THEODORE EDSON CHANDLER

Theodore Edson Chandler was born at Annapolis on 26 December 1894 into a distinguished Navy family.  His father, the future RADM Lloyd H. Chandler, attended the Naval Academy at the time.  Young Chandler followed in his father’s footsteps, entering the Naval Academy in 1911.  After a combat tour on the WWI destroyer CONNER (DD-72) he assumed the position of executive officer aboard the newly launched destroyer CHANDLER (DD-206).  That ship had been named in honor of Chandler’s late grandfather, William Eaton Chandler, President Chester Arthur’s Secretary of the Navy.  Theodore served between the Wars aboard several battleships and destroyers, even aspiring to a brief tour with the office of the Chief of Naval Operations.

In the months before the still neutral US entered WWII, (now) CAPT T.E. Chandler commanded OMAHA (CL-4) in the Atlantic Fleet’s Neutrality Patrol.  One task in this employ was to enforce international laws governing ships of combatant nations who might call on American ports.  In the wee hours of 6 November 1941 OMAHA came across a curiously darkened ship out of Philadelphia showing the name Willmoto.  A suspicious Chandler stopped the freighter, who proved in truth to be the German blockade runner Odenwald, illegally running rubber to the Weimar Republic.  “Willmoto” was taken into custody.  Soon-to-be-changed Navy regs required that Chandler supervise her sale at public auction, the last instance in our Navy’s history when a warship’s crew shared “prize money.”  Chandler was promoted to RADM in May of 1943 and transferred to the Pacific in October 1944.  He served under VADM Jesse B. Oldendorf as commander BatDiv 2 during the battle of Leyte Gulf and the liberation of the Philippines.

Then at 1730 on 6 January 1945 a Japanese kamikaze crashed the starboard bridge of USS LOUISVILLE (CA-28), flagship of Commander PacFlt Cruiser Division 4, RADM T.E. Chandler, operating in the Lingayen Gulf in support of the Allied invasion of Luzon.  Chandler was thrown to the deck and doused with flaming gasoline.  Heedless of his severe burns however, he pitched in with his enlisted rates, manhandling fire hoses and supervising damage control.  He patiently waited for medical aid, allowing those more seriously injured to be attended.  Only when he had been satisfied that the needs his sailors had been met did he allow himself to be treated.  But by then the effects of his pulmonary burns were too severe to reverse.  He died this following day.  For his gallant sacrifice he is a recipient of the Navy Cross.  The WWII Gearing-class destroyer THEODORE E. CHANDLER (DD-717) bore his name, as does our former Kidd-class guided missile destroyer DDG-996.

Watch for more “Today in Naval History”  11 JAN 26

CAPT James Bloom, Ret.

Department of the Navy, Naval History Division.  Dictionary of American Naval Fighting Ships, Vol 7 “T-V”.  Washington, DC: GPO, 1981, pp. 127-28.

 Morison, Samuel Eliot.  History of United States Naval Operations in World War II, Vol 13  The Liberation of the Philippines: Luzon, Mindinao, the Visayas.  Boston, MA: Little Brown and Co., 1959, pp. xii, 109.

Theodore E. Chandler

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                                   WHERE WERE THE CARRIERS?

Most everyone will recall that one significant shortcoming of the Pearl Harbor raid from the Japanese perspective was its failure to destroy the American Navy’s aircraft carriers.  Yamamoto had targeted them in particular, appreciating as he did, the importance of naval air power.  It was with some disappointment that the airstrike launched knowing the carriers were not in port.  But just where were our carriers at 0755, 7 December 1941?

For the past year, US attentions had focused on the Atlantic where four of our seven carriers were based.  German U-boats had already attacked US warships escorting freighters on Roosevelt’s “Neutrality Patrol.”  In fact, REUBEN JAMES (DD-245) had been sunk in September 1941 on just such a mission.  Dawn on December 7^th found YORKTOWN (CV-5) in Norfolk and RANGER (CV-4) a day out, both having just finished Neutrality Patrols.  Brand new HORNET (CV-8), just 2 months in commission, was also readying herself in Norfolk.  WASP (CV-7) was serving as our training carrier and lay at anchor in Grassy Bay, Bermuda, observing the usual Sunday morning routine between Caribbean cruises.

In the Pacific, SARATOGA (CV-3) was fresh out of dry-dock in Bremerton.  The morning of December 7^th found her pulling into San Diego to embark Marine Corps aircraft intended for Wake.  After hearing the news from Hawaii, SARATOGA got underway immediately, hoping to reinforce the besieged garrison at Wake.  She reached Pearl Harbor on the 15^th, stopping only for fuel.  But the tiny island outpost at Wake fell before SARATOGA could arrive.

