What is your favorite historical speech?

I left these shores, at Vancouver, a red-hot imperialist. I wanted the American eagle to go screaming into the Pacific. It seemed tiresome and tame for it to content itself with the Rockies. Why not spread its wings over the Philippines, I asked myself? And I thought it would be a real good thing to do.

I said to myself, here are a people who have suffered for three centuries. We can make them as free as ourselves, give them a government and country of their own, put a miniature of the American constitution afloat in the Pacific, start a brand new republic to take its place among the free nations of the world. It seemed to me a great task to which we had addressed ourselves.

But I have thought some more, since then, and I have read carefully the treaty of Paris, and I have seen that we do not intend to free, but to subjugate the people of the Philippines. We have gone there to conquer, not to redeem.

We have also pledged the power of this country to maintain and protect the abominable system established in the Philippines by the Friars.

It should, it seems to me, be our pleasure and duty to make those people free, and let them deal with their own domestic questions in their own way. And so I am an anti-imperialist. I am opposed to having the eagle put its talons on any other land.

I rather liked his speech to Congress on December 8th, 1941,
calling for a declaration of war against the Japs.

Pearl Harbor Attack No Surprise

Roger A. Stolley
Historians are still arguing over whether President Franklin Roosevelt knew in advance that Japanese forces were about to launch a devastating attack against the U.S. Pacific fleet at Pearl Harbor, Hawaii, on December 7, 1941.

Mr. Roger A. Stolley, a resident of Salem, Oregon, has something important to add to this discussion. In the following essay, which first appeared in the Salem daily Statesman Journal, December 7, 1991, he provides personal information to confirm that Roosevelt not only anticipated the Japanese attack, but specifically ordered that no steps be taken to prevent it. (Mr. Stolley's essay is reprinted here with grateful permission of the author.)

John Toland, the Pulitzer Prize-winning historian who addressed the October 1990 IHR conference in Washington, DC, tells us that Stolley's essay "rings true."

Each year near the anniversary of the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, Dec. 7, 1941, I get angry at the lie perpetrated upon the U.S. people that it was a surprise attack.

It may have been a surprise to the U.S. people, but it certainly was not a surprise to President Franklin D. Roosevelt and the select few persons who surrounded him or the U.S. Army intelligence officer working under his direct orders.

I previously worked in a civilian capacity for LTC Clifford M. Andrew, a former U.S. Army intelligence officer, who temporarily was assistant chief of Staff, military intelligence, general staff, United States Army.

My employment ended with Andrew on May 15, 1966 when a bullet entered the back of his head, ending his life.

Upon at least three occasions in his home in Tigard [Oregon] he related to me the history of his military life and personal involvement in the actions of Roosevelt and other officials surrounding the Pearl Harbor attack. He said:

Anything I now tell you I will deny ever saying. I am still subject to military court martial for revealing the information. The American public is completely ignorant of those affairs that occur behind the scenes in top American government positions and offices. If you try to tell them the truth, they won't believe you.

Five men were directly responsible for what happened at Pearl Harbor. I am one of those five men ... We knew well in advance that the Japanese were going to attack. At least nine months before the Japanese attack upon Pearl Harbor, I was assigned to prepare for it.

I was operating under the direct orders of the President of the United States and was ordered not to give vital intelligence information relating to the whereabouts of the Japanese fleet to our commanders in the field.

We had broken the Japanese code ... We'd been monitoring all their communications for months prior to the attack ... It was a lie that we didn't have direct radio communications with Washington, D.C.

It was at least 48 hours before the attack that I personally received the most tragic message of my life ... which was Top Secret and coded, which my radio operator handed to me. I had the code book and decoded it. The basic text of the message ran: "The Japanese will attack at (the approximate time). Do not prepare retaliatory forces. We need the full support of the American nation in a wartime effort by an unprovoked attack upon the nation in order to obtain a declaration of war."

That message and my 40 file cabinets of top secret information on Pearl Harbor were taken out and burned by myself and two other witnessing intelligence officers so that the Congressional investigation could not get to the truth as to what actually did happen at Pearl Harbor.

