Pearl Harbor Conspiracy

[WhiteLion]

While the subject of conspiracies are hot, would anyone here know much of the CT's and facts which refutes the Pearl Harbor CT's?

[WhiteLion]

A conspiracy-claim I recently encountered was for example this one:

Quote:

"Roosevelt removed any effective air cover from Pearl Harbor and sent the newest ships out to maneuvers at sea, leaving the older ships behind to be destroyed. Even as "negotiations" were being conducted with Japan, Roosevelt was intercepting radio transmissions indicating an impending attack at least one week prior to December 7, 1941. By withholding any preventative measures, Roosevelt knew that he would successfully involve the United States in a European war that the American people were overwhelmingly against."

[drkitten]

Originally Posted by WhiteLion

"Even as "negotiations" were being conducted with Japan, Roosevelt was intercepting radio transmissions indicating an impending attack at least one week prior to December 7, 1941.

This statement is simply wrong. The PURPLE archives have been rather thoroughly examined.

While it's true that Roosevelt did technically have access to advance information that might have led him to expect hostilities with Japan to break out at any moment, his "advance" was literally on the order of hours, far too short for a warning message to get from DC to Pearl. (Basically, the codebreakers got the text of the diplomatic message that the Japanese ambassador was supposed to bring to the White House announcing the start of hostilities, and had faster typists.

[milesalpha]

I have read a couple of the "alternative" (because that's where this belongs) histories on Pearl Harbor. It's the same type of cherry picking research that is done by the historical revisionists. I have never run into a real historian that subscribes to the theory.

[WhiteLion]

Originally Posted by drkitten

This statement is simply wrong. The PURPLE archives have been rather thoroughly examined.

While it's true that Roosevelt did technically have access to advance information that might have led him to expect hostilities with Japan to break out at any moment, his "advance" was literally on the order of hours, far too short for a warning message to get from DC to Pearl. (Basically, the codebreakers got the text of the diplomatic message that the Japanese ambassador was supposed to bring to the White House announcing the start of hostilities, and had faster typists.

Thanks for the input drkitten.

Found this site to be helpful as well.

[WhiteLion]

Here's a conspiracy article on "Pear Harbor" written by one of the more known White Nationalists in the US.

It doesn't get much more CT-wingnutty then this it seems.
It was published a while back at Stormfront.

Quote:

East Wind, Rain: Treason at Pearl Harbor

by Kevin Alfred Strom

If you want to understand why the American government supports Communists in Haiti and South Africa -- if you want to understand why neither Democrats nor Republicans will protect our borders from alien invasion -- and if you want to understand why we are rapidly losing our freedoms that our fathers and their fathers fought to defend -- then you must gain an understanding of the events that took place over a few days' span over a half century ago.

The truth about this incident of treason against the American people and betrayal of our fighting men is so shocking -- and so revealing -- that once heard, it will forever alter your view of our world and the forces that shape it. After hearing this broadcast, you will never be able to trust the controlled media again; and you will see with crystal clarity the hand of America's enemies as they guide our government from disaster to disaster.

In the early morning of December 4th, 1941, at a US Navy shortwave monitoring station in Cheltenham, Maryland, a half-hour drive southeast of Washington, DC, senior radio operator Ralph Briggs was just coming on duty. Briggs was 27 years old, had been with the Navy since the age of 20, and had worked with Naval Intelligence monitoring foreign shortwave broadcasts for four years. He had been an amateur radio operator, callsign W9NCM, since he was a teenager.

It seemed like an ordinary morning, as he tuned his receiver to the station and began transcribing what he heard. At 8 a.m. he received the message he had been waiting for. It seemed to be nothing more than a regional weather forecast, the kind that the stations he monitored transmitted every day during their news broadcasts. But Briggs, alone among the radio operators at Cheltenham, knew what the three words meant. They meant that the world was going to change in unpredictable but cataclysmic ways.

They meant that many of his friends and countrymen would soon be dead. They meant that America would never be the same again. The three words were casually spoken during the regular news and weather feature from Radio Tokyo, Japan. The words were "East Wind, Rain." Briggs immediately teletyped the message to Washington.

"East Wind, Rain" was one of three possible "execute" messages which Japanese diplomats around the world had been alerted to begin listening for on November 19th. They were told to monitor the regular news and weather broadcasts from Tokyo, just as they always did, but to pay especially careful attention to the phraseology employed to describe the weather.

If they heard the words "North Wind, Cloudy," it meant war with the Soviet Union.

If they heard the words "West Wind, Clear," it meant war with the British Empire.

And if they heard the words "East Wind, Rain," it meant war with the United States.

Just a few miles away from Cheltenham, in Washington, DC, at the Japanese embassy, Chief Petty Officer Kenici Ogemoto also was listening to the weather report. When he heard those fateful words, he immediately rushed into the office of the naval attache, Captain Yuzuru Sanematsu, and shouted "the winds blew." Sanematsu ran with Ogemoto back into the radio room just in time to hear the Radio Tokyo announcer repeat the weather forecast, "Higashi no kaze ame" -- "East Wind, Rain." Instantly workers at the embassy began destroying their cryptographic equipment and codebooks, while others took the secret documents from their files, piled them in huge heaps in the garden, and burned them. The Japanese diplomats knew that their embassies and consulates in the United States and its territories would soon be seized; and they themselves would soon be interned as enemy aliens pending their exchange for American diplomats in Japan. All their code-making and code-breaking hardware and software, and all their secret papers, had to be destroyed immediately.

