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Ever since the Japanese Attack On Pearl Harbor on December 7 , 1941 , there has been much debate as to how and why the United States had been caught unaware, and how much and when American officials knew of Japanese plans and related topics. Some have argued that various parties high in the US and British governments knew of the attack in advance and may even have let it happen or encouraged it in order to force America into war. Evidence supporting this view is taken from quotations and source documents from the time, but each one must be looked at individually, in context, in order to be a truly legitimate point for or against. Part of the controversy of the debate centers on the state of documents pertaining to the attack. While conventional wisdom would seem to dictate that all of the Pearl Harbor documents were declassified decades ago, there are some records that have not been released. Others may not exist as many documents were destroyed early during the war due to fears of an impending Japanese invasion of the Hawaiian Islands. Examination of information released since the War has revealed that there was considerable intelligence information available to US and other nations' officials. It was the failure to process and use this information effectively that has led some to invoke Conspiracy Theories rather than a less interesting mix of mistake and circumstance. The US government had ''nine'' official inquiries into the attack – the inquiry by Secretary of the Navy Knox (1941), the Roberts Commission (1941–42), the Hart Inquiry ( 1944 ), the Army Pearl Harbor Board (1944), the Naval Court of Inquiry (1944), the Hewitt investigation, the Clarke investigation, the Congressional Inquiry ( 1945 – 46 ) and the top-secret inquiry by Secretary Stimson authorized by Congress and carried out by Henry Clausen (the Clausen Inquiry) ( 1945 ). It is important to note that investigators prior to Clausen did not have the security clearance necessary to receive the most sensitive information and that some of those questioned were put in a difficult spot of having to lie under oath to protect secrets they were charged with. Clausen reported that even though he had a letter informing witnesses that he had the necessary clearance, he was repeatedly lied to until he produced copies of top secret decrypts, proving that he indeed had the proper clearance. The top-secret information that Clausen collected was not declassified until the mid-1980s and not published until 1992, when Clausen wrote his own account of the investigation. This has led to the propagation of misinformation as authors refer back to older documents that have information that has been superseded and corrected. DEBATE #1: WAS THE US READING JAPANESE CODE? The JN-25 code tends to be one of the more debated areas of Pearl Harbor lore. JN-25 is the US Navy's final designation for what the Japanese Navy referred to as Code Book D. This type of code is different than modern forms of message Encryption in being based on a book code (ie, battleship = 63982) and using superencryption by an additive cypher, also in a book. It was based upon the Latin alphabet, likely due to the greater complexity of other forms of Japanese writing. Superencrypted codes of this sort were widely used and can be considered the state of the art in practical cryptography of the time. The original JN-25A system used five-digit numbers, divisible by three, giving a total of 33,333 valid code values. To make it harder to crack a code item, 'noise' was overlaid into the transmission in the form of an additive book of five-digit numbers that had no meaning; they were added to codegroups to obscure the use of code values. JN-25B superseded the first release of the JN25 system at the start of December of 1940. JN-25B had 55,000 valid codes and while it initially used the same additives, this was soon changed and the code breakers found themselves back to square one. Over the years various claims have been made as to the progress of decrypting the code. Lt. John Leitweiler, Commander of Station CAST, Corregidor is quoted often as stating in November of 1941 that his staff could “walk right across” the number columns of the coded messages. This, however, refers not to the message itself but to the superencrypting additives and was in relation to how easy a new method for attacking the code made the discovery of additives. Additionally, no known JN-25B decrypts of intelligence value prior to Pearl Harbor were ever recorded. Such breaks as recorded by Holmes and Blair were into the additive tables. The first 100 JN-25 decrypts from all sources in date/time order