[4] Produced during the height of World War II, the film was used as propaganda to boost morale back home and to entice young men to join the Submarine Service of the U.S. Navy.

On Christmas Eve, the submarine USS Copperfin, under the command of Captain Cassidy, departs Mare Island Naval Shipyard on a secret mission.

At sea, Cassidy opens his sealed orders, which direct him to proceed first to the Aleutian Islands to rendezvous with a PBY Catalina and take meteorologist Lt. Raymond aboard.

At least partly to expiate his mistake, Tommy volunteers to defuse an unexploded bomb stuck under the deck under the direction of Captain Cassidy.

In desperation, after long hours and barrages of depth charges, Cassidy attacks, sending a destroyer to the bottom and enabling the crew to return safely home.

Members of the cast spent time at the U.S. Navy's Mare Island Naval Shipyard in Vallejo, California, to familiarize themselves with submarine procedures and operations.

[6] The Wahoo was reported as missing in action after production on Destination Tokyo completed, sunk by Japanese aircraft in October 1943 while returning home from a patrol in the Sea of Japan.

The model of the Copperfin used for filming was based on actual American submarines, except that, to confuse the Japanese, it was given equipment and apparatus that were used on numerous different types of subs.

[4] The incident in Destination Tokyo in which the pharmacist's mate performs an appendectomy was based on an actual event which took place on the submarine USS Seadragon.

[2] The New York Times reviewer Bosley Crowther wrote: It has a lot of exciting incident in it; some slick, manly performances are turned in by Cary Grant (as the commander), John Garfield, Alan Hale and Dane Clark.

But an essential rule of visual drama, which is to put within a frame only so much explicit action as can be realistically accepted in a space of time, is here completely violated.

According to his autobiography, Destination Tokyo influenced Ronald Reagan in his decision to accept the lead role of a World War II submarine captain in the 1957 movie Hellcats of the Navy.