Admiral Harry Yarnell
—Jason

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Harry Yarnell was an American Admiral who served the in the US Navy for 51 years between 1898 and 1944.  The time he was active in the US military saw the most tumultuous events of the early twentieth century: he fought in the Spanish-American War, the First World War, and Second World War.  Yarnell was instrumental in developing aircraft carrier doctrine during the 1920s and 1930s.  The wargames in which he took part clearly indicated the vulnerability of the United States Pacific Fleet while sitting in bases believed to be secure.

Yarnell was born on 18 October 1875 in Independence, Iowa.  Despite being born in the borders of a landlocked state, he enlisted at the U.S. Naval Academy in 1893.  After graduating, Yarnell was assigned as an ensign aboard to the battleship USS Oregon.  Being stationed to one of the most powerful warships in the US Navy was every recent graduate’s dream.  Battleships were the cornerstone weapon in the power projection, and ultimately, protection, of the nation.

Coinciding with the beginning of Yarnell’s budding military career, the United States was leaving its post-Civil War isolation and flexing its diplomatic and industrial power throughout the world.  This was a period when it was believed that all “Great powers” needed to have overseas colonies to provide them with natural resources and aa captive audience for good manufactured at home.  The existing European Empires controlled most of Africa, Asia, and Oceania between them; the United States was very late to the game of imperial expansion.

Spain was an imperial power that had been steadily declining since the early 1800s.  At its height, the Spanish Empire controlled most of Central and South America, large tracts of the North America west of the Mississippi, the Caribbean, and the Philippines.  However, the French occupation of Spain during the Napoleonic Wars (1800 – 1815) had crippled the latter’s power.

Central and South American countries had fought successfully for their independence during the early and mid-nineteenth century.  Despite losing these valuable territories, the Spanish clung tenaciously to Cuba and the Philippines until their defeat in the Spanish-American War.  As Cuban rebels worked to end Spanish control of their homeland, the United States sent the battleship USS Maine to Havana Harbor to intimidate the Spanish.  When the Maine exploded on the night of 18 February 1898, this was used as an excuse for the Americans to intervene.

Yarnell’s first experiences of combat were during the Spanish-American War, taking place between 21 April 1898 and 10 December 1898, and later during the Philippine Insurrection, occurring between 1899 and 1902.  He was present aboard the USS Oregon during the Battle of Santiago de Cuba on 3 July 1898 where the US Navy shattered the Spanish fleet.  The destruction of the Spanish fleet ensured that soldiers and war materials from the United States could land in Cuba without interference.  The Spanish-American War ended with Spain ceding independence to Cuba and allowing American annexation of the Philippines.  Yarnell was transferred from the Atlantic Fleet to the Asiatic Squadron in July 1899.

Yarnell’s next adventures involved the suppression of the Boxer Rebellion in China between 1899 and 1901.  After his stint in China, he was transferred yet again and during 1907 wound up as an officer aboard the newly commissioned battleship USS Connecticut.  Yarnell’s career almost ended when the Connecticut was damaged during a grounding incident on 13 January 1907: he and the ship’s commanding officer were brought to trial.  The ship’s captain was court-martialed, and Yarnell lucked out by being acquitted.  Following this close call, he was next assigned to take part in the voyage of The Great White Fleet, which took place between December 1907 and February 1909, circumnavigating the world.

Yarnell’s career continued to flourish between 1909 and 1917 when he was assigned to work as part of CINCLANT's (Commander in Chief Atlantic) staff as well as serving at the United States Naval Academy.  Once the United States entered World War I in April 1917, Yarnell was first assigned to the British naval base of Gibraltar and was then transferred to London.  He was part of the staff doe US Admiral William S. Sims, the commander of all American naval forces in Europe, and was able to coordinate with his contemporaries in the British Grand Fleet.

Upon the end of World War I, newly promoted Rear Admiral Yarnell, was bounced back and forth between sea and shore-based assignments.  In 1928, he was assigned as the prospective commander of the aircraft carrier USS Saratoga; this proved to be both a blessing and a curse for Yarnell.  This assignment and his championing for more aircraft carriers put him in sights of the “battleship club” of American admirals.  

The United States had slowly been building several aircraft carriers during the interwar period but had not developed a doctrine for the new ships.  The budget for the US military had been severely cut and some admirals argued that what funding existed should be used to commission new battleships.  Yarnell believed aircraft carriers and their strike groups would eventually dominate naval warfare and so called for more carriers and fewer battleships.

Yarnell’s theories about the vulnerability of surface warships to aerial attack was put on display during the 1932 and 1938 Pacific Wargames.  These training exercises were used to show the readiness of the ships, crews, and commanders in the event of a war.  The battleship club admirals had argued throughout the 1920s and 1930s that warships, and bases, were secure from attacks by naval aviation. 

Yarnell proved just how overconfident his contemporary admirals were.  During the February 1932 wargames conducted around Hawaii, Yarnell was in command of the carriers Saratoga and Lexington which he ordered an air raid on Pearl Harbor.  Sailing north of Oahu, Yarnell’s carriers sent 152 aircraft to conduct an air raid on the battleships and other military facilities at the base.  The army airfields were first knocked out and then Battleship Row, where all the Pacific Fleet’s battleships were moored, was also destroyed.

The 1932 wargames demonstrated the vulnerability of the US Pacific Fleet at Pearl Harbor to aerial attack.  However, the battleship club admirals argued that the exercise was unfair as they believed that no enemy navy could conduct such a raid.  They decided to ignore the established intelligence reports that the Imperial Japanese Navy was building an extensive naval aviation task force.  Yarnell warned his fellow admirals of the danger these ships represented; he was ignored and ostracized by the battleship club.

In another wargame, conducted in 1938, Yarnell’s tactics were used by Admiral Earnest King’s carriers once again defeated the surface ships of the US Pacific Fleet.  This was conducted again around Hawaii and once again King’s aviators destroyed the American forces stationed there.  This wargame’s results were again rebuffed by the battleship admirals and, while some additional anti-aircraft defenses were added, Pearl Harbor was left vulnerable to surprise attack.

The Japanese surprise attack on the US Pacific Fleet conducted on Sunday, 7 December 1941 was as devastating as Yarnell had warned.  The American battleships were sitting targets at Battleship Row as waves of Japanese aircraft came from the northeast, the same direction Yarnell’s “attackers” had appeared during the wargames.  The army airbases were destroyed in the same manner as they had been during the exercises.  The saving grace for the United States was that the aircraft carriers of the Pacific Fleet were not in harbor and thus were available to help blunt the Japanese advances in mid-1942.