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“Hitler’s American Gamble” by Simms and Laderman
Brendan Simms & Charlie Laderman, Hitler’s American Gamble: Pearl Harbor and Germany’s March to Global War (New York: Basic Books, 2021), 528 pages, $35, Amazon $28.13, Kindle $19.99.
John Lukacs’ Five Days in London May 1940 covered 24-28 May 1940, when the British Cabinet debated negotiations with Germany. Hitler’s American Gamble is equally fascinating because it does the same thing. It focuses on 7-11 December 1941, from Pearl Harbor attack to Hitler’s declaration of war on the United States.
Hitler’s declaration was considered an inexplicable blunder by many at the time as well as today. Simms and Laderman disagree: “[I]n reality, Hitler’s declaration of war was a deliberate gamble, driven by his geopolitical calculations, his assessment of the balance of manpower and materiel and, above all, his obsession with the United States and its global influence. The world that emerged on 12 December 1941 was not inevitable, even immediately after the Pearl Harbor attack.”
To prove that what happened was not inevitable, Simms and Laderman consider the concerns and actions of five countries. Primarily, that involved the leaders of Germany, Britain, America, Japan and Russia. (Italy is usually mentioned as an afterthought.)
Churchill’s concerns
In his war memoirs Churchill famously wrote of the Japanese attack: “…now at this very moment I knew the United States was in the war, up to the neck and in to the death. So we had won after all!”
Not so fast, Simms and Laderman argue: Not even Hitler’s declaration of war justified Churchill’s sentiment. Salvation would come on 31 December when the British and American chiefs of staff agreed upon the strategy of “Germany first.” These five days were probably more trying for Churchill than any other leader. By contrast, Hitler and the Japanese knew what they were going to do from the outset.
Churchill’s primary concern before Pearl Harbor was what the U.S. would do if Japan attacked only British possessions. That prompted his promise immediately to declare war on Japan if it attacked America. FDR did not reciprocate. Pearl Harbor removed that worry, only to have it replaced by more serious ones. How would Lend-Lease would be impacted? In the short term, Churchill knew it would be severe. The War Department under Henry Stimson promptly shut off the flow of shipments to both Britain and the USSR, even going to the extent of unloading ships containing Lend-Lease materials and asking Britain to return armaments already shipped.
Churchill told the King on Monday 8 December: “We have to be careful that our share of munitions and other aid which we are receiving from the United States does not suffer more than is, I fear, inevitable.” Given the vehement reaction by Americans to the Japanese attack, he also feared the U.S. might concentrate on the Pacific. And there were lots of military men in America who wanted to do just that.
Churchill’s visit to Washington
For both these reasons, the authors write, Churchill told the King “he must set sail for Washington to meet with Roosevelt as soon as possible, in order to coordinate the ‘whole plan of Anglo-American defence and attack.’” Foreign Secretary Anthony Eden, and his advisers Alexander Cadogan and Oliver Harvey opposed his visit. Eden knew he would be in Moscow consulting with the Russians at the same time. Harvey noted in his diary that the “PM is a lunatic.” Churchill ignored them, of course, and on 9 December asked Roosevelt for an early visit.
The same day Ambassador Lord Halifax duly approached FDR, who fended him off, expressing concerns for Churchill’s safety at sea. Simms and Laderman suggest that Roosevelt really feared an early visit by the British leader might fuel “accusations that Britain was seeking to draw the United States into a European war too.” The President told Halifax no meeting was possible before the New Year. Churchill was not happy to hear this. He was less happy the next day, 10 December, when Halifax advised him that FDR preferred meeting in Bermuda “on security grounds.”
Churchill dismissed safety concerns, agreeing to Bermuda if necessary, but thought waiting a month was a bad idea. If the President gave the word, he was ready to leave the next day. Two unsent replies by FDR on 10 December continued to resist an early visit. Tellingly, the actual reply, after Hitler’s war declaration, effectively said: come on over!
German intentions
At the time, both Roosevelt and Churchill were aware from intelligence intercepts that Germany had promised Japan as early as 28 November 1941 to declare war on America in the event of a conflict between the U.S. and Japan. Technically Hitler was required to act only if Japan was attacked first. Roosevelt was cautious and could not be sure if Hitler would keep his promise to Japan. The USSR had learned the hard way about the Führer’s promises.
Hitler was scheduled to address the Reichstag at 3pm on Thursday 11 December (8am in Washington). U.S. newspapers reported from Berlin that Hitler would declare war on the Americans. Simms and Laderman suggest Roosevelt was aware of this also. Whatever the reason, at 6:30pm on the 10th, FDR changed his tune and sent a message to Churchill: “Delighted to have you here at the White House.” After that, the authors helpfully tell us, “with Eleanor still away on the West Coast,” FDR “mixed cocktails and dined alone” with Norwegian Crown Princess Märtha before “parting just after midnight.” The Princess told her chief aide, “There was no talk of policy.”
(Note: Viewers of PBS Masterpiece Theater series Atlantic Crossing will know of Princess Märtha’s stay at the White House with her children following the German invasion of Norway. That film speculated on a romantic relationship between the President and Princess. Simms and Laderman say an unnamed Roosevelt son suspected “a true romantic relationship,” and that “over the past year, she had spent more time with Roosevelt than any other figure out side of his immediate White House circle, leading his aides to refer to her as ‘the president’s girlfriend.’”)
Roosevelt’s “disinformation” campaign
An intriguing aspect of the book is how Roosevelt and his administration hedged its bet that Hitler would declare war. In various ways they conveyed what today is called “disinformation”—that Germany was involved in the Japanese attack. This would establish a basis for war on Germany. Some examples:
Monday 8 December—FDR claims Japan had acted “under pressure from Berlin… to divert the American mind and the British mind from the European field.”
