The article with links at:[url]
http://www.independent.org/tii/news/011203Stinnett.html[/url]

December 3, 2001
Pentagon Still Scapegoats Pearl Harbor Fall Guys
By Robert B. Stinnett*
As we remember the roughly 2,400 persons killed in the Japanese attack at Pearl Harbor -- the worst one-day loss of American lives prior to Sept. 11th of this year -- recently declassified U.S. military documents authored more than 60 years ago compel us to revisit some troubling questions.
At issue is American knowledge of Japanese military plans to attack Hawaii prior to Dec. 7, 1941. The first question is whether President Franklin D. Roosevelt and his top military chieftains provoked Japan into an "overt act of war." The second question is whether Japan’s military plans were obtained in advance by the U.S. but concealed from the Hawaiian military commanders, Admiral Husband E. Kimmel and Lieutenant General Walter Short. Both Kimmel and Short were relieved of their commands, blamed for failing to ward off the attack, and demoted in rank after the Japanese raid.
The latter question was answered in the affirmative last year on October 30, 2000, when President Bill Clinton signed a defense appropriations bill containing congressional findings that both Kimmel and Short were denied crucial military intelligence.
However, despite the numerous pardons he issued shortly before leaving office, President Clinton deferred to the Pentagon’s long-standing policy against posthumously restoring the commanders to their 1941 ranks. Nonetheless, the congressional findings should be widely seen as an exoneration of years of blame assigned to Kimmel and Short.
But the other important question remains, looming ever larger in the inevitable comparisons made between Dec. 7, 1941 and Sept. 11th: Does the blame for the Pearl Harbor disaster revert to President Roosevelt?
Before Walt Disney Studios released the movie "Pearl Harbor" earlier this year, the film’s producer, Jerry Bruckheimer, commented on claims of FDR’s foreknowledge by saying "That’s all b___s___."
Yet Roosevelt believed that provoking Japan into an attack was the only option he had to overcome the powerful America First non-interventionist movement. Though Germany had conquered most of Europe, and her U-Boats were sinking American ships in the Atlantic Ocean, Americans wanted nothing to do with "Europe’s War."
However, Germany made a strategic error. She, along with her Axis partner, Italy, signed the mutual assistance treaty with Japan, the Tripartite Pact, on September 27, 1940. Ten days later, Lieutenant Commander Arthur McCollum, a U.S. Naval officer in the Office of Naval Intelligence, saw an opportunity to counter the U.S. anti-war movement by provoking Japan into a state of war with the U.S., and triggering the mutual assistance provisions of the Tripartite Pact.
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Memorialized in a secret memo dated October 7, 1940, McCollum’s proposal called for eight provocations aimed at Japan.
President Roosevelt acted swiftly, and throughout 1941, implemented the remaining seven provocations.
The island nation’s militarists used the provocations to seize control of Japan and organize their military forces for war against the U.S., Great Britain, and the Netherlands. During the next 11 months, the White House followed the Japanese war plans through the intercepted and decoded diplomatic and military communications intelligence.
At least 1,000 Japanese radio messages per day were intercepted by monitoring stations operated by the U.S. and her Allies, and the message contents were summarized for the White House. The intercept summaries from Station CAST on Corregidor Island were current -- contrary to the assertions of some who claim that the messages were not decoded and translated until years later -- and they were clear: Pearl Harbor would be attacked on December 7, 1941, by Japanese forces advancing through the Central and North Pacific Oceans.
As I explained to a policy forum audience at The Independent Institute in Oakland, California -- which was telecast nationwide by C-SPAN on July 4th last year -- my research shows that not only were Kimmel and Short cut off from the Japanese communications intelligence pipeline, so were the American people. The coverup lasted for nearly 59 years.

*Robert B. Stinnett is Media Fellow at The Independent Institute in Oakland, Calif. and the author of Day of Deceit: the truth about FDR and Pearl Harbor (Free Press).

Whom - "The simple theory of he was aiming to bring about the end of the Depression will work, I suppose."

