[tcuoohjohn]

I have..

You seem to have some difficulty distinguishing between possibility (1 + infinity-1) and probablity ( 50%+1)

All the irrelevancies in the world do nothing to further your assertion. If you believe that the total weight of the tomes or the volume of strident voice furthers your assertion then you will be sorely disappointed.

All the theories, inferences, speculations, mean nothing if they only result in further theories, speculations, and inferences. It merely becomes a grand tautology.

Is is possible that FDR knew. Yes. There is nothing in the record that excludes the possibility. Is it probable that FDR that The Japanese would attack Pearl Harbor?..No. There is nothing in the record that would indicate that probability. There is a mountain of strained inference, goofy speculation, and grossly misinterpretated data that has been debunked by cryptanalysts.

Now the diffrence between possibility and probability is the difference between looking at Mount Everest and climbing Mount Everest. Any one who says they have climbed mount Everest by looking at it is intellectually dishonest.

The key to the Pearl Harbor issue is the earnest desire to understand the events as they happened not as you want to see them. Anything else is merely a variant of the well know phenomenom of the Texas Sharpshooter Effect.

ONe day perhaps some one will fine definitive evidence of Roosevelt's prior knowledge of the attack at Pearl Harbor. I know that as of this date that hasn't happened. Stinnet's book has been roundly and deservedly bashed by intelligence professionals as the kind of shoddy and intellectually dishonest interpretation of data that results form either incredible sloppiness or willful fraud. ( Intelligence professionals believe it is the later)

I can have some sympathy for Toland in that his error was understandable and explainable.

Stinnett?...can't say as much for him. To many glaring inconsistencies between the actual record and Stinnetts tortured prose. To make that many errors of fact and interpretation would appear to me to fall well beyond the level of accident and coincidence.

[jamaksin]

Um ... probability as in Bayesian analysis, or "fuzzy logic" as in yes/no/maybe or even better Borel sets. Maybe the simplier "confidence interval" from ANOVA is your plateau - perhaps not, however.

Are those to same "intelligence professionals" from the firm of Martin and Mitchell? More than a tad of the patina is gone there ...

Stinnett's prose might be a bit tighter - agreed. But, then this is so-called "popular history" and he did name names (viz., radio operators), show documents for the first time (e.g., TESTM reports), ... point to the wealth of documents still in US Navy hands and beyond FOIA rules, ... and those lead in only one direction. As Costello, Hoehling, ... also lead in that direction.

Now, on that "peer review" side ... your impression of Wilford's thesis is? Award winning thesis, you know. His article in the Northern Mariner also won an award ... yes, a refereed journal ... my, my.

The only "strident" voices I hear/see are those in the form of a bi-polar disorder.

Consider means of resoution here - just two instances for example:

A. Phil has in his latest missive (See December 2003 issue of Naval History) several uses of "probably" as in frequency ... well, why not open that still classified file and see the raw message - communication headers, at. el., You'd think Phil would actively advocate this approach - well, actually no, he would very likley not.

B. Stinnett shows SRN 116643 - aka the "famous" Tanpan Bay/Hittokapu Wan message - that is located at 45.0 N,147.66E (to help you find it). He shows two variants on pages 50-51, these are each annotated " ... spelled out, not from single code group." Agreed so far- perhaps not?

This particular message is vouchsafed by Duane Whitlock as not having it spelt out; LS and others point to this as a Stinnett fax paux ... (So, if in a given code book there is no nameplace for your location ... what do you do ... I'll give you a hint - See Hinsley and Stripp "Code Breakers - The Inside Story of Bletchley Park" - page 275.)

Now why not release that raw intercept with its communications informations ...

So simple, just two instances - yet no joy ... Why is that? So many oddities ... easliy resolved ... so why not after sixty plus years ... ?

On FDR ... has documentation ever been found that Hitler attended or knew or signed off on the Wannsee Conference? Are you expecting that? Perhaps the same with FDR - perhaps not. Or, for that matter, where was Marshall the night of December 6/7, 1941?

Again, you were saying ... what, exactly?

[Perhaps to stress the point - the US government would never have admitted to the contraband on the SS LUSITANIA until it had to (and the very essence of her as an example) ... Pearl Harbor will likely be the very same ... intelligence professionals nothwithstanding.]

Oh, yes, you were saying ... ?