The American government at that time was that of Franklin Roosevelt. It was the first presidential administration in the United States of which it can definitively be said that it was fully under alien control. Never before had so many subversive aliens and traitors, many of them out-and-out Communists, been ensconced in powerful positions; never before had the federal government increased its power over the states and the people to such an extent; never before -- but often since.

To give you an idea of the true atmosphere of those times, which is assiduously hidden from you by establishment historians and was covered up by the controlled media of the time, let me relate a little incident recounted in John T. Flynn's book, The Roosevelt Myth.

In 1939 a Communist youth group calling itself the "American Youth Congress" was being investigated by the House Un-American Activities Committee, headed by Congressman Martin Dies. A group of Communists from the "Congress," including their leader Joseph P. Lash, Joe Cadden, and Abbot Simon, staged a series of protests against the investigation, at one point marching into the Committee room and attempting to disrupt the proceedings. They jumped over tables, shouted at the Congressmen, tossed Communist pamphlets about, and at one point Joseph Lash even began singing a foul and insulting song directed at Dies. Present at the time, and leading the assembled Communists in their protests, was none other than the wife of the President of the United States, Eleanor Roosevelt. Not only that, but the Communists had been chauffeured to their demonstration in official White House cars, and one of them, Lash, was living full-time at the White House, while Cadden and Simon were often boarders there.

A member of Congress, who had been an ardent Roosevelt supporter, visited the White House one morning. While there, he was amazed to see Abbot Simon, a board member of a well-known Communist front organization, emerge from one of the bedrooms. He asked the White House usher if he had really seen what he thought he had seen. The usher assured him that he had indeed, and that Simon had been occupying the bedroom for two weeks, sleeping each night in a bed formerly used by Abraham Lincoln.

In such an atmosphere it is not surprising that the Roosevelt government was anxious to enter the war on the side of the Soviets. Nor is it surprising that Jewish interests, which also figured large in the Roosevelt regime (and in all administrations since), were also zealous in their efforts to involve the United States in the war against Germany, which by that time had removed organized Jewish interests from their former positions of power in that country. Also, it should be noted that in the 1930s and 1940s, the Jewish and Communist power structures were largely congruent, even to the extent of there being large numbers of individuals belonging to both groups simultaneously. Pressure from two overlapping interest groups, both very influential in the White House, were pushing for war. But the American people were solidly against it -- so much so that when campaigning for his third term in November, 1940, while World War II raged in Europe and America was officially neutral, Roosevelt told the American people in a speech in Boston carried by radio and by wire services around the nation:
"I say to you fathers and mothers and I will say it to you again and again and again. Your boys will not be sent into foreign wars."

In fact, one week before Pearl Harbor, polls showed the American people a solid 75% against war, despite the best efforts of Roosevelt and the controlled media's hate propaganda.

As we have already mentioned on a previous American Dissident Voices broadcast, Roosevelt's Secretary of War, Henry L. Stimson, entered in his diary two weeks before the attack on Pearl Harbor, the fact that FDR had stated to his cabinet that his plan was to maneuver Japan into war without America firing the first shot. And that is exactly what he did. Among many other things, he instituted a trade embargo against Japan, starving that resource-poor nation of vital industrial materials.

The Roosevelt government knew the meaning of the "East Wind, Rain" message. They knew it because American and British intelligence were able to read the Japanese diplomatic code, and they had intercepted and read the message from the Japanese foreign ministry of November 19th, 1941, which instructed Japanese embassies and consulates to be listening for the "winds" execute messages on their shortwave receivers, and which explained the meaning of the messages in no uncertain terms.

The powerful transmitters of Radio Tokyo broadcast the "winds" execute message several times that day, and it was heard and understood not only by Naval Intelligence in Cheltenham, Maryland, but also by other US monitoring stations around the nation; by the monitoring station of the Australian Special Intelligence Organisation located near Melbourne, Australia; by the British Intelligence intercept station on Stonecutter's Island, Hong Kong; and of course by Japanese diplomats around the world.

After Ralph Briggs had teletyped the "winds" message to Washington, it was quickly transmitted to Army Signals Intelligence and to the White House. The teletype equipment then in use at Cheltenham produced an original and a copy at the sending end, and two copies at the Washington end. He also typed out another original and two carbon copies on a regular typewriter.
These were all carefully filed.

