Charles Lindbergh Stands Against Military Interventionism, War Hawks (1941)

[FrankRep]

Yeah most of that movement disintegrated after Pearl Harbor. So much for principles...

Japan committed an act of War.

[NIU Students for Liberty]

Japan committed an act of War.

Japan didn't commit an act of war, the Japanese government responded to sanctions placed on them by the U.S. government. Neither American nor Japanese citizens benefited from the atrocities committed by both of their governments. It's unfortunate that at one time there was a strong non-interventionist sentiment in the U.S. but all it took was a revival in jingoist/nationalistic propaganda to permanently shatter that movement.

[thequietkid10]

Japan didn't commit an act of war, the Japanese government responded to sanctions placed on them by the U.S. government. Neither American nor Japanese citizens benefited from the atrocities committed by both of their governments. It's unfortunate that at one time there was a strong non-interventionist sentiment in the U.S. but all it took was a revival in jingoist/nationalistic propaganda to permanently shatter that movement.

...how do economy sanctions from one country, in response to imperialist expansion, justify a military attack?

[heavenlyboy34]

Japan didn't commit an act of war, the Japanese government responded to sanctions placed on them by the U.S. government. Neither American nor Japanese citizens benefited from the atrocities committed by both of their governments. It's unfortunate that at one time there was a strong non-interventionist sentiment in the U.S. but all it took was a revival in jingoist/nationalistic propaganda to permanently shatter that movement.

Truth. The US regime's sanctions against the Japanese were an act of war. Kamikazee blowback.

[FrankRep]

Truth. The US regime's sanctions against the Japanese were an act of war. Kamikazee blowback.

I hope you would agree that attacking Pearl Harbor was a pretty stupid move.

[heavenlyboy34]

I hope you would agree that attacking Pearl Harbor was a pretty stupid move.

Sure.

[mello]

Wasn't Lindbergh a fan of the Nazi Party?

[FrankRep]

Wasn't Lindbergh a fan of the Nazi Party?

Don't forget that Lindbergh fought in WWII for the United States.

Lindbergh supported Germany rebuilding itself after WWI (most people did), but he didn't realize how evil the Nazis were to become after they gained power. Lindbergh was disgusted and angered when he heard about the Nazi concentration camps.

[acptulsa]

Pearl Harbor was an act of war. Both the U.S. and Japan wanted to be 'the Britain of the Pacific', and it was no surprise to any knowledgable person when it all came to a head. It takes two to tango. Lindburgh was obviously one of too many who were looking at Europe, when he should have been asking questions like, do we need an empire in the Pacific? Do we dare just leave it to Japan to run an empire there? And even these questions were too late; Teddy Roosevelt was the one that conquered the Phillipines.

Lindburgh obviously considered Pearl an act of war...

'I start firing as the plane is completing its turn in my direction. Tracers and the 20s (20mm from the license-built Hispano Suiza cannon) find their mark, a hail of shells directly on the target. He straightens out and flies directly toward me. I hold the trigger down and my sight on his engine as we approach head-on. My tracers and my 20s spatter on his plane. We are close--too close--hurtling at each other at more than 500 mph. I pull back on the controls. His plane (a Japanese 'Sonia' single engine light bomber) suddenly zooms upward with extraordinary sharpness. Will we hit? His plane, before a slender toy in my sight, looms huge in size. A second passes--two--three--I can see the finning on his engine cylinders. There is a rough jolt of air as he shoots past behind me. My eyes sweep the sky. There are only P-38s and the plane I have just shot down.'--Charles Lindburgh diary, July 1944

[robert68]

...how do economy sanctions from one country, in response to imperialist expansion, justify a military attack?

The US had been an imperialist power in the Pacific and on Japan beginning in the 1850’s with the expedition of Commodore Matthew Perry. It brutally conquered the Philippines, in Japan's backyard, at the turn of the century and had military bases there ever since. The US wouldn’t let Japan get their oil from anyplace in their neighborhood, it had to be purchased from the US, and they wanted this to change. Bombing Pearl Harbor was a fooling way of going about it, but it was only a military target, and never made them a threat to the US, contrary to the war propaganda, that to this day is still believed by a great many.

If the Pearl Harbor bombing justified the US decimating Japan, as the US did, then half or more of the world is justified in violently responding to the US in any way or manner they choose, because the US, and its century plus year old every expanding global empire has aggressed on them, in one way or another, which is far more than Japan did to the US.

And it’s no accident that China was taken over by communists a few years after the US conquered and occupied Japan.