Pearl Harbor and the Deceptions of War.

B

blackascoal

The Force is With Me
Pearl Harbor and the Deceptions of War.

BlackAsCoal
December 7, 2008


As America commemorates this day of mourning and sorrow for the lives lost at Pearl Harbor 67 years ago on this day, it is also wise to learn and teach the lessons of that fateful day. I can think of no wiser words on the lessons of December 7, 1941 than the words of Sun Tzu, "All war is based on deception.” No differently than Hitler’s Reichstag Fire, the “surprise” attack on Pearl Harbor was a deception. Roosevelt knew the Japanese were on their way to Pearl Harbor and that it would be attacked. In fact, he not only goaded the Japanese to attack, he welcomed it.

During the presidential elections of 1940, FDR campaigned as a man of peace. During the last days of the campaign he said these words on October 30, 1940 in Boston, "I have said this before, but I shall say it again and again and again: Your boys are not going to be sent into any foreign wars." Two days later in Brooklyn, he had this to say, "I am fighting to keep our people out of foreign wars. And I will keep on fighting." The very next day in Rochester, New York, he said this, "Your national government ... is equally a government of peace -- a government that intends to retain peace for the American people." On the same day in Buffalo, New York, he said, "Your President says this country is not going to war." On the next day, November 3rd in Cleveland, he said, "The first purpose of our foreign policy is to keep our country out of war." FDR campaigned and won the election on his promise of peace.

However, underneath the campaign promises and speeches, FDR had already opened up secret communications with Winston Churchill, and soon after his election, FDR began to put in place all the elements of going to war. Stanford University history professor Thomas Bailey, who coined the term “International Gangsterism,” wrote in his book. “The Man on the Street”, “Franklin Roosevelt has repeatedly deceived the American people during the period before Pearl Harbor. He was like the physician who must tell the patient lies for the patient's own good. The country was overwhelmingly noninterventionist to the very day of Pearl Harbor, and an overt attempt to lead the people into war would have resulted in certain failure and an almost certain ousting of Roosevelt in 1940, with a complete defeat of his ultimate aims.” In spite of all of his pronouncements of peace, FDR was anxious to get America involved in the war that was ravaging through Europe, and he took great steps to ensure that would happen. His most bold and tragic step was to allow the death and destruction at Pearl Harbor to happen without challenge. As he suspected, it was the last step he needed.

Americans don’t like uncomfortable truth and there are many who will reject any knowledge not created by Hollywood or not found in the so-called “mainstream” media. But there are many truths too obvious to ignore or cover-up with “patriotism.” Just a little more than an hour before the attack on Pearl Harbor began, The USS Ward sunk a Japanese minisub just off Pearl Harbor Bay. All totaled, four minisubs would be sunk and one would run aground that day. The range of a minisub at the time was about 60 miles. Thus, unless Japan lies 60 miles off the coast of Pearl Harbor, we had to have known that there were some very large ships sitting somewhere nearby that brought them there. Yet, we didn’t even send out recon to look for them. The first Japanese planes were seen on radar nearly an hour before the air strike began. Yet, this also went unchallenged. There is absolutely no historical question of whether FDR knew an attack was imminent, but the misdirect put out by FDR himself was that the Japanese fleet would attack the Philippines or Guam. The truth was that we had already cracked the Japanese code and we knew the attack would come at Pearl Harbor. Supposedly we were searching for the Japanese fleet, but paid no attention when it showed up at our door.

There are several theories of why FDR was so anxious to get America involved in the war and why he would allow such death and destruction to occur unchallenged. America was slowly pulling itself out of the Great Depression and war has always been a profitable money-making business for America. But on November 5th, 1940, the very next day after FDR was re-elected, he announced plans to open “the Arsenal of Democracy” for Great Britain. In December 1940, he announced the Lend-Lease Act to the American public, and in March of 1941, Congress passed it. The act fired up America’s industrial engines that had laid dormant throughout the Depression. It was a rousing success, thus FDR did not have to go to war to profit from it.

