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INFAMOUS
QUOTES- WWII
"I
have yet to talk to any military or naval
expert of any nationality who thinks ...
that England has a Chinaman's
chance.""
-Joseph
P. Kennedy (U.S. Ambassador to Great
Britain), 1939
"It
is simply unthinkable that we will ever
again send overseas a great expeditionary
force of armed men.""
-Frank
Knox (Publisher of the Chicago Daily News
and former Republican Vice-Presidential
nominee), April 3, 1940
"The
United States is at present so demoralized
and so corrupted that, like France and
England, it need not be taken into
consideration as a military
adversary.""
-Richard-
Walther Darre (German Cabinet Minister),
speech to Nationalist Socialist Party
officials, May 1940
"And
while I am talking to you mothers and
fathers, I give you one more assurance. I
have said this before, but I say it again
and again and again: Your boys are not
going to be sent into any foreign
wars."
-Franklin
D. Roosevelt (President of the United
States), campaigning for reelection in
Boston, October 30, 1940
"The
United States will not be a threat to us
for decades–not in 1945 but at the
earliest in 1970 or 1980-90.
-Adolf
Hitler remark to Russian President and
Commissar of Foreign Affairs
Vyacheslav
Molotov, November 12, 1940
"It
is not only our right but it is our
obligation as American citizens to look at
this war objectively and to weigh our
chances for success if we should enter it.
I have attempted to do this, especially
from the standpoint of aviation; and I
have been forced to the conclusion that we
cannot win this war for England,
regardless of how much assistance we
extend."
-Charles
A. Lindbergh (American aviator, military
consultant, and Pulitizer Prize-winning
author), speech in New York, 1941
"War
between Japan and the United States is not
within the realm of reasonable
possibility."
-Major
George Fielding Eliot (author and military
science writer), "The Impossible War
With Japan, " The American Mercury,
September 1938
"Japan
will never join the Axis.""
-General
Douglas MacArthur at a dinner party in
Manila, September 27, 1940 (the night
before the newspapers announced Japan had
joined the Axis)
"We
won't be at war with Japan within 48
hours, 48 days or 48 years."
-Wendell
Wilkie (former Republican candidate for
U.S. President), December 7, 1941
"A
Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor is a
strategic impossibility."
-Major
George Fielding Eliot (author and military
science writer), "The Impossible War
with Japan, " The American Mercury,
September 1938
"The
Hawaiian Islands are over-protected; the
entire Japanese fleet and air force could
not seriously threaten Oahu."
-Captain
William T. Pulleston (former Chief of U.S.
Naval Intelligence), "What Are the
Chances?" The Atlantic Monthly,
August 1941
"No
matter what happens, the U.S. Navy is not
going to be caught napping."
-Frank
Knox (U.S. Secretary of the Navy),
December 4, 1941
"Well,
don't worry about it.... It's
nothing."
-Lieutenant
Kermit Tyler (Duty Officer of Shafter
Information Center, Hawaii), upon being
informed that Private Joseph Lockard had
picked up a radar signal of what appeared
to be at least 50 planes soaring toward
Oahu at almost 180 miles per hour December
7, 1941
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