Secret dispatch of December 3.
48 Ibid., part 26, pp. 392–93.