The truth of why FDR clamored for war so much that he allowed Pearl Harbor to happen can be found in examining the relationship between him and Winston Churchill before the attack on Pearl Harbor. Churchill implored FDR to get involved in the war and told him that Britain was on the verge of defeat and was completely broke. He warned, “If we go down you may have a United States of Europe under Nazi command far more numerous, far stronger, far better armed than the New World.” Many influential Americans such as, Herbert Hoover, Joseph Kennedy, and Charles Lindbergh opposed entering the war. Both FDR and Churchill came to recognize that Japan would be the gateway to their aims and soon after re-election, FDR began a series of steps to goad Japan into an attack.

There can hardly be a more credible source of this truth than Winston Churchill himself. Churchill wrote in his Nobel Prize winning series on WWII, “The Second World War,” that FDR knew about the Japanese plans to attack Pearl Harbor. In it, Churchill makes the points that a) Hawaii's commanders did not get proper warning, b) he was not going to judge what FDR did at Pearl Harbor, c) that he and FDR were very afraid that the US could not come into the war unless Japan attacked the U.S., d) FDR welcomed the attack, e) Pearl Harbor was worth the price. FDR "knew the full and immediate purpose" of the Japanese at Pearl Harbor, said Churchill. FDR goaded the Japanese to attack, then he allowed it to happen.

No differently that than the attack on the USS Maine by the Spanish, that never happened, but led to the Spanish/American War, the Gulf of Tonkin Incident, that never happened, but led to greater US involvement in Vietnam, or the weapons of mass destruction that Saddam did not have that led to the invasion of Iraq, the “surprise” attack on Pearl Harbor was no surprise at all. It was just another deception of war.

As we approach the inauguration of Barack Obama, another so-called “man of peace”, whose entire cabinet did not have the “good judgment” to recognize the all too obvious deceptions of the invasion of Iraq, it is wise to remember and teach the lessons of Pearl Harbor and the deceptions of war. America is already involved in two wars at the same time with other serious major conflicts looming close by. Obama talks a lot about Lincoln, but his closest parallel may be that of Roosevelt. Only this time, instead of coming out of a depression, America is sinking into one. Talking peace and walking war by deception is a strategy America can ill-afford, and all Americans should remain diligent to ensure that does not happen .. again.
 
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AssHatZombie said:
Did you write that, man? That rocks. Of course, damo the mason will move it to the conspiracy forum.
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Thank you my brother .. I did write it.

This is validated history, not conspiracy, and I hope Damo agrees with the history even if he disagrees with my conclusions.
 
Yes what a better world we would have had if FDR had just stayed out of WWII. What a better world had Hitler been able to win that war. He should have remained a pacifist so that the Germans could have defeated Britain, established fortress Europe and eventually invaded the US.
 
blackascoal said:
Thank you my brother .. I did write it.

This is validated history, not conspiracy, and I hope Damo agrees with the history even if he disagrees with my conclusions.
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Just because it is history doesn't make it "not conspiracy".

Conspiracy is not secret code for "not true". Now Conspiracy Theory tends to mean a conspiracy that has yet to be proven, but the word conspiracy doesn't necessarily make something untrue.
 
Socrtease said:
Yes what a better world we would have had if FDR had just stayed out of WWII. What a better world had Hitler been able to win that war. He should have remained a pacifist so that the Germans could have defeated Britain, established fortress Europe and eventually invaded the US.
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There's really no knowing what would have happened.
 
Socrtease said:
Yes what a better world we would have had if FDR had just stayed out of WWII. What a better world had Hitler been able to win that war. He should have remained a pacifist so that the Germans could have defeated Britain, established fortress Europe and eventually invaded the US.
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are you saying that the ends justify the means?
 
Between this, interning Japanese Americans unlawfully, vetoing anti-lynching legislation, and the single most massive expansion of government in world history, it's absolutely amazing that people admire him.
 
Socrtease said:
Yes what a better world we would have had if FDR had just stayed out of WWII. What a better world had Hitler been able to win that war. He should have remained a pacifist so that the Germans could have defeated Britain, established fortress Europe and eventually invaded the US.
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How about a real argument?

NOWHERE in anything I've said demonstrates that I believe we should have stayed out of the war.

Pearl Harbor was a deception that worked, unlike the deceptions of Vietnam or the invasion of Iraq which did not .. but it was deception no less.
 
Damocles said:
Just because it is history doesn't make it "not conspiracy".

