Pearl Harbor : Final Judgement [Paperback]

Henry Clausen (Author), Bruce Lee (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: April 2, 2001

In 1944, Secretary of War Henry L. Stimson, knowing that high-ranking members of the military had falsely testified before the various bodies investigating the attack on Pearl Harbor, selected a then-unknown major by the name of Henry C. Clausen to undertake a new investigation. From November 1944 to September 1945, Clausen traveled more than 55,000 miles and interviewed over a hundred U.S. and British Army, Navy, and civilian personnel. He was given the authority to go anywhere and question anyone under oath, from enlisted personnel right up to George C. Marshall, the chief of staff. He ultimately presented an 800 page report to Stimson—a report that revealed a massive operational failure by the United States to use the priceless intelligence signals that it had obtained months before Pearl Harbor. Pearl Harbor is the "final judgement"-the story behind Clausen's investigation and a blistering account of his conclusions.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

This book goes a long way toward ending the 50-year-old debate as to how the Japanese managed to surprise U.S. forces when they bombed Hawaii on December 7, 1941. In 1944, Secretary of War Henry Stimson selected co-author Clausen, then a lawyer in the U.S. Judge Advocate's office, to conduct an independent investigation into the Pearl Harbor attack; Clausen submitted a top-secret report on the matter, the substance of which is published here for the first time. Assisted by New York-based editor Lee, Clausen details his discovery of egregious errors of omission and commission, as well as criminal neglect of duty by the Army and Navy high command in Washington and Honolulu. He concludes that the top officers in Hawaii, General Walter Short and Admiral Husband Kimmel, were simply asleep at the switch and ignored repeated warnings. Probably the most telling factor in this failure of communication, he argues, was the Navy's arrogant hoarding of secret intelligence that should have been shared with its Army counterparts. This thoroughly engrossing narrative, as compelling as a detective novel, answers two major questions: What did Washington and Honolulu know about Japanese actions before the attack and what did they do about it? A significant historical breakthrough that should attract a wide readership. Photos. 60,000 first printing; BOMC, QPB and History Book Club alternate.
Copyright 1992 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

From Library Journal

By now everyone is aware that the worst of the Pearl Harbor tragedy might have been avoided if the United States had heeded the warnings more carefully and had had a little luck. Clausen adds to the picture by describing his high-level wartime mission to find the truth about the raid. Although he makes dramatic charges of laxness and organizational bungling, his overheated claims of outright malfeasance are neither new nor surprising. If the book adds little to the controversy, however, the wartime documents it reproduces make a useful addition to the Pearl Harbor literature. It is written in a fastidious, lawyerly fashion but is a nice supplement to Gordon Prange's classic At Dawn We Slept . Previewed in Prepub Alert, LJ 5/15/92; for other Pearl Harbor books, see "The Day of Infamy in Print," LJ 9/1/91, p. 206-07.--Ed.
- Raymond L. Puffer, U.S. Air Force History Prog., Los Angeles
Copyright 1992 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 485 pages
• Publisher: Da Capo Press; New edition edition (April 2, 2001)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0306810352
• ISBN-13: 978-0306810350
• Product Dimensions: 9 x 6 x 1.3 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.7 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.7 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (11 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,627,449 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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17 of 18 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Simple truths vice wild imaginings., July 16, 2001

By A Customer

This review is from: Pearl Harbor : Final Judgement (Paperback)

This book is misnamed, but otherwise an outstanding and essential work regrading the causes of and responsibility for the Pearl Harbor debacle. It sinks outright the majority of the Pearl Harbor conspiracy theories, and destroys most of the supports for the remainder.

Henry Clausen, at the time a major in the Army JAG corps, was appointed by Secretary of War Stimson in 1944 to reinvestigate the disaster at Pearl Harbor when it became apparent that the Army Board investigating Pearl Harbor received tainted testimony designed to prevent disclosure of the secret of Magic. Magic--information gained by breaking Japanese codes--was considered absolutely vital to the war effort and false testimony was given to prevent its disclosure. When it became apparent that these measures were distorting the proper evaluation of what took place at Pearl Harbor, Stimson ordered a new investigation by Clausen.