For the people of the United States both then and now I feel sorrow, for a people to have been so misled, to have been lied to so much, and to have so thoroughly believed the lie given to them.

Pearl Harbor is an example of how a small group of men in control of government has the power to destroy the life, property, and freedom of its citizens. How can this nation, or any nation, survive when its electorate is uninformed, that government hides the truth, labels it top secret, and destroys it.

http://www.ihr.org/jhr/v12/v12p119_Stolley.html

Do Freedom of Information Act Files Prove FDR Had Foreknowledge of Pearl Harbor?
March 11, 2002
Robert B. Stinnett, Douglas Cirignano


An Interview with Robert B. Stinnett by Douglas Cirignano

On November 25, 1941 Japan’s Admiral Yamamoto sent a radio message to the group of Japanese warships that would attack Pearl Harbor on December 7. Newly released naval records prove that from November 17 to 25 the United States Navy intercepted eighty-three messages that Yamamoto sent to his carriers. Part of the November 25 message read: “...the task force, keeping its movements strictly secret and maintaining close guard against submarines and aircraft, shall advance into Hawaiian waters, and upon the very opening of hostilities shall attack the main force of the United States fleet in Hawaii and deal it a mortal blow...”

One might wonder if the theory that President Franklin Roosevelt had a foreknowledge of the Pearl Harbor attack would have been alluded to in this summer’s movie, Pearl Harbor. Since World War II many people have suspected that Washington knew the attack was coming. When Thomas Dewey was running for president against Roosevelt in 1944 he found out about America’s ability to intercept Japan’s radio messages, and thought this knowledge would enable him to defeat the popular FDR. In the fall of that year, Dewey planned a series of speeches charging FDR with foreknowledge of the attack. Ultimately, General George Marshall, then Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, persuaded Dewey not to make the speeches. Japan’s naval leaders did not realize America had cracked their codes, and Dewey’s speeches could have sacrificed America’s code-breaking advantage. So, Dewey said nothing, and in November FDR was elected president for the fourth time.

Now, though, according to Robert Stinnett, author of Simon & Schuster’s Day Of Deceit, we have the proof. Stinnett’s book is dedicated to Congressman John Moss, the author of America’s Freedom of Information Act. According to Stinnett, the answers to the mysteries of Pearl Harbor can be found in the extraordinary number of documents he was able to attain through Freedom of Information Act requests. Cable after cable of decryptions, scores of military messages that America was intercepting, clearly showed that Japanese ships were preparing for war and heading straight for Hawaii. Stinnett, an author, journalist, and World War II veteran, spent sixteen years delving into the National Archives. He poured over more than 200,000 documents, and conducted dozens of interviews. This meticulous research led Stinnet to a firmly held conclusion: FDR knew.

“Your boys are not going to be sent into any foreign wars,” was Roosevelt’s famous campaign statement of 1940. He wasn’t being ingenuous. FDR’s military and State Department leaders were agreeing that a victorious Nazi Germany would threaten the national security of the United States. In White House meetings the strong feeling was that America needed a call to action. This is not what the public wanted, though. Eighty to ninety percent of the American people wanted nothing to do with Europe’s war. So, according to Stinnett, Roosevelt provoked Japan to attack us, let it happen at Pearl Harbor, and thus galvanized the country to war. Many who came into contact with Roosevelt during that time hinted that FDR wasn’t being forthright about his intentions in Europe. After the attack, on the Sunday evening of December 7, 1941, Roosevelt had a brief meeting in the White House with Edward R. Murrow, the famed journalist, and William Donovan, the founder of the Office of Strategic Services. Later Donovan told an assistant that he believed FDR welcomed the attack and didn’t seem surprised. The only thing Roosevelt seemed to care about, Donovan felt, was if the public would now support a declaration of war. According to Day Of Deceit, in October 1940 FDR adopted a specific strategy to incite Japan to commit an overt act of war. Part of the strategy was to move America’s Pacific fleet out of California and anchor it in Pearl Harbor. Admiral James Richardson, the commander of the Pacific fleet, strongly opposed keeping the ships in harm’s way in Hawaii. He expressed this to Roosevelt, and so the President relieved him of his command. Later Richardson quoted Roosevelt as saying: “Sooner or later the Japanese will commit an overt act against the United States and the nation will be willing to enter the war.”

