Betrayal at Pearl Harbor: How Churchill Lured Roosevelt into World War II

This is another fine account of the codebreaking activities by the British and Americans prior to and during World War II. for those of us who lived during those years, it is more than "interesting." It is vital information about how the United States was led into that war. Perhaps an even more interesting account is that written by Stinnett, in Day of Deceit. Both books, however, have the ring of truth to them, in that each incorporates much detail, extensive footnotes, detailing dates, times, places, names, ranks, and photographs of declassified documents verifying most of their statements. This book was written by a Brit, assisted by an Australian Navy codebreaker (Nave) who transferred to the Royal Navy in the same capacity after spending some years in Japan, learning Japanese. He was an early codebreaker, and responsible for many breakthroughs. Now, today, the British Navy would like to deny his existence, and indeed tried to, because of his knowledge of embarrassing facts. The thrust of the book is that Churchill was intent upon dragging America into the war by any means possible, including inducing Roosevelt to push the Japanese into attacking us, and, say the authors, he was successful in doing so--and then kept the day and hour of the attack, of which he was aware through breaking thier code, from the United States, thereby resulting in the loss of many lives, which could have been avoided had the commanders on the scene (General Short and Admiral Kimmel) been warned. Because the United States Navy's archives have been "cleansed" of all intercepts of the Japanese codes, specifically the naval code known as JN-25, it is difficult to prove guilty knowledge on the part of our top commanders, including Roosevelt himself. The authors of this book make the assumption that he was innocent of wrongdoing, and naive when pitted against the wily Churchill. After reading Stinnett's book, however, you will come away with a different viewpoint, and a different opinion of FDR. But, one must remember the stakes! Both men were faced with a world in flames, and a bleak outlook for their own nations, at best. Hitler and Mussolini dominated Europe, and the Japanese were well on the way to establishing their Greater East-Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere--a sphere devoid of the hated white race, and the domination by Europe of the Dutch East Indies, French Indochina, China, the Malay Peninsula, the Philippines, the Marianas, Borneo, and eventually Australia, New Zealand, and India. And the United States population resisted getting involved in "foreign wars;" the isolationist movement was strong. Roosevelt had to promise (tongue in cheek, of course) during the campaign for a third term, against Wendell Willkie, that he would not send their sons to foreign wars. So, he lied to his people. So did Churchill. It could have been better handled. We could have trapped the Japanese fleet north of Hawaii, inflicted heavy losses on them and minimized our own losses at Pearl, and still ended up with the Cause Celebre that both Churchill and Roosevelt sought. But, we didn't. And, in the end, we won. What can you say? (...)