In the wake of whistle blower Edward Snowden ’s leaks about the NSA ’s PRISM surveillance programme , I keep hearing people wander out the former World War Two set phrase “ loose lips sink ship . ” How literally , I wonder , are we supposed to take that ? Have intelligence leaks ever led directly to the loss of a U.S. naval vessel before ?
Maybe . Over the track of our naval chronicle , there have been security breaches . At the same clock time , there have been ships and boats and lives miss . Most of the time , it ’s very hard to pull a straight line from an instance of the former to one of the latter . There ’s often correlativity , but not clear causing . In one of these cases , the mouth that might have sunk the ships were seize to a congressman .
During WWII , concerns about internal security were probably mellow than ever before in U.S. history , and secrecy was paramount to security and the war elbow grease . Civilians were reminded of this through the “ informal lips ” poster , and many soldiers serving oversea were issuedpamphletsthat reminded them that …
If only someone had given a copy of that to Andrew J. May . The Kentucky democrat served in the House of Representatives from 1931 to 1947 and chaired the House Military Affairs Committee during the warfare . During the summer of 1943 , May and other House appendage natter site in the Pacific Theater and received briefing on operations and tidings . Upon his income tax return household , May gave a pressure group discussion and shared a little too much of what he learned .
Vice Admiral Charles Lockwood , air force officer of the U.S. pigboat fleet in the Pacific , blame May ’s leak for leave to meliorate Nipponese maneuver and American casualty . “ I hear Congressman May say the [ Japanese ] deepness charge are not countersink deep enough , ” Lockwood write in a letter to another officer . “ He would be pleased to recognize [ they ] set ‘em deeply now . " Lockwood estimated that May ’s “ injudiciousness ” at once led to the loss of ten subs and 800 seamen .
Lockwood ’s accusations and estimation might not be water - tight , though . The Navy ’s “ Enemy Anti - Submarine Measures ” account , a sum-up of the Pacific fleet ’s experience with Nipponese anti - sub weapon system , makes no reference of a variety in depth charge deployment after May ’s leak , and says that the Japanese were never capable to forecast out the full profundity capabilities of American subs . Even if the depth charges were set lower , the Japanese still did n’t know how down they had to go before the subs could n’t maneuver below them . The Naval History Division ’s account of submarine personnel casualty in the war , meanwhile , does note the utilization of depth charge in the approach lead to the loss of ten submarine , but the theme also could n’t conclude the exact reasons for the red ink of each of those subs . The events surrounding some release were only learn year after the war from foe reports or other second - hand info , and may not be totally accurate or definitive .
Representative May , meanwhile , suffered no upshot for his giving mouth except some high-risk jam . He was later get up in malicious gossip , though , and convict of consent bribes and using his position to secure contract and favors for a munitions caller . He serve nine months in prison and was pardoned by President Truman , but his political calling was drop .