of translation have been released and are available in the National Archives. The first JN-25B Decrypt was in fact by Station Hypo (Hawaii) on 8 January 1942. (numbered #1 up JN-25B RG38 CNSG Library, Box 22, 3222/82 NA CP) The first 25 decrypts were very short messages or partial decrypts of marginal intelligence value. As Duane Whitlock stated "The reason that not one single JN-25 decrypt made prior to Pearl Harbor has ever been found or declassified is not due to any insidious cover-up . . . it is due quite simply to the fact that no such decrypt ever existed. It simply was not within the realm of our combined cryptologic capability to produce a usable decrypt at that particular juncture." Of, course, it should be recognized that Exhibit No. 151 from the Hewitt Inquiry, has a copy of the US Navy message Opnav-242239 'Evaluation of Messages of 26 November 1941' which has in part: '1. Reference (a) advised that Com 16 intercepts were considered most reliable and requested Com 16 to evaluate reports on Japanese naval movements and send despatch to Opnav, info Cincpac. Com 16's estimates were more reliable than Com 14's, not only because of better radio interception, but because Com 16 was currently reading messages in the Japanese Fleet Cryptographic System ("5-number code" or "JN25") and was exchanging technical information and translations with the British C. I. Unit at Singapore. McCollum knew this and gave it due consideration when he drafted reference (a).' This is directly contrary to Whitlock - he being a traffic analyst at the time. Further, NSA's Frederick Parker, from the official history of OP-20-GYP-1, on page 25, is found "The discovery ... of a number-date table in Baker code ... place {Link without Title} the reading of messages in Baker code on a current basis ... the reading of messages in Baker before Pearl Harbor, however, must be understood to have been a qualified success." Again, contrary to Whitlock above. Detailed month by month progress reports have shown no reason to believe that any messages were fully decrypted before the start of the war. Tallied results for September, October, and November reveal that roughly 3,800 code groups (out of 55,000, about 7%) had been recovered by the time of the Attack On Pearl Harbor US Signals Intelligence in 1941 was both impressively advanced and uneven. The US MI8 cryptographic operation in New York City had been shut down by Henry Stimson (Hoover's newly appointed Secretary of State), which provoked its now ex-director, Herbert Yardley , to write a book ( The American Black Chamber ) about its successes in breaking other nations' crypto traffic. Most countries responded promptly by changing (and generally improving) their ciphers and codes, forcing other nations to start over in reading their signals. The Japanese were no exception. Nevertheless, US cryptanalytic work continued after Stimson's action in two separate efforts by the Army's Signal Intelligence Service (SIS) and the Office of Naval Intelligence's (ONI) crypto group, OP-20-G . Cryptanalytic work was controlled to such extent, however, that major commands such as the 14th Naval District that was headquartered at Pearl Harbor were prohibited from working on code breaking by Admiral Turner and the flow of intercepted information was tightly controlled to the point that at times even President Roosevelt did not receive information gleaned from code-breaking activities. By late 1941 , those organizations had broken several Japanese ciphers (such as " PA-K2 ", called ''Tsu'' by Japan, and the diplomatic code, dubbed " Purple " by the U.S.) but as has been mentioned previously, had made little progress against the Naval JN-25 code. The break into the Purple cipher was a considerable Cryptographic triumph and proved quite useful later in the War. It was the highest security Japanese Foreign Office cipher, but prior to Pearl Harbor carried little information about events planned by the Japanese; the military, who were essentially determining policy for Japan, didn't trust the Foreign Office and left it "out of the loop". Unfortunately for the US, the two service groups generally competed rather than cooperated, and distribution of intelligence from the military to US civilian policy-level officials was poorly done (capriciously chosen and distributed) and in a way that prevented any of its recipients from developing a larger sense of the meaning of the decrypts. Along with obsessional security, there was no analysis; decrypts were provided raw, completely without context. In addition, there was a perennial shortage of manpower, thanks to penury on one hand and the perception of intelligence as a low-value