Why Didn’t America Join the War Sooner?

PearlHarbor.org ^ | 2017

[CondoleezzaProtege]

It often seems that modern day American leaders and many of the American people are eager to intervene in conflicts…Over 75 years ago, the exact opposite could be said.

With Europe locked in battle, President Franklin D. Roosevelt supported the idea of America going to war, giving Great Britain the backing it needed, but FDR faced his own struggles. The United States didn’t want to intervene.

During an emergency cabinet meeting called by Roosevelt immediately after the war erupted in Europe, it was agreed that the United States would remain an outside influence unless directly threatened or attacked…

The United States was still getting over the turmoil of World War I. The general public was not ready to join another war, opting for neutrality. A poll taken in 1939, after the outbreak of war, showed 94% as being against going to war.

Even if the United States had wanted to enter the war, its military force was simply not ready.

Facing off against millions of Germans, the American military was only about 100,000 strong without a draft. To enter the European crisis would likely mean a complete decimation of America’s forces.

Beyond a lack of force, the United States military was generally behind on weaponry, with much of it dating back to the First World War. The current force wasn’t ready for war against the better-trained Germans. Even if the numbers were there, the preparedness was not.

The war in Europe didn’t seem to pose any threat to the American economy and joining it only served to threaten its stability… the US was actually benefiting from the conflict, manufacturing military equipment and vehicles for the Allied forces…

Then it all changed…

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TOPICS: History
KEYWORDS: agitprop; fdr; pearlharbor; secondworldwar; worldwar2; ww2

[Responsibility2nd]

I can think of lots of movies showing the difficulties vets had when returning from war.

https://www.perplexity.ai/search/show-me-a-list-of-movies-that-tkbYnliXRVCrSAC2Ftxfhw

[dfwgator]

But during the height of “The Red Scare”?

[Racketeer]

There is a reason Patton did not come home alive. As well, FDR made sure the US entered to war by creating the motivation.

[dfwgator]

This may or may not have been said by Churchill:

“Americans can always be trusted to do the right thing, once all other possibilities have been exhausted.”

[dfwgator]

There is a reason Patton did not come home alive. As well, FDR made sure the US entered to war by creating the motivation.

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I’d say Hitler and Tojo pretty much did that on their own.

[SoCal Pubbie]

There was zero chance the Royal Navy fleet would have been defeated, let alone surrendered to Germany. Plans existed to move the royal family, the entire government, navy and as much of the army as possible to Canada. Furthermore there was zero chance that a German invasion would have succeeded. Of course that was not widely known at the time. The fleet would have been scuttled before handing it to over to Hitler.

I don’t think the fate of the Royal Navy entered any Americans’ minds in terms of isolation before Dec. 7 of 1941.

[mewzilla]

Wilson was just the guy Deep State hid behind.

1913 gave us the 17th Amendment, the federal income tax, the Fed...

Wilson didn’t accomplish all that on his lonesome.

[Regulator]

“Furthermore there was zero chance that a German invasion would have succeeded”

Well if they just put on orange life jackets and jumped into dinghys and demanded “asylum” upon arrival it would have worked out fabulously!

[dfwgator]

It was certainly on FDR’s mind. He was after all, Assistant Secretary of the Navy during WWI.

[FiddlePig]

Actually the USA never declared war on Germany in WW2. Hitler declared war on USA December 11, 1941. The the USA only reconized that a state of war existed with Germany. Oddly, the USA was the only country Hitler actually declared war on.

USS Reuben James was sunk October 31, 1941, and Pearl Harbor was barely over a month later... so maybe FDR knew something we didn’t?

[dfwgator]

Well if they just put on orange life jackets and jumped into dinghys and demanded “asylum” upon arrival it would have worked out fabulously!

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I know right. Hitler right now in Hell is going, “Why didn’t I think of that?”

[PermaRag]

I’ve always found it amusing how the Left ping-ponged about the war:

1. Hitler begins Germany’s quest for “Lebensraum”: “War now! The “right wing” (LOL) Nazi menace must be stopped! Germany learned nothing from WWI — we must teach them another painful lesson! It’s up to us to save the world!”

