Remember Pearl Harbor

[Unimatrix11]

Well, BP, plan rainbow meant war with japan for base commanders for all practical purposes. So war was expected to start very, very soon. As i said, it had also already been established what the japanese would be trying to do in such a war. Probably the date wasnt known exactly, but that it would be on the weekend was widely guessed. Adding the interecepted comm, and the time it takes for a fleet to go from Japan to Pearl, it had to be the 7th, maybe one week later. It would actually be hard to come up with an example of a war that had been more predictable (or even and rather: better predicted beforehand).

I think, it was a deliberate decision by the US to make it look like a surprise attack (now, on that you can call me, snoopy, as, of course, i cannot proof this), so it would get all the public support it could not even have asked for otherwise. And, yes, most, if not all the men and women in Pearl had no idea about all this. It´s probably even better for them that they died with the surprise, rather than knowing that they were used as bait...

[Unimatrix11]

Snoopy, i tend to rank ´incompetence of the people responsible´ quite low in the list of probable causes for desaster, but rather ask myself, if the goal communicated is the goal approached. For example, unlike most people, i do not believe that GWB is total dumbass, but that he does (or did) what he wants to do pretty skillfully actually - its just not for the purposes he talks about...

[snoopy369]

I think you underestimate the capacity for incompetence at a bureaucratic level. Individual people may be very intelligent, but it is an unfortunate fact that as the organization grows larger, the stupidity grows exponentially; simply because, if there was a chain of 15 people between (guy who decoded japanese plans, saw japanese ships, etc.) and (guy who can decide to prepare for war), it only took one of those people to say "yeah, right, not happening" and stop the entire process.

The most substantial problem with nearly all conspiracy theories I've ever seen, quite simply, is they seem to act as if the great bureaucracy that is the US Government (or, fill in gov't name here) is capable of pulling off some pretty complex stuff, without a hitch, and without anybody noticing. The number of things that we definitely got wrong is mind-numbingly staggering; the idea that we might have gotten this many things right in a row is pretty hard to believe.

In this particular case, I think you can blame cultural differences - and assumptions based on those differences. A lot of Americans assumed the Japanese acted in certain ways, and the fact that they did meant that they assumed they were incapable of acting otherwise. A lot of stupidity can arise from simply assuming your opponent will not act in certain ways, particularly if said opponent is aware of said assumptions.

[Unimatrix11]

Well, okay, we can make this long story rather short: The US COULD have known about the impending attack in Pearl just like any other nation knows or knows not about his neighbor going to attack him. It was not some special sort of surprise, it was simply the beginning of a war. A war, both sides saw coming and both sides could have prevented if one or both had cared enough to maintain peace. It was not an attack totally out of the blue. It was almost certain to happen as soon as japan was set on the oil-embargo and the responsible people in the US should have known this, and could have, had they cared to inform themselves or if the people who knew had cared to inform them. And not just that japan would attack, but also when and where. It was far less of a surprise than the first A-bomb on hiroshima was for japan, and they had been given that day and another one, to take action and capitulate before another one would send another 60-100,000 to hell...

(well its gotten long again, and i actually never wanted to go here - it really cant be THAT hard to agree to my initial assessment that a posted hiroshima-pic while saying ´remember pearl harbor´ and nothing else is pretty tasteless)

[Kuciwalker]

Originally posted by Blaupanzer
The DoD would be unhappy to hear that about Iraq. What was all that prattle about "Shock and Awe," if both sides knew it was coming?

Neither shock nor awe require surprise.

[snoopy369]

Originally posted by Unimatrix11
(well its gotten long again, and i actually never wanted to go here - it really cant be THAT hard to agree to my initial assessment that a posted hiroshima-pic while saying ´remember pearl harbor´ and nothing else is pretty tasteless)

Yes, I agree with that wholeheartedly. I simply disagree with the rest of your opinions

[snoopy369]

Originally posted by Kuciwalker

Originally posted by Blaupanzer
The DoD would be unhappy to hear that about Iraq. What was all that prattle about "Shock and Awe," if both sides knew it was coming?

Neither shock nor awe require surprise.