career path on the other. Furthermore, there were difficulties retaining good intelligence officers and trained linguists; most did not remain in the job for the extended periods needed to become truly professional. DEBATE #2: WAS THE JAPANESE KIDO BUTAI BROADCASTING? As the Kido Butai (Special Attack Force) lead by Admiral Chuichi Nagumo neared Hawaii, there is claimed to have been a flurry of radio traffic that beget later warnings to US intelligence and even directly to White House connections. For instance, the Matson liner SS ''Lurline'', heading from San Francisco to Hawaii on its regular route, is said to have heard and plotted unusual radio traffic, noting here that Japanese Morse code is very different from International Morse code. That traffic, which is said to have persisted for several days, is further said to have been from the approaching Japanese fleet. There are several problems with this, however. All surviving officers from Nagumo's ships claim that there was no radio traffic to have been overheard by anyone; their radio operators had been left in Japan to fake traffic for the benefit of listeners (ie, military intelligence Traffic Analysts in other countries), and all radio transmitters aboard Nagumo's ships were claimed to have been physically disabled to prevent inadvertent broadcast and subsequent tracking of the attack force. To disobey the radio silence orders would mean that the entire attack force would have been jeopardized, and so personnel reports provide corroboration for the basic situation. Unfortunately, the whereabouts of either the SS ''Lurline'''s log, and reports delivered to the Navy by Lurline radio operator Leslie Grogan in Hawaii, are not known, so contemporaneous written evidence of what was recorded aboard the SS ''Lurline'' is not now available. Generally, however, the directions given by Grogan in a recreation of the logbook for the Matson are consistent with locations used for radio deception by the Japanese at that time. One suggested example of proof of a Kido Butai transmission is the November 30, 1941 COMSUM14 report in which Captain Joseph Rochefort of Hawaii's code-breaking Station Hypo mentioned that a "tactical" circuit was heard calling "marus" (Japanese commercial vessels - however, the usage SHIRIYA MARU, she being an IJN tanker and not a member of Japan's merchant fleet, appears in Parts XIII, pages 407, 420, 462-464, and Part XXX, page 2743, 2787, and 2792 in the Hearing before the Joint Committee). However this is much more likely (or perhaps not) to be part of the radio deception program to mislead enemy intelligence into believing that the units and commands of the Kido Butai were continuing to exercise off Kyushu and the Western Inland Sea. DEBATE #3: CIRCUMSTANTIAL EVIDENCE One quote from Gordon Prange's ''Pearl Harbor: The Verdict of History'' is often used to add legitimacy to the notion that the British Government knew in advance that the attack was coming. Oliver Lyttelton, the British Minister of War Production, is quoted on page 35 as saying, " ... Japan was provoked into attacking the Americans at Pearl Harbor. It is a travesty of history ever to say that America was forced into the war. Everyone knows where American sympathies were. It is incorrect to say that America was truly neutral even before America came into the war on an all-out basis." When considering information like this as a point for or against, the reader must keep in mind questions such as, was this official privy to information about the US government, did he have communications with high-level administration figures such as President Roosevelt or Ambassador Grew, or is this just a strongly held personal opinion? For instance, one position discussed in author Robert Stinnet's book ''Day of Deceit'' suggests that a Memorandum prepared by Office Of Naval Intelligence Lieutenant Commander Arthur McCollum was central to US Government policy in the immediate pre-war period. The Memo suggests that only a direct attack on US interests would sway the American public to favor direct involvement in the European war, specifically in support of the British. Although the memo was passed to Captains Walter Anderson and Dudley Knox , two of Roosevelt's military advisors on October 7 , 1940 , there is no evidence available to suggest that Roosevelt ever saw the memo. Moreover, although Anderson and Knox offered eight specific plans to aggrieve the Japanese Empire and added "If by these means Japan could be led to commit an overt act of war, so much the better," of the eight "plans" (actions to be taken) offered in the memo only one was ever implemented in any fashion, and there is considerable doubt that