The Roundtable Forum
Official
newsletter of the
BATTLE OF MIDWAY ROUNDTABLE
"Dedicated
to preserving the memory of the great battle
and
honoring the men who fought it."
20 JUNE 2004
......................... Issue No. 2004-08 .........................
Our 7th Year
Note:
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AROUND
THE TABLE
MEMBERS' TOPICS IN THIS ISSUE
1. CDR Tom Cheek, USN-Ret: Final
Sortie
2. The Redman Brothers
3. Pearl Harbor: Getting It Right
=========================================
"Commander
Tom Cheek, USN-RET: Final Sortie" (see Now Hear This, issue
4-06, Terry Higham & Chris Bucholtz, issue 4-07)
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
14 June 2004
From: CAPT Stanford
E. Linzey, CHC, USN-Ret slinzey@juno.com (BOM vet, USS
Yorktown)
We pause to pay respects to a flying legend of US Naval Air, CDR Tom Cheek,
USN, RET. He was born in Harrison, Arkansas April 15, 1917 to Jay and
Margaret (Traux) Cheek and died on June 3, 2004 at his home in Salinas,
California. He was eighty-seven years old.
CDR Cheek was a decorated navy
pilot, serving in the navy from 1935 to 1956. Tom was a fighter
pilot in World War II and flew in the Battle of Midway. He served in the
USS Lexington, Enterprise, and Yorktown. He retired
from the Air Transport Squadron 21, NAS Barbers Point, Hawaii
in 1956. CDR Cheek received the following medals and awards:
The Navy Cross, The Presidential Unit Citation, Good Conduct Medal, American
Defense, Asiatic-Pacific Campaign Medal, World War II Victory Medal and a letter
of Commendation.
Tom was a hero in
the Battle of Midway. Assigned to cover the attack by VT-3, he shot
down three enemy fighters, which saved some of our pilots and
aircrew.
CDR Cheek is
survived by his wife, Marie McLaughlin Cheek; a son, Thomas Fred Cheek of
Toronto, Canada; two daughters: Elizabeth Cheek Jones of Burke,
Virginia and Linda Cheek Hall of Pensacola, Florida; six
grandchildren, six great grandchildren and nephews and nieces.
CDR Cheek was
interred at Moss Landing in Castroville, California, with full military
honors. We mourn his passing.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Chaplain Linzey was in the ship's band
on the Yorktown. He subsequently served a long career in the Navy's
Chaplain Corps, and is the author of "God Was At Midway."
*
* *
"The
Redman Brothers" (see Elmer
Jones, issue 4-07)
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
13 June 2004
From: Bill Vickrey bkv@triad.rr.com
JOHN R. REDMAN
was the senior of the two having been born 17 April 1891. He did not
attend the Naval Academy. He was promoted to Rear Admiral on 22
June 1942 and retired in that rank in June 1946. I find no
record of his having been given any awards. He was born in Nevada and
died in California.
JOSEPH R. REDMAN
was born on 13 January 1898. He graduated from the Naval Academy with the
class of 1919. Among his classmates--with some renown for the BOM-- were
Tom Jeter (XO of ENTERPRISE ), Dixie Keifer (XO of YORKTOWN)
and Logan Ramsay (who was in charge of all aircraft flying from Midway
during the BOM). During his career he was awarded three Legions of Merit
and a Navy Unit Citation. He became a Rear Admiral on 04 March
1944. He retired as a Vice Admiral on 01 October 1957. This must
have been an active duty rank as I do not believe the LM was a combat
award which would have made him eligible to advance one grade on the
Retired List. He died on 29 May 1970. He was born in New York and
died in Maryland.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
13 June 2004
From: Phil Jacobsen
k6fw@cox.net (BOM vet, Japanese
intercept operator, Station H, Hawaii)
In
response to the request as to what happened to the infamous Redman brothers who
ousted Captain Laurence Safford from his position as head of OP-20-G and
orchestrated the banishment of Commander Joseph J. Rochefort for showing them
up at the Battle of Midway among other things, here is some limited
information.