Briggs was scheduled for weekend leave in Ohio the following Sunday, December 7, 1941. It was there that he received the initial news of the Japanese surprise attack on the US Pacific fleet at Pearl Harbor, Hawaii. He, and the rest of the staff at Cheltenham, knew that war was imminent, but felt that America was forewarned and well prepared. He felt certain that the Japanese had fallen into a well-laid trap. In fact, the first and heavily censored news reports of the attack claimed that the Japanese had sunk only one "old battleship" and one destroyer, and that the Japanese had suffered heavy casualties. It was not too long before the truth came out, however, and Briggs and everyone else came to know what the Japanese commanders knew as they radioed back "Tora! Tora! Tora!," meaning "Tiger! Tiger! Tiger!," their signal indicating that the attack was successful and had been a complete surprise.

Ralph Briggs' immediate superior was Chief Petty Officer Radioman Daryl Wigle. In a recent interview, Briggs says: "When I came off of that weekend I had a chance to talk with Wigle, and I said 'What happened?' And he said, 'I don't know, all I can say is nobody's talking,' and that was the end of our conversation. No one knew anything. So I let it rest, as by then with war declared we were very busy. But in the next month, as we began to hear the real facts about our losses, that's when I started looking back through our records for that 'execute' intercept and to see what I'd done with it."

But Ralph Briggs found nothing in the files. Every copy of the "winds" message had mysteriously vanished.

On the 24th of September, 1941, the Army's shortwave radio monitoring station at Oahu, Hawaii, intercepted a message from Tokyo to the Japanese consul, Nagao Kita, in Honolulu. This monitoring station's job was to intercept all traffic to the Japanese consul there, and also all traffic on the Tokyo-Berlin and Tokyo-Moscow radio circuits. But none of the radio operators or codebreakers in Hawaii were cleared to decode the material -- it was all sent on to Washington in encrypted form, exactly as received.

The message to Nagao Kita divided Pearl harbor up into several numbered target areas for an aerial attack and requested him to make a twice-weekly report to Tokyo on the vessels at anchor in Pearl Harbor and their exact locations. Never before had the Japanese asked for such attack plan information about any American military installation. The codebreakers in Washington knew the significance of this message -- they even called it The Bomb Plot Message. Yet Washington did not pass this information along to the Army and Navy commanders in Hawaii. At least three messages about the bomb plan for Pearl Harbor passed between Tokyo and the Japanese consulate in Hawaii. All of them were read by Washington, the last that we know of on December 3d. None were passed along to the American commanders at Pearl Harbor.

The Roosevelt government not only were reading the Japanese diplomatic code, they were also reading the Japanese naval code. A strange twist of fate helped the American codebreakers just a few days before the attack. The Japanese naval code was normally changed every six months. After each change, it took the British and American codebreakers a few weeks to crack the new code. The next change date was December 1st, but due to the fact that some Japanese naval communication units had not yet received their new codebooks in time, the date for the code change was pushed back to December 4, thus giving our codebreakers valuable extra days of Japanese naval intelligence.

The Japanese also made the error after December 4 of communicating with some units, who still hadn't received their code tables, in the old code while at the same time sending the same messages to others in the new. Slips like this are a codebreaker's fondest dream, and greatly speeded the process of cracking the new code.

Washington knew through reading the Japanese naval traffic that all Japanese merchant vessels were to return to their home waters by December 7th. This information was not given to the commanders at Pearl Harbor. Washington knew through reading the Japanese naval traffic that a huge task force, including a large group of aircraft carriers, was sailing into the Pacific on November 26th for an eight-day voyage and was to reach its standby position and refuel on December 4th. Washington also knew that there was no possible target in the Pacific that required the use of carrier-borne aircraft except Pearl Harbor. This information was not given to the commanders at Pearl Harbor.

On the 27th of November, Washington learned through the Dutch attach in Washington (who had also received a decrypt of the Japanese naval message ordering the task force to sea from his own intelligence men in the Dutch East Indies) that the task force's most likely direction was east and that its most likely target was Pearl Harbor. This information was not passed along to the American commanders at Pearl Harbor.

And on December 2d, the day after which the naval code would normally have been changed, Washington intercepted and read the message giving the date for the attack. "Climb Mount Niitakayama 1208." Mount Niitakayama was then the highest mountain in the Japanese Empire and was the code word for the attack, and 12-8 Japanese time is 12-7 Hawaiian time. This message was also intercepted and read by British intelligence, who concluded, according to one of their number, W. W. Mortimer of the British Far East Combined Bureau, that since no task force had been sighted in waters south of Japan, the only target that fitted the length of voyage, midocean refueling, and the inclusion of aircraft carriers was Pearl Harbor, and that an attack on Sunday, December 7, (the date given in the Japanese message) would offer the greatest element of surprise there. This information was passed along to Washington, who, once again, did nothing to warn the commanders at Pearl Harbor.

Ladies and gentlemen, only in the last few years has the information obtained by the breaking of the Japanese naval codes been available to the public. But even the limited knowledge we had earlier of the decryption of the diplomatic codes was enough to indicate to any reasonable man that Franklin Roosevelt and the men around him should have been tried for treason and for the betrayal of every American fighting man -- not only those who died on that fateful day of December 7th, 1941, but every one who died or was maimed for life in that entire suicidal and fratricidal conflict called World War Two.