[b]And the close to 3000 lives lost works for u[/b]?

Whom - "However, the Japanese had the choice to send the fleet after us, and they had the choice to not attack us at all."

[b]This statement is based on a complete lack of understanding of the political situation at the time[/b]. FDR used the Japanese and if your interested and can afford a few twenties for a couple books, check out the books I suggested in this thread - [url]http://www.ar15.com/forums/topic.html?id=76028[/url]

Mike

[url]http://www.ibiblio.org/pha/ultra/nwc-01.html[/url]
Make note of the date ONI actually broke JN-25.(It was based on a variation of the enigma machine)

The book I mentioned :[b]Pearl Harbor[/b] devotes a substantial portion to these issues (codes and when they were broken & even how they were broken) and that's one of the reasons I suggested it for a worthwhile read on this subject.

Mike

Just to clarify a bit, the "Flag Officers' Cipher" is not the same thing as JN-25.
Link [url] http://www.ibiblio.org/pha/ultra/SRH-149.html[/url]

Here's another thought.

Kimmel and Short beleived the MAIN Japanese threat was from sabotage by Island dwellers.

Kimmell and Short had been sent to replace (I forget the name) a Pearl Commander who thought the main Japanese threat was....


(drum roll please)

A massive assault launched from mainland Japan involving countless airplanes and the majority of the japanese navy.

Kimmell and Short replaced the other Commander SIX MONTHS before Dec. 7.

I'm NOT inclined to beleive that is coincidence.

Because they had seen coms intercepts that indicated there was anywhere between 20 and 50 Japanese agents on the island. These agents were providing unencoded intel via the telephone. (To this day we still intercept all international calls)

OK, you are in charge of Pearl.

Which do you prepare MOST for?

sabotage by 50 nutcases, or the entire Jap Navy and Air Force???

My criticism is NOT of Kimmell and Short. My criticism is of the pols who I beleive INTENTIONALLY replaced the Commander who was PREPARING for Dec. 7 with those who were twiddling their thumbs preparing for someone "spraying graffiti on the airplanes." (comparative hyperbole)
'

I don't much like FDR's policies.  However, in his defense, it is ridiculous to think that FDR allowed thousands of Americans to die just to enter the war (regardless of the reason, depression or whatever).  Had the American fleet been alerted to the imminent Japanese attack justification for war with Japan would still be there...and they would have at least had a fighting chance.

The Pearl Harbor attack was a tremendous (although shortlived) victory for the Japanese Navy.  But, it also shows the lack of preparedness of the American Navy at the time.

The Japanese attacked a legitimate military target.  America was ill-equiped to deal with it.  I believe that fact is the result of bad planning, ignorance, and a low state of alert...not some kind of big conspiracy.

Had America acted to hinder Japan's military domination in Manchuria and Indochina?  Yes.  Does that constitute "provocation" of Japan?  Perhaps.  What should America have done?  Should we have continued to supply raw material such as oil and steel to the Japanese military machine?  Hell, no!  If that caused them to make war on us, then so be it.  We all know the end result.

In hindsight, the fact is that Pearl Harbor was a good and necessary lesson for America...be alert.  Be prepared for war.

OK, you are in charge of Pearl.

Which do you prepare MOST for?

sabotage by 50 nutcases, or the entire Jap Navy and Air Force???

My criticism is NOT of Kimmell and Short. My criticism is of the pols who I beleive INTENTIONALLY replaced the Commander who was PREPARING for Dec. 7 with those who were twiddling their thumbs preparing for someone "spraying graffiti on the airplanes." (comparative hyperbole)
'

The Japanese High Command was content with December 7, 1941, happening just as it did with one exception - no, repeat, no attack on Pearl Harbor, everything else would have remained the same.

They assumed that with the loss of the Philippines and a few small atolls in the Pacific, the lethargic, isolationist Americans would have been loathe to engage in a war in the Pacific. They may have been right!

