As I posted on another thread, "Wendell Willkie had evidence that FDR knew about the Japanese prepartions for the attack, and that he should thus be impeached. Willkie was persuaded not to present this evidence in his 1944 Presidential campaign by the Army (the war was still on), since it would reveal that the Japanese code system had been cracked, and so he did not."
FDR wanted to enter the European war. Perhaps he earnestly believed that it was the right thing for the U.S. to do. He also knew that Americans had no interest at the time in engaging in a war overseas. Wilsonianism had been discredited on the left, and the right at the time was fiercely isolationist. An egregious hostile act by Japan precipitated the US entry into war against the Axis Powers.
mark
Yes and Bush brought down the two towers, LBJ and the CIA killed Kennedy, and Hitler went to Argentina. Oh and the British Royal family had Diana killed.
Continuation of our Pearl Harbor/”FDR Knew” discussion. I found an article by Stinnett (thanks, panaxanax) that can serve as a discussion piece.
Thanks for posting. Was it Willkie or Dewey in 1944? Willkie dropped out very early in that campaingn after he lost an early primary.
I am also in the camp of those who hold that FDR knew ahead of time, and acted to scapegoat Admiral Kimmel and General Short, the commanders in Hawaii — after he had left them even more blind than they would have been on their own.
Yet I think FDR did not anticipate how hard the Japanese would be able to hit, how much we would lose, and we all lucked out in the Battle of Midway.
http://www.thenewamerican.com/index.php/history/american/576
In most events like this, it is easy to look back on it and find puzzle pieces you can put together and come to this conclusion. It is much harder, however, to do this in real time without the blessing of hindsight. Just like those who say we should have known 9/11 was going to happen, at the time it was unimaginable, but after the fact we can see what evidence points to it going to take place.
It is like trying to put together a puzzle without having the picture of what it should look like.
I just can’t buy that “FDR knew”. FDR was a navy man. He knew the importance of the Navy.
Why in the world would anyone, who understood the importance of the Navy—especially in the Pacific, jeopardize the entire fleet—knowing how important (and long it would take to rebuild)?
The fact the Carriers weren’t at Pearl—so? The majority of the thinking of the day basically was carriers were “toys” and battleships were king.
Many different things could have been done, but history is, well, History.
And if anyone should have been CM it was that idiot MacArthur.
If no one knew, it does seem awfully strange that our entire fleet was in port at Pearl Harbor. They were actually called back in.
Put me in the believer column until someone offers definitive proof that it was not used as the only way to get the US people to agree to another war, thereby ending the painful depression.
Bush most certainly knew that 9/11 was going to happen.
Clinton most certainly knew, as well, via Opplan Bojinka.
/s
=.=
I suppose he could have ordered the fleet to sortie.
But then the Arizona and our other captial ships would have been sunk in waters too deep to salvage.
It was thought that none of the torpedo technology at the time would have been capable due to the shallowness of Pearl. Yet the Japanese used a little engineering to make that successful.
The oil embargo, instituted by the US, led directly to the conflict. But as with all instigations, the US thought it would end quickly.
Had Adm. Kimmel known of an approaching attack, he would have had the fleet at sea, instead of anchored at Pearl, and the loss of life might have been greater. He was that aggressive and a dis-service was paid to him by being made the scapegoat.
Needless to say Pearl was the ONLY time, the Japanese planned and practiced so much for one mission, and they thought that the US forces would detect them and a great sea battle would ensue. They were prepared to throw the dice on the one decisive battle, but not on a campaign, which they were ill-prepared and equipped.
Wilkie ran against Roosevelt in 1940. By the time the 1944 election rolled around he was dead. So unless he was clairvoyant I don't see how he could have used Pearl Harbor against Roosevelt.
Allegedly, Manilla was made ready to appear to be an invasion staging area four months prior to Pearl Harbor. They were attacked within days after Pearl Harbor
read, “Bataan Uncensored” by Col. E.B.Miller
He was the commander of a tank battalion from Minnesota. They became the first POW’s captured and the last released in what many of them called “Being bait”
Old WW1 tanks with no ammo and other useless things that could not be used otherwise were also part of the bait,
A sad and bitter story but very good read.
I heard it was an inside job. Those planes were fakes, painted to look like Japanese planes. And the pilots were the grandfathers of those 11 fake hijackers from 9-11-2001.
/SARC
I’ve read variations of this for years, and have an open mind on anything. Sorry, but it smacks of trutherism.
I’m not sure why FDR would want to enter the war at all unless he somehow thought it would forward his agenda. In fact he specifically promised that we’d stay out of war. Of course after the war started FDR was rewarded with even more control of Gov.
If he knew they were going to attack Pearl Harbor he would have boosted defense at the base and prayed the Japanese were not successful. Just releasing the intell to the public would have gotten us into the war if FDR wanted. An actual successful attack would have knocked us out of the war before we ever got started.
The original attack plan was to knock out the Oil Depot, the sub pens, the navy repair yard and of course the carriers. The Japanese briefly debated having an invasion force land after the initial attack and holding onto Hawaii. Ultimately they decided against that aspect of the attack. However, anyone considering what would happen with a Japanese attack on Pearl would have to consider this possibility: the complete loss of Hawaii as a base of operation. You are then trying to run a Pacific campaign from California. The Japanese failed to blow up the massive oil depot even though they had designed and armed many of their aircraftr with weapons designed to do just that. The repair yard and sub pens were for the most part untouched.
Well, I have often read these charges, and I’m not sure if it’s true or not. There is certainly some evidence that it might be.
It seems likely that, if he did it, Roosevelt miscalculated how badly Japan could damage our fleet in the attack and in the early part of the war.
Why would he do it? 1. Power. For the next five years the government said “Don’t you know there’s a war on,” and pretty much treated people like pawns. 2. Economic recovery. There was a theory that a war would pull us out of the depression. 3. Uncle Joe Stalin. Roosevelt was VERY biased in favor of Stalin and Communism, and Stalin said he needed some help against Hitler. 4. The usual reasons: defend France and England, defeat Hitler, and so on.
It is generally agreed that Roosevelt did provoke Japan. The last straw was when he acted to cut off their supplies of oil, when Japan was trying to industrialize and modernize.
To say that Roosevelt could have done this doesn’t meant that it wasn’t necessarily the right thing. Defeating Hitler was good. Helping the Soviet Union was bad. So you can argue about that.
Woodrow Wilson also ran on a promise to keep out of the war, and then after being elected went right in. Roosevelt did the same thing.