James M. DAngelo (author) - Pearl Harbor Declassified: The Evidence of American Foreknowledge of the Attack

This book by James M. DAngelo, M.D., noted author of Victory at Midway , analyzes the events preceding the dramatic opening of the Pacific War on Decem- ber 7, 1941. From a distance of 200 miles, a six-carrier Japanese task force launched a surprise attack on U.S. naval and military installations on Oahu, Hawaiian Islands. It resulted in the sinking of several battleships of the U.S. fleet at Pearl Harbor, the destruction of hundreds of land-based aircraft and sea planes at other bases, the killing of about 2,500 sailors, soldiers, and civilians, and the wounding of thousands more.

This account comprises the most recent example of revisionist history as applied to the perennial controversy over whether the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor was as much a surprise to the government leadership in 1941 as it was to all other American citizens. It is worthwhile to consider the meaning of revisionism in history, as it is far from a one-time event. Rather, revisionism is a constant process as historians with new resources and different perspectives try to make sense out of the past. One definition of revisionism is the following: the advocacy of revision of some political theory, religious doctrine, historical or critical interpretation. Nearly all historians resort to a degree of revisionism in the effort to contribute something new to our understanding of the past.

Some view revisionism as an aberration, while others see it as a betrayal of the past as they know it. To many, however, revisionism is a way of gaining new insight on events that might otherwise be unknowable or misunderstood, like turning a kaleidoscope to see new patterns or using a stronger microscope to see more details on a slide. Since 1945 the events leading up to the attack on Pearl Harbor have been examined in more than one hundred historical books and thousands of articles. Historians have tried to understand how it was that the United States was caught off guard by Japan, a nation some 3,800 miles away from the Hawaiian Islands, then a U.S. territory, not a state. The Second World War had begun in Europe in September 1939, and by 1941 it had spread from Germany to Poland, France, Belgium, the Netherlands, Great Britain, Scandinavia, Italy, and the Soviet Union. The United States, at first, had not wished to get involved, but with world-wide financial interests, as well as political and cultural ties to western Europe, Americans were gradually drawn into a war not of their making, but one in which their vital interests were at stake.

In early 1941, Franklin Delano Roosevelt began his third term in office, but even before this he had been struggling with the question of whether, how, and when his administration would enter the war. He had spoken out adamantly to U.S. citizens about avoiding war because a predominant part of the American population opposed involvement in the late 1930s. There were still bitter memories of losses and scarcities during World War I among the public at large. On the other hand, in order to lift the nation out of the Great Depression, the administration supported legislation to strengthen the U.S. fleet, build more tanks and modern military aircraft, and increase employment.