# Easy question, re: Pearl Harbor **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [January 30, 2005, 1:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/easy-question-re-pearl-harbor/287362 "2005-01-30T01:54:15Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 8\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Ludovic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/7ab992/32.png) [@Ludovic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ludovic)\ **Post date:** [July 29, 2016, 5:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/easy-question-re-pearl-harbor/287362/41 "2016-07-29T17:48:36Z")
And _now_ I understand where the substitution phrase “catch a _tiger_ by the toe” was chosen! 😃 ---
**Author:** ![Corry\_El](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/ecae2f/32.png) [@Corry\_El](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Corry_El)\ **Post date:** [July 29, 2016, 10:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/easy-question-re-pearl-harbor/287362/42 "2016-07-29T22:08:09Z")
> [@doorhinge](#): > > I have not heard of the consonant-vowel pairs theory, either. AFAIK, “Tora” is Japanese for “tiger” and the coded message/phrase “Tora, tora, tora” issued on the morning of Dec 7 meant that complete surprise has been achieved. As to ‘consonant vowel pairs’ Japanese Morse Code equivalents for telegraph and wireless corresponded to kana, each of which is a consonant/vowel pair, Japanese doesn’t have letters. So any signal in Japanese was composed of consonant/vowel pairs. The Japanese Wikipedia entry for ‘tora tora tora’ gives acronym for TOtsugeki RAigeki (sudden attack, lightning attack) and the word tora (‘tiger’) as possible origins. IOW it doesn’t seem at this point it will ever certainly be known, or it was both, or meant one to some people and the other to other people, or simply what they were supposed to signal if surprise was achieved. > **[トラトラトラ](https://ja.wikipedia.org/wiki/%E3%83%88%E3%83%A9%E3%83%88%E3%83%A9%E3%83%88%E3%83%A9)** > > トラトラトラは、太平洋戦争の始まりである日本軍の真珠湾攻撃が奇襲により開始されることを伝えた電信の暗号略号である。 > 意味は「ワレ奇襲ニ成功セリ」。 > 本来はモールス符号「･･―･･　･･･」を繰り返すものでトラ連送とされた。真珠湾攻撃時には攻撃隊長・淵田美津雄中佐の搭乗する九七式艦上攻撃機から第一航空艦隊司令部（旗艦：空母「赤城」）に宛てて発信された。 > 真珠湾攻撃は、奇襲の場合（敵の防御が効力を発揮する前に攻撃可能であると空中指揮官が判断した場合）には艦攻による対艦攻撃を先行させ、強襲の場合には艦爆による対空防御制圧が先行させる計画になっていたが、「ワレ奇襲ニ成功セリ」はこのうち前者を指す電文となる。従って、これはあくまで攻撃が奇襲によって開始されることを示すものであり、攻撃そのものの成功を意味するものではない。 Note that the entry is under トラトラトラ which is katakana. The IJN though used katakana a lot for abbreviations and codes, so perhaps in that sense it leans towards saying ‘it’s just a code’. For example the action reports of IJN units (those of the carrier air groups at PH for example) are written in an abbreviated style consisting of Chinese characters (for people’s names and some common nouns and verbs, as in normal writing now, though older forms of them not the simplified postwar ones), certain IJN-only symbols (for various a/c types for example, based on stylized Latin letters), and katakana for everything else. In normal Japanese writing now, katakana is generally used only for foreign words, and hiragana for grammatical particles, etc. ---
**Author:** ![Siam\_Sam](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/d78d45/32.png) [@Siam\_Sam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Siam_Sam)\ **Post date:** [July 30, 2016, 3:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/easy-question-re-pearl-harbor/287362/43 "2016-07-30T03:10:01Z")
> [@Johnny\_L.A](#): > > The codeword to indicate the breech of the Möhne Dam was the name of Gibson’s dog, which was hit by a car and died the day before the mission. The dog’s name was ‘[N-word]’ (most likely referring to Indians, rather than Africans), and that word is taboo. Side question: Was this portrayed in an old British film? Because what you say about the dog’s name and it dying in a car accident is exactly what was being portrayed in an old film on a TV set in the background of the hotel room that Bob Geldof decided to trash in _Pink Floyd: The Wall_ (1982). Really. ---
**Author:** ![Johnny\_L.A](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johnny_l.a/32/1084_2.png) [@Johnny\_L.A](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Johnny_L.A)\ **Post date:** [July 30, 2016, 3:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/easy-question-re-pearl-harbor/287362/44 "2016-07-30T03:18:13Z")
> [@Siam\_Sam](#): > > Side question: Was this portrayed in an old British film? Yes, the dog’s name was mentioned several times in the 1955 film _The Dam Busters_. ---
**Author:** ![Siam\_Sam](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/d78d45/32.png) [@Siam\_Sam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Siam_Sam)\ **Post date:** [July 30, 2016, 3:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/easy-question-re-pearl-harbor/287362/45 "2016-07-30T03:20:30Z")
Thank you. I’ve seen _Pink Floyd: The Wall_ many times over the years and have always wondered what old movies that was. ---
**Author:** ![gkster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gkster/32/14107_2.png) [@gkster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gkster)\ **Post date:** [July 30, 2016, 5:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/easy-question-re-pearl-harbor/287362/46 "2016-07-30T05:42:16Z")
I wonder whether taking the first 2 syllables of the long words to form “Tora” is related to a common type of abbreviation and word formation in Japanese? They do this with English words like “Pocket Monster” becoming “Pokemon” or “Costume play” becoming “Cosplay” and “personal computer” becoming “pasocon”. And this also happens with Japanese words, like Tokyo Daigaku (Tokyo University) becoming Todai. Of course we do this in English (like University of Connecticut becoming UConn) but it seems more common in Japanese. ---
**Author:** ![TokyoBayer](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tokyobayer/32/13989_2.png) [@TokyoBayer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TokyoBayer)\ **Post date:** [July 30, 2016, 8:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/easy-question-re-pearl-harbor/287362/47 "2016-07-30T08:59:59Z")
> [@gkster](#): > > I wonder whether taking the first 2 syllables of the long words to form “Tora” is related to a common type of abbreviation and word formation in Japanese? > They do this with English words like “Pocket Monster” becoming “Pokemon” or “Costume play” becoming “Cosplay” and “personal computer” becoming “pasocon”. > And this also happens with Japanese words, like Tokyo Daigaku (Tokyo University) becoming Todai. > Of course we do this in English (like University of Connecticut becoming UConn) but it seems more common in Japanese. It is very common in Japanese to take the first two kanji – not syllables – of words for an abbreviation. However, it’s much more likely that tora tora tora was simply the code used. ---
**Author:** ![md2000](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/73ab20/32.png) [@md2000](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/md2000)\ **Post date:** [July 30, 2016, 1:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/easy-question-re-pearl-harbor/287362/48 "2016-07-30T13:21:51Z")
> [@Boyo\_Jim](#): > > Glad to hear it. I was afraid we’d permanently lost some letters of the alphabet during the war, but people born since never knew because the letters could no longer be printed. 😛 I think that was just the Germans who lost a few letters… and the Russians. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/easy-question-re-pearl-harbor/287362.md?page=2)