Steady Nerves and Stout Hearts: The Enterprise (Cv6) Air Group and Pearl Harbor, 7 December 1941

June 18, 2001Dear Sirs:The first paragraph of the review I submitted on June 17, 2001 should end like this:....it is an excellent source document for military historians with much important new information about the military action of this carrier during and immediately after the attack on Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941.Thank you for your time and interest.Ralph Peterson

As this book contains recently declassiifed information regarding the US aircraft carrier USS Enterprise from the ship's logbooks, as well as diaries of the pilots who flew her planes, it is an excellent source document for military historians with much important new information on the role and military actions of this carrier during World War II.And all readers should find interesting the little-known story of an unexpected gale which developed some 300 miles west of Hawaii on December 5, 1941 as the Enterprise was returning to port at Pearl Harbor from a training exercise and which probably saved this carrier. This unexpected storm caused Admiral Halsey to cut the speed of this 13-ship task force in half, delaying their scheduled arrival back at Pearl Harbor for 24 hours until Sunday afternoon of December 7th (after the Japanese attack had occurred at dawn that morning).Many WWII history buffs will appreciate the fact that if the Enterprise had been in port that Sunday morning as scheduled (and as the Japanese expected) , it would almost certainly have been sunk with all of the US battleships there. And the Japanese Admirals would have probably been emboldened enough to dare make a second strike against the fuel storage tanks and other important military targets on the island. Since the US only had three carriers in the Pacific at that time (and the Japanese had eight) , the situation for the American fleet would have extremely serious and could have put the entire Southeast Pacific area (including Australia) at grave risk of occupation by Japanese forces. The documented story of the miraculous gale which probably saved the Enterprise (and which has not been widely disseminated before) in itself makes this book well worth buying.