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You are welcome to your opinion. But give Japan and Yamamoto credit for one hell of an opening move.
I've already said the US got hit far harder than they thought they might. Who knew the Japanese were bloodthirsty killers who would bayonet the wounded and enslave the surrendered. Who knew Japanese Long-Lance Torpedoes would be effective in the shallow waters of Pearl. Wooden Fins to the rescue.
The goal was to enter the war in Europe. The primary pipeline of men and material went into Europe. Japan and the Pacific were small potatoes compared to Europe. But Hitler was not planning on attacking America. Japan, because of the embargo, did.
While fighting a war in Europe, keeping Russia and Britain afloat with material supplied by multiple armadas of Liberty Ships, fielding multiple land and air armies out of a handful of divisions, developing world breaking new aircraft types and atomic weaponry; the United States developed an entirely new fleet type, 'The Fleet That Stayed', that acquired the air bases necessary to control the IMMENSE area of the Pacific and allow her B-29s to throttle the life out of Japan.
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No one, infact the Allies didnt knew about that torpedo untill 1943. It also wasnt used by the B5N (Kate) at PH, they used the Type 91 torpedo.
<------Smartass.
That's the whole point, strategically the Americans knew that the Japanese will come... but tactically Yamamoto outsmarted them and exploited that good initial move to the best. I guess the loss of the Philippines, Malaya, Wake, the DEI was not planned (because it gave Japan the resources they needed). Therefore Pearl Harbor is hard to see as a good conspiration from the American side. If they schemed for it they screwed it royally.
But I think the theory that the Japanese knew perfectly their moves, while the Americans were ill-prepared to the actual action is a much simpler theory (FDR wanted to join the war, but not that fashion).
No, no and no. they didnt knew they will come.
Also the attack on PH was not a tactical move but a strategic one. The goal was to neutralize the US Pacific Battle fleet so Japan has a free hand.
It was even a third rate power, because it had the third largest Navy in the World. Imagine.
Walter Short and Husband Kimmel did not know the Japanese were coming. McArthur did not know they were coming. But Roosevelt did.
In the 1920's, Billy Mitchell suggested the feasibility of the attack. In 1937, Patton wrote a dissertation about the probability of the attack.
Stalin knew the Japanese were coming to Pearl. In September, Lucy (Richard Sorge) provided ample intelligence that Japan had enough of Russia when Zhukov kicked their butts out of Mongolia. This allowed Stalin to move Zhukov's Siberians in front of Moscow in time for General Winter's party New Years party for the Germans. Stalin was informed when the Kido Butai sailed out of Japanese waters.
In 1941,Office of Naval Intelligence (ONI), the American High Command, and Roosevelt knew the Japanese were coming from MULTIPLE intelligence sources, primarily the radio detection command center in San Francisco, whose commander personally handed Roosevelt the intelligence of the carrier force. The story of Johan Ranneft you've heard from me at least twice. Ergo, the Americans 'knew'.
Now, Pearl was clueless. The naval and air commanders at Pearl were given multiple 'vague' warnings of impending action to protect ONI's ability to break PURPLE. Due to the skill of the Japanese pilots, the wooden fins on the Long Lance Torpedoes, and Yamamoto's cunning; the results were far worse than Roosevelt's worst nightmare.
Give the Japanese credit for a bold opening stroke, but they paid for it in blood many times over.
Which part? You want me to type the whole thing back out with footnotes rather than doing it from memory? Give me some time, I'll be back.
PURPLE's decryption was largely irrelevant to Pearl Harbor; it was only used for diplomatic messages, while the attack was a military operation without involvement from the diplomatic arm. The Japanese ambassador and staff were continuing negotiations over the embargo and occupation of French Indochina right up to December 6. The decoding of the critical message breaking off negotiations was only completed December 7, at which point it was accurately determined to mean that an attack was imminent. The warning, however, was sent out too late to be of any use; it didn't even arrive until after the attack had taken place.
I'm also curious about the assertion that the Kido Butai was detected by radio traffic. The Japanese plan called for the use of semaphores and light signals to transmit signals between ships, going so far as to physically disable the ships' radios to prevent any incidental signals from leaking out by accident, a precaution corroborated and confirmed to have been in place by their own after-action report. Given the perceived success of the operation, it seems unlikely they would have systemically lied throughout the highest levels to turn in a false report. That said, we do know that IJN signals in general spiked significantly when the Kido Butai set sail due to the operational orders sent out to other task forces, but this was no immediate indication of an attack on Pearl Harbor. There was significant, and admittedly naive expectation that the primary targets of any sneak attack would be the Philippines due to the foreknowledge that the Japanese would enter into any such war with the aim of seizing the DEI, and this assumption seemed to inform most preparations in the Pacific theater. Unfortunately, MacArthur was not ready for the attack that did eventually come even with forewarning of the events of Pearl Harbor; with ten hours of warning, there was still this persistent underestimation of the Japanese which, combined with local lack of preparedness, resulted in the Far East Air Force being devastated on the ground.
