Pearl Harbor: The Seeds and Fruits of Infamy - Ludwig von Mises ...

630 Pearl Harbor: The Seeds and Fruits of Infamy
own division had given no hint that an attack might be expected
on Pearl Harbor. 42 Miles responded:
We had known for many years that all three of those outposts
[Philippines, Panama, and Hawaii] would probably be subject
to an attack in a Japanese war. Th at is why we had our forces
on them and why the Chief of Staff warned them when he
considered the time had arrived that hostile Japanese action
was possible at any moment. 43
Murphy was disturbed by “the inference” in Miles’s testimony
that he was “probably the only person in Washington who
expected the attack at Pearl Harbor.” Time after time Miles had
said “how obvious it was, and how inherent it was in the situation.”
Yet Murphy said he had read Miles’s reports
from cover to cover and . . . have not seen it [Pearl Harbor]
mentioned once. Apparently people at Hawaii did not think it
was so obvious because they were taken by surprise, and apparently
the others in Washington did not think it was so obvious
because they were taken by surprise. 44
Gearhart pointed out to Miles,
[T]here is plenty in all of this literature, an abundance, which
points out the possibility of attack in the Philippines, in the
Kra Peninsula, in Th ailand, in Indochina, everywhere except
on these two very great fortresses at Singapore and Hawaii.
. . . If you have anything to the contrary I would like to have
you point it out. . . . Why, even on the 27th, after Mr. Hull had
handed his fi nal statement to the Japanese, a letter was written
by the Joint Chiefs of Staff in which they point out all of these
42 Ibid., pp. 875–76, 902, and 921–22.
43 Ibid., pp. 890–91.
44 Ibid., p. 902.