What if the Japanese didn't attack Pearl Harbour?

sAd CaSe SG

1.It is true that the US knew abt the planned
2.It is also true that the US needed Jap atk to get into war
3.The US had to a certain extent,delibrately called the Pacific fleet back into the Harbour.
4.They did it so as to prevent the Jap atk AND declare war on Jap.

Therefore,they underestimated the Japs at Pearl Harbour caused they wanted 2 bring down the attack and declare war on japan for attacking.Looks like they got owned in the first battle

Aulf SG

Hard 2 accept dat the Americans wld turn 2 such a costly alternative to go 2 war wif Japan ... surely there muz be a better way ... well, if the attack didn't happen, and the Americans entered the war much later, Europe & the rest of the world wld have 2 endure more of Nazi Germany and WW2 wld hv dragged for a longer time ... more lives wld hv been lost Sad

spencer99 SG

60 years from now... people will say that Bush delibrately let Osama attack WTC so that he can launch a major war to setup a base in the Gulf and control the oil there.

|-|05| SG

The US loses werent as bad as it would seem…sure 3 BB’s sunk….8 more almost sunk some 10 destroyers and cruisers hit.Planes gone and men dead but honestly the BB’s were all outdated,the planes too.The 3 aircraft carriers were called out for an excerise at a convient time werent they?most of the better planes werent even depolyed there yet.Overall while many lives were lost,the lost to material and stuff werent much.All in all it looked real but i think it’s a ploy to get into a war

Obersturmfuhrer SG

This I beg to differ, the sinking caused a diplomatic furore back then and there was much protesting and argument but the Americans remained neutral. The US Congress voted and unanimously rejected President Roosevelt's call to declare war on Germany while Churchill had to sit back to sulk for a while longer.

Gedanken SG

Well, the warnings were there and coming in a steady stream since 1999. Why was nothing done about it? The congressional hearings about 9/11 have produced a lot of scapegoats, but isn't it odd how Rumsfeld, Wolfie and gang have so far gotten away relatively unscathed? It reminds me of how Douglas McArthur's career took off after he apparently screwed up the defence of the Phillipines, to the point of keeping the Air Force on the ground for an extra 9 hours.

Nelstar SG

the reason why it was recorded as Americans were unprepared:

Will you go and tell your citizens that you heard about possible invasions and probably did nearly nothing about it because you don't believe it?

surely you wouldn't want to tell your children that you know that you might go bankrupt, risk it nearly got bankrupt and they had to suffer poverty becos of your poor decision making rights?

Typhoon SG

- Historians have found a note from Lt. Cmdr Arthur McCullum, dated 7 Oct 1940 listing eight actions designed to incite a military action by Japan, including such actions as the blocking of the sale of oil to the Japanese, maintaining a heavy US naval presence in the Pacific, and supporting Chiang Kai-shek in China.

- Having cracked the Japanese Navy cipher, the US government was well aware of the preparations Japan was making to attack Pearl Harbour. They were also aware of the date the Japanese had chosen at least a week in advance. Coincidentially Yorktown, Hornet and Enterprise were not in Pearl during the attack but were later available to turn the tide at Midway.

- The entire purpose why the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbour was to cripple the US carrier fleet. The Japanese knew that the key to dominance of the Pacific was not the battleship but the aircraft carrier. If the 3 US carriers had been present at Pearl Harbour Japanese casualties would have been heavier but it would have ensured them winning the war.

Some books on the Pearl Harbour conspiracy theory:

Morton A. Kaplan, Why Roosevelt Wanted Japan to attack Pearl Harbor

Robert B. Stinnett, Day of Deceit: The Truth about FDR and Pearl Harbor

Langley SG

There are no ‘what ifs’ in history. Reason being simply that anything could have happened. The US could have sat out the war. Or the US could still have decided that Japan was a threat and needed to be countered. Mathematically speaking, speculation is useless since there are close to infinite permutations with all of them having a roughly equal chance of coming true. And thinking of conspiracy theories is dangerous. Such theorists have it right when they argue that disasters like Pearl Harbour and 911 allow countries alot of leeway to pursue previously unthinkable policies eg. become a world power, control the Asia-Pacific/Middle East. But they are simply outlandish to believe that leaders would consciously murder their own citizens such that these policies could be pursued! Unless certain rogue elements of the government allow these things to happen.. All in all, its pointless to speculate.

