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

Joint Congressional Committee, Pearl Harbor Attack: Reports 837
Saturday night, December 6; and Sunday morning, December
7, the President of the United States failed to take that quick
and instant executive action which was required by the occasion
and by the responsibility for watchfulness and guardianship
rightly associated in law and practice with his high offi ce
from the establishment of the Republic to our own times. 21
Evidence set forth in this report in detail is ample to show that
in the period approximately from May 1940 to December 7,
1941, the high authorities at Washington assumed so much
of the direction of aff airs at Hawaii as to remove many of the
basic responsibilities from the commanders in the fi eld. Th e
result was to reduce the discretion of the commanders in the
fi eld by those things which they were ordered to do by directions
from Washington and not to do certain things unless
they were so ordered from Washington. Another result of this
practice was to lull the commanders in the fi eld into awaiting
instructions from Washington. 22
Admittedly Marshall and Stark were
carrying heavy burdens in preparing the armed forces of the
United States for war; in making war plans; in building up an
Army and Navy (which they knew were not yet ready for war),
and in struggling for a postponement of the war until the Army
and Navy were better prepared to cope with the foe. With
regard to the President, the Secretary of State, the Secretary of
War, and the Secretary of the Navy, it may be said justly that
they were carrying heavy burdens also. But all these offi cials, as
Secretary Stimson’s diary demonstrates, spent many days before
December 7 in general discussions which led to no decisions.
Th is they did at a time when they possessed special knowledge
of Japanese designs and were acquainted with their own intentions
and resolves and certainly had the leisure to do the one
21Ibid., pp. 505–06.
22Ibid., p. 553.