A Japanese invasion of Hawaii

[Torplexed]

How would spies in Pearl let Nagumo know of the carrier situation? And just as important, would any communication be safe from prying US or British ears?

The spy Takeo Yoshikawa was embedded at the Japanese consulate in Oahu and was making regular reports to Japan regarding the ships in port, and dates of sailings and returns. He made a "ships in port" report on the 6th, indicating no carriers in the harbor. This message was in the PA-K2 code and translated on Dec. 8th by the US Army. This code had been broken but was accorded such a low priority that incoming messages were often not decrypted and translated for many days, and little significance was attached to their contents as they were usually of a commercial or business nature.

[Aurelian]

I have to say in this case, Curtis Lemay's theoretical dog just wouldn't have hunted in reality, no matter what a commercial wargame might allow the wartime Japanese to do.

Now, now, in the old boardgame Victory in the Pacific, I took Hawaii. It took optional rules and some luck, but I did it.

In the old Axis and Allies, I took the West Coast of the US. I couldn't hold it, but there we are

[Curtis Lemay]

Communications are not my thing. So if anyone knows about this stuff can they comment on what was possible in December 1941 please.

Potential problem facing the Japanese

The KB, approximately just over half way between Japan and Hawaii, are under strict radio silence and are reliant upon comms from Pearl to tell them whether the carriers are in port. How would spies in Pearl let Nagumo know of the carrier situation? And just as important, would any communication be safe from prying US or British ears?

This plan has to ensure that operations in the South China Sea and the Western Pacific remain co-ordinated so as not to give the Allies advance warning. How do Japanese spies in Pearl let Tokyo know the situation so that this information can be disseminated to the various commands either to cease operations or to begin them? Again, I am thinking about this from a security perspective.

I don't remember the film, but it showed agents in Tokyo calling a Japanese barber whose shop looked out over the harbor. Asked him what capitol ships that he could see were in port under some pretext about family on board or such. He wasn't even a spy, just used by Tokyo in this fashion.

Obviously, Tokyo would have preset code words for informing the carriers and the other operations.

[Curtis Lemay]

And the B-17s there could of bombed Formosa. But, but, this wasn't supposed to happen as the Japanese were to ignore the PI to take some islands in Hawaii....

Again, just canceling the invasion of the PI. Air raids and such against air and sea assets would still take place.

[Platoonist]

I don't remember the film, but it showed agents in Tokyo calling a Japanese barber whose shop looked out over the harbor. Asked him what capitol ships that he could see were in port under some pretext about family on board or such. He wasn't even a spy, just used by Tokyo in this fashion.

Obviously, Tokyo would have preset code words for informing the carriers and the other operations.

The film would have been Michael Bey's 2001 disaster-and-romance flick, Pearl Harbor, a movie where the Japanese stage a surprise attack on an unsuspecting love triangle.

I seem to recall it was a dentist in that scene. I remember thinking, why would the Japanese possibly tip their hand calling up uninvolved civilians and asking them which ships were in port? Civilians who probably couldn't distinguish battleships from cruisers. The actual consulate was very circumspect and refused to enlist or involve the local Japanese-American population.

If an agent had wanted to know which ships were in Pearl Harbor on any given day, all he would have had to do was to take a car up to the hills and mountains that ring the harbor. The answers would be at his feet. No need to involve any outsiders..

As an aside, Pearl Harbor, the movie that has been reviled for years in the War in the Pacific forum for its glaring inaccuracies and gross liberties with history.

[Aurelian]

As mentioned in the book mentioned earlier, in Jan 42, the Naval General Staff studied invading, taking, and sustaining a garrison there.

3,000,000 tons of cargo required to feed the population over a year, pus 30 ships a month for military equipment. A 9kt freighter would 36 days to get there and back, not counting load/unload time, ship maintenance, and waiting for escorts.
Already, in Japan, food shortages were a serious topic.

The study concluded that their already overstressed merchant marine couldn't do it.

[RangerJoe]

And the B-17s there could of bombed Formosa. But, but, this wasn't supposed to happen as the Japanese were to ignore the PI to take some islands in Hawaii....

There was fog in Formosa so the Japanese attack was delayed 5 hours. But someone in charge thought that the PI could remain neutral so the B17s were not ordered to load up and bomb the airfields which there were no pictures of in the PI.