Nelstar SG

There are always sources quoting this type of discoveries as historians like to dig up shit. Afterall, they are the ones who forced the archaelogists to dig up bones.

Moxie SG

The conspiracy theories sprouted primarily cuz relevant documents were being declassifed only 10 years ago, some even in the new milllineum & are ongoing.

What's established facts is that, while America is still largely isolationist, the FDR administration was very hawkish - for good reasons. Macro-ly, Europe was falling to the Nazis & Fascists, twingeing the idealistic instints of a great Democratic bastion. Micro-ly, the US Navy was already tangling with German U-boats in the months prior to Pearl Harbour.

Concurrently, the Neutrality Act was already been repealed bit by bit, the US miltary was starting to mobilise its troops (the entire pre-war active army was smaller than MacArthur's Phillipines command, if I'm correct), & FDR actually sanctioned the nuclear-war progam a day before Pearl Harbour.

Also, the cracking of the Japanese cipher is a true event; the USA knew beforehand that the militarists had won the day & that they've given up on diplomacy. What FDR didn't know, however, is when & where the attack or attacks would occur - & it is this which the conspiracy theorists are arguing about. What's no longer accepted is the idea of Pearl Harbour catching America 100% "blind".

I think thread has - inadvertently? - asked 2 geopolitical questions here:

(a) what if Japan didn't attack Pearl Harbour, as the topic title indicated? My guess is the ongoing U-boat entanglements would've been the persuasive catalyst for the FDR administration to seek a declaration of war from Congress. This could've taken a while, or maybe not - it's largely dependent on how much Hitler (who was focusing on Soviet Russia at this point) wanted to fight a 2nd front.

(b) what if the US had stopped the attack, as worded in the initial post, to elicit a stalemate or successfully beaten off the Japanese squadrons? This is easier to answer. Hitler wasn't informed of the surprise attack, but Germany (& Italy) had an agreement with Japan to support the latter in such a situation. So the 2 Axis powers would've still declared war on the USA days after the event, instead of vice-versa in history (post-attack, America declared war on them 1st, before they "returned the favor").

In both cases, I don't think the momentum towards a global war (i.e. European & Pacific theaters) could've been stemmed. Instead, IMHO the big alternative-history question is whether the USA & Nazi Germany would've each shied away from fighting 2 main fronts if they could. As it happened, Destiny decided for them ...

spencer99 SG

The 3 Hawaii based carriers at the point of the attack are the Enterprise, Lexington and Yorktown. But only two are in the Western Pacific. The two are ferrying planes to Guan and Wake Island in preparation for the coming war. The third carrier in the West coast undergoing repairs/overhaul.

The Hornet is moved from the Atlantic to the Pacific together with some BBs after the Pearl Harbour attack to meet the Japanese threat. Prior to the PH attack the Naval priority was in the Atlantic.

ferret69 SG

On an unrelated note but interesting to WW2 fans, this little bit of trivia.

Cost of Manhattan Project : $2 Billion

Cost of B-29 bomber development programme : $3 Billion

spencer99 SG

"In two hours 18 warships, 188 aircraft and 2,403 servicemen were lost in the attack. Luckily, the navy's three aircraft carriers, Enterprise, Lexington and Saratoga, were all at sea at the time"

Sorry, the three carriers were Enterprise, Lexington and Saratoga.

ferret69 SG

As for my thoughts on this "conspiracy" theories, I do not believe in them. The main failure of the United States was not in intelligence gathering, but in the systematic analysis of all these disparate pieces of info which would reveal a surprise attack on Pearl Harbor and on other US interests.