Unfortunately, it was Yamamoto who insisted that the attack on Pearl Harbor be included in the final plan! He thought a deathblow against the American fleet would have stunned the Americans into inaction for a sufficient time for him to achieve Japan's goals.

Before we give Yamamoto too much credit, we must remember that he lacked the foresight to send any planes against the Naval fuel depots in Hawaii. Had he done so, America would not have had sufficient fuel reserves to do much of anything for approximately a year!

Imagine, no Battle of Coral Sea, no Midway!

Eric The(ImagineThat!)Hun[>]:)]

[b]Because they had seen coms intercepts that indicated there was anywhere between 20 and 50 Japanese agents on the island. These agents were providing unencoded intel via the telephone. (To this day we still intercept all international calls)[/b]

Not so, Kimmel & Short were sent [b]warnings from Washington[/b] deliberately leading and directing them (to protect against sabotage) to take actions which indirectly aided the Japanese in their attack. (For example, while grouping planes together, inorder to make for a better defense against sabotage, they unintentionally made it easier for them (Japanese) to take them out.)

Read the books on the subject, decide for yourself.

Mike


 

Oh come on, Invictus...you KNOW it was really the space aliens that attacked Pearl Harbor...

Yeah, they [B]unintentionally[/B] made it easier for the attack.  There was a legitimate fear of sabotage BEFORE the attack on Pearl Harbor.  What you are saying [B]PROVES[/B] nothing.  They had some information and acted on it.  For someone that says they read books on the subject you are pretty light on the FACTS and what they mean.  Really for a scholar like yourself maybe you could give us some FACTS to refute instead of offering your vague opinion.

C’mon Mr_Wilson, We NEED you!

-Velveeta

Personally I do not think you have read any books on the subject, probably just some excerpts to make yourself look well read.

(Man I thought you knew something.  I took out my tinfoil hat for THIS?)

FDR may not have, but somebody certainly did.  My father was assigned to  the office staff of Admniral James Halloway of the Bureau of Personnel during the Korean Conflict; his job was processing security clearances.  He had access to the Master Log of the US Navy which contains the log entries of all ships at sea.  According to Dad, a picket of US subs detected the presence and movement of the  Japanese fleet at least a full [i]week[/i] before the attack at Pearl.  [i]Somebody[/i] dropped the ball or suppressed the info. Who it was, or what his motivations were are likely lost to history.

Mr. Veelveta,
You sir, are not interested in the Facts, (the "they unintentionally" I was referring to was Kimmel and Short).
I do not have the book at work (so I'm not sure which was the Army commander and which was the Naval), but the Naval commander prior to Kimmel [b]quit[/b] because he was not happy over the lack of intel he was receiving, or because he saw what was headed his way, but that is a matter of record. The minority congressional opinion of the day concluded that the real blame for the attack was [b]NOT[/b] the Commanders in Hawaii, but the Commanders in [b] Washington[/b], personally IMHO Kimmel & Short were the scapegoats.

All of this is in the books, you say I haven't read, I am 3/4s of the way through the Pearl Harbor book and would have been finished weeks ago, but for the fact that at times reading it makes me angry, and at other times checking the author's bibliography takes time & effort. All of which I'm sure is of NO interest to one such as yourself.

For someone who calls Winston Churchill a [b]CRACKPOT[/B], you are sure full of criticism for others.

Personally I think even if I sent you copies of the books I've referenced you are the type of person who wouldn't read them. My opinions are just that [b]MINE[/B], you can jump on Amazon.com buy the books, read 'em and form your own opinions of what they mean or you can continue to call me a liar.

[b]No matter to me[/b]
Mike

Added: Guess you don't want to read anything here, either [url]thenewamerican.com/focus/pearl_harbor/index.htm[/url]. Thanks to Liberty76 for this from another thread.

My grandfather was one of the men who intercepted and decoded messages for the Navy.  According to him, they knew there was a large Japanese fleet heading in the direction of Pearl Harbor.  They informed their higher ups who informed their higher ups.  He said they never got a response on the matter but he always said that FDR did nothing about it so the American public would have no beef about joining the war.  I wish I could get the whole story but he passed on 4 years ago.