[RangerJoe]

Just want to re-emphasize the level of inert obliviousness the Allied forces were in:

1. The Malaya invasion forces were detected well in advance. No effective action was taken.
So you wanted the Allies to attack the Japanese before war was declared or started?
2. The Pearl aircraft were detected by radar. Ignored.
The radar was new, there were no protocols on what to do in regards to anything being detected, the USA was not at war until the next day.
3. A mini-sub was detected at the harbor entrance and probably sunk. Ignored.
Not ignored, it was reported. Again, no protocols on what to do.
4. The Japanese ultimatum was decoded a day before Pearl - except for one part which was held for the morning. No action taken.
Action was taken but there was radio interference so a commercial telegraph was sent with no special priorty.
5. When the final part of the ultimatum was received on the day of the attack - clearly a war warning - the opportunity to telephone Kimmel was aborted. A message via telegraph was bungled and didn't arrive till after the attack.
It did not specifically state war. Were there open telephone lines available? Was there a way to talk securely?
6. When the attack occurred, news of it was disbelieved. It couldn't have been Pearl!
Because of wishful thinking. That attitude has since been changed.
7. Land AAA guns in Pearl didn't have ammo initially.
The US was at peace. Why would ammo be stored with the guns? That could be dangerous.
8. Aircraft on Oahu were deployed to prevent sabotage - a disaster for the air raid.
That was because of the perceived highest risk.
9. The day of the attack - after news of Pearl has spread - the air forces on Luzon were caught on the ground and destroyed.
They had been in the air but the Japanese attack was delayed. The planes on Luzon landed to refuel and that is when they were caught on the ground,
The North Pacific in December has very bad weather and high seas. Detection of the carriers would have been unlikely and even if it occured, the report would have been unlikely to have much accuracy or be interpreted to be what it actually was. This would be made worse if the Japs aborted and nothing happened. Having cried wolf once and been wrong, how would any intel officer ever be listened to again?
You can't guarantee that the weather would be acceptable for an attack in one week or whenever the Japanese decided to bother attacking. Especially with the loaded troop transports running out of food and even worse, potable water. Not to mention getting word to all of the other Japanese forces as to when the attack will finally occur without any spies notifying the targets about the attacks.

[Torplexed]

If an agent had wanted to know which ships were in Pearl Harbor on any given day, all he would have had to do was to take a car up to the hills and mountains that ring the harbor. The answers would be at his feet. No need to involve any outsiders.

This is exactly what the agent Yoshikawa did when assigned to scope out Pearl Harbor's fleet habits. He often strolled through the hills of Aiea above Pearl Harbor and on Tantalus Mountain above Honolulu. Both magnificent vantage points to observe the sorties of the fleet's units. In gathering intelligence, he also took advantage of the tour boats in the harbor and tour flights in small planes above it, usually in the company of a lady friend. Acting the gaudy tourist in a floral shirt proved to be the perfect disguise.

[Curtis Lemay]

If an agent had wanted to know which ships were in Pearl Harbor on any given day, all he would have had to do was to take a car up to the hills and mountains that ring the harbor. The answers would be at his feet. No need to involve any outsiders.

This is exactly what the agent Yoshikawa did when assigned to scope out Pearl Harbor's fleet habits. He often strolled through the hills of Aiea above Pearl Harbor and on Tantalus Mountain above Honolulu. Both magnificent vantage points to observe the sorties of the fleet's units. In gathering intelligence, he also took advantage of the tour boats in the harbor and tour flights in small planes above it, usually in the company of a lady friend. Acting the gaudy tourist in a floral shirt proved to be the perfect disguise.

+1
Naval vessels are enormous and out in the open. They can't hide. Oahu was full of native Japanese and had plenty of telephone connections between Oahu and Tokyo. Impossible to keep ship info from Tokyo. It doesn't matter what the details were, we know that the carriers were receiving info on ships in Pearl almost in real time.

[Curtis Lemay]

Just want to re-emphasize the level of inert obliviousness the Allied forces were in:

1. The Malaya invasion forces were detected well in advance. No effective action was taken.
So you wanted the Allies to attack the Japanese before war was declared or started?

Plenty of preparations could have been made. And it wasn't just the British that should have been alerted by this. All the Allies should have been. In modern terms we would have gone to DEFCOM 2.

2. The Pearl aircraft were detected by radar. Ignored.
The radar was new, there were no protocols on what to do in regards to anything being detected, the USA was not at war until the next day.

In other words, "inert obliviousness", as I said.

