Mark Schwartz
SaddleBrooke’s World War II Roundtable welcomes you to our second presentation of the 2025-26 season with a topic that illustrates America’s military superiority in the Pacific Theater. Bill Todd, a former Navy submariner in the nuclear age, will present the exploits of the Navy’s “silent service,” which helped assure victory against Japan. For the presentation, we ask your support in donating $1 as you attend to help defray our cost of using the DesertView Theater (at $60 for each use).
The U.S. Navy submarine campaign against Japan had a profound effect on Japan’s ability to make war by strangling its supply of oil and raw materials. Why was the U.S. fleet-type submarine so much more effective than the German U-boats of World War I? What caused our submarine warfare to be ineffective for the first half of the war? Was it technical issues or human issues like leadership, training, and personnel issues? Conversely, how did our program become devastatingly effective from 1943 to 1945? Why did America succeed in World War II undersea warfare when Germany and Japan failed? Just as important, who were the standout sub commanders who led this daring charge—men like Charlie Lockwood and the legendary Dudley “Mush” Morton. Morton’s boat, the USS Wahoo, sank 19 Japanese ships over several patrols, and Morton earned four Navy Crosses, the last posthumously, as Wahoo never returned from her patrol.
Bill Todd’s presentation will illustrate how submarines work and explain the challenges of attacking enemy ships and sailing away as a survivor. Join us to learn about the war’s most celebrated submarine commanders and why they succeeded in a most lethal environment in America’s “silent service.”
Bill Todd has a business degree from the University of Chicago and served in the U.S. Navy from 1962 until 1969, achieving the rank of Machinist’s Mate 1st Class (E6) when he left the Navy. He is a graduate of the U.S. Navy’s Nuclear Power School and served as an instructor at the U. S. Navy Nuclear Power School. Bill qualified in submarines and served as the leading Engineering Laboratory Technician on the fleet ballistic missile submarine USS Daniel Boone SSB(N) 629 for five patrols, during which he was responsible for all radio chemical and chemical analyses on the power plant and radiation safety.
Following service in the Navy, Bill spent 20 years with Siemens Medical Systems and the rest of his career as a partner in a small software development company. Bill and Sheila moved to Sun Lakes, a Robson community, in 1995 and to SaddleBrooke in 2009.