What FDR haters on this board , oh no
Rogerb - in HYDE PARK, N.Y. (guess who lived here and is buried here boys !!!!!!)

Actually the plot to attack Pearl Harbor was created by Castro, the Mafia, CIA and Elvis.  The Japs were just a patsy.  

Kimmel and Short were not only denied intelligence they were unbelievably denied the code breaking machines. (Purple ?)

Admiral Kimmel received his warning delivered by telegram after the attack was underway.  Plenty of radio comm's but he gets a telegram.

Roosevelt knew the U.S. had to enter the war and sacrificed our people at Pearl to make certain we did enter.  (Also later in the war Churchill allowed the Germans to bomb Covington rather than risk the exposure of "Enigma.")  The U.S economy was again heading down so fast that the depression was going to look like good news. ( Economist John M. Keynes pay one group to dig a hold and another group to fill it had not worked and was not going to work.)

The British had a pretty good clue where the Japanese fleet was etc., etc.  A U S destroyer sunk a midget submarine that morning etc.  Two Army PFC's were testing their radar on their own time that Sunday morning and picked-up the Japanese planes, etc

Kimmel and Short were the scape goats.  However there were many break downs in the chain of command.
I'd like to see a discussion on whether the sacrifice of our 2400 at Pearl was ultimately done for the greater good.  Or not.

The New American has a great Series of Articles on it. check it out:

[url]http://thenewamerican.com/focus/pearl_harbor/index.htm[/url]

The "greater good." Well, that's fairly subjective.

But here's my take. Pearl was SACRIFICED by FDR to get American into WW2 to save Communism from Nationalist Socialism. Hitlers prime ambition was to protect teh Motherland of germany (which included expanding borders a bit, both as he felt they needed to win back territory that was the "motherland" AND becasue Germany needed the natural resources these surrounding countries had.

Of course, history reveals Hitler had accomplished most of the territory taking / natural resource gathering by 1939 / 1940.

At this point, Hitler was turning his attention east, and had Moscow in the crosshairs. His main objection to Moscow was the interference the World Commuists in Moscow were having on teh nationalist Socialists in germany. He was fighting the political attcks on the Motherland by globalist Communists.

The US entered the war, and essentially attacked Hitlers "rear" and gave him a two front war. Eventually Hitler had to break off his Eastward march toward Moscow, and defend the Western Front.

Leave it to the Democrats to ensure our country is vulnerable to attack.

Oh my God.  What a completely off-kilter and wrong-headed way to look at the history of WW2.  

That response, without an alternative theory, or other ideas presented, is worth about as much as the doctor who says "Yup, he's bleeding to death" but then refuses to administer any first aid. [rolleyes]

Rik, I thinks its come to the point that you just take the opposite opinion, no matter what i say. If i said the sun sets in the West, you would SWEAR it sets in the east.

Sometimes, i wonder if you even KNOW why you disagree with me, or if you just reassure yourself that WHATEVER opinion I present, the "right" opinion is the polar opposite.  [}:D]

i believe youre mistaken, GM.

i'd try to reason with you, but youre so determined to say that fdr was a communist that i fear there's no point. fdr for all his faults probably kept us from a fascist or communist revolution.

hitler wanted lebensraum. conquest, pure and simple. the entire world, if he could grab it.  neither denmark nor holland nor belgium nor norway nor russia nor greece had any german territory to "recover"[:O]. the japanese attacked the US, not the other way around. the germans declared war on us, not the other way around.

oh, never mind. [%|]

People always point to the fact that the carriers were away from Pearl as proof that we knew an attack was coming. But remember that aircraft carriers were pretty much unproven in combat at that time. Obviously there was tremendous potential to be had, but it wasn't untill the Japanese attacked that the power of carriers was fully demonstrated to the world. Until that point the only other action seen by carriers was the Brits vs the Bismark.
 Battleships were still the pinnacle of world naval power at that time. Besides, even if there were no battleships at Pearl during the attack, i believe it still would have provoked us into WWII. And another point is that we were much more concerned about the Germans. If this was a conspiracy to get us in the war, then why not set up something to be hit by the Krauts?
 Further, the Japanese sent a declaration of war to Washington, DC on the 7th, but it was so long that by the time the message was decoded the attack had already begun. So this wasnt supposed to be a "sneak" attack after all. I'm sure some will say there was a conspiracy to keep this message from being released, but where's the proof.