3. A mini-sub was detected at the harbor entrance and probably sunk. Ignored.
Not ignored, it was reported. Again, no protocols on what to do.

Never made it up the chain of command. (inert obliviousness).

4. The Japanese ultimatum was decoded a day before Pearl - except for one part which was held for the morning. No action taken.
Action was taken but there was radio interference so a commercial telegraph was sent with no special priorty.

This was the night before. It was ignored. (inert obliviousness).

5. When the final part of the ultimatum was received on the day of the attack - clearly a war warning - the opportunity to telephone Kimmel was aborted. A message via telegraph was bungled and didn't arrive till after the attack.
It did not specifically state war. Were there open telephone lines available? Was there a way to talk securely?

Ordered the embassy to destroy codes and secret docs. War was obvious. But the lines of communication were oblivious.

6. When the attack occurred, news of it was disbelieved. It couldn't have been Pearl!
Because of wishful thinking. That attitude has since been changed.

It clearly shows how oblivious the high command was to a sneak attack on Pearl.

7. Land AAA guns in Pearl didn't have ammo initially.
The US was at peace. Why would ammo be stored with the guns? That could be dangerous.

Clearly, they weren't at DEFCOM 2. (inert obliviousness).

8. Aircraft on Oahu were deployed to prevent sabotage - a disaster for the air raid.
That was because of the perceived highest risk.

(inert obliviousness).

9. The day of the attack - after news of Pearl has spread - the air forces on Luzon were caught on the ground and destroyed.
They had been in the air but the Japanese attack was delayed. The planes on Luzon landed to refuel and that is when they were caught on the ground,

They should have been on a full war footing by then. Not having any planes in the sky over the airbases is just more evidence of inert obliviousness. And this is AFTER Pearl.

The North Pacific in December has very bad weather and high seas. Detection of the carriers would have been unlikely and even if it occured, the report would have been unlikely to have much accuracy or be interpreted to be what it actually was. This would be made worse if the Japs aborted and nothing happened. Having cried wolf once and been wrong, how would any intel officer ever be listened to again?
You can't guarantee that the weather would be acceptable for an attack in one week or whenever the Japanese decided to bother attacking. Especially with the loaded troop transports running out of food and even worse, potable water. Not to mention getting word to all of the other Japanese forces as to when the attack will finally occur without any spies notifying the targets about the attacks.

Huh? Nobody is going to be running out of supplies. Ships can be supplied at sea. Weather in the North Pacific in December is very different from weather in Hawaii in December.

[Curtis Lemay]

As mentioned in the book mentioned earlier, in Jan 42, the Naval General Staff studied invading, taking, and sustaining a garrison there.

3,000,000 tons of cargo required to feed the population over a year, pus 30 ships a month for military equipment. A 9kt freighter would 36 days to get there and back, not counting load/unload time, ship maintenance, and waiting for escorts.
Already, in Japan, food shortages were a serious topic.

The study concluded that their already overstressed merchant marine couldn't do it.

This would be for a direct assault on Oahu, I assume. I'm proposing a much cheaper grab of the Neighbor islands with a few battalions. Then using land based AC to torch Pearl.

Feeding the population? Maybe that's why the Germans never could take Leningrad! Oh the food requirements! The Japs were just as ruthless as the Germans.

[TulliusDetritus]

3,000,000 tons of cargo required to feed the population over a year, pus 30 ships a month for military equipment.

Aurelian, I know you're just the messenger, but this analysis is just weird.

Luzon, Mindanao, Borneo, Celebes, Java, Sumatra, Malaya and many other places were other Hawaiis too. Were they sending these "3 million tons" x4 or x6 or x7 to these poor wretched colonials? And what about huge China?

[RangerJoe]

Just want to re-emphasize the level of inert obliviousness the Allied forces were in:

1. The Malaya invasion forces were detected well in advance. No effective action was taken.
So you wanted the Allies to attack the Japanese before war was declared or started?

Plenty of preparations could have been made. And it wasn't just the British that should have been alerted by this. All the Allies should have been. In modern terms we would have gone to DEFCOM 2.

Preparations were made and were continuing. What is DEFCOM 2?

2. The Pearl aircraft were detected by radar. Ignored.
The radar was new, there were no protocols on what to do in regards to anything being detected, the USA was not at war until the next day.

In other words, "inert obliviousness", as I said.

No, there were no protocols to follow. Also, the radar set was already supposed to be turned off.