The thing that clinches it for me, however, is Roosevelt himself. He was very unabashed in his willingness to prosecute hostilities with Nazi Germany. As such, it seems unlikely that he would intentionally invite an attack on Pearl Harbor that would redirect American attention away from Europe and towards Japan. Remember that the outbreak of hostilities between Germany and the US was a consequence of actions by Germany: to wit, Hitler's declaration of war in support of Japan. At the time, the only precedent established in the alliance between Japan and Germany had been the exact opposite: Japan had refused to invade the USSR with Germany mid-1941, had declined to immediately invade the Dutch or British Far East possessions in 1939 or 1940, and had instead attacked French Indochina, a colony which had sided with Vichy France and thus was in a state of armistice with Germany. As such, the reasonable expectation would be for Hitler to cheer for American distraction and quietly provide Japan with at most only moral support, just as Japan had done to him. If we accept the postulate that Roosevelt somehow played the chessmaster to cause a war with Japan, as opposed to simply and catastrophically misjudging their willingness to resist the cessation of war with China in a status quo ante, then the only reason it worked was because Hitler, against all reason, chose to allow it to work. If Hitler had not declared war, the US would have been stuck with a Japan-first strategy and would likely have been forced to pull back forces from the Atlantic, where the policy of "proactive defense" was beginning to bear fruit.
I'm also curious about the assertion that the Kido Butai was detected by radio traffic. The Japanese plan called for the use of semaphores and light signals to transmit signals between ships, going so far as to physically disable the ships' radios to prevent any incidental signals from leaking out by accident, a precaution corroborated and confirmed to have been in place by their own after-action report. Given the perceived success of the operation, it seems unlikely they would have systemically lied throughout the highest levels to turn in a false report. That said, we do know that IJN signals in general spiked significantly when the Kido Butai set sail due to the operational orders sent out to other task forces, but this was no immediate indication of an attack on Pearl Harbor. There was significant, and admittedly naive expectation that the primary targets of any sneak attack would be the Philippines due to the foreknowledge that the Japanese would enter into any such war with the aim of seizing the DEI, and this assumption seemed to inform most preparations in the Pacific theater. Unfortunately, MacArthur was not ready for the attack that did eventually come even with forewarning of the events of Pearl Harbor; with ten hours of warning, there was still this persistent underestimation of the Japanese which, combined with local lack of preparedness, resulted in the Far East Air Force being devastated on the ground.
The thing that clinches it for me, however, is Roosevelt himself. He was very unabashed in his willingness to prosecute hostilities with Nazi Germany. As such, it seems unlikely that he would intentionally invite an attack on Pearl Harbor that would redirect American attention away from Europe and towards Japan. Remember that the outbreak of hostilities between Germany and the US was a consequence of actions by Germany: to wit, Hitler's declaration of war in support of Japan. At the time, the only precedent established in the alliance between Japan and Germany had been the exact opposite: Japan had refused to invade the USSR with Germany mid-1941, had declined to immediately invade the Dutch or British Far East possessions in 1939 or 1940, and had instead attacked French Indochina, a colony which had sided with Vichy France and thus was in a state of armistice with Germany. As such, the reasonable expectation would be for Hitler to cheer for American distraction and quietly provide Japan with at most only moral support, just as Japan had done to him. If we accept the postulate that Roosevelt somehow played the chessmaster to cause a war with Japan, as opposed to simply and catastrophically misjudging their willingness to resist the cessation of war with China in a status quo ante, then the only reason it worked was because Hitler, against all reason, chose to allow it to work. If Hitler had not declared war, the US would have been stuck with a Japan-first strategy and would likely have been forced to pull back forces from the Atlantic, where the policy of "proactive defense" was beginning to bear fruit.
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The amount of men that were actually sent from the Russian Far East to the European front was marginal at best in terms of size.
Even the Moscow counter-offensive included only a relatively small number of proper Siberians.
In fact the Soviets kept a sizable army in the Far East until 1945 when they invaded Manchuria.
Which combined with how many Japanese troops China was sucking up meant that Japan never had any realistic chance of threatening the Russian Far East in 1941.
The thing I've never understood about the Pearl Harbour conspiracy, is why FDR wouldn't tell anyone?
You have proof that the Japanese are going to attack you, you know when and where. Why not alert your base commanders so they can take basic precautions, and then catch the Japanese by surprise?
It's not like they have any chance of getting wind of it. You could just order routine stuff (i.e., dispersal of aircraft, heavy CAP on Sunday morning with other aircraft ready to scramble, battleships quietly at action stations in the pre-dawn hours), then when the Japanese turn up you're sitting ready for them.
Hell, the Japanese don't even need to hit anything. The act of the attack itself is bad enough.
You have proof that the Japanese are going to attack you, you know when and where. Why not alert your base commanders so they can take basic precautions, and then catch the Japanese by surprise?
It's not like they have any chance of getting wind of it. You could just order routine stuff (i.e., dispersal of aircraft, heavy CAP on Sunday morning with other aircraft ready to scramble, battleships quietly at action stations in the pre-dawn hours), then when the Japanese turn up you're sitting ready for them.
Hell, the Japanese don't even need to hit anything. The act of the attack itself is bad enough.