Until 1990, the United States government refused to admit that the Japanese naval code even existed, much less had been broken. But now leaks uncovered by diligent researchers have finally thrown aside the curtain. The governments of the US and Britain still keep a tight lid of secrecy on important aspects of the Pearl Harbor story. Many documents are missing from the records of the period. Some have been altered. What we do have is so damning, though, that no further confirmation of the essentials is necessary. When a patriotic administration takes power someday in Washington, the declassification of all records of the treason of the Roosevelt regime will fill in the details of this story, and no doubt other crimes will be uncovered. But on this we are certain: the administration knew, at the very highest level, what was going to happen at Pearl Harbor.

They wanted it to happen, because they wanted America to go to war against Germany. Since Germany would not do anything to justify an American declaration of war, despite Roosevelt's secret war against Germany in the Atlantic and his multiple provocations and violations of American neutrality, Roosevelt was forced to provoke Japan, which was Germany's ally. Roosevelt and his henchmen cared so little for the lives of American soldiers, and so much for their plan to get us into the war, that they chose not to warn our commanders at Pearl Harbor. Roosevelt wanted the Americans at Pearl Harbor to suffer a horrible defeat so that the outrage of the American people at Japan would send the 75% of the American people who had been against the war down to the enlistment offices, and in this he was entirely successful.

I have only been able to relate to you a tiny portion of the story of Pearl Harbor in this half hour. The events of December 7th, 1941 were pivotal to the subsequent history of our nation and civilization. An understanding of those events will deepen your understanding of our nation's current plight.

[Gravy]

I can only judge by people who've posted somewhat off-topic in the "Loose Change" thread. Of those, Euromutt seems to be the resident expert.

http://forums.randi.org/showpost.php...&postcount=112
http://forums.randi.org/showpost.php...&postcount=225
http://forums.randi.org/showpost.php...&postcount=229
http://forums.randi.org/showpost.php...&postcount=385

(Whoa, that's crazy WhiteLion:I just posted a link to a Stormfront page a few minutes ago in a different thread, and that was the first time I'd ever seen the site.)

[kookbreaker]

Originally Posted by Gravy

I can only judge by people who've posted somewhat off-topic in the "Loose Change" thread. Of those, Euromutt seems to be the resident expert.

I'm not bad on this myself. Here's what I can make of White Lions encountered post:

Quote:

"Roosevelt removed any effective air cover from Pearl Harbor and sent the newest ships out to maneuvers at sea,

False. There were still lots of land based planes at Pearl. Any planes on a carrier deck would likely have been blown up there.

Quote:

leaving the older ships behind to be destroyed.

Deceptive. Those 'old ships' were proven technology, while the carriers were new and untested. Eventually, the 'older ships' would fight most of the sea battles in the Pacific.

Quote:

Even as "negotiations" were being conducted with Japan,

Implication of something sinister. I would remind folks that as Japan 'negotiated' with us they were planned a sneak attack.

Quote:

Roosevelt was intercepting radio transmissions indicating an impending attack at least one week prior to December 7, 1941.

Absolutely wrong. Implying a much greater sped of decoding and translation than was available. There were indications of attack coming, but they were expected at places other than Pearl Harbor.

Quote:

By withholding any preventative measures, Roosevelt knew that he would successfully involve the United States in a European war that the American people were overwhelmingly against

Why start a war by getting much of your fleet wiped out? What if Japan had attacked the fuel depots during their raids? The US would have been in a royal mess. Roosevelt could have just as easily warned Pearl Harbor, intercepted the raid, and pointed out the nasty treachery.

As for getting involved in the European theater, I would only need to say: Hitler declared war on the US first. Not the other way around.

[Curnir]

Originally Posted by kookbreaker

Why start a war by getting much of your fleet wiped out? What if Japan had attacked the fuel depots during their raids? The US would have been in a royal mess. Roosevelt could have just as easily warned Pearl Harbor, intercepted the raid, and pointed out the nasty treachery.
.

I seem to remember that the fuel depots were planned targets for the third wave of attack, which was canceled by the Japanese Admiral Nagumo.

hmm ahh here's what wikipedia sez.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Attack_...er_two_strikes

[Mr. Skinny]

You may want to PM Kiwiwriter. He's pretty new to the forum, but if I recall correctly, he has a WWII web site. I think he has a link to his site in his sig file.

[Legalduck]

Quote:

If you want to understand why the American government supports Communists in Haiti and South Africa -- if you want to understand why neither Democrats nor Republicans will protect our borders from alien invasion -- and if you want to understand why we are rapidly losing our freedoms that our fathers and their fathers fought to defend -- then you must gain an understanding of the events that took place over a few days' span over a half century ago.

I don't mean to cherrypick, I'm still lost how accepting the Pearl Harbor CT explains U.S. policy in Haiti or South Africa. Generally, the U.S. supported Aristide and his Lavalas party in Haiti because they had been democratically elected. The U.S. even helped return Aristide to power after the coup in the 1990s (not the best decision since Lavalas was little better in the human rights department than "Papa Doc" Duvalier in th 80s). I'm not sure what connection the writer is trying to make to Pearl Harbor.

Sounds like the typical CT tactic of appealing to fear of an unnamed "them." Even by CT standards, there's in the way of evidence, explanation, or analysis.