Thus the impetus in drafting the National Security Act of 1947, creating the CIA tasked "with coordinating the nations intelligence activities and correlating, evaluating and disseminating intelligence which affects national security."

zenden9 SG

With or without pearl harbour attack! US will still declared war on Japan.As Japan was badly shortage of natural resources for its war industries even with conquest of Coastal China and Indochina.They need the oil field and other natural resources in Burma and Malaya to substance further.

US had warned any further invasion of Britain territories will trigger a war with US. Without Pearl Harbour attack,Japan will still attack the remain of southeast-asia and force the US pacific fleet to fight Japan.The asia WWII will end faster with US pacific Fleet intact and able to deal Japan a terrible defeat by using phillipine as a major attack base to strike all Japan base in asia and Japan.Plus Singapore will not fall! US army r far more superior than Japan.A jungle war will be advantage for US.

Gedanken SG

I beg to differ. Over the course of 1941, the Americans had been warned by Australians, Germans (the German ambassador to the US was in fact an anti-Nazi subsersive), Peruvians and Russians (courtesy of Richard Sorge) that the Japanese were specifically going to attack Pearl Harbour in November or December. Days before the attack, the US intercepted a Japanese transmission giving the go-ahead for the attack on the morning of 7 December - the Americans, British and Chinese had already broken the code months prior to the message.

Despite all of this, CINCPAC Admiral Kimmel was never informed or warned of the impending attack. All of the information was there - it was just not passed on to the one person who needed it, even though pearl Harbour was already known to be the target.

Viper52 SG

Back to the original question, American would have still come into the war regardless or not the Japanese had hit Pearl Harbour on 7th December. This is because the Japanese will still have struck at East Asia including the Philippines on that date. The Americans would have been dragged in due to the attack on the Philippines and even if the Japanese had bypassed the Philippines and gone for Malaya and the East Indies purely, the US would have responded to the imminent threat and Japan would have to invade the Philippines sooner or later. The difference is without Pearl Harbour, the Americans might not have the same resolve to prosecute the war.

Nelstar, its always good to re-examine history using new facts and info that have been discovered. One such example is a theory slowly gaining ground that far from being the screw ups they have been painted as, the crew of the cruiser IJN Tone's infamous Scout No.4 at Midway did an excellent and accurate job of scouting for the Japanese at Midway and only bad luck prevented the information from being better used, based on a study of new facts done by a USN college.

We must however remember to use these new facts correctly and judge historical figures fairly despite these new facts. After all,

wd1 SG

the only way we'll know for sure is to send someone back in time and kill ADM Yamamoto's mum before she met his dad.

IMO the US entry into the war would have been inevitable once the Japs invaded the philippines and malaya. the USN would of course have been in a much stronger position to take on the IJN in terms of men and materiel, but i feel it would have suffered in terms of public support and the emotional drive of its men, since it took the massive surprise, shame and damage of pearl harbour to galvanise the US as a country to totally support the war. if pearl harbour didnt happen and the US went to war anyway you might have seen crowds going out on the streets to protest against the war like they are doing against the iraq war.

gaoyue SG

I think I'll just answer the main question.. This is just my 2 cents alright.

1. The attack will not take place, however, the American government will not attack Japan.
2. Japan will continue to be a police state under Yamagato.
3. Colonies under Japan rule will still be under its "protection", mainly SE Asia, Mongolia and South Korea.
4. The war in Europe will last a hellva longer, and Germany might win.
5. America will take the oppotunity to establish itself in Europe, becoming "friends" with Germany and it will used Japan's mistake to conclude an agreement for its own benefits.
6. Because of difference in idealogy between America and major powers in Europe, WW3 might occur around now.
7. Yamagato's influence will slowly fade away, and Ito-minded people will have the chance to take over as the major statesman of Japan. The royal family will continue to act as their symbol of power towards the people of Japan.

Well, might be.

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