When asked about his meteoritic rise in the ranks to Commander in Chief, United States Fleet and Chief of Naval Operations King stated, “When the bullets start to fly, they come looking for the sons of bitches".
Superb? He was a nasty SOB, a politician in Uniform . A most unimpressive so called sailor, who didn't do much sailing at all and spent WW2 screwing up everything he got involved in. The USA Navy would have been far better off without him around .
@@bobg1069 We could not disagree more on Fleet Admiral Ernest J. King. I suggest you read Thomas B. Buell's Master of Sea Power: A biography of Fleet Admiral Ernest J. King. Andy McKane
@@andymckane7271 He was clearly ignorant of the application of sea power, bar perhaps aircraft, as evidenced by his antagonism to Admiral Cunningham, a true sea dog fighting Admiral. They hated each other and ABC considered him over promoted and a political animal. Nimitz saved his reputation with his brilliance but it was none of Kings doing. He is no more than as footnote in history.
Thank You to Lorain schools and U-tube for this most stellar biography on Admiral King. Together with the personal reminiscences of former subordinates, gives one a fact based kaleidoscope back into American 20th century Naval history.
ADOLPHUS ANDREWS: KIng's friend(?) from his Naval Academy days was a full captain in 1942 when King was already a full admiral and the CNO, the most senior posting in the US Navy. That year he was in charge, the French ocean liner, the Normandie, the third largest ship in the world, was being converted into a troopship for the United States when it caught fire. Fireboats pumped so much water that the ship took on a very dangerous list. Andrews did not order or even ask the fireboats to stop pumping more water. Then a man with a Russian accent pleaded to be let on board to open the seacocks so that the ship would sink onto the harbor bottom before capsizing--Normandie was so large that there was very little water between the bottom of the ship and the bed of the Hudson River. Adolphus sent him away. The man was Alexander Yerkevich, the chief designer of the Normandie and the inventor of the bulbous bow used by nearly all modern ships. Adolphus retired as a Vice Admiral.
problem was leahy was outside the traditional rank structure. he was chief of staff to the commander in chief or a.k.a the first chairman of the joint chiefs but he was not attached to the navy or army in any specific command.
I was a naval officer in the 80s and 90s. One thing that really disturbed me was how many senior officers had obvious emotional disorders often aggravated by alcoholism and for the most part the navy just looked the other way. When I brought this up at the time people would just shrug and say, "Yeah, it's always been that way." I hope that's changed now that some of these things, like bipolar disorder, are better understood but I wouldn't bet on it.
My father mentioned his first CO, PD Fraser had a massive drinking problem and he eventually got drummed out when it got so out of hand the Navy couldn’t ignore it any more.
63 years old is an amazing age to become a distinguished essential war hero. And his wife had big hair. A remarkable man. Seamen cannot “drink too much”.
Mr. King finished high school a year early. Then he went to war with the Spanish a year early too? !!!😲 WOW 😯!!! Now that’s what I call ambitious. That war didn’t even start until 1898!
I've read that one of King's favorite subordinates was Adm. David Pye, the commander who left the Marines on Wake - didn't evacuate them or resupply the island, just hung them out to dry. I'll give Adm. King points for being a badass, but a lot of guys got killed while he reinvented the wheel in re. antisubmarine tactics, and it all happened because he didn't like the British. He did right by reaming Halsey out after the Leyte Gulf debacle, though.
What he did right by was smacking around the bureau of ordnance over the mark 14 torpedo and its destroyer and aerial derivatives. He propagandized himself into a corner using halsey as the poster boy for "We're kicking their asses all the way to Tokyo so sign up and get a piece of the action!" Then ol' bill bull went off the rails, leaving the taffy groups without adequate cover from a massive surface fleet he knew was in the area, followed up by sailing 3rd fleet through TWO typhoons. He couldn't unload on halsey when it would make a difference and he didn't.
He didn't issue the mark 14s, he didn't have control over the bureau of ordnance when the war started. When he DID have authority over them he very quickly forced them to test and fix it, their pride be damned.
issue was leahy was not part of hte the rank structure anymore he was above the rank structure as he was FDRs chief of staff a.k.a the first chairman of the joint chiefs.
King's disdain for the British cost 10's of thousands of lives of Merchant Marines because he sent individual merchant ships to sea alone instead of with the security of the proven tactic of convoys. He should have been tried and jailed.
About 3/4 of the way through I had that same thought. I joined the USAF in 1976. During my time in I came to know a lady who was retired Navy and spent several years during WW2 as a Yoeman. She was a civilian and did some data entry tasks. She worked very closely near Adm King's office in the 1940s. She and I had several conversations about her Navy career. She once told me her father taught her that if you can't say anything good about a person stay quiet and not say anything at all. She rarely spoke of Adm King.
king is the most uniue naval character as he's the only one to be 1.) fleet admiral 2.) CNO (chief of naval operations) 3.) COMINCH or CINCUS (commander in chief - US fleet) some thing no other navy officer will ever accomplish
As Drachinifel put it "Effectively God-Emperor of the US Navy" Likely never to be repeated, as a naval force that would put enough strain on the US navy to *need* such an overarching head of the navy doesn't exist and probably will never exist.
I think of the quote from Patton: "I don't want them to love me, I want them to fight for me", and I think of another high ranking American military officer known probably as much for his irascible personality as for his tremendous talents and capabilities, Walter Bedell Smith, Eisenhower's chief of staff.
And didn´t he lead an attack on Pearl Harbour in 1938 with planes from a carrier group. The copy of the famous attack of Admiral Harry Yarnell from 1932. Therefore he must have been one of the soldiers to tell FDR about the possibility of a japanese attack.
@@williamgrear7467 Yes I am aware of it. Admiral Richardson told FDR that the fleet would be in danger in Hawaii. He followed the orders only reluctantly and therefore FDR removed him from his command. But they all had to admit that he was right. Do you know the novelle "The Great Pacific War" from 1926? published by an English writer
A successful attack on Pearl was proven possible....IF a fleet could get in range to do so. No one believed Japan, with their meager logistic capabilities, could reach Pearl from any of their established bases, let alone do so without being spotted anywhere along the way. The US higher ups knew an attack was coming, it's why the carriers weren't in port; they were delivering aircraft to every other base in the pacific, which were very much within easy range of Japan's navy.
MrHoppers002 Leahy wasn’t involved in naval operations; his position was akin to Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. Technically he outranked King, but they really weren’t in the same chain of command.
Yep - he was the King of all Numbskulls ......... how was it possible for the German U Boats to have sunk so many US ships and lost so many US merchant seaman ??....and he never changed his tactics ...... until he was FORCED to from above ...... and all because he didnt like the Client (the UK) that the US ships were supplying ....how sick is that ....??
@@normanbraslow7902 I would agree = Intellectual Resources .... it does not pay to have some weird quirky hatred of your allies .... apparently he found it hard to even be in the same room as the British ..... he was a very strange bird ..... he should have been on the other side ...LOL
Chris Eddy, He did not have either the ships, the men or the equipment. He was not an imbecile. He knew that convoying saved the British in the first war and in the Napoleonic Wars as well. But without the material, just what could he do? But yes, he did irrationally hate the British.
adm king and george marshall were the greatest americans of the 20th century....a lot of lesser human beings seem to like to criticize king .... he made mistakes and he learned from them and is the man who made the american navy the most powerful in history.
Now I understand why Admiral King vehemently hated the English, his dad was Scottish. Fair enough I'm Scottish decent & we still haven't forgiven "LongShanks" Bloody King Edward 1 for his subjugation of Free Wales & his unlawful war against Free Scotland.😁
Maybe you should all read up on some history instead of hating people from sheer ignorance. King hated the English because he was an ignorant, arrogant idiot.
I do believe that Fleet Admiral King is buried at the Navy Academy in Annapolis not at Arlington. Fleet Admiral Halsey is buried at Arlington next to his father Navy Captain Halsey. You state that he should be removed from Arlington Cemetery, why? What's your rationale?