—FDR’s Director of the Supply Priorities and Allocation Board calls Pearl Harbor “an attack upon us by the Axis powers… directed primarily from Berlin.”
—New York mayor Fiorello La Guardia, FDR’s Director of the Office of Civil Defense, says “Nazi thugs and gangsters” were “the masterminds” behind Pearl Harbor.
—FDR tells bipartisan congressional leaders about a rumor that two planes at Pearl Harbor “were seen with swastikas on them.” He said he would consider that to be “news until something more definite comes in.”
—FDR releases a statement to the press that “obviously Germany did all it could to push the Japanese into the war as it hoped that such a conflict would put an end to the Lend-Lease program.”
***
Wednesday 10 December—In his first fireside chat since Pearl Harbor, Roosevelt claims Japan was in “actual collaboration” with the Nazis and that Germany had “instructed” Japan to attack the United States. It would not be enough to defeat Japan if we “found that the rest of the world was dominated by Hitler and Mussolini.”
—An AP story reports that “Rumors were afloat that some Germans had been shot down in Japanese planes” during attacks on the Philippines and quotes “a United States Army spokesman” in Manila who said “Japanese ground tactics… indicated German tutelage if not actual German participation.”
—The Minneapolis Morning Tribune runs the AP story under the headline, “Japanazis: Toyko Air Force is Equipped by Nazis.”
—The Atlanta Journal reports Carl Vinson, chairman of the House naval committee as saying he is “confident that the attacking planes and ships were Japanese in name only.” In the same article, Senator Walter George, chairman of the Senate Finance Committee, says many German planes “have been overhauled and flown to Japan… and there can be no question that the attack was arranged and engineered by the Germans.”
“Prussians of the Far East”
The authors do not recount Hitler’s reaction to this fake news, but they do reveal how he first learned of the Pearl Harbor. It wasn’t from his erstwhile Axis ally, Japan. Hitler’s press chief, Otto Dietrich, heard it on an enemy broadcast—Reuters East Asian radio—and rushed to tell Hitler. Simms and Laderman say all accounts of Hitler’s reaction agree: The Führer was “surprised—he clearly had no foreknowledge of the date and time of the attack—and ecstatic.”
The first issue of the Economist following Hitler’s declaration of war, quoted by the authors, presciently mirrors their own view. The journal questioned those calling it “Hitler’s greatest blunder.” It would be “wise to assume,” the Economist wrote, “that Hitler and his General Staff do not commit blunders… if Hitler thinks a Japanese attack on America serves his purposes, it is more probable that he is right than wrong.” Hitler was not blundering, they added. He was “gambling—gambling on time, short-term against long term, immediate results against future hazards.”
To Goebbels, Hitler, not especially known as a sports fan, explained his thinking on declaring war with a boxing analogy: “A boxer who saves his most crushing blows for the fifth or sixth rounds can experience what Max Schmeling experienced in his last encounter with Joe Louis, which is that he is knocked out in the first round.” Goebbels further disclosed in his diary that Hitler was delighted to have secured the Japanese as a strong ally because he considered them “the Prussians of the Far East” and that he “once again radiates a wave of optimism and confidence in victory.”
A fatal underestimation
Goebbels further explained the reasons for Hitler’s renewed optimism. “The USA will hardly be in a position to send significant amounts of material to England, let alone the Soviet Union. They will need it themselves in the next weeks and months.”
Meanwhile, the “Prussians of the Far East” were busy cutting their own deal with Stalin. It made no difference that Japan was in the Axis and Russia with the Allies. Neither of them wanted to fight a two-front war. A war with Japan would hinder Stalin’s battle with the Nazis. For Japan, war with Russia would detract from its struggle with America and Great Britain.
On Monday, 8 December, Chiang Kai-shek met with the Soviet ambassador, calling for the USSR to declare war on Japan. Some in the U.S. government, including Douglas MacArthur, also favored this. But Roosevelt never insisted on that as the price for Russia continuing to receive Lend-Lease shipments. Likewise, Hitler never made Japan declaring war on the Soviet Union a condition of Germany declaring war on America. The day after Pearl Harbor, Japan took the initiative: Foreign Minister Togo told the German ambassador that Japan would continue to honor the Neutrality Pact and assumed the Soviets would do likewise. In the event, they did. Had either declared war on the other, the war could have taken a more ominous turn for Britain and America.
Simms and Laderman…
…contend that Churchill was right in continuing to press for a meeting with FDR as soon as possible after Pearl Harbor. He correctly disregarded the contrary advice of Eden, Cadogan and Harvey. He knew, if they didn’t, that he needed to be in the room when future U.S. military strategy was determined.
Had Churchill meekly accepted Roosevelt’s proposal to delay their meeting, American strategy could have been set in stone without his input. If as a result the U.S. decided on “Japan First,” Hitler might well have been on his way to winning his gamble.
On the other hand, Roosevelt always favored a “Germany First” strategy, even after Pearl Harbor. This is shown by his “disinformation” campaign that Germany was really behind the Japanese attack. FDR was intent upon a “war of choice” versus Germany, using its alleged involvement in Pearl Harbor as a pretext for war even if Germany did not declare war on the U.S.
Similarly, 62 years later, G.W. Bush promoted a “war of choice” with Saddam Hussein using the “disinformation” of implying a link between Saddam and al-Qaeda over 9-11 and Iraq’s alleged possession of weapons of mass destruction. In the event, FDR did not need the “disinformation” for his war of choice against Germany thanks to Hitler’s declaration, whereas Bush very much needed his “disinformation” for his war of choice with Iraq. Things worked out for FDR; not so much for Bush.