Chapter 16: Command and Cooperation
Nothing is more important in war than unity in command.—NAPOLEON, Maxims
The Guadalcanal campaign provided the first real test of the organization established at the end of March 1942 for the conduct of joint operations in the Pacific. Though the troops on Guadalcanal had survived each crisis and were, by the end of the year, in sight of final victory, the margin of safety had been too narrow, the moments when the issue seemed in doubt too numerous to permit a repetition of those grueling and heartbreaking six months. Haste, inexperience, a failure to assess accurately the enemy’s reaction and the forces required for speedy victory undoubtedly accounted for much of the difficulty and would be corrected in the future. But from the reports of commanders in the field and observers sent out from Washington it was evident that these facts did not account for all that had gone wrong. Misunderstandings and disagreements between the services had had an important effect upon the conduct of the campaign and would, unless quickly resolved or removed, continue to plague operations and hinder the effectiveness of future offensives against Japan.
Army-Navy Relations in the South Pacific
In the South Pacific, the most serious disagreements between the Army and Navy commanders arose from differing views on the role of the air arm and the proper utilization of Army aircraft. Operational control of all aircraft in the theater was in the hands of naval officers, first Admiral McCain and then Admiral Fitch. General Harmon, himself a senior air officer with a staff of experienced airmen headed by General Twining, had little or nothing to say about how his planes would be employed. Through Admiral Ghormley he could make recommendations and suggestions, which might or might not be accepted, but his authority extended little further than his personal influence. And though his relationship with Ghormley and the air commander was cordial and even friendly, it could not overcome the differences between Air Forces and Navy doctrine.
From the first Harmon felt that not enough emphasis had been given to air power. In his report to Marshall on the
Guadalcanal landing he called attention to the fact that no air construction units had been included in the invasion force, and that even when Henderson Field was completed it would be impossible to base bombers there until fighter and antiaircraft protection was provided. Since the prospect for the early completion of the field was slim, he did not push the matter. More urgent was the need for airfield construction personnel and equipment, ground crews, fuel, bombs, and ammunition. Only if the Navy could send these up to Guadalcanal, together with Marine fighter and scout bombers, Harmon told Marshall, would he be able to send in his own bombers. “If all this were done,” he wrote, “I believe the position can be held. It is the procedure I propose to recommend to Admiral Ghormley.”1
On Harmon’s recommendation Ghormley did make the effort to send forward construction equipment, but progress was disappointingly slow. Still Harmon was optimistic and felt that Ghormley was doing all he could. So gratifying was the naval effort that Harmon reported to General Marshall on 9 September that he was very pleased and that he was getting along fine with the Navy. “My Chief of Staff [Twining] and I,” he wrote, “confer with Admiral Ghormley and his Staff almost every day and decisions are made and action taken without delay.”2 Once the field on Guadalcanal was made suitable for “continuous, effective bomber operations on a reasonable scale”—which he then expected to be by the 15th—he felt he would be “out of the thick woods.”
Within the week Harmon’s mood had changed. In a note to General Arnold dated 15 September he recited a long list of grievances. Henderson Field was still not usable by medium or heavy bombers, and by fighters only in dry weather. The steel mats required for construction had not arrived and there was only enough fuel to last four more days. He was sending more P-400’s and P-39’s up to Guadalcanal, but wanted Arnold to know that “they simply cannot function at the altitude at which Jap bombers operate, and are of limited value as medium altitude fighters.”3
Without criticizing Ghormley—“no man could have more conscientiously endeavored to carry out a most difficult directive”—Harmon made it perfectly clear that the Navy’s failure to give first priority to airfield construction on Guadalcanal was the most serious error of the campaign and the reason why the situation there was so critical. From the very beginning he and his staff had stressed that point, he said, and he was beginning to wonder “if the Navy really and fully appreciated this necessity in the beginning. They seemed to as we talked to them but the positive action was not taken.... The point is that it was not the consuming thought in every Naval Commander’s mind and the plan did not have as its first and immediate objective the seizure and development of Cactus [Guadalcanal] as an Air base.”4
The Navy’s failure to appreciate the importance of airfield construction was, in Harmon’s view, a reflection of the Navy’s concept of air power as a supporting
arm for naval and ground forces. To Harmon, and he assumed to Arnold as well, air power was the dominant element in the war, surface and ground forces the supporting elements. Moreover, it was the land-based, not carrier-based aircraft, that would have to make the main effort.
