Faith of My Fathers

Faith of My Fathers Read Free

Book: Faith of My Fathers Read Free
Author: John McCain
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United States Naval Academy. He was awarded a fourth star posthumously.
    My father, who had left for the States immediately upon receiving word of the admiral’s death, arrived too late to pay his respects. My mother found him standing on the tarmac at San Diego when she returned from Washington. He was in the throes of deep grief, a grief that took years to subside. He told my mother he was relieved to have missed the funeral. “It would have killed me,” he explained.
    There was, however, an event near the end of my grandfather’s life that no one discussed. In none of the published accounts of my grandfather’s death nor in any of the many tributes offered by his contemporaries was mention made of the incident that had cost my grandfather his command just one day before the war’s end.
    Less than three months earlier, he had been ordered by Nimitz to resume command of Task Force 38, which at that time constituted almost the entire Third Fleet as it provided air support to the American invasion of Okinawa. One week after he resumed command, my grandfather and Halsey received the first reports from search planes of a tropical storm south of Okinawa that was fast becoming a typhoon.
    When the first reports of the June typhoon were received, the fleet meteorologists advised Halsey not to move the fleet. But Halsey, fearing that the typhoon would drive him westward and in range of Japanese planes based in China, ordered his task groups to sail southeast in an attempt to get around the storm. My grandfather was aboard his flagship, the
Shangri-La.
Puzzled by his instructions, he turned to his friend, a war correspondent for the Associated Press, Dick O’Malley, and said, “What the hell is Halsey doing, trying to intercept another typhoon?” His observation was a reference to Halsey’s actions during a typhoon that had struck the fleet in December 1944, sinking two destroyers. According to John Thach, my grandfather had recommended a heading for the fleet that would have avoided the earlier storm, as had Admiral Nimitz. But Halsey had insisted on another course, a course that tragically failed to take his ships out of harm’s way.
    A little less than six months later, at one o’clock on the morning of June 5, Halsey received a late report from an amphibious command ship that this latest storm was too far to the south for the fleet to get safely around it. Halsey attempted to get out of its way by reversing course from southeast to northwest, greatly surprising the commanders of his task groups, who were now in imminent peril.
    At four o’clock, one of those commanders, Admiral J. J. Clark, signaled my grandfather (to whom Halsey had given tactical command of the fleet’s race to safer waters) that their present course would bring his task group directly into the storm. A few minutes later he signaled, “I can get clear of the center of the storm quickly by steering 120. Please advise.”
    My grandfather consulted Halsey, who advised against a course change. He then signaled Clark for an updated report of the position and bearing of the storm’s eye before ordering Clark to use his best judgment. After communicating with Halsey and Clark, my grandfather could have spent only a few minutes considering the matter before deciding to reject Halsey’s advice. But it was a few minutes too long. His order came twenty minutes after Clark signaled for advice and too late for his task group to escape the worst of the storm.
    Although none of Clark’s ships sank, many of them were damaged, including four carriers. One hundred and forty-two aircraft were lost. Six men from Clark’s task group and a nearby fueling group were swept overboard by the storm-tossed seas and drowned. Four others were seriously injured.
    A few days after Task Force 38 resumed operations off Okinawa, my grandfather and Halsey were ordered to appear before a court of inquiry on June 15. In

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