War Plan Orange
US Navy planners created War Plan Orange for fighting a war against Japan. The plan envisioned the Japanese commencing hostilities by attacking the Philippines. An American fleet response from Hawaii and the west coast of the United States would sortie into the western Pacific. Ironically, and with implications for Pearl Harbor, American plans fit neatly together with Japanese expectations. American naval planners would send a reinforced Pacific Fleet across the Central Pacific to meet the Japanese Combined Fleet somewhere near the Marshall or Caroline Islands. There they would destroy it before moving on to the Philippines and the eventual invasion of the Japanese Home Islands. Though the timetable for such a series of missions varied, the objectives remained constant.