[WhiteLion]

I appreciate the replies.
Yes somehow, racist CT's like K.A Strom finds it adding to their claims "validity" to include an even larger conspiracy in the background-themes.
Isn't this classed as cryptocracy 101?

On Stormfront I've even read, from ardent WN's, that the people who jumped out of the burning WTC's were already dead, thus thrown out and that the Freemasons are behind it all, hah.
Ding dong, who's there?

[Kiwiwriter]

Originally Posted by Mr. Skinny

You may want to PM Kiwiwriter. He's pretty new to the forum, but if I recall correctly, he has a WWII web site. I think he has a link to his site in his sig file.

Yes, I have a web page on World War II, and it's got a lot on Pearl Harbor on it.

The address is in the signature block, as advertised, and my thanks to Mr. Skinny for singing my praises.

Also, get your hands on the three best books on Pearl Harbor, all by Gordon W. Prange:

At Dawn We Slept
December 7, 1941
Pearl Harbor: The Verdict of History

The latter covers the conspiracy theories. Prange's point is echoed by many other writers...the Japanese planned very carefully and executed a solid plan. They benefited from a good deal of luck, a large amount of successful preparation, and a great deal of American ineptitude and disbelief, and won the day.

It's important to note several things about Pearl Harbor: the Japanese did not expect the attack to be a surprise. They fully expected to face an alerted enemy. In that regard, they were surprised themselves.

Equally importantly is that most of the conspiracy theories about Pearl Harbor display a lot of ex post facto knowledge. The idea, for example, that FDR would sacrifice what were later seen as outdated warships (second-generation battleships and older destroyers). At the time, carrier operations were entirely new, and very few nations had mastered them. Not even the Japanese conceded the seas to carriers...the plan for Midway six months later called for the coup de grace to be delivered not by Nagumo's carriers, but by Yamamoto's powerful battleship division, led by the Yamato. If a war was going to be fought, the planners of 1941 expected it to be fought by those second-generation battleships lined up at Pearl Harbor, with the carriers in a supporting role.

There's also the point that tethering the battleships at Hawaii without torpedo nets was not as stupid as it sounded...the torpedoes the Japanese used in the attack were new and highly secret. The Long Lance remained a gigantic surprise to the Americans all through the war.

And if Pearl Harbor is the subject of conspiracy theories, then Savo Island, on August 8/9, 1942, should be even worse. Four cruisers sunk, 1,000 bluejackets drowned, with no damage in return. That was months into the war, and the US Navy still was operating with a peacetime mindset nine months after "Bloody Sunday."

FDR was Assistant Secretary of the Navy in World War I, and loved the Navy, its traditions, the sea, and ships. The destruction of the battle line and deaths of its sailors enraged him as few other things in his life, presidency, and war infuriated him. He could be devious, manipulative, and shallow, but all accounts of Pearl Harbor indicate that he was as stunned and surprised as everyone else.

The bottom line to me on Pearl Harbor is that the Americans underestimated the Japanese in 1941 as funny little yellow men in buck teeth and spectacles who bowed a lot and made cheap imitation goods. We made the same mistake about a lot of funny little bearded brown men in turbans and rags who pray to Allah a lot and shout about jihad and infidels. Nobody took the Japanese seriously in 1941...even fewer took Islamic radicals seriously in 2001. The warnings were similar, and the results were the same.

There are so many holes in the conspiracy theories about Pearl Harbor that it does takes books to shoot them down, because they are so complex.

I do feel that Short and Kimmel got a harsher deal from Washington than they deserved. MacArthur lost all of his planes in Hawaii the following day, and became a hero. Short and Kimmel were not colorful characters or brilliant leaders, but they were unfairly treated when compared with MacArthur and Brereton. Their talents -- and Kimmel's were pretty considerable -- should not have been left to waste. As Prange writes, "There is enough blame to go around at Pearl Harbor."

If anyone has more questions, just PM me, or ask me publicly, or check out my web page and contact me through that. If that doesn't work, try Ethyl. If Ethyl doesn't work, try Mabel.

[Belz...]

Originally Posted by Kiwiwriter

Yes, I have a web page on World War II, and it's got a lot on Pearl Harbor on it.

The address is in the signature block, as advertised, and my thanks to Mr. Skinny for singing my praises.

Also, get your hands on the three best books on Pearl Harbor, all by Gordon W. Prange:[...]

That was very informative, Kiwi. Thanks.

[Spektator]

Sigh...someone's going to come along and insist that the USS Arizona had a solid concrete core....

[Curnir]

Originally Posted by Spektator

Sigh...someone's going to come along and insist that the USS Arizona had a solid concrete core....

no but they did use C-4 to build it

[kookbreaker]

Originally Posted by Spektator

Sigh...someone's going to come along and insist that the USS Arizona had a solid concrete core....

There was one 'theory' rolling around claiming that the Japanese Zeros were actually Spitfires painted in Japanes colors flown by British pilots.

[Kent1]

Originally Posted by Kiwiwriter

Yes, I have a web page on World War II, and it's got a lot on Pearl Harbor on it.