Two carriers were in the waters around Hawaii.  ENTERPRISE (CV-6) was returning from an aircraft ferrying assignment, having delivered VMF-211 to Wake Island.  She had planned to make Pearl that day, in fact, her scout planes arrived over the harbor in the midst of the Japanese attack and joined the defense.  She pulled in on this day, pausing briefly to refuel, then departed to hunt down the Japanese.  Though she did not locate the enemy strike force, her aircraft did sink the sub I-170 on the 10^th.  Our oldest flattop in service, LEXINGTON (CV-2), was returning from Midway, having likewise delivered a squadron of Marine fighters.  Upon learning of the Pearl Harbor attack she promptly launched search planes in an unsuccessful attempt to locate the Japanese fleet, then diverted south to rendezvous with ENTERPRISE and INDIANAPOLIS (CA-35).

After today’s disaster, YORKTOWN cast off for Hawaii on December 16^th.  HORNET was readied for Doolittle’s Tokyo raid, departing Norfolk on 4 March 1942.  WASP was pulled from training duties and eventually transferred to the Pacific after the loss of YORKTOWN at Midway in June 1942.  RANGER remained in the Atlantic.

Watch for more “Today in Naval History”  13 DEC 25

CAPT James Bloom, Ret.

Department of the Navy, Naval History Division.  Dictionary of American Naval Fighting Ships, Vol 2 “C-F”. Washington, DC: GPO, 1977, p. 356.

Department of the Navy, Naval History Division.  Dictionary of American Naval Fighting Ships, Vol 3 “G-K”. Washington, DC: GPO, 1977, pp. 368, 434.

Department of the Navy, Naval History Division.  Dictionary of American Naval Fighting Ships, Vol 4 “L-M”. Washington, DC: GPO, 1969, pp. 47, 104.

Department of the Navy, Naval History Division.  Dictionary of American Naval Fighting Ships, Vol 6 “R-S”.  Washington, DC: GPO, 1976, pp. 31, 85, 340.

Department of the Navy, Naval History Division.  Dictionary of American Naval Fighting Ships, Vol 8 “W-Z”.  Washington, DC: GPO, 1981, pp. 144, 534.

ADDITIONAL NOTES:  RANGER is perhaps the least well-remembered of our seven pre-WWII carriers.  She remained in the Atlantic and Mediterranean until August 1944, when she also transferred to the Pacific.  Here she was relegated to pilot training duties off the California coast.

Our first carrier, the former LANGLEY (CV-1), was still in service, but had been converted to a seaplane tender (AV-3) in the 1930s.  She was operating with the Asiatic Fleet at the war’s outbreak and was sunk by Japanese planes in late February 1942.

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                              DETERMINATION vs. COMPLACENCY

Japan emerged from the First World War as a bona fide naval power, a rival to US primacy in the Pacific.  And as early as 1918, Imperial Defense Policy identified the United States as her foremost potential enemy.  The mandates of the 1922 Washington Disarmament Conference caused further dissention; Japan (correctly) perceiving that the US-backed formula for capital warship limitation was structured to insure American parity, if not dominance in the Pacific.  She reacted with a naval policy which acquiesced to US strength in numbers but emphasized ships of greater firepower.  Imperial naval cadets were indoctrinated with hostility toward America.  A decade later even the Japanese citizenry sensed the eventuality of war with the United States.  It was not a surprise then, when Japan vacated the continuing arms limitation talks in 1936.  The next year Japan began to solidify her western Pacific empire by inciting a war with China.

Meanwhile many US planners remained complacent, secure in a misplaced confidence in our strength and Japan’s weakness.  Unruffled US attitudes are reflected even days before the Pearl Harbor attack:

“Nobody now fears that a Japanese fleet could deal an unexpected blow on our Pacific possessions…Radio makes surprise impossible.”  Josephus Daniels, former Secretary of the Navy, 16 Oct 1922.

“War between Japan and the United States is not within the realm of reasonable possibility…A Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor is a strategic impossibility.”   MAJ George Fielding Eliot, USA, military scientist, Sep 1938.

“The Hawaiian Islands are over-protected; the entire Japanese fleet and air force could not seriously threaten Oahu.”   CAPT William T. Pulleston, Chief of Naval Intelligence, Aug 1941.

“No matter what happens, the U.S. Navy is not going to be caught napping.”   Frank Knox, Secretary of the Navy, 4 Dec 1941.

“Well, don’t worry about it…it’s nothing.”   LT Kermit Tyler, Ft. Shafter Duty Officer after being told the newly installed RADAR had picked up what appeared to be incoming aircraft, 7 Dec 1941.

