Much as I despise FDR, those people are FOS. Everyone KNEW an attack was coming, they expected it at Guam, the Philippines and a few other places and they were correct, those places were attacked on the same day or within days of Pearl.dammitgriff wrote: ↑Sat Feb 23, 2019 12:24 am My favorite line in the TV show MASH:
“What if they threw a war and nobody came?â€
I often wonder why anyone is surprised that an isolated naval base, far from the continental mainland, would be considered an enemy target.
The attack on Pearl Harbor was to be expected. Tons of documentation exists to prove the White House knew the Japanese were coming and willfully withheld the information from military commanders in charge at Pearl Harbor. Where’s the outrage at that?
Economic sanctions are a declaration of war. Some historians say the Japanese were provoked into attacking due to the oil and commodities embargo placed against it by the U.S., and the attack provided us the needed excuse to enter the war. We just can’t help ourselves from believing every fairy tale our government spins.
Nobody expected an attack at Pearl, they believed the water was too shallow for torpedo bombers and were unaware of a simple Japanese modification that made such an attack possible. Also at Pearl everything was protected against fifth column sabotage which was a genuine threat as there were many Japanese friendly agents and families in Hawaii at the time.
But more than anything else, even a complete tard like FDR wouldn't risk the US fleet to get himself into a war that he wanted into. Without the US fleet, he would have been powerless and he didn't know exactly where the Japs would hit us let alone when.
It was blind luck that most of our carriers were not in port during the attack and that the Japanese task force was sailing under radio silence and couldn't receive that update. But even with the carriers that were absent at Pearl, and the other ships we managed to salvage nothing was a done deal.
Coral Sea was a trade off and nothing really got decided until Midway. And even when we were reading the Japanese navy transmissions as fast as they were, it really came down to who found who first and we again got very lucky.
To suggest FDR pulled off this elaborate deception and then played a brilliant game a naval brinksmanship that couldn't have ended in complete disaster is to give the man way too much credit.
A bunch of American pilots died holding the Japanese carrier force in place until a stronger force of American fliers could show up and do some real damage. It really came down to that single event, in that single action at Midway that changed everything to our advantage.
If that didn't happen, nothing would have really mattered. Going in knowing the Aleutians was a diversion and a trap would not have made a damn bit of difference if their planes happened to find our carriers first.
FDR sucks, he knew the Japs would hit us, he didn't know exactly where but was willing to accept it to get us into the war. But he didn't have the first clue the main fleet at Pearl was going to get hit, his mind was on things like trying to figure out how not to lose everyone stationed in the Philippines and of course he couldn't even figure out how to make that happen.