I would tend to agree with some of the critics. King was a poor planner. The attack on Pearl Harbor and the Atlantic Uboat losses and initial lack of a decent strategy delayed our victory. The fact that our carriers were not laying in wait for the Japanese at either the Philippines or outside Hawaii ready to intercept but scattered and unorganized is proof the Navy was not prepared to act. This is why you always hear “Remember Pearl Harbor “. In other words, be ready! Be prepared. I’m not referring to the quality of the ships or planes. Not being ready is a failure in leadership. Why were we not actively watching the Japanese Fleet? Why were we not patrolling around Pearl Harbor with the PBYs? Or around the Philippines? Why were there no reinforcements prepared to land in the Philippines? No evacuation plan in place? Submarines should have been on station around Japan or the Philippines?
Michael Dobson, perhaps you might read a bit about the status of the Navy before the war. Congress cut back all the services severely, and the Navy just did not have the material resources to do any of the things you suggested. Don't blame King, blame Congress and the very powerful isolationists who refused to adequately fund the armed services. He did hate the British, true. I think that was just a kind of fetish with him.
King was not CNO/OpNav during the run-up to Pearl Harbor; ADM Harold R. Stark was CNO/OpNav and Husband E. Kimmel was CinCUS/CinCPac. Stark couldn’t control the infighting between Office of Naval Intelligence (ONI) and War Plans over who controlled what intelligence information went to his field commanders. All of those questions beginning with “why were . . .” should have been directed at Stark and his Chief of War Plans, RADM Richmond Kelly Turner, and to a lesser extent ADM Kimmel and Commander 14th Naval District RADM Claude C. Bloch.
When asked about his meteoritic rise in the ranks to Commander in Chief, United States Fleet and Chief of Naval Operations King stated, “When the bullets start to fly, they come looking for the sons of bitches".
Exceptional biography of Fleet Admiral King. Thank you for making his superb naval officer's career available for all to see and listen to!
Superb? He was a nasty SOB, a politician in Uniform . A most unimpressive so called sailor, who didn't do much sailing at all and spent WW2 screwing up everything he got involved in. The USA Navy would have been far better off without him around .
@@bobg1069 We could not disagree more on Fleet Admiral Ernest J. King. I suggest you read Thomas B. Buell's Master of Sea Power: A biography of Fleet Admiral Ernest J. King. Andy McKane
@@andymckane7271 He was clearly ignorant of the application of sea power, bar perhaps aircraft, as evidenced by his antagonism to Admiral Cunningham, a true sea dog fighting Admiral. They hated each other and ABC considered him over promoted and a political animal. Nimitz saved his reputation with his brilliance but it was none of Kings doing. He is no more than as footnote in history.
@@bobg1069 We could not disagree more.
Thank You to Lorain schools and U-tube for this most stellar biography on Admiral King. Together with the personal reminiscences of former subordinates, gives one a fact based kaleidoscope back into American 20th century Naval history.
If pppp pop ppppppppppppppppppppp
One of King's daughters said he was the most even-tempered man she knew of: Always angry. This was not that much of an exaggeration.
He should be committed.
The quote (to news reporters) was "My father is the most even-tempered man I know, he's always in a rage!"
people who are out of their depth often turn into angry individuals. Bullies are never to be admired or celebrated.
A traditional man of his era might have had his patience tried after four daughters. 😡
"Earnest Effort" lol
Apparently also didn’t believe the British early on 1942 when they told him that convoys were a good idea to get ships across the Atlantic ...
He didn't trust the British intelligence during the U-Boat attacks in early 1942. A lot of ships got sunk and crews killed before he finally acted.