Not until Japan invaded Indochina in July 1941 did we embargo oil and steel.  Historians credit that oil embargo as the final impetus inciting Japan to strike at the US Fleet.

Continued tomorrow…

CAPT James Bloom, Ret.

Cerf, Christopher and Victor Navasky.  The Experts Speak:  The Definitive Compendium of Authoritative Misinformation.  Pantheon Books, New York, NY, pp.115-16, 1984.

Fuchida, Mitsuo and Masatake Okumiya.  Midway: The Battle that Doomed Japan.  USNI Press, Annapolis, MD, pp. 25-32, 1955.

Prange, Gordon W.  At Dawn We Slept:  The Untold Story of Pearl Harbor.  Penguin Books, New York, NY, pp. 3-8, 1981.

ADDITIONAL NOTES:  The anti-American sentiments in Japan in the decades before WWII are well described in Fuchida’s book above.  In fact, believing the United States to be her eventual enemy, Japan began in the 1920s to rotate the elite of her young naval officers through diplomatic or training duty in America.  By the late 1930s, the Imperial Navy had a core of senior officers familiar with American traditions, attitudes, and motivations.  Among these was Combined Fleet commander-in-chief ADM Isoroku Yamamoto, the architect of the Pearl Harbor attack.

Some historians have criticized the Pearl Harbor attack this day for failing to destroy the shore facilities and even for failing to invade the Hawaiian Islands.  But Japan’s intentions were to impede the United States’ ability to intervene in the western Pacific long enough for Japan to secure an empire.  They targeted what they perceived to be the center of gravity of our seapower, the ships of our US Fleet–not the Pearl Harbor base nor the Hawaiian Islands.  Ironically, in the minds of US planners of that day our bases were the potential targets.  The presence of a strong fleet in port, it was reasoned, would cause a would-be aggressor to think twice.  Thus, following scheduled exercises in the Fall of 1941, the US Fleet normally homeported at San Pedro was held in Hawaii as a deterrent.

It could be argued that the Japanese assessment that our fleet was our center of gravity was flawed.  The ships could be replaced, but the forward bases essential to their operation in the Philippines, Guam, Wake and Shanghai proved difficult and costly to recover.

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                                   US DEPARTS THE PHILIPPINES

The presence of American military bases in the Philippines was a consequence of our acquisition of that archipelago in 1898 after the Spanish-American war.  When independence was granted to the Republic of the Philippines after WWII the US retained control of her military installations under a 99-year lease starting 27 March 1947.  However, in deference to growing concerns over the US presence, under the Eisenhower administration in 1959, the 99-year term of the lease was shortened by 56 years to 16 September 1991.

In a Cold War dominated world of the 1980s, America viewed its bases in the Philippines, particularly Naval Station Subic Bay, as, “A vital link in the defense of freedom,” and in 1989 talks began on the possible renewal of the Bases Agreement.  However chief negotiators Richard L. Armitage of the US and Raul Manglapus of the Corazon Aquino administration were far apart on the terms of an extension.  Too, a growing public movement against the US presence was founded in sentiments dating from WWII, with Franklin Roosevelt’s “Europe first” war policy.  Thus, on September 10^th, 1991, the 23-member Philippine Senate rejected a final American $2 billion total aid package by a margin of four votes.  The best the pro-American Aquino government could achieve was a three-year extension to accomplish a permanent American withdrawal.

The dismantling of our Philippine bases now began in earnest.  A decision to abandon Clark AFB, that had been ravaged by the Mt. Pinatubo volcanic eruption in June of 1991, had already been approved by US planners.  At Subic, 50,000 tons of ordnance was destroyed or removed, and 5900 servicemen, 3900 dependents and 214 pets were shipped out.  The fleet replenishment squadron VRC-50 was relocated to Guam, and the drydocks USS MACHINIST (AFDB-8), RESOURCEFUL (AFDM-5) and ADEPT (ADDL-23) were towed to other Pacific facilities.  In what was termed the “biggest yard sale in history,” 450,000 tons of material were sold at 15-cents on the dollar–the Philippine government buying up $26 million in goods.  Outside the gates of Subic, the city of Olongapo formed the Subic Bay Metropolitan Authority (SBMA) to facilitate conversion of the massive 630,300 acre facility into an economic free-trade zone.

On 30 September 1992 Naval Station Subic Bay closed, following the other facilities at Camp John Hay, Camp Wallace, Capas Tarlac and San Miguel.  The last remaining US assets were consolidated to NAS Cubi Point.  Then on this day, COMUSNAVPHIL officially ceased to exist as RADM Thomas Mercer stepped off Cubi Point’s Alava Pier onto the brow of USS BELLEAU WOOD (LHA-3), and the last 800 US sailors and Marines departed the Republic of the Philippines.

