Book Description
Pearl Harbor was not an accident, a mere
failure of American intelligence, or a brilliant Japanese
military coup. It was the result of a carefully orchestrated
design, initiated at the highest levels of our government.
According to a key memorandum eight steps were taken to make
sure we would enter the war by this means. Pearl Harbor was
the only way, leading officials felt, to galvanize the
reluctant American public into action.
This great question of Pearl Harbor--what did we know and
when did we know it?--has been argued for years. At first, a
panel created by FDR concluded that we had no advance warning
and should blame only the local commanders for lack of
preparedness. More recently, historians such as John Toland
and Edward Beach have concluded that some intelligence was
intercepted. Finally, just months ago, the Senate voted to
exonerate Hawaii commanders Admiral Kimmel and Lieutenant
General Short, after the Pentagon officially declared that
blame should be "broadly shared." But no
investigator has ever been able to prove that fore-knowledge
of the attack existed at the highest levels.
Until now. After decades of Freedom of Information Act
requests, Robert B. Stinnett has gathered the long-hidden
evidence that shatters every shibboleth of Pearl Harbor. It
shows that not only was the attack expected, it was deliberately
provoked through an eight-step program devised by the Navy.
Whereas previous investigators have claimed that our
government did not crack Japan's military codes before
December 7, 1941, Stinnett offers cable after cable of
decryptions. He proves that a Japanese spy on the island
transmitted information--including a map of bombing
targets--beginning on August 21, and that government
intelligence knew all about it. He reveals that Admiral
Kimmel was prevented from conducting a routine training
exercise at the eleventh hour that would have uncovered the
location of the oncoming Japanese fleet. And contrary to
previous claims, he shows that the Japanese fleet did not
maintain radio silence as it approached Hawaii. Its many
coded cables were intercepted and decoded by American
cryptographers in Stations on Hawaii and in Seattle.
The evidence is overwhelming. At the highest levels--on
FDR's desk--America had ample warning of the pending attack.
At those same levels, it was understood that the isolationist
American public would not support a declaration of war unless
we were attacked first. The result was a plan to anger Japan,
to keep the loyal officers responsible for Pearl Harbor in
the dark, and thus to drag America into the greatest war of
her existence.
Yet even having found what he calls the "terrible
truth," Stinnett is still inclined to forgive. "I
sympathize with the agonizing dilemma faced by President
Roosevelt," he writes. "He was forced to find
circuitous means to persuade an isolationist America to join
in a fight for freedom....It is easier to take a critical
view of this policy a half century removed than to understand
fully what went on in Roosevelt's mind in the year prior to
Pearl Harbor."
Day of Deceit is the definitive final chapter on
America's greatest secret and our worst military disaster.