To those who believe that government conspiracies can’t possibly happen, Day Of Deceit could prove to them otherwise. Stinnett’s well-documented book makes a convincing case that the highest officials of the government—including the highest official—fooled and deceived millions of Americans about one of the most important days in the history of the country. It now has to be considered one of the most definitive—if not the definitive—book on the subject. Gore Vidal has said, “...Robert Stinnet has come up with most of the smoking guns. Day Of Deceit shows that the famous ‘surprise’ attack was no surprise to our war-minded rulers...” And John Toland, the Pulitzer Prize-winning author of the Pearl Harbor book, Infamy, said, “Step by step, Stinnett goes through the prelude to war, using new documents to reveal the terrible secrets that have never been disclosed to the public. It is disturbing that eleven presidents, including those I admired, kept the truth from the public until Stinnett’s Freedom of Information Act requests finally persuaded the Navy to release the evidence.”

http://www.independent.org/newsroom/article.asp?id=408

I rather liked his speech to Congress on December 8th, 1941,
calling for a declaration of war against the Japs.

That was as phony a speech as has ever existed, Om.

Quote:

Pearl Harbor Attack No Surprise

Roger A. Stolley
Historians are still arguing over whether President Franklin Roosevelt knew in advance that Japanese forces were about to launch a devastating attack against the U.S. Pacific fleet at Pearl Harbor, Hawaii, on December 7, 1941.

Mr. Roger A. Stolley, a resident of Salem, Oregon, has something important to add to this discussion. In the following essay, which first appeared in the Salem daily Statesman Journal, December 7, 1991, he provides personal information to confirm that Roosevelt not only anticipated the Japanese attack, but specifically ordered that no steps be taken to prevent it. (Mr. Stolley's essay is reprinted here with grateful permission of the author.)

John Toland, the Pulitzer Prize-winning historian who addressed the October 1990 IHR conference in Washington, DC, tells us that Stolley's essay "rings true."

Each year near the anniversary of the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, Dec. 7, 1941, I get angry at the lie perpetrated upon the U.S. people that it was a surprise attack.

It may have been a surprise to the U.S. people, but it certainly was not a surprise to President Franklin D. Roosevelt and the select few persons who surrounded him or the U.S. Army intelligence officer working under his direct orders.

I previously worked in a civilian capacity for LTC Clifford M. Andrew, a former U.S. Army intelligence officer, who temporarily was assistant chief of Staff, military intelligence, general staff, United States Army.

My employment ended with Andrew on May 15, 1966 when a bullet entered the back of his head, ending his life.

Upon at least three occasions in his home in Tigard [Oregon] he related to me the history of his military life and personal involvement in the actions of Roosevelt and other officials surrounding the Pearl Harbor attack. He said:

Anything I now tell you I will deny ever saying. I am still subject to military court martial for revealing the information. The American public is completely ignorant of those affairs that occur behind the scenes in top American government positions and offices. If you try to tell them the truth, they won't believe you.

Five men were directly responsible for what happened at Pearl Harbor. I am one of those five men ... We knew well in advance that the Japanese were going to attack. At least nine months before the Japanese attack upon Pearl Harbor, I was assigned to prepare for it.

I was operating under the direct orders of the President of the United States and was ordered not to give vital intelligence information relating to the whereabouts of the Japanese fleet to our commanders in the field.

We had broken the Japanese code ... We'd been monitoring all their communications for months prior to the attack ... It was a lie that we didn't have direct radio communications with Washington, D.C.

