Annotated Notes:

Foreknowledge of the Attack on Pearl Harbor:

The question of whether the Roosevelt administration had foreknowledge of the attack on Pearl Harbor has been one of the most hotly debated controversies of the 20th century. While it is impossible to know exactly what Roosevelt, Stimson, and others believed at the time, the ever-growing body of evidence makes it quite clear that they understood that an attack on Pearl Harbor and other locations would occur within days, if not hours, of December 7th. George Victor outlines the timeline of events quite succinctly in his controversial book, The Pearl Harbor Myth (pages 43-46, Potomac Books, 2007). His main points:

1. In 1941 Stimson and others conducted three war game exercises to plan for a possible attack on Hawaii.

2. On September 24th the US began intercepting a continual stream of messages regarding the precise location of ships within Pearl Harbor, as well as several other naval bases.

3. On November 24th, the intercepted messages for Pearl Harbor began to include the state of ship preparedness for war. The Pearl Harbor communiqués were the only messages that included ship preparedness reports.

4. December 2nd, the Dutch attaché in Washington, Captain Johan Ranneft, noted in his diary a discussion with the Navy Department where they showed him a map with the location of two Japanese air craft carriers west of Honolulu.

5. December 2nd, Navy Seaman Robert Ogg located Japanese carriers “near” Pearl Harbor. He reported his findings to his superior officer, Captain Richard McCullough, who he believes gave the reports directly to FDR.

6. On December 6th, Ranneft indicated in his diary that the carriers were 300 miles off the coast of Hawaii. This was the approximate distance from which the Japanese planes took off; it took the fighter planes 1½ hours to fly to the harbor.

7. None of these reports were communicated to General Walter Short at or Admiral Husband Kimmel, the commanding officers at Pearl Harbor.

Historian Joseph E. Persico noted the discussion of several warnings within top officials at the White House in his book, Roosevelt’s Secret War (pages 142-44, Random House, 2002). According to Persico, on November 24th, Stimson and others met with President Roosevelt. Stimson recorded the president’s words in his diary: “We were likely to be attacked perhaps (as soon as) next Monday (December 1)… the question was how to maneuver them into the position of firing the first shot.” On November 28th, more evidence arrived: intelligence officers decrypted a message from Japanese Foreign Minister Shinegori Togo to the Japanese Embassy after treaty negotiations with Americans had failed. Togo’s message read: “I do not wish you to give the impression that the negotiations are broken off. Merely say to them that you are awaiting instructions.” The implication is that Japan is preparing to attack. On December 4th, evidence of the impending attack became immediate. Lt Commander Kramer intercepted a message to Japan’s Embassy in Washington to destroy all codes and documents—the infamous “Winds Code” communiqué. With no way to decrypt messages from Japan, it was clear that the Japanese Embassy would end negotiations, leaving war as the only option. On December 6th, one day before the attack, Kramer hand delivered the “Winds Code” message to Roosevelt and waited while the president read it. FDR’s response was unambiguous: “This means war.”

Was Henry Stimson worried about his role in this affair? In 1946, Time Magazine published excerpts from Stimson’s diary. At the time, all of the above information was still classified so there was very little context with which to place Stimson’s words. After the catastrophe at Pearl Harbor, Stimson entered the following note in his diary: “With the aid of hindsight I have reached the opinion… that (we) would have placed ourselves and the safety of the country in a sounder position if (we) had transmitted to General Short more information than we did….” While not clear evidence of foreknowledge of the attack on Pearl Harbor, Stimson’s entry does indicate that he and others withheld information about attack plans on the harbor.