The
first thing that the Redman brothers did was to recognize that communications
intelligence would be greatly expanded during the war and they arranged to get
rid of Captain Laurence Safford and install Commander John R. Redman as a
temporary head of OP-20-G even though he had no experience in intelligence
matters. John Redman made Commander John Wenger his assistant to run the
intelligence operation . It has been alleged that Wenger was also part of the
ousting of Safford and banishment of Rochefort. It should be said that
Safford did have some administrative limitations and had made some mistakes in
providing the best communications intelligence on the Japanese Navy leading up
to Pearl Harbor. First, he vetoed the planned exchange in responsibility
for field exploitation of JN-25B from Corregidor to the superior cryptanalytic
team at Pearl Harbor under Commander Joseph J. Rochefort. Thus,
Rochefort’s top team was left languishing on the practically abandoned
admirals' or AD code. This was a terrible waste of top cryptanalytic
talent.
Safford
also gave in to the army’s request to divert most of Washington’s cryptanalytic
and Japanese translation efforts from Japanese naval matters to Japanese
diplomatic traffic that was being read after the army’s breaking of the
diplomatic cipher machine Purple. Whether this was his decision to make or he
was pressured from above is not fully known. As a result of these actions,
there was only limited progress in code and cipher recoveries of JN-25B and no
decrypts of intelligence value were obtained before Pearl Harbor.
However, it is only conjecture to say that an improved concentrated effort on JN-25B
would have provided enough information to expose the planned Japanese attack on
Pearl Harbor. In spite of arguments to the contrary, very little
information was contained in JN-25B messages to alert the small intelligence
group at that time of the pending attack unless one was possessed with complete
20/20 hindsight. This is in spite of the practically 100 percent decrypts
of all available messages at both Hawaii and Corregidor that was accomplished
in 1945-47 versus being in the initial stages of breaking into JN-25B.
When
John R. Redman was selected for Captain in the summer of 1942, he was
transferred to Com14 as the District Communications Officer and reported in on
15 September 1942. There are those that claim this was orchestrated from
Washington in their continuing efforts to get rid of Rochefort. Before
leaving Washington, John Redman arranged with Wenger to establish a special
cryptochannel so he could communicate with Washington in secret. The
obvious reason was to further the efforts to have Rochefort transferred to
Washington where he could be muzzled. The records show that the special
communications channel was used for that purpose. When Admiral Nimitz
found out about the special channel, he was quite upset and had it done away
with. If he had known more about what was going on to get rid of
Rochefort, perhaps he would have been more vindictive.
If
my memory serves me right, I believe John R. Redman attained the rank of Rear
Admiral. Since it was early in the war, I assume it was a direct
promotion and not a retirement promotion.
Captain
Joseph J. Redman was promoted to Rear Admiral around September 1942 and spent
the next six months at sea. After his sea duty, he returned to Washington
to become the Director of Naval Communications. I don’t know what
happened to him after that, but the Congressional Investigations on Pearl
Harbor list him as a witness with the rank of Admiral.
Perhaps,
someone has more accurate information on these two who did a lot of damage to naval
communications intelligence by having Rochefort removed from a very important
wartime position to a nothing billet.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
*
* *
"Pearl
Harbor: Getting It Right"
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
15 June 2004
From: James Bowen
pacificwar@bigpond.com
(Australia)
I
noticed an interesting piece of history in a recent obituary. Toshikazu
Kaze died on May 21. He was one of the Foreign Ministry staffers who
helped draft the final 14-part Japanese message to Secretary of State Cordell
Hull that preceded the attack on Pearl Harbor.
An
interesting, but annoying, aspect of this obituary, were the words:
"He helped draft the document in which Tokyo broke off negotiations with
Washington and declared war." I have added the emphasis,
because the final 14-part message from Tokyo was neither a declaration of war
nor a breaking of diplomatic relations with the United States. All that
this document did was break off the discussions then taking place in Washington
between Secretary Hull and Ambassador Nomura. The formal declaration of
war against the United States (by Japan's Emperor Hirohito) did not occur until
after Pearl Harbor was blazing and at a time when Nagumo's carriers were
on their way back to Japan.
