Chuck demands to know where the carriers were:
There were, on 7 December, only three [carriers] in the Pacific. USS Enterprise, USS Lexington (CV-2), and USS Saratoga (CV-3). While USS Ranger (CV-4), USS Wasp (CV-7), and the recently commissioned USS Hornet (CV-8) remained in the Atlantic, Yorktown departed Norfolk on 16 December 1941 and sailed for the Pacific, her secondary gun galleries studded with new 20-millimeter Oerlikon machine guns. She reached San Diego, Calif., on 30 December 1941 and soon became flagship for Rear Admiral Frank Jack Fletcher’s newly formed Task Force (TF) 17. The carrier’s first mission in her new theater was to escort a convoy carrying Marine reinforcements to American Samoa. Departing San Diego on 6 January 1942, Yorktown and her consorts covered the movement of marines to Tutuila and Pago Pago to augment the garrison already there.
Having safely covered that troop movement, Yorktown , in company with sistership Enterprise, departed Samoan waters on 25 January. Six days later, TF 8 built around Enterprise, and TF 17, built around Yorktown , parted company. The former headed for the Marshall Islands, the latter for the Gilberts — each bound to take part in the first American offensive of the war, the Marshalls-Gilberts raids.
I note that I have already posted this information before.
Internment Order: February 19, 1942
Total carriers in the Atlantic: Nine – Wasp, Hornet, Ranger, Long Island, Charger, Archer, Biter, Avenger, Dasher.
Total carriers in the Pacific: Four – Yorktown, Enterprise, Lexington and Saratoga.
Total carriers assigned to protect the West Coast and Hawaii: Zero.
Clearly the admirals were terrified of invasion…. of New York. Please remember that Michelle Malkin is on record as asserting that there were ZERO carriers in the Atlantic at this time. The Japanese invasion theory is silly and betrays a remarkable ignorance of military history.