ADOLPHUS ANDREWS: KIng's friend(?) from his Naval Academy days was a full captain in 1942 when King was already a full admiral and the CNO, the most senior posting in the US Navy. That year he was in charge, the French ocean liner, the Normandie, the third largest ship in the world, was being converted into a troopship for the United States when it caught fire. Fireboats pumped so much water that the ship took on a very dangerous list. Andrews did not order or even ask the fireboats to stop pumping more water. Then a man with a Russian accent pleaded to be let on board to open the seacocks so that the ship would sink onto the harbor bottom before capsizing--Normandie was so large that there was very little water between the bottom of the ship and the bed of the Hudson River. Adolphus sent him away.
The man was Alexander Yerkevich, the chief designer of the Normandie and the inventor of the bulbous bow used by nearly all modern ships.
Adolphus retired as a Vice Admiral.
Drachinifel brought me here.
I believe Leahy was the first American five-star naval officer (ahead of King and Nimitz by a few days in December 1944).
problem was leahy was outside the traditional rank structure. he was chief of staff to the commander in chief or a.k.a the first chairman of the joint chiefs but he was not attached to the navy or army in any specific command.
I was a naval officer in the 80s and 90s. One thing that really disturbed me was how many senior officers had obvious emotional disorders often aggravated by alcoholism and for the most part the navy just looked the other way. When I brought this up at the time people would just shrug and say, "Yeah, it's always been that way." I hope that's changed now that some of these things, like bipolar disorder, are better understood but I wouldn't bet on it.
I spent 21 years as a Naval Officer and never noticed any emotionally disturbed senior officers.
Bipolar is not a disorder.
My father mentioned his first CO, PD Fraser had a massive drinking problem and he eventually got drummed out when it got so out of hand the Navy couldn’t ignore it any more.
63 years old is an amazing age to become a distinguished essential war hero. And his wife had big hair. A remarkable man. Seamen cannot “drink too much”.
As a Marine might say, a seaman cannot drink too much of a Marine’s semen.
Mr. King finished high school a year early.
Then he went to war with the Spanish a year early too?
!!!😲 WOW 😯!!!
Now that’s what I call ambitious.
That war didn’t even start until 1898!
I'm glad Adm King controlled his laughter.
Cause I know most of you would never say that to his face if he was alive
I would because I have no respect for this man.
I've read that one of King's favorite subordinates was Adm. David Pye, the commander who left the Marines on Wake - didn't evacuate them or resupply the island, just hung them out to dry.
I'll give Adm. King points for being a badass, but a lot of guys got killed while he reinvented the wheel in re. antisubmarine tactics, and it all happened because he didn't like the British.
He did right by reaming Halsey out after the Leyte Gulf debacle, though.
What he did right by was smacking around the bureau of ordnance over the mark 14 torpedo and its destroyer and aerial derivatives. He propagandized himself into a corner using halsey as the poster boy for "We're kicking their asses all the way to Tokyo so sign up and get a piece of the action!" Then ol' bill bull went off the rails, leaving the taffy groups without adequate cover from a massive surface fleet he knew was in the area, followed up by sailing 3rd fleet through TWO typhoons. He couldn't unload on halsey when it would make a difference and he didn't.
King rejected convoys for US merchant ships. He then issued mk 14 torpedos. A greater disaster than Perl Harbour.
He didn't issue the mark 14s, he didn't have control over the bureau of ordnance when the war started. When he DID have authority over them he very quickly forced them to test and fix it, their pride be damned.
Kint was *not* the first five-star admrial; it was Admiral Leahy.
Yes...WILLIAM LEAHY...CALLED back into service...out of retirement...
Leahy was Roosevelt's military right hand man. Appointed first so none of the other's could be Top Dog. He could always have the last word.
Admiral Dewey
issue was leahy was not part of hte the rank structure anymore he was above the rank structure as he was FDRs chief of staff a.k.a the first chairman of the joint chiefs.
King's disdain for the British cost 10's of thousands of lives of Merchant Marines because he sent individual merchant ships to sea alone instead of with the security of the proven tactic of convoys. He should have been tried and jailed.
"Arghh,The bells,the bells??holy bat stink penfold was it that awful buzzing"??...🤯..