Conspiracy is not secret code for "not true". Now Conspiracy Theory tends to mean a conspiracy that has yet to be proven, but the word conspiracy doesn't necessarily make something untrue.
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I agree with that .. but "conspiracy" has also been redefined to paint anything that many don't want to hear. Relagating something to "conspiracy" allows closed mind to stay unencumbered by truth, logic, and common sense.
 
conflict (war) between the u s of a and japan was inevitable

if japan had gotten our pacific carriers, it would have taken longer to defeat them, but the u s of a is bigger than both germany's and japan's conquered area at the onset of war with japan and germany

we literally out produced germany and japan

the one thing that germany was working on (a fission bomb) might have tipped the balance, but we got there first
 
DonQuixote said:
conflict (war) between the u s of a and japan was inevitable

if japan had gotten our pacific carriers, it would have taken longer to defeat them, but the u s of a is bigger than both germany's and japan's conquered area at the onset of war with japan and germany

we literally out produced germany and japan

the one thing that germany was working on (a fission bomb) might have tipped the balance, but we got there first
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Yeah imagine if Hitler had allowed the use of Noahide Science. They would have got there first.
 
Socrtease said:
Yes what a better world we would have had if FDR had just stayed out of WWII. What a better world had Hitler been able to win that war. He should have remained a pacifist so that the Germans could have defeated Britain, established fortress Europe and eventually invaded the US.
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I would never regret a world without totalitarianism.

However, you're making a case for the ends justifying the means.
 
Watermark said:
Oh please. This is a conspiracy theory.
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Then you'll have no problem challenging the plethora of evidence.

Churchill .. Winston Churchill .. in his Nobel Prize winning memoirs "The Second World War" says the FDR knew.

However, if you do not know the realtionship of Churchill and FDR during those times .. you do not know enough history to even be having this converstaion .. and I'll prove that.

But Churchill is to big a chunk for you to attack first .. start from here ..

Here's something I read about 20 years ago .. testimony from Major General Sherman Miles

Monday, Dec. 10, 1945
They Called It Intelligence

The Pearl Harbor Committee turned from diplomatic to military witnesses. Two facts were quickly established: 1) the Japs—sometimes through carelessness, sometimes through code messages—gave the U.S. much more advance notice of the Pearl Harbor attack than has been generally realized; 2) thanks to stupidity in Washington and in the field, the U.S. took the least possible advantage of the warnings.

To the stand went balding, bumbling Major General Sherman Miles, wearer of four rows of ribbons, Assistant Chief of Staff for Military Intelligence in the crucial days of 1941. Into the record went a long series of Japanese code messages intercepted before Dec. 7. Most significant: instructions sent by Tokyo on Sept. 24, ordering a spy in Honolulu to divide Pearl Harbor into five sectors, report on the ships at anchor in each.

Asked a committee counsel: "Isn't that type of message of a special significance?"

Answered onetime G-2 Miles: "The message . . . was not taken alone. It was one of a number ... to all points of the world, to follow the movement of our vessels."

Q. It looks like a bombing plan for Pearl Harbor?

A. That's exactly what it looks like, now that we know Pearl Harbor was bombed.

Q. Wasn't this message quite different from the others? . . . Have you found any others like this?

A. I have not found any similar.

Q. One of the functions of a properly functioning G-2 would have been to single this out and attempt to evaluate its significance, wouldn't it?

A. Yes, sir. But we did not see the significance at that time that we now see in the light of subsequent events.

Opportunity Keeps Knocking. On Nov. 15, the Jap spy was instructed to send reports twice a week on ships in Pearl Harbor; on Nov. 29 he was asked for Pearl Harbor reports "even when there are no movements." Both messages were decoded well in advance of the attack. General Miles conceded that they gave "added significance to the first message." But Intelligence paid no particular heed, said nothing about them to Lieut. General Walter C. Short, the Army commander in Hawaii.

Other intercepted messages, sent between Nov. 24 and Dec. 6, were even more revealing. Tokyo was asking for detailed information on ship movements and schedules, for any reports of barrage balloons over the harbor. The Honolulu spy was reporting that there appeared to be no aerial reconnaissance, that "opportunity is still left for a surprise attack."

