The USS Indianapolis Tragedy

In the book, In Harm's Way, by Doug Stanton the setting starts off in Litchfield, Connecticut, on Winvian Farm. The farm is described as being “in rich horse country”. It is the home of Captain Charles Butler McVay III. However, the majority of the book is set in late World War II, and the setting centers around the USS Indianapolis. For short she is referred to as the Indy. The ship is 133 feet tall, and 610 feet long, with a top speed of 32.75 knots, and 3-4 inch armor plating. The ship is a battle cruiser. Amongst other things it has 2 radio rooms, 4 boiler rooms, and an airplane hangar. Towards the middle of the book the setting is the Pacific Ocean. The oceans waters are full of sharks and debris from the sunken ship. The main characters

This intelligence allowed Nimitz to avoid a secondary naval battle and concentrate a surprise attack unforeseen by the Japanese at Midway. Nimitz was able to position the fleet out of the Japanese carrier’s striking range and hide fall under the protection of land based air at Midway. Aligning the three carriers and land-based air power was instrumental in matching and defeating the larger and more competent Japanese fleet.

Nimitz was able to crack the Japanese secret code of communication and he was able to prepare his military for the surprise attack on Midway planned by the Japanese. Along with this, other strategies used were American submarine patrolling (Mcgowen 26). The submarines would gauge the enemy's attack and shoot torpedoes to sink the enemies ships. It would also help in sending secret codes that would help the United States military to prepare for the attack in addition to also protect their battleships. The United States were also advantageous on their land.

prepared for an attack. During the attack on the USS Indianapolis, it was noticed that there was

One reporter asked was the USS Greer visibly marked as American by anything other than the small flag. He questioned if the USS Greer was alone or in company of other larger vessels. The President answered that the flag along with an identification number was listed on the side of the destroyer; however, the vessel was traveling alone. During his Fireside Chat, President Roosevelt reiterated the vessel was clearly marked being American. He asserted the Germans’ unprovoked attack on the USS Greer simply because it was American. He also stated if the USS Greer was visible to the U-boat, this was a deliberate attack. Yet, if the USS Greer was not clearly visible, the situation was worse than they originally believed. President Roosevelt claimed United States was above exaggerating a single incident such as this, and hysteria would not be beneficial to the country. He also mentioned it would take more than a submarine attack to declare

On November 26, 1941, the Japanese Task Force comprised of six aircraft carriers. A support force, which included two battleships, three cruisers, nine destroyers, three submarines, escorted it and eight oil supply ships, began their trek to Hawaii. They must travel four thousand miles across open sea and remain undetected by the UNITED STATES Forces. (Wisniewski 20) The UNITED STATES Military knew a surprise attack by Japan was possible and they thought they were prepared. Adm. Husband E. Kimmel and Lt. Gen. Walter C. Short, the commanders of the UNITED STATES Naval and Army forces in Hawaii, respectively, had regularly scheduled training exercises and had taken many precautions to avert disaster. (Pearl Harbor’s History, Filmstrip)

The ship was shot down by Germany and was carrying Americans on board. 128 American passengers were killed. In 1916 the U.S. and Germany entered into an agreement called the Sussex Pledge. The pledge meant that Germany agreed to give us fair warning before sending an attack on ships in that area so we would know to get americans out of there to safety. This I think was a good idea because it let us know to move out of the way, and helped us save lives. In 1917 Germany decided to ignore the Sussex Pledge and continued to shoot down ships without giving us warning. This killed many more American citizens. I think that instead of that leading us into a war we should have just told all American citizens to stay out of that area until the war was

intelligence was aware that the Japanese fleet was on the move in late 1941. In the book, Day of Deceit by Robert Stinnett, he stated “they were able to intercept information from the Japanese fleet as they were crossing the Pacific, including information that the Japanese carriers were west of Hawaii on the evening of December 6th.” (Smiley, G., 1970) Japanese messages were intercepted and deciphered showing Japanese spies were asked to gather detailed information about the base at Pearl Harbor, but sadly this information was never given to the U.S. leaders to analyze. (Attack on Pearl Harbor, Why, 2016)

