http://homepage.ntlworld.com/andrew.etherington/month/thismonth/04.htm
December 4th, 1941
UNITED KINGDOM: Parliament passes a new national Service Bill. It includes compulsory direction and conscription for female labour. Unmarried women are to be called up to serve in the police, fire services and armed services under rules announced by the prime minister. Those affected are aged between 20 and 30. Married as well as single women up to the age of 40 are to register as available labour which might be directed to industry.
Mr Churchill describes the new arrangement as “another instalment of toil and sweat”. The age of call-up for men is down to 18 years and six months, while those aged between 41 and 50 are also liable for armed service. Boys and girls aged 16 must register their names as a first step toward uniform, and boys aged 16 are being encouraged to join the Home Guard as cadets. As Mr. Churchill sees it: “We must be careful that our boys do not run loose.”
Single women with illegitimate or adopted children, and other special hardship cases, are exempt. Female conscientious objectors can claim exemption even though women do not serve in most combat units. Among men, lay preachers and farm workers are among those whose “reserve occupations” keeps them out of uniform. Yet the potential pool of labour resulting from the new rules will contain nearly 1.7 million single women and 70,000 youths.
Destroyer HMS Nepal launched
ASW trawler HMS Dunkery launched.
Minesweeping trawler HMS Sir Lancelot launched.
Submarine HMS Truculent laid down. (Dave Shirlaw)
GERMANY:
U-599 commissioned
U-336 launched. (Dave Shirlaw)
U.S.S.R.: The Finns take Hango, and German Army Group Centre presses hard on the Moscow Front.
Moscow: Poland’s exiled premier, General Wladyslaw Sikorski, signs a mutual assistance pact with Stalin.
Soviet submarine SC-214 sinks Italian tanker Torcello (3336 t) near Bosfor. (Dave Shirlaw)
SOUTHEAST ASIA: The Japanese landing force that will attack Malaya sails from Hainan.
COMMONWEALTH OF THE PHILIPPINES: MacArthur orders Brereton to initiate air patrols to north of Luzon and to disperse aircraft. Brereton uses fighters for this mission. Patrols continue to December 8, 1941.
Patrols spotted a formation of between nine and 27 bombers over Luzon after dark.
21st Pursuit Squadron at Nichols receives 24 P-40E’s, turns its 17 P-35A’s over to the 34th at Del Carmen.
Del Monte Field sufficiently developed to be used by B-17’s.
(Marc Small)
WAKE ISLAND: Aircraft carrier USS Enterprise sends F4F Wildcat aircraft ordered to reinforce US garrison. (Dave Shirlaw)
CANADA:
Minesweeper HMCS Lachine launched Levis, Province of Quebec.
Minesweepers HMCS Outarde, Medicine Hat and Melville commissioned.
Corvette HMCS Lunenburg commissioned.
Patrol vessel HMCS Nenamook commissioned. (Dave Shirlaw)
U.S.A.: The firefighting role of the Quartermaster Corps of the United States Army is transferred to the Corps of Engineers.
The Engineers acquired fire stations staffed with professional civilian fire fighters and Army acquired fire apparatus as well as the Quartermaster Corps fire apparatus designers, fire apparatus in the procurement stage and the policies and procedures applicable to peacetime. (Jean Beach)
Magic continues to yield key pieces of the puzzle, but that info is not passed along, except in the most non specific terms to Kimmel in Hawaii.
Intel in DC has been tracking a series of “winds” messages from Tokyo to embassies, and receive a winds message that they, correctly, believe to be the war warning to the embassy, known as the “winds execute message”: “north wind clear”. Hawaii is never informed.
Kimmel, Navy Commander Hawaii, receives intel that the local Japanese consulate is destroying all but one code, and is burning documents, but fails to understand the significance of this.
The head of RCA, Sarnoff, had agreed to provide the Navy in Hawaii with the coded messages tapped from local Japanese and from the Japanese Consulate phones and messages. Key intercepts were provided on December 3, 4. Rochefort put his best people on it, but couldn't finalize decoding until Dec 10, at which point they realized they had the key info forecasting the attack.