Separating Myth from Fact in the Pearl Harbor Attack (1941)
83 years from the date "which will live in infamy," how much of the truth does the public know?
When I first started looking into the facts around Pearl Harbor, I thought it would be relatively straightforward. I figured that few had done the yeoman’s work to uncover the lies.
I have been amazed at how many have done so much, and how easily much of the information has been to uncover. Many have labored years, in several cases decades, to try and author the definitive works unpacking America’s perhaps most foundational modern myth: the myth of the sneak attack which started the glorious global war.
Thousands of pages of evidence, dozens of books, which almost no one seems to know about.
Even many contrarians and well-read friends of mine, many of whom are readers here, seem surprised at some of the most basic claims made with copious amounts of evidence.
It seems as though few want to admit that not only did FDR has some vague inkling that the attack was coming, or that perhaps he mildly encouraged the Japanese attack, but that he actually planned it and actively worked for it to happen.
No one wants to believe that an American President as revered as Roosevelt could be so subversive, invidious and just downright evil as the evidence says quite clearly and plainly.
Pearl Harbor was not an accident or a surprise, it was policy.
You can see this in many different moments where the crisis could have been avoided if Washington had not intervened to choose the most irrational and incorrect choice if they were seeking to avoid war, and in the very deliberate actions taken to ensure that the Japanese fleet would arrive with minimal opposition and maximum carnage.
Roosevelt brought America into the war by sacrificing 2,393 boys at Pearl Harbor so that the Soviet Union would survive.
The strategy was simple: let Japan attack and cause enough casualties to prosecute a war of extermination with a demand for unconditional surrender. Japan would be out of oil in six months, so simply sit back and wait for Japan’s economy to collapse so that America could come in and outmaneuver Japan’s navy.
Japan’s strategy was to make a sudden attack in order to immediately sue for better economic terms: they wanted oil, a free hand in China, and raw materials. They didn’t realize that Roosevelt wanted that ‘sneak’ attack so that he could then justify the destruction of their entire Empire.
Sparking a pointless was with Japan, with all of its horrors, was more important than leaving the death struggle between Hitler and Stalin to chance. Communism would not be allowed to lose or even suffer a humiliating defeat and have to accept a disgraceful peace settlement.
Roosevelt needed to take the pressure off of Stalin’s eastern flank. The troops that Stalin was forced to station there to protect against an invasion by Axis ally Japan were the critical difference in the European war. The Soviet Union never declared war against Japan until two days before their surrender.
The war that Roosevelt started, and the evil men he used for this purpose, would not just stop at the war in the Pacific, they were the same ones that gave China away to Mao, Korea away to the Kim family, Vietnam to Ho Chi Minh, Cuba away to Castro. These were the men who set up the United Nations to dilute the power of the United States, who drew up the Soviet domination of Eastern Europe, and who set things in motion for the Communists to dominate Asia for a century.
A conservative estimate of how many lives were lost by empowering these monsters is probably 100 million souls.
These lives were lost because Communism was empowered and subsidized to start its trademarked killing fields and because war was pursued globally to accomplish political goals instead of diplomacy and patience.
By late 1941, Franklin Roosevelt needed a world war and needed it in a way that brought America in. He needed it in order to save the Soviet Union from defeat.
Luckily policy in the State Department had been developed for years in this regard by one obscure department: the Division of Far Eastern Affairs in the State Department. That department’s deputy was someone… familiar to this publication.
They were threatening Japan with war if they didn’t leave the Axis. If they left the Axis powers, they would be handsomely rewarded. If they refused to leave the Axis, they must be destroyed. There was no alternative option.
Roosevelt had been trying to start the war, but was unsuccessful.
Now they knew they had the Japanese in a bind. The Japanese Ambassador asked Washington to have Roosevelt meet in Pearl Harbor anytime in October 1941 for a peace conference. The Japanese relayed that they would accept any terms, but they needed the political victory with their own people to keep the militarists at bay. Roosevelt refused and it collapsed the Konoe government causing the militarists to take control of Japan.
He had depth-charged German submarines unprovoked. American destroyers were escorting British ships carrying military aid to Britain.
By May 1940, one of the courageous wire clerks of the U.S. embassy in Britain saw the cable traffic between FDR and then-Navy Secretary Winston Churchill planning and plotting the second world war and how to bring America into the war. This was 19 months before Pearl Harbor. Tyler Kent was arrested as he tried to give the incriminating FDR-Churchill cables to a member of Parliament who might read them into the public record, and in a first the host nation ‘waived’ diplomatic immunity so that Kent could be prosecuted for spying by Britain. He served out the rest of the war in a British cell.
The U.S. was providing lend-lease to Britain and Russia: blank checks for war material and civilian aid to keep those nations in the fight. Britain was asked to liquidate her empire in exchange for the aid. The British had to agree to denominate international oil sales in dollars instead of pounds sterling, the birth of the U.S. Dollar as the global reserve currency was born. The Soviets were given everything for free.