3. A mini-sub was detected at the harbor entrance and probably sunk. Ignored.
Not ignored, it was reported. Again, no protocols on what to do.

Never made it up the chain of command. (inert obliviousness).

Yes, it did go up the chain of command. But someone wanted the report verified. Otherwise, a cetacean could have caused an alert to be called. Do you realize just how many of those creatures would be in the area?

4. The Japanese ultimatum was decoded a day before Pearl - except for one part which was held for the morning. No action taken.
Action was taken but there was radio interference so a commercial telegraph was sent with no special priority.

This was the night before. It was ignored. (inert obliviousness).

t was not ignored.

5. When the final part of the ultimatum was received on the day of the attack - clearly a war warning - the opportunity to telephone Kimmel was aborted. A message via telegraph was bungled and didn't arrive till after the attack.
It did not specifically state war. Were there open telephone lines available? Was there a way to talk securely?

Ordered the embassy to destroy codes and secret docs. War was obvious. But the lines of communication were oblivious.

So? There are plenty of times to destroy codes and secret docs with no war coming. War was not obvious, at least no involving the USA. The lines of communication were not oblivious but they were not as reliable nor effective as they are now.

6. When the attack occurred, news of it was disbelieved. It couldn't have been Pearl!
Because of wishful thinking. That attitude has since been changed.

It clearly shows how oblivious the high command was to a sneak attack on Pearl.

Incorrect. Admiral Ernest King (have you ever heard of him? Do you know what position he held? wargamed such an attack.

7. Land AAA guns in Pearl didn't have ammo initially.
The US was at peace. Why would ammo be stored with the guns? That could be dangerous.

Clearly, they weren't at DEFCOM 2. (inert obliviousness).

Again, what is DEFCOM 2? Even at higher stages of peacetime alerts, ammo is not disbursed since that can lead to things left theft and accidents.

8. Aircraft on Oahu were deployed to prevent sabotage - a disaster for the air raid.
That was because of the perceived highest risk.

(inert obliviousness).

You are fond of that phrase but what do you mean by it? Here it appears that you are ignoring the danger from the highest perceived risk to the aircraft.

9. The day of the attack - after news of Pearl has spread - the air forces on Luzon were caught on the ground and destroyed.
They had been in the air but the Japanese attack was delayed. The planes on Luzon landed to refuel and that is when they were caught on the ground,

They should have been on a full war footing by then. Not having any planes in the sky over the airbases is just more evidence of inert obliviousness. And this is AFTER Pearl.

You love to ignore what doesn't ft your narrative. All of the aircraft had been in the air and needed to be refueled. At that time, there was no inflight refueling capabilities. Apparently, to satisfy you, you want airplanes to run out of fuel in the air and crash.

The North Pacific in December has very bad weather and high seas. Detection of the carriers would have been unlikely and even if it occured, the report would have been unlikely to have much accuracy or be interpreted to be what it actually was. This would be made worse if the Japs aborted and nothing happened. Having cried wolf once and been wrong, how would any intel officer ever be listened to again?
You can't guarantee that the weather would be acceptable for an attack in one week or whenever the Japanese decided to bother attacking. Especially with the loaded troop transports running out of food and even worse, potable water. Not to mention getting word to all of the other Japanese forces as to when the attack will finally occur without any spies notifying the targets about the attacks.

Huh? Nobody is going to be running out of supplies. Ships can be supplied at sea. Weather in the North Pacific in December is very different from weather in Hawaii in December.

Describe in detail the Japanese capabilities of the Japanese resupply at sea in all weather conditions during this time frame. If the Japanese ships are not cruising in the North Pacific where they might have been discovered by fishing vessels, are you stating that the Japanese ships are sailing around in the Hawaiian area?

[warspite1]

I have to say in this case, Curtis Lemay's theoretical dog just wouldn't have hunted in reality, no matter what a commercial wargame might allow the wartime Japanese to do.

Anyway, the intel concerning the comings and goings at PH was being sent to Tokyo through the Japanese Consulate in Honolulu using diplomatic comms. Tokyo would then pass this on to Nagumo at sea. This process normally added at least a day's delay for the PH info to reach Nagumo.

warspite1

Morning Buckrock. For the reasons given previously I agree with you. However I am curious to understand what was possible, as opposed to physically impossible - albeit that possible does mean allowances are made in decision making that are simply beyond one's imagining.

