Pearl Harbor, an exercise in ignorance?

Because that was what he did for a living.

There was no "nurse" involved. The Japanese intelligence officer on the island was a serving officer in the Japanese Navy, stationed at the embassy . . . Takeo Yoshikawa was sent to Oahu in March 1941 and operated under the cover identity of a vice-consul with the false name Tadashi Morimura. He was able to maintain that fictional cover once the war started and was repatriated to Japan in an exchange of diplomatic personnel. He did not, however, by his own postwar admission, have specific foreknowledge of the attack, though it was not hard to figure out that war was imminent when orders came through to destroy documents and code machines. Yoshikawa worked in IJN intelligence for the remainder of the war . . . pretty well documented, you should look it up in something reliable.

The German agent on Oahu was one Bernard Kuehn, who was mostly involved with communicating, via radio, low level information to the IJA. He was rolled up in February 1942, tried, and sentenced to death, though the sentence was reduced to a long prison time on the basis of his cooperation.

The US signals intelligence people, army and navy, were trading information and equipment with the British BEFORE Pearl Harbor, they, the US people, knew exactly what an Enigma was. They provided to the British, yes, again, before Pearl Harbor, what was called a Purple machine which could decode Japanese diplomatic signals in real time . . . all you needed was a Japanese translator to read the product.

I believe, without bothering to look it up (its 0400 here and I have to be at work in four hours), the first Enigma machine, captured solely by US personnel was aboard the U-505, boarded and captured on 4 June 1944. Earlier, in mid April 1943 a Coast Guard boarding party from USCGC Spencer, specifically trained for the purpose, boarded the sinking U-175 in order to retrieve coding equipment (read "Enigma") and documents, but were unable to retrieve the equipment before having to leave the sinking submarine. The boarding party board the U-505 knew exactly what they had. Frankly, any communications officer or NCO involved in coding and decoding his own radio traffic would have recognized the purpose of an Enigma machine at a glance. The British captured quite a few over the course of the war. The Americans captured radio equipment, but none utilizing the Enigma system from German weather ships and stations as early as September 1941. (You do realize the Germans - and everyone else for that matter - and more than one coding system and different equipment for coding same, right?) When boarding parties of both the RN and the USN went aboard enemy ships they were specifically looking for the coding equipment and documents . . . that's why it was/is specific SOP to toss that stuff overboard in weighted bags.

There are some really excellent, non-golly-gee-whiz sensationalist types, but unfortunately for some, really dry historic presentations on these subjects, not to mention, if you know what you're doing, actual wartime reports on some of these matters available on the internet.

 

My memory of this is quite hazy as it is a long time since I did WW2 history, and I applaud your defence of the US intelligence service.

We are however talking pre US involvement in hostilities in WW2, and I was led to believe that the exchange of information between Britain and the US was not as great as you think, prior to the US getting involved in the European theatre.
The "Nurse" I was also "taught" was actually informing the Japanese of ships and movements out of Pearl Harbour, for some time prior to the Japanese attack.

Without wishing to sound flippant, I was also led to believe that in several area's the US and British version of events tend to differ depending on which side of the Atlantic you reside.

As I stated before there are quite a few instances in different theatres where American forces decided to ignore British advice.

 

Oh, I get it . . . stupid Americans. Oh, how stupid of me not to believe your presentations as absolute fact . . . I guess it goes with the territory, eh? Please excuse my intervention into your tall tales.

Sorry chum, you put up the garbage, and I'll toss it out. You may, by your own admission, not be up on the subject, and your writings seem to reinforce that concept, but I assure you, I am up on the subject. And I don't need to denigrate the British to present the facts, either. Defend US intelligence? Goodness, no, I can find their mistakes all by myself. The problem is that your xenophobic tall tales do not match the historic record. Do yourself a favor, do some real research and stop guessing.

 

You mentioned stupid Americans not me, as I said there are two versions of the same story, depending on which side of the Atlantic you reside.
And then there is personal experience to go along with what has been taught this side of the Atlantic, as in 3 generations of the same family having personal experience of American "intelligence".

Do not result to the tall tales to back up your version of events, you discredited Popov, but Marshall chose to write about him in the appendix to his book, that the British government would let him publish in Britain under the secrets act, so he chose to publish in America, so is it any wonder it shows an American bias.

I also said my memory is hazy on the subject, but I am not making things up, it's very hard to recollect things you may have read forty years ago as a teenager in school.

I don't need to do some "real" research, I believe my sources as much as you believe yours.

Now remind me, just how far out were the Americans when they landed on Omaha, despite being told repeatedly by the Royal navy they were heading for the wrong beach, and how many times did the British tell them they were bombing their own men at Casino ... I rest my case regarding American military and their versions of the "facts"

 

Feel better now? Another round of American bashing under your belt . . . must make you feel all warm and fuzzy.

Tell you what, you can write of the war in Europe to your little heart's content . . . I tend to avoid it as I am only vaguely aware of the fact that there was a war there . . . not hardly a jot of interest.

 

You can dismiss it as much as you like, but the fact remains that there was more than one instance of American incompetence intelligence wise in WW2, if you want to be more up to date, check the stats on Gulf Wars 1 & 2 and see which units were most guilty of friendly fire, in the forces it's called a blue on blue.

