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

Joint Congressional Committee, Pearl Harbor Attack: Part 2 699
Ferguson: Well, at any time after November the 25th, 1941,
did the chief of naval operations, that is Admiral Stark, advise
you that instead of being damned if he knew what the United
States was going to do in the event that Japan attacked the
Malay barrier after by-passing American positions, he did
know what the United States was going to do? You see, he
wrote you that letter on the 25th.
Kimmel: If he had informed me that he knew what the United
States was going to do and what they were going to do, it would
have been of great assistance to me. 71
Ferguson: Did you know that the president by direct order
[OPNAV message December 2, 7 p.m. Washington time,
to CINCAF, Hart, CinC, Asiatic Fleet, Philippines 72 ] had
ordered three ships to go into the Gulf of Siam or off the Coast
of China to watch for this [ Japanese convoy] movement into
the Kra Peninsula?
Kimmel: No, sir; I did not. 73
Kimmel said he had known “that the commander in chief of
the Asiatic [Fleet] had been ordered to send some planes over to
scout,” but he had not known about the ships. However, Kimmel
thought that was “a perfectly natural thing” to do if “we wanted
to know what the Japanese were doing; . . . whether they would
come to the Philippines or not.”
Ferguson pointed out that the stations the three small vessels
were to assume, as specifi ed in the message were located well to
the west of the Philippines, almost directly in the projected paths
of the southbound Japanese convoys sighted by our overfl ights.
According to the message, they were “to observe and report by
radio Japanese movements in west China Sea and Gulf of Siam.”
71Ibid., part 6, p. 2874.
72Ibid., part 14, p. 1407, OPNAV Message #012356 to CINCAF.
73Ibid., p. 2872.