Japanese keyboards existed during the war, but they were very unwieldy, forcing the user to constantly shift between the three character sets. In fact, typing in Japanese usually required a trained typist all the way up to the invention of computers. To send messages in code, it was necessary to use Roman letters.
Thanks again.
Did that involve writing a message in plain text Japanese, then encoding it, then translating it into English, (or encoding it after translating into English) and then reversing the process at the other end?
If so, they’d have needed pretty special multi-lingual signallers, or did they have English / Japanese translation books, or some other way of dealing with using the Roman alphabet?
LOL at your sig. You forgot people who don’t use turn signals! (Big here is Washington, DC)
Good find on the orders. I’ve read that if the Japanese launched a third wave, many of their returning aircraft would have had to perform night carrier landing operations. Nerve racking today even with modern technology and training. But consider that the Japanese, nor anyone, hadn’t had much experience with landing carrier aircraft at night in those days…
no, sending messages in english would have been asking the USN to read their codes. They used romanization of japanese (ie writing Japanese with roman letters), which isn’t difficult: Japanese is non-tonal, has a limited syllabary, and doesn’t have any sounds that western languages don’t.
Thanks again.
Clears up something I’ve long wondered about with the designations of Japanese operations like MO and FS.
In the interests of maintaining the high standards of this board, the sig has gone to sig heaven. 
Well, the USNavy thought so much of Isoruku they were prepared to compromise their own codes simply to “Grab the Peacock By the Tail” over Bougainville!
THEY certainly took Yamammoto seriously enough!
There was a SMALL group of nightlanders present at Coral Sea. Their attack was a fiasco, with returning aircraft actually attempting to land on a US Carrier!
Like all Japanese air assets, there were never enough of them, no endless supply of avaition gas to set in motion a pilot training program on the scale of Britain/US Australia.
Aussies trained 14,000 pilots for the Empire Air Training Scheme alone!
Too many to compete with…
True, but it’s interesting to read the debates about whether it was proper or moral to target and kill him, making the Allies assassins rather than soldiers.
Same sort of rubbish that goes on between national leaders who think they’re too precious for the death and destruction they readily approve for lesser mortals.
I thought he was a great commander. problem is he didn’t last long. he was killed in an air attack during Guadalcanal in 1942
it won the battle. or I should say the code breakers won it
Concentration of Japanese Carriers was certainly not detrimental. When you group Carriers into a large formation, the size of the airstrike you can launch, without resorting to wasteful “waves” of aircraft, is larger. The “Box” formation was not practiced by the U.S. Navy,(U.S. TF’s were designed principally for maximization of anti-aircraft fire). The more Carriers you have in a task force, the more “screening” vessels you need to cover their activities. Minoru Genda came up with the “box” to maximize the attacking power of the “Kudo Butai” (“Combined Fleet”)…
Right up until Wade Mcluskey’s Dive Bombers attcked, Operation MO was on the “upswing”…Fletcher and Spruance’s Carriers had been cornered, and the strike of over 200 attack aircraft was sure to be a lot more than a nuisance…two factors combined to tip the situation decisively in favour of the U.S…
1/ The previous “wave” of American attacking aircraft were torpedo bombers. The pilots of Lt. Cmdr John C. Waldron’s TORPEDO SQDRN 8 flew on to attack in the certain knowledge that they wer beyond return range. Attacking unescorted against heavy AA fire and fighters, they were all shot down (Ensign George Gay survived. Clutching an aircraft seat for floatation, he watched the battle from the water and lived to see three carriers slipping beneath the waves)…despite their small numbers, they succeeded in pulling down to water level the fierce Combat Air Patrol of the “Kudo Batai”. Torpedo 8 have justly become famous for their bravery in pressing the attack. But they deserve to be equally famous for their bravery just in flying the mission. Even had they survived the attack they could not have returned to their carrier…by the time Mcluskey’s divebombers arched over to attack, the combat air patrol of “Kudo Batai” were nowhere to be seen…
QUOTE… PRE-BATTLE MESSAGE…
[i][b]"My greatest hope is that we encounter a favourable tactical situation, but if we don’t and worst comes to worst, I want each one of us to do his utmost to destroy our enemies. If there is only one plane left to make a final run-in, I want that man to go in and get a hit. May God be with us all. Good luck, happy landings, and give em’ hell!..
Lt Cmdr JOHN C. Waldron…June 3rd, 1942…[/b][/i]
2/ Mcluskey had been searching for the “Kudo Batai”, and had so far failed to make contact. Flying up and down, he was moving in precisely the opposite direction for contact to be made.
Until…
glancing down at the water surface, he noticed a Japanese Fleet DD (the ARASHI) making full speed. ARASHI had been detached from the “Kudo Batai” to investigate a submarine warning (there was, in fact, an American Sub operating in the vicinity, but ARASHI could not pin it down. After a fruitless search, she was making haste to rejoin the fleet. Mcluskey looked down and thanked providence. The direction of the ARASHI’s wake pointed his divebombers straight at their intended target. 10 to 15 minutes more, and Mcluskey would have been sending his bombers home after jettisoning their payloads.
They were running out of time, and ARASHI had lead them straight “on the money”…
They arrived at the precise time as some of the first aircraft were rolling down the catapults to form up for what would have been an AWESOME attack, and possibly the continuance of the “fruits of victory” for another six months…all gone in 5-10 minutes…
RADIO TRANSMISSIONS FROM DIVEBOMBER PILOTS AT THE BATTLE OF MIDWAY…
“Entering dive…our objective is the rear ship. STEP ON IT!..are we going to attack, or what?”
[b][i]“THEY’RE ALL BURNING!!!”
“THAT scared the hell out of me! I thought we weren’t going to pull out!”
“Your bomb really hit them on the fantail! Boy, thats swell!!”
“These Japs are as easy as shooting ducks in a rain barrel…”
“Gee!..I wish I had just one more bomb!”
“Tojo, you son of a bitch, send out the rest and we’ll get those too!”[/b][/i]
If that last attack from the “Kudo Batai” had gotten airborne, you would be referring to Isoruku Yamamoto as an unreserved GENIUS in the art of modern naval warfare…
As it was…the LUCK FACTOR prevailed…
Task Force groupings were prepared days or weeks in advance. Each Task Force had it’s own set of signal codes, which a ship from a different TF would not know. Thus a strange ship could not simply “join” a new task force and start taking orders from it. In some of the battles, U.S. carriers nominally belonging to the same TF operated many miles apart with seperate “screens”. In real terms, they would be seperate TFs…
In 1942, the U.S. Navy was barely accustomed to operating even TWO carriers close together - this had seldom been done in peacetime manuevers -and would never have tried to operate three.
The U.S caught up with Japanese practice in that respect later in the war…
Yamamoto does not look so incompetent now…does he?
The Allies thought so much of his command style, that they were prepared to compromise their entire code breaking efforts specifically to eliminate this man over Bougainville, in an aeriel ambush that brought down the G4 “Betty” transport he was travelling in…
If he was incompetent, they most certainly would have left him in charge…
Agree,but I still think the Y’s luck is really too bad.This plan will work if only they had a little luck.
Do you have a ww2 pacific book in youre lap while you are typing:rolleyes:
he was a great leader.he lost his aircraft carreiers in 3 days.
How and who cause his three aircraft carriers to be lost?