It was at least 48 hours before the attack that I personally received the most tragic message of my life ... which was Top Secret and coded, which my radio operator handed to me. I had the code book and decoded it. The basic text of the message ran: "The Japanese will attack at (the approximate time). Do not prepare retaliatory forces. We need the full support of the American nation in a wartime effort by an unprovoked attack upon the nation in order to obtain a declaration of war."

That message and my 40 file cabinets of top secret information on Pearl Harbor were taken out and burned by myself and two other witnessing intelligence officers so that the Congressional investigation could not get to the truth as to what actually did happen at Pearl Harbor.

For the people of the United States both then and now I feel sorrow, for a people to have been so misled, to have been lied to so much, and to have so thoroughly believed the lie given to them.

Pearl Harbor is an example of how a small group of men in control of government has the power to destroy the life, property, and freedom of its citizens. How can this nation, or any nation, survive when its electorate is uninformed, that government hides the truth, labels it top secret, and destroys it.

http://www.ihr.org/jhr/v12/v12p119_Stolley.html

Quote:

Do Freedom of Information Act Files Prove FDR Had Foreknowledge of Pearl Harbor?
March 11, 2002
Robert B. Stinnett, Douglas Cirignano


An Interview with Robert B. Stinnett by Douglas Cirignano

On November 25, 1941 Japan’s Admiral Yamamoto sent a radio message to the group of Japanese warships that would attack Pearl Harbor on December 7. Newly released naval records prove that from November 17 to 25 the United States Navy intercepted eighty-three messages that Yamamoto sent to his carriers. Part of the November 25 message read: “...the task force, keeping its movements strictly secret and maintaining close guard against submarines and aircraft, shall advance into Hawaiian waters, and upon the very opening of hostilities shall attack the main force of the United States fleet in Hawaii and deal it a mortal blow...”

One might wonder if the theory that President Franklin Roosevelt had a foreknowledge of the Pearl Harbor attack would have been alluded to in this summer’s movie, Pearl Harbor. Since World War II many people have suspected that Washington knew the attack was coming. When Thomas Dewey was running for president against Roosevelt in 1944 he found out about America’s ability to intercept Japan’s radio messages, and thought this knowledge would enable him to defeat the popular FDR. In the fall of that year, Dewey planned a series of speeches charging FDR with foreknowledge of the attack. Ultimately, General George Marshall, then Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, persuaded Dewey not to make the speeches. Japan’s naval leaders did not realize America had cracked their codes, and Dewey’s speeches could have sacrificed America’s code-breaking advantage. So, Dewey said nothing, and in November FDR was elected president for the fourth time.

Now, though, according to Robert Stinnett, author of Simon & Schuster’s Day Of Deceit, we have the proof. Stinnett’s book is dedicated to Congressman John Moss, the author of America’s Freedom of Information Act. According to Stinnett, the answers to the mysteries of Pearl Harbor can be found in the extraordinary number of documents he was able to attain through Freedom of Information Act requests. Cable after cable of decryptions, scores of military messages that America was intercepting, clearly showed that Japanese ships were preparing for war and heading straight for Hawaii. Stinnett, an author, journalist, and World War II veteran, spent sixteen years delving into the National Archives. He poured over more than 200,000 documents, and conducted dozens of interviews. This meticulous research led Stinnet to a firmly held conclusion: FDR knew.