the Memo was the source of the inspiration for that implementation. Japanese intelligence (that is, espionage) efforts against Pearl Harbor included at least two German '' Abwehr '' agents, one of them, Otto Kuhn , a Sleeper Agent living in Hawaii with his family; he and they were essentially incompetent. The other, Dusko Popov a Yugoslavian businessman, was thought quite effective by the Abwehr, but was actually a double agent whose loyalty was to the British. He worked for the XX Committee of MI5 . In August 1941 he was tasked by the ''Abwehr'' with specific questions about Pearl ( Masterman 's book on the Double Cross operation and Prange 's ''Verdict'' both reproduce it), but the FBI seems to have evaluated the effort as of negligible importance. There has been no report that its existence, or even Popov's availability as a double agent, was passed on to US military intelligence or to civilian policy officials. J. Edgar Hoover dismissed Popov's importance noting that his British codename, Tricycle, was connected with his sexual tastes. In any case, he was not allowed to continue on to Hawaii and to develop more intelligence for the UK and US. Regardless, Prange demonstrates Popov's claim to have provided warning is overblown, and a case that his notorious questionnaire was a product of '' Abwehr '' thoroughness. More to the point, the Japanese did not need ''Abwehr'' assistance, having one well-placed agent, Takeo Yoshikawa , in Hawaii at the Japanese Consulate, who had been reporting for several months. (Sometimes called a "master spy", he was in fact quite young, and his reports were frequently fraught with error.) Pearl Harbor base security was so lax, Yoshikawa had no difficulty obtaining access, even taking the Navy's own harbor tourboat. (Even had he not, hills overlooking the harbor were perfect for observation or photography, and not off-limits.) Gossip with taxi drivers is supposed to have been one of his sources. Some of his information, and presumably other material from the Consulate, was hand-delivered to intelligence officers aboard Japanese vessels calling at Hawaii, during the summer and early fall, but most was transmitted to Tokyo. Many of these messages were intercepted and decrypted; most were evaluated as the sort of intelligence gathering all nations routinely do about potential opponents and not as evidence of an attack plan. None of those currently known, including those decrypted later in the War when there was time to return to those remaining undecrypted, explicitly stated anything about an attack on Pearl; the only exception was a message sent from the Hawaiian Consulate on 6 December, which was not decrypted until after the 7th and was thus moot. No cable traffic (the usual communication method to/from Tokyo) was intercepted in Hawaii until after David Sarnoff of RCA agreed to assist during a visit to Hawaii immediately before the 7th; such interception was illegal under US law, though it had been going on in New York for some time. Farago's POSTSCRIPT offers the viewpoint of RCA personnel. In the final analysis, the illegal co-operation of American cable companies changed little or nothing, since intercept stations were picking up some of the traffic, and American intelligence didn't make maximum use of their information, in any case. The Japanese had, during the days prior to the attack, asked Yoshikawa to divide the waters of Pearl Harbor into sections, a grid, to save time (and telegraph bills). He could say "six DDs section AA" instead of "six destroyers in the area northwest of Ford Island". Some people have referred to this as the "bomb plot" message. Note that, importantly, while Washington knew beginning the Fall of 1941 of the "Kita Messages" or bomb plots - neither Admiral Kimmel or General Short were told. However, the Japanese Navy did not use the "bomb plot", the exact locations of the ships in Pearl were not forwarded to them prior to the attack; however, in Stinnett on page 106, is a figure "A. Sketch Used Reporting Enemy Anchoring Formation" obtained from a downed Japanese aircraft on December 7, 1941, so it seems SUZUKI's trip to Hitokappu Wan as Tappan Bay in Layton (as given in SRN 116643 in the National Archives, SRNs - Special Reseach Navy - Japanese Naval messages said to have been translated in 1945/1946), prior to the attack, yielded the precise berthing locations. (A harbor chart reproduced in ''I-boat Captain'', presumably based on Yoshikawa, erroneously lists some of them.) While the Japanese had the Panama Canal Zone under surveillance and the Philippines as well, in addition to Hawaii, Pearl Harbor was the only installation now known to have been divided into a grid