Michelle Malkin conducted absolutely no scholarly research in the writing of this ridiculous book. She argued that Japan controlled the entire Pacific Ocean, maintained a vast network of spies in the US, and planned to invade the West Coast. Through subterfuge and falsification of information, she thus concluded that internment camps were not morally reprehensible because they were of military necessity and because, in her mind, racism did not exist during the 1940s.
Fortunately, Eric Muller, a law professor at UNC -- Chapel Hill, revealed that Malkin's arguments were entirely unsubstantiated and willfully falsified. As historian Greg Robinson observed, "there were no reports of sabotage or espionage" following Pearl Harbor or before Japanese-Americans were unlawfully imprisoned. Allied forces maintained a Germany-first strategy because they considered Japan to be a lesser threat, in part because it did not have absolute control of the Pacific Ocean. Moreover, internment camps were established in June 1942, after the Battle of Midway, in which Japan's defeat greatly diminished its threat to the US mainland.
Despite the great deal of criticism she received, Malkin refused to budge from her position that MAGIC cables established the military necessity of internment camps. She underscored how important MAGIC was to her argument by dedicating her book to David Lowman, whose "research" on MAGIC she borrowed extensively from. However, James C. McNaughton, Command Historian of the US Army, Pacific, declared that Lowman's work on MAGIC to be of no merit and dismissed Lowman's "polemics ... as symptomatic of the lingering bitterness stemming from Pearl Harbor and the emotions raised by apologies and compensation."
Even the Historians' Committee for Fairness proved that Malkin's book represented "a blatant violation of professional standards of objectivity" -- "decades of scholarly research, including works by the official historian of the US Army" have contradicted every one of her intellectually dishonest claims. Following a report by the US government Commission on Wartime Relocation and Internment of Civilians, President Reagan authorized that compensation be paid because the denial of civil rights to Japanese-Americans had been "motivated by racism" instead of veritable military concerns. As the noted biographer Jean Edward Smith pointed out, during their internment, Japanese-Americans lost more than $400 million from 1942 to 1945, a sum when adjusted for inflation equated to almost $5 billion. These financial losses were never fully or adequately recouped.
Lastly, it should be noted that the segregated Japanese-American 100th Battalion/442nd Regimental Combat Team became the most highly decorated unit for its size and length of service in the history of the US Army. When the European Theatre finally ended, the 100th/442nd had received 7 Presidential Unit Citations, and its members were awarded numerous decorations for valor and competence, including 21 Medals of Honor, 52 Distinguished Service Crosses, 560 Silver Stars, 4,000 Bronze Stars, and 9,486 Purple Hearts. Their sacrifice was astounding because they suffered a casualty rate of 314 percent, which meant, on average, every man was injured more than three times.
