John Sidney McCain Jr. (January 17, 1911 – March 22, 1981) was a United States Navy admiral who served in conflicts from the 1940s through the 1970s, including as the Commander, United States Pacific Command.
The son and namesake of a naval officer, McCain grew up in Washington, D.C., and graduated from the U.S. Naval Academy in 1931, after which he entered the submarine service. During World War II, he commanded submarines in several theaters of operation and was responsible for sinking several Japanese ships, eventually being decorated with both the Silver Star and Bronze Star. After the war, he held a variety of commands, specializing in amphibious warfare. He led the U.S. invasion of the Dominican Republic in 1965. He also served in several posts in Washington, including the Legislative Affairs Office and as Chief of Naval Information, where he became influential in political affairs. He was a staunch anti-Communist, and his advocacy of a strong naval presence earned him the nickname of "Mr. Seapower".
During the Vietnam War, McCain was Commander-in-Chief, Pacific Command (CINCPAC), commanding all U.S. forces in the Vietnam theater from 1968 to 1972. He was a stalwart supporter of President Richard Nixon's policy of Vietnamization. McCain played a significant role in the militarization of U.S. policy towards Cambodia, helping to convince Nixon to launch the 1970 Cambodian Incursion and establishing a personal relationship with Cambodian leader Lon Nol. McCain was also a proponent of the 1971 incursion into Laos. He retired from the Navy in 1972.
His father, Admiral John S. McCain Sr., was a naval aviator and Task Force commander during World War II. They were the first father-son pair to achieve a four-star rank. His son, John S. McCain III, was also a naval aviator who was a prisoner of war in North Vietnam during McCain's time as CINCPAC, and later became a United States Senator and the 2008 Republican presidential nominee.
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Early years, education, and family
McCain was born in Council Bluffs, Iowa, on January 17, 1911. His father, John S. McCain Sr., was a junior officer on the armored cruiser USS Washington and was away at sea at the time and his mother, the former Catherine Davey Vaulx, was traveling cross-country to visit with her sister. He was called "Jack" by his family, although he would also be called "Junior" by others, which he liked less. His family's history of military service extended beyond his father—his paternal uncle was U.S. Army Brigadier General William Alexander McCain. His family tree also contained other people engaged in military service, which extended back through many wars.
McCain grew up at various naval stations where his father was posted and then in Northwest, Washington, D.C., going to local schools and working as a paperboy. His father was away on duty for much of his childhood, and his mother did much of the parenting. He graduated from Central High School in the district.
McCain entered the United States Naval Academy in 1927, aged 16. He disliked the hazing tradition and behavioral restrictions of Annapolis and accumulated many demerits and earned mediocre grades during his years at the Academy. As one biographer wrote, McCain "was given to taking unauthorized midnight leave and spent much of his four ... years in contention with authority and working off massive doses of extra duty." McCain later stated: "I was known as a 'ratey' plebe, and that's the plebe who does not conform always to the specific rules and regulations of the upperclassmen. Some of these upperclassmen would ... require you to do such things which only incited rebellion and mutiny in me, see." At one point, McCain had so many demerits he was at risk of not graduating; his partying and drinking was especially dangerous as it was taking place during Prohibition. During much of his final year there he was banished from Bancroft Hall, the normal residence for midshipmen, and forced instead to live on the barracks ship Reina Mercedes. He graduated in 1931, finishing 423rd out of 441 in class rank, nineteenth from the bottom.
Upon graduation, he was commissioned an ensign and assigned to duty aboard the battleship Oklahoma in the Pacific. He applied to flight school to become a naval aviator, but was turned down due to a heart murmur, and was accepted at Submarine School at Naval Submarine Base New London in Connecticut instead. There, he placed 28th out of 29 in his class.
World War II
After the 1941 attack on Pearl Harbor, McCain would not see his family for long stretches. By then a lieutenant commander, McCain was assigned to command the submarine Gunnel, joining her in May 1942 for trials and seeing the boat commissioned in August 1942.
Gunnel was deployed as part of the November 1942 invasion of French North Africa. Operating conditions for the five submarines sent there were not favorable, due to overcrowded waters, poor weather, and mixed-up signals, and the deployment had no accomplishments. Like many other U.S. submarines, Gunnel was attacked in error by friendly aircraft. The Hooven-Owens-Rentschler (H.O.R.) diesels (known as "whores") which powered Gunnel were troublesome; at one point while returning home, drive gears of all four of the main engines were out of commission, and McCain's crew had to rely on their tiny auxiliary engine for the last 1,000 nautical miles (1,900 km). Gunnel went into the navy yard for an extensive refit and was replaced on patrol station off North Africa by "Pilly" Lent's Haddo.
After the refit, Gunnel was ordered to the Pacific Fleet, and in June 1943, went on patrol in the East China and Yellow Seas. On June 15, McCain torpedoed and sank the freighter Koyo Maru (6400 tons) in the Tsushima Strait. Early on June 19, he engaged a Japanese convoy that was headed for Shanghai. He torpedoed and sank the freighter Tokiwa Maru (7000 tons) and hit a smaller vessel. The convoy's escorts then staged a prolonged counter-attack on Gunnel, dropping depth charges that shook and damaged the boat and grappling hooks that rattled along its hull.
Underwater for hours, sometimes near the seabottom, McCain surfaced; Japanese escorts fired shells at him as he stood on the bridge, while he fired torpedoes back, striking and sinking one (originally thought to be a destroyer, it was the coastal minesweeper Tsubame). He dove again and the Japanese ships continued in sonar-based pursuit. After a total of 36 hours, nearly all spent underwater, Gunnel's batteries were about to fail and the air was very hot and virtually unbreathable. McCain surfaced in battle stations position, ready to engage in a disadvantageous gun battle with the Japanese pursuers, but they were heading in the opposite direction and he was able to escape.
Persistent trouble from the submarine's diesel engines then cut short the patrol after only eleven days, after which McCain returned to Pearl Harbor. Despite the reduced time, the freighter tonnage Gunnel sunk was the second-largest total for any of the sixteen U.S. submarines deployed into operational areas in the Pacific that month.
"Mr. Seapower"
After the end of the war, McCain remained in the Navy and his family settled in Northern Virginia. He was assigned as Director of Records to the Bureau of Naval Personnel until early 1949. McCain published a January 1949 article in United States Naval Institute Proceedings examining the training challenges the Navy faced in the nuclear era. He assumed command of Submarine Division 71 in the Pacific that year, with his flag in Carp, which took him to a variety of naval stations and two exploratory cruises to extreme northern waters, adding to the knowledge of an increasingly important strategic area for submarine operations.
From February through November 1950, McCain was executive officer of the heavy cruiser Saint Paul, and from June 1950 was involved in the early stages of the Korean War, joining Task Force 77 to patrol the Formosa Strait.
Now a captain, McCain was assigned to a series of posts at the Pentagon in alternation with various commands. He was director of Undersea Warfare Research and Development from 1950 to 1953, commander of Submarine Squadron 6 aboard flagship Sea Leopard in the Atlantic from 1953 to 1954, commander of the attack transport Monrovia from 1954 to 1955 in the Mediterranean, Director of the Progress Analysis Group from 1955 to 1957, and commander of the heavy cruiser Albany from 1957 to 1958. During these years, McCain went to the Naval Academy a number of times to admonish his son John on his performance there, which was at least as troublesome as his own had been. As one biographical profile stated, "Few fathers and sons could have been more alike as adolescents than Jack McCain and John Sidney III: Youthful rebellion seemed encoded in their DNA."
McCain was promoted to rear admiral in November 1958. From 1958 to 1960, he was assigned to the Office of the Secretary of the Navy, where he joined the Legislative Affairs Office as Chief Legislative Liaison. There he formed many useful political connections, as senators, representatives, admirals, and generals were all frequent social visitors to his centrally located D.C. house, which would later become the Capitol Hill Club. McCain was also a member of the Cosmos Club, Army and Navy Club, and the Chevy Chase Club, all in the D.C. area, and was a 33rd degree mason. His wife Roberta, viewed as "charming" and "wonderful" by McCain's superiors, also aided the social success, which featured as house guests powerful Congressional figures such as Carl Vinson, Richard Russell Jr., and Everett Dirksen. (His son John would witness some of these and earlier interactions and two decades later assume the same role, on way to the start of his political career.) During this stint, Rear Admiral McCain became an effective advocate for the Navy in congressional hearings and behind-the-scenes dealmaking, and helped persuade Congress to restore budget allocations it had earlier cut from construction programs for aircraft carriers.
Vietnam War
In February 1967, McCain received his sought-after promotion to full admiral (which became effective in May), and became Commander-in-Chief, U.S. Naval Forces, Europe (CINCUSNAVEUR), stationed in London. At the change of command ceremony for the Eastern Sea Frontier post, held on his father's old flagship USS Wasp, McCain was awarded a gold star in lieu of a third Legion of Merit for his work during the U.N. assignment. As the Vietnam War escalated, McCain was a strong advocate for bringing Iowa-class battleships out of the United States Navy reserve fleets in order to support shore bombardment missions. He ordered a Naval Court of Inquiry to be convened following the June 1967 USS Liberty incident, and chose his colleague, Admiral Isaac C. Kidd Jr., to head it. McCain limited the scope of the Inquiry and gave Kidd only a week to investigate and come up with a report on the matter, factors that led to doubts persisting for decades about what actually took place in the Liberty attack.