Even the Navy’s conduct of its own naval operations, Harmon felt, was open to criticism. Though he protested that he found it difficult “to charge lack of aggressiveness,” he made it evident that he held no high opinion of the Navy’s accomplishments in the South Pacific. “Boats go in, start to unload and then run out on threat of attack,” he observed. “No naval surface forces have been in the Cactus-Ringbolt area [Guadalcanal–Tulagi] since Turner departed with what was left of his outfit after the `battle’ of Savo Island, August 9th.”5
Over-caution and a defensive spirit dominated the Navy’s operations, Harmon believed. He appreciated the necessity for “ a line of action tempered with reasonable caution,” but pointed out at the same time that most of the Navy’s surface losses had come when it was operating “in a role other than offensive.” As an example he cited the case of the Wasp sunk by torpedoes while on patrol south of the Solomons. Assigning a patrol mission to the carrier and the surface forces required to protect it did not impress him as sound doctrine. “I may be entirely wrong,” he wrote, “but if I owned any CVs I would surely leave them safely tucked away a thousand or more miles back or I would use them on a deliberate offensive thrust.”6 Vigorous offensive action he insisted was the best defense, regardless of the strategic role ‘assigned the Pacific in global strategy.
Although General Harmon’s criticism of the Navy’s failure to appreciate the importance of air power or to employ its surface forces offensively left much to be said on the other side, it did make strikingly clear his strong dissatisfaction with the conduct of the campaign. General Arnold, to whom these comments were directed, soon had the opportunity to judge for himself the truth of Harmon’s assertions. His voyage to the Pacific later in September took him to Nouméa where he conferred with Ghormley and Nimitz as well as Harmon. His conclusions, presented to General Marshall on his return to Washington, were, first, “that the Navy had not demonstrated its ability to properly conduct air operations,” and, second, that the Navy’s failure to appreciate the importance of logistics had led to a shortage of the supplies required to support military operations.7
The Navy had some criticisms of its own. Especially disappointing to it was the performance of the Army’s heavy bomber, the B-17, which, the Navy contended, bombed from too high an altitude to be effective against shipping and surface craft, the prime naval targets. General Harmon readily agreed that his B-17’s were having trouble in this respect, but attributed it to the green crews and the fact that the strikes were often made at extreme range. He hoped to do better, he told his naval colleagues, but despite his insistence on low-altitude bombing the performance of the B-17 against maneuvering surface targets continued
Damage to supplies caused by improper packing, dunnage, and handling
to be disappointing. There was no getting around the fact that the B-17 was not the ideal plane for such missions.8
Logistical matters, too, provided cause for dissatisfaction, and on this subject Marshall received numerous reports which supported the complaints from General Harmon and the conclusions of General Arnold. A résumé of the information supplied by four Army officers recently returned from the Solomons listed as the major shortcomings in the campaign there the supply system, improper loading, and the failure to expand the airfield facilities sufficiently to support heavy bomber operations. In the latter part of September, these officers reported, supplies on Guadalcanal had been so scarce that had it not been for the captured Japanese rations and gasoline, the lot of the troops would have been “extremely desperate.” Their conclusion, after reviewing other effects of the supply shortages, was that ‘long range supply planning for the operation could have been improved upon,” and they suggested that the logistical organization established in Australia be used as a model. These comments, edited to remove any statements that might unnecessarily
Henderson Field in November 1942
offend the Navy, Marshall passed on to Admiral King “for whatever the information may be worth to your people.”9
Admiral Halsey’s assumption of command in mid-October and the offensive spirit that marked operations thereafter brought warm approval from Harmon. The two men worked well together and Halsey’s insistence on the “one force” principle did much to eliminate misunderstanding, as did his willingness to give the Army more responsibility and a greater share in the conduct of operations. This attitude was apparent almost immediately when General Harmon, whose opposition to the seizure of Ndeni in the Santa Cruz Islands Ghormley had overruled, recommended to the new commander that the operation be canceled and the forces earmarked for Santa Cruz be sent to Guadalcanal instead. Halsey accepted this proposal with the result that the Army’s 147th Infantry from Tongatabu landed at Guadalcanal the following month. “Where disposition of Army forces is involved,” Harman told General Marshall, “the Commander South Pacific makes his decision only after conference with me.”10
Despite the improved relations between the two commanders in the Pacific—Harmon was pleased to report that Halsey was establishing his headquarters ashore at Nouméa, close to his—there was little improvement in the airfield at Guadalcanal. By the middle of November the field there was still
not adequate to support medium and heavy bombers. Harmon was optimistic about the future but had to confess that the failure to develop the airdrome at Lunga Point was “one of the biggest disappointments of this campaign.”11
Nor had the performance of the B-17 against surface targets improved. Halsey, himself an airman, understood the difficulties and appreciated the fact that the B–17 was most effective in high-altitude mass bombing against fixed targets, but so long as the Japanese continued to send their ships into the southern Solomons he had to employ the bombers against them.12 Necessity here overrode doctrine and Harmon, while suggesting more profitable targets, did
Admiral Halsey and General Harmon
his best to better the B-17 score in attacks against shipping.
