Then you are already at least 50% of a "conspiracy nut," because that is at least half of the alleged "conspiracy."
Now, if I could just get you to pay attention to the evidence about Pearl Harbor itself, then you'd be home with us, defending the truth instead of a pack of political lies. ;-)
CougarGA7: "What I have said (even in the last post) is that there is no evidence that FDR knew that Pearl Harbor was going to get hit by the Japanese and intentionally allowed his fleet to get surprised and sunk.
I have also said that there were failures all the way up the chain of command."
I too have never said, "FDR knew that Pearl Harbor was going to get hit by the Japanese and intentionally allowed his fleet to get surprised and sunk."
What I do say, and evidence fully supports, is that top leaders in Washington, including FDR, knew or suspected the coming Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, but failed to adequately warn the Hawaii commanders, because among other screw-ups, they were ordered to insure that Japan would commit the first overt act of war.
CougarGA7: "I know how military bureaucracies work too, and there is still no evidence that FDR ever saw this memo and there is less proof that he or any of his inner circle contracted its authorship."
Then you know full well, that a memo like McCollum's never just appears out of nowhere.
There had to be many discussions, it had to be a consensus document, and the proof of that is: the endorsement by McCollum's boss, and the high officials to whom it was addressed.
These high officials met frequently with FDR, so McCollum's Eight Actions (and, no doubt, others) would have been reviewed, discussed, debated, modified and executed according to Roosevelt's intentions.
And they were all eventually executed, despite your repeated claims to the contrary.
CougarGA7: "It’s really the core problem with this memo, the suppositions are so far out there that they are not even believable."
The only "far out" suppositions I've ever seen are those by the Pearl Harbor deniers claiming that McCollum's memo does not really say exactly what it clearly does say.
CougarGA7: "Considering the numerous problems with Stinnett’s book, I’m not very surprised that he claims all 8 were done.
And, like I said, 2 of them were just a restatement of policies that were already decided before the memo was even written (not very telling).
3 of them never happened."
OK, pal, the time has come for you to put up or shut up.
Name the eight actions, one by one, and explain how each action either did not happen, or was not part of a plan to provoke the Japanese into war.
Once you have spelled out your argument in specificity, I will show you where you're wrong.
CougarGA7: "Of the 5 of 8 actions that did take place, none of them are outside the realm of what would make sense considering the situation."
Not a single one of those actions was intended to avoid war, or help negotiate peace with Japan -- just the opposite.
They were intended to cause a crisis with Japan, and they succeeded.
CougarGA7: "I put the question out there when it happened, what would you (general you, not specific to you) have done."
As I've said here frequently, I approve of everything President Roosevelt did about Japan, except his failure to more effectively warn the commanders in Hawaii.
CougarGA7: "The full embargo, which really was a primary motivator for Japan, was just an extension of the embargos that were levied after July of 1940 when Japan occupied northern Indochina."
Here is one brief description of those events:
"After Japan occupied northern French Indochina in late 1940, FDR authorized increased aid to the China, a policy that won widespread popular support.
In July 1941, after Japan occupied the remainder of Indo-China, he cut off the sale of oil to Japan.
Japan thus lost more than 95 percent of its oil supply.
Roosevelt continued negotiations with the Japanese government, primarily through Secretary Hull.
Japan Premier Konoye desired a Pacific conference with FDR which U.S. Ambassador Joseph Grew favored but which Hull opposed.
When Kenoye failed to produce diplomatic results, Emperor Hirohito replaced him with Minister of War Tojo.
Meanwhile Roosevelt started shifting the long-range B-17 bomber force to the Philippines."
The important point here is that McCollum's Eight Action Plan, dated October 7, 1940, was contemporary with Japan's move into Indo-China, and President Roosevelt's authorization of increased aid to China.
CougarGA7: "Keeping the fleet in Hawaii? That was a done deal long before this memo was written."
In fact, the President's decision to fire Admiral Richardson for Richardson's opposition to keeping the US fleet in Hawaii was made after McCollum's memo was typed up.
So, McCollum's plan helped support FDR's policy, and suggested other ways to accomplish their goal.
CougarGA7: "So was the commitment to help China. T.V. Soong had already brokered loans disguised as trade agreements..."
Which goes to prove, yet again, that McCollum's memo only reflected the thinking already in place, and was not proposing radically new ideas.
CougarGA7: "It was not until October of 1941 as plans were changing on how much effort was going to be put into defending the Philippines (championed by MacArthur of course) that two divisions were sent, almost doubling the number of submarines assigned to the Asiatic Fleet..."
Remember, McCollum was a lowly Commander in Naval Intelligence -- he in no way could tell his bosses, much less the Commander in Chief, FDR, what to do.
So all his memo does is provide suggestions for how to accomplish the goals his CinC has laid out -- to provoke the Japanese into a first overt act of war.
Roosevelt alone made decisions on if or when to implement McCollum's action items.
But the bottom line is, FDR did eventually implement all eight actions, and they did accomplish the goals McCollum and Roosevelt intended.
CougarGA7: "I don’t see how this memo could have anything to do with it."
McCollum's memo simply reflected the thinking of FDR's inner circle at the time it was written -- in late September and early October, 1940.
And there is no evidence -- zero, zip, nada -- that this thinking ever significantly changed before December 7, 1941, exactly 14 months later.
Now this next statement of yours if funny because you contradict yourself. Let me lay this out for you because we all got a good laugh out of it.
I too have never said, "FDR knew that Pearl Harbor was going to get hit by the Japanese and intentionally allowed his fleet to get surprised and sunk."What I do say, and evidence fully supports, is that top leaders in Washington, including FDR, knew or suspected the coming Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor
That is comic gold dude.
As to the failed to adequately warn, we can go into that when its more timely.
Again you offer no proof of FDR's knowledge of the McCollum memo. But thanks for the continued wild speculation. There are a couple of people who signed off on that memo, it doesn't mean that it ever got any traction. Most correspondence of this type never do.
Now I have already gone over the individual actions on this memo last month. Like I've told you before, I will not hold your hand with this stuff. You need to start paying attention. Put those search skill of yours to work and go find them. I've already given you a hint. I suspect that you might be able to locate it based on that. The amusing thing is that you have not been able to piece this together just from my last post. Not surprising that you couldn't wrap your head around it, but amusing nonetheless.
And again, with the 5 that did happen. They were all reasonable actions to take. It's not about what would cause war or peace, it's about what a reasonable action is. An escalation of the diplomatic pressure on a hostile nation by embargo is a reasonable action. Especially in the light of the failure of appeasement. The continued support of an already decided action is a reasonable action. The deployment of two submarine divisions to a defensive area when war is appearing to become immanent is a reasonable action.
Even McCollum would agree with this. After the war McCollum stated that the action taken in 1940 and 1941 "were but a logical extension of American foreign policy at least as old as John Hay and his Open Door Policy, especially as far as Japan was concerned by President Theodore Roosevelt’s dispatch of the American fleet to the Pacific and thence around the world in 1907.”
McCollum's memo wasn't contemporary. In fact in many ways it was almost redundant.
Now you do make one valid point. McCollum was a lowly Commander in Naval Intelligence. There is no evidence that this lowly commander's memo was ever received by FDR and therefore it is reasonable to assume that the actions taken were not related to that memo. And again you have offered nothing new that would lead any rational person to believe that this memo was the cornerstone of American policy.