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

Joint Congressional Committee, Pearl Harbor Attack: Part 3 779
open my safe. Otherwise, the only people who knew the combination
of the safe in which that particular fi le was kept were
three people, Lieutenant Harrison, the then Chief Yeoman
Bryant, and myself. . . . From an examination of the fi les last
Saturday in the Navy Department and this study, exhibit 142,
of about a week or so ago . . . I am as positive as I can be that
that fi le number 7001 could not possibly have been any winds
message. Th at is in addition to the fact that I have absolutely no
matter of any kind, no recollection, no knowledge that a winds
message was ever written up by my section. 165
Keefe questioned Kramer about the Japanese government’s
14-part reply. According to Kramer’s 1944 memorandum,
Kramer recalled receiving the fi rst 13 parts during the afternoon
of December 6. He had tried by phone to locate Beardall, Turner,
Wilkinson, and Bratton. He had tried, unsuccessfully, to reach
Stark. Kramer said he had delivered the 13 parts to Beardall’s
aide at the White House that Saturday evening. 166 He also told
the JCC that he delivered the 13 parts about 9:45 p.m. to Knox
at the Wardman Park and had then gone to Wilkinson’s home in
Arlington, Virginia, where he was having a dinner party. [Kramer
delivered to Wilkinson’s home and Beardall was there. Kramer
thought Wilkinson MAY have phoned Stark and Turner that
evening.] “Admiral Wilkinson was present, also Captain Beardall
[FDR’s naval aide].” Kramer said his memory had been “refreshed
only quite recently to the eff ect that General Miles was also present.”
Kramer had then returned to the Navy Department, before
going home. 167
He was positive that he had not delivered the 13 parts of
the Japanese reply that evening either to Ingersoll, the assistant
chief of Naval Operations, or Turner, chief of the Navy War Plans
165Ibid., part 9, p. 3939.
166Ibid., pp. 4096–97.
167Ibid., part 8, pp. 3903–04, 4025.