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 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 Percy L. Greaves ∙ October 1, 1982
At Dawn We Slept: The Untold Story of Pearl Harbor by Gordon W. Prange, in collaboration with Donald M. Goldstein and Katherine V. Dillon, McGraw Hill, 889pp, $22.95. The Pacific War, by John Costello, Rawson Wade, 742pp, $24.00. Infamy, by John Toland, Doubleday, 366pp, $17.95. The Pearl Harbor disaster marks much more than the worst…
By Percy L. Greaves ∙ December 7, 1947
Remember Pearl Harbor? Of course you do. No American will ever forget December 7, 1941. Our casualties came to 3,435 – Japan's were fewer than 100. We lost 188 planes outright – Japan 29. Our proud Pacific fleet was smashed. Eight battleships were useless. Japan lost five midget submarines. It was the greatest military and…
By Keith Stimely ∙ December 1, 1983
The latest furious round of publication and ensuing controversy about Pearl Harbor erupted at the end of 1981, and has not simmered down yet. The opening shot was the release in November that year of Gordon W. Prange’s massive At Dawn We Slept: The Untold Story of Pearl Harbor. Prange had been working on the…
By Percy L. Greaves ∙ December 1, 1983
Before presenting the testimony relating to December 7th, it would be helpful to review the information available to Generals Marshall, Gerow and Miles as well as Secretary of War Stimson before they left their respective offices on December 6th. There was a mounting accumulation of facts and events that could not help but create an…
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…
End of content
End of content
