US Marine Corps - The Black Vault

290 Amphibians Came To Conquer
INTELLIGENCE CHILLS
One of the first things that Rear Admiral Turner was told upon his
arrival in Wellington, New Zealand, was that Tulagi had already been
named in the local papers as a probable amphibious assault objective. This
perturbed him.”
A Wellington daily newspaper, Tbe Dominion, on 4 July 1942 carried a
long story with a New York City dateline quoting Major George Fielding
Eliot as having said in the New Yo~k Herald Tvibane:
What is needed, is to drive the Japanese out of their positions and convert
them to our own use, The only way to take positions such as Rabaul, Wake
Island and Tulagi is to land troops to take physical possession of them.zj
Observation of the amenities of military life seemed the best and simplest
cover plan to disguise the imminence of the combat operation, if not its
destination, so the Governor General of New Zealand, Marshal of the
Royal Air Force, Sir Cyril Newall, E.C.B., O. M., G. C.M.B., C. B.E., kindly
entertained the senior officers at dinner.
Despite the cover plan, on 21 July 1942, the day before sailing, Rear
Admiral Turner, reported to the Area Commander, Vice Admiral Ghormley:
A very disturbing circumstance is that a lot of New Zealand civilians in the
government service seem to know the general features of our plans. We are
having this investigated, but believe the leak occurred in the New Zealand
Intelligence Office, which the Marines consulted in order to obtain information.
However, in a happier mood, he said:
On the whole, I feel well satisfted with the plan, although there are one
or two tough spots in it. I do not underestimate enemy reaction either in the
air or on the surface. On the contrary, the arrangement of force proposed
is designed to take care of these reactions as well as we can. I am trying to
leave as little to chance as possible—but since the operation has been decided
upon, the best thing to do is to assume it will be successful and to push it
through as rapidly as possible.z’
ORGANIZATION FOR WATCHTOWER
The command diagram in COMSOPAC’S Operation Plan 1–42 for
WATCHTOWER, dated 16 July 1942, was simplicity itself.
mTurner.
= Herbert L. Merillat, The Islutsd (Boston: Houghton Mifflin Co., 1944), p. 11. Reprinted by
permission of Harold Ober Associates Inc. Copyright 1944 H. L. Merillat.
z~RKT to Ghor~ley, persona] letter, 21 Ju1. 19.12.