Indeed. The US strategy was largely 'Bring a whole bunch of troops and scare the piss out of the Iraqi army, so that they forget about pulling the triggers on their guns while they are wetting themselves'. We made it clear we were attacking long before we actually did so.

[Unimatrix11]

Actually, Snoopy, GWB said he would attack if Saddam wasnt going to leave the country within 48 hours - and then came back to the cams like half an hour later adding that if Saddam did leave Iraq, the US would attack regardless.
But yeah, it was announced beforehand. Because it was affordable and with the whole UN-WMDs-mambo-jambo having been on for months it was totally obvious anyway. Maybe they just wanted to make sure Saddam wasnt going to pull a Pearl on them...

EDIT: The question if you compare the two situations is not so much about the surprise but rather about if the attack had not come, would one have been attacked oneself instead. Is the pre-emptive argument ligit.

In the case of Pearl i´d say, that the US probably would have intervened (albeit with a lot less public support) had the japanese started a war against the Commonwealth and the Dutch alone - thus Pearl Harbor. (The japanese certainly were not keen for a war with the US)

On the case of iraq the very possibility of the attack conflicts with the reason given for it: The WMDs - had Saddam had any, one could have not attacked him this way, by assembling troops at the border and announcing impendending invasion. Thus the whole reason for the war was a pretext and its pre-emptive nature must be doubted. Would Iraq have attacked the US had the US not attacked Iraq ? It couldnt have (at any meaningful scale).

[Tattila the Hun]

Originally posted by Kuciwalker


Afghanistan and Iraq weren't exactly surprise attacks.

Ah, certainly, the invasions were not, but, for Iraq atleast, the bombings were. That's something Clinton did right.

[Berzerker]

Saddam was surprised as hell

[dannubis]

Originally posted by Grandpa Troll


Really?

Just how tasteless?

Maybe you could contact the Japanese Government, and aske them if they could do it all again, would they snaekmattack on a Sunday morning and kill all those military personnel?

I will say this, Tokyo, Nagasaki and Hiroshima sent them a message, You fricked with the wrong Hombre', Amigo!!

The innocent persons in those cities, I am sorry about but war sucks and thats the awful truth about the matter.

As for tasteless, it is history and that cannot be changed.

I personally have nothing against either Japanese or German persons, heck, I am a descendant of Deutche lineage.

Be well but cannot agree that the picture was tasteless, it was revisiting what we did when we got back on our feet

Gramps

Nobody is discussing the destruction of the main cities of your enemy in here.

We are discussing the fact whetehr or not it is appropriate to remember the dead at pearl harbor by gloating over the deads in Japan...

[TCO]

When we say remember Pearl Harbor, it's not mostly sadness over dead. It' has more a connotation of outrage. We are remembering the sneak attack. The term has historically been one that was laden with rallying for counterattack, not pathos. See here:

http://my.execpc.com/~dschaaf/songnew.html

That said, I agree that my post was tasteless and provacative.

[TCO]

Another tremendously popular song at the times was; "Praise The Lord and Pass the Ammunition".

http://my.execpc.com/~dschaaf/praise.html

[tinyp3nis]

How U.S. Economic Warfare Provoked Japan’s Attack on Pearl Harbor
May 1, 2006
Robert Higgs
The Freeman

Ask a typical American how the United States got into World War II, and he will almost certainly tell you that the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor and the Americans fought back. Ask him why the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor, and he will probably need some time to gather his thoughts. He might say that the Japanese were aggressive militarists who wanted to take over the world, or at least the Asia-Pacific part of it. Ask him what the United States did to provoke the Japanese, and he will probably say that the Americans did nothing: we were just minding our own business when the crazy Japanese, completely without justification, mounted a sneak attack on us, catching us totally by surprise in Hawaii on December 7, 1941.

full article: http://www.independent.org/newsroom/article.asp?id=1930

By the way Smedley Butler commented as early as 1935 about US was provoking Japan.

[TCO]

Japan was a bunch of evil militarists. We sparred with them, to keep them from dominating Asia. They fvcked with the bull and got the horns. Now they are pacifists like the Germans.