But these messages were not decoded in time. The Signal Corps's "Magic" project, which held the secret of the Jap code, was short of men and facilities. General Miles "assured" himself that the work was being done as fast as possible under the circumstances, decided that there his responsibility ended.

Other facts disclosed by Miles:

¶ Jap messages decoded by "Magic" were seen by only a few top brass hats, were not always shown to the President, were not sent to commanders in the field at all. (The Army & Navy were afraid the Japs might learn their secret.)

¶ Neither Army nor Navy Intelligence placed any credence in a report from Tokyo by Ambassador Grew, in January 1941, that the Peruvian Minister had learned "from many sources, including a Japanese source" that the Japs planned to open the war with a sneak attack on Pearl Harbor. (Intelligence officers somehow figured out that no Jap in a position to know would be so stupid as to say.)

¶ The Navy high command warned Admiral Husband E. Kimmel on Dec. 3 that Jap diplomats and consuls all over the world were destroying their papers and codes. General Miles did not ask the Navy to pass this message along to General Short at Honolulu. Said he: "That was not considered necessary. ... I believed that the Navy messages were being transmitted to the Army in Hawaii and vice versa."
They Called It Intelligence - TIME

Miles makes the incompetent disconnected argument .. but he wasn't privy to anything other then what he was given .. although he conclusively proves that the attack on Pearl Harbor should not have been any surprise.

Later, in 1948, he had this to say ..

"Wherever or whenever Washington may have thought the Japanese cat would probably jump, Hawaii's primary mission was to meet it there if it came. Yet both the Army and Navy commands there acted as if there were no chance of a Japanese overseas attack on them. What they actually did and did not do, simply spelled 'It can't happen here.'"

"Had Japan not attacked us when the Washington conference failed, there were but two courses of action that could have resulted in our interference with her policy of conquest. The President might have persuaded Congress to declare war, or he might have interposed U.S. forces in the path of the Japanese advance. The Administration's difficulties would have been great and its success problematical in either case. And how the isolationist elements in the country—the "Hearst-McCormick-Patterson Axis," "America First," and others—would have howled!"

"Our fleet and fortress together constituted what probably was, at that time, the most formidable strong point in the world. The fortress, with its garrison reinforced, had great firepower and a not inconsiderable air force. "'The presence of the fleet," General Marshall had told the President, "reduces the threat of a major attack." Had the fleet been held together and deployed in adjacent waters, it could have retained sea supremacy. Six months later, at Midway, weaker forces, supported by far fewer land-based planes, decisively defeated a Japanese fleet much superior to the hit-and-runners that bombed Pearl Harbor."

NOTE: Conclusively puts to bed the notion that Pearl wasn't defensible and there would have been nothing we could have done had we known.

It is true that most of our air strength was not on the alert or otherwise available when the attack came; but the Japanese had to assume it would be, as of course it might have been. Our radar detection stations closed down after 7.00 A.M., but that again the Japanese could hardly have known. Though we could not have matched the Japanese carrier-borne air force, plane for plane, we had the great potential advantage of near-by land bases for much of our force. Hostile planes had also to count on facing well-equipped and presumably well-prepared antiaircraft batteries, both afloat and ashore. Consideration of high policy aside, a Japanese attack on such a place-of-arms, under alert commands, was, on the face of it, improbable.

Our reasoning was correct. The flaw lay in that phrase "under alert commands."

The Hawaiian fortress and naval base were built with but one potential enemy in view, Japan. Studies concerning the Japanese bore on their military characteristics. It was well known that they were given to treachery and surprise. The President himself, less than a fortnight before Pearl Harbor, remarked that "the Japs are notorious for making an attack without warning."

The strategic importance of Hawaii, coupled with the possibility of surprise on the part of its sole potential enemy, was with us always, whatever might be the probabilities of other Japanese action in any given situation and at any given time. The answer could only lie in Hawaiian readiness to meet an attack, whenever and however made. That had been Army teaching for many years—coupled with the devout hope that we might get some warning of war.