We have
touched on this subject before when Bill Price had the wheel, but perhaps it's
worth further attention in view of the incorrect statement in the obituary and
the fact that the film
"Tora! Tora! Tora!" has probably helped to reinforce this major
historical error in the minds of younger generations.
"Tora! Tora! Tora!" is a splendid film in many ways, but this
American-Japanese co-production has almost certainly contributed to distortion
of the historical significance of the famous 14-part message. The film
suggests that the Japanese intended to declare war immediately before
the attack on Pearl Harbor, and that this intention was frustrated by grossly
inefficient typing in the Japanese embassy in Washington. If the TTT
account is believed, the attack on Pearl Harbor was not intended by the
Japanese to be either a "sneak attack" or "a treacherous stab in
the back." This part of an otherwise splendid film is actually
nonsense. Perhaps this distortion of history was done at the behest of the
Japanese producers who put their money into the film.
The
historical truth is that the Japanese always intended the attack on Pearl
Harbor to be a surprise attack, and not preceded by a formal declaration of
war. The diplomatic discussions in Washington were deliberately extended
by Tokyo to keep the United States preoccupied with hope of a peaceful solution.
The 14-part message was not regarded by Japan in 1941 as being equivalent to a
formal declaration of war, but the Foreign Ministry wanted it delivered before
the attack on Pearl Harbor to avoid an accusation afterwards that the attack
had been a treacherous stab in the back undertaken while diplomatic
negotiations were still taking place in Washington.
I will
be revising my Pearl Harbor section of the Pacific War web site to make the
above points very clear for young history students!
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
James Bowen's Pacific War
web site is linked on our home page.
NOW
HEAR THIS!
NEWS & INFO IN THIS
ISSUE
-- BOM 62nd anniversary
report
-- Promoting the Roundtable
-- Ralph Weidling
-- Contacting Us
-- TV this week
===========================================
BOM 62nd ANNIVERSARY REPORT
(see Now Hear This, issue 4-07)
Washington, DC, 28 May: three of our members were
among thirteen BOM vets who were the guests of honor at a morning ceremony at
the Navy Memorial. Bernie Cotton, Lew Hopkins, and Bill Roy represented
the Roundtable--other vets on hand were Bert Earnest, Robert Elder, Roy Ball,
E. Anderson, and (sorry, last names only:) Crawford, Eckel, Ney, Snell,
and Urban. A wreath was presented at the Lone Sailor monument, and the
U.S. Navy Band performed.
(The foregoing was
excerpted from Bill Roy's earlier report on his visit to the new WWII
memorial.)
Arlington,
VA, 3 June: The Midway Dinner on June 3 was hosted by RADM
Gaudioi,
Commander Naval District of Washington. Bernie Cotton of the Hornet
and Roundtable was there with his son and daughter. BOM vet and
Roundtable member VADM Bill Houser was recognized for his efforts in
establishing Midway dinners at navy bases both here and abroad, as well as
working with the Chief of Naval Operations in drafting the proclamation to
annually recognize the victory at Midway along with the birth of the United
States Navy.
The
Honorable Gordon England, Secretary of the Navy was the keynote speaker.
He spoke of the bravery at Midway in answering the call to duty and compared
our military efforts in Afghanistan and Iraq to this devotion to duty.
Also joining the guests was Dr. James Schlesinger, former Secretary of Navy and
Director of Central Intelligence. He is still pursuing a memorial to the
Battle of Midway.
Several
Midway veterans were recognized as honored guests. The Navy Jazz Combo
provided music for the reception and the Navy Ceremonial Guard presented the
colors at dinner. The dinner had an attendance of 285. Sponsors
were the Association of Naval Aviation, Naval Order of the United States, Navy
League of the United States, Surface Navy Association, Tailhook Association,
and the Naval Historical Foundation. (Thanks to Bill Price for this
report.)
Houston,
TX, 4 June: The BOM commemorative luncheon at the Hess
Club in Houston went well. The audience was composed of members of the
Naval Commandery and the Navy League. Guest speaker and Roundtable member RADM
Lew Hopkins rolled out his "Ensigns at Midway" presentation,
pointing out that 59 ensigns (plus a few old salts) "carried the
mail" (mainly, bombs aboard SBDs), and that the IJN had hardly been
scratched until the dive bombers arrived overhead.
