"By 1944, the Allies were clearly winning, and national security would no longer wash as a barrier to trials.
A congressional act mandated the court-martials.
At last, the former Hawaiian commanders would have their day in court."In August [1944], the Naval Court of Inquiry opened.
A source inside the Navy Department had already tipped Kimmel and his attorneys about the scores of Magic intercepts kept from the admiral in 1941.
One of the attorneys, a former Navy captain, managed to get at the Department's files, and authenticated the existence of many.
Obtaining their release was another matter.
Obstruction after obstruction appeared — until Kimmel tried a ploy.
Walking out of the courtroom, he bellowed to his lawyer that they would have to tell the press that important evidence was being withheld."By the next day, the requested intercepts had been delivered — 43 in all.
The admirals on the Court listened to them being read with looks of horror and disbelief.
Two of the admirals flung their pencils down.
More than 2,000 died at Pearl Harbor because those messages had been withheld.
Navy Department officers gave additional testimony.
After nearly three months, the inquiry finished.
The verdict of the Roberts Commission was overturned.
Admiral Kimmel was exonerated on all charges.
Admiral Stark — who had rejected pleas of juniors to notify Hawaii on the morning of the attack — was severely censured."News of the intercepts leaked to the Army Pearl Harbor Board, convening at the same time.
The Board secured copies of Magic from War Department files.
The Board's conclusions still expressed modest criticism of General Short, but found overwhelming guilt in General Marshall and his Chief of War Plans, General Gerow.
Its report ended with this statement:"Up to the morning of December 7, 1941, everything that the Japanese were planning to do was known to the United States except [Tokyo's final diplomatic message] the very hour and minute when bombs were falling on Pearl Harbor." "
There is much more to the story, but this is a start...
"Up to the morning of December 7, 1941, everything that the Japanese were planning to do was known to the United States except [Tokyo's final diplomatic message] the very hour and minute when bombs were falling on Pearl Harbor."
I don't know where to start on your John Birch Society article. Washington, DC and Kimmel and Short all knew that war was imminent on December 7. Nothing in Magic identified Pearl Harbor as a main target on December 7.