The type of attack actually made—the how of it—had by no means been overlooked by the military. Many years before 1941 our fleet had made, in maneuvers, an attack on Pearl Harbor very similar to the actual one. In the early and middle 1930's the possibility of such an attack had been seriously discussed. General Drum, when in command in Hawaii, had had a long correspondence with the War Department on the subject. Even the "vacant sea," that area between the great Pacific traffic lanes through which an attacking force could approach Hawaii undetected, had been marked down in our defense studies.

In January, 1941, the Secretary of the Navy listed the first three Hawaiian dangers "in order of importance and probability... (1) air bombing attack, (2) air torpedo plane attack, (3) sabotage." The Secretary of War concurred. Generals Marshall and Short corresponded on the subject that spring, and the former pointed out that the first six hours of hostilities would probably be decisive in Hawaii. In March the two senior air officers there, General Martin and Admiral Bellinger, made a defense study in which they practically called the turn on what later happened. And in May General Short wrote the Chief of Staff describing joint maneuvers he had held with the fleet, the theme of which was the defense of Hawaii from a carrier-borne air attack.

Question: Please tell me how the attack was a "surprise" when they had been training for it?

I have said that the War and Navy Departments' dispatches contained clear warnings of possible hostilities. I think the record will bear me out. Let's look at it.

As early as July 25, when we froze Japanese assets, the Pacific commands, including Hawaii, were informed of it by the War and Navy Departments "in order that you may take appropriate precautionary measures against any possible eventualities." On November 24, a joint Army and Navy dispatch pointed out the possibility of Japanese "surprise aggressive movements in any direction." On November 27 the Navy Department sent another dispatch beginning: "This is to be considered a war warning"—not much doubt about that. On the same day the War Department sent another one, over General Marshall's signature, and Military Intelligence followed it up with a message to G-2's.

The Marshall dispatch read in part: "Japanese future action unpredictable but hostile action possible at any moment. If hostilities cannot, repeat cannot, be avoided the United States desires that Japan commit the first overt act. This policy should not, repeat not, be construed as restricting you to a course of action that might jeopardize your defense. Prior to hostile Japanese action you are directed to undertake such reconnaissance and other measures as you deem necessary but these measures should be carried out so as not, repeat not, to alarm civil population or disclose intent. Report measures taken."

This dispatch has since been criticized as a "do-don't" order. In its drafting, Military Intelligence had no part, and I have no personal concern with the "do-don't" controversy. But aside from a certain obscurity about not disclosing intent, the "don'ts" were nothing to get excited about—don't start a war; don't alarm civilians. Those were old Army policies. The importance of the message lies in what it was meant to convey and what it did convey—to others.

NOTE: Even with his position of authority, he had no clue of the why of orders he recieved to carry out.

It was drafted under the personal supervision of the Secretary of War, who had in mind that "defense against an attack by Japan was the first consideration." General Marshall later defined the dispatch tersely as "a command directive for alert against a state of war." It is indeed difficult to miss a clear war warning in the phrases of the message itself. The Philippines, Panama, and the West Coast received the same or a very similar dispatch, had no doubts about its intent, and acted accordingly. Only Hawaii, the vital pivot in a Japanese war, thought that such a warning had but slight local application.

.. the War Department had actually cut into the seed corn of air power to strengthen Hawaiian defense. What could be spared only at great detriment to other commands, in planes, in antiaircraft-artillery, and in radar equipment, went to Hawaii. The Philippines were left, for that period, practically helpless, and even the vital artery through Panama was neglected—until Hawaii was given what could be had. Then, and only then, about August, did Washington begin to build up Panama and the Philippines. Even so, when Pearl Harbor came, Hawaii was much better equipped for defense than either of the other two great outposts or our own West Coast itself.

But Hawaii had lowered its guard to "alert against sabotage" on land and "condition 3" afloat. On this point, General Marshall testified: "I never could grasp what had happened between the period when so much was said [in Hawaii] about air attack, the necessity for antiaircraft, the necessity for planes for reconnaissance, the necessity for attack planes for defense and the other requirements which anticipated very definitely and affirmatively an air attack—I could never understand why suddenly it became a side issue."

NOTE He makes this point again.