It was rumored that King shaved with a blowtorch, this came from the Navy he commanded!
In this video t
You make no mention of the battle of midway and the battle of the coral sea
Based on the theme of this "Biography" Nimitz was a minor player in the Pacific War.
About 3/4 of the way through I had that same thought. I joined the USAF in 1976. During my time in I came to know a lady who was retired Navy and spent several years during WW2 as a Yoeman. She was a civilian and did some data entry tasks. She worked very closely near Adm King's office in the 1940s. She and I had several conversations about her Navy career. She once told me her father taught her that if you can't say anything good about a person stay quiet and not say anything at all. She rarely spoke of Adm King.
Does Naval Academy still have entrance exams ?? Or do they take any schmuck at all ???
Everybody is bashing a dead man in the comments show some respect
You must earn respect.
king is the most uniue naval character as he's the only one to be
1.) fleet admiral
2.) CNO (chief of naval operations)
3.) COMINCH or CINCUS (commander in chief - US fleet)
some thing no other navy officer will ever accomplish
As Drachinifel put it "Effectively God-Emperor of the US Navy"
Likely never to be repeated, as a naval force that would put enough strain on the US navy to *need* such an overarching head of the navy doesn't exist and probably will never exist.
Probably no one will see this but im related to Ernest.
Victors need exceptional leadership. Admiral King was just such a hero.
Hero he was not.
I think of the quote from Patton: "I don't want them to love me, I want them to fight for me", and I think of another high ranking American military officer known probably as much for his irascible personality as for his tremendous talents and capabilities, Walter Bedell Smith, Eisenhower's chief of staff.
@@Arbeedubya well King made 5000 seamen and civilians die for him, though not willingly.
I thought William D Leahy was the 1st 5 Star Admiral?......
You are correct.
"When the chips are down, they send for the sons of bitches".
Leahy was the first to receive 5 stars , then King then Marshall.
I guess I should say, needlessly died because of him.
And didn´t he lead an attack on Pearl Harbour in 1938 with planes from a carrier group.
The copy of the famous attack of Admiral Harry Yarnell from 1932.
Therefore he must have been one of the soldiers to tell FDR about the possibility of a japanese attack.
Admiral Richerson Told FDR. He was before Admiral Kimmel.
@@williamgrear7467
Yes I am aware of it. Admiral Richardson told FDR that the fleet would be in danger in Hawaii. He followed the orders only reluctantly and therefore FDR removed him from his command. But they all had to admit that he was right.
Do you know the novelle "The Great Pacific War" from 1926?
published by an English writer
A successful attack on Pearl was proven possible....IF a fleet could get in range to do so. No one believed Japan, with their meager logistic capabilities, could reach Pearl from any of their established bases, let alone do so without being spotted anywhere along the way.
The US higher ups knew an attack was coming, it's why the carriers weren't in port; they were delivering aircraft to every other base in the pacific, which were very much within easy range of Japan's navy.
Music is too loud.
26:00 I think he means 1942.
Leahy was the first to wear 5 stars
MrHoppers002
Leahy wasn’t involved in naval operations; his position was akin to Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. Technically he outranked King, but they really weren’t in the same chain of command.
"i refuse to meet with macarthur" but what about teamwork, admiral?
MacArthur?.
Not s nice man. His own daughter said he was the most even tempered man in the navy. In a rage ALL the time, and NOT a friend of the British.
That doesn’t mean he’s not a nice man that means he is a man of tough skin a no one likes the British at that time colonizers stuck up people
Yep - he was the King of all Numbskulls ......... how was it possible for the German U Boats to have sunk so many US ships and lost so many US merchant seaman ??....and he never changed his tactics ...... until he was FORCED to from above ...... and all because he didnt like the Client (the UK) that the US ships were supplying ....how sick is that ....??
How easy do u think it is to detect a uboat with this new thing called a radar not very easy
King simply did not have the resources.
