Fwd: Truth is the First Casualty of War

[Michael Hoover]

> > >Is there anything to back up the rumour that FDR was aware of the Japanese
> > >plans for Pearl Harbour at least a day ahead of time 
> > >Rob.
> 
> > Brad De Long:
> > It is true that the U.S. military and the White House thought a 
> > Japanese attack was not unlikely in December 1941. But if I recall 
> > correctly they were much more worried about large-scale 
> > sabotage--hence Clark Field in the Philippines, where the B-17s were 
> > parked wingtip-to-wingtip so that saboteurs could not get at them, 
> > making a perfect target for air attack...
> 
> Gordon Fitch:
> In a schoolbook I found discarded in the 'hood -- _Rise_to_
> _Globalism_ by Steven E. Ambrose, sixth revised edition -- I
> find the following:  "One of the most persistent myths in
> American History is that FDR knew the attack on Pearl Harbor
> was coming but refused to give the commanders in Hawaii advance
> notice.  In fact, Washington gave the military in Hawaii plenty
> of warning about the imminent outbreak of hostilities.  There
> was no specific warning about an attack on Pearl Harbor because
> no one imagined the Japanese were capable of such a daring
> raid.  

  
for what little it's worth, below is post that I sent the other day
but which must be floating somewhere in cyberspace...

Boyhood friend of mine's father was one of cryptographers who
intercepted/decoded Japanese messages as early as Nov. 27.  As
I recall story he told (almost 40 years ago now), US had info
indicating likely attack but thought Philippines would be target.

I've since read that US decoded message by Dec. 6 revealing Japanese 
attempt to get info about US ships at Pearl Harbor and that neither
an adequate attempt to check local security nor adequate warning to 
local commanders was issued.

But Secretary of State Cordell Hull was expecting attack somewhere
prior to interception of any messages given that he mentioned it 
during three separate Cabinet meetings in Nov. (see Herbert Feis' 
favorable account of US behavior/policy in his book _The Road to 
Pearl Harbor_).  

Prior US-Japan negotiations were destined to fail because former refused 
to drop demand that latter accept 'free trade' that no countries, 
including US, practiced at time.  Paul Schroeder (_The Axis Alliance and 
Japanese-American Relations, 1941: An Appraisal of the American Policy_) 
documented both Japanese diplomatic attempts to avoid war via concessions
on China (contrary to official US account) *and* trade discrimination 
that US and other countries practiced against Japan.

Charles Beard argued in _President Roosevelt and the Coming of War, 1941_
that US goaded Japanese in order to enter war in Europe.  Mainstream
historians (Schroeder, liberal Schlesinger, conservative Ambrose, among
them) have disputed this, but  fact of matter is that racist anti-Japanese 
sentiment was higher in US than were anti-fascist views before Pearl
Harbor.  And US manipulated racist sentiment (interning over 100,000 
Japanese-Americans in process) following Pearl Harbor even as it prepared 
to focus upon European theater.  

Re. Roosevelt, New Deal had been intellectually and politically dried up 
for several years, his desire to enter war on side of British was well-
known, and gradual escalation of embargo against Japan over two year period 
forced Japanese to take offensive in Asia in search of alternative sources 
of fuel and raw materials.  US would have pursued whatever policies - 
diplomatic, military, or otherwise - deemed necessary to settle differences 
in favor of its imperial interests.     Michael Hoover