pattern However, examination of an aerial photo of Pearl Harbor at the time of the attack makes it plain a pilot could easily determine the locations of individual ships and their classes without reference to a guide. This fields to point the way to Pearl. Even in the absence of any evidence of this claim (none has come to light), it is immediately apparent a hundred-foot arrow would appear negligibly small compared to the much larger capital ships clearly visible in the harbor. Locally, Naval Intelligence in Hawaii had been tapping telephones at the Japanese Consulate before the 7th, and overheard a most peculiar discussion of flowers in a call to Tokyo (the significance of which is still publicly opaque and which was discounted in Hawaii at the time), but the Navy's tap was discovered and was disconnected in the first week of December. The local FBI field office was informed of neither the tap nor its removal; the local FBI agent in charge later claimed he would have had installed one of his own, had he known the Navy's had been disconnected. Throughout 1941, the US, Britain, and the Netherlands collected a considerable range of evidence suggesting that Japan was heading for war against someone new. But the Japanese attack on the US in December was essentially a side operation to the main Japanese thrust south against Malaya and the Philippines —many more resources, especially Imperial Army resources, were devoted to these attacks as compared to Pearl. Many in the Japanese military (both Army and Navy) had disagreed with Adm. Isoroku Yamamoto 's idea of attacking the US Fleet at Pearl Harbor when it was first proposed in early 1941, and remained reluctant through the Imperial Conferences in September and November which first approved it as policy, and then authorized the attack. The Japanese focus on South-East Asia was quite accurately reflected in US intelligence assessments; there were warnings of attacks against Thailand (the Kra Peninsula), Malaya, French Indochina , the Dutch East Indies (Davao-Weigo Line), even Russia . There are reports of concern at the War Department and in the White House about Japanese plans for the SE Asian region. There had even been a specific claim of a plan for an attack on Pearl Harbor from the Peru vian Ambassador to Japan in early 1941. (The source for this bit of intelligence has been traced to the Ambassador's Chinese cook. It was treated with the sketicism such gossip deserves.) Since not even Yamamoto had yet then decided to even argue for an attack on Pearl Harbor, discounting US Ambassador Grew's report to Washington about it, in early 1941, was quite sensible. Later reports from a Korean labor organization also seem to have been regarded as unlikely. There has been no record of a serious conviction by anyone in US or UK military intelligence or among US civilian policy officials, prior to the attack, that Pearl Harbor or the US West Coast would be attacked. The so-called " Winds Code " announcing the direction of new hostilities via a broadcast weather 'forecast', remains a curious and confused episode, demonstrating the uncertainty of meaning inherent in most intelligence information, and its handling/mis-handling - and in this case, even uncertainty about the existence of some intelligence information, or its active removal, especially some years after the event. It is known, however, that the Winds system was to be implemented only if the communications between Japan and Washington were cut, and they were never out of touch with their embassy prior to the attack. Given this any talk of intercepted "Winds" messages would appear to be specious. An important note here, however, there is the fact that in Briggs' Special Research History - SRH-051 (still a very heavily censored document in the US National Archives) - he relates his interception of the "Winds Execute", the notification of that reception to ONI, and further his being (see page 16 of SRH-051) ordered by Captain Harper not to testify at the Pearl Harbor hearings. Nevertheless, in late November, both the US Navy and Army sent war warnings to all Pacific commands. Although these clearly stated the high probability of war with Japan, they did not mention the likelihood of an attack on Pearl Harbor itself, instead focusing on the probability of an attack on the Far East. The Washington officials also forwarded none of the intelligence available to them and did not solict the views of the local Hawaii commanders, Admiral Husband E. Kimmel and General Walter C. Short . The messages have also been criticised by some (e.g., the US Army Pearl Harbor Board - "Do/Don't Messages") containing "conflicting and imprecise" language. Since