Watch for more “Today in Naval History”  1 DEC 25

CAPT James Bloom, Ret.

Branigin, William.  “Philippines Sets Compromise on Closing of U.S. Naval Base:  Aquino, Senate Agree on 3-Year Withdrawal Period.”  The Washington Post, 3 October 1991, p. A-37.

Branigin, William.  “U.S. Military Ends Role in Philippines:  After 94 Years, Navy Leaves with Parade, Tears, Questions.”  The Washington Post, 24 November 1992, pp. A-1, A-17.

Burlage, John.  “The End of an Era:  Packing Up and Shipping Out at Subic Bay.”  Navy Times, 30 November 1992, pp. 12, 14.

Burlage, John.  “The Last of the Last to Say Good-Bye.”  Navy Times, 30 November 1992, pp. 14-15.

Dutcher, Roger.  “Subic Bay’s Last Days.”  Surface Warfare, September/October 1992, pp. 20-21.

Gregor, A. James and Virgilio Aganon.  The Philippine Bases:  U.S. Secuity Risk.  Washington, DC: Ethics and Public Policy Center, 1987, pp. 33-47.

Oberdorfer, Don.  “U.S. Bases Rejected in Philippines:  Cheney Says Subic Bay Facility Will be Closed if Decision Stands.”  The Washington Post, 10 September 1991, pp. A-1, A-12.

“Philippines to US: Leases on Bases Will End in ’92.”  The Washington Post, 16 May 1990, p. A-7.

Shenon, Philip.  “U.S. Will Abandon Volcano-Ravaged Air Base, Manila is Told.”  New York Times, 16 July 1991, p. A-6.

Sicam, Paulynn.  “Pressure Mounts to End Bases Pact.”  Christian Science Monitor, 14 May 1990, p. 3.

ADDITIONAL NOTES:  For centuries before the appearance of Europeans, the Philippine islands were economically exploited by Asian powers, largely China.  Magellan claimed the islands in March 1526 for his Spanish King Philip.  For three hundred years Spain dominated the islands, setting up the famous Manila-Mexico trade.  Once a year a gold and treasure laden galleon would leave Manila taking a northerly route through the Pacific.  After a voyage of many months, they would make landfall at Cape Mendicino in California, and from there hug the coast to Acapulco.  The islands remained under Spanish domination until 1898, when CAPT George Dewey defeated the Spanish Fleet in a decisive naval action in Manila Bay.  Along with Cuba, Puerto Rico, and Guam, the Philippines was ceded to the United States at the close of the Spanish-American war.

The only remaining official US presence in the Philippines is the American Memorial Cemetery outside Manila in which 17,206 American servicement killed in WWII and 36,279 soldiers, sailors, airmen and Marines whose remains have never been found are memorialized.

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                                                31 AUGUST 1812

                                         THE MISSING HUSBAND

Not even three months had passed since war was declared against England in 1812.  Both the US Army and the US Navy were filling their ranks for the fight.  A military draft would not exist for another 50 years, and to their credit, American recruiters refrained from conscription’s lesser cousin, impressment.  But that is not to say that to procure sailors and Marines, recruiters weren’t above taking advantage of those whose discretion was temporarily compromised.

On this date Mrs. Jane Stringer, the loving wife of Daniel Stringer, a baker of Philadelphia, wrote to Secretary of the Navy Paul Hamilton about a matter that distressed her greatly.  Referring to herself in the third person as “your Petitioner,” Mrs. Stringer admits that her husband enlisted in the Marines six days earlier, though she is not specific as to how she learned of his actions.  She goes on to state her conviction however, that, “at the time he enlisted he was so much under the influence of liquor as to be incapable of knowing what he did.”  She condemns the enlisting officer who “took advantage of [Stringer’s] intoxication when he persuaded him to enlist,” so much so that Stringer, “had not recovered from the effects of the liquor when he took the Oath before the magistrate.”  Mrs. Stringer goes on to say that this unfortunate circumstance has left her without the means to support her two small children, and that such comes at an absolutely inopportune time, as she is struggling to pay the onerous medical expenses incurred as a result of a recent illness from which her husband recovered.

In 1812 it was possible to obtain an early release from military service if one could find a substitute to serve the remainder of his term.  Mrs. Stringer goes on to offer the sacrifice of “a part of her furniture with which to procure the means of providing a substitute in the place of her husband.”  She ends with her commitment to continue ever prayerful in the matter and requests that the Secretary, “will be pleased to direct the commanding officer on the station to discharge her Husband from the term of his enlistment upon her procuring a substitute.”  Her petition encloses an affidavit of veracity by three Philadelphians of presumed virtue.