The U.S. imposed an oil, steel, and raw materials embargo on Germany in 1940, along with other trade restrictions. The U.S. seized the foreign assets of the Axis powers.
Roosevelt was trying to start a war and it wasn’t working. No one was taking the bait. The Germans were exercising Herculean restraint in the Atlantic Ocean despite the provocations, it was no mystery what Roosevelt was up to after all, and they knew what would happen if America came again to bail Britain and Russia out of another World War.
The Chief of Naval Operations, Lt. Cmdr. Arthur H. McCollum wrote the eight-action-points-memo on Oct. 7, 1940 to try to get Japan to attack the United States first.
You can read the entire important McCollum memo about baiting Japan into war here. This memo was originally uncovered by historian Robert Stinnett (1924-2018) and published in his 1999 work, “Day of Deceit.” Here’s the key section:
On October 10, 1940, Roosevelt brought in his Pacific commanders and informed them that he sought to go to war with Japan quietly and with economics. This left them ‘amazed’ according to later testimony by Admiral James O. Richardson.
In the winter of 1940, an American doctor who spent decades in Korea ends up in Hawaii. While there, Koreans keep identifying Japanese military spies on the island. The doctor relates this to the military, who tells him that they know all about it already and not to worry.
On January 27th, the State Department’s Ambassador to Japan Joseph Grew learns that the Japanese plan, in case of a conflict with the United States, is to launch a sneak attack on Pearl Harbor.
Lt. Cmdr. McCollum dictates a memo to the CINC Pacific Fleet on February 1, 1941 that in case of a Japanese sneak attack, it will most likely happen at Pearl Harbor. Here’s the memo:
Adm. Richardson had been replaced in February 1941 because he was concerned that the Japanese would start a war by attacking the Pacific Fleet at Pearl Harbor. He was opposed to rehoming the fleet from the West Coast of America in San Diego to Pearl Harbor. He was replaced with Adm. Kimmel.
In May 1941, Japanese diplomats are caught telling the Brazilians that they will be at war with the Americans soon.
Gen. Short replaced Maj. General Albert M. Jones in June 1941, as responsible for the ground defense of the islands.
In late July the press is complaining that FDR has been subsidizing the Japanese war effort because Roosevelt is selling cheap oil and cheap steel to Japan. Roosevelt says he is doing this because if he were to cut these exports off, it would cause war with Japan. A week later, Roosevelt cuts off oil and steel to Japan.
On July 31st, Washington seized 19 Japanese fishing vessels that were spying around Hawaii.
In August Lloyd’s of London started selling “bombing insurance” in Hawaii. A week later, they stopped selling the insurance.
In August, the Konoe government of Japan was begging Washington for a peace treaty. They told Washington they would accept any terms and proposed a peace summit in Hawaii. Roosevelt demurred and deflected, and the response was that Japan would have to first make humiliating concessions to Washington first. These actions ultimately caused the collapse of the Japanese government on October 16th and empowered the militarists.
In October, Washington ordered all commercial traffic in the Pacific sea lanes to stop. By clearing the sea lanes, there was a clear path for the Japanese fleet to get to Pearl Harbor. They made it so that no commercial craft would inadvertently alert Pearl Harbor to the incoming attack.
But some did anyway:
In mid-October, a Hearst reporter is repeatedly urging Admiral Glassford, the head of the Asiatic Fleet, that the Japanese will attack on or after December 6th. Adm. Glassford takes this seriously enough to personally relocate himself and the reporter to Manila.
On November 3rd, the State Department learns and discusses that the Japanese in Panama have told their allies and representatives that war with America is coming soon and inevitable. See below.
On November 6th, a military engineer named James E. Cassidy was instructed to have plans ready in one hour to build and deploy anti-aircraft regiments and batteries defending the northern island of Oahu, which is precisely the path that the Japanese attack happened from. These plans were then given a 5 month build-time. Cassidy had no doubt that orders were given to warn of an incoming attack and were countermanded by higher-ups. He said as much in a confidential letter to the U.S. Senator investigating Pearl Harbor in 1945, here’s the excerpt of the letter:
On November 10th, the State Department is gloating that the embargo has brought Japan to its knees, and it will either have to pursue war or humiliating concessions from Washington. They estimate Japan has 10 months of oil for domestic consumption left, and 2 years worth of oil for their Navy stockpiled.
On November 17th, the State Department said in private memos between the Ambassador to Japan Joseph Grew and the Secretary of State Cordell Hull that if war with Japan were to start, it would start with a sneak attack. See below.
On November 24, 1941 and again on December 2nd, the military brass knew that the Japanese fleet was outbound and was going to attack somewhere. They discussed over memos whether it would be a British or American possession and base that was attacked.
On November 27th, Washington ordered Adm. Kimmel and Gen. Short to set condition 1 across Hawaii, which was putting the entire area on alert for possible acts of sabotage with no threat from attack. Gen. Short was refused permission to distribute ammunition in order to defend the island.