Dec 7th, 1941. A day that will live in infamy. Tragic but not a conspiracy.

Invictus,
mighty fine thread
I'm no longer surprised that this group, when pushed, has remarkable knowledge on a wide range of subjects.

(Of course we still too much enjoy a good urinating contest !)

FDR WAS a commie. Not only was he buds with Stalin, many of his staff, and his ideas were communistic.

Here is Herbert Hoover quoted from "The Motives behind the Betrayal"([url]http://thenewamerican.com/tna/2001/06-04-2001/vo17no12_motives.htm[/url]):

[i]As former President Herbert Hoover recalled: "In June 1941, when Britain was safe from German invasion due to Hitler’s diversion to attack Stalin, I urged that the gargantuan jest of all history would be our giving aid to the Soviet government. I urged that we should allow those two dictators to exhaust each other. I stated that the result of our assistance would be to spread Communism over the whole world.... The consequences have proved that I was right."
[/i]

If you want an "alternative response" read a damned history book.  Not one of the current revisionist pieces of crap, one written when people were more interested in what actually happened than in how it affected the feminist agenda or minority rights.



Well sure, Mark...you asserting that FDR got us involved in WW2 to PROTECT COMMUNISM FROM NAZIISM is JUST the same thing as saying "the sun sets in the west."  No difference there at all...



I disagree with you, Mark, BECAUSE YOU'RE WRONG.  Your statement was ludicrous, as anyone with a passing knowledge of history could tell you.  I have more than a passing knowledge.

No.  FDR was a Fabian Socialist.  People who know their history know that socialism and communism are not the same thing.

Liberty,
my feelings of revulsion for FDR make me want to agree with you.
However I'll simply say this - FDR started the cold war by giving Stalin the go-ahead to take over Poland, the Czech's, etc., etc.
Winston Churchill knew better but nothing would stay FDR from his chosen path.  FDR actually thought, really believed that by force of personality he could make "Uncle Joe" see the light.
This is the same "Steel" (Stalin) that after having about 20,000,000 people killed said "Now I am truly safe.  I have neither friends nor enemies."
Roosevelt be he Communist or Fabian Socialist was at best, at the very best a naive idiot.

Welcome to the club.

Sorry if this is redundant.

[url]www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/world/la-120701codes.story[/url]

Story is about [b]Japan[/b] breaking our codes and how they knew a little more than we thought.

Watch it, that kind of talk will get the Libertarians on this board up in arms. Remember, free trade, without regard to political or moral repercussions, is ideal.

My father is a WWII vet. After the war, his friend who served on a submarine said we were sinking Japanese shipping two weeks before Pearl. Does that mean we expected an attack? I don't know, but my father and his buddies who served at Iwo certainly do.

No, you are not in the same club as Mark.  He actually believes what he posts.

i agree, but what differnence there is does'nt mean squat. if you read the communist manifesto you will see various forms of socialism described. Fabian Socialism is closer to a socialist-democracy.

people who know their history; know the Karl Marx believed that socialism was good, but communism was better because it would bring it about faster.

government control and influence on the economy.
no concept of the individual and individual rights. only collective. hallmark of all socialist type governments from communism (international socialism) to Facism (national socialism)


Red lib

Of course it does.  Just because FDR was a left-winger economically and socially doesn't mean he would sell out his country and sacrifice its people just to help a Communist Soviet Union.  The idea is totally ludicrous.