History records neither the fate of PVT Daniel Stringer, USMC, nor the response of the Secretary to Mrs. Stringer’s petition.  Today enlisting into military service while under the influence of drugs or alcohol constitutes a “fraudulent enlistment,” and modern recruiters eschew such practices.  One can only hope this story had a happy ending!

Watch for more “Today in Naval History” 3 SEP 25

CAPT James Bloom, Ret.

Petition of Jane Stringer to Secretary of the Navy Hamilton, dtd. 31 August 1812.  IN:  Dudley, William S. (ed).  The Naval War of 1812: A Documentary History  Vol I.  Department of the Navy, Navy Historical Center, Washington DC: GPO, 1985, p. 261.

ADDITIONAL NOTES:  The production, distribution, and consumption of distilled spirits were quite prevalent in 19^th century America, more common even than today.  Many farmers ran their own stills as a routine part of their farming operation.  It has been argued that distilling whiskey from grain was an effective means of preserving the caloric content for indefinite periods of time.  So ubiquitous was liquor that when the US government was in need of a source of revenue in 1791 it was suggested that alcohol be taxed.  This tax brought about the three-year-long “Whiskey Rebellion” in western Pennsylvania. 

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                                        KELLOGG-BRIAND PACT

World War I left a scar on the psyche of the Western hemisphere.  Northern France was left a moonscape of stripped forests, ghost villages, and farmland rendered permanently useless by unexploded ordnance.  The 117,000 American fighting men who lost their lives paled in comparison to the 1.2 million British, 1.7 million French, 2.8 million Russian and 3.9 million German and Austrian deaths.  Man’s ingenuity in killing reached new bounds with the introduction of flame throwers, poison gas, tanks, submarines, and machine guns.  The mud, filth, and rats of the trenches and the carnage of mass infantry charges against fortified positions signaled a devaluation of human life.  Surely if mankind were to survive, war had become too repulsive and abhorrent.

Anti-war measures followed.  In the aftermath of the “war to end all wars” the map of Europe was redrawn to limit monocratic politicians.  Germany was severely punished, economically and militarily.  The League of Nations was formed as an alternative for resolving international disputes, and a series of disarmament movements scrapped existing weapons inventories of major nations and scaled-back arms manufacture.  The World Court was instituted as a forum for redress, and in 1929 the Geneva Conventions, originally negotiated in 1864, were further strengthened.

Against this backdrop, the French Minister of Foreign Affairs, Aristide Briand, proposed to the United States in 1927 a bilateral agreement to outlaw war between the two nations.  President Calvin Coolidge and US Secretary of State Frank B. Kellogg were less than enthusiastic, recognizing that bilateral alliances had contributed to the outbreak of WWI in the first place.  Kellogg was sent to France rather to negotiate an agreement that would invite all nations of the world to abandon war.  Their deliberations culminated in the “General Treaty for the Renunciation of War as an Instrument of National Policy” which went into effect this day.  Our US Congress ratified this “Kellogg-Briand Pact” by a vote of 85-1, but only after introducing the first “crack of the door” with a statement that the Pact did not limit our right of self-defense.

Unfortunately, the Pact lacked enforcement provisions.  It outlawed only territorial aggression by force, not annexation per se, and was readily subverted with claims of self-defense.  Such was the case in 1935 with Italy’s invasion of Abyssinia (Ethiopia) and the 1937 conquest of Manchuria by Japan.  On 1 September 1939 German soldiers dressed in Polish uniforms instigated a border incident that gave Hitler a sham under which to invade Poland, initiating a conflict that would dwarf the carnage of the first world war.

Watch for more “Today in Naval History”  31 AUG 25

CAPT James Bloom, Ret.

Kissinger, Henry.  Diplomacy.  New York, NY: Simon and Schuster, 1994, pp. 280-81, 374-76, 808-09.

Sweetman, Jack.  American Naval History:  An Illustrated Chronology of the U.S. Navy and Marine Corps, 1775-Present, 3^rd ed.  Annapolis, MD: USNI Press, 2002, p. 136.

US Department of State, Office of the Historian website.  “The Kellogg-Briand Pact, 1928.”  AT: https://history.state.gov/milestones/1921-1936/kellogg, retrieved 20 July 2015.

Yale University on-line archive.  “Kellogg-Briand Pact 1928” [text of], AT: http://www.yale.edu/lawweb/avalon/imt/kbpact.htm, retrieved 20 July 2015.