On November 29, 1941, Australia offers to intervene to stop the impending war. They asked to mediate the fight to avoid a war. The response from the State Department and the Secretary of State Cordell Hull was that “the diplomatic stage was over…”
On November 30, 1941, national editorialist Walter Lippmann was explaining that if negotiations with Japan fail, the U.S. will not start a war, but Japan very likely will do so, “…but Japan may start a war in which we shall have to fight back.”
On November 30, 1941, the Honolulu Star-Advertiser announced in a screaming page one headline: the Japanese may strike over the weekend!
The week prior to the Pearl Harbor attack, the military was drafting an order declaring martial law.
The carriers had been sent away. The U.S.S. Lexington was sent on November 28th on a training exercise to the southeast. The U.S.S. Enterprise was sent on December 5th west on a patrol mission. The U.S.S. Saratoga had been sent on November 28th to a mission in the South Pacific. The aged and obsolete battleships were left in port, with their port holes open.
The entire Pacific Fleet was brought into the harbor and lined up for a parade and review. Whereas previously the fleet was never gathered in one spot at one time like this, it was gathered on December 6th and prepared so that on Monday December 8th, it could be reviewed by Admiral Husband Kimmel. Kimmel gave leave to the sailors for December 7th, so many of them were hung over on that Sunday morning. According to several tipsters, Admiral Kimmel was as well.
A week prior the newspaper had warned of a possible impending Japanese attack.
Sailors later told their hometown newspapers that a state of war had existed for some time with Japan, and that it was well-known in the Pacific that the Japanese were firing upon U.S. ships. You can read one account of that here in 1942, from Pennsylvania sailor Joseph Purta:
From Dec. 2nd through Dec. 6th, Naval Intelligence officer Robert D. Ogg (1918-2006) was relaying movements of the Japanese fleet, the Kido Butai fleet that would attack Pearl Harbor, to his commander, Capt. Richard T. McCullough. McCullough was in touch with the Roosevelt White House giving them updates on where the Japanese fleet was at.
Prior to the attack, doctors and nurses were warned that an attack was coming, so they stockpiled supplies. On the day of the attack, according to witnesses writing to Senators years later, they noticed that no military reconnaissance planes were in the air anywhere on the island, which was not normal. They were told not to fire a shot without clearance from Washington.
On December 6th the Navy ordered the submarine nets protecting Pearl Harbor taken down for ‘regular maintenance.’
On December 6th, Adm. Johan Ranneft (1886-1982) from the Dutch Navy serving as the attache in Washington is visiting friends in the Office of Naval Intelligence in Washington, D.C. and while there, he sees an incoming Japanese fleet steaming for Pearl Harbor. He asks what’s going on and is told to forget what he’s seeing. He had previously seen the same force heading east on December 2nd. When he relates this story years later, he’s called a liar. But years prior, he had submitted his diaries from those years to an archive. When the archive is checked, his diary noted that he had seen the incoming Japanese fleet on December 6th while at the Navy’s headquarters for military intelligence.
In the evening of December 6th, the men of the U.S.S. Wright see an aircraft carrier steaming towards Pearl Harbor. They cannot determine its nationality, and there is some dispute about whether or not they radio’ed the contact in.
G-2 Military Intelligence ordered the Opana Point radar operators, Privates Joseph Lockard and George Elliott, to turn off their radar at 7:00AM. Hawaii air defense radar had been on a 24/7 cycle, but were shifted by Washington into a cycle only covering the early mornings. They disobeyed orders and kept the radar on anyway, to get extra practice time using the machines. When they turned them on at 7:02AM they were alarmed by the incoming fleet of planes, so they reported it immediately. They were told “not to worry about it.” Repeatedly. No fighters would be sent to intercept the large incoming swarm of planes even with an hour’s warning before the attack started.
This person who refused to take their warnings, Lt. Kermit Tyler (1913-2010), was never reprimanded for his role in negligently allowing the Pearl Harbor attack to happen. If Lt. Tyler had sent up the fighters to intercept the first Japanese wave when they were first detected at 7:02AM, it’s very likely the U.S.S. Arizona and the U.S.S. Oklahoma would not have been sunk over an hour later. Whenever this is brought up, the court historians claim without evidence that it wouldn’t have mattered.
The Soviet Ambassador had caught the last plane out of Hawaii on Saturday night.
On December 7th, Washington had notice of the break in Japanese relations at noon eastern standard time, which was 6:30AM Hawaii-time. This was 90 minutes before the attack. Hawaii was not notified because of what they said were “technical difficulties” that included a malfunctioning communications device. The message was sent after the attack was over.
There’s more, but I’m just not sure how much more matters.
There is this weird and idiotic meme that the U.S. was just absolutely surprised and shocked that the Japanese chose war. I wrote about this as the taxonomy of various Pearl Harbor advance-knowledge claims.
It came as no surprise to anyone in power at the time.
Here’s a Virginian paper the day before December 7, 1941:
Roosevelt knew. And he could have done anything to stop it. But he didn’t want to stop it. He wanted to use it.
