Page 53 (62)
“One of the most important discoveries of captured documents was made
by the Japanese Navy from the U.S. submarine Darter, which ran aground
west of Palawan on 23 October. The Japanese recovered many documents
dealing with radar, radio, and communications procedure, as well as
instruction books, engine blueprints, and various ordnance items.
It is difficult to evaluate the intelligence which the Japanese have
obtained from documents, but in those cases here it has been possible
the information has been found to be relatively accurate.“
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Figure 1: USS Darter (SS-227) grounded on Bombay Shoal off Palawan, the Philippines on 4th patrol, 24 October 1944. The shell holes from a Japanese destroyer, several US Navy submarines, and a Japanese air attack. This included 55 point-blank hits from the 6-inch deck gun of the Nautilus (SS-168) on 31st October 1944. Unfortunately, Darter was boarded prior to that shelling by an away team from a Japanese destroyer and the entire unburned contents off her classified technical library were seized for analysis by Imperial Japanese Naval Intelligence. Visible on the top of the conning tower are the undamaged radar, radio and identification friend or foe antenna’s. Photo credit — Navsource.org
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See my Chicagoboyz post here for a more complete telling of the Darter’s lost classified documents story:
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The Grounding of USS Darter — A Case Study of an Operational Security Disaster
October 29th, 2017
https://chicagoboyz.net/archives/56192.html
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The Bilgepumps podcast is now posted, see–
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Bilgepumps Episode 38: Section 22 – The Forgotten Electronic Warfare Superstars of WWII and the Historians who are changing that
FEBRUARY 24TH, 2021
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Now today’s concluding slides:
To close this series I’d like to thank the Bilgepumps podcast crew:
Alex (@AC_NavalHistory),
Drach (@Drachinifel), and
Jamie (@Armouredcarrier).
…and especially the other 16 guys on the international Section 22 Special Interest Group e-mail list who helped make this social media event possible with their contributions since March 2015
Australia:
Craig Bellamy
Kevin Davies
David Dufty
Peter Dunn
Darryl Ford
Robert Livingstone
Japan
Tadashi Yoda
New Zealand
Charles Darby
Peter Money
Peter Johnston
Ian Russell
David Glerean
USA
William Cahill
Ryan Crierie
Gene Hellickson
Robert McArthur
All of you guys rocked. Your collective work has radically changed the modern retelling of WW2 history in the Pacific. Take a bow. All of you have earned it.
These are the final Section 22 Week social Media cross posts:
“Section 22 Week” Feb 24 2021 post
Banzai facebook group
https://www.facebook.com/groups/1414345762215538/?multi_permalinks=2823788304604603¬if_id=1614120631888966¬if_t=feedback_reaction_generic&ref=notif
Section 22 Week Feb 24 2021 post
https://twitter.com/TrentTelenko/status/1364660767828496386
Finally, the thread reader roll up is at the link so you all can see the slide thread all in one place and download the thread as a PDF.
https://threadreaderapp.com/thread/1362812605539094530.html
The PDF costs a premium membership for the app. I get nothing from it.
The app has been useful to me that throwing them an income stream is the least I can do for their efforts.
Do we know wny the crew of USS Darter were not able to destroy any of the documents? Was there a protocol for doing so? The grounded sub riddled with shell holes suggests a desperate situation. Nonetheless, not letting the Japanese capture that information should seemingly have been a priority.
Lex,
Cmdr McClintock sent a separate classified letter detailing what was left behind that may be with the Navy Heritage Command in the Washingt5on Navy Yard.
It was not in any NARA or AFHRA finding aid that the Section 22 list reviewed.
Lex
At pages 216-217 of the on-line logs of USS Darter, Commander McClintock made the following remarks:
1. Demolition Outfit: It is recommended that a permanent wiring system for the demolition charges be installed on each submarine at the earliest practiable date. Conditions such as those encountered by the Darter call for this. With lightening the ship, destruction of gear installations below decks, and fires burning, the flimsey wiring provided may easily be damaged; and the wiring available to rig the charges may easily be inadequate, if the ship is left in the presence of the enemy in circumstances where it cannot be sunk.
2. Classified Matter: It is recommended that the number of registered publications carried on board be further reduced. Also that all confidential files except essential letters be turned in prior to departure on patrol. The time taken to burn all the registered publications and confidential charts, let alone ordinary confidential letters, makes this of vital importance.