Piercing the Fog - Air Force Historical Studies Office

Piercing the Fog
to the Philippines. We were pretty sure that they would attack Wake and
Midway when they did attack. . . . So I think that there was a general acceptance
of the possibilities of Japanese aggression, certainly against the Philippines and
against Wake and Midway, and possibly, against Hawaii.”’3R
Evaluations of the intelligence failure at Pearl Harbor would reveal
deficiencies not only in organization but also in interpretation. Miles himself
stated: “In estimating the situation . . . there are two principles that should be
followed: One is never to lose sight of or ignore anything that the enemy may
do that is within its capabilities whether you think it is wise for him to do that
or not . . . . The second is to concede to your enemy the highest form of good
sense and good judgment.”13’ There are those who argue that the U.S.
government somehow had advance warning of the Pearl Harbor attack which
it chose to ignore. The most exacting examination of the story of Pearl Harbor,
however, concludes that the United States was genuinely ~urprised.’~’ That
surprise resulted in no small way from the intelligence analysis failure that
accepted estimates of probable enemy intentions rather than accepting broadrange
assessments of enemy capability for alternate actions.
A Tentative Assessment
Had Pearl Harbor represented an isolated failure of prewar intelligence, it
would have been difficult enough to explain. As the United States found itself
at war, the attacks on Pearl Harbor and the Philippines were examples of what
Arnold later referred to as “one of the most wasteful weaknesses in our whole
setup . . . our lack of a proper Air Intelligence Organi~ation.”’~‘
To a large extent, the problems with air intelligence in the years before
1942 reflected the broader issues of the role of air power and its place in the
national defense establishment. In an era when honest differences of opinion
and inevitable bureaucratic infighting were exaggerated by tight budgets and
crippling manpower limitations, struggles over where to place air intelligence
functions within the War Department and the Air Corps were inevitable. The
uncertain and often confusing responsibilities of General Staff and Air
Corps/Air Forces intelligence organizations reflected a search for organizational
identity in the development of the Air Corps. As with any evolutionary process,
progress proceeded by fits and starts, with false offshoots and inappropriate
adaptations occurring along the way.
Compounding organizational issues were the broader, and ultimately more
critical, conceptual ones of defining what constituted air intelligence and
determining how it should be acquired, interpreted, and disseminated. Those
airmen who developed the theory of strategic bombing at the ACTS in the
1930s recognized that it demanded far more than traditional intelligence
information such as enemy OBs and combat capabilities. Their grasp did not
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