The Southwest and Central Pacific
MacArthur’s use of the heavy bombers also came under criticism from the Navy, but for a different reason. He was employing his B-17’s primarily against enemy airfields rather than shipping, as the Navy desired. When queried about this, General MacArthur explained that it was necessary to gain air superiority in New Guinea and that he had, in fact, achieved this objective. Moreover, it was this superiority that enabled him to support Ghormley’s operations in the Solomons. His earlier efforts to bomb surface craft, he pointed out, had proved disappointing because of the training and leadership of his air forces. This was the view also of an observer sent out by General Marshall who reported that the bombardiers “could not hit anything from any altitude principally because they lacked necessary training.”13 But these difficulties, MacArthur believed, would be overcome soon and better results against Japanese shipping achieved under the newly arrived air commander, General Kenney.
Another disturbing factor in the relationship between the Army and Navy in the Pacific was the cooperation, or lack of it, between the South and Southwest Pacific Areas. General Marshall’s frequent references to this problem are a measure of the importance he attached to it, and, perhaps, of his doubts about assurances of harmonious relations. He had raised this question very early in the campaign, apparently on the basis of unofficial reports, and had received from MacArthur, Ghormley, and Harmon strong denials of any differences. Yet, at the end of August, Harmon told General Arnold that he was doing his best to coordinate the air effort of the two areas. “It is a rather delicate assignment,” he wrote. “Bring it up in conference every few days and once in a while hand Ghormley a message suggesting he might want to send it to MacArthur. He usually does.”14
There is little doubt that MacArthur provided support to the South Pacific when asked to do so. Usually this support took the form of bomber strikes against Rabaul and the northern Solomons, and more than once he alluded
to grateful acknowledgements from Admiral Ghormley for this assistance. Still the rumors of a lack of cooperation persisted and as late as 19 October, in response to a query from the White House, General Marshall had to assure the President that MacArthur was doing all he could to support the Guadalcanal campaign.15
But MacArthur also had his hands full, and with justice complained that his own operations were considerably hampered by the lack of naval forces. Since these had been loaned to Ghormley for the Guadalcanal invasion MacArthur asked late in August that the South Pacific commander be given the additional responsibility of covering the sea approaches to the Milne Bay area where the Japanese had recently landed. Apparently Ghormley and Nimitz opposed this suggestion, but Marshall was able with King’s help to arrange for the return of the Southwest Pacific naval units to MacArthur.16 This transfer had hardly been effected when another crisis on Guadalcanal brought from Nimitz a request that the submarines in the Southwest Pacific be placed under his control. Feeling possibly that the cooperation between the two theaters was a one-sided affair, MacArthur rejected the proposal, only to find late the following month that the Joint Chiefs had assigned twelve of his submarines to the South Pacific.17
Marshall’s efforts to secure the coordination of forces in the South and Southwest Pacific during the Guadalcanal campaign seemed to the Army planners in Washington to have had little effect. The same officer who had served as the Chief of Staff’s observer in MacArthur’s area, and who had been given the task of briefing Brig. Gen. Walter Krueger before his departure for Australia, summed up the difficulties ahead as follows:
The problem most urgently in need of immediate solution is that of unity of command of the forces now operating from the Southwest and South Pacific Areas against the same enemy force based on Rabaul. ... The operations of two large and powerful forces are being conducted concurrently with no coordination other than lateral liaison. As long as this continues it is allowing the enemy to take fullest advantage of his unity of control and interior lines. A solution to this problem would also help in simplifying some of the logistical complications now existent in the support of these separate forces.18
In the Central Pacific Area, which Nimitz commanded as a part of his larger Pacific Ocean Areas, relations between the Army and Navy commands also caused some concern in Washington. Fortunately, since the area was not yet the scene of active operations, the disagreements there had no serious consequences. But some of these differences dated from prewar days and their persistence was not a hopeful sign for cooperation in the future. In July, for example, the Navy expressed concern over the latest Army defense plan because it failed to make provision for certain important
naval installations. Rather than order General Emmons to alter the plan, Admiral Nimitz referred the matter to Washington with the request that his responsibility for assignment of defense missions be clarified. King took the view that Nimitz had that right under the principle of unity of command, and General Marshall agreed with him. But Marshall made the distinction between the assignment of a mission and the employment of forces for its accomplishment. The former was the responsibility of the theater commander, the latter of the service commander.19 The distinction was a fine one, not always understood, and the problem became the subject of dispute again at a later date.
