vendredi 15 août 2014

Pearl Harbor Historian Views Concerning The Issue

By Tanisha Berg


Historians always agree on many occasions. The incident occurring at Pearl Harbor raised varied opinions and thoughts. This is occurrence that happened when Japan attacked the American naval base in Hawaii during the World War 2. These made America to revenge. Many questions were raised by the citizens on the issue. They included: whether the U. S. Knew of the attack, was it unprovoked, as well as whether it was deliberate so as to trigger Japan and engage the two in nations into a war. Among the first to question the initial story was Pearl Harbor historian Beard.

Beard in his book upheld that United States deliberated the move to leave Japan with no choice other than launching the attack. This move was by America cutting off Japan from accessing raw materials. The materials were very important to Japan for its military adventure. This forced them to strike even though it was a risk as the action would arouse the United States. In any way, the government must have had the knowledge of attack in before.

Thomas Fleming in his book argues that President Roosevelt deliberately and deceitfully forced America into war with Japan. Basil Rauch in his book refuted the argument by Beard, saying that America did not know of any attack in advance. It however knew that there would be an attack somewhere. America though had made some efforts to challenge Japan to take the first shot.

More varying views came from Richard N. Current concerning the attack. In his book, it is true that Stimson had anticipated a possible attack though not in America. An attack would be launched in the Pacific where possessions of the Dutch and Britain belonged.

He also did not agree with the thought that Stimson intended to somehow maneuver Japan to attack. His plan was Japan to attack the possessions owned by Britain or Dutch which could obviously look like attack on United State. This was a plan to convince United State Congress to approve a declaration of war.

Another historian, Roberta Wohlster decided to view the issue on a different argument, paying little attention to whether government in anyway needed an attack from Japan. Her main concern was the presence of knowledge about the attack before its occurrence. She concluded that in fact had received enough warning and it almost obvious that Japan was to attack. They however chose to ignore the evidence.

Admiral Edwin raised a concern about the intelligence of United States about this issue in his memoir. There was also an allegation from Gordon W. Prange that the administration of U. S. Made mistakes in making wrong interpretation of the intentions of Japan. He however did not agree that Roosevelt was deliberate in forcing a war with Japan.

Lastly, claims emerged later long after the incident. This was from John Toland who in his book alleged that the navy had information about the attack after fresh evidence came up. He was convinced that the president had known the possibility of it happening and yet allowed it as he knew that this would arouse the nation. However, Toland like fellow writers could not give enough evidence.




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