 FDR has his own agenda as most significant world leaders do. Whether Pearl Harbor was an oversight of gross incompetence on senior leadership, or a conspiracy, I don't know. Either way, FDR did enact many socialist policies on this country then that paved the way for men like Bill Clinton. I have no more respect for FDR then any other traitor who has torn apart our Constitution - maliciously or not. Maybe he didn't "betray" the US, but the b#st#rd sure as hell turned us into a welfare state.

You Sir are a liar.  I am VERY interested in the FACTS, not your vague observations and opinions.



OK, And the “they unintentionally made it easier for them (Japanese) to take them out.)”  woks for them.  You need some reading comprehension classes.



So what does that have to do with your assertion that there was prior knowledge of the attack or some grand conspiracy?  Military leaders have always been made scapegoats.  The military felt someone had to be held accountable for the fiasco at Pearl Harbor to appease the public.  What about the Indianapolis?  Do you think that Capt. McVay was scapegoated to END the war? C’Mon there was a scapegoat there must be some deep conspiracy!  



Are there a lot of pictures in the first half?  When you complete a whole book maybe you can consider yourself and expert on a subject.



Well there is a levelheaded analytic mind at work for you!



You are correct.  Your reading habits are of no interest to one “such as” myself.



The whole topic of a deep dark conspiracy at Pearl Harbor is a criticism of many brave men and women who died for their country, their commanders and their politicians.  I just want some “facts” here buddy!  You are making accusations, back them up!



In another thread someone who has read the books (ALL THE WAY THROUGH!) says he does not know how you are getting what you got from them.  Of course you “dropped” that thread.  Facts would be inconvenient to “one like you”. ;)

-continued below-

"Fake Cheese,"
I've previously posted regarding FDR's probable complicity at Pearl Harbor.

Now I'll take a look at his Socialist ideals.
Prior to Roosevelt, income taxes were collected in order to fund the operation of the federal government, the military etc.
Roosevelt used the IRS and the income tax system as a method of redistributing wealth.

That horror is still with us today.

That is untrue.  If they were your opinions you would not cry about not having your books at work.  You would be able to explain your opinions on your own.  They are OTHER people’s opinions and you need to go reread them so you can get you opinions back.  



I am asking for facts.  Just give some facts the mr_wilson!



Yup, when asked for facts that may shatter your little world you will go away.



OK, well tell me what facts support your argument and what you agree with.  I want to debate this with YOU not let you have the grace of pulling out when you are wrong by saying “OH, well I didn’t write the article”

Thanks,

-Velveeta

Atmospheric conditions prevented radio communications between Washington D.C. and Pearl Harbor. Got anything else?

-Velveeta

Ouch! The pain!  Your cleverness is matched by your knowledge!





OH, I see because we do not agree with or like a person that makes facts irrelevant and the person guilty.  I think I am starting to get this.

-Velveeta

Which doesn't make it factual.

I will have to digress at this point.  Billy Mitchell had long since displayed the wonders of air power, especially against the  flagships of the day, the Battleship.  As far as the Navy is concerned, the only way to harness this air power for your blue water fleet is via flat deck aircraft carriers.  Since naval air power was known to be crucial, even before our first shots of WW2 had taken place, and our Pac Fleet carriers were first rate, (we aren't talking the USS Langley here), I think that all four carriers out of port is unlikely to be an accident.  Besides weren't the vast majority of the escort ships in port?  How often are you going to see 4 carriers amble around the pacific without a healthy contingent of escorts?

Yeah, you are a lengend in your own mind Rik.

And just for the record....


ONCE again ALL you do is state your disagerement with me - NOT ONE SHRED of factual evidence or proof contrary to my supposition.

And as far as me reading a "damned history book" (EXCELLENT use of the expletive to bolster your point. You seem SO much MORE authoritative WITH the expletive) its NOT my job to prove myself wrong. Its your job, since you came in this foruim attacking my statement as "ludicrous."

You sound JUST like a Liberal - attack the person, without ever addressing the substance of the argument.

Forget it man - you are just TOO emotionally involved.