the Army was officially responsible for Navy ships in port at Pearl, Army actions are of particular interest. Short reported to Washington that he had increased his alert level (but an earlier change in meaning for those levels led to misunderstanding in Washington of what Short was doing). In addition, Short's main concern seems to have been sabotage, accounting for his orders that Air corps planes be parked close together well away from the edges of the airfields. There seems to have been no increased urgency about getting radar equipment emplaced and properly integrated; leisurely training continued and the early warning center was left minimally staffed. Anti-aircraft guns remained in a state of low readiness. Long range patrol aircraft were not used effectviely, remaining on a peacetime maintenance and use schedule. The mistakes made by both Hawaii and Washington meant little was done to prepare for an air attack. Rumoured inter-service rivalries between Kimmel and Short did not improve the situation. Particularly, most intelligence information was sent to Kimmel, assuming he would relay it to Short, and vice versa. Hawaii did not have a PURPLE machine, so it was dependent on Washington from intelligence from that source. However, since Short had no liaison with Kimmel's intelligence staff he was usually left out of the loop. Henry Clausen reported that the war warnings could not be more precise because Washington could not risk Japan guessing the U.S. was reading important parts of their traffic. Additionally, he stated that military men of the rank of Kimmel and Short should have understood the nature of the warnings and that they should have been vigilant. All other Pacific commands took appropriate measures for their situations. Like most commentators, Clausen ignores what the "war warnings" (and their context) do say: DC, with more complete intelligence, expects an attack anywhere but Pearl Harbor. He, like most, also ignores what Kimmel, Short, and Admiral Claude C. Bloch (Commander, Fourteenth Naval District, responsible for Hawaii) did do: what they were told. They took precautions against sabotage, widely expected as precursor to war, and reported their preparations. They did not, and neither did Washington, expect an air attack. ONI, in Washington, is further said to have been aware of Japanese carrier movements. First appearing in John Toland’s ''Infamy'', a Dutch Rear Admiral claimed to be present at the US Office of Naval Intelligence. According to Toland and entries in J.E. Meijer Ranneft’s diary, naval intelligence informed Ranneft of two Japaness carriers. Toland claims the diary states these ships were northwest of Honolulu. Later Toland claims the diary states the ships were north. However among the many problems with the story, the diary (photo in hardback version, removed in later paperback printings) states “beW. Honolulu.” meaning “Westerly of”. Also none of the witnesses present on those dates support’s Ranneft’s claims. Some speculate the diary could have been reference to carriers near the Marshall Islands. Toland has also made other conflicting and incorrect claims about the diary as well. Each of these points remains controversial. Conflicting stories regarding FOIA (Freedom of Information Act) requests for the source materials used, e.g., Sheet Number 94644, are also common among the debate. However much information was automatically destroyed under a destruction of classified information policy. Note that various authors have continued to bring classified Pearl Harbor materials into the sunlight via the FOIA mechanism. Closer to the moment of the attack, the attacking planes were detected and tracked as they approached by an Army radar installation being used for a training exercise. The Opana Point radar station, operated by two enlisted men (Pvts. Lockard and Elliot) plotted the approaching force and then their relief team plotted them returning to their carriers. These radar returns were thought, by the ill-trained junior officer (Lt. Kermit A. Tyler ) in charge at the barely-operational information center at Pearl Harbor, to be a flight of American bombers expected from the mainland—and in fact those bombers did arrive, in the middle of the attack. Additionally, mini-subs were sighted and attacked outside Pearl Harbor entrance and at least one was sunk—all before the planes came within bombing range. It has been argued that this failure saved the USS ''Enterprise'' . If she had been directed to investigate she might have run into the six-carrier Japanese strike force. Detection of one of these by the USS ''Ward'' might have provided enough notice to disperse aircraft and fly off