At 1:20 a.m. on December 7, 1941, on the darkened bridge of the Japanese aircraft carrier Akagi, Vice Admiral Chuichi Nagumo was handed the following message: “Vessels moored in harbor: 9 battleships; 3 class B cruisers; 3 seaplane tenders, 17 destroyers. Entering harbor are 4 class B cruisers; 3 destroyers. All aircraft carriers and heavy cruisers have departed harbor….No indication of any changes in U.S. Fleet or anything unusual.”
American officials could have easily found the Japanese spy who set the stage for the Pearl Harbor attack—if only they had looked.
Nagumo was commanding a task force about to strike Pearl Harbor, crush the Pacific Fleet there, and open Japan's war with the United States. The message, the last of many sent from the code room at the Japanese consulate in Honolulu, was received only hours before the attack—now 70 years ago.
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