Let's assume PH was a conspiracy, but do they really have to lose the Philippines and have the ABDA disaster to convince the American population that the Japanese are dangerous?
Because in that case they covered their conspiration damned good to look like pure incompetency and unpreparadeness.
Not to mention that the US would have been much much better prepared to wage war against Japan a year later.
In 1982, John Toland wrote a book on Pearl Harbor, laying out an argument that the United States government knew the Japanese were going to attack Pearl Harbor, and allowed the Japanese to strike to incite the public to war. A good part of that was based on the account of Johan Ranneft.
Dutch Admiral Johan Ranneft died in Houston, Texas, at the age of 95 in 1982. Around the year 2000, I had the privilege of dining with his son, Theodore Ranneft. Theodore lived in Houston with his daughter, who has a PhD and teaches in the private school system in Houston. She worked for my wife around the year 2000. My wife and I were invited to the Ranneft home for dinner on at least two occassions. I was unaware of Johan Ranneft's story until I heard it from the lips of Theodore himself.
Johan Ranneft was attached to the Office of Naval Intelligence (ONI) in 1941, coordinating intelligence from the Dutch East Indies. Theodore, not yet twenty years old, had left school and joined the navy following the occupation of Holland. He was attached to either the light cruiser Java or De Ruyter, and was sunk in the Battle of the Java Sea before being rescued and spending most of the war in Australia. He does not see his father again until after the war, but they spend many years together thereafter.
This is a snippet of UPI story from 1982, coinciding with the release of Toland's book:
Dutch Admiral Johan Ranneft died in Houston, Texas, at the age of 95 in 1982. Around the year 2000, I had the privilege of dining with his son, Theodore Ranneft. Theodore lived in Houston with his daughter, who has a PhD and teaches in the private school system in Houston. She worked for my wife around the year 2000. My wife and I were invited to the Ranneft home for dinner on at least two occassions. I was unaware of Johan Ranneft's story until I heard it from the lips of Theodore himself.
Johan Ranneft was attached to the Office of Naval Intelligence (ONI) in 1941, coordinating intelligence from the Dutch East Indies. Theodore, not yet twenty years old, had left school and joined the navy following the occupation of Holland. He was attached to either the light cruiser Java or De Ruyter, and was sunk in the Battle of the Java Sea before being rescued and spending most of the war in Australia. He does not see his father again until after the war, but they spend many years together thereafter.
This is a snippet of UPI story from 1982, coinciding with the release of Toland's book:
To be fair if there were credible sources they would have been digged deep.
Conspiracy is not the right word. The United States was the victim of an unprovoked attack by the Imperial Japanese Navy. The American carriers didn't come in and bomb our own fleet. What you are dealing with is willful ignorance, they knew an attack was coming but not necessarily when or from where.
The answer to the question 'why' lies on the other side of the world. Hitler, in 1941, was unbeatable. Roosevelt desperately wanted to get into the war, but the American people were not interested in dying for Europeans, let alone Asians. Roosevelt's campaign promises, repeatedly, were he would keep America out of the war, Isolationism and Pacifism. In reality, he is already laying the groundwork for moblization and plotting with William Stephenson (Intrepid) on behalf of the Special Operatives Executive (SOE) with Intrepid operating as a personal liason between Roosevelt and Winston Churchill.
By early 1941, the US has laid the keel for all of the North Carolina battleships, all four Iowa class battleships, and the Essex. While General Marshal is testifying before Congress that the United States has no interest in war, his staff is already drawing up mobilization plans.
So, when the Dutch underground passes along information to the United States about a pending Japanese attack; the Americans simply don't want to hear it. Multiple signals from England, Russia, and the Dutch were handed to America suggesting Japanese intentions. They want to take the hit for the greater good. But there is no smoking gun showing Roosevelt in front of a radar screen watching the bombers fly in over Diamondhead.
The answer to the question 'why' lies on the other side of the world. Hitler, in 1941, was unbeatable. Roosevelt desperately wanted to get into the war, but the American people were not interested in dying for Europeans, let alone Asians. Roosevelt's campaign promises, repeatedly, were he would keep America out of the war, Isolationism and Pacifism. In reality, he is already laying the groundwork for moblization and plotting with William Stephenson (Intrepid) on behalf of the Special Operatives Executive (SOE) with Intrepid operating as a personal liason between Roosevelt and Winston Churchill.
By early 1941, the US has laid the keel for all of the North Carolina battleships, all four Iowa class battleships, and the Essex. While General Marshal is testifying before Congress that the United States has no interest in war, his staff is already drawing up mobilization plans.
So, when the Dutch underground passes along information to the United States about a pending Japanese attack; the Americans simply don't want to hear it. Multiple signals from England, Russia, and the Dutch were handed to America suggesting Japanese intentions. They want to take the hit for the greater good. But there is no smoking gun showing Roosevelt in front of a radar screen watching the bombers fly in over Diamondhead.
I am adding an anecdote someone asked me to elaborate upon, but that whole German-to-English problem is kicking in.
You are suggesting I am not credible, or Ranneft's story is not credible? You are suggesting I am lying? Or you are suggesting this man, on his deathbed, lied to his son about this?