When the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor, they attacked the territorial outpost of a colonial rival. (In 1941 Hawaii was not yet a State of the Union.) It gave the U.S. the long-sought pretext to enter World War II. But did the attack on Pearl Harbor come as a surprise, or did the Roosevelt administration have ample pre-warning, which it deliberately ignored in order to maximize the ensuing casualties and, thus, also the public’s outrage and support for entering the war? Revisionists claim precisely this: Admiral Husband Kimmel, commander of the Navy units in Hawaii, was deliberately kept in the dark about intelligence gathered by the Roosevelt administration which showed that the Japanese, driven into a corner by various boycotts and blockades, were about to strike…
By Martin Merson ∙ July 1, 1988
When Percy Greaves died of cancer on 13 August 1984 – eleven days short of his 78th birthday – little did he know of the seeds he had planted. No man, to this writer's knowledge, has done more to inspire others to continue along the trail he blazed; a trail beginning with his service as…
By Mark Weber ∙ April 1, 1985
Franklin Roosevelt often lied to further his goals. In a radio address broadcast to the nation on 23 October 1940, for example, he gave “this most solemn assurance” that he had not given any “secret understanding in any shape or form, direct or indirect, with any government or any other nation in any part of…
By James Joseph Martin ∙ December 1, 1983
We have been solemnly assured even in our own day that gossip is part of history.[*] We find it from Thucydides to Tacitus; Suetonius' History of the Twelve Caesars is liberally seasoned with gossip. And some of the most graceful and elegant gossip ever committed to posterity is to be found in Plutarch. Apparently it…
By Percy L. Greaves ∙ December 1, 1983
Truman's quick action had two immediate effects. First, the news of Marshall's appointment completely blanketed the media publicity that Hurley had hoped would be produced by his resignation and his startling reasons for doing so. Second, it called for a change in Marshall's schedule and that of the joint Congressional Committee (JCC) investigation of the…
By Percy L. Greaves ∙ December 1, 1983
Prior to the Pearl Harbor Congressional investigation this writer had twice met Homer Ferguson. During the 78th Congress when Ferguson was a freshman Senator, I was Associate Research Director of the Republican National Committee. That sounds like a political position but essentially it was a fact-finding one – finding facts the Democrats didn't want known….
By Percy L. Greaves ∙ December 1, 1983
If the testimony on the knowledge and actions of the top Navy command on that momentous weekend seems to be confusing and inconsistent, that on the Army side was downright mysterious and almost impossible to comprehend without an understanding of two facts of human nature. The first is that few people will voluntarily confess their…
By Percy L. Greaves ∙ December 12, 1966
After the Pearl Harbor attack, Americans were told that it had come without any warning. The official story has been that it was a surprise attack that forced us into war against our wishes. For years the charges that Roosevelt lied and cajoled us into war were vehemently denied. In 1948 the great historian Charles…
By James Joseph Martin ∙ April 1, 1983
Perpetual War for Perpetual Peace: A Critical Examination of the Foreign Policy of Franklin Delano Roosevelt and Its Aftermath. Edited by Harry Elmer Barnes, with the collaboration of William Henry Chamberlin, Percy L. Greaves, Jr., George A. Lundberg, George Morgenstern, William L. Neumann, Frederic R. Sanborn, and Charles Callan Tansill. Second, expanded edition, Torrance, California:…
By Percy L. Greaves ∙ December 1, 1983
We now come to the critical twenty-four hour period before the attack. What did the leaders in Washington know? When did they know it? What did they do about it? Unfortunately, the testimony is a jumbled mass of contradictions. Most witnesses swore under oath that they had performed their duties. Nonetheless, valuable hours were lost…
By James Joseph Martin ∙ April 1, 1982
On 16 October 1940 male residents of the United States between the ages of 18 and 35 registered nation-wide for possible induction into the armed services of the country. It was the first machinery for the introduction of peacetime conscription in the country's history, being the operational consequence of an act of Congress signed by…
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