“As Mild as Milk” - Stimson’s Opinion of Truman In 1941, Senator Truman became head of the U.S. Senate Special Committee to Investigate the National Defense Program, commonly known as “The Truman Committee”. It was charged with investigating military waste by exposing fraud and mismanagement. Undeniably, one of concerns was the disappearance of vast sums of money into the three secret facilities working on the atomic bomb. Accounts differ on whether Henry Stimson telephoned Truman, or Truman telephoned Stimson. That Stimson asked then Senator Truman not to investigate the Manhattan Project, is well established; Stimson’s opinion of Truman at that time is murkier. In Christopher Andrew’s For the President’s Eyes Only, he writes that when asked about the success of the call, Stimson replied that it went well, and that Truman was “as mild as milk.” (pg 150, For The President’s Eyes Only, Harper, 1996). Several months later, Truman made a second attempt to gain insight into the Manhattan Project and was rebuffed. According to David McCullough Pulitzer Prize-winning biography, Truman (Touchstone Press, 1993), Stimson referred to Truman as “mean and dishonest” in his diary after that second attempt.

War Plans Estimate on Casualties from an Invasion: After the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, the most commonly repeated government estimates for American casualties from a land invasion of Japan was 500,000, though it climbed as high as one million. According to McCullough, the source of this figure appears to be a memo (dated June 4, 1945) from General Thomas Handy, a member of George Marshall’s staff (Truman, Touchstone Press, 1993). How he obtained this figure is unknown, and it was not agreed upon by the Joint War Plans committee or administration officials as a “real” number. According to Ronald Takaki, author of Hiroshima: Why We Dropped the Atomic Bomb (Little, Brown and Company, 1995), the Joint War Plans Committee was asked to calculate the number of casualties: their estimate was 40,000. I was unable to find this document, but he may have been referring to Admiral Leahy’s opinion as stated in the minutes of the June 18th, 1945 meeting. President Truman. Marshall, Admiral Leahy, and Henry Stimson were present. Together, they agreed that the real cost of the invasion of Kyushu, Japan, under a plan called Olympic, would be “similar” to the invasion of Lizun, and at most equal to Okinawa (Leahy’s sole opinion). The total number of dead, missing, and wounded in Lizun was 31,000; in Okinawa the number reached 41,000. This estimate, it should be noted, is for the first 30 days of engagement. Had fighting continued (and they were certainly prepared for a longer battle), the number would be higher. Additionally, the invasion of Kyushu was to be followed by a landing on Honshu four months later-- if necessary. However, the report also suggests that the Kyushu landing, in conjunction with the Russian declaration of war against Japan, might be sufficient. This conclusion appears to have been reached without considering Japan's efforts to negotiate a peace agreement through the Russians. Minutes from this meeting were declassified in 1991, and are available online at the Truman Library here.

Supreme Allied Commander Not Consulted on the Bomb: With victory in Europe, General MacArthur became Supreme Allied Commander of Asia. Though he was aware of the atomic bomb, he was not consulted on the decision to use it on Hiroshima or Nagasaki. He was informed 48 hours before it was dropped to insure that no American ships or planes were in the area (Takaki, Hiroshima: Why we Dropped the Atomic Bomb, pg 3).

Truman’s Awareness of Japan’s Request for a Russian-brokered peace agreement: For decades historians and government officials have denied any awareness that Japan was ready to surrender. Recently declassified documents have put the facts straight, but the belief still remains, despite the fact that Truman’s own diaries (excerpts now available online at http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/amex/truman/psources/ps_diary.html) state it explicitly: “Stalin had told P.M. (Prime Minister Churchill) of telegram from Jap emperor asking for peace. Stalin also read his answer to me. It was satisfactory.” Contemporary biographers and historians have also made several references to this fact. In Truman, David McCullough writes that “Stalin told Truman of the secret Japanese peace feeler (pg 425). Christopher Andrew, in his analyses of US intelligence espionage, For the President’s Eyes Only, writes that American intelligence, in fact, had already intercepted and decrypted Japan’s request (pg 150, Harper Perennial edition, 1996). Due to the wonder of the internet and the Freedom of Information Act, the majority of the secret messages between the mainland and the Japanese Embassador in Russia are available online here .

