don't realize that the first shots fired in the
war of the Pacific were by us.
into Pearl Harbor's 'what ifs'
operated vehicles located an intact
Japanese torpedo at the bottom
of Pearl Harbor. The star-shaped object
near the center is a brown sea urchin.
NBC's Jim Miklaszewski reports on the Pearl
Harbor anniversary and the undersea expedition that
has yielded new insights.
By Randolph E. Schmid
WASHINGTON, Dec. 7 -- A midget
Japanese submarine rests on the sea floor outside
Pearl Harbor, a remnant of America's sudden
introduction to World War II and a reminder of
missed opportunity. American forces might have had
time to prepare for the Japanese attack on Dec. 7,
1941, if higher command had heeded the warning from
an American ship that discovered tiny subs trying
to enter the harbor and attacked them, undersea
explorer Robert Ballard said Thursday.
BALLARD HAS BEEN working near Pearl Harbor for a
television special planned to air in May. He chose
the anniversary of the attack to discuss his sea
floor discoveries, including the midget sub, tanks,
airplanes and an "incredible" amount of ammunition.
"Most people don't realize that the first shots
fired in the war of the Pacific were by us,"
Ballard said in an interview. It was 45 minutes
before the Japanese aircraft attacked that a U.S.
destroyer, the USS Ward, dropped depth charges on a
midget submarine that was trying to sneak into the
harbor behind a tugboat.
The Japanese submarine's job was to enter Pearl
Harbor and attack U.S. Navy ships in conjunction
with the arriving Japanese airplanes, he explained.
"The people on the tug saw the periscope, alerted
the Ward, and the Ward came over an engaged it," he
said. "Ironically, they reported it, but no one
pushed it up the chain of command. Just imagine
what a totally different outcome it would be if
we'd gotten a 45-minute warning," Ballard said.
it turned out, the 360-plane Japanese air attack
struck an unprepared U.S. base, sinking or severely
damaging 18 ships, destroying 200 aircraft and
killing an estimated 3,700 Americans. Decried by
President Franklin Roosevelt as "a date
which will live in infamy," the attack brought the
United States into World War II. "Just imagine if
they had heeded that warning and had 45 minutes to
get ready before the Japanese came ... it would
have been a very different day," Ballard said.
Ballard's television special is scheduled to air in
May on the National Geographic Channel, a new cable
channel being launched nationwide in January.
Ballard brought veterans of the battle back to
the scene -- one Japanese man who had served on a
submarine that helped launch the midget subs and
two Americans who served on the Ward. "There is
something about bringing these adversaries back
together 60 years later, and all of a sudden the
memories, they remember things that they thought
they'd forgotten," he said. "We had a Shinto
ceremony out there ... it was very tearful."
Beneath the sea, he said, "We found a museum
down there: fighter planes, a Hellcat, seaplanes,
we found tanks, landing craft, one midget
submarine, parts of another, and the deep sea
preserves it." The artifacts were all American
except for the midget submarines and a few
torpedoes, he said.© Copyright 2000