The Best Captain Matt Garth Quotes

Captain: [On the phone to his boss] They've taken the bait, Sir. It's Midway!

Miss: Damn it, I'm an American! What makes us different from German-Americans or Italian-Americans?
Captain: Pearl Harbor... I guess.

Captain: Listen, Carl; I understand my boy, Tom, is in your squadron. How's he doing?
Cmdr. Carl Jessop: Good, he's doing good. Good pilot. Good all around. I think his only problem would be... enemy identification. The boy's got to learn man: you do not win a war by kissing the enemy

Captain: How much can you decipher?
Commander: Fifteen percent.
Captain: Really decipher?
Commander: Ten percent.
Captain: Ten percent? That's one word in ten, Joe! You're *guessing*!
Commander: [slightly hurt] We like to call it "analysis."

Adm. Chester W. Nimitz: [Is informed Admiral Halsey's been hospitalized] Damn. You know how much Bill Halsey hates hospitals.
Capt. Matt Garth: Maybe it's not that serious, sir.
Adm. Chester W. Nimitz: If he's scheduled himself to go anywhere *near* one, it's not only damn serious, it's probably critical.
Cmdr. Joseph Rochefort: [Joins them] Admiral, I got some really bad news.
Adm. Chester W. Nimitz: Well, today's the day for it.
Cmdr. Joseph Rochefort: The Japanese have changed their JN-25 code, that's the one that's been giving us Yamamoto's plans.
Adm. Chester W. Nimitz: How long will it take for you to unravel their new system?
Cmdr. Joseph Rochefort: A month, maybe two.
Capt. Matt Garth: Sir, do you still want that fleet order issued?
Adm. Chester W. Nimitz: ...Yes. Target: Midway.

Captain: Can I ask you something personal? Very personal?
Commander: Sure.
Captain: You know, it really stinks down here. How often do some of your people take a bath?
Commander: Bath? Hell, I don't know. What *day* is it?

Captain: [to his son, Tom, who he is having an argument with] You better shape up before some hotshot Jap pilot flames your ass!... You're being paid to fly planes, not sit in your room and cry over your girlfriends picture!

RAdm. Frank J. 'Jack' Fletcher: I'd give my retirement pay to know what Nagumo is up to now.
Captain: Same thing we are, Admiral- Sweating it out.

Captain: Admiral, Commander Rochefort has something he would like to tell you.
Commander: It's about objective AF, sir, the meaning of AF. Now, our listening posts have been picking up alot of traffic between Yamamoto's staff commanders.
Captain: There has been a heavy volume of traffic, sir, with the recurring references to Objective AF and... what was the other one?
Commander: AO. Now, AO is still a mystery, Admiral, maybe a diverson, but I think we've identified Objective AF as Midway. Now, it really had us stymied there, until one of my men remembered an enemy intercept we decoded last March. Now, a Jap reconnaissance pilot radioed his base that he was passing close to AF. Now we plotted every possible course this plane might have taken, and the only appreciable land mass he could have overflown at the time was Midway.
Captain: Joe...
Commander: Look, I know it's thin...
Admiral: Thin? Damn near invisible.
Commander: But I found a way to confirm it, sir.
[Takes out a message and passes it to Nimitz]
Commander: If you will have this flown to Midway. It's a fake message, sir, reporting that Midway's fresh water condenser has broken down. Now, it should be transmitted in the clear, so there's no question of Japanese operators getting every word of it.
Admiral: [Smiles and nods, passing it over to Blake] Instruct Midway to include that in their housekeeping traffic tomorrow.
Lieutenant Commander Ernest L. Blake: Aye, sir.

Lieutenant: [after telling his dad that he is marrying a Japanese girl] I need your help, Dad.
Captain: I guess you damn well do, Tiger.

Captain: I read the FBI report on you and your parents.
Miss: Ask me anything you want to.
Captain: Okay. You're father was frequently seen coming and going from the Japanses consulat.
Miss: He has old friends there.
Captain: I see. And what about those Japanese patriotic organizations you belong to?
Miss: My father enrolled me in those when I was born! Out of respect for him, I never resigned. But I wasn't active!
Captain: [Nods] I see. And what about those magazines they found in your apartment?
Miss: The Prairie Shinburn? Published in Wyoming. My father had deep emotional ties to Japan, but even so, he thought it was a rediculous propaganda sheet.
Captain: Then why did he subscribe?
Miss: He's a traditional and honorable man. He was once indebtted to the man who publishes the Prairie Shinburn.