Pearl Harbor; We knew about this one too!

Quick stats on Pearl Harbor:
- Pearl Harbor attacked Sunday, December 7, 1941
- Two waves of attacks: 7:49 A.M. and 9:00 A.M.
- First wave included 183 Japanese dive- and torpedo-bombers with zero escorts
- Second wave included an additional 168 Japanese planes.
- 18 operational warships sunk, including four battleships, sunk or damaged
- 188 aircraft destroyed
- 2,403 Americans killed (68 of them civilians)
- 1,178 Americans wounded

Many Americans are unaware that evidence regarding Pearl Harbor points to our government being fully aware of the attacks that were to take place on December 7, 1941. Much like the assassination of JFK and 9/11, "conspiracy theorists" (although in this case, the people uncovering the truth were less 'theorists' and more 'realists') have accumulated a wealth of evidence to support such a claim.

During that time, President Franklin D. Roosevelt was in a bind. An overwhelming 80% of Americans were opposed to entering WWII as an active participant. After Pearl Harbor, things quickly changed and Roosevelt gained wide support from Congress to declare war on Japan. Much like the aftermath of 9/11, however, questions around the attack immediately surfaced.

Why was America attacked? Was it avoidable? Were the Japanese going to attack again? Why didn't our readily available Army and Navy commanders (Admiral Husband E. Kimmel and General Walter Short) fumble in their job to protect one of America's most important naval bases? ...and of course, WHO WAS RESPONSIBLE?

Roosevelt was all too aware of the questions surrounding the attack and quickly summoned up a special commission to investigate. Big surprise! (Side note: The trend of creating "special commissions" didn't begin here, but has come to be -just what you do- after shit hits the fan or to distract the public from the real issue - see Pearl Harbor, JFK, Watergate, Clinton-Lewinsky, 9/11, steroids and baseball...hell even the Bowl Championship Series gets a special commission in Washington! The sad thing is these commissions wouldn't happen if the average American was smarter than our President and recognized them as what they are - smoke and mirrors. Again, I digress! Back to the topic.) Anyway the chair of this commission was Associate Supreme Court Justice Owen J. Roberts. The interesting thing about this man is that he was the leading advocate of the Committee to Aid America by Aiding the Allies. It's a no-brainer what happened next. The commission absolved any high ranking political and military members, except for two - Admiral Kimmel and General Short! Suffice to say, they were blamed for being unprepared, removed from their positions and demoted. It's amazing the MacGyver-ish things you can do with smoke and mirrors, eh?

Back to the topic at hand. It's widely known now that the U.S. had some vital information regarding an imminent attack on Pearl Harbor. However, this information was not passed on to the Naval and Army commanders. The blunder of Pearl Harbor was originally blamed on political mismanagement of critical intelligence information.

This of course doesn't explain why we did nothing to prevent Pearl Harbor, even in the face of intercepted Japanese messages (which were received in Washington as early as Dec 4th indicating failing relations and irreversible action against U.S. interests). The message in question is referred to the EAST WIND RAIN message, which Roosevelt and his cronies denied ever receiving. Chief Warrant Officer Ralph T. Briggs who was working at the Cheltenham, Maryland intercept station in late 1941 however, testified that he received the message, and Navy memoirs indicated that the message had even been received prior to him getting it. This testimony was backed up by a man named Captain Laurence Safford.

Whether or not our govt. knew exactly where Japan was going to attack remains unclear. But what is clear is that: there was no real urgency to alert the commanders at Pearl Harbor, our government did in fact know of an impending attack, our govt. knew who would attack us, and they very well knew where we'd be attacked (EAST! WIND! RAIN!). So Roosevelt and his buddies sat and waited for the attack and quickly used it as an excuse to go to war with Japan.

God, does history repeat itself or what?!

I'll write a little more about this later, but alas, it's time for me to leave work. :) For more info, GOOGLE it!