In order to circumvent the veil of secrecy around Magic, Clausen was granted access to Magic and permitted to carry certain pertinent Magic documents in an incendiary pouch to aid in deposing witnesses in his investigation. Presentation of the documents as Clausen's bona fides of being in on Magic club permitted witnesses to speak freely to him. But Clausen found not only lies designed to protect Magic, but to cover up individual failings.

What Clausen does best in this narrative of his investigation and testimony before the Congressional Pearl Harbor investigation is explain why General Short and Admiral Kimmel lack any semblance of a legitimate defense. Having had access to Magic, as well as War and Navy Department communications logs, Clausen lays out in sequence the warnings that Short and Kimmel received from their superiors, but later claimed they had lacked. He clearly draws an analogy between their performance of their duties and those of a sentry asleep at his post. This very effectively yanks the rug out from under the growing sympathy campaign for these two historical figures.

Clausen then goes farther and identifies twelve more individuals who contributed to the debacle, uncovering some little-known details of certain persons' roles and actions. He is on target in these evaluations which set on edge a number of revisionist "truths" that have come to light in recent years. The credibility of the late Rear Admiral Layton is particularly damaged.

However, although he cites Colonel Bratton for his failure to ensure that his deputy, Colonel Dusenbury, performed properly, Clausen fails to take the point far enough and misses a few contributory players. This might be a result of Clausen's freely admitted status as "a civilian lawyer in uniform" with no military officer training. As a result he misses the larger application of the principle he applies to Bratton, in which officers at higher levels of organization bear responsibility for the proper organization of subordinate levels.

Thus, General Marshall, General Miles, Admiral Stark, Admiral Noyes, Admiral Wilkinson, and Admiral Bloch escape Clausen's list of parties whose contributory negligence helped make the disaster through poor organization of the War and Navy Departments for war, and more particularly the poor organization of their Intelligence, Communications and War Plans divisions. However, he does successfully demonstrate that General Marshall and Admiral Stark were not guilty of any criminal negligence in the fashion of Short and Kimmel, both officers having transmitted appropriate warnings to their subordinates in Hawaii.

Hence, Clausen's work cannot be the "Final Judgement" claimed in the title.

It does, however, admit a breeze to clear away some of the smoke that obscures the truth about Pearl Harbor and permits conspiracy theories to thrive. It graphically demostrates that Pearl Harbor resulted from a systemic gaffe, personal failings and mundane events. By ordering and condensing the information received by Short and Kimmel, it becomes readily apparent exactly what they received in the way of warnings. By including previous correspondence discussing the hazard of air attack on Pearl Harbor, and anxiety about the issue,from the War and Navy Secretaries down to the Hawaiian commanders, Clausen dispels the notion that such an attack was inconceivable to the American leadership. Rather, it was a foremost concern.

Clausen also brings out the essential irrelevance of the "Winds Code Messages" by revealing that they governed a contingency that did not occur: disruption of communications with Japanese diplomatic posts before the onset of hostilities. Thus, looking for the Winds Code activation message as a precursor for war was faulty logic. Communications with Japanese diplomatic posts were not disrupted before hostilities and therefor there was no need to transmit the activation message. This did not, however, prevent US command and intelligence personnel from fooling themselves into looking for said message as an essential precursor to war.

Clausen also exposes the awkward arrangements made for decoding intercepted messages and the even more amateurish method of their distribution, tracking and routine destruction for security reasons. He further reveals the extent of stove-piping in the Army and Navy Intelligence divisions and the inter-service politics and rivalries that impeded the proper sharing and dissemination of priceless Magic-derived information.