[warspite1]

How would spies in Pearl let Nagumo know of the carrier situation? And just as important, would any communication be safe from prying US or British ears?

The spy Takeo Yoshikawa was embedded at the Japanese consulate in Oahu and was making regular reports to Japan regarding the ships in port, and dates of sailings and returns. He made a "ships in port" report on the 6th, indicating no carriers in the harbor. This message was in the PA-K2 code and translated on Dec. 8th by the US Army. This code had been broken but was accorded such a low priority that incoming messages were often not decrypted and translated for many days, and little significance was attached to their contents as they were usually of a commercial or business nature.

warspite1

That's useful info - thanks Torplexed.

[warspite1]

As an aside, Pearl Harbor, the movie that has been reviled for years in the War in the Pacific forum for its glaring inaccuracies and gross liberties with history.

warspite1

I'm fed up with people knocking Pearl Harbor - quite simply one of the greatest WWII movies ever made and featuring two of Hollywood's finest actors.

This epic film also featured two of the most poignant lines of any film ever made:

https://www.google.com/search?q=i+think ... e&ie=UTF-8

Danny: I think World War II just started

Nurse Evelyn: Do you ever wonder if this war's going to catch up with us?

Priceless, and not in the least bit crass or even faintly nausea inducing.

The testament to the accuracy of the film can be shown in this clip 'allegedly' from a Matrix game

Ben.jpg (192.22 KiB) Viewed 830 times

[warspite1]

Okay so the Kido Butai, having refuelled again, sail for the flying off point where they intend to attack on Sunday 14 December 1941.

We will assume the supplies necessary to keep the KB at sea are available, the tankers and KB itself continue to remain undetected, the Allies don't start asking questions about the Japanese convoy sailing west toward Malaya that suddenly turned around, and the US carriers, having returned to Pearl, are not earmarked for any further operations that would remove them from Pearl by the 14th.

1941

So we know when the KB will attack. Under this scenario, there are landings on Hawaiian islands (not Oahu) and these are to be followed up by aircraft so that the Japanese can operate from the islands to stop US reinforcements, and whittle down the defences on Oahu.

So questions here from your simulations:

- In playing out this scenario, how many (battalion strength? - please confirm) of troops are landed and at which islands?
- When are these troops landed in terms of the attack? Have these troops sailed with the KB or are these follow-up?
- Presumably these units have come from the PI OOB?
- What aircraft are earmarked for this operation? Please confirm the unit ID's and where they are based in December 1941.
- It would be interesting to know the number and split of fighters and bombers - and types of bomber that you were able to commit to this operation.
- Which specific islands have you flown them to?
- Finally what is the timetable for them reaching HI and how do they get there? A timetable would be really useful here please.
- What provision is made for supplying, refuelling, arming, repairing and replacing these aircraft units once on the islands?

As you say, we can worry less about the troops. As Guadalcanal showed, feeding their own troops was considered an optional extra for the Japanese and they sure as hell wouldn't be wasting energy on the local populace.

I am trying to keep this done in bitesize chunks but hopefully this is okay.

[ncc1701e]

As an aside, Pearl Harbor, the movie that has been reviled for years in the War in the Pacific forum for its glaring inaccuracies and gross liberties with history.

warspite1

I'm fed up with people knocking Pearl Harbor - quite simply one of the greatest WWII movies ever made and featuring two of Hollywood's finest actors.

This epic film also featured two of the most poignant lines of any film ever made:

https://www.google.com/search?q=i+think ... e&ie=UTF-8

Danny: I think World War II just started

Nurse Evelyn: Do you ever wonder if this war's going to catch up with us?

Priceless, and not in the least bit crass or even faintly nausea inducing.

The testament to the accuracy of the film can be shown in this clip 'allegedly' from a Matrix game

Ben.jpg

Thank you I laughed so hard

[Curtis Lemay]

Plenty of preparations could have been made. And it wasn't just the British that should have been alerted by this. All the Allies should have been. In modern terms we would have gone to DEFCOM 2.

Preparations were made and were continuing. What is DEFCOM 2?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DEFCON was what I meant.

2. The Pearl aircraft were detected by radar. Ignored.
The radar was new, there were no protocols on what to do in regards to anything being detected, the USA was not at war until the next day.

In other words, "inert obliviousness", as I said.

No, there were no protocols to follow. Also, the radar set was already supposed to be turned off.

You're just making excuses for WHY they were oblivious. That's irrelevant. What matters is that they WERE oblivious.

