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Pearl Harbor: Warning and Decision (Paperback)

~ Roberta Wohlstetter (Author) "In the last few hours of peace, the detection and communication of warning signals depended most desperately on the speed and efficiency of technical facilities..." (more)
Key Phrases: naval warning, code burning, radio traffic analysis, United States, Pearl Harbor, Far East (more...)
4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (7 customer reviews)

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Pearl Harbor: Warning and Decision + Day Of Deceit: The Truth About FDR and Pearl Harbor + The Pearl Harbor Myth: Rethinking the Unthinkable (Potomac's Military Controversies)
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Product Details

  • Paperback: 428 pages
  • Publisher: Stanford University Press; 1 edition (June 1, 1962)
  • Language: English
  • ISBN-10: 0804705984
  • ISBN-13: 978-0804705981
  • Product Dimensions: 8.4 x 5.5 x 1.1 inches
  • Shipping Weight: 1.2 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
  • Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (7 customer reviews)
  • Amazon.com Sales Rank: #343,634 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

    Popular in these categories: (What's this?)

    #42 in  Books > History > Military > World War II > Pearl Harbor
    #69 in  Books > History > United States > State & Local > Hawaii

Inside This Book (learn more)
First Sentence:
In the last few hours of peace, the detection and communication of warning signals depended most desperately on the speed and efficiency of technical facilities and on the reaction time of the individual observer. Read the first page
Key Phrases - Statistically Improbable Phrases (SIPs): (learn more)
naval warning, code burning, radio traffic analysis, code destruction, naval war plans, theater warnings, surprise aggressive movement, joint dispatch, interceptor command, aircraft warning service, winds code, first thirteen parts, pilot message, district intelligence officer, inshore patrol, signal picture, vital installations, fourteenth part, first overt act, war warning, carrier division, surprise air attack, strategic warning, diplomatic traffic, shooting orders
Key Phrases - Capitalized Phrases (CAPs): (learn more)
United States, Pearl Harbor, Far East, General Short, State Department, Admiral Kimmel, Admiral Stark, Chief of Staff, War Department, General Marshall, Admiral Turner, Great Britain, Netherlands East Indies, General Gerow, Naval District, Secretary Hull, French Indochina, General Miles, Ambassador Grew, Navy Department, President Roosevelt, Hong Kong, Ten Point Note, Admiral Bloch, Panama Canal
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Front Cover | Table of Contents | First Pages | Index | Back Cover | Surprise Me!
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Customer Reviews

7 Reviews
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67 of 68 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars Pearl Harbor: Warning and Decision, May 14, 2000
By Gary W. Roberson (Arlington, VA United States) - See all my reviews
This work is the definitive analysis of the intelligence failures leading up to the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941. It is not an historical account of the attack, but is rather a concise analysis of the mistakes made by naval intelligence authorities in Hawaii and the U.S. during the months leading up to the attack.

The book offers a unique analysis of the attack, and doesn't pull any punches. Human failures are analyzed, as well as bureaucratic failures, which were many. The reader comes away with a better understanding of the attitudes prevelant among intelligence authorities of the time, as well as an insight into their workings.

This is not a book for those just beginning their studies of the attack. It is more appropriate for someone who already has a good understanding of the historical timelines of the attack, the Japanese perspective of U.S. military policy at the time, and the military and civilian authorities involved in the attack and their roles.

The only negative comment regarding the book is that it offers rather tedious reading at times. But to serious researchers this is more than offset by the volumes of information gleaned from it.

This is a "must-have" book for serious Pearl Harbor researchers.

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26 of 31 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars A Hearty Perennial, January 2, 2005
By G.G.P. III (NC United States) - See all my reviews
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The first two (petulant) reviews here rather miss the point. Wohlstetter's "Pearl Harbor" is a venerable classic which is still read and quoted from more than 40 years after publication. (It is, for example, referred to by historian and strategist John Lewis Gaddis in the lead article of the Jan/Feb 2005 issue of "Foreign Affairs.")

If you haven't read "Pearl Harbor: Warning and Decision," then you really aren't prepared for serious discussions with well-informed people about such things as "pre-emptive" and "preventive" wars.
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3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars Anatomy of a Surprise, March 11, 2008
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The Japanese surprise attack on Pearl Harbor in 1941 succeeded in putting a large portion of the U.S. Pacific Fleet out of action for months. The attack succeeded because of what today would be called a failure of Command, Control, Communications, Intelligence, and Reconnaissance (C3IR). In this definitive history, Roberta Wohlstetter provides an extensive documentation that catalogues the C3IR failures that explain the success of the Japanese attack. From her account it is clear that these failures were caused by a pervasive mindset among the U.S. Army and Navy high commands that Japan would not and could not attack the fortified island of Oahu in then territory of Hawaii.

Wohlstetter demonstrates that this mindset was coupled with an almost complete lack of inter-service cooperation between the Army and the Navy. Not even George C. Marshall, the brilliant Army Chief of Staff, understood that to defend an island like Oahu the Army would need to cooperate closely with Navy. In fact Marshall and his naval counterpart Chief of Naval Operations (CNO) Admiral Stark hardly communicated at all. This distant relationship was duplicated by the lack of cooperation between General Short, commander of the army's Department of Hawaii and Admiral Kimmel, commander of the U.S. Pacific Fleet. Thus the defense of Oahu and Pearl Harbor was not based on joint, integrated planning nor on a mutual understanding of the two services' capabilities and weaknesses.

The much discussed failure of the then U.S. intelligence system to provide warning of the Japanese attack was exacerbated by the failure of the newly established Air Warning System (AWS) to operate as it was designed. Neither Short nor Kimmel demonstrated any interest in the AWS and made no effort to ensure it was properly staffed and trained. Further the Navy chose not to provide the long range air reconnaissance patrols that were to be a part of the AWS. Finally the command and control as exercised by the Army General Staff and the CNO in Washington in the period prior to the attack was weak and badly executed. This was mirrored by the staffs of Short and Kimmel in Hawaii. In short the Japanese surprise attack on December 1941 succeeded because the U.S. C3IR systems in place failed. As Wohlsetter clearly shows Pearl Harbor was caused by multiple U.S. Military failures of concept and execution.

This book wisely does not speculate on the pre-Pearl Harbor actions of the U.S. civil government under President Franklin Roosevelt. The evidence here is much more complex and subject to interpretation.
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Most Recent Customer Reviews

5.0 out of 5 stars Pearl Harbor: Anatomy of a Warning Failure...
1962's "Pearl Harbor: Warning and Decision" is Roberta Wohlstetter's meticulous reconstruction of the indications and warning process preceding the successful Japanese surprise... Read more
Published 15 months ago by D. S. Thurlow

5.0 out of 5 stars When it comes to Pearl Harbor, there is no such word as "enough."
The latest news is that a midget submarine did in fact penetrate Pearl Harbor and launch its two torpedoes into a battleshipm and the midget supposedly sunk by the destroyer WARD... Read more
Published 22 months ago by Anthony Benedict

5.0 out of 5 stars Excellent Read
This is the quinteissential book about the Intelligence failure of Pearl Harbor. SecDef Rumsfeld is said to have required all of his aides to read it (prior to 9/11). Read more
Published 23 months ago by Jerome

1.0 out of 5 stars Tedious and Useless
The simple fact about US intelligence before Pearl Harbor in the Pacific is that we had cracked their diplomatic (Purple)code, but that was of little use in understanding what... Read more
Published on January 19, 2004 by Kent Beuchert

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