Clausen's work is an essential one for understanding what happened to make Pearl Harbor an easy target. Do not be put off by its seeming Army-bias at times (Clausen's actually very fair if you read him impassively), or Clausen's causal and almost flip narrative, or Lee's imperfect editorial effort: pay attention to the facts being laid out and the conclusions being drawn. Then ask yourself if they make sense. I suspect after reading this work, you won't give a Pearl Harbor conspiracy theorist the time of day.

Also recommended: Prange's "At Dawn We Slept" and supporting volumes by Prange and his research staff, as well as Lord's more poetic narrative "Day of Infamy" and Layton's sometimes self-serving insider perspective "And I was there..." Toland's "Infamy" can be read for familiarity with the underpinnings of the conspiracy theories. ....

10 of 10 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Sheds New Light on Who Was Responsible for Pearl Harbor, November 30, 2004

By 

Jeffrey T. Munson (Dixon, IL) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Pearl Harbor : Final Judgement (Paperback)

I originally read this book about eight years ago, but I recently finished reading it for the second time, and I got much more out of it than the first time through. Henry C. Clausen, a San Francisco lawyer with his own practice, was appointed by Secretary of War Henry Stimson to conduct a thorough investigation of the Pearl Harbor disaster after it was discovered that there may have been some tainted testimony with the recently completed Army Pearl Harbor Board investigation. Armed with "Magic" decrypts in a "bomb pouch" which Clausen was to detonate if captured, he set off to take affidavits from the key personnel involved in the Pearl Harbor disaster.

According to the book, from November, 1944 to September, 1945, Clausen traveled more than 55,000 miles and interviewed over one hundred U.S. and British Army, Navy, and civilian personnel. Clausen had the authority from Stimson to go anywhere and interview anyone under oath from enlisted personnel up to General George C. Marshall. After completing his investigation, Clausen presented an 800 page report which revealed a massive failure by the United States to use the intelligence obtained months before the Pearl Harbor attack.

The crux of Clausen's investigation centered on the failure of the Army and Navy to share intelligence. It was the Navy's responsibility to share their intelligence with the Army, but, according to Clausen's investigation, this did not happen. Clausen also faulted Admiral Kimmel and General Short for failing to correctly interpret Washington's war warning message dated November 27, 1941. Among the other charges leveled by Clausen against Kimmel and Short were Kimmel's failure to share intelligence with the Army and his own staff, while Short was charged with failing to defend the fleet, failing to adequately prepare to assume command in Hawaii, failing to alert his forces of the probability of a surprise attack, failing to conduct reconnaissance, and failing to communicate effectively with Kimmel.

Clausen names others who were responsible in his investigation, from Admiral Richmond Kelly Turner's attempt to take over Naval intelligence and assuming that Pearl Harbor had a "Purple" machine, to Fleet Intelligence Officer Edwin Layton, who failed to keep the Army abreast of intelligence developments by not following Kimmel's directive to deliver intelligence to the Army in person. Others are listed as well, but these four men, especially Kimmel and Short, bear much of the responsibility for Pearl Harbor, according to Clausen.

Clausen was called as a witness before the Congressional hearings to testify about his findings. He did a masterful job of handling the committee's questions, and managed to sway the thinking of several of the committee members.

I highly recommend this fine book. Written in the first person by Clausen himself, he takes the reader on an incredible journey that uncovered many falsehoods and half-truths while, in my opinion, accurately identifying the persons directly responsible for the disaster at Pearl Harbor. The only part of the book where I felt Clausen spent too much time on was the "Winds" message. He admitted himself that he devoted perhaps too much time to this one issue, but this is a minor point which does not take anything away from the book. Colonel Clausen did his country a remarkable service by completing such a fine investigation. His methods were precise and produced the desired results. I believe that Clausen's report accurately identifed who was to blame for the attack. There is an excellent appendix section in the book which contains many of the "Magic" intercepts which Clausen used in his investigation. Read this excellent work of history and find out who was responsible for the attack on Pearl Harbor.

