Joe Rochefort's War

The Odyssey of the Codebreaker Who Outwitted Yamamoto at Midway

By: Elliot Carlson

Narrated by: Danny Campbell

Elliot Carlson's biography of Captain Joe Rochefort is the first to be written of the officer who headed the U.S. Navy's decrypt unit at Pearl Harbor and broke the Japanese Navy's code before the Battle of Midway. Listeners will share Rochefort's frustrations as he searches in vain for Yamamoto's fleet prior to the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor and share his joy when he succeeds in tracking the fleet in early 1942 and breaks the code that leads him to believe Yamamoto's invasion target is Midway.

His conclusions, bitterly opposed by some top navy brass, are credited with making the U.S. victory possible and helping change the course of the war. The author tells the story of how opponents in Washington forced Rochefort's removal from the decrypt unit at Pearl and denied him the Distinguished Service Medal recommended by Admiral Nimitz.

In capturing the interplay of policy and personality and the role played by politics at the highest levels of the Navy, Carlson reveals a side of the intelligence community seldom seen by outsiders.

For a full understanding of the man, Carlson examines Rochefort's love-hate relationship with cryptanalysis, his adventure-filled years in the 1930s as the right-hand man to the Commander in Chief of the U.S. Fleet, and his return to code-breaking in mid-1941 as the officer in charge of Station Hypo at Pearl Harbor. He traces Rochefort's career from his enlistment in 1918 to his posting in Washington as head of the Navy's code-breaking desk at age 25, and beyond. In many ways a reinterpretation of Rochefort, the book makes clear the key role his codebreaking played in the outcome of Midway and the legacy he left of reporting actionable intelligence directly to the fleet.

An epilogue describes efforts waged by Rochefort's colleagues to obtain the medal denied him in 1942, a drive that finally paid off in 1986, when the medal was awarded posthumously.

©2011 Elliot Carlson (P)2012 Tantor

Critic reviews

"The stuff of a wartime thriller." ( The Wall Street Journal)

Signal Intell, Code breaking and Rochefort story

Students of the Pacific war, especially the naval intelligence aspect of the war, will enjoy this book. Learned about the Navy's foresight in sending young officers before the conflict to Japan to learn the Japanese language.. Rochefort was one of them as was many of others who became crucial to the fight to come. Story on station Hippo's code breakers and his great talent as an Intelligence Analyst makes for compelling reading. Signal intelligence also plays a prominent role in the story. After he proved the Washington officers wrong about Midway, Redman brothers plus others forced Rochefort out at Hippo and sidelined him for most of the war outside his talents. Highly Recommend.

Excellent book!

This is a must have book for anyone interested in naval history or the Pacific theatre of WWII. President Reagan said if there was ever a battle involving tens of thousands of men whose result could be traceable to the work of one man, this would be it.

Excellent!

Well researched, neutral perspective and a fascinating piece of history. Former Defense Secretary James R Schlesinger made the argument that Rochefort’s genius and leadership was the singular factor in the US Navy’s winning plan for the battle of Midway. He went on to argue that the victory at Midway allowed the US to throw its military might at Germany which balanced Soviet control of Europe and set the stage for the Cold War defeat of global communism. By this logic Rochefort was the critical individual of the late 20th century. Don’t discount this theory until you’ve read this book. And I never knew the story of the bureaucratic jealousies that forced Rochefort to leave the code breaking team he created and led just 6 months after Midway.

fascinating story.

About arguably the most important battle of ww2. Well told and good production quality. kudos.

Facinating but little slow in places

Would you recommend this audiobook to a friend? If so, why?

facinating story although it took me a little while to get into it at the biggining.
hate to see how thick it is in paper form.

interesting story

Knew some about Rochefort's story. He was well versed in what it took to lead Hypo. My biggest complaint, and it's a general one for most Audible books, is how bad all of the voice over presenters mispronounce Japanese words, specifically Yokosuka. its Yo Ko Ska, not Yo Ko Sooka.

Great story

Excellent narration. Well researched. I gained a lot of insight concerning the military hierarchy and the roll that egos/ personalities played in decision making.

Amazingly engaging

How in the world do you make a 22 hour audiobook about an obscure Naval officer from 70 years ago work? Well, Elliot Carlson/Danny Campbell find a way. A large portion of this book is dedicated to a detailed account (almost day by day) of code-breaking in the Pacific theater from mid-1941 to mid-1942 period, but it's not boring. Before and after those detailed accounts is the story of Joe Rochefort and his career's many highs and lows; a compelling story itself.

Obviously, this is a book meant for people with a high level of interest in WWII (like me) and I can't imagine my wife sitting through even 30 minutes of this book. However, even for someone who finds the stories from WWII compelling, this could have been TMI if not written with as much care and style.

Danny Campbell's reading is adequate. He does have an occasional inflection/emphasis issue when pronouncing certain words and names (e.g. "Rabaul" comes out as "ra-BOW-el"), but overall it does not detract from the story.

Finally, when writing a book about a somewhat controversial figure from this period, Carlson could have sided with Rochefort unilaterally to make his subject an absolute hero. Instead, he does a good job of balancing the account and provides a well researched and fair treatment of Rochefort and his primary adversaries, the Redman brothers.

Details about Midway and Rocheford’s career

I have read much about how US was able to ascertain Japanese intentions at Midway but never knew details about how hard it was to accomplish until heard this book. Likewise knew nothing of the back room events that were taken again the Rocheford career as well as what might have happened if he had continued as leader of code breaking after Midway.

Great about war history

What made the experience of listening to Joe Rochefort's War the most enjoyable?

Elliot makes the events interesting but I am not sure if a listener who is not interested in war history would not want to last the distance as some of the events can be drawn out. The history is very through and well referenced.

What other book might you compare Joe Rochefort's War to and why?

No other book has been so researched to the extent as this book.

Have you listened to any of Danny Campbell’s other performances before? How does this one compare?

No

If you were to make a film of this book, what would be the tag line be?

The Pacific Code Breakers.

Any additional comments?

Very topical and recent history to the Bush administration.