@@normanbraslow7902 I would agree = Intellectual Resources .... it does not pay to have some weird quirky hatred of your allies .... apparently he found it hard to even be in the same room as the British ..... he was a very strange bird ..... he should have been on the other side ...LOL
Chris Eddy, He did not have either the ships, the men or the equipment. He was not an imbecile. He knew that convoying saved the British in the first war and in the Napoleonic Wars as well. But without the material, just what could he do? But yes, he did irrationally hate the British.
Thought this was a documentary about comb-overs and really bad men's hairstyles for a minute.
Brylcream & California Poppy Oil must have been considered essential war materials.😆
adm king and george marshall were the greatest americans of the 20th century....a lot of lesser human beings seem to like to criticize king .... he made mistakes and he learned from them and is the man who made the american navy the most powerful in history.
And stupid people rain kudos on him in spite of his so-called “mistakes” as you put it.
A lot of American sailors lives would have been saved if he'd have had his stroke before the German 'operation drumbeat.'
He alone was responsible for the deaths of more allied sailors and merchant marines than any individual on the earth!!!
Now I understand why Admiral King vehemently hated the English, his dad was Scottish. Fair enough I'm Scottish decent & we still haven't forgiven "LongShanks" Bloody King Edward 1 for his subjugation of Free Wales & his unlawful war against Free Scotland.😁
ScottyFox ,
God has already dealt with Longshanks' cruelty.
You're next.
Longshanks took your FREEEEDOMM
Maybe you should all read up on some history instead of hating people from sheer ignorance. King hated the English because he was an ignorant, arrogant idiot.
Scotland Forever 🏴
He hated the "British", and that includes the Scots. Stop your Orwellian rewrite of history
He’s a distant relative of mine...
That is not something to boast about. I would be embarrassed myself.
@MrHoppers002
I would not be proud to be associated with *King.*
John suck a fat one be proud of we’re u come from
You should be proud of him.
AK 91'
Ernest King should be removed from Arlington Cemetery.
I do believe that Fleet Admiral King is buried at the Navy Academy in Annapolis not at Arlington. Fleet Admiral Halsey is buried at Arlington next to his father Navy Captain Halsey. You state that he should be removed from Arlington Cemetery, why? What's your rationale?
Lost all respect for King the way he treated Captain McVey. King was over rated big time.
I agree, one of the main reasons I don’t think he was good. McVey was scapegoat.
I would tend to agree with some of the critics. King was a poor planner. The attack on Pearl Harbor and the Atlantic Uboat losses and initial lack of a decent strategy delayed our victory.
The fact that our carriers were not laying in wait for the Japanese at either the Philippines or outside Hawaii ready to intercept but scattered and unorganized is proof the Navy was not prepared to act.
This is why you always hear “Remember Pearl Harbor “. In other words, be ready! Be prepared.
I’m not referring to the quality of the ships or planes. Not being ready is a failure in leadership.
Why were we not actively watching the Japanese Fleet? Why were we not patrolling around Pearl Harbor with the PBYs? Or around the Philippines? Why were there no reinforcements prepared to land in the Philippines? No evacuation plan in place? Submarines should have been on station around Japan or the Philippines?
Michael Dobson, perhaps you might read a bit about the status of the Navy before the war. Congress cut back all the services severely, and the Navy just did not have the material resources to do any of the things you suggested. Don't blame King, blame Congress and the very powerful isolationists who refused to adequately fund the armed services. He did hate the British, true. I think that was just a kind of fetish with him.
King was not CNO/OpNav during the run-up to Pearl Harbor; ADM Harold R. Stark was CNO/OpNav and Husband E. Kimmel was CinCUS/CinCPac. Stark couldn’t control the infighting between Office of Naval Intelligence (ONI) and War Plans over who controlled what intelligence information went to his field commanders.
All of those questions beginning with “why were . . .” should have been directed at Stark and his Chief of War Plans, RADM Richmond Kelly Turner, and to a lesser extent ADM Kimmel and Commander 14th Naval District RADM Claude C. Bloch.
So irritating to listen to an authoritative lip-smacker.
who needs something done with his adenoids.