ADDITIONAL NOTES:  Under the treaty, signatories vowed to, “solemnly declare in the names of their respective people that they condemn recourse to war for the solution of international controversies, and renounce it, as an instrument of national policy in their relations with one another.”  Signed initially by 15 European and North American nations, subsequently 62 of the world’s sovereignties have joined.  The treaty remains in effect today, Croatia and Bosnia-Herzegovina being the most recent signatories in 1994.  Though it failed to prevent war, it has provided the legal basis for the category of “crimes against peace” which was applied at Nuremburg and Tokyo in the post-WWII years.

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                               LIONS, CUBS, AND NAS CUBI POINT

WWII’s clouds were gathering in the late 1930s, and it was increasingly recognized that existing naval bases along our Atlantic and Pacific seaboards would be inadequate to fully support operations thousands of miles distant in Europe or Asia.  Thus, the Navy Bureau of Yards and Docks (BuDOCKS) began a project to develop advanced operational support bases that could be quickly deployed in distant theaters.  To launch this effort, a conference was convened on 23 January 1942 to address the CNO’s concerns that, “…immediate steps be taken to assemble materials and equipment required for four main advanced bases and twelve secondary advanced bases.”  The two forms of advanced bases were codenamed “LIONs” and “CUBs.”  LIONS 1-4 would provide logistic and personnel support for a major fleet group including specific repair capability for submarines, aircraft, and surface ships comparable to services provided with ARs, ADs, and ASs, as well as support for 210 aircraft.  Twelve secondary bases, CUBs 1-12, operated under the guidance of a LION and were exclusively afloat.  They served a task force unit, supporting 4100 sailors and Marines and providing logistics for ships and 105 aircraft.  The 3000 Navy personnel assigned to a CUB included supply and medical staff.  CUBs were moved across the Pacific as the war progressed.  It is not known how the codenames “LION” and “CUB” were derived.

By October 1944 the LION and CUB concept was in full swing.  That same month US forces began retaking the Philippine Islands from Japanese occupation.  Subic Bay, on the island of Luzon, had been a US Navy base before the war, and, after its recapture, it was rapidly revitalized.  BuDOCK’s CUB One was moved there to support the anticipated operations on Iwo Jima, Okinawa, and ultimately the Japanese home islands.  CUB One was positioned afloat, off the quiet fishing village of Banicain, on the jungled point of land opposite the Subic Bay docks.  The area soon became “CUB 1 Point” to Americans.  As the war ended and Naval Station Subic Bay expanded in the years following, the need for a CUB was obviated by more permanent facilities ashore.

Then in 1950, the Korean Conflict necessitated the construction of an airfield in the Philippines.  In an effort that harkened of the Panama Canal’s construction, Mobile Construction Battalions 2, 3, 5, 9, and 11, bulldozed a mountain ridge, backfilling a portion of the bay to create a 10,000-foot runway.  Construction took nearly four years, during which time sailors began shortening “CUB 1 Point” to “Cubi Point.”  On 25 July 1956, NAS Cubi Point was commissioned.  The NAS remaining active until, at Philippine request, our Navy vacated the base in November 1992.

Watch for more “Today in Naval History”  30 JUL 25

CAPT James Bloom, Ret.

United States Naval Administration in World War II, Chapter VI, Advanced Base Units LIONS, CUBS, and ACORNS.  AT: https://www.ibiblio.org/hyperwar/USN/Admin-Hist/021-AdvancedBases/AdvanceBases-6.html, retrieved 28 May 2022.

Site visit and Personal History, CAPT James Bloom, Ret.  Naval Station Subic Bay and NAS Cubi Point, October 1988-October 1990.

ADDITIONAL NOTES:  The LION and CUB concept was further expanded as the war progressed to include advanced shore-based facilities, codenamed “OAKs” and “ACORNs.”

Airfield construction at Cubi Point necessitated the plowing under of the village of Banicain, whose residents were relocated to the town of Olongapo.  The site of the former village now lies under 45 feet of backfill.

The Cubi Point O-Club was perhaps the most popular in the Pacific during the Vietnam era.  In fact, when the base closed in 1992, the Cubi Point O-Club was disassembled, brought home, and reconstructed in its exact floor plan at the NAS Pensacola Naval Aviation Museum.

Urban legend holds that the name “Cubi Point” is an acronym for “Construction Unit Battalion 1,” the unit supposedly responsible for the airfield’s creation.  However, as above, MCB-1 did not participate in the effort.