2. Hitler and Stalin team up: “No! Wait ! Stay out of it! Avoid foreign entanglements! Shed no American blood! This is Europe’s problem, not ours!”

3. Hitler and Stalin break off their engagement, leaving Mother Russia (and kindly old Uncle Joe) vulnerable to Hitler’s megalomania: “War is necessary! We must pay any price and suffer any amount of losses in order to save Russia, er I mean stop Hitler! It’s up to us to save the world and make it safe for Communism!”

(Oops, wait, scratch that last one....)

[dfwgator]

Well we would have been at war with Germany once they sank another US Ship, and with Britain in the fight against Japan, there were no more restraints on aiding Britain, so it only would have been a matter of weeks, if not days, before we would have been at war with Germany, even had Hitler not declared war on the US.

[dfwgator]

2. Hitler and Stalin team up: “No! Wait ! Stay out of it! Avoid foreign entanglements! Shed no American blood! This is Europe’s problem, not ours!”

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Pravda at the time, referred to it as the “European Imperialist War”.

[dfwgator]

Hitler thought he would get help from Japan against the Soviets, if he did declare war on the US.

But after Hitler stabbed the Japs in the back with his Non-Aggression Pact with Stalin, the Japs were like, “Uhhhh, no thanks!” In fact, unbeknownst to Hitler, they had already signed their own deal with Stalin, after Zhukov and Co. kicked their asses at Khalkhin Gol in 1939.

[PUGACHEV]

I was born in 1950 and growing up I had the benefit of the views of both my father and my grandfather on WWII. They were both very well connected with associates in the highest levels of government, finance, and the military at the time. Neither of them lacked patriotism, and, in fact, my father served as a deck officer in the Merchant Marine during the first years of the war and later joined the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. Both expressed the same rational for the country's reluctance to get involved in WWII before Pearl Harbor, although both saw war with Japan as an inevitability.

The general feeling in the county 1939 was that we had been tricked into involvement in WWI at the behest of the British, who's real interest was to preserve the economic benefits of their empire by excluding others, including Germany and the U.S., from foreign markets which they controlled. It was felt, generally, that WWI for all its high ideals, had really accomplished nothing and that the U.S. would have been far better off by not getting involved and letting the European powers fight it out to a final resolution. To his credit, Roosevelt understood this, and the Lend-lease Deal worked out to save Brittan from immanent collapse required that it effectively dissolve the Empire within several years of the war's end. So it did, and the U.S. has been profiting from that deal and follow-on Breton Woods Agreement to the present day.

[allendale]

Then and now the American people do not want to go to war unless the nation is directly attacked. That is why these foreign entanglements in Iran, Afghanistan and Iraq whatever and however rational they may seem are not supported by the majority of the American people. Ultimately the politicians who lead us into such wars pay a price. That price BTW is nowhere as severe as the price paid by the brace young men who are killd, physically and psychogically maimed.

[dfwgator]

The world would have been better off if the Central Powers won WWI.

They would have taken care of Russia, so no Bolsheviks. The old imperial order would have remained in place in Germany, so no Hitler. Britain would still have her Empire.

[DugwayDuke]

PermaRag wrote: “Then FDR allowed/encouraged Pearl Harbor to happen, and things changed on a dime: “WE WUZZ UHTACKKT!!!!!1!””

Standing up to evil dictators that threaten the free world is not ‘allowing/encouraging’ an attack on Pearl Harbor.

[jerod]

By providing weapons, money and food to the UK during the war America was already essentially part of the war. They weren’t contributing their blood, sweat and tears but pretty much everything else.

After Pearl Harbor they were full blown participants, but they didn’t need to be... They could’ve concentrated on taking on Japan and and ignored the European theatre and Hitler, but Hitler made the mistake of aligning himself with Japan in 1936. That sealed his fate and made America’s declaration of war against Germany a fait accompli.