Prior to the upcoming Coral Sea battle, a number of Japanese military messages had been intercepted by the U.S. Navy signals intelligence unit. The first, dated March 28, 1942, was encoded as stating “The objective of MO will be first to restrict the enemy fleet movements and will be accomplished by means of attacks on the north coast of Australia.” (“Battle of the Coral Sea”) Subsequent messages were intercepted that provided allied forces with updated details concerning IJN fleet progress, as well as elements of IJN plans that included battleship and carrier logistics. This resulted in the U.S. Navy’s deployment of a cotillion of numerous warships and support craft, and also the carriers Lexington and Yorktown (“Battle of the Coral Seas”). In the upcoming battle, these ships would do battle against a superior IJN force comprised of far more battleships, submarines and support craft, as well as aircraft carriers.

"In very exceptional cases, they made no mention of their plans or movements to any of their embassies, so that, in these instances, there were no codes to decipher. The attack on Pearl Harbour was such a case" (Ford,

Typical of Japanese naval planning during the Second World War, Yamamoto's battle plan was quite complex.[15] Additionally, his designs were predicated on optimistic intelligence information suggesting USS Enterprise and USS Hornet, forming Task Force 16, were the only carriers available to the U.S. Pacific Fleet at the time. USS Lexington had been sunk and USS Yorktown severely damaged (and believed by the Japanese to have been sunk) at the Battle of the Coral Sea just a month earlier. The Japanese were also aware that USS Saratoga was undergoing repairs on the West Coast after taking torpedo damage from a submarine.

That is a clear indication that no ship, be it passenger or warship nor weapon bearing or not, flying the colors of any enemy known to the German forces were to enter those waters. With this knowledge one would think that sending a passenger ship into dangerous waters would require an escort. The Lusitania was not escorted. The captain of the ship Captain Turner was also advised on several occasions to reroute to a safer location or docking. These requests were ignored. It was also confirmed that the Lusitania, a passenger ship, indeed was carrying weapons and ammunitions. Along with that it is believed the Lusitania suffered from a second explosion, either the ammunition stored down below or a possible second torpedo launched from the U boat. Knowingly travelling into enemy waters, unguarded, with weapons, the Lusitania was inevitably sunk in order to achieve an excuse to join actively into the war for profit.

Unfortunately, the officer on duty ignored the warning. Had he not, the attack on Pearl Harbor could have been less severe, if not countered completely. In addition, the task of almost the entirety of the air defense of Pearl Harbor fell upon the United States Navy and the United States Air Corp, despite the 16th Coast Artillery Regiment having eighty-two 3-inch anti-aircraft guns, twenty 37 mm anti-aircraft guns, and one hundred and nine .50 caliber anti-aircraft machine guns. The Army Air Corp’s P-36 and P-40 pursuit planes were the main deterrent to enemy aircraft, unfortunately, this was the target of the Japanese Naval Fleet (Anti-aircraft). At the end of the attack, only a few P-36’s were able to escape the barrage of bullets and bombs, and managed to destroy ten of the Japanese Zero’s, while the 16th Coast Artillery Regiment brought down six.

In October 2000, the United States Congress passed a resolution that Captain McVay's record should state that "he is exonerated for the loss of Indianapolis." President Bill Clinton signed the resolution. The resolution noted that, although several hundred ships of the U.S. Navy were lost in combat in World War II, McVay was the only captain to be court-martialed for the sinking of his ship. In July 2001, the Secretary of the Navy ordered McVay's record cleared of all wrongdoing. On November sixth 1968, McVay committed suicide by shooting himself with his service pistol at his home in Litchfield, Connecticut. He was found just outside his back porch by his gardener. Although a note was not left, McVay was known by those close to him to have suffered from loneliness, particularly after losing his wife to cancer. McVay also struggled throughout his life from vicious letters and phone calls he periodically received from grief-stricken relatives of dead crewmen that were aboard the

The destroyers found no trace of a ship. President Johnson was convinced that the destroyers Maddox and Turner Joy had been attacked by the North Vietnamese and decided that the United States must react quickly.