McCain's son, naval aviator Lieutenant Commander John S. McCain III, became a prisoner of war in North Vietnam in October 1967, after being shot down and badly injured during a bombing raid over Hanoi. McCain's prominence made the downing of his son front-page news. McCain and his wife Roberta treated the news stoically, attending a dinner party in London without indicating anything was wrong, even though initial word indicated their son was unlikely to have survived the shoot-down. McCain would later say little about his son's captivity in public, other than that they had indications he was alive and "that is something to live for."
McCain continued to expand on his vision of the Soviet threat, saying that the Soviets' maritime goal "encompasses not only the military uses of the sea, but also those relating to world politics, economics, commerce and technology", and likened its propaganda value to the Space Race. In April 1968, at the height of the Vietnam War, McCain was named by President Johnson as Commander-in-Chief, Pacific Command (CINCPAC), effective in July 1968, stationed in Honolulu and commander of all U.S. forces in the Vietnam theater. In an unprecedented move, Johnson had considered candidates from outside the Navy, including U.S. Army General William Westmoreland, who was leaving as commander of Military Assistance Command, Vietnam (MACV). However, the strong recommendation of Ellsworth Bunker, who had since become U.S. Ambassador to South Vietnam, was key in Johnson's decision. At the change-of-command ceremony for the Europe post, McCain was awarded the Navy Distinguished Service Medal.
Retirement and death
McCain retired on November 1, 1972. There was no ceremony, as it would have been redundant after the one that took place two months earlier in Hawaii; as one associate said, "He just didn't come to work today."
In early 1973, with the conclusion of the Paris Peace Accords, his son was released from confinement as a prisoner of war in North Vietnam and repatriated to the United States.
McCain visited the White House in 1975 and discussed naval preparedness issues with President Gerald Ford. During the late 1970s, McCain sometimes acted as an advisor on military matters to Ronald Reagan, who was preparing for his second presidential candidacy. McCain also participated in a January 1978 traveling "Panama Canal Truth Squad", led by Senator Paul Laxalt, that sought Senate rejection of the Panama Canal Treaty; McCain felt that the eventual ceding of the canal to Panamanian control would endanger U.S. security and provide an opening to the Soviets in the region.
However, McCain felt despair over his reluctant retirement from the United States Navy, and fell into prolonged poor health. His son John felt his father's "long years of binge drinking" had caught up with him, despite a mostly successful later recovery in Alcoholics Anonymous.
McCain died of a heart attack on a military aircraft en route from Europe on March 22, 1981, with his wife at his side. He was buried at Arlington National Cemetery on March 27, 1981.
Namesakes
USS John S. McCain (DDG-56) was named for both Admirals McCain. The Navy rededicated the ship to also honor Senator John S. McCain III in 2018.
McCain was written about extensively in his son John's 1999 memoir Faith of My Fathers. McCain was portrayed by actor Scott Glenn in the 2005 television movie adaptation.
Grandson John S. "Jack" McCain IV attended and graduated from the United States Naval Academy in 2009, the fourth-generation John S. McCain to do so. He became a naval aviator, like his father and great-grandfather, including flying helicopters during the War in Afghanistan. John S. McCain IV has a son John S. "Mac" McCain V.
Awards
By the end of his career, Admiral John S. McCain Jr. had received the following medals and decorations:
Writings
McCain, John S. Jr. (January 1949). "Where Do We Go from Here?". Proceedings. 75 (1). United States Naval Institute: 47–52.
McCain, John S. Jr. (January 1963). "Amphibious Warfare During the Next Decade". Proceedings. 89 (1). United States Naval Institute: 104–111.
McCain, John S. Jr. (November 1, 1963). "New Four Ocean Challenge". Vital Speeches of the Day.
McCain, John S. Jr. (1964). The New Four Ocean Challenge. Washington, D.C.: Department of the Navy, Bureau of Naval Personnel, Office of the Special Assistant for Leadership Development.
McCain, John S. Jr. (June 15, 1966). "Total Wet War". Vital Speeches of the Day.
McCain, John S. Jr. (1967). The Expanding Scope of Sea Power. Washington, D.C.: Department of the Navy, Bureau of Naval Personnel.
McCain, John, ed. (1999). The Reminiscences of Admiral John S. McCain Jr., U.S. Navy (Retired). Annapolis, MD: Naval Institute Press. LCCN 00267356. OCLC 50234750. ASIN B0006RY8ZK.