"Top Secret"

The Secretaries of War & Navy shut the door last week on the story of Pearl Harbor. They had read the reports of their separate courts of inquiry. They had searched their consciences, consulted with the Commander in Chief of the U.S. Fleet and the Judge Advocate Generals of the Army & Navy and had reached this conclusion: publication of the reports now would do the country more harm than good.

Navy Secretary Forrestal, "in the best interests ... of the U.S.," labeled the report of his special court "top secret" and "secret" and locked it up. Mr. Stimson did the same. He was convinced, he said, that any other course would hurt the war effort, and even jeopardize American lives.

The evidence, the Secretaries found, did not warrant court-martialing any Army or Navy officer for what he did or failed to do preceding the Pearl Harbor attack. Rear Admiral Husband E. Kimmel would not get his day in court, which he has demanded. Major General Walter C. Short had been punished enough when he was removed, like Kimmel, from his command.

Thus, unless Congress kicks in this double-bolted door, the Administration has closed the case until the end of the war.

"Errors of Judgment." The almost identical statements did not whitewash Kimmel and Short, both of whom had been charged with dereliction of duty in the earlier Roberts report (TIME, Feb. 2, 1942). In a calmer atmosphere, the Secretaries now found Kimmel and Short merely guilty of "errors of judgment." In one respect the Secretaries went farther than the Roberts report. They spread an indictment for bad judgment over "[naval] officers both at Pearl Harbor and at Washington," as well as other "officers in the field and in the War Department." (No names were mentioned. )

Their opinion--that spreading the courts' records before the public would jeopardize the war effort--could mean only that public confidence might be shaken in certain high-placed men who have since proved useful to the U.S.

Full Responsibility. Messrs. Stimson and Forrestal, on the anniversary of Pearl Harbor, had also given citizens something to think about.

The nation had been enraged by Japan's attack on Pearl Harbor. It was also enraged over getting caught with its pants down. After it had cursed those "little yellow bastards," it demanded scapegoats at once. The Roberts Commission supplied them. Now, three years later, in a soberer mood, thoughtful citizens looked beyond those scapegoats. Pearl Harbor was no isolated event: it was the culmination of a foreign policy which had resulted in war. The U.S., to gain time for an inevitable war with Japan--inevitable unless Japan was to be allowed to conquer Asia--had appeased Japan by selling her oil and scrap iron, and then had begun to squeeze Japan by gradually cutting off these supplies.

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