3. A mini-sub was detected at the harbor entrance and probably sunk. Ignored.
Not ignored, it was reported. Again, no protocols on what to do.

Never made it up the chain of command. (inert obliviousness).

Yes, it did go up the chain of command. But someone wanted the report verified. Otherwise, a cetacean could have caused an alert to be called. Do you realize just how many of those creatures would be in the area?

4. The Japanese ultimatum was decoded a day before Pearl - except for one part which was held for the morning. No action taken.
Action was taken but there was radio interference so a commercial telegraph was sent with no special priority.

This was the night before. It was ignored. (inert obliviousness).

t was not ignored.

5. When the final part of the ultimatum was received on the day of the attack - clearly a war warning - the opportunity to telephone Kimmel was aborted. A message via telegraph was bungled and didn't arrive till after the attack.
It did not specifically state war. Were there open telephone lines available? Was there a way to talk securely?

Ordered the embassy to destroy codes and secret docs. War was obvious. But the lines of communication were oblivious.

So? There are plenty of times to destroy codes and secret docs with no war coming. War was not obvious, at least no involving the USA. The lines of communication were not oblivious but they were not as reliable nor effective as they are now.

More irrelevant excuses. What matters is that they had all these warnings and still got taken by surprise. That is a strong sign that spotting a carrier somewhere in the middle of the Pacific isn't going to make any real difference.

6. When the attack occurred, news of it was disbelieved. It couldn't have been Pearl!
Because of wishful thinking. That attitude has since been changed.

It clearly shows how oblivious the high command was to a sneak attack on Pearl.

Incorrect. Admiral Ernest King (have you ever heard of him? Do you know what position he held? wargamed such an attack.

They wargame everything. They were still in disbelief when the attack was finally confirmed.

7. Land AAA guns in Pearl didn't have ammo initially.
The US was at peace. Why would ammo be stored with the guns? That could be dangerous.

Clearly, they weren't at DEFCOM 2. (inert obliviousness).

Again, what is DEFCOM 2? Even at higher stages of peacetime alerts, ammo is not disbursed since that can lead to things left theft and accidents.

8. Aircraft on Oahu were deployed to prevent sabotage - a disaster for the air raid.
That was because of the perceived highest risk.

(inert obliviousness).

You are fond of that phrase but what do you mean by it? Here it appears that you are ignoring the danger from the highest perceived risk to the aircraft.

More excuses. They don't matter. They were oblivious to a carrier sneak attack. That matters.

9. The day of the attack - after news of Pearl has spread - the air forces on Luzon were caught on the ground and destroyed.
They had been in the air but the Japanese attack was delayed. The planes on Luzon landed to refuel and that is when they were caught on the ground,

They should have been on a full war footing by then. Not having any planes in the sky over the airbases is just more evidence of inert obliviousness. And this is AFTER Pearl.

You love to ignore what doesn't ft your narrative. All of the aircraft had been in the air and needed to be refueled. At that time, there was no inflight refueling capabilities. Apparently, to satisfy you, you want airplanes to run out of fuel in the air and crash.

They should have had multiple team flights staged, so that the air was never unguarded. It's like they needed a while to get into a full war footing. That was true of Pearl as well.

The North Pacific in December has very bad weather and high seas. Detection of the carriers would have been unlikely and even if it occured, the report would have been unlikely to have much accuracy or be interpreted to be what it actually was. This would be made worse if the Japs aborted and nothing happened. Having cried wolf once and been wrong, how would any intel officer ever be listened to again?
You can't guarantee that the weather would be acceptable for an attack in one week or whenever the Japanese decided to bother attacking. Especially with the loaded troop transports running out of food and even worse, potable water. Not to mention getting word to all of the other Japanese forces as to when the attack will finally occur without any spies notifying the targets about the attacks.

Huh? Nobody is going to be running out of supplies. Ships can be supplied at sea. Weather in the North Pacific in December is very different from weather in Hawaii in December.

Describe in detail the Japanese capabilities of the Japanese resupply at sea in all weather conditions during this time frame. If the Japanese ships are not cruising in the North Pacific where they might have been discovered by fishing vessels, are you stating that the Japanese ships are sailing around in the Hawaiian area?

The details are irrelevant. If they've been at sea so long that they run out of food, they can return to port if resupply at sea isn't available. But resupply at sea is physically possible, and the Japs could have had it setup as part of the plan if they really wanted to.