Free No Ordinary Joes by Larry Colton

expansionism and the conquest of China. Over the years the Japanese navy had steadily grown, and as part of the treaty ending World War I, Japan had been awarded the Marianas (less Guam), Carolinas, and Marshalls. These islands, if developed as naval bases, would cut off U.S. lines to the Philippines and would enhance the power and mobility of the Japanese fleet. Plan Orange assumed an initial Japanese attack would come on the Philippines, America’s most vulnerablearea. To prevent this, the plan was for a small Army garrison and the Asiatic Fleet to hold them off until the Pacific Fleet could sail to the rescue from Pacific waters, including Pearl Harbor. Plan Orange dominated all U.S. naval planning and thinking.
    In 1940, the U.S. naval forces in the Pacific had been divided into two fleets: the Asiatic, which guarded the Philippines, and the Pacific, based in Pearl Harbor. When Japanese troops moved into Indochina to build air bases, U.S. naval officers were convinced that war with Japan was inevitable. By October 1941, the number of submarines in the Asiatic Fleet had been increased to twenty-nine (out of a total of fifty), leaving the Pacific Fleet at Pearl Harbor seriously depleted.
    Rear Admiral Thomas Withers was in charge of the Pearl Harbor fleet, and on paper he had twenty-one subs, but in November 1941, only ten were actually in the harbor. Most of the rest were at Mare Island in California for repairs. The
Gudgeon
, with Chuck now on board, was one of the ships in Hawaii.
    In Japan, Prime Minister Tojo had made the decision to widen the war beyond his nation’s expansion into China, with plans to invade the Philippines, Hong Kong, Singapore, and the Malay Peninsula, as well as Thailand and Java for their rich oil deposits. To accomplish this, a key strategy was the total destruction of U.S. naval forces in the Pacific. The first target would be the U.S. fleet at Pearl Harbor. If it could be destroyed in a single strike, the U.S. Navy could not recover in time to mount a counteroffensive.
    It was 7:00 a.m. Sunday morning, December 7, 1941. In the waters just outside Pearl Harbor sat five U.S. submarines, including the USS
Gudgeon
. For the past two days the
Gudgeon
had been practicing firing dummy torpedoes. The Navy brass were concerned about the performance and accuracy of their new Mark XIV torpedoes. The entire Pacific Fleet was on high alert due to the growing threat of a military strike by Japan.
    Wearing only his dungarees, Chuck readied himself for the day. Walking across the deck, he whistled “Elmer’s Tune”—a song stuck in his headever since he’d heard it the night before on the
Lucky Strike Hit Parade
on Armed Services Radio. He’d spent Saturday night studying the sub’s electrical system so he could pass that part of his qualifying test.
    At eight o’clock the ship’s Sunday morning calm was disrupted by an announcement over the PA system: “Now hear this, now hear this. This is the captain speaking. Pearl Harbor is under attack. There are air raids on Pearl Harbor. This is not a drill. I repeat: This is not a drill. Prepare to dive.”
    Chuck wasn’t sure what to think, but an attack on Pearl Harbor seemed too far-fetched to believe.
    The
Gudgeon
, with the normal complement of five officers and fifty-five enlisted men on board, submerged, staying under the surface for most of the next twenty-four hours. The next morning, December 8, they were ordered to return to Pearl Harbor and arrived that afternoon. Chuck stood on the deck, unprepared for the devastation he saw—the water in the harbor coated with oil; half-sunken ships still burning; bandaged men lying everywhere. And the smell, the horrible smell: a mix of smoke, oil, and burned flesh.
    On one of the burning ships he saw a man crawling out of a porthole with torn skin hanging from his arms. Everywhere there were medics and men being carried away on stretchers. Chuck scanned the skies over the valley to the east, looking for