Note: This article was submitted in January 2018. -Ed
The United States Navy is well known for publicizing removal of its commanding officers. In the last three months, five levels of the Pa cific Fleet chain of command were either removed from command or told their careers were finished. While publicly announcing the remov als, the Navy is also notoriously reticent in discussing them with any detail. Much of this derives from a deep seated cultural desire to not air dirty laundry. Some of it derives from a modern concept of privacy; some from an older concept of shame. And some part derives from the guilt associated with schadenfreude – the pleasure felt at someone’s mis fortune and the relief felt that the misfortune fell to someone else. The cultural approach to reliefs is such that very little is written about them, and because so little is written, what is written becomes writ.
Recent actions in the Pacific are not the Navy’s first brush with com mand removal. Two previous spikes brought internal Navy investiga tions. Historically, removing commanding officers is unusual, but also not unheard of. Removal for operational or personal failings, was, and is, part and parcel of the business of going to sea and fighting a war. And, just like today, little of substance was written about the removals. There were no newspaper stories detailing the problems associated with naval command. No messages between commanders seeking solutions to any sort of ‘skipper problem.’ No guidance to the Fleet on improved profes sionalism, or to increase sleep. No added PowerPoint training.
At the start of World War II there were weightier issues to cover in the press and via message. However, as America and her Navy moved past the existential threat, actions poorly documented took on lives of their own and oral tradition filled in for fact. The first open recognition that there’d been any sort of problem came in 1975 with Clay Blair’s seminal work Silent Victory. Blair combined contemporary war reports with postwar data reconstruction and interviewed hundreds, if not thou sands, submarine veterans. He greatly benefited from 30 years of post war scholarship. He also suffered some from post-war nostalgia. Blair’s work is the basis for the modern understanding of how WWII submarine skippers performed and typically any discussion of World War II, sub marine commanders, warfighting prowess, leadership (or lack thereof), or commanding officer removal likely includes a comment along the lines that ‘at the beginning of World War II a third of submarine com manders were relieved – generally because they were unaggressive or bad leaders.’
The conventional wisdom is simple: the undersea Pacific War went poorly until warrior skippers took command of submarines and purged the interwar era plans, procedures, tactics and mindset from the force. There’s only one problem with this idea; it isn’t true. Or at least the issue is far more complicated than the accepted basis that one third of COs were relieved. Blair’s passage is oft referenced, but less often cited, and reads thus:
During 1942, the three commands [Commander Submarine Force Pacific Fleet, Commander Submarines Asiatic Fleet, and Commander Submarines Southwest Pacific] relieved about 40 skippers out of 135 – almost 30 percent – because of poor health, battle fatigue, or nonproduc tivity [sic], mostly the last.;
However, a modern review of patrol records, promotion patterns, and subsequent assignments for those skippers shows a different reality.
Blair mentions some reliefs by name but only clearly identifies 29 of the 40 he asserts were relieved in that first dark year. A review of patrol data from the San Francisco Maritime National Park Association and commanding officer names and assignments collated by Stephen Svona vec at fleetorganization.com confirms a total of 29 reliefs for cause out of 131 submarine commanding officers; but only 29. Ifwe stopped at the numbers one could argue there’s no real discrepancy. 29 of 131, 22%, isn’t as great a number as Blair’s “almost 30%.” So what? It’s not until each relief is separated and addressed individually that the new picture emerges.
Yes, somewhere between twenty and thirty percent of submarine commanding officers were relieved for cause in 1942. However, while just under half of these officers were removed for not producing in most cases the issues were far more complicated that simple passivity. 10 were removed or requested relief over physical or mental health issues. Three were reportedly removed for bad planning or bad luck. Two were relieved for unrecorded causes, the reason and rationale lost to history.
More interesting, given Blair’s statements, of the 14 commanders re lieved for poor patrols in 1941 and 1942, five returned to command sub marines later in the war. Four were awarded the Navy Cross for actions during those reportedly non-productive patrols. Additionally, in the first year of the war, there were almost 200 patrols – and 76 of them produced no attacks. Of those who attacked, only 64 had at least one confirmed sinking. In thirteen months of war, Pacific Fleet submarines had a one in three chance of firing a torpedo on patrol, and if a torpedo was fired there was a less than fifty percent chance of sinking a ship. However, only 14 commanders were relieved for poor patrols.
While Blair lays blame at the feet of non-producing COs, he also points out the inescapable facts these additional statistics show – there was more to the ‘skipper problem’ than just submarine commanding offi cers. Blair writes, in the next paragraph down from the issue of non-pro ductivity that “[t]he major reason for the submarine failure of 1942 was not mechanical, physical or psychological. It was…a failure of imagina tion on the highest levels by King, Edwards, Nimitz, Hart, Wilkes, With ers, English, Lockwood, Christie, and Fife.”ii This failure of imagination lay not only with prosecuting the war, but in what to do with officers in command. Some of that failure of imagination also lays with Blair, who either ignored or downplayed later contributions of some officers he spe cifically names. The divergence between Blair’s statements and reality are well illustrated in the cases of Donald McGregor, Joseph Callaghan, and Morton Mumma.
Lieutenant Commander Donald John McGregor took command of USS Gar (SS 206) in April 1941. He led Gar through four war patrols, was awarded the Navy Cross for her first war patrol (February to March 1942) but patrols three and four resulted in no attacks and in Novem ber 1942 McGregor was removed from command. Between November 1942 and March 1943, he was promoted to Commander before taking command of USS Seahorse (SS 304) where in one patrol he made two attacks and was depth charged off Palau. On return to Midway, McGre gor was removed from command after, Blair writes, his executive offi cer complained to Commander Submarines, Pacific that McGregor was “failing in his duty.”;;; Command of Seahorse then passed to that same executive officer. As was common with most relieved commanders, Blair never mentions McGregor again. Records show that McGregor left submarines but was promoted to Captain before taking command of USS Laurens (APA-153) in 1944 and later commanding Service Squad ron 1. He retired in 1956, after thirty years’ service, as a Rear Admiral. He died in 1982.
Lieutenant Commander Joseph A. Callaghan took command of USS Porpoise (SS-172) in June 1939. When the Japanese attacked, Porpoise was in the Philippines for refit. All four main engines were in various states of overhaul and her entire after battery was removed. In two weeks she was seaworthy and transited to Manila, beginning her first war patrol on December 22nd. Before ending her patrol a month later, Porpoise attacked two ships without result. During the patrol Callaghan suffered from extreme exhaustion. He told Blair “I have always consid ered that I had all the requisites for being a successful wartime subma rine commander, except one: stamina. That was my undoing, the lack of it and total exhaustion I experienced may be attributed to it.” Like McGregor, Callaghan also had a poor relationship with his executive officer. In Callaghan’s war patrol report he placed blame for a poorly executed, and missed, shot, on exhaustion saying he would not have fired had he been in “full possession of his mental faculties.”iv Callaghan was relieved as soon as the war patrol ended. Command passed to Lieutenant Commander John McKnight. McKnight began the war in command of S-36, which ran aground in Makassar Strait. Damage was so severe that S-36 was scuttled. McKnight was not blamed for the incident! Nor did he suffer for taking Porpoise into a typhoon. McKnight was eventually relieved of command, after making four war patrols. His first two were unsuccessful, however in his last two he made six attacks and sank two ships. Blair says of McKnight that he “found plenty of good targets, twenty-three in all…However, he failed to capitalize on his opportuni-ties. When he returned, Lockwood criticized him…”and “regretted” that McKnight had not attacked more targets. McKnight left submarines for good, going to communications duty.” vi
Like McGregor, Blair acts as if Callaghan and McKnight drop off the face of the earth. Callaghan became the executive officer in USS Holland (AS-3) before taking command of USS Hanover (APA-116) in 1945 and USS Oneida (APA-221) in 1946. In 1953 he served as the Chief of Staff to the Commandant of the First Naval District. He retired as a Captain and died in 1988. McKnight might have gone to “commu nications duty” but he was also awarded the Silver Star for his service in command of S-36 and Porpoise. By August 1943 he was in command of USS Litchfield (DD-336). In 1952 he took command of USS Prairie (AD-15). He retired in 1959 and died in 2002.