Another example of a lack of singleness of purpose in the Central Pacific was the difficulty in establishing a joint Army-Navy command post. This project dated from October 1941 when the proposal was made by the Chief of Naval Operations. General Short opposed the scheme vigorously but his successor, on orders from the War Department, gave his consent. The Navy drew up plans for the command post in January, revised them to meet the wishes of the Army headquarters, and then submitted revised plans. These elicited further objections, and six months passed without any visible progress. It was apparent by now that the entire matter would have to be referred to a joint board for a decision on the location of the proposed command post. Such a board was finally appointed in September, but its members could reach no agreement. It was not until December 1942, more than a year after the initial proposal had been made, that a site was finally selected. The building itself was still in process of construction at the end of the war.20
Joint Staffs
Long aware of the differences in doctrine and training between Army and Navy officers, General Marshall sought in various ways to overcome the obstacles to genuine unity of command. Constantly he impressed on his staff and on
Army commanders in the field the necessity for subordinating service interests to the larger interests of the war. Concession and compromise were the principles that guided his relations with Admiral King, and cooperation was a recurring theme in the messages he sent to his subordinates.
One of the major obstacles to a unified command, General Marshall recognized early, was the service point of view, the inevitable result of a lifetime spent in learning the business of being a soldier or a sailor or an airman. Since there was no way of eliminating this obstacle short of an extended period of training, Marshall sought to diminish its effect by placing Army officers on the staff of Naval commanders and sponsoring the appointment of Naval officers to staffs headed by Army commanders. This exchange, he felt, would result in a better understanding by each of the services of the others’ problems and practices and alert the commanders to potential areas of disagreement.
It was this thought that prompted Marshall, when the South Pacific Area was established, to secure the assignment of two Army officers to Admiral Ghormley’s staff. With the formation of an Army headquarters in the area some months later and General Harmon’s arrival in Nouméa, there seemed to be little need for Army representation on Ghormley’s staff and both officers were reassigned. Instead Harmon himself and the senior members of his staff consulted frequently with their naval colleagues. “Twining and myself are on board [the Argonne, Ghormley’s headquarters] almost daily,” Harmon reported to General Arnold. “Breene has been contacting Admiral Turner and his staff on logistic matters and was on board today getting some problems of supply coordinated.” At Espiritu Santo were other officers “practically serving on McCain’s staff.”21
In Hawaii there was no comparable coordination between the Army and Navy commanders, none of the frequent and informal exchanges of views which marked the relationship between Harmon and Ghormley. When General Emmons complained that the Navy did not appreciate the importance of logistics, Marshall suggested as a means of overcoming the difficulty, the assignment of Army officers to Admiral Nimitz’ staff. “I am inclined to believe,” he told Emmons, “that the constant presence of a capable Army staff officer in a G-4 capacity with a naval staff would have rapidly tended to correct such lack of realization.” In Marshall’s view, liaison between the commanders was not a satisfactory substitute for a joint staff that would assure the commander of competent and disinterested advice. “Higher commanders talk things over in generalities. Staff officers plan in intimacy over long periods.” To this assertion he added General Arnold’s view that “until Naval commanders Of joint forces have qualified Army officers as working members of their staffs the maximum effectiveness of the combined arms cannot be secured.”22
During the next few days Marshall discussed this problem with Admiral King. The admiral quickly accepted his colleague’s suggestion that Army officers be assigned to the staff of a naval officer exercising unity of command and
proposed that General Marshall should select the officers for such assignment. On his part, Marshall proposed that King detail naval officers to Army commands to ensure the close cooperation “we have both striven constantly to attain.”23 Both men thereupon informed the designated theater commanders—MacArthur was not included—of their decision and proceeded to select officers for these assignments.
