History

asasolid2r :
As stated above, this was a short a sweet version for a poll. If you want the more complex I suggest 'At Dawn We Slept: The Untold Story of Pearl Harbor' by Gordon W. Prange

I remember Ben Aflek barely had time to get to his fighter plane

jv339 :
Dropping the bombs was a whole other bag of horrible in and of itself. The era was complex and nuanced. There's always chance that they knew it was coming for sure. If anything it was to get the US on board with the fight. Hell, before Rupert Murdoch or Elon Musk there was William Randolph Hearst and Henry Ford. Both had significant investments in Germany and keeping America out of the war. That and both were known to be antisemites. Anyhow, prior to Pearl Harbor, a highly visible minority of German and Nazi sympathizers existed in the U.S., led primarily by the German American Bund, which openly promoted Hitler's ideology and filled Madison Square Garden for a massive rally in 1939. This movement was reinforced by domestic fascist groups like the Silver Shirts and a powerful wave of isolationism driven by the America First Committee. However, this public sympathy immediately collapsed after the December 7, 1941 attack on Pearl Harbor, which united American public opinion against the Axis powers. Isolationist groups dissolved, the Bund was outlawed, its leaders were jailed for sedition, and the FBI interned several thousand suspected subversives, while the vast majority of German-Americans completely disavowed these groups to serve with distinction in the U.S. military.

StainlessSteelR : that's a good book, worth a read every decade or so, but far from an encompassing history of the moment. It does do a nice job of attempting to set up the pedestal of American naval admiralship of the first half of the 20th century above their peers, which led to the events 6 months later at and near Midway.

asasolid2r :
Fair enough. It's definitely painted by the era it was written in. What's your take on 'Pearl Harbor: From Infamy to Greatness' by Craig Nelson?

StainlessSteelR : if he would have retired from acting after All the Right Moves would the world be a better place for everybody besides Jerry Van Dyke? Never read the book.My take on Pearl Harbor is the USS Arizona Memorial. The lesson was the Battleship became a wasteful, mostly obsolete piece of naval armanent even if it was a marvelous piece of human engineering in many ways similar to the Astrodome.

StainlessSteelR :
Actually, to a certain degree, yes. I also was told that Americans did not want to get involved in another WW. The "unprovoked attack" caused most to change their minds.

StainlessSteelR :
The attack was preceded by serious intelligence failures.
It could have been prevented.
So both thoughts are missing that detail

Furface11 :
I'm not. I excluded them because they are theories that have never been confirmed. The U.S. government knew a war with Japan was coming, but they had absolutely no idea it would hit Pearl Harbor on December 7. Cryptologists had cracked Japan's diplomatic codes, but they couldn't read the secret naval codes where the actual attack plans were hidden. Everyone in Washington assumed Japan would strike the Philippines or Southeast Asia instead of Hawaii. To make matters worse, the Japanese fleet kept total radio silence on their way over, so U.S. radar and navy intelligence completely lost track of them. A few clues did pop up right before the bombs dropped, like a submarine sighting and a massive radar blip, but officers on duty brushed them off as false alarms or friendly planes. In the end, it wasn't a crazy conspiracy or a lack of rumors; the military just couldn't connect the dots in time

jv339 :
Facts

StainlessSteelR : I read that one! It was excellent and very detailed.