One of Blair’s more egregious stories, and omissions, concerns Lieu tenant Commander Morton C. Mumma, Jr. Blair spends two pages on Mumma’s war patrol in USS Sailfish (SS-192). Mumma, Blair writes, was handpicked for Sailfish to overcome her previous bad luck and sink ing as USS Squalus (SS-192). Blair concedes that despite Mumma’s focus as a “strict disciplinarian”, “strong personality” and “zeal, compe tence, and emphasis on spit and polish” the boat was “different” because of her experience as Squalus. On December 13, 1941, Mumma and Sail fish encountered two destroyers and submerged to make the approved pre-war doctrinal sonar approach and attack. Sailfish was detected and attacked, but still fired two torpedoes. The destroyers pressed their at tack, dropping almost two dozen depth charges. Mumma, according to Blair, “went to pieces.”vii He purportedly turned command of the boat over to his executive officer who immediately radioed higher command. On return to Manila, Mumma was relieved of command – and also pre sented the Navy Cross. Blair surmises the award was “designed to save everybody embarrassment” and then writes of how devastating being relieved of command is:
To fail in command usually spelled the end for an officer, denying him an opportunity for good jobs and advancement to flag rank. Mum ma’s humiliation before his classmates and fellow submariners was fur ther heightened by the fact that he had no way to leave Manila for other duty. He had to remain and face them every morning. Many officers, especially the younger ones, were appalled by Mumma’s conduct in war. No one could understand it. At the Naval Academy, they had been ex horted to “go in harm’s way” and give their lives for their country. But they were soon to discover that Mumma was no isolated case. All too many of his contemporaries in the submarine force showed a disinclina tion to attack the enemy boldly and persistently, an unforeseen circum stance that would plague the submarine force throughout the war.viii
Again, Blair is both overstating, and understating, the issue. The Navy Cross is the second highest award for valor. The idea that this award might be presented “to save everybody embarrassment” is dubi ous. However, if one accepts the idea the award was given as Blair char acterized, then one must also accept that Pacific command leadership saw greater issues than one commanding officer breaking down in com bat – and those issues may have impacted relief rates. Mumma also soon returned to command. Mumma, whose conduct Blair called “appalling,” commanded Task Group 50.1 – the PT boats in the Southwest Pacific. From 1943 through 1944 he led his boats from Papua New Guinea, sup porting the Pacific advance.ix On his regular relief in 1944 he received the Legion of Merit and became the naval aide to the Secretary of the Navy, James Forrestal. He retired in 1946 but was recalled for the Ko rean War. After his second retirement, and tombstone promotion to Rear Admiral, he served as the president of the National Rifle Association before dying of cancer in 1968. A recipient of the Order of the British Empire, Mumma is also remembered via Mort Bay, Papua New Guinea, named in his honor and the NRA’s Mumma Trophy which recognizes his and his father’s contributions to the association.
These officers are not anomalies. Adrian Melvin Hurst command ed USS Permit (SS-178) for three years and two war patrols, the last of which resulted in three sunken ships. Hurst’s tour was dogged with bad engines, multiple health issues among his crew, and one patrol with extra personnel where the boat ran short of food. He was relieved and disappears from “Silent Victory”. The rest of his story includes com mand of an an LST task group in the assault on Makin Island, promotion to Captain and command of Naval Station San Diego. He died in 1975. Hamilton Stone was relieved of command after two years in USS Snap per (SS-185). He led two war patrols and was credited with one sinking. After leaving Snapper he moved among staff jobs before assignment as executive officer in USS Orion (AS-18). He later served as operations officer of a gunfire support group during the amphibious assaults on Iwo Jima and Okinawa for which he received the Bronze Star. After the war he commanded the Japanese Cruiser Sakawa, transferring her to Bikini Atoll for atomic bomb testing. In January 1947 he promoted to Captain and retired. He died in 1993. Stone’s relief in Snapper, Harold L. Bak er, was also relieved after two patrols but returned to command in USS Cuttlefish (SS-171). Edward R. Hannon commanded USS S-43 for more than three years before being relieved for “not producing.” He returned to command USS Dolphin (SS-169) for almost two years before leaving submarines to command USS Orion (AS-18) as a Captain.
One early relief might surprise some because not only did the officer get a second chance at command, but he also became one of the most successful and decorated commanders of the war. Dudley “Mush” Mor ton was relieved for cause in 1942 by Captain John Haines, commander Submarine Division 42, who described Morton’s command, USS Dol phin, as “filthy and [that] Morton [was] incompetent to fix it.” Morton agreed, reportedly telling his executive officer that “The Dolphin is a death trap. I’m going to try to get off her. I advise you to do the same.”x
Rescued by another senior officer who knew him, largely because they’d both played football at the Naval Academy, Morton returned to command only a few months later. Morton commanded USS Wahoo (SS-238) through four war patrols. This sinking record in four patrols placed him third in post war tallies and earned him four Navy Crosses; a record he compiled in less than a year before Wahoo was lost with all hands on her seventh war patrol (Morton’s fifth as commander). Despite his successes, Morton had one patrol where he returned after making six attacks but without sinking a single ship. Even the most successful commanders had bad, or unproductive, patrols.
Morton’s success in Wahoo eclipsed his problems with Dolphin. To day Morton is one of the best known and celebrated Pacific War sub marine commanders. In 1960 Vice Admiral Charles A. Lockwood, Jr.,wrote about Morton:
When a natural leader and born daredevil such as Mush Morton is given command of a submarine, the result can only be a fighting ship of the highest order, with officers and men who would follow their skipper to the Gates of Hell …. And they did. Morton lined up an impressive number of ‘firsts’ during the short ten months that he commanded Wahoo: first to penetrate an enemy harbor and sink a ship therein; first to use suc cessfully a down the throat shot; and first to wipe out an entire convoy single-handed.xi
Lockwood commanded submarines throughout the war culminating as Commander, Submarine Force Pacific from 1943 to 1946. During 1942 and 1943 he personally relieved at least 8 skippers for a variety of reasons. His epitaph for Morton stands in stark contrast to John Haines’ words. Who was right? Was either wrong? Lockwood, despite author ing over eight books about submarine operations during the war, never directly addressed the skipper problem, which leaves historians wanting for an explanation of the difference.
Morton’s experience is one extreme of this “skipper problem” but is not an extreme in isolation. Morton’s predecessor in Wahoo, LCDR Marvin G. Kennedy, was relieved for not being aggressive enough. He left submarines and after a tour as repair officer in USS Bushnell (AS- 15) he took command of USS Guest (DD-472) and was awarded the Silver Star for action in Guam, the Palau Islands, and The First Battle of the Philippine Sea – an action Blair acknowledges. The award was his second Silver Star – he also earned one while in command of Wahoo, on the same patrol for which he was later relieved of command for not being aggressive enough.
In addition to John McKnight and S-36, at least four other com manders ran their submarines aground. One, Albert Bontier, was re moved after grounding USS Razorback(SS-394) during her 1944 shake down cruise but returned in command of USS Seawolf (SS-197) only weeks later. The other, William N. Wylie, was removed after grounding USS Scorpion (SS-278) in 1943. Wylie left submarines and went on to command USS Stormes (DD-780). He was awarded the Navy Cross during his first submarine war patrol and later the Silver Star for ac-
tions during the Battle of Okinawa while in command of Stormes. He was promoted to Captain prior to retirement and died in 1960. In 1942, Lieutenant Commander Francis Brown ran S-39 aground and she was so damaged the crew eventually abandoned ship. While there were rec ommendations that Brown receive court martial, he was actually moved to command another submarine, S-43. In 1944 Lieutenant Commander John D. Crowley ran USS Flier aground on her maiden patrol while entering Midway harbor during a storm. During the attempted recovery submarine rescue vessel USS Macaw also ran aground, broached and sank killing her commanding officer and four crew. Crowley took Flier to San Francisco for repairs and remained in command. He returned to sea, completed one war patrol and was awarded the Navy Cross. One her second patrol Flier sank, likely from striking a mine between Bor neo and the Philippines. He and seven crew members survived nearly a month on Palawan Island before rescue. Crowley retired as a Captain and died in 1997.
The numbers and stories presented here largely focus on 1941 and 1942, the timeframe Blair is most critical of. In 1943, 18 Pacific Fleet submarine skippers were relieved and in 1944 there were eight. These numbers all belong in context.
In five years of war, over 700 individual officers completed over a thousand command tours. In total only 60 officers are clearly identified as relieved of command-less than 10 percent. Of those 60, 25 returned to command, some in submarines, some in surface ships. Of those who returned to command, many continued on to major command and flag rank. Eight became executive officers in submarines and surface ships, and the remainder continued in staff positions. In the end, only two com manders, of700, left the service after their reliefs and in both those cases severe mental illness manifested in command carried past the relief.
As for timidness or non-producing, in over 1700 submarine patrols in the Pacific and Atlantic Oceans, 545 patrols were completed without an attack. 446 were in the Pacific Ocean. In the Atlantic, of 114 patrols only 5 resulted in ship sinkings. No Atlantic commanders are document ed as removed for non-productive patrols.
Conversely, there were only 21 patrols with 10 or more attacks. The names in these patrols are legend, as they should be. O’Kane, Fluckey, Underwood, Klakring, Nimitz (Jr), and Morton. However, when order ing these high attack patrols by date a new picture appears. 1942 had only three patrols with 10 or more attacks (R. E. Moore in Stingray, F. W. Fenno in Trout, and T. B. Klakring in Guard.fish). These 35 attacks re sulted in 13 ships sunk and two more damaged. By comparison, in 1944 there were 11 patrols with 10 or more attacks totaling 120 attacks for 65 ships sunk. Essentially, early war commanders were not producing – for many reasons. Relieving 29, or 40, did little to change the odds.
It’s time we put to bed the idea that early World War II submarine commanders were not aggressive, non-producing or acted cowardly. Some may have been, but more probably they were only doing as trained
– acting as ordered. In order to understand today, to know what our ac tions today may cause “we must first understand our history – how we got to where we are.” xii