The address is in the signature block, as advertised, and my thanks to Mr. Skinny for singing my praises.

Also, get your hands on the three best books on Pearl Harbor, all by Gordon W. Prange:

At Dawn We Slept
December 7, 1941
Pearl Harbor: The Verdict of History

The latter covers the conspiracy theories. Prange's point is echoed by many other writers...the Japanese planned very carefully and executed a solid plan. They benefited from a good deal of luck, a large amount of successful preparation, and a great deal of American ineptitude and disbelief, and won the day.

It's important to note several things about Pearl Harbor: the Japanese did not expect the attack to be a surprise. They fully expected to face an alerted enemy. In that regard, they were surprised themselves.

Equally importantly is that most of the conspiracy theories about Pearl Harbor display a lot of ex post facto knowledge. The idea, for example, that FDR would sacrifice what were later seen as outdated warships (second-generation battleships and older destroyers). At the time, carrier operations were entirely new, and very few nations had mastered them. Not even the Japanese conceded the seas to carriers...the plan for Midway six months later called for the coup de grace to be delivered not by Nagumo's carriers, but by Yamamoto's powerful battleship division, led by the Yamato. If a war was going to be fought, the planners of 1941 expected it to be fought by those second-generation battleships lined up at Pearl Harbor, with the carriers in a supporting role.

There's also the point that tethering the battleships at Hawaii without torpedo nets was not as stupid as it sounded...the torpedoes the Japanese used in the attack were new and highly secret. The Long Lance remained a gigantic surprise to the Americans all through the war.

And if Pearl Harbor is the subject of conspiracy theories, then Savo Island, on August 8/9, 1942, should be even worse. Four cruisers sunk, 1,000 bluejackets drowned, with no damage in return. That was months into the war, and the US Navy still was operating with a peacetime mindset nine months after "Bloody Sunday."

FDR was Assistant Secretary of the Navy in World War I, and loved the Navy, its traditions, the sea, and ships. The destruction of the battle line and deaths of its sailors enraged him as few other things in his life, presidency, and war infuriated him. He could be devious, manipulative, and shallow, but all accounts of Pearl Harbor indicate that he was as stunned and surprised as everyone else.

The bottom line to me on Pearl Harbor is that the Americans underestimated the Japanese in 1941 as funny little yellow men in buck teeth and spectacles who bowed a lot and made cheap imitation goods. We made the same mistake about a lot of funny little bearded brown men in turbans and rags who pray to Allah a lot and shout about jihad and infidels. Nobody took the Japanese seriously in 1941...even fewer took Islamic radicals seriously in 2001. The warnings were similar, and the results were the same.

There are so many holes in the conspiracy theories about Pearl Harbor that it does takes books to shoot them down, because they are so complex.

I do feel that Short and Kimmel got a harsher deal from Washington than they deserved. MacArthur lost all of his planes in Hawaii the following day, and became a hero. Short and Kimmel were not colorful characters or brilliant leaders, but they were unfairly treated when compared with MacArthur and Brereton. Their talents -- and Kimmel's were pretty considerable -- should not have been left to waste. As Prange writes, "There is enough blame to go around at Pearl Harbor."

If anyone has more questions, just PM me, or ask me publicly, or check out my web page and contact me through that. If that doesn't work, try Ethyl. If Ethyl doesn't work, try Mabel.

A few articles I would recommend.
(I've spoken to all of these authors at one time or another. They're great guys and are very helpful)

John C. Zimmerman Pearl Harbor Revisionism: Robert Stinnett's Day of Deceit (Intelligence and National Security, Vol 17, No.2 Summer 2002)

Philip H. Jacobsen Radio Silence and Radio Deception: Secrecy Insurance for the Pearl Harbor Strike Force (Intelligence and National Security, Vol. 19, No.4 Winter 2004)

Philip H. Jacobsen Pearl Harbor: Radio Officer Leslie Grogan of the SS Lurline and his Misidentified Signals (Cryptologia April 2005)

Stephen Budiansky, Battle of Wits - The Complete Story of Codebreaking in World War II

Also if you happen to run across David Aiken at the Pearl Harbor boards
http://www.pearlharborattacked.com/c.../ikonboard.cgi

On the revisionist side you have Wiley, Stinnett, and Timothly Wilford.
Wiley the most "out there", Wilford the most grounded in something that comes close to reality.

[c4ts]

The ONLY thing that could have destroyed the Arizona was a controlled demolition. National Geographic is hiding the truth from you!

[Kiwiwriter]

Originally Posted by kookbreaker

There was one 'theory' rolling around claiming that the Japanese Zeros were actually Spitfires painted in Japanes colors flown by British pilots.

Yes, that was published in 1951, in a scurrilous article in an equally scurrilous Chicago area newspaper, claiming that the damage was all done by British planes, and the Japanese merely sent along camera planes to get shots of the "action." The article further said that US Navy armed guards on December 6 kept sailors from returning back to their ships from shore leave.

I think that's the bottom of the scurrility pit. I don't recall the exact newspaper and quote, but it's in Prange's book, in the back section on "revisionists."