“Your boys are not going to be sent into any foreign wars,” was Roosevelt’s famous campaign statement of 1940. He wasn’t being ingenuous. FDR’s military and State Department leaders were agreeing that a victorious Nazi Germany would threaten the national security of the United States. In White House meetings the strong feeling was that America needed a call to action. This is not what the public wanted, though. Eighty to ninety percent of the American people wanted nothing to do with Europe’s war. So, according to Stinnett, Roosevelt provoked Japan to attack us, let it happen at Pearl Harbor, and thus galvanized the country to war. Many who came into contact with Roosevelt during that time hinted that FDR wasn’t being forthright about his intentions in Europe. After the attack, on the Sunday evening of December 7, 1941, Roosevelt had a brief meeting in the White House with Edward R. Murrow, the famed journalist, and William Donovan, the founder of the Office of Strategic Services. Later Donovan told an assistant that he believed FDR welcomed the attack and didn’t seem surprised. The only thing Roosevelt seemed to care about, Donovan felt, was if the public would now support a declaration of war. According to Day Of Deceit, in October 1940 FDR adopted a specific strategy to incite Japan to commit an overt act of war. Part of the strategy was to move America’s Pacific fleet out of California and anchor it in Pearl Harbor. Admiral James Richardson, the commander of the Pacific fleet, strongly opposed keeping the ships in harm’s way in Hawaii. He expressed this to Roosevelt, and so the President relieved him of his command. Later Richardson quoted Roosevelt as saying: “Sooner or later the Japanese will commit an overt act against the United States and the nation will be willing to enter the war.”

To those who believe that government conspiracies can’t possibly happen, Day Of Deceit could prove to them otherwise. Stinnett’s well-documented book makes a convincing case that the highest officials of the government—including the highest official—fooled and deceived millions of Americans about one of the most important days in the history of the country. It now has to be considered one of the most definitive—if not the definitive—book on the subject. Gore Vidal has said, “...Robert Stinnet has come up with most of the smoking guns. Day Of Deceit shows that the famous ‘surprise’ attack was no surprise to our war-minded rulers...” And John Toland, the Pulitzer Prize-winning author of the Pearl Harbor book, Infamy, said, “Step by step, Stinnett goes through the prelude to war, using new documents to reveal the terrible secrets that have never been disclosed to the public. It is disturbing that eleven presidents, including those I admired, kept the truth from the public until Stinnett’s Freedom of Information Act requests finally persuaded the Navy to release the evidence.”

http://www.independent.org/newsroom/article.asp?id=408

YEAH; the Japs fell for it.
I wonder whether thay subsequently REGRETED it ?
Things got a little ruff for Japan,
later in the war.

YEAH; the Japs fell for it.
I wonder whether thay subsequently REGRETED it ?
Things got a little ruff for Japan, later in the war.

I know that you like phony,

Om, and that you positively thrill to the US's frequent war crimes
against so many of the world's peoples.

You are just the type of depraved scum that make
a mockery of what the US is supposed to stand for.

He liberated them from foreign oppression.
Previously they were enslaved by imperial forces.

And now that world-wide Communism is -- thank the gods -- a dead issue, the Vietnamese people still revere Ho Chi Minh as the father of their newly-independent country and as a liberator of the Vietnamese people from the Chinese, the Japanese, the French and the Americans. Good for them.

It tells us that the human mind approaches infinite malleability.

It tells us that the human mind approaches infinite malleability.

That's the premise on which Fox News operates.

Btw, you won't find many dictators that have slaughtered as many
of their own citizens as your poster boy Pinochet.

I hate to be contrary, but Ho Chi Minh was (or at least became) a Soviet client
who supported the Soviet-led invasion of Czechoslovakia in 1968,
which clearly violated that country's right of self-determination.

Good one, Set. Which brings to mind:

"Nuts!"

Speech and reply given by General Anthony Clement McAuliffe

Really??? Will u support that with some evidence ?

There's loads of studies that show Fox News viewers actually know less about the world around them because they watch Fox News.

Really??? Will u support that with some evidence ?

You've never let evidence get in the way of ideology before Dave.
There's loads of studies [How many loads??] that show Fox News viewers
actually know less about the world around them because they watch Fox News.

I'm not running around looking for it. The truth is out there.

Your memory is correct. You should read The Bridge at Andau by James Michener.
It's so heartbreaking I had to put it down.

There was also the Soviet military intervention in Berlin in 1953.

Can't stay. Gotta go.

The significant criterion was NOT citizenship. It was communist treason, like the Rosenbergs.
Thay deserved what thay got and a lot worse.

[How many loads??]

That was CLEVER, Izzy.
Lemme know if u run into Fox Molder,