to certain vessels, the recommissionings of others, the readying end
sailing of all vessels concerned, and the executing of many other
of the early Task Group commitments went on simultaneously with the
organizing of the Task Group and the-plannins for
tion.
the entire opera-
Not only did this, of necessity, tend to impose a "day to day”
type of planning for the early operations, but this was superimposed on
the over-all plamins for the operation.
Obviously, there was no
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sovereizn remedy for such troubles; the only possible answer was tc
comply “ith the time schedule by impressing on all concerned the absolute necessity for meeting the target date.
By thus securing the co-
operation of all hands, the operation proceeded on schedule.
The
great speed required in order to meet the target date also engendered
a possible threat to security.
Dispatching of the first unit (COMSTOCK
and the three LST) on schedule could only be achieved by much overtime work at Neval Shipyard Pearl Harbor.
For more than a year, the
authorizing of overtime work had been held to a very few special cases
on order of the Secretary of the Navy.
The sudden authorization of
much overtime, without any accompanying relaxation of restrictions by
the Secretary, could only point to a “hot Top Secret" operation, sO
tongues began to wag and many theories were aired as to employment of
the ships.
The press releases made in early December soon stilled
such speculation,
Many planning difficulties were caused by the separation between the Main JTF 7 Headquarters in Washington, where most of the over-
all planning for "SANDSTONE" wes accomplished, and Task Group 7.3
Section VII