In the South Pacific, this move was not greeted with much enthusiasm. Harmon thought his method of working with Halsey entirely adequate, but when Marshall directed him to name an air officer for assignment to Halsey’s staff he did so promptly. Other officers were similarly assigned later under urging from Washington, but in the fall of 1943, there were only six Army officers on Halsey’s staff.24 Their value, Harmon thought, was questionable. “As good and possibly better results would have been obtained,” he wrote, “had planning activities continued on the initial basis of close daily association of opposite numbers on the Army and Navy staffs.”25
A Unified Command for the Pacific
One other solution to the difficulties in the Pacific was to place the entire theater under one command. This proposal was first put forward by General Arnold on his return from the Pacific early in October and reflected the Air Forces view that Army aircraft under naval control were not being employed effectively. Only by establishing a single command for the entire theater and placing an Army officer in charge could these problems be resolved, Arnold asserted. That there would be powerful opposition to such a move, he readily conceded. As a matter of fact, he thought a “Presidential decree” would be required to bring about the change. And for General Marshall’s information, he nominated three officers for the post: General MacArthur, Lt. Gen. Joseph T. McNarney, and Lt. Gen. Lesley J. McNair, all of whom he thought “perfectly capable of conducting the combined operations ... in this area.”26
What General Marshall thought of Arnold’s suggestion we do not know. All he did was pass it on to the Operations Division without comment, at least none that was recorded. There it was studied by General Streett, an air officer, and General Wedemeyer, each of whom prepared a separate memorandum on the subject. Streett, who had apparently drafted Arnold’s paper in the first instance, naturally approved of the whole idea and thought that Marshall would support it, “regardless of the difficulties.” What he and Wedemeyer ought to do now, he declared, was to draft a study on the subject for General Marshall, one that “will not be entirely unpalatable for the Navy nor do violence to our feelings.” The problem would come in selecting a commander; that task, Streett thought, ought to be done by the President himself.27
Though he was more cautious about taking action, General Wedemeyer supported the idea of a single commander for the Pacific. The present organization with its “divided responsibility and chopped-up areas” he agreed was wasteful and inefficient. The consolidation of the theater would make possible the concentration of resources where they were most needed. In his opinion, command should be vested in the Air Forces, the service that would exercise the strongest influence in the Pacific. On this basis, Wedemeyer recommended as his first choice General Arnold, McNarney as his second.28
That General Marshall saw these studies is doubtful; nor is there any evidence that either Wedemeyer or Streett ever discussed the subject with him. But when the President on 24 October inquired about the situation in the Solomons, Marshall took the occasion to list, under “measures to be taken,” the need “for a further unification of command in the entire Pacific Theater,” especially in the South and Southwest Pacific Areas. “The present complications in the employment of air in the Pacific,” he concluded, “emphasize this necessity.”29 When the President failed to respond to this suggestion, Marshall dropped the matter.
The postscript was written by General Streett five days later when he outlined for his chief, General Handy, his views on command in the Pacific. “At the risk of being considered naive and just plain
country-boy dumb,” he could not help feeling that the major obstacle to a “sane military solution” of the problem was General MacArthur himself. Only with MacArthur out of the picture would it be possible to establish a sound organization in the area. Streett appreciated fully the political implications of removing MacArthur, but thought it could be done safely if the general were given some high post such as the ambassadorship to Russia, “a big enough job for anyone.” Then, depending on whether the Navy or the Air Forces was considered to have the dominant role in the war, the post of supreme commander in the Pacific could be given either to Admiral Nimitz or General McNarney. The South and Southwest Pacific, Streett thought, should be combined under General Eichelberger, I Corps commander, with Brig. Gen. Patrick J. Hurley, former Secretary of War, as his “Chief of Civilian Affairs.” The organization of the remainder of the theater could be left to the supreme commander who -would “draw his own lines, designate subordinates, and select his own command post.”30 General Handy’s comments on this proposal, if he made any, are not recorded. Streett left the Operations Division about a month later and ultimately became one of MacArthur’s senior air commanders.
The problems arising from the organization of the Pacific into two major commands (one predominantly Army, the other predominantly Navy) continued to be a major concern of the Joint Chiefs and the basis for misunderstanding and disagreement between the services.
The fact that they had little effect on operations and the vigor and speed with which the war against Japan was conducted is a tribute to the determination of all concerned to make common cause against the enemy.31