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                                          THE DOMINO THEORY

In March 1938, (then) LCOL Dwight D. Eisenhower watched Hitler convince the Austrians to join an Anschluss (alliance) with Nazi Germany.  Seven months later Hitler annexed the Sudetenland (eastern Czechoslovakia).  The whole of Czechoslovakia fell in March 1939.  Poland was invaded six months later, triggering WWII.  The year of 1940 saw the consecutive falls of Denmark, Holland, Belgium, Norway, France, Romania, and Hungary.  All this transpired while the other Axis power, Italy, took Abyssinia (Ethiopia) and Egypt then invaded Greece.  The result, by the time the United States entered the war, was that much of Europe languished under dictatorial fascism.

After WWII, concern over Russian Communism in eastern Europe prompted the influential American diplomat George Kennan to coin the term “containment” to describe the need to limit the spread of world Communism.  Americans tended to view Communism as a monolithic threat to democracy, made no less dire with the subsequent Communist revolutions that divided China and Korea.  And in 1954, during the Viet Minh’s siege of French forces at Dien Bien Phu, a Communist takeover of French Indochina (Vietnam) seemed imminent.

No doubt reminiscent of the sequential fall of nations in Europe before the war, now our 34^th President, Dwight Eisenhower, called for US backing of the French in Indochina.  In a press conference this day he justified the effort stating, “You have broader considerations that might follow what you would call the ‘falling domino’ principle…You have a row of dominos set up, you knock over the first one, and what will happen to the last one is a certainty that will go over very quickly.”  He implied that should the Communists take Indochina, next to fall would be Burma, Thailand, Malaya, and Indonesia, extending perhaps even to a Communist takeover in Japan!  The French did ultimately lose Indochina, while Eisenhower’s “domino theory” came to drive our involvement in Vietnam, and our foreign policy in general, for the next two decades.

Today the domino theory is suspected by some to have been an anxious exaggeration.  As was shown after the US embarrassment in Vietnam, and subsequent Communist pushes in Laos, Malaya, the Philippines, Indonesia, and several African and Central American nations, Communism proved to be non-monolithic.  Russian, Chinese, and other versions of Communism are disparate, even competitive at times.  A world takeover by “monolithic” Communism seems a delusion today as competition between versions of Communism limit its spread.  Indeed, the rise of Communism in third-world nations was likely driven more by local desires to improve economic depression than by an overarching plot for world domination.

Watch for more “Today in Naval History”  11 APR 25

CAPT James Bloom, Ret.

Eisenhower, Dwight D.  “The President’s News Conference, April 7, 1954.”  The American Presidency Project website.  AT: http://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/ws/?pid=10202, retrieved 23 February 2018.

Kennan, George.  “The Sources of Soviet Conduct.”  Foreign Affairs, 01 July 1947, AT: https://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/russian-federation/1947-07-01/sources-soviet-conduct, retrieved 23 February 2018.

Leeson, Peter T. and Andrea M. Dean.  “The Democratic Domino Theory: An Empirical Investigation.”  AT: http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1540-5907.2009.00385.x/abstract:jsessionid=28BD26109195D99094FN7E9732F8861E.f03t02, retrieved 23 February 2018.

Ward, Geoffrey C. and Ken Burns.  The Vietnam War: An Intimate History.  New York, NY: Alfred A. Knopf, 2017, p. 27.

ADDITIONAL NOTES:  The word fascism comes from the Roman fasces,

a type of battle axe.  The fasces became the symbol of the Roman Republic, much like the eagle is a symbol of the United States.  Modern fascism got its start in WWI-era Italy with a (failed) political movement to recreate the former Roman Empire.

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                                           THE VIRGIN ISLANDS

World War I had been tearing Europe apart since the summer of 1914.  Here, we struggled to stay neutral, despite the sinkings of American merchant ships carrying cargoes to the Allies.  To most Americans, WWI was 5000 miles away, too distant to raise concern, especially with the vast Atlantic Ocean insulating us.  That is, until events brought the war nearer in early 1917…

The German Foreign Minister Arthur Zimmermann, recognizing that the Central Powers needed help to win the war, sent a telegram to the German ambassador to the United States, Johann von Bernsdorff, instructing him to pass it to the German ambassador to Mexico, Heinrich von Eckhardt.  The message promised the return to Mexico of Texas, New Mexico, and Arizona (lost in the 1840s war with the US) if Mexico entered the war for the Central Powers.  The Western Union telegram was intercepted by British intelligence and passed to American authorities.  Our public was outraged.  Despite our neutrality, the war was moving closer to our shores!

To complicate matters, Japan was rumored to be building a naval base on Cedros Island, off Mexican Baja California.  Though Japan was aligned with the Allies, the plan smacked of the further dragging of our Western Hemisphere into the war.  These rumors turned out to be just that, but a more serious concern over Denmark simultaneously gripped President Woodrow Wilson.