It's not American bashing, it's facts, facts the Americans don't like to admit to, so they make up their own history to diver the blame, the fact is that had the American high military listened to the warnings given Pearl Harbour could have been avoided as most of the ships would have been at sea.

British military saying :

When the Brits fire the enemy ducks
When the enemy fire the Brits and Yanks duck
When the Yanks fire.....everybody ducks

 

"Why would Popov lie?" -- there is a simple answer: to make a buck.

American magazines would pay good money for articles which were sensational and cooberate with certain anti-FDR sentaments. Not all which is printed even in resposible and respected newspapers is 100% truthful and accurate. Sometimes it is sloppy journalism while sometimes it is deliberate.

Case in point: British newspapers published stories falsely reporting where the German V-1 and V-2 weapons were impacting. Local Londoners complained about this, not knowing this was deliberate because it was thought that this information would reach neutral countries were German agent would then pass it on to Germany. Then the range of the V-1s and V-2s would be "corrected" so as to miss London.

 

I guess that the Germans had problems of their own at the time, shortly after the USA entered the war Germany lost the war or am I mistaken here?

 

What does telling a lie to protect London have to do with Pearl Harbour, I just don't see the relevance.

 

If you term "shortly" as three years then yeah that happened, you may have "helped" win the war in Europe, but the Allies had been on their own long enough to stop Germany overrunning the desert, and the Med, if it hadn't been for that, your troops would never have been able to go through Italy.
You also have to ask that had Hitler not declared war on you, would you have entered the European theatre at all ?

 

I didn't know either that Hitler declared war on the US, why would he do that? Poor strategy really. I think that the US would enter the war, after the attack on Pearl Harbor, any friends of the Japanese would be US enemies I think.

 

Admiral Husband Kimmel and General Short were the designated fall guys for the Pearl Harbor debacle that was covertly engineered by FDR to get the U.S. into WW2 before the wobbling English had to throw in the towel and sue for peace. Both men were exonerated and restored to their previous rank by an Act of Congress in 2001. One of the findings:
"3) Numerous investigations following the attack on Pearl Harbor have documented that Admiral Kimmel and Lieutenant General Short were not provided necessary and critical intelligence that was available, that foretold of war with Japan, that warned of imminent attack, and that would have alerted them to prepare for the attack, including such essential communiques as the Japanese Pearl Harbor Bomb Plot message of September 24, 1941, and the message sent from the Imperial Japanese Foreign Ministry to the Japanese Ambassador in the United States from December 6 to 7, 1941, known as the Fourteen-Part Message."

Millions of words have been written on the subject. and you can spend a lifetime plowing through them. As in many cases, a fictional re-creation deeply, researched and grounded in the facts, can give a reader a better sense of what went on. I will recommend my novel, found here:
http://www.amazon.com/The-Great-Lia...=1406299736&sr=8-1&keywords=jerry jay carroll

There are a couple of people, slaves to the official line concocted in the cover up, who hover over this website like flies above ordure. The ban remains: I will not read or respond to their comments. They know who they are.

Jerry Jay Carroll

 

If you will not read nor respond to the comments of others then what the heck are you doing here? I thought this was a forum for the EXCHANGE of ideas and knowledge of military history.

 

Obviously our resident "author" also failed Marketing 101.

Can he pass History 101?

Who in the US government knew the Japanese were going to attack Pearl Harbor on Sunday 7 December 1941? Be specific, name names, provide verifiable sources.

How did this person or persons come to have this knowledge? Specifics please as above.

When did this person or persons come into this knowledge? Where?

Who provided the specific information on the the planning and execution of the Japanese attack?

How was this information obtained?

Again, be specific and provide evidence we can all evaluate for ourselves, none of this would have, could have, should have, nonsense and citations from conspiracist's repetition of each others tales.

You can have your little bans, Mr. Carroll, but you must understand that to make a charge stick requires evidence . . . you've offered none and apparently are still only interested in hawking your novel. Of course, as we all know, novels are not history.

 

I find this remark quite disparaging to be honest, we may not have been fighting in Europe from start to finish, but the British regiments were fighting on other fronts too, and some would say we were little overstretched, relying as always on our Imperial past to supply us with troops.
Yes the US did help Britain in the form of supplies, but it wasn't just coming from America across the Atlantic, a lot of people seem to forget a large country north of you called Canada, who were also sending grain by the ship load.

 

I agree, Jack, it is quite disparaging. You and I have some obvious disagreements on sources and interpretation, but at least we are relatively civil about it. Mr. Carroll prefers disparagement and name calling when someone asks him to be specific in his claims.

Further, what our Mr. Carroll fails to mention is that the resolution to restore Short and Kimmel to their pre-war ranks was an amendment to a defense appropriation. No passing vote, no appropriation. And, he also fails to point out that neither house of the US congress has the authority to promote anyone in rank. He does not tell us that a resolution by the Congress is non-binding, it is not a law, it is not enforceable. In fact, in this specific case, NO president (who does have that authority) has, to date, recommended that either of these men be restored to their pre-war rank.

 

The British made that mistake too, promoting officers who had survived WW1 to Flag Rank and General Staff, which is why I think we ended up at Dunkirk with a paddle for the canoe.
Once we got shot of that lot and brought some modern thinkers into the game, ( Montgomery, Harris) then the tables started to turn.