8 of 9 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Major Primary Source, August 2, 2005

By 

Douglas L. Lambert (Fort Wayne, IN United States) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Pearl Harbor : Final Judgement (Paperback)

This book is a major contribution to the understanding of who was really responsible for Pearl Harbor. Although Clausen's report (and his subsequent testimony) are part of the record of the Congressional investigation, his description of how he actually pursued his inquiry helps to fit each witness's affidavit into context. Clausen's colorful (and sometimes humorous) narrative of the course of his investigation makes this book highly readable, and his insightful and lawyerly evaluation of his witnesses and their testimony is a great aid to those who truly seek answers about why America was surprised at Pearl Harbor.

The book is not without its flaws, however. Clausen was conducting an Army investigation; thus the majority of his witnesses are from the Army, and when he did interview Navy personnel, his lines of inquiry were limited to obtaining information that was relevent to mistakes that might have been made by the Army. Thus, his point of view is necessarily limited. In his list of the 14 people most responsible for Pearl Harbor, he has Admiral Richmond Kelly Turner in a tie for fourth-place on the list, but Clausen never even interviewed the Admiral--this great level of culpability is not satisfactorily explained in either the text or the list. Clausen does refer to the subsequent Congressional investigation's having answered that question, however, and reading the Congressional report does explain it. Also, amazingly, Clausen fails to assign any significant blame to Admiral Claude Bloch, who was commandant of the 14th Naval District (Hawaii) and Base Defense Officer for Pearl Harbor. Clausen also gets a few minor facts wrong that make it clear he's not a professional historian--for example, the Army did not have any P-39s at Pearl Harbor, and General Short did not attend West Point.

In answer to some of the criticisms raised by other reviewers: Clausen does have some biases, but he's very open about them. He explains, in his Congressional testimony, why he couldn't investigate Stimson--Congress directed Stimson to conduct the investigation. As for protecting Marshall, Clausen quotes Stimson's endorsement to the Army Board report--Marshall was not responsible for the day-to-day management of the War Plans Division(it is worth noting, however, that Marshall still accepted the blame for not noticing that Short had not gone to the proper state of alert, even though he couldn't recall having seen Short's reply, and General Gerow had previously admitted to making the error). Clausen's story should also put to rest, once and for all, the revisionist canard that Stimson sent him around the world to browbeat witnesses into reversing their testimony in order to protect the Chief of Staff. I would also point out that one of the other reviewers seems to have confused the terms "anecdote" and "sworn statement."

Finally, on the subject of Clausen's giving the "government version," is it unreasonable to expect one of the chief government investigators to give that version? The whole statement is loaded, and has clear revisionist implications. Kimmel and Short were not "scapegoats"; as Prang states, this word implies that they were blameless. They were clearly not, and Clausen proves it with sworn testimony. The evidence against Short is frankly damning, though I'm sure some revisionists will attempt to explain it away. Short failed to read the extensive briefing materials that his predecessor, General Herron, had carefully prepared for him to study during his 5-day voyage to Hawaii in February 1941. Furthermore, he chose an officer with no intelligence experience or training to be his intelligence chief, rather than the officer with intelligence training and experience (who was recommended by Herron), simply because Short didn't want an unwashed reservist as part of his inner circle. Had Short bothered to study the material (or simply asked around) he would have discovered that alerts did not alarm the civilian population, and that Herron considered the risk of sabotage to be minimal. Kimmel failed to share crucial intelligence with Short (as he'd been directed). Finally, the two commanders had been ordered to confer and cooperate, but Short simply assumed that the Navy knew where the Japanese carriers were, and was conducting reconnaisance patrols; Kimmel assumed that Short was alert against air attack, and using his radar.

This book should be on the shelf of everyone who's interested in Pearl Harbor--right next to At Dawn We Slept.