[Kiwiwriter]

Originally Posted by Kent1

A few articles I would recommend.
(I've spoken to all of these authors at one time or another. They're great guys and are very helpful)

John C. Zimmerman Pearl Harbor Revisionism: Robert Stinnett's Day of Deceit (Intelligence and National Security, Vol 17, No.2 Summer 2002)

Philip H. Jacobsen Radio Silence and Radio Deception: Secrecy Insurance for the Pearl Harbor Strike Force (Intelligence and National Security, Vol. 19, No.4 Winter 2004)

Philip H. Jacobsen Pearl Harbor: Radio Officer Leslie Grogan of the SS Lurline and his Misidentified Signals (Cryptologia April 2005)

Stephen Budiansky, Battle of Wits - The Complete Story of Codebreaking in World War II

Also if you happen to run across David Aiken at the Pearl Harbor boards
http://www.pearlharborattacked.com/c.../ikonboard.cgi

On the revisionist side you have Wiley, Stinnett, and Timothly Wilford.
Wiley the most "out there", Wilford the most grounded in something that comes close to reality.

I've communicated with him in the past...very good man, very knowledgeable. His critiques have helped me get my page straight.

Highly recommended.

Budiansky's book, too. Mine is at his home, getting autographed.

[Kiwiwriter]

Originally Posted by Belz...

That was very informative, Kiwi. Thanks.

...we're always open.

That's sort of my purpose and fate in life...to give lengthy and complete answers to all questions. I was well programmed by my schoolteachers and mother, I'm afraid. Give the full answer by "pencils down," no matter what the question.

[VicDaring]

But why did the Arizona sink at faster than free fall speed?

[kookbreaker]

Originally Posted by VicDaring

But why did the Arizona sink at faster than free fall speed?

The black smoke coming out of Pearl Harbor shown in the films also inidacated that the fire was oxygen starved and would put itself out soon.

You know, you can almost apply that sentence to any disaster with fire!

[Kiwiwriter]

Originally Posted by VicDaring

But why did the Arizona sink at faster than free fall speed?

She didn't sink...she went up first, with the explosion!

And if you look carefully at the famous film of it, you'll see a man on a grassy knoll pointing a rifle at the ship....

[Spektator]

I must say I do enjoy posts taking the mickey out of CTers...

But join me in a moment of silence for the U.S. servicemen and women and the civilians who died at Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941...and for those who gave their lives during that and other wars.

[DJLegacy2k5]

Pearl Harbor was really pulled off by the Atlantis-inians from the lost city below the oceans. Everyone knows that.

[SBrown]

Originally Posted by DJLegacy2k5

Pearl Harbor was really pulled off by the Atlantis-inians from the lost city below the oceans. Everyone knows that.

Gawd does anyone here post seriously? You are almost as bad as that Pardalis guy.

[Pardalis]

Originally Posted by SBrown

Gawd does anyone here post seriously? You are almost as bad as that Pardalis guy.

What is that supposed to mean?

[aggle-rithm]

Originally Posted by Kiwiwriter

I do feel that Short and Kimmel got a harsher deal from Washington than they deserved. MacArthur lost all of his planes in Hawaii the following day, and became a hero. Short and Kimmel were not colorful characters or brilliant leaders, but they were unfairly treated when compared with MacArthur and Brereton. Their talents -- and Kimmel's were pretty considerable -- should not have been left to waste. As Prange writes, "There is enough blame to go around at Pearl Harbor."

I think you mean the Phillipines.

The funny thing is that Pearl Harbor is easy to explain next to the Phillipines debacle. McArthur knew who was coming, when they were coming, what direction they were coming from, and he STILL got caught off guard. Arguably, the losses of the Phillipines was a much worse strategic loss than a few battleships, which were (unbeknownst to the navy at the time) already obsolete. So, why no conspiracy theories there?

Anyway, I look forward to visiting your site when I have a moment. Both my parents served in the military during WWII, so it's of major historical interest to me.

[aggle-rithm]

Originally Posted by SBrown

Gawd does anyone here post seriously?

No. Every single post in this forum is a big, fat joke. Any post that you don't find amusing is simply over your head.

Get it?

[SBrown]

Originally Posted by aggle-rithm

No. Every single post in this forum is a big, fat joke. Any post that you don't find amusing is simply over your head.

Get it?

See this again proves my point. Everyone here seems to relish the opportunity to try and ridicule someone. It is quite a frenzy type environment. If I wanted that I would go post on some stupid gaming site.

[aggle-rithm]

I don't know if this has been mentioned, but Edwin Layton's "And I was There" is an excellent historical record of the state of military intelligence leading up to Pearl Harbor. Much of the blame can be placed on political infighting and territorialism among the big brass.

[aggle-rithm]

Originally Posted by SBrown

See this again proves my point. Everyone here seems to relish the opportunity to try and ridicule someone. It is quite a frenzy type environment. If I wanted that I would go post on some stupid gaming site.

Hey!

Didn't I say it was a joke?

[Kiwiwriter]

Originally Posted by aggle-rithm

I think you mean the Phillipines.