Lew took the audience on a replay of his mission on the morning of
June 4th, covering the navigation problems, fuel problems, McCluskey's
decision making, the aftermath of the attack, and getting home to
the Enterprise. He also took the opportunity to promote the
Roundtable to the audience. (Many thanks to Lew for this
report.)
*
* *
PROMOTING THE ROUNDTABLE
Speaking
of promoting the Roundtable, BOM vet Ed Fox has gone the extra mile (literally)
in doing just that. Be sure to click the URL below to see his custom
license plate attachment. Great job, Ed! We'll even forgive you for
putting it on a Japanese car.
See Ed's
handiwork at: http://www.midway42.org/temp/fox-plate.jpg
*
* *
RALPH WEIDLING
We're
very sorry to learn of the passing of BOM vet Ralph Weidling's wife
Margaret. Ralph was exceptionally devoted to Margaret, who had been
in poor health for the past year. Ralph and Margaret, with daughter
Barbara, did make it to the Midway Night dinner in San Francisco on June
5th. She passed away June 16th, the day after their 57th
anniversary.
As a Seaman
1/C, Ralph Weidling was a radioman-gunner with VS-2 aboard USS
Lexington at the Battle of the Coral Sea. From there he
transferred to the USS Yorktown and VB-5 (which became VS-5
before the Battle of Midway). At the BOM, he flew with pilot Bob
Dixon. In recent years, Ralph has served as docent aboard the USS
Hornet (CV-12) museum ship at Alameda. We wish him the best during
these painful and difficult days.
*
* *
CONTACTING US
Some
members have begun sending in contributions to The Roundtable
Forum to our Military.com e-mail address. Although we changed the
format of the Roundtable in May, the address for members sending e-mail
to me did not change. The Military.com address continues to be intended
solely for non-members and others to inquire about the Roundtable--it's the
address we want published on other web sites, for example. (The
Military.com address is convenient for the stated purpose, but its e-mail
interface is very user-unfriendly and hard to work with.)
If
you're receiving this issue directly from me (not forwarded and not CC), then
you're a member on our roster. Anything you send in should go
to my address that you used previously, and if you've lost it, no
problem--you can just click REPLY on this or any issue of The
Roundtable Forum.
--RR
*
* *
TV THIS WEEK
TV listings of possible interest for
the week of 20-26 June.
Times shown are Pacific Daylight Time--check your local guide for the time in
your area.
Channels
DSC = Discovery
Channel
HC =
History Channel
Tuesday, 22 June
10:00 AM (HC) "Wake
Island: Alamo of the Pacific" Set your VCR for this
one--it's an excellent 2-hour documentary on the epic saga of Wake Island
in WWII. As in all such programs, there are a few minor inaccuracies
(in one graphic, Wake is shown in the wrong part of the ocean), but they don't
detract from the overall quality of the production, which features extensive
veteran interviews and commentary.
6:00 PM (DSC) "Marine: Earning
the Title" A highly acclaimed documentary on modern Marine
Corps boot camp. You senior marines on the Roundtable, compare what you
see here to your experiences in the good ol' days and give us a report.
Whenever
you become aware of an upcoming TV listing that might be of interest to
our members, please send me the details not later than Saturday prior
to the broadcast date. The info needed is: date, time
(and time zone), channel, title, and any available descriptive info.
The
Roundtable Forum is distributed by e-mail,
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Roundtable. For information on joining the roundtable, please see
the "How to Join the BOMRT" page on our web site, or click this
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Members or
anyone receiving this newsletter are encouraged to forward it as
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indicated. All original content is copyright 2004 by the submitting
writer or by the editor, as appropriate. Permission to copy or quote
from The Roundtable Forum is universally extended providing
that credit is given to "The Roundtable Forum, newsletter of the
Battle of Midway Roundtable, www.midway42.org."
Attention non-members:
see below for contact information, or send an e-mail
message to: bomrt@military.com
Editor and
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95242 USA. Phone 209-367-5819