---

The War Department has been pilloried for failure to tell Hawaii that its alert did not meet either the situation or the intent of General Marshall's order. That order had required a report of action taken. The Hawaiian command reported: "Alerted to prevent sabotage. Liaison with Navy"—nothing more. The War Department did not reply. Admittedly, this was a serious oversight, for which senior officers have assumed responsibility. But to what extent does the War Department's failure to reply justify the retention of Hawaii's inadequate alert up to the time of the attack? [color]On that matter I must again speak as an outsider, since it was not a function of Military Intelligence to check the readiness or any other disposition of United States forces, nor did I, or anyone else in Military Intelligence, see General Short's cryptic report.[/color]

NOTE: And again

When war came, our "magic"—the breaking of Japanese codes—paid enormous dividends. It materially aided us in concentrating those slender means by which we won the Battle of Midway, the turning point in the Pacific war. It has always seemed to me that we were extremely lucky in keeping the vital secret of "magic" within an already fairly large group in Washington, and wise in rigidly limiting it to that group and the Philippine commands until we were actually at war. I well remember a day when a copy of one of the "magic" messages was missing. The Secretary himself got into that fracas, and I finally ran down the message in the possession of a person unauthorized to have it—in the White House!

After the war, "magic" supplied what appeared to many as definite indications of what the Japanese had been planning at Pearl Harbor. We had those indications before the attack. Why, then, didn't we foresee it? The question hinges on selection, guided by hindsight. If one reads first the end of a good detective story, and then starts in at the beginning and reads through, it is easy to pick out the real clues from those which would have led to other deductions. It is not so easy if one takes the clues, true and false, as they come. The "magic" intercepted and translated by us in the six months before Pearl Harbor, if printed in book form and type, would make several normal volumes. There was no lack of clues—a broad field from which to select, after the event, those which seem to point to that event and to that only.

NOTE: " .. that event and that event only"

There were many "magic" messages showing Japanese interest in conditions existing in Hawaii, largely requests for information of military value. Some concerned the location of anchorages of our warships in Pearl Harbor, by limited sections of that area, their arrival and departure, and so forth. These messages were primarily of naval interest, and the Navy apparently took them to mean two things: first, that Japanese spies there were looking down our throats—a deplorable condition which the Army and Navy had known for thirty years or more; and second, that the Japanese were planning an attack on our fleet, by air or submarines or both.

But since the fleet might eventually be a deterrent to them, it would have been strange indeed had they not made plans to attack it if they could. We ourselves had plans for contingencies far less obvious than that. It is difficult to believe that any senior Army or Navy officer in Hawaii would have found it news had he been told by Washington that the fleet was under close Japanese espionage and the subject of aggressive planning. Indeed, a naval officer would have replied that the fleet had no intention of meeting a major attack at their moorings in Pearl Harbor!

The Hawaiian commands later complained that this "magic" information was not transmitted to them ..

NOTE: Confirming what Churchill said.

The plain fact is that the war warnings sent out by the highest military authorities nine days and more before Pearl Harbor were far more authoritative and more definitive of what the Hawaiian commands might expect, and what was expected of them, than any information or interpretations from "magic" that Military or Naval Intelligence could possibly have sent. Complete reliance was placed on the effect those warnings should have had—and did have everywhere except in Hawaii.

In any event, the Muse who had so consistently worked up the tragedy saw to it that the message was delivered to all addressees, except Hawaii. She was taking no chances; but it was a busy morning for her. She had to see to it that operations against a Japanese submarine just off Pearl Harbor, beginning almost four hours before the attack, caused no general alert. She was almost caught out by a couple of gadget-happy soldiers who stayed overtime on their radar and actually saw and reported the approaching Japanese planes. But she promptly trumped that trick by producing a lieutenant who said, "Forget it." How the Greeks would have appreciated that final touch of inexorable fate!

NOTE: Here comes the punch line

It remains to be seen whether the recent merger of the forces—land, sea, and air—guided by the lessons of a global war, can be made effective, or whether pre-Pearl Harbor conditions are inherent in a democracy before the shooting starts. They had better not be, for the next surprise attack will be quite another story.

Can you say 9/11 .. "A New Pearl Harbor"

Pearl Harbor in Retrospect
The Atlantic * July 1948 * Pearl Harbor in Retrospect * Miles

Should Miles also be discredited .. along with WINSTON CHURCHILL?
 
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