The funny thing is that Pearl Harbor is easy to explain next to the Phillipines debacle. McArthur knew who was coming, when they were coming, what direction they were coming from, and he STILL got caught off guard. Arguably, the losses of the Phillipines was a much worse strategic loss than a few battleships, which were (unbeknownst to the navy at the time) already obsolete. So, why no conspiracy theories there?

Anyway, I look forward to visiting your site when I have a moment. Both my parents served in the military during WWII, so it's of major historical interest to me.

Sorry, I meant the Philippines, obviously. I did not copy-edit too closely.

Yes, you never hear conspiracy theories about the Philippine debacle, which was an even greater disaster, as it played a key role in the Bataan agony.

You also never hear any conspiracy theories about the horrible job of logistics MacArthur did. He sent empty trucks into Bataan, when freezers back in Manila were jammed with meat and sacks of rice filled up a stadium there, too. But he let refugees into the Bataan peninsula, who only ate more of his food.

Hope you enjoy my WW2 page.

[Kiwiwriter]

Originally Posted by SBrown

See this again proves my point. Everyone here seems to relish the opportunity to try and ridicule someone. It is quite a frenzy type environment. If I wanted that I would go post on some stupid gaming site.

It's just to relieve the sheer idiocy of the paranormal stuff, conspiracy theories, and bizarre ideas that we contend with. It astounds us that there are intelligent people who believe in the Loch Ness Monster, 9/11 conspiracy theories, that the Jews control the world, UFO cattle mutilations, and that John Edwards can talk to the dead -- and that they listen.

[ARubberChickenWithAPulley]

Quote:

The bottom line to me on Pearl Harbor is that the Americans underestimated the Japanese in 1941 as funny little yellow men in buck teeth and spectacles who bowed a lot and made cheap imitation goods. We made the same mistake about a lot of funny little bearded brown men in turbans and rags who pray to Allah a lot and shout about jihad and infidels. Nobody took the Japanese seriously in 1941...even fewer took Islamic radicals seriously in 2001. The warnings were similar, and the results were the same.

It has always struck me that the Pearl Harbor conspiracy theory is basically advancing the same sort of thinking: the Japanese didn't really get the jump on us. We knew about the attack all along, and it was all part of Roosevelt's master plan. Even if it appears that the Japanese planned and executed a surprise attack, we were really two steps ahead of them the whole time.

People forget that war is basically a series of blunders followed by episodes of sheer luck and occasional brilliance. We just tend to remember the luck and brilliance of wars that we win, and the blunders of the ones we lose.

[Kiwiwriter]

Originally Posted by ARubberChickenWithAPulley

It has always struck me that the Pearl Harbor conspiracy theory is basically advancing the same sort of thinking: the Japanese didn't really get the jump on us. We knew about the attack all along, and it was all part of Roosevelt's master plan. Even if it appears that the Japanese planned and executed a surprise attack, we were really two steps ahead of them the whole time.

People forget that war is basically a series of blunders followed by episodes of sheer luck and occasional brilliance. We just tend to remember the luck and brilliance of wars that we win, and the blunders of the ones we lose.

People often forget that the other guy is as clever and smart as you are. All through history, enemy victories have been attributed to treason and trickery. "Masked batteries" caused the Union defeat at Bull Run. Mata Hari was responsible for French failures in 1917. Paratroopers dressed as nuns conquered Belgium in 1940. All rubbish. We assume that our generals are beleagured but ingenious patriots and their generals are incompetent mad dogs.

We simply have to accept that the good guys do not win every time and that history is not a series of inevitabilities in which they do. For that, I blame history textbooks, which make history boring by presenting history as just that. That's one of the reasons kids tune out in history class. If the good guys always win, then why should anyone care? Answer...they don't always win, and we don't always have the smartest guys.

[aggle-rithm]

Originally Posted by ARubberChickenWithAPulley

It has always struck me that the Pearl Harbor conspiracy theory is basically advancing the same sort of thinking: the Japanese didn't really get the jump on us. We knew about the attack all along, and it was all part of Roosevelt's master plan. Even if it appears that the Japanese planned and executed a surprise attack, we were really two steps ahead of them the whole time.

People forget that war is basically a series of blunders followed by episodes of sheer luck and occasional brilliance. We just tend to remember the luck and brilliance of wars that we win, and the blunders of the ones we lose.

Well said...and Pearl Harbor was by no means the last of the American blunders in the Pacific! But they got it right, eventually.

[MRC_Hans]

The most silly thing about the Pearl CT is that even if you accept its premise that FDR allowed an attack to happen in order to get an excuse to go to war, it still doesn't make sense.

Obviously, even in that situation, he would not want them to win the initial battle. All he needed for his purpose was an attack on US ground. So why not put Pearl Harbour on the alert, send most of the fleet (not just the carriers) out, and not away from the action, but into a position to strike hard at the Japanese fleet, the moment the first bomb fell over Pearl? He would have a war (he would already know that the Japanese would declare war immidiately after the attack), and he would have a first decisive strike against the enemy.

Even given evil, secret intentions, it would make no sense at all to render Pearl Harmour defenceless and unprepared.

Hans