reconnaisance, except, yet again, reactions of the duty officers were tardy. (''Ward'' sinking her may provide the basis of Japanese claims the U.S. started the war.) One of the main considerations making an attack against Pearl Harbor unimaginable was the depth of Pearl Harbor -- generally less than 40 feet. Depths of less than 150 feet were (in the USN) widely believed insufficient for torpedo attack; at the time, torpedoes from planes dove deeply before attaining running depth and in water that was not deep enough (like Pearl Harbor) would contact the bottom, detonating or embedding themselves in harbor mud. The British had proved that torpedoes, modified for shallow water, could be effective, by their attack on the '' Regia Marina '' at Taranto on November 11, 1940 ( Battle Of Taranto ). The US Navy discussed this new development as can be seen in a July 1941 memo , but as Taranto was about 75 feet deep and Pearl less than 40, it was not considered that the British attack method could be used in Hawaii. The RN (Royal Navy) had used Swordfish torpedo planes (fabric-covererd biplanes), and their slow speed was part of the reason the Taranto attack succeeded. The IJN (Imperial Japanese Navy) no longer had any like them, thus other methods were required. The Japanese independently developed shallow water torpedo modifications ("Thunder Fish") during the planning and training for the attack in 1941. Wooden fins had been added to the tail and roll "flippers" kept the torpedo upright once in the water. The fins kept the torpedo's nose level in the air and broke off when they hit the water. The level flight of the torpedoes helped keep them from diving too deep and embedding themselves in the mud (but, despite these modifications, several torpedoes did indeed dive to the bottom and several remain unaccounted for). This very simple modification of the Japanese torpedoes was not anticipated by the USN and Admiral Bloch never pushed for torpedo nests. Another point brought up in the debate is the fact that neither Admiral Kimmel or General Short ever faced court martial. It is suggested that in order to do so the military would have had to release information they did not want to see the light of day. One major point often omitted from the debate (though Costello covers it thoroughly) is the fact MacArthur, unlike Kimmel, had complete access to Purple (indeed, Stinnet quotes Whitlock to that effect), and was caught by surprise nevertheless, nine hours after the Peral Harbor attack. Caidin and Blair also raise the issue. Another piece of circumstantial evidence is that the aircraft carriers were out of port at the time of the attack. This has been alleged by some as evidence of advance knowledge of the attack: the carriers were supposedly away so as to save them (the most valuable ships) from the attack. In fact, the two carriers then operating from Pearl Harbor, ''Enterprise'' and ''Lexington'', were on missions to deliver additional fighters to Wake and Midway. These assignments sent the carriers west, toward Japan and the Japanese Navy, lightly escorted. At the time of the attack, the ''Enterprise'' was about 200 miles west of Pearl Harbour, heading back to Pearl Harbour. In fact, the ''Enterprise'' was scheduled to be back on December 6th, but was delayed by storm. A rescheduling had the ''Enterprise'''s estimated time of arrival as 7:00, almost an hour before the attack, but the ship was also unable to make this. Conspiracy theorists repeatedly point to the fact that Roosevelt desperately wanted the United States to intervene in the war against Germany. This is undoubtedly true, but a basic understanding of the political situation of 1941 precludes this as good evidence that the Pearl Harbor attack was "allowed" to happen by Roosevelt. An attack by Japan was no guarantee that the U.S. would declare war on Germany. American anger would be directed at Japan, not Germany, in the case of a Japanese attack. The alliance between Germany and Japan called for one to aid the other in case of attack, and so Japan could not reasonably claim that America had attacked Japan in such a case. In addition, Germany had been at war with the U.K. since 1939, and the U.S.S.R. since June of 1941 without Japanese assistance. There was a serious if low-level naval war going on in the Atlantic between Germany and the US Navy in the summer of 1941 in any case. Nevertheless, it was only Hitler's declaration of war several days after the Pearl Harbor attack that brought the U.S. into the European war. FURTHER READING
(Those who change this information are encouraged to discuss edits in discussion) EXTERNAL LINKS
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