The small, neutral nation of Denmark lay immediately north of Germany, within easy reach of Kaiser Willhelm II.  Germany might easily overrun Denmark, allowing her overseas possessions of Greenland, Iceland, and the Danish Virgin Islands to come under the control of the Central Powers.  Then, Germany announced on 31 January, the resumption of unrestricted submarine warfare.  Would the Danish Virgin Islands of St. Croix, St. Thomas, and St. Johns become a Caribbean U-boat base?  Such would threaten our Panama Canal, opened in August 1914, and our operations in two major oceans.  A German presence in the Caribbean had to be prevented.

The Wilson administration approached the Danish government with an offer to purchase the Danish Virgin Islands.  The offer was accepted, on 17 January 1917, the Danish Virgin Islands were transferred to the United States for $25 million in gold.  Administration of the islands was assigned to the Navy Department, and on 29 March two companies of US Marines landed on St. Thomas to establish a garrison and begin construction of shore batteries and harbor defenses.  Then on this day RADM James H. Oliver formally took possession, becoming the islands’ first governor.  The timing was fortuitous, for in less than a week, on 6 April 1917, the US declared war on the Central Powers.

Watch for more “Today in Naval History”  4 APR 25

CAPT James Bloom, Ret.

Cooney, David M.  A Chronology of the U.S. Navy:  1775-1965.  New York, NY: Franklin Watts, Inc., 1965, pp. 223, 224.

Neiberg, Michael S.  The Path to War: How the First World War Created Modern America.  New York, NY: Oxford Univ. Press, 2016, pp. 92-93.

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                                            THE YEOMANETTES

By the Spring of 1917 the “Great War” had been raging in Europe for several years and a yet neutral America was being drawn ever closer to the fray.  Noting the gathering war clouds, Congress had approved President Wilson’s request for a “Navy second to none,” appropriating an unprecedented $500 million.  The legislation authorized the new construction of 26 battleships and cruisers, 50 destroyers and 83 other vessels.  From his office in downtown Washington DC, Secretary of the Navy Josephus Daniels eyed the build-up and wondered from where the crews for all these new ships would come.

Army regulations clearly specified that only “male persons” could be enlisted, but the 1916 Navy Act (possibly through clerical omission) simply stated that “all persons” could be enlisted as necessary to meet the Navy’s needs.  Just who originated the idea of recruiting women is still debated, but Daniels jumped at the possibility of solving a major manpower crisis.  Eschewing contemporary social morays, on this date he exploited the loophole and authorized the US Navy to begin enlisting women into the rates of Electrician (radio), Yeoman, and other stateside non-combat assignments.  Officially tagged the Naval Reserve Yeoman (F) program, it was our Armed Forces’ first recognition of the contribution women could make in any role other than nursing.  Two days later, on 21 March, YN(F) Loretta Perfectus Walsh became our first “Yeomanette.”

America entered WWI before three weeks had passed. The slogan “free a man for the front” drove women to enlist for service as clerks, draftsmen, fingerprinters, translators, messengers, attendants, and camouflage designers among other duties.  One group manufacturing munitions in Newport, RI, was complemented on their efficiency.  Where 175 men had previously produced 5000 primers a week, 340 women now produced 55,000 units–the six-fold increase attributed by Daniels to the women’s ability and devotion.  Even after working hours Yeomanettes often pulled extra duty promoting war bonds or staffing recreational facilities.  On 12 August 1918, just three months before the armistice, a Marine Corps equally pressed for combat manpower followed suit by opening enlistment to similar duty for women “Marinettes.”

Throughout World War I, nearly 12,000 women honorably served the Navy, Marine Corps, and Coast Guard.  Upon their mustering-out, Josephus Daniels paid an endearing, if inadvertently misspoken tribute, “We will never forget you.  As we embrace you in uniform today, we will embrace you without a uniform tomorrow”.

Watch for more “Today in Naval History”  26 MAR 25

CAPT James Bloom, Ret.

Ebbert, Jean and Marie-Beth Hall.  Crossed Currents:  Navy Women from WWI to Tailhook.  New York, NY: Brassey’s (US), 1993, pp. 3-21.

Holm, Jeanne.  Women in the Military:  An Unfinished Revolution.  Novato, CA: Presidio Press, 1992, pp. 9-10.

Millett, Allan R.  Semper Fidelis:  The History of the United States Marine Corps.  New York, NY: Macmillan Pub Co., 1980, pp. 307-08.

Sweetman, Jack.  American Naval History: An Illustrated Chronology of the U.S. Navy and Marine Corps, 1775-Present, 2^nd ed.  Annapolis, MD: USNI Press, 1991, p. 135.

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