Truman’s Conscience about Dropping the Bomb: Truman always maintained that his conscience never troubled him, and that he had no regrets about dropping the bomb, or any other part of his presidency. Takaki, in his book Hiroshima: Why America Dropped the Atomic Bomb, documents evidence of Truman’s conscience extensively. When asked if it was a difficult decision, Truman replied: “Hell no, I made it like that!” and snapped his fingers (pg 144; original source: Rose, Dubious Victory). Did he regret any decision of his presidency? “No. Never. Not one time,” was his response (pg 144; original source: Merl Miller, Plain Speaking). Takaki notes, however, that his insistence of a clear conscience was at times shrill and brusque. When Robert Oppenheimer, the head scientist at Los Alamos, expressed his regret by saying, “I have blood on my hands,” Truman’s response was to hand him his handkerchief and suggest he wipe the imagined blood off (pg 149; original source: McCullough, Truman). When asked to go to Japan as a part of a documentary of his life, Truman responded: “I’ll go to Japan, but I won’t kiss their ass” (original source: Miller, Plain Speaking). In the days leading up to authorizing its use, Truman called the decision, “a terrible decision,” and the bomb a “terrible bomb… the most terrible thing ever discovered” (his diary entry of July 25th, 1945). His use of “terrible” was not to denote incorrect or wrong, but rather “grave” and “painful”. Several days after the bombing, Truman confessed to James Wallace that he had an ongoing headache. When Wallace asked, “Physical or figurative?” Truman responded by saying, “both” (pg 150).

Some insight can also be gained from how he later characterized the atomic bomb. McCullough documents a conversation David Lilienthal had with Truman in 1948. At one point, Truman describes the atomic bomb by saying: “This isn’t a military weapon: it is used to wipe out women and children and unarmed people and not for military uses.”

Truman’s Knowledge of the Bomb’s Capabilities for Destruction It is sometimes argued that Truman could have known very little about the extent of destruction he was about to unleash on civilians, and the after effects of radiation. On July 21st, however, he was given an eight page report from General Leslie Groves (who was at the test site in Los Alamos) on the successful test. It outlined the destructive force in detail: “I estimated the energy generated to be in excess of… 15,000 to 20,000 tons of TNT. There was a tremendous blast… a huge ball of fire… windows were broken… one was some 125 miles away. A crater the diameter of 1200 feet was formed; the steel tower was evaporated. One-half mile from the explosion there was a massive steel test cylinder, 70 feet high, weighing 2020 tons, (that was) firmly anchored to concrete foundation, comparable to a steel building (but) much stronger than ordinary steel construction. The blast tore the tower from its foundations, twisted it, ripped it apart and left it flat on the ground. None of us had expected it to be damaged. I no longer consider the Pentagon a safe shelter from such a bomb. The (mushroom) cloud deposited its dust and radioactive materials over a wide area. Here and there the activity on the ground was fairly high… radioactive material in small quantities was located as much as 120 miles away. For a brief period there was a lighting effect within a radius of 20 miles equal to several suns in midday. 1100 news stories from all over the state started to flow into the Albuquerque Associated Press. One of these was a blind woman who saw the light.” The entire report is available online at: pbs.org.

The Reclassification of POWs as Disarmed Enemy Forces to Avoid the Geneva Conventions: Though largely unknown to Americans, the reclassifying of German POWs as Disarmed Enemy Forces is quite well documented. Giles MacDonogh’s After the Reich (pages 392-428, Basic Books, 2007) provides a succinct look at this experience. Controversy remains about the number of German deaths that occurred after the war’s end because of the reclassification. MacDonogh estimates that 800,000 to 1.3 million German soldiers died on marches, while housed in internment camps, and while working in American, Russian, British, and French labor camps after the war. While it is now believed that the vast majority of these deaths occurred at the hands of the Russians, it should be noted that Roosevelt and Truman not only approved reclassification, but transferred hundreds of thousands of German soldiers under their care to the Russian camps. Essentially slave laborers, some of the surviving German soldiers did not return home for nearly a decade.