Although
FDR desired to directly involve the United States in the Second
World War, his intentions sharply contradicted his public pronouncements.
A pre-war Gallup poll showed 88 percent of Americans opposed U.S.
involvement in the European war. Citizens realized that U.S. participation
in World War I had not made a better world, and in a 1940 (election-year)
speech, Roosevelt typically stated: "I have said this before,
but I shall say it again and again and again: Your boys are not
going to be sent into any foreign wars."
But privately, the president planned the opposite. Roosevelt dispatched
his closest advisor, Harry Hopkins, to meet British Prime Minister
Winston Churchill in January 1941. Hopkins told Churchill: "The
President is determined that we [the United States and England]
shall win the war together. Make no mistake about it. He has sent
me here to tell you that at all costs and by all means he will
carry you through, no matter what happens to him – there
is nothing he will not do so far as he has human power." William
Stevenson noted in A
Man Called Intrepid that American-British military staff
talks began that same month under "utmost secrecy," which, he
clarified, "meant preventing disclosure to the American public."
Even Robert Sherwood, the president's friendly biographer, said:
"If the isolationists had known the full extent of the secret
alliance between the United States and Britain, their demands
for impeachment would have rumbled like thunder throughout the
land."
Background to Betrayal
Roosevelt's
intentions were nearly exposed in 1940 when Tyler Kent, a code
clerk at the U.S. embassy in London, discovered secret dispatches
between Roosevelt and Churchill. These revealed that FDR –
despite contrary campaign promises – was determined to engage
America in the war. Kent smuggled some of the documents out of
the embassy, hoping to alert the American public – but was
caught. With U.S. government approval, he was tried in a secret
British court and confined to a British prison until the war's
end.
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During World
War II's early days, the president offered numerous provocations
to Germany: freezing its assets; shipping 50 destroyers to Britain;
and depth-charging U-boats. The Germans did not retaliate, however.
They knew America's entry into World War I had shifted the balance
of power against them, and they shunned a repeat of that scenario.
FDR therefore switched his focus to Japan. Japan had signed a
mutual defense pact with Germany and Italy (the Tripartite Treaty).
Roosevelt knew that if Japan went to war with the United States,
Germany and Italy would be compelled to declare war on America
– thus entangling us in the European conflict by the back
door. As Harold Ickes, secretary of the Interior, said in October
1941: "For a long time I have believed that our best entrance
into the war would be by way of Japan."
Much new light has been shed on Pearl Harbor through the recent
work of Robert B. Stinnett, a World War II Navy veteran. Stinnett
has obtained numerous relevant documents through the Freedom of
Information Act. In Day
of Deceit: The Truth about FDR and Pearl Harbor (2000),
the book so brusquely dismissed by director Bruckheimer, Stinnett
reveals that Roosevelt's plan to provoke Japan began with a memorandum
from Lieutenant Commander Arthur H. McCollum, head of the Far
East desk of the Office of Naval Intelligence. The memorandum
advocated eight actions predicted to lead Japan into attacking
the United States. McCollum wrote: "If by these means Japan could
be led to commit an overt act of war, so much the better." FDR
enacted all eight of McCollum's provocative steps – and more.
While no one can excuse Japan's belligerence in those days, it
is also true that our government provoked that country in various
ways – freezing her assets in America; closing the Panama
Canal to her shipping; progressively halting vital exports to
Japan until we finally joined Britain in an all-out embargo; sending
a hostile note to the Japanese ambassador implying military threats
if Tokyo did not alter its Pacific policies; and on November 26th
– just 11 days before the Japanese attack – delivering
an ultimatum that demanded, as prerequisites to resumed trade,
that Japan withdraw all troops from China and Indochina, and in
effect abrogate her Tripartite Treaty with Germany and Italy.
After meeting with President Roosevelt on October 16, 1941, Secretary
of War Henry Stimson wrote in his diary: "We face the delicate
question of the diplomatic fencing to be done so as to be sure
Japan is put into the wrong and makes the first bad move –
overt move." On November 25, the day before the ultimatum was
sent to Japan's ambassadors, Stimson wrote in his diary: "The
question was how we should maneuver them [the Japanese] into the
position of firing the first shot...."
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The bait
offered Japan was our Pacific Fleet. In 1940, Admiral J.O. Richardson,
the fleet's commander, flew to Washington to protest FDR's decision
to permanently base the fleet in Hawaii instead of its normal
berthing on the U.S. West Coast. The admiral had sound reasons:
Pearl Harbor was vulnerable to attack, being approachable from
any direction; it could not be effectively rigged with nets and
baffles to defend against torpedo planes; and in Hawaii it would
be hard to supply and train crews for his undermanned vessels.
Pearl Harbor also lacked adequate fuel supplies and dry docks,
and keeping men far from their families would create morale problems.
The argument became heated. Said Richardson: "I came away with
the impression that, despite his spoken word, the President was
fully determined to put the United States into the war if Great
Britain could hold out until he was reelected."
Richardson was quickly relieved of command. Replacing him was
Admiral Husband E. Kimmel. Kimmel also informed Roosevelt of Pearl
Harbor's deficiencies, but accepted placement there, trusting
that Washington would notify him of any intelligence pointing
to attack. This proved to be misplaced trust. As Washington watched
Japan preparing to assault Pearl Harbor, Admiral Kimmel, as well
as his Army counterpart in Hawaii, General Walter C. Short, were
completely sealed off from the information pipeline.
Prior Knowledge
One of the
most important elements in America's foreknowledge of Japan's
intentions was our government's success in cracking Japan's secret
diplomatic code known as "Purple." Tokyo used it to communicate
to its embassies and consulates, including those in Washington
and Hawaii. The code was so complex that it was enciphered and
deciphered by machine. A talented group of American cryptoanalysts
broke the code in 1940 and devised a facsimile of the Japanese
machine. These, utilized by the intelligence sections of both
the War and Navy departments, swiftly revealed Japan's diplomatic
messages. The deciphered texts were nicknamed "Magic."
Copies of Magic were always promptly delivered in locked pouches
to President Roosevelt, and the secretaries of State, War, and
Navy. They also went to Army Chief of Staff General George Marshall
and to the Chief of Naval Operations, Admiral Harold Stark. However,
although three Purple decoding machines were allotted to Britain,
none was sent to Pearl Harbor. Intercepts of ciphered messages
radioed between Tokyo and its Honolulu consulate had to be forwarded
to Washington for decrypting. Thus Kimmel and Short, the Hawaiian
commanders, were at the mercy of Washington for feedback. A request
for their own decoding machine was rebuffed on the grounds that
diplomatic traffic was of insufficient interest to soldiers.
How untrue that was! On October 9, 1941, the War Department decoded
a Tokyo-to-Honolulu dispatch instructing the Consul General to
divide Pearl Harbor into five specified areas and to report the
exact locations of American ships therein.
There is nothing unusual about spies watching ship movements
– but reporting precise whereabouts of ships in dock has
only one implication. Charles Willoughby, Douglas MacArthur's
chief of intelligence, later wrote that the "reports were on a
grid system of the inner harbor with coordinate locations of American
men of war ... coordinate grid is the classical method for pinpoint
target designation; our battleships had suddenly become targets."
This information was never sent to Kimmel or Short.
Additional intercepts were decoded by Washington, all within one day of their original transmission: