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Short wrote to Marshall. Marshall replied that the War Department "appreciated fully" the need for aircraft warning systems, but it would be necessary "to comply with certain fixed regulations in those cases where facilities are to be established on lands pertaining to the Department of Interior.... The National Park Service officials are very definitely opposed to permitting structures of any type to be erected at such places as will be open to view and materially alter the natural appearance of the reservation."
By Dec. 7, a handful of radar stations were in operation. But only a handful of men knew how to run them. One man who did, Pfc. Joseph L. Lockard, was sitting at one on that fateful Sunday morning and spotted a large formation of planes. He notified Air Forces Lieut. Kermit Tyler, sole officer at the Information Center, who was there for training. Tyler thought Pfc. Lockard's planes were probably a flight of B-17s, due to arrive from the West Coast. "Forget it," said Lieut. Tyler, in effect. Said the Army Board: "By his assumption of authority he [Tyler] took responsibility and the consequences of his action should be imposed upon him." Airman Tyler has since risen to lieutenant colonel on the basis of his combat record in the South Pacific.
Tidy Attitude. One of the weirdest chapters in the report deals with the state of Hawaii's Coast Artillery Command. There were three regiments under Major General Henry T. Burgin. But their activities were limited 1) by "important and influential civilians on the island" who objected to artillery using their land for gun positions, and 2) by Ordnance's reluctance to let them have any ammunition.
Ordnance "did not want to issue any of the clean ammunition, let it out and get dirty, have to take it back in later on and renovate it." General Short supported Ordnance in this tidy attitude. As a result, said Burgin, it would take "from a few minutes to six hours before all the guns could be got in position and firing." On the morning of Dec. 7 only half the anti-aircraft guns had ammunition at hand.
Infantry, field artillery and aircraft ammunition was likewise carefully guarded by Ordnance to keep it clean. When the attack came, planes at Bellows Field had no .30-cal. machine-gun bullets.
For air defense, Major General F. L. Martin, commanding general of the Hawaiian Air Force, had only 123 modern pursuit and bombardment planes, a handful of other largely obsolete craft.
Nevertheless, testified General Marshall, Hawaii was the best-equipped base the U.S. had. Said he: "As to Hawaii . . . it had the maximum of materiel that we possessed. ... As to Panama: if the Hawaiian state of preparation in men and materiel was 100, Panama was about 25% and the Philippines about 10% and Alaska and the Aleutians completely negligible."