Operation Vengeance: The Secret Mission to Assassinate the Architect of the Pearl Harbor Attack

Nearly a year and a half after the Pearl Harbor attack, the United States Office for Naval Intelligence intercepted and deciphered a coded message from the Japanese. The Americans realised they had struck gold. The message contained the detailed travel schedule of Yamamoto, who was planning to visit troops on the Solomon Islands in an attempt to boost morale. What followed was preparing an incredibly daring and risky secret operation: Operation Vengeance, the mission to assassinate the mastermind behind the Pearl Harbor Attack.

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Chapters:
0:00 Introduction
1:42 Deciphering the Itinerary
4:18 Operation Vengeance
9:15 The Controversy

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The content of this video covers events, people or concepts via a lecture-style presentation that is educational and historical in nature. Every video is original content by House of History. The events relating to conflict in this video are portrayed in their historical context without either value judgment or an ideological message attached to it. There is no intent to shock, upset or disgust. The goal of my channel is to make interesting lecture-style videos, no more, no less.

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By February 1943 the tide of the war in the Pacific was decisively shifting in favour of the United States. The Japanese had retreated from Guadalcanal, lost many warships, aircraft carriers and aircraft, and the morale of Imperial troops was plummeting. From his base in Rabaul, Papua New Guinea, Yamamoto decided to visit troops on the frontlines on Bougainville, part of the Solomon Islands Archipelago. The visit’s goal was to increase soldiers’ dwindling morale. They often complained about the lack of senior commanders ascertaining the frontlines’ situation.

Now, over the years American, British, French and Dutch codebreakers cooperated in order to break the Japanese naval codes and cyphers. Japan’s main, and most secure communication scheme used by the Imperial Japanese Navy was referred to as JN-25. Intercepting dozens of coded Japanese diplomatic and military messages, slowly but surely the grasp on JN-25 strengthened.

One of the critical methods was the so-called known-plaintext attack, abbreviated to KPA, and commonly known as exploiting “Cribs.” Basically, the process of cribbing meant cryptographers inferred coded messages with the partial knowledge of plaintext they expected. Japanese military orders often contained sentences such as “I have the honor to inform your excellency…”. Knowing this helped cryptographers to decipher intercepted coded messages.
And although the Japanese Navy adopted improved variants, namely JN-25b, c and eventually d, Allied codebreakers managed to decipher large parts of the messages that were transmitted by the Japanese, albeit without their knowledge.

If you have any feedback, questions or criticism feel free to leave a comment. Your opinion truly aids me in improving the content of the channel! If you have a question, feel free to leave a comment and I will either write a reply, answer your question in a Q&A video, or make an entire video about it!

Sources:

Written by House of History

Further reading: Kahn, David (1996) [1967]. The Codebreakers. Macmillan.

Photos, paintings and imagery: Public Domain, Wikicommons

#HouseofHistory #History

[connorb]

I think the name of the operation speaks volumes. As an American, I'll always remember Pearl Harbor, but the death of Yamamoto reminds me of a scene in one of my favorite books where a character asks whether they seek vengeance or justice, and the other replies regretfully that vengence is easier, and requires less thought.

[benanimates]

My great grandfather was that code breaker

[michaelcampbell]

Everyone's a samurai until the P38's show

[khkartc]

I understand that Japanese Admiral Ozawa expressed dismay at Yamamoto’s including all of the details of his itinerary in even a coded message. He could sense how much was riding on the unbreakability of JN-25–I.e., high consequence—no matter how low the perceived risk was of decryption. No one on the Japanese side could know the _actual_ risk, and their perceptions were informed all along by their racist dismissal of America as a nation of ignorant, cowardly barbarians. Even Ozawa had to learn that lesson the hard way in the Philippine Sea.

[douglassauvageau]

Peripheral-Credit for the success of Operation Vengeance must be given to Charles A. Lindbergh. Blackballed by the White House from U.S. military service due to his pre-war opposition to belligerence, Pacific Commanders Nimitz and MacArthur surreptitiously employed a belatedly-proactive Lindbergh to improve the aeronautic technologies and tactics employed in that theater. Lindbergh demonstrated operational techniques which extended the range of the P-38 Lightening and made Operation Vengeance (and other operations) feasible.

[oceanhome]

He was also the master mind of the (Failed) Midway attack

[Trident]

He was an enemy combatant. He was not assassinated. He was killed in action. End of story.

[katnerd-Glen]

Yamamoto's reasoning for not attacking the US, I recall reading somewhere, was based on his knowledge of the country having, by a huge margin, the largest industrial infrastructure in the world. Probably dwarfing all other Western nations combined. To the best of my knowledge he was the only leader opposing the Allies who was actually aware of this, the others simply fearing the US's natural resources being thrown behind Britain's manufacturing industry.

[skeletonmakesgood]

It was not an assassination. It was war.

[sherirobinson]

Always enjoy the house of history... desktop, coffee cup, pic's and maps...a recipe for success 👍

[chrisg]

I'm glad you acknowledged that it was probably Rex Barber who did the shoot down instead of Lanphier who was a complete bastard and imo he engaged in stolen valor by trying to take credit for it and purposefully trying to discredit Barber. The behavior of lanphier was pretty despicable as he went against everything that the military is supposed to stand for while Barber seems to have been just refuting his claim. You're not supposed to proclaim yourself the hero and take all the attention which is what Lanphier did.

[dennisburby]

I think Yamamoto insisted that a declaration of war was delivered before the attack on Pearl Harbor. But poor deciphering(or intentional malice) delayed it in DC. I can't quite honor the man, but the attack on Pearl was brilliant. Also believe he was against warring with the US, knowing the eventual outcome

[goals]

Hello, I'm a French viewer
In French:
Avec les sous titres automatiquement traduit en français, je peux regarder et découvrir des sujets rarement traités par des You Tubers Français.
Merci pour ces vidéos et pour votre travail de qualité.
Thank you for your work.

[larryking]

Very Brave Men doing VERY BRAVE THINGS....that won the war. Only a few of them left now. RIP to all the other

[garykubodera]

Thanks for making an episode of the assination of Adm. Yamamoto I mentioned to you in a previous video comment I made. Very informative and enjoyed it a great deal. Keep up the great work and look foreward to your next video Oscar!😀

[Snaproll]

Live by the sword, die by the sword. Yamato would have understood the concept.

[minhthunguyendang]

10:57
Not only Yamamoto but Kuribayashi who commanded Iwo Jima, also studied in the 🇺🇸

[scottgarbs]

To refer to the Yamamoto shoot down as an "assassination" is incorrect and derogatory to the US. Yamamoto' was killed in action just like any combatant who is killed by the enemy. Can you please explain why you used the term "assassination"? Thank you

[walterulasinksi]

Since the US had issued a declaring of war against Japan following Pearl Harbor, all military commanders were fair targets. The main secret was to give the appearance of the timing, being coincidental, as to not expose that the Japanese codes had been broken. After the formal Japanese announcement of his death even a small controversy of who actually shot down the flight was diverted into a bragging rights squabble to distract from the code breaking. But even thar squabble should never have happened. It is why Mitchell was only honored with a Navy Cross as was appropriate, since the combat was not one of exceptional valor. Had Mitchel or anyone else been given such honors, it would have tipped the hand as to what had actually occurred.

[liveinthenow]

Thanks so much for a wonderful detailed segment! AF Vet..Desert Storm!