Deja Vu All Over Again, AGAIN!!!!!

What did the President know and when did he know it ???

Faulty intelligence, public apathy, cover-up ????

Iraq ? NO!

Iran ? NO !

9/11/2001 ? NO !

If we don't learn from history, we are doomed to repeat it !!

This time, I am talking about the Pearl Harbor attack by Japan on December 7, 1941. Was it a sneak attack? Technically, yes because the Japanese Embassy in Washington, DC had trouble transcribing their message directing the ambassador to deliver a Declaration of War just prior to the start of the attack on Pearl Harbor. Because of this transcription problem, the message was delivered over an hour late and as a result, the attack on Pearl Harbor turned out to be an "unintentional" sneak attack.

OR WAS IT ?????

What did FDR know and when did he know it. The United States just prior to Pearl Harbor was so isolationist / pacifist, that they made our current Defeatocrats look like war-mongers. FDR knew that the U.S. involvement in the war was inevitable, but could not get any support from Congress or the public except for passage of the "Lend-Lease Act" which supposedly maintained our neutrality while providing war materials and supplies to Great Britain.

In the late 1930's, we were selling oil to Japan, who was an oil dependent economy much like we are today. Japanese aggression started to expand and Japan invaded China and started to expand their conquests throughout Southeast Asia. To stem the Japanese aggression, the U.S. placed an embargo on selling oil to Japan. Needless to say, this angered Japan. Hence, their planning and execution of the Pearl Harbor attack.

BUT!!! Was it a "Surprise" Attack???? Again, what did FDR know and when did he know it????

This "conspiracy" has been debated for decades with no concrete answers. As more and more documents are declassified, there is more evidence available to support both sides of the question. What do I think?? I'm glad you asked. I am NOT a hard core advocate of the conspiracy theory, but I lean in that direction. I have some questions about the timing of certain events and the eventual results that appear to me to be more than coincidence.

We had decoded Japanese diplomatic encryption codes for their messages at least a year before Pearl Harbor, which means, that we were reading their diplomatic mail. We had also developed a limited capability to decrypt their Naval codes. Bottom line: FDR most likely knew they were coming, when they were coming and where. FDR even sent a very cryptic message to Admiral Kimmel that they might be coming, but not to interfere with the Japanese because any hostile action must be initiated by Japan.

Also, it has been reported that the Japanese Fleet maintained strict radio silence on their transit to Hawaii. New info has been found that this apparently wasn't true and U.S. Navy "listening stations" intercepted Japanese Fleet radio chatter regularly and through triangulation with radio direction finding equipment, tracked them all the way across the Pacific. The reports on these positions were supposedly sent directly to FDR.

There were NO aircraft carriers in the harbor during the attack. Where were they? One was ferrying aircraft to Wake Island. A second was ferrying aircraft to Midway Island. A third was in San Diego picking up aircraft to ferry to Hawaii. The fourth was still attached to the Atlantic Fleet preparing to transit to Hawaii. Why would we leave Pearl Harbor with ZERO aircraft carriers when we knew the Japanese Fleet was coming?? Because we didn't want to sacrifice good hardware to the attack?

What ships were in the harbor posing as valuable targets ?? Antiquated World War I vintage battleships that lacked the technology to defeat the modern Japanese Fleet and a few antiquated auxilliary ships that were equally expendable. Let Japan destroy our antiques and we have a ready made excuse to build a modern battle fleet capable of defeating Japan and neither Congress nor the public would have the will to disapprove.

So, the bottom line: Was there a conspiracy to allow the Japanese to attack Pearl Harbor virtually unopposed as an excuse to bring the United States into World War II ? There are still a lot of documents from the era that remain classified and these documents probably hold the definitive answer, however, until those documents are released, I have to say Yes